Il libro di Jaylos

Halloween Night

Halloween night was not going according to plan.

Jay had wanted to stay in with his boyfriend and the girls, eating candy and watching scary movies, but all it took was ten minutes before Mal and Evie had decided to make things more interesting.

"Fuck, it's cold out here." Carlos pulled his jacket tighter around his shoulders, his breath making white puffs in the air.

"They couldn't have at least waited for the first person to die?" Jay grumbled, shaking his head. "Or gone back to their room?"

"From the face Mal was making," Carlos said wryly. "Apparently they couldn't wait another millisecond."

Jay only grunted.

Hearing him, Carlos slipped his hand into Jay's, squeezing. "Hey. It's all good. We'll just go out for ice cream or something."

"Ice cream?" Jay scoffed again, which was unfair because he really did like ice cream. It was cold and sweet - exactly like old thrown-out Auradon magazines on the island had described.

"Come on." Carlos gave him a look, his eyes practically glowing under the campus streetlights. "You're not that mad, are you?"

"No." And he wasn't - not really, anyway. "Sex is cool and all - trust me, I'm a big fan."

"I know." Carlos said it under his breath, but Jay caught it anyway and threw him an apologetic smile.

"Don't be jealous, Pup, you know I like you best. And I'm getting better at dissolving that cover. You know that."

"Yeah." Carlos squeezed his hand as they walked along the path towards the little downtown. "But you could care less about that movie - you even said it was lame. Why get so disgruntled about them going at it? It's not like that's out of the ordinary or anything. Remember last week when they almost did it in the middle of dinner?"

He was right. And the truth was, Jay didn't know why he was so bent out of shape about the girls interrupting their movie night to have a little fun of their own; in fact, if it had been any other night, he probably would've egged them on.

"I dunno." Jay looked over at his boyfriend and let himself dwell on the dark eyeliner and splatter of sparkles across his nose from an early Halloween costume. "I guess... we always have sex. But we don't always get a chance to just hang out, you know? And act like a normal couple."

At that, Carlos smiled - his face lighting up just a bit. "Yeah. Well, tell you what, we'll go and get some ice cream, and then head back to finish the movie, alright? From the way Evie was teasing, I bet they won't go very long. They can crash while we cuddle up or something."

And really, that sounded pretty good to Jay.

The ice cream shop was well-lit and mostly empty. Jay figured on a cold October night, most students had opted to go out and eat candy rather than ice cream, but he didn't mind; the empty shop was rather nice.

He and Carlos grabbed two stools at the bar, ordering heaping sundaes full of chocolate and fudge. Not even five seconds after the server slid Carlos' order over to him, his boyfriend already had a large smear of chocolate on his lips and nose.

"Didn't you already eat half the chocolate candy from earlier?" Jay teased, handing him a napkin.

"Shhh." Carlos stuck his tongue out. "This is the one night a year I'm allowed to binge it."

Just seeing Carlos' bright smile was enough to ease Jay's irritation away. He really couldn't blame Mal for falling prey to Evie's charms; they loved each other just as much as he and Carlos did. Maybe if he didn't use sex as a tool, maybe if he didn't crave affection and simple love, he would've understood sooner.

"Hey, 'Los?"

Carlos grinned, sucking chocolate off his fingers. "Yeah?"

"I love you."

Now, Carlos' smile really did light up the whole room. "Me too, Jay. I love you, too."

---

By the time the boys had returned to their dorm (one thousand chocolate-covered kisses later), they found Mal and Evie sated happily on Jay's bed.

"Yes," Carlos grinned. "They did it on yours and not mine. That's your laundry problem now."

"Really?" Jay rolled his eyes at Mal, flipping her off. "You couldn't even put down a towel?"

But he knew Mal would just use her magic in the morning, so he let Carlos pull him over to the other bed.

Maybe the night hadn't gone exactly as he'd planned, but it still turned out pretty alright in the end. And really, Jay had his two best friends smiling like idiots in the bed next door, some (yes, very lame) scary movie playing on the TV, and his boyfriend tangled up beside him.

Who was he to complain?