Unlikely Valentine
by Rob Warr
Chapter 6
The sleepover
We talked for a long time, but nothing was really said, if you know what I mean. It was as if we were both just pussy-footing around the subject, hoping the other would be bold enough to say what needed to be said. Well, it sure wasn't going to be me. I mean, Dylan held all the cards here. He was the God-like Adonis and I was, well, just plain old Josh, and I wasn't about to jump into the volcano with gasoline undies on...he he.
Eventually his parents made it home and his mom suggested they order pizza for dinner rather than have her cook. Pizza was the typical sleepover food and things were starting to feel very comfortable and brought back memories of my childhood when having a friend over was an almost weekly thing.
I felt comfortable with Dylan's folks too. I guess they still had some of those laid back feelings that they'd had in the 70's, when it was free love and just enjoying life. They might have accepted their fate and became part of society, but they hadn't lost their spirit or their love of life.
The pizzas came, three of them, one cheese only, one pepperoni, and one Canadian bacon. I had a piece of each, and they were all delicious. Then I went back for a second pepperoni, cause that's my favorite.
Mrs. Hanes ate only the cheese pizza, while Mr. Hanes ate only the two kinds with meat. I was reminded of that nursery rhyme, Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean, and I had to smile. I was quickly starting to really like his folks and I wondered if his older brother was as cool as Dylan. Maybe I'd meet him come Spring break. I hoped so.
After dinner, Dylan suggested we go up to his room to chill and let our food settle, and I followed him upstairs once again, this time boldly staring at his cute butt.
In his room he giggled, "Were you staring at my butt?"
"No, of course not," I lied, trying to sound indignant, "what kind of pervert do you think I am?" I added with a grin. Once again I was surprised that I was being so bold and suggestive.
"Well, it's okay if you were. I've been told it's a very nice butt."
"By who, your girlfriends?" I smirked.
"No, but I've seen a few staring at it, boys, too."
"It's probably just something we do, right? I mean, we're always checking out the competition, right?"
"Well, there's a fine line between checking out the competition and staring lustfully," he chuckled.
"Are you accusing me of staring lustfully?" I said feigning hurt.
"Like I said, it's okay if you look, no matter what the reason."
"Do you ever, um, look at other boys like that?"
"Only one, lately," he said locking eyes with me.
"Oh, well...he he, do I know him?"
"I'd say, yeah, very well."
"Hmm, well...so does that mean...?"
"That I'm gay? Maybe, I like girls, too, but right, now no girl interests me like this particular boy does."
Dare I think he was talking about me? Then I remembered the card.
"I have something for you," I said jumping up and grabbing my backpack.
Fishing out the card, I hesitated about two seconds then handed it to him. "Now you can say you got a card from a boy, too."
His smile filled the whole room, "Awesome," he said pulling it out of the envelope and reading the words I'd written, "fist bump," he chuckled, "isn't it supposed to be hugs and kisses?"
I blushed bright red, "I was going to put hugs, but you know...?"
"Why didn't you?" he said reaching over to grab a sharpie off his desk. Then holding the red felt tip marker out to me he added, "here, write what you really feel."
Was it this easy?
"Was that, um, card in my locker....Was it from you?"
"He smiled but blushed a little, too. Was it okay?"
"Okay? It was amazing. Is that really how you feel?"
"Yes, is that okay?" he asked sounding very vulnerable at the moment.
I didn't reply, instead I took the marker, removed the cap, and below the fist bump sentiment, I wrote, Love, Josh. Then I filled the bottom of the card with a few X's and O's.
Capping the marker I handed it back to Dylan along with the card, "I guess this ought to answer your question."
He studied the card and a big grin broke out on his face.
"Josh Billingsly, will you be my Valentine?" he said softly as he gazed into my eyes.
"Yes, Dylan Hanes, I will be your Valentine, and I'll even be your boyfriend if you'll have me."
"Yes, yes, yes," he said excitedly, "can I, can I...kiss you?"
It was my time to gush yeses, and our lips met for our first kiss. It was probably not the most romantic kiss to ever happen between two boys, but for us it was pure magic. The kiss, however, got much better as we continued, learning as we went.
We finally broke for air and I ran my hand along the side of his face and smiled at him, "Is this real?" I whispered, "How can this be real? No way is my crush crushing on me, too."
"I don't know when you first started crushing, but for me it began the first day of 9th grade," he confessed, "I didn't even know your name or what grade you were in, but when I saw you in the hallway my heart nearly sprang out of my chest, just like the card."
"Speaking of that, I didn't know you were an artist."
"I'm not, my cousin, Leo is. He's cool and when I told him what I wanted he was happy to draw that little cartoon for me. The writing was all me, though."
"It was perfect," I said, "but...why didn't you try to find me, or talk to me all that time?"
"I wanted to, I really did. But we didn't have any classes together and at lunch you were always with that same bunch of guys, and I was too nervous to approach you."
I laughed, "You were too nervous, what about me? Just looking in your general direction caused me to sweat. But what happened to make you change your schedule?"
"It's kind of personal, but one of the teachers, who I won't name, for some reason had a problem with me and made the class a living hell for me. If I can say one thing for my parents, they don't put up with that crap, and they have connections. So the school agreed to change my classes if we'd drop the matter, and we did. I felt it was best to keep a low profile cause you know how kids are when it comes to secrets and stuff."
"Cool, I'm glad you had trouble with that teacher then," I teased, "cause otherwise we might never have met for real."
"You know we can't tell anyone, right?"
"Duh, do I look like a fool?" I teased, "but Nicky already suspects I have a crush on you." Then I told him about our encounters and Dylan looked both angry and worried.
"He won't tell anyone, will he?"
"Nah, I've known him a long time and I trust him for the most part. Besides, I think he might have sort of been crushing on me, too."
"Wow, I'll have to beat him up then," Dylan joked.
"Nah, he's got a girlfriend now and I think he's happy."
"Josh?"
"Yeah."
"Can I hug you?"
"Yeah, anytime," I said grinning like an idiot, and he did and it was wonderful.
That night we showered and piled into bed in just our undies. We kissed and we snuggled, but contrary to what you might think, we did not have sex of any kind. That would come later as we learned more about each other and our relationship grew stronger.
We did utter the L word several times that night, and I'm pretty sure we both meant it. It would have been easy to utter those words in the heat of passion, so I think they meant more because we weren't under that pressure.
That night was special. Not just because my crush became my Unlikely Valentine, and boyfriend, but because I'd discovered some very important things about myself. My self-esteem had taken a beating ever since entering middle school, but Dylan had shown me that I was a better person than I believed. His friendship had literally turned my life around, and his love was taking me to new heights.
Even Kenny's teasing didn't bother me, and as for the two of them, they got along fine, and Dylan soon began to think of my little bro as his little bro, too.
Nicky saw the change in us right away, but he never confronted us. He did give us a few curious glances from time to time, but the other guys at our table seemed clueless.
I don't know what Dylan's other friends, especially the girl variety thought of him suddenly spending most of his time with me, but he was popular and I guess most kids just accepted his choices.
We finally moved beyond kissing and snuggling about two weeks after the sleepover, at a second sleepover at my house this time. I felt more comfortable in my own bed, though I did worry about Kenny being in the room next to us.
However, we were quiet, for the most part, and managed to please each other by hand without one of us screaming in ecstasy...he he. Next, we might try the oral thing, but we're in no hurry, right now it's just great having my crush turn into my boyfriend, and I'm pretty sure he feels the same.
Happy Valentine's Day, the world needs more lovers.
Rob Warr
Authors deserve your feedback. It's the only payment they get. If you go to the top of the page you will find the author's name. Click that and you can email the author easily.* Please take a few moments, if you liked the story, to say so.
[For those who use webmail, or whose regular email client opens when they want to use webmail instead: Please right click the author's name. A menu will open in which you can copy the email address (it goes directly to your clipboard without having the courtesy of mentioning that to you) to paste into your webmail system (Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo etc). Each browser is subtly different, each Webmail system is different, or we'd give fuller instructions here. We trust you to know how to use your own system. Note: If the email address pastes or arrives with %40 in the middle, replace that weird set of characters with an @ sign.]
* Some browsers may require a right click instead
