Page 46 of Stupid Dirty

After, instead of rolling over like he usually does, Cade lay on his back next to me. Our bodies were pressed together from our shoulders down to the backs of our hands, and his warmth beside me helped settle my nerves. We lay that way for a while before he passed me a tissue to clean up with.

He’s my best friend. He keeps me safe. I keep him safe. This is just another part of that.

Neither of us has brought up the things that were different about our jerk-off session last night, and it’s definitely not going to be me that does it.

Chapter Nineteen

It’s the middle of Friday afternoon, and Aunt Jaz is picking the girls up from school to take them for the weekend, which I’m sure they’re stoked about. It’s been almost a week since Dad showed his face. Silas staying here has made all of us feel better, but I’m sure they could use a break.

Not to mention, the bender Mom’s been on since Dad’s little performance ripped the scab off all her trauma isn’t fun to watch, whenever she shows her face. She knows better than to go around Jaz when she’s like this. Technically, Jaz is her aunt, not mine, and she’s the only one who can put her foot down around Mom and get away with it.

Today is going to be good. The girls get a couple days of relative normalcy, Mom’s working overtime on a barroom floor somewhere, and me and Silas are both off work and have the whole place to ourselves.

One bright, shining tear in the time-space continuum. For one weekend we aren’t brothers and sons and providers and protectors, but just two guys goofing off. It’s fucking magical.

Right now, we’re both lounging on the sofa, playingCall of Dutyon my ancient PS4. I was right, and Silas didn’t get to play a lot of video games as a kid, so I’ve been teaching him whenever we have downtime.

He deserves to play video games. There’s something about the fact that it’s totally, deliberately unproductive that feels so deliciously indulgent. I like watching him lean into that.

I get distracted watching him play. He gets so into it, just as focused on the game as he would be on the track. There’s a flash of pink as he bites the tip of his tongue in concentration, and it pulls my focus from the game enough for me to get fucking destroyed.

“Fuuuuuuuuuuuck,” I groan, throwing myself more heavily into the arm of the couch, stretching out one leg so I can prod his arm with my bare foot like a petulant child. “You’re getting too good at this. I don’t know if I wanna play with you if you’re going to start kicking my ass.”

I keep kicking him in the arm, smiling so he knows I’m kidding, and I get a half-smile, half-laugh out of him as he bats my bare foot away.

“You’ve always been a sore loser.”

“I like to think of it as knowing my rightful place in the world. First place.”

Silas tries to scowl at me, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. He grabs my foot to keep me from kicking at him anymore, but instead of shoving it back towards my side of the couch, he drops it into his lap, bracing his arm on my shin as he picks up the controller again and turns his attention back to the TV.

Like it’s no big deal.

Which it isn’t.

Except it kind of is. Making him smile and laugh over something as stupid as a video game, or getting his touch-starved ass to be comfortable enough to physically lean on me just because he wants to, feels like everything.

Sometimes it feels like I was created specifically to undo every shitty thing that’s ever been done to Silas. Every smile gives me a bigger sense of accomplishment than anything else in my life, and it’s literally my job to save people’s lives.

Maybe Tristan is right. Maybe me and Silas are too intense around each other and lack boundaries.

Of course, he said that without knowing about our exciting new bedtime activity. The one that is weird and confusing and so fucking hot that it eats boundaries for breakfast and spits out the bones.

Maybe I should talk to Silas about it. But I don’t know what to say other thanI have no idea if any of this is normal friend shit, and it’s confusing me.I’m worried that any version of that sentence is going to sound like a rejection to him.

And it’s not. I am the opposite of rejecting him. If I could hollow out the space inside my ribs and place him there for safekeeping, I would.

But that’s a very weird thing to think about your friend.

So, my confusion persists.

Thinking about our midnight masturbation sessions was a bad idea, because once I start, I can’t stop. It’s clearly been too long since I hooked up with someone, because I forgot what it was like to listen to someone else be turned on. Silas and I aren’t even doing anything together. We’re just sharing space. Because of extenuating circumstances. But the sound of his hitched, heavy breathing puts fucking fire in my veins.

I’m normally too tired and stressed out to get off more than a couple times a week, especially considering how hard it is to carve out a little privacy in this house, even when I’m not sharing a bedroom. But ever since this started, it’s like my dick hassnapped to attention. Every night, I have to get off. And I need the sound and heat of him getting off next to me too, apparently.

I mean, I guess it makes sense. I’m a tactile person. I’m a social person. My dedication to solo sessions is due to circumstances, not preference. Jerking off with company seems like the perfect compromise to my weird-ass brain.

Of course, now that I let myself think about it, I’m horny as hell. Sitting on the couch with a hard-on in the middle of the afternoon like an animal. I’m surprised Silas hasn’t wiped the floor with me yet in the game, because very little blood is flowing to my brain right now, so I look over at him.

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