Page 66 of Brighter Shades of Light
I didn’t know what to say.
“As childish as it is, when you were keeping secrets from me, it hurt,” Tristen continued. “I felt like I was losing you, and I panicked.”
“You won’t lose me, Tristen.” I went over to him. “I love you, man. You don’t need a family who will make you feel like crap, anyway. That shit is toxic. We’re your family. Marcus, Keith, Rachel, me. All of us. I got you. Always.”
Tristen pressed his face into my neck, and his arms came around me. “I love you, too. Sorry I’ve been a jealous little bitch lately.”
“It’s okay.”
“So, you really like this professor?”
“Yeah. I do.”
He stepped back and smiled sadly. “Then, I’m happy for you.”
“Ah, come on, Tristen.” I knuckle-bumped his shoulder. “Where’s that golden boy smile?”
“I’m not a fucking golden boy.” But my attempt to lighten the mood worked. He grinned and shoved me away. “I gotta get to class.”
I knew what it was like to feel alone. My dad had been supportive of my sexuality, but the kids in my school hadn’t been. I had felt isolated. When I finally met another guy who was gay, I had gotten close to him and thought I was in love. But it hadn’t been love or anything close to it. I had just felt less alone.
Tristen felt how much I liked Sebastian, and it had made him overreact and panic that I’d be taken from him.
But that was impossible. We were brothers for life.
***
The quiet room made it hard to focus. The quieter it was, the more I heard the smaller noises, like people sniffling and coughing, the turning of the test pages, and the squeaking of chairs as people erased the circles on the scantron sheet.
I deeply inhaled and focused on the test.
The first page was pretty easy. I knew the material like the back of my hand and sped through it. The problem came with the second page where Sebastian had written out equations for us to calculate entropy. After tutoring, I understood it better, but the section on Gibbs free energy still caused me some trouble.
I looked up at Sebastian, who was sitting at the desk in the front of the lecture hall, and narrowed my eyes at him.
His gaze met mine, confused at first, but then he softly smiled and went back to reading his book. Yeah, he knew he was an asshole.
Anyone who thought I would get special treatment for being romantically involved with my professor obviously hadn’t met Sebastian. He didn’t believe in taking it easy on students, no matter who you were.
A week had passed since I’d stayed over at his house on Halloween. We hadn’t spent the night together since then, but I drove over to visit him some throughout the week. Still hadn’t had penetrative sex. But I was enjoying the romance of waiting. Not that jumping into bed together on the first night couldn’t be romantic, but I guess it was old-fashioned to kind of date each other for a while first. And I loved it.
My hand didn’t love it, though. It had been putting in a lot of over time lately.
Ugh, focus, Cody. Think of Gibbs free energy. Not dick.
There was space on the test to work out the problems, but I ran out of room and had to write really small in the margin. I felt confident about some of the questions; others I ended up guessing on. It was a multiple choice, test but sometimes it was more like multiple guess. I filled in the circle for A since it hadn’t been chosen for a few rows.
Totally legit reasoning.
Sebastian wrote on the board every fifteen minutes, counting down how much time we had left to complete the exam. Every time I saw him move, my brain got all jumbled and I had to re-read the questions several times before absorbing what they were actually asking.
When there were only three minutes left, I skimmed the last six questions and answered them as best as I could. I was the last one still working. Great. Brandon, the nosey fucker, had probably seen my moment of panic and knew I’d guessed on the last two questions. I scooted back from my chair right as Sebastian called time.
I placed my scantron on his desk, not looking at him, even though I wanted to.
“I’ll post your grades by Sunday evening,” Sebastian said. “Have a great weekend.”
I returned to my desk and grabbed my bag, shaking my head at myself for not being more focused. I had studied for the test, too. Everything I knew flew out the window when I sat down. Knowing I was timed didn’t help, either.
