Yeah, I asked him about telling the guys about us. I would do it again, too. That’s not moving the goalposts no matter how my boyfriend wanted to twist things. He might not have accused me of that this time, but I knew he was thinking it. Look, I didn’t get into a relationship so I could hide it from everyone. I only wanted to be normal and open like any other couple.
We’d had a La Nova pizza delivered to his house because his roommate was once again not home. La Nova’s pizza was heavy stuff, but we could bury it easily, enough thanks to our physical activity—on and off the ice. Kayden, to his credit, kept himself hard-wired to focus on hockey and winning, and constant sexseemed not to slow him down. Keeping up that kind of heat was no easy job, but he had to slow down sometime, and this was one of those moments.
Sitting in front of the TV, we watched Netflix with a pizza box open on the table in front of us. We’d sunk deep into the couch cushions, bundled up in each other’s arms, kissing with greasy lips.
These moments didn’t normally just end with kissing either. Like, the smooching could leap to sex or we might only strip out of our clothes and fondle each other. In this case, I felt Kayden’s hand grope my crotch, making my dick go hard, but I was in no hurry to shed my clothes. I squeezed and kneaded Kayden’s hard-on through his track pants, stoking his fire, as he kissed my cheek and neck.
I could live in moments like this forever.
“I love you,” I said.
“Yeah?”
“Uh-huh.”
And he kept kissing me, not quite like I’d said nothing at all, but might as well have. I released his hard-on, pushed his hand away from my crotch, sat up, and turned on a light.
“What the fuck, dude” Kayden sounded like he’d awakened from a nap when he spoke.
“Look, we’ve got to talk.”
“This is gonna be about telling the world we’ve been jumping up each other’s asses, isn’t it?”
“No, it isn’t, but that’s a really poetic way of putting it, don’t you think?”
His eyes fell shut, and he stood up. Even Kayden knew when nookie was no longer in the cards, but that didn’t stop an erection from tenting the front of his pants.
I pulled my eyes away from his crotch, so I wouldn’t succumb to any urges. I’m strong-willed but still human.
“If that’s not it,” he said, “then what’s the problem?”
“The problem is that I just told you I loved you.”
“That’s not a problem. You’ve said that before.”
I gritted my teeth. Sometimes I didn’t know if my boyfriend meant to be mind-blowingly obtuse, if he worked at it, or goofiness just came naturally.
“I know I’ve said it to you before,” I said. “Lots of times. Problem is, I’ve never once heard you say it back.”
“I get some sort of prize for that, don’t I?”
“The Silver Pig award, maybe.”
“Come on, be nice.”
“No one hands out prizes to the emotionally stunted.”
“Come on, bro. It takes a lot of restraint to have not said it by now.”
Again, I’ll refer to my previous question about whether his goofiness came naturally. I even wondered if he’d said something stupid just to change the subject. You know, because I would be too busy trying to figure him out.
“I’m just saying that I’ve put my heart on the line a bunch of times now,” I said. “It shouldn’t be like pulling teeth to hear it back.”
“God, doesn’t this sound familiar?”
“Wait, is this another moving-the-goal-posts complaint?”
“No, I’ve had girlfriends that said the same stupid thing.”
