Page 75 of The Locker Room
would meet eyes and yearn for a time to be alone.
Apparently, Christian couldn"t take it anymore after a while, and as
Xander walked by the back door, he was surprised when it opened, and
Chris grabbed his hand. He"d been drinking almost steadily for two days,
and Xander was a little concerned by the bobble in his walk and the lack
of awareness in his smile. But he followed him anyway, because he"d
follow Christian to hell or, well, all the way through the meandering
brick paths of Chapel Hill, right? And he was more than surprised when
they came up in the middle of Coker Arboretum… and then Chris kept
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going and pulled him back through the wisteria to a big tree, surrounded
by shrubs and undergrowth. This time of early early morning this was
the most deserted place on campus—a coed had been killed there in the
sixties, and in the morning, when the mist came off the ground, or in the
dark of the night, even the most stoic avoided it like the plague.
Apparently being gay and in love trumped some of that
superstition, at least now.
“Remember last summer?” Chris murmured as they walked.
Xander grunted, “Yes.”
They"d rented a tiny cottage on Bald Head Island, one with two
bedrooms and a couch. Chris"s family had come to visit for two weeks,
and Xander and Chris had spent an hour before they arrived trying to
figure out how to make it look like Xander had been using the other
bedroom, while they were moving all his shit into the front room to make
room for his parents, with Penny on a cot in Chris"s room.
The night after they arrived, after Andi and Jed had taken them to
dinner at probably the nicest restaurant Xander had ever been to outside
a booster dinner at the school, they were all getting ready to go to bed,
and Andi and Jed had looked at each other meaningfully.
