Page 7 of Awakening
And somehow, those three words hit harder than any “welcome to campus” sign ever could.
Later, we unpacked, rode to the grocery store to grab some food, and headed to the campus dining hall, where we met other athletes and hung out. Back at our dorm, we talked music, sports, movies, queerness, and what it meant to rebuild yourself from scratch. Knox opened up and told me he was bisexual, and how his parents, while not queer, were staunch allies and accepted Knox completely and unconditionally. He was raised on protests and poetry and most of all, LOVE, and for the first time, I would tell someone the truth about home without choking on shame.
Maverick Carter knew he’d made the right choice to leave home and never look back.
It was a rainy day on campus, and water drops tapped gently on the window, slow and steady like a pulse. The room was dim, lit only by the muted glow of the lamp on our end table. We made it to the end of our first semester as college students, and life was extraordinary. I’d found a balance between my studies, football,and my campus job at the library. Knox and I had built an amazing friendship, and we just worked as roommates. He was clean, didn’t touch my things without asking, and always checked with me before having company over. We worked out together, attended study groups, partied, and I even met his parents when they popped in for homecoming weekend.
Finals week was upon us, and Knox planned to go home for the holidays while I opted to stay on campus, work out, and volunteer at the free clinic and homeless shelter. Knox made his way in from class and slipped off his shoes as I pulled off my hoodie, making my way in from work, both of us sitting on the couch pretending to scroll through our phones like there wasn’t a charged energy in the room between us. My heart was beating so hard against my chest, I wondered if he could feel it.
Knox scooted to the edge of the couch, barefoot and quiet. I stepped near the window, arms crossed over my chest like a shield.
“You okay?” Knox asked, and I could feel his eyes on me.
I turned halfway, then nodded, “Yeah. Just… thinking, shit maybe overthinking.”
Knox chuckled, “You? Never.”
I smiled, the first real one all night.
“Can I ask you something?” My voice lowered now, “And I need you to tell me the truth.”
“Always.”
I crossed the space between us, stopping just a foot away. “Have you ever wanted something so bad it scared you?”
Knox looked up at him slowly, his gaze steady.
“Yeah,” he said, “He’s standing right in front of me.”
The silence between them folded inward, warm and electric.
My breath caught in my throat.
“I keep trying to talk myself out of this, out of you.Convincing myself that the chemistry is imagined, you know? To stay in my head. But I can’t stop thinking about you. The way you laugh. The way you look at me like you see me—even the messy parts.”
“I do,” Knox said, standing up and coming close enough that I could feel the heat radiating off him, “You don’t have to explain yourself, Mav. Not to me. I’ve been watching you carry armor that doesn’t belong to you. You don’t have to wear it here,” my body reacting hearing him call me Mav. Everyone else on campus called me Blue, but Knox settled with Mav, and I never stopped him.
My throat worked around something unspoken, eyes glossy with unshed tension, “I don’t know how to do this, I mean I know how to love, but I don’t know how to show it because it’s never been shown to me,” I whispered.
“You don’t have to know,” Knox said, “Just let me show you I mean it.”
Our foreheads touched first, softly, my body trembling from the contact. Closing the last inch between us, I pressed my lips to Knox’s. It wasn’t frantic. It wasn’t uncertain. It was careful, reverent, knowing. We knew we were walking across something sacred and had no intention of turning back.
Sliding my hands up to Knox’s jaw, he gripped the hem of my shirt, fingers brushing my skin as he pulled it up, and I let him—let myself be seen for the first time without apology.
Our clothes were shed in the quiet moments between kisses and breathless laughter. Our bodies meeting like puzzle pieces, like home, like an answer to a question we hadn’t dared ask aloud.
Knox’s touch was patient, exploratory, without pressure, sensual without demand. He was tuned into my every movement, pausing when my breathing changed.
“You good?” Knox asked, voice low, warm.
I nodded, then, holding his face in my hands, “Yeah. I’ve never felt this safe before, and that scares the hell out of me.”
Knox kissed my lips. “Then we’ll take our time. We don’t have to rush anything.”
Shaking my head slowly, eyes locked on his, “No. I want this. I want you, all of you, all you have to give me.”
The rest unfolded slowly, our bodies wrapped in sheets and whispers, the rain still tapping the window like a lullaby. Moving together like music, like trust, like a promise kept.
