“I’m shocked and horrified with both of you,” Nancy was saying, although she didn’t sound shocked and horrified. If anything, she sounded utterly delighted. This had to feel like, well, Christmas to her. The best present she could have gotten. After all, why else had she come?
Simon’s mind was racing around in circles, and then he felt Ray shift beside him, and all of a sudden, everything was clear. Well, at least more clear. Enough to break his thoughts free for this moment, anyway.
“How very rude of you to interrupt us. I’m sure you could see that we were busy,” Simon said, his tone stern. She was going to speak to him like he and Ray were naughty children who needed to be scolded? He was a forty-five-year-old man, and a teacher, at that. His teacher's voice was more than a match for her mom's voice.
“Yes, I could see that! Breaking all sorts of school rules, and poisoning the minds of impressionable children, like my poor Mandy,” she replied, after just a moment or two where she was clearly surprised by his seeming lack of fear. But she was clearly not the sort of person who knew how to back down since she’d flown all the way across the ocean just to screw him over.
“If I’ve broken school rules, that’s between my boss and me, and none of your business,” Simon told her firmly. “As for poisoning anyone’s minds, that only works if you think that two consenting adults kissing is the sort of thing that hurts teenagers to see.”
She was staring now, the smirk fading from her lips. She had probably been eagerly anticipating him begging her not to tell and begging for his job. Yes, she would like that, but even if Simon had thought there was a chance that she wouldn’t, he wouldn’t have been able to do it.
It wasn’t just pride, either. Part of it was that he didn’t want to apologize for kissing Ray, or act like it was somehow shameful. It wasn’t. Rules or not, he hadn’t done anything wrong, that was the way it felt. The school might disagree, but Simon would be damned if he could see who he and Ray had hurt with their fling.
“You’re going to lose your job,” Nancy snarled, all traces at polite, well-bred shock and dismay utterly eradicated. Her dislike, maybe even hatred, was written all over her face, and if nothing else, Simon could take pleasure in the fact that he had broken that. “I’ll see to it.”
Simon knew that it wasn’t a bluff, but he didn’t so much as hesitate. He wrapped his arm around Ray’s waist, because what was there to lose at this point? They’d been caught kissing, so this was relatively minor.
As they passed Mandy, Simon felt her hand pluck at the sleeve of his coat. When he turned to look at her, he noticed that she was very pale, even shaking slightly. She mouthed two words, “I’m sorry,” at him, and Simon nodded slightly in acknowledgment of the words if nothing else.
He wasn’t sure how to feel about Mandy. She seemed to have had something to do with her mother being out here. And, most likely, with her mother being here at all. Or was it just a coincidence that Nancy had shown up right after Mandy had tried to kiss Ray? It didn’t seem that likely.
But she was just a kid and one who had had her heart broken. So when he looked at her, he tried not to show her any disapproval. He didn’t know for sure. So he kept it neutral, but she still looked like she was going to burst into tears.
“Simon, what are you doing?” Ray whispered as they made their way into the warmth of the lobby and toward their room. “She wasn’t kidding. She’s going to get you fired.”
“That’s going to happen no matter what I do,” Simon explained, although even he was surprised by the calmness of his voice. It wasn’t that he wanted to lose his job, or that he was okay with it. It was just that, if something was inevitable, what point was there in him holding himself back?
“Yeah, but maybe …” Ray started, but Simon cut him off.
“We have one more week,” he said and saw the start of surprise from Ray at his vehemence. “That’s it. One more week. I’ll be damned if I’m going to let her ruin it.”
Ray considered that as they made their way to their hotel room. By the time they got there, he had a wicked grin on his face and had clearly come around to the idea.
“Well, there’s one good thing,” Ray murmured, slipping his chilly hands into Simon’s coat and up under his shirt to rest on his stomach. “Now we don’t have to try to hide it. So we don’t need to be super quiet at night anymore.”
And that was an amazing point. Nancy didn’t need to be kept in the dark anymore, so as long as they weren’t loud to the point where they disturbed any of the students, they were pretty much in the clear.
“It’s Christmas,” Simon murmured, letting his hands pluck the coat from Ray and drop it on the floor before starting on his shirt. His fingers tugged at those beautiful brownish-pink nipples, teasing them into nubs. “I think I have another present I’d like to give you.”
Oddly, he wasn’t even nervous. He knew that he could be somewhat fixed in his ways, but Ray was worth challenging that. Besides, they had such a short time, and he knew he would regret it if he hadn’t done this by the time they parted. Why not now?
“What is it? You don’t have to get me anything else,” Ray, sometimes a bit oblivious, said. Simon laughed and finished stripping Ray, then pulled him by his hands over to the bed.
“There’s something we haven’t tried,” Simon explained, and he watched as the light dawned in Ray’s eyes. “If you’re interested. I’ve never done it before, not that way, but if you’re interested …”
Ray was on him in a second. As soon as he understood what Simon was saying, there was not even the slightest hint of hesitation. He was tackling Simon onto the bed, going for his clothes, stripping him off just as fast as Simon had gotten Ray’s clothing off of him.
“So I take it you’re interested,” Simon murmured, and Ray grinned at him as he reached for the lube and condoms they kept in the bedside table drawer.
“I have some definite ideas,” Ray replied, with that same irrepressible, wicked grin that always made Simon’s knees go weak. And yet, there could be no better person in the whole world to do this with. He knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Ray would do everything in his power to make this amazing for Simon.
Although he did have to wonder just what he was in for. Ray was young, full of energy, and a little bit wild sometimes.
They kissed again, and Simon felt the slick touch of lubed up fingers as they pressed between the cheeks of his ass. No one had ever touched him like that before, and he softly whimpered as he felt fingertips massaging at the delicate flesh at the entrance to his body.
“Just relax, baby, I’ve got you,” Ray whispered, and Simon moaned as he spread his legs wide and let himself surrender to this. He had had lovers that wanted to do this before, but he’d never been interested. It was as though he had been saving it for this moment without even knowing it.
He did relax. For maybe the first time in years, he let his body fully relax, looking at another person with complete trust. Even Nick hadn’t gotten that from him, but Ray had somehow managed to get past every single barrier, and there had been many, that Simon had put up.
