Or people.
Or places.
Or things.
“Well, whatever. The point is she’s hot, and she was over at my place the last few nights and was complaining that it looked like her old dorm room.”
I grimaced as I hit the road. I never went to college, of course. The moment my life fell apart when I learned my dad wasn’t actually my dad and I was the unwanted child, they quit paying for things. College was off the table. Hell, I didn’t even graduate since they kicked my ass out at sixteen. I took my GED six weeks after I turned eighteen, got in the shitty car my grandpa left me after he died, and slept at the shelter across from the Y until Boden realized where I was staying and moved me in with him.
But I still knew what a dorm room looked like. My first blowjob had been at a frat party I’d snuck into my sophomore year of high school. Not my finest moment, but a memorable one. The guy invited me back to his dorm, and it smelled like ball sweat and Doritos.
I would not be surprised if Jonah’s place smelled the same way.
“So you and Chelsea are getting serious, or…”
Being blind from birth, Jonah had never really developed a poker face. His expressions were entirely instinctual and showed every emotion. He shot me a disgusted face. “God, no. And not because she works concessions. She just…”
I waited for a beat. “What?”
“She smells a little bit like those rye chips from the party mix at the bar.”
“Yeasty?”
He grimaced. “No. Just…salty. And savory. I don’t know. It’s fucking weird, okay? Also, she likes to pinch my balls with her toes, and I’m so not into that.”
“Where the fuck do you meet these people?”
He burst into laughter. “Work, obviously. And judgy much? Where was your last fuck from?”
I wasn’t about to tell Jonah he was probably homeless—I didn’t have proof, but it was implied. Or that we fucked in the storeroom of a club outside of town, and he was gone before I woke up. “My last hookup was the Zamboni guy that I met when you made me drive your ass back to Turenne after that one game where Micah almost got his finger cut off.”
Jonah frowned. “That was a year ago.”
“Yep. Now that we’ve established my life is pathetic, can we talk about your apartment?”
He sighed. “I’d rather talk about your neglected dick.”
“If you’re offering?—”
He flipped me off again. “I mean, if it was the right dick, I wouldn’t say no. But I’ve heard the stories about your penis, and it’s a no from me, dawg.”
Reaching out, I thwapped him upside the head before putting my hand back on the brake and coasting to a stop at the red light. “My dick is amazing, so your loss. But honestly, I just haven’t really been in the headspace. I think seeing Tucker and Deo has fucked me up.”
Jonah looked surprised. “What? Why? They’re so fucking cute together it’s almost nauseating.”
“Exactly.” I took a breath. I hadn’t said this to anyone. Not Boden, because he had his own shit going on. Not Tucker, because the last thing he needed me to do was storm cloud on his joy parade. “Whatever it is they have? I haven’t come close to that, you know? Like, I didn’t know that kind of shit existed outside of rom-coms or those historical romances your brother loves so much.”
Jonah grimaced, but he nodded because he understood it. He was in constant competition with his brother’s bullshit reputation, and while it was nonsense, Micah had no intentions of correcting what people thought about him.
Jonah was the odd man out most of the time.
Just like me.
Sometimes it felt like I was the only one who wanted romance, but I couldn’t seem to muster up the desire to go out and get it, even when it fell in my lap. Well, Ian was the exception to that rule, but he and I had an understanding, and he’d stuck to it.
“You’re quiet,” Jonah said softly.
“It’s been a weird couple of months. Hugo shook everything up, Boden’s beside himself with his self-righteous anger, Tucker’s moving on to bigger and better things…”
