(11) Sleepover 2.0

My grandparents wanted to spend extra time catching up with their friends and my dad and stepmom are forced to stay for optics. It means that back home, Jaron and I are alone. I finally give him a tour of the house since there’s no chance of him running into my family.

“You have a home theater!” He looks very excited.

“Just an extra bedroom we converted. Nothing special.”

“Damnit, why were we watching Chris Hemsworth on your laptop when we could have had this?” He leaves and comes back with my laptop. “Okay how does this work? Projector in the back?”

“Yeah. Converter’s there too.”

He fiddles around with it and then there is indeed a shirtless Chris Hemsworth projected on the much bigger screen. Jaron tackles me onto one of the couches.

I fall onto my back. “Oof!” He smothers my face in kisses and I feel both loved and suffocated. “You’re so clingy.” He doesn’t bother replying to me. He looks around and presses the button to make the couch recline. He shifts just slightly so he can see the screen while still lying on top of me. I touch his hair. “You were saying something about your parents,” I mutter, “Before we were interrupted.”

“Mmh. Yeah we fought. They want me to go to pastor school. I don’t want to.”

I try to sit up. I can’t, but I try. “That can’t be a thing. Is it?”

He smiles. “It is. Not called pastor school, but yeah.”

“Why would that be a fight? Are they really so strict about it?”

“Not strict, exactly. I dunno. We just fought.” He’s stopped kissing my face and is staring blankly at the screen, so I assume it’s a touchy subject and don’t ask.

I ask something that he has to answer for me. “Am I a rebound, Jaron? You kissed me the day after Ansel dumped you.”

He buries his face in my neck.

“Jaron,” I say. I push his head away. “I’m…I-I never even thought about being with a guy. I have a crush on Thyra. And then…you’re kissing me and it feels really good. Don’t play with my heart.”

He makes a face. “You have a crush on someone else?”

“Jaron,” I say again.

“Speaking of crushes, you should probably text that girl Anjali back and tell her you’re already with someone.”

I shove him away. “Answer me. Despite what you may think, I have more self-respect than letting you do whatever to me just ‘cause you’re heartbroken.”

He blinks and rubs his face, lifting his head off me. “Okay. Sorry.” He sits up and holds my hand. “Ansel is out. Obviously. And I’m not, and he found it hard to sneak around all the time. So we stopped seeing each other. But, um, we were never really dating or anything, so.”

“Okay.” I wait for more. For him to answer what I really asked.

“You’re not a rebound. I promise,” he says. “I thought you were hot the first time I saw you. More interesting than all the others when you called me Asscomb. I wanted to get to know you. And it’s finally happening.”

“Well you kissed a guy you were in a group project with once. While you were drunk. Lucky that guy reciprocated. Else you would have looked like a tool.”

He smiles. “Yeah, pretty lucky.”

“You can lay on me again,” I say. He does. Now that we’re paying attention to the movie again, Chris Hemsworth isn’t shirtless anymore. We don’t get to lay like that for long since I hear footsteps coming up the stairs. I elbow him off me. “Get to your own seat,” I hiss. He falls over the seat dividers just as the door opens and my dad opens the door. I smooth out my clothes. “Hi, Dad.”

“Hey boys. We got frozen samosas from the store. Want some?”

Jaron looks eagerly at me.

“Um, sure,” I say.

Dad nods and leaves.

Jaron fixes his hair. “I…we should stop making out when doors aren’t locked.”

“Obviously.”

He checks the door but doesn’t come back onto my seat. He just stays on his but holds my hand. “We’re seeing each other now right? And maybe eventually going to date if I don’t mess up?”

“W-What—I mean. Okay.”

He shyly presses his cheek into his shoulder, not able to look at me, and smiles faintly.

“For the record, I’m probably the one who’s going to mess up,” I say.

“Let’s see.”

“It’s not a competition,” I tell him.

He laughs and kisses my hand like he’s a Victorian gentleman. He then hugs my arm to his chest as if it’s a teddy bear.

Dork.

———

“Are you just hungry or you actually like the food?” I ask, as Jaron finishes his 7th samosa. Those are just supposed to be snacks. Not a full meal. But I guess it’s been a few hours since lunch and we’ve not been called down for dinner.

“Both. I’m an athlete. We eat a lot.” He puts the plate on his stomach and falls back against the recliner, his eyes focused on the big screen in front of us.

“Did you work out today?”

He looks guilty. “No.” He fiddles around with the Fire Stick. “What should we watch next? Oooh, how’s this? Red, White and Royal Blue.”

“Wouldn’t it be suspicious if two dudes are caught watching a gay movie together? This room doesn’t lock.”

“You’re making it sound like we’re watching porn.” He puts the movie on. “Look, they’re like us. One is a brown dude, and the other is blonde.”

“Okay,” I say.

Not that either of us pay attention to it. We spent hours in here after getting back from the pooja, cycling through movies, when really all we were doing is making out while listening for footsteps (and sometimes talking). It’s a dangerous game, and one that we should probably move to my bedroom which does lock.

We sneak down for dinner when my family is in the living room and try to sneak back up without being seen, but Aunty catches us. She looks tired already. I blame it on my grandparents. She smiles for us anyway. “Isn’t it late, boys?” she murmurs.

I frown. Was Jaron being politely asked to leave? “No,” I say defensively.

Jaron digs his nail into my back, looking down at me smugly. I know what that means. He’s caught me wanting him to stay longer. I try to get his hand off me without alerting Aunty to the fact that it’s dangerously close to touching my ass. His hand does not move.

“Just stay the night,” Aunty tells him, “It’s too long a drive to make this late.”

Oh, that’s what she meant by ‘it’s late.’ My throat goes dry.

Jaron also smiles back at her. “That’s very kind. Thank you!”

“I’ll make up the guest room–” she starts.

Jaron’s eyes gleam. “That’s not necessary.” He sticks his thumb into the waist of my pants. “We’ll probably just… stay up late.”

I turn away and open a snack cabinet to hide how hot my face has become.

Aunty nods. She begins making three cups of tea to take back to the living room.

Jaron and I go back upstairs, to my room this time, with our plates. He sits on my bed. “You’re not allowed to eat on my bed,” I snap.

He smirks and ignores me.

“You’re not even allowed on my bed,” I say harshly.

“I’m gonna sleep in it tonight.”

“No you’re not.” That’s a lie on my part. I hope he’ll sleep in my bed tonight, but denying him seems to be the more comfortable thing to do.

“We’ll see.”

“You’re also not allowed to stick your hand down my pants in front of my family!” I tell him.

“I didn’t. Just my thumb.”

“That’s disgusting.”

“Can I do it again?” he asks, “Is it okay now that we’re alone?”

That reminds me. I get up to lock the door. “No,” I say.

“Well let me know if you change your mind.”

What a loser. There are sexier ways to ask for consent, but it seems he didn’t know any of them. I bite my cheek to stop the smile coming to my face.

“I made you smile!” he gloats.

“You did not!”

“Yes I did!” He abandons his food and swivels around for his phone. When he finds it, he puts it in my face and takes a photo.

“S-Stop!” I tell him.

“I need evidence that the angsty artist emo kid smiled,” he explains.

“I’m not an angsty artist emo kid.”

“Are you going to argue with me about everything?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“Good. It turns me on,” he assures me.

That makes me laugh, and he gleefully takes several more photos, even when I try to cover my face with my hood.

This whole thing feels so warm. Like… emotionally. And I guess physically too, since he’s a leech that seems to need my skin on his or else he’ll explode. After he’s done trying to wrestle my hood off to take more photos (I only let him after he starts whining), he sits in my lap and finally picks through his food. “You should come to my place next,” he mutters.

“Okay.”

He presses his warm cheek into mine and holds my hand even though he’s literally on my lap. “I thought you were going to argue about it.”

I think this guy’s love language is clearly touch. “I can if you want me to.” Maybe arguing is also his love language.

“Not about this,” he says quickly. He clears his throat. “Wednesday?”

“Works for me.”

He looks around. “You could sleep over then,” he whispers with a small smile. “My turn to host.”

“Sure,” I whisper back. This time, I don’t try to stop myself from smiling down at him.

———

When we go to bed, he's wearing my pajamas and the toothbrush I gave him is sitting next to mine in the bathroom. It's a strange feeling. I don't dislike it... but it's just strange. Jaron wraps both his arms around my waist and buries his face into my back. It's almost uncomfortable lying on his arm like this so I make him detach the arm from under me and put it somewhere else.

He whines like I've asked him to amputate his arm, instead of just move it. I shift a little to let him move it somewhere less suffocating, and he obviously chooses to grope my chest. Which I like. But I will not tell him that.

"Stop breathing on my neck," I say. He moves higher so that his face is now pressed into my hair instead of my back. He's also a human radiator. "I'm going to melt," I complain. "What's wrong with your skin? You're too hot."

"I dunno," he mutters sleepily. "I am hot."

"Ugh." I fidget against him until I finally decide that I have to change if I'm going to tolerate him touching me. He whines some more when I try to get out of bed.

When I come back, dressed in a t-shirt and shorts, he looks at me with lidded eyes. "Maybe you could just take it all off," he suggests.

"We've been in this... situationship for like 4 hours and you're already trying to fuck me."

"I'm just a perv," he says. “You said it yourself the other night.”

"At least you know it."

He nods. "And yet, you come back into my arms."

That was too poetically sweet. I smack him. "Stop it."

He presses me close to him again when I settle under the covers. He seems much more comfortable than me like this. Sleeping with another guy in bed, I mean. Like it's totally normal to crawl into said guy's bed and wrap yourself around him like a weighted blanket.

He actually falls asleep pretty quickly once I stop squirming. Of course he falls asleep. This smug, musclebound dumbass. I lie here with his breath still in my hair and his thumbprint still burned into my spine. Unlike him, I cannot fall asleep. It is obviously his fault.

I sit up and dig around for my melatonin like a drug addict. Even that doesn't help. I scroll through every app, fidgeting for an hour. Jaron wakes up periodically and shifts to adjust to whatever position I'm in before drifting off again.

Finally, he just sits up and looks at me.

I shut off my phone. "Sorry," I say.

"Why?"

Because I'm annoying. "I'm keeping you up."

"Not in the way I want," he says, which makes me blush. Maybe I should just take a red sharpie to my face since 'red' seems to be the permanent state of my face these days. "It's fine," Jarons says softly. He runs his hands down my arm. "Nervous? Should I go to the guest room?"

"No," I say, faster than intended, which is humiliating. He smiles like he knows exactly what that means, which, of course he does. "Sorry. I'll be still," I tell him.

"I kind of like it," he murmurs into my ear. "Knowing I make you nervous." He says it in that sleep-rough, lazy voice that sounds way hotter than he probably knows.

Butterflies riot beneath my sternum.

"I'll be fine," he says. "Don't worry about it." He lies down again, still hugging me, and closes his eyes.

And now I'm even more awake. Jerk. I elbow him just because I can. He laughs softly, and I feel his eyelashes flutter against the top of my head.

I still don't know why he likes me, or why he tolerates me being so rude to him. Objectively, I'm unpleasant. I know that. He joked around about being attracted to me being mean...but a relationship couldn't really be built out of that. He'd get sick of it eventually.

I'd start being nicer to him. Or at least trying to be nicer to him.