DISCLAIMER: The following is rated "Mature" for coarse language, graphic scenes, and adult themes and is thus deemed inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. Bisexuality and homosexuality are heavy themes in the following content. Reader discretion is advized.

Robin And Jack

by V.E. Silber

Robin was quiet and gothic; he loved music and dark poetry, war films and video games, and playing mediocre music on his Fender guitar. Jack was loud and funny, often moody and very sporty; he was fond of his glow sticks, which he was expert at, he adored football and anything which remotely had to do with it. Robin and Jack were good friends, but not best friends. Jack’s best friend was Ben, and Robin preferred not to have best friends. Robin’s parents worried about him, especially since they were away for a year on an on-site research project in Greenland; though they were not there, and hence the boy had all the freedom a teenage boy could ever want, he had but one restriction: he had to see a psychologist once a week, Monday after school; his parents called the psychologist every Tuesday to make sure he had attended, if he hadn’t, they phoned Robin’s flat immediately to verify why. Jack lived in a large house in the midst of a posh suburb with his wealthy father and gold-digging stepmother, along with his younger brother, recently turned twelve, and his four dogs (Three poodles named Betty, Beatrice, and Bernard, and a Yorkshire terrier named Nemo). Robin had recently turned sixteen, on the seventh of November. Jack was to turn seventeen that coming January. He didn’t really like big birthday parties, so he had settled with his large group of friends and girlfriend to have but a small event: they reserved an entire Paint-ball court for their purposes only for some three hours, then to be followed by numerous alcoholic beverages, a strip club, and then more alcoholic beverages as an after-party at Ben’s house. Robin didn’t have a girlfriend, and he hadn’t celebrated his birthday that year. Jack was quite popular: he was tall, and well-built—the athletic type—, blonde, a bit rugged, with soulful green eyes and an adorable disposition. Robin blended in with the walls, and he had willed it that way—he didn’t like attention much—, he dressed darkly and dangerously and had his left nostril pierced, he had beautiful features: nice full lips, a strong jaw, dark circles under his grey eyes, high-cheekbones, and pale olive skin. They were both smart, and very poor in algebra; they both showered in the morning, and drank coffee and milk—heavy on the milk and only one lump of sugar—, they both liked watching hockey games, and loved to wrestle, but, then again, that wasn’t much of a shock: you more or less had to love to wrestle if you wanted to be in with that group of friends. The wrestling, Jack thought, had started to mess with his mind. There was something about the physical contact, touching another person’s body so intimately, aggressively, bruising another’s thigh in a heart-pumping struggle. When you think about it, wrestling was really like sex: touching private part’s of another’s body, sweating, panting, screaming, moaning, and then end up on the floor, exhausted, in the mood for a cigarette. It was even followed by a brief post-coital depression—save, it was minus the actual “coital”. Wrestling was like an hour’s worth foreplay with no follow-up sexual contact. So each wrestling match left him with this lingering feeling of unfulfilment, that longing to finish off what he had started with whatever wrestling buddy he had began. But of course he never did, because it was all just wrestle in good fun, and was of course a wrestle with another boy. He wondered sometimes if his wrestling partners didn’t feel the same about the whole affair. But he observed that they obviously didn’t. Maybe it was just because he did so often that he felt this way, or maybe it should be the other way around, maybe he should already be used to it. But either way, he felt unsatisfied. Usually after a good wrestle with a mate, he would almost literally run off and find his girlfriend and fuck for a good hour or so (record time for him); nice, good, violent, rough fucking. That satisfied him some, got out some of that built up sexual frustration. But he didn’t much fancy making love to his girlfriend in such a violent manor, after all, she was a lady, she should be treated delicately, she should be made love to, not this manly, Viking-esque rape and pillage style. After every time he felt like he had done her great in justice, but she seemed not to care too terribly much, even seem to enjoy rough fucks better, but he still felt like shit about it. He felt that his mates, the ones whom had built up this high sexual frustration, were the ones who should take the hard fucks, after all, they were men, they could be treated rough. But that was disgusting, they were other boys. He felt guilty about it most of the time. He wasn’t gay, he was quite sure of that; but the intimate contact, the foreplay, had begun this sort of downward spiral concerning sex and his ideas about. Any intimate contact of that sort, of a man is gay or not, makes for an unimaginable amount of pent up sexual aggravation.

Robin never had any of these troubles. He wasn’t very fond of wrestling or that sort of physical activity. Wasn’t very much for real sports, or sports in which he had to participate. He wasn’t a very violent person either, in spite of his appearance. He actually considered himself to be a very gentle person; never treated his girlfriends poor, was always very gentlemanly with them, made love considerately, usually submitting to whatever his girlfriends wanted to do. He wrestled with Jack and others seldom, and only when he was attacked by. He usually wasn’t in the mood, so consequently threw them off and continued what he was doing, and the boy whom had attacked him, seeing his uninterest, would go off and find another to wrestle, usually Jack, seeing as he was always on the ready for. Robin wasn’t that into relationships, and only had girlfriends when the girl expressed her interest firstly. He didn’t take much initiative. And when a girl was waiting to be courted, he would only yawn and play dumb: he was too lazy to court. He didn’t need a girl or a relationship to make his life complete, and he had had enough sex in his early teens to know what it was about and to now find uninteresting or unnecessary. And when he did find he was sexually frustrated and “jacking off” did not suffice, he would at last court a girl whom fancied him and fuck meaninglessly for a week or so, or at least until she got bored, and he would let her drift away from him. He didn’t see women as objects though. He actually believed he had more female friends than male, they had a tendency to be more intellectual, seeing as they couldn’t resort to sports as much. He had to be honest though and admit that there were indeed clusters of girls who were mindless as the tubes of lipstick they were so fond of, girls only for fucking. If he really wanted a girlfriend, he would be a with a girl whom had courted him, a girl with some balls and a brain, which is why they had the courage and the initiative to ask him out in the first place. He really knew what he was doing when it came to that (and here you thought he was just a lazy macho prick). When he wanted a good intellectual discussion he would go to Natalie, or to Dana. When he wanted to talk sports, or discuss the malady that was women (usually when he had just broken up with a girlfriend), or perhaps the last hockey game, he would go to Ben or Jack, or Tom-tom, or Phil. He told his psychologist that he thought he was using people. But no one, he thought, used people more that Jack. It seemed to Robin that Jack took from everyone what he needed at that very instant. At least Robin knew how to be alone, but no, not Jack. Jack always had to be surrounded by people. He was never seen alone. He would be seen with a certain given person depending on his mood: if he was feeling lusty, he would be with his girlfriend, if he was feeling sporty, he would be with his mates, or the captain of the football team, Tom-tom. It was moments like those when Robin lost the slightest bit of respect for him. Robin pitied him: he always pitied a man who wasn’t man enough to stand on his own. Where do you think the saying pillar of strength comes from? Not from a crowd of people standing around one, holding one up. Robin wouldn’t consider himself a pillar of strength really, but at least he enjoyed his own company once and a while, and he thought that’s the way it should be.

Meanwhile, Jack was having other more disturbing fetishes and fantasies. Concerning this wrestling business, he was just far too sexually frustrated, and these thoughts about touching his mates were too present. He had, after much internal debate, decided he would “try something” on one of his mates, just to satisfy himself or bring his mind to some level of peace so he would know what he wasn’t missing out on. For some weeks he had meandered the halls and sat staring emptily in class trying to decide what mate would be best to “try” these ideas on. Maybe Ben… but no, that was his best mate, and things would be far too weird between them, and he couldn’t be without a best mate, that was a given. Tom-tom would take it too personally, and besides was too masculine, absolute turn off (he was also larger than Jack and could hurt him if he wanted). And of course etcetera, one could fill an entire page with the mates Jack went through in his head. But here is where Robin and Jack tie in directly. Though they were always related as friends, Jack chose Robin as the mate he would “try on”. Robin was a pretty boy, nice on the eyes, not very strong either, so he wouldn’t be able to fight him off or kick his arse the next day. Robin was also quiet, so he wouldn’t tell anyone. Robin was also often by himself, so it wouldn’t be hard to corner him. And on top of the rest, there had been some much doubt about Robin’s sexuality at school, seeing as the boy wore makeup and kind of girly clothing (Robin defended this often by saying it was the “gothic style”—which was of course true, but the possibility that his sexuality might not be all that straight was far more fun to gossip about). So this was the outcome: Robin was “Jack’s man”, in a figurative sense. Jack watched the lone boy often in the halls. And, as time went by, the fantasy of jumping Robin seemed to grow. Though Jack wasn’t really attracted to him, not really, the anticipation he had to admit was very sexy. Sort of like planning a murder: where the planning and the premeditation is far more entertaining and sensual. at night, in bed, he would plan in detail how he would corner the boy, with exact precision how he would “get into it”, and at these thoughts would often find himself jacking off. Usually in his fantasies, fantasy Jack would be surprised to find fantasy Robin enjoying it, moaning his name, and begging for more. In some odd way, to know that these thoughts were considered utterly perverse, unnatural, and disgusting, made it all the sexier. It took some time for Jack to really be attracted to Robin, seeing as he wasn’t gay. But the more he obsessed over him, the more he thought about him or the more he contemplated something close to rape, he became more and more attracted to the boy. Again, the anticipation was what made the whole thing worth while. Of course he never really, really truly, considered actually trying this on Robin, in Jack’s mind it was all just a fun fantasy to vent the post-coital depression due to wrestling, and was fun in the fact that it might happen, that it could happen if he really wanted. But he never thought he would act upon it… Until the opportunity presented itself and he had to honestly ask himself if this was really what he wanted to do. And then he though, “why the fuck not?” (surely there were thousands of reasons why he shouldn’t, but he was a normal teenage boy driven by sexual frustration, and that seemed like a good enough reason at the time…)

Robin stayed later after school sometimes, only when he felt that he couldn’t stand to be alone with himself at home. It was one of those days again, when he stayed until six in the afternoon swimming. He only got out of the school’s swimming pool because the lifeguard was going home. He stayed an hour later in the showers, just staring into space and he fancied maybe he had cried a little. He couldn’t figure it out, but recently he had become something close to being depressed. Now, it wasn’t as if Jack had been stalking him, honestly. It was an honest to God coincidence that Jack had decided that that day in particular he had wanted to be alone, and at that very hour he wanted to go down and watch the swimming pool and had just happened to hear the showers running. He came in, not knowing or really thinking on what to expect, he just felt like he was drifting distantly through life, feeling unattached. He felt as if some kind of a mattress had been shoved into his chest and stomach when he saw Robin coming out of the showers, having just finished wrapping a towel around his waist. Jack was left gaping at him. It was that moment. Should he or shouldn’t he. His heart was beating in his ear and he was on the verge of hysterical blindness as he approached. Robin was startled by Jack’s presence, for obvious reasons. Robin was dripping wet, having just showered, and wasn’t wearing a stitch of his usual makeup. Somehow he looked softer, more natural, and therefore his disposition warmer. Robin grinned idiotically, as was polite to do with one’s mates. ‘Jesus, you scared the shit out of me,’ Robin laughed politely. Jack’s palms were sweaty and his mouth dry. ‘Hey, man,’ Jack replied out of habit. ‘What’re you doing down here so late?’

‘Just…’ Jack searched his mind quickly for an excuse, and found no better excuse than the truth. ‘…just wanted to be alone for a bit, you know?’

‘Oh, definitely.’ And Robin really had understood completely. The corner of Jack’s mouth twitched with something that wanted to become a mischievous smirk; but he contained himself as his mind raced five-hundred miler per hour with possible taunts to irritate the docile Robin enough to wrestle, especially in such a vulnerable light. ‘Good to see you’re not wanking off to gay porn down here, faggot.’ Ah, those wonderful teenage taunts. Robin laughed loudly and threw his head back, making him look a bit like a stallion or so. ‘Who’re you calling a faggot, homo?’ Excellent reply, Jack thought. ‘Come over here and prove your man hood, boy,’ here he used a mocking southern accent. Surprisingly, the jeers worked, and Robin dove to tackle him. Jack mentally shrugged, and plunged into the act that was wrestling, ah, a wonderful thing. Jack wrapped his arms around Robin’s chest and squeezed until the boy hollered, then Robin whipped around grabbed Jack in a surprisingly strong headlock. Jack managed to get his arms under Robin’s and keep him pinned, in which position they struggled, or at least Robin struggled, for his freedom. They boys were laughing and panting and sweating and Robin gave the occasional mocking holler. Robin managed to push Jack back against a wall, but Jack still had him pinned to his own body, Robin’s bare back against Jack’s panting clothed chest. Then Robin engaged in a different kind of struggle, and soon began half shouting half laughing, ‘No, noooo! I give up! Ha ha ha! I give up! Let go! For real, Jack! My towel’s falling off! I give up! Let go!’ His laughing began to subside and became the sound of struggling grunts as he tried beyond hope to keep his towel up being unable to use his hands. ‘For real, Jack, let GO!’ Of course Jack wasn’t going to let go, as his breathing became heavy with something else, and Robin’s twitching and wincing body froze as his towel slipped off from around his slim moist waist and fell in a wet little heap on the ground at their feet. Jack could hear Robin swallow. ‘Jack…’ he started in a small quivering voice, ‘Let go now…’ Jack was breathing hard in Robin’s ear, holding on tight to the naked boy in his arms. ‘Come on, tough shit,’ Jack breathed pornographically in Robin’s ear, ‘You can’t tell me a little towel’s going to spoil the fun. Show me what you got, faggot.’ But Robin didn’t reimburse the fight, instead he just stood there, shivering slightly, letting his panting die down. ‘I mean it, Jack. I give up. Let me go. I want to get dressed.’ Jack could tell how Robin felt all the more vulnerable, obviously, and was currently feeling a bit violated. But this had gone too far for Jack to just turn away now and let a perfectly defenceless Robin walk off and go home. He had to finish what he started. Jack swallowed hard.

Robin was feeling violated and vulnerable. He was naked and being squeezed unpleasantly hard by a boy almost twice his size (at least strength-wise). He was cold, and cheerless, and just wanted to go home. He had been feeling lonely, and had thought wrestling would take his mind off himself, but now this had reached a very dangerous level, and he felt like the strength of spontaneity had been sapped out of him. He just wanted to go home now and cry for some while. But this was bad, this was very bad: Jack wasn’t letting go. If anything his grip had tightened; and Robin was becoming painfully aware of something he had previously chosen to ignore, which was the bulge in Jack’s pants jabbing the back of his hips. As it seemed Jack’s breathing in his ear grew harder, Robin almost heard himself whimper. ‘Jack,’ he said in a voice much smaller and scared than he had intended. ‘Please let go of me.’ Had he just said ‘please’? What was this? A mugging where he was begging for mercy? That was pathetic! Jack quieted him with a low ‘shhh’ in his ear, and Robin felt a shiver of fear creep over his spine.

Robin was stiff with the most enticing fear. Jack had never felt so in control in his entire life, and never had he felt so lustful. He felt as if he had sucked all the strength from Robin’s body and now glowed with it. Jack clasped both Robin’s wrists together with one hand and started to let the other trail down from the boy’s shoulder, to his chest, past his nipple and down to his naval. Robin began to struggle, recovering some of his strength in an adrenaline pumped instinct to maintain his well-being. ‘Jack, stop!’ he screamed. ‘STOP—!’ But quick as a whip, the hand that had clasped Robin’s wrists was now around his mouth, squeezing the slim jaw so hard that Robin whimpered and a tear escaped in pain. Jack kept Robin’s head pulled back against his shoulder, so all he would be able to see was the white ceiling, but Robin’s pretty eyes were squeezed shut in what could be either horror or pain, or both.

The pain around Robin’s jaw was unbearable. So much that he could only use his now free hands to dig the nails into Jack’s arm, but Jack was wearing some kind of a thick army jacket and his nails did no damage to the skin underneath. Robin heard himself whimpering, but he was as if from somewhere far away. In his panicked mind he could not stress how bad this was. Bad, he thought, this is really, really bad! Thoughts raced like mad wild horses across Robin’s mind: Jack could rape him down here, or even worse, Jack could rape and murder him down here and no one would ever know. As these thoughts crossed his mind, and Jack’s other hand went lower still, he started to try and scream behind Jack’s large hand, but all that escaped were muffled moans. Fear rose in his cheeks once more, and he felt too terrified to move. His body was trembling, trembling so much he felt he could not have pulled away even if he could. His muffled screams subsided as well. Even his vocal chords were frozen with utter fear. Jack’s hand started messaging the inside of his bare thigh, and then higher, and something else started to rise in Robin. He was so terrified he thought he would never have been able to get aroused by this sick boy’s teasing. Jack’s hand rose a bit further and started masturbating him slowly. Robin let out a cry of amazement and a true moan. His chest rose and feel rapidly with Jack’s hand’s movements, and Jack even let go of his jaw. But robin couldn’t move, he was in some sort of hypnotized state. He let out small gasps every so often. Jack’s other hand teased his nipple and traced his chest idly. Both their bodies and given way entirely, so that there was no more pain and stiffness, and the act was almost enjoyable. Robin felt his head lull to the side, pressing his forehead against Jack’s neck, and the other boy shivered, making the actions of his hand more vigorous.

Robin was moaning softly and melting in Jack’s arms. Of course he didn’t blame him: what boy would turn down a hand job, no matter from whom? Robin even relaxed enough to let his arms slide back and gently grab a hold of Jack’s hips, at which point Jack could have an orgasm, save Robin did first, and his moaning was to beautiful to miss. Jack let go of him and Robin’s legs sort of seemed to give way, so Jack caught his by the chest quickly. ‘I got ya’…’ he whispered, trying to avoid any loud sounds or quick movements which might scare the other boy away. ‘Please don’t tell anyone about this,’ Robin pleaded, still in a slightly orgasmic tone, his eyes still squeezed shut. ‘I wasn’t planning to…’ Jack breathed, and was unprepared for when Robin tugged free of his loose grip. The boy stoically plucked his towel from off the ground and wrapped it around his waist. His smooth chest still rose and fell heavily. He half ran to a tap and began splashing water on his face dynamically. Jack started painfully. ‘Robin, I…’

‘Shut up, Jack,’ Robin groaned, a bit muffled seeing as he had his hands over his face.

‘I just wanted to say,’ Jack continued, feeling steadily worse about himself, ‘That I was sorry.’

‘Are you?’ Robin insisted almost angrily. He still wouldn’t look at him, he now only stared hard into the depths of the drain.

‘Yes, yes I am.’

Robin let out a dry sob and covered his mouth instantly. Jack felt so low in himself that he just wanted to dig a pitiful hole and burry himself in. He took a step towards Robin, but he instantly screamed. ‘Don’t you fucking come near me!’ He took off, barely stopping to grab his duffel bag with his clothes. Jack felt his knees give in and let them, letting himself fall to the floor, burying his face in his arms.

Robin dressed in the men’s bathroom on the second floor. He drove his parents’ dark green Audi home. When he reached his destination, and sat stiffly on his bed, utterly numb, the tears started to finally break through, and they came in big, dry, overwhelming gasps. He pulled the pillow over his head and sobbed like he never had before. It wasn’t just what happened with Jack, though that was part of it; it had just seemed like everything had accumulated, and he didn’t even really know what ‘everything’ was, just whatever it was had piled on top of itself and had now become too much to handle. The alleged ‘everything’, along with this ‘little incident’ (as Robin would come to call it) with Jack, just seemed to overpower him, and make his mild state of depression sink into a full blown gulf of devastation. He had already been overcome by the rest of his world seemingly crumbling around him, and now to add insult to injury, he had now to worry about whether he was gay or not. This incident had made his mind turn summersaults and made him doubt everything he thought he was or had been. He had never doubted his sexuality before, never having even innocently wondered if he was or not. Never. Never had he felt sexual excitement in the presence of another boy, and never had he even thought of it. Now he had to take a step back, a step out of his emotionally shattered self, and seriously contemplate the situation at hand: he had been jacked off by another boy and had enjoyed it. Certainly, another far more friendly part of his mind reasoned, no boy could be able to resist a good hand-job. But no, that wasn’t normal. Boys will be boys, yes, but boys, no matter how good the hand-job is, should and could never get aroused by being touched by another boy. Technically Robin could phone the police and have Jack arrested for sexual assault and/or attempted rape, but then of course Jack could then accidentally ‘let slip’ the minor fact that Robin had actually enjoyed it. But he hadn’t chosen this!, Robin’s mind screamed. Surely, it would sit with him perfectly fine mentally if he had chosen to ‘experiment’ with another boy, but he hadn’t, he hadn’t wanted this homosexual contact, because he wasn’t gay, and had no desire to be. He felt so entirely violated. Jack was his friend, and he had betrayed his trust by doing…that horrid thing! Robin felt like vomiting every time he saw himself on the mirror. He was Jack’s bitch, that’s all he saw when he looked into his reflection. And he hadn’t wanted to be, that was the problem. He had been aroused, that was true and there was no denying that fact; but he hadn’t asked to be aroused… If that makes any sense.

The following day at school, Robin was acting as if nothing at all had taken place between him and Jack the previous night. Surely Jack felt a pang of hurt, but soon snapped into stoic stand-by, finding it in the back of his mind to be some sort of game: ‘if he’s playing it cool and ignoring the fact, then I certainly will as well.’ But the act was too convincing, and Jack began doubting his own sanity, until he saw the bruises on Robin’s wrists where he had grabbed them and a sore-cut on the edge of his jaw where Jack had squeezed it. But Robin didn’t flinch in his presence, nor was he overcome with disgust, he merely acted… normal, in simple words. For Jack, however, the act was too crushing, he couldn’t keep it up long. The thought of nothing having taken place the night before was unfathomable. He didn’t know what he felt exactly for Robin. Perhaps so much time passed with obsession and inexplicable attraction that it had made for some sort of an emotional bond, a crush even. Robin was the object of his desire, and it was a rule of thumb that Jack always got what he wanted. His obsessions would become his doormats, his fantasies his habits, and his dreams his routine. And he would stop at nothing to have them. He had set up this scenario for himself (picking a boy to ‘try’ with…) because he knew it would be one of the hardest things he’d be able to obtain—besides from the fact that he was sexually frustrated from the wrestling. This would be his greatest feat: getting another boy to become attracted to him. Now that he had attempted on Robin, he saw it wouldn’t be as simple as he thought. The way Robin reacted made Jack feel horrible about himself, as if he were a rapist or so. It had never worked out that way in his fantasies.

About a three days after it happened, Jack decided to confront Robin. He caught him alone in the gent’s one day, during Physical Education class, which Robin never participated in, and everyone else did, so there was little to no chance of them being interrupted. Robin saw him come in and waved him a sleepy, ‘Hey, Jack,’ as he began leaving, but Jack caught him by the sleeve. Robin glared at him. ‘I’d like to talk…’ Jack began guiltily, ‘About what happened the other…’

‘Nothing happened “the other day”,’ Robin hissed, his façade melting with every second. ‘Got it? And I never want you to mention it again.’ With time and the illusion of normality, Robin had thought the event could just evaporate from the record of existence. If he just acted forever as if nothing had happened, it would seem after some while that it had in fact never happened. But now he realized that was impossible: as long as another human being knew, it would always be, it will always have taken place. At the moment, Robin felt could not have loathed any human being more than he presently loathed Jack, and now he merely loathed him for being alive.

‘No,’ Jack insisted. ‘Something happened, and I want to talk about it.’ He wasn’t going to let this go. This was his own sanity really. Though he wanted nothing more than to penetrate Robin’s heart, he had to set things right, or else he couldn’t live knowing that Robin though he was a brutal asshole pervert.

The anger which had suddenly surfaced in Robin like a wave of lava from an active volcano, melted just as suddenly into artic stoic ice. His emotional barrier. Protection against anything Jack might say. ‘Go ahead then. What is it you have to say?’ Robin asked icily, sending a shiver of guilt and absolute impotence down Jack’s spine. ‘Because I sure as hell don’t have anything to say.’

‘I know I’ve said this before but…Robin, I’m sorry.’ At that Robin scoffed. ‘I really am,’ Jack insisted. ‘I…wanted to try something… and was selfish by making you be a part of that when you hadn’t wanted to. And I just want us to be friends again. I know I was a total asshole, and I’ll understand if I’m not forgiven, but at least maybe now I’ll be able to sleep better at night knowing you know how totally and unfuckeably sorry I am, though I’ll never be entirely at peace knowing you hate me.’ He looked at the marble floor soulfully.

‘But I mean, you have to understand my position here,’ Robin defended, feeling like he was loosing ground despite having been the victim in the first place. ‘You practically tried to rape me. People who almost get raped rapped rarely ever forgive their almost rapists.’

‘Oh, God, I’m so sorry about doing that to you Robin.’ Jack looked up at him with the largest, most sincere eyes Robin had ever seen on him. This was rare and wrong, Robin thought. Jack was being entirely honest. This was Jack here. Jack never spoke frank. You were lucky to get a single serious word out of the man. And to have a serious conversation with the boy…? Never! After all, this was Jack. Robin felt utterly confused, and seeing that face of deepest regret indeed, accompanied by a spice of shame, and topped with guilt, how could Robin possibly deny him forgiveness? ‘Jesus, Jack,’ Robin cursed quietly. ‘I mean, I of all people would understand you being gay or whatnot. I’m not Phil or Tom, you know. I don’t care about those kinds of things. But you really didn’t have to drag me into it. Besides popular belief, I’m straight: I’m not like that.’

‘I know…’ Jack brooded (a rare sight indeed). ‘I really regret it. I fucked everything up. And, by the way,’ he looked Robin intensely in the eye. ‘I’m not gay.’

‘Whatever’, Robin shrugged. ‘Just don’t get me messed up in your business, okay? It’s your stuff, and not mine, I have my own shit to deal with. I mean, I sort of forgive you. Not entirely though, because nothing can excuse what you did.’ Here he positively glared and made Jack shiver. ‘But I guess you were just like… overwhelmed. You must be kind of confused and have lots of shit to try and handle, and then you started something and you just became… yeah, overwhelmed.’ He shrugged again, this time in defeat. ‘Being overwhelmed makes people do stupid crazy shit, you know? So…yeah, I can’t say I entirely blame you, though I don’t entirely forgive you.’ He gave Jack a long stern look. But Jack was extremely relieved. He felt like he could breathe again. They indulged in the modern ghetto greeting or clasping hands together and cracking knuckles.

Over the next few weeks, it seemed to Jack that he had been wholly pardoned. Even more than that: it seemed their friendship had become deeper. They appeared inseparable, one was never witnessed without the other. Robin almost refused to spend time with anyone besides him. Walking through the halls, joking and engaged in horseplay, Jack could feel a pang of jealously from his other best friend, Ben, who would glare at them whenever saw them together. Jack could not explain Robin’s sudden change of heart; after the incident in the locker-room, Jack was positive he had entirely shattered the superficial relationship between them. But it seemed that for Robin a certain unspoken bond had been formed: the two shared a secret a secret between them, and had become intimate with each other in what was practically over night. Now that he thought about, it stood to reason that Robin would gravitate towards a person he had shared a delicate intimacy with, however against his will it may have been. But for Jack, the sudden and constant proximity of his unconventional crush was enough to drive him insane. If the sexual frustration had been before, when he had felt nothing emotionally for the boys he wrestled with, now that Robin was officially his heartthrob, it was practically torture. He could barely stand to touch the boy for fear that he may not be able to control himself and end up jumping his fragile frame…

Robin didn’t really have an explanation for his odd after-behaviour. He was extremely confused lately. After what happened with Jack, the ‘incident’, and then his inability to stay angry with him just because he spoke sincerely, was enough to make an insecure teenage boy extremely bemused. He really had intended to stay angry with him, truly, but some merciless little voice in the back of his head was whispering something to the effects of ‘any sex is good sex’. Whenever it appeared, he wanted to leap inside his own mind and positively strangle that infuriating voice. Of course the voice only stuck it’s tongue out at Robin, knowing perfectly well he couldn’t climb inside his own head; ridiculous. Feeling confused as he did, the only thing he could think of doing was not letting Jack out of his sight. Jack had revealed something very personal and had shown Robin a very vulnerable, frank side of himself; that had to be worth something, right? Robin had recently been lonely and in desperate need of friends; what more could he ask for in a friend than an honest, smart, nicely humoured, likeable guy? So he’d be friends with the boy who’d shown him his most exposed side—not the boy who’d practically tried to rape him in the locker-room. Robin had entirely shunned from his mind any thought of what had happened that day. Thoughts of it and what he felt towards it confused him too much to think about them on a regular basis. Besides, confusion was unpleasant, one doesn’t like feeling unpleasant things. What served as a great distraction for this, however, was his new best friend. He never realized how being Jack’s mate can bust your popularity so.

Jack found he jacked-off practically every day (ironic, considering his name was Jack…but anyhow), if not more than once a day. At thought of Robin, at thoughts of what had happened in the locker room, Robin’s soft moans and gasps… Robin’s words circled around in his mind constantly, especially when jacking-off, ‘I of all people would understand if you’re gay.’ Was he? Seemed at abstract idea. One hears it all during one’s life when growing up: ‘faggots’, ‘homos’, sick perverts these, and how boys will always tease each other about it school— but when the time finally comes to stop and ask yourself of you are or not, you’ve made fun of the concept so much that you’ve lost sight of what it actually is, adding to one’s confusion the fact you don’t even really know what homosexuality is any more. Guys like Elton John, that’s what gay was. Guys with limp wrists, who wore makeup and didn’t like sports. That’s what gay was. Guys who have sex with other guys, that was what gay was… If all that was true, Jack felt he really didn’t qualify, not in the slightest. Therefore, he would not include himself in that category. He wanted to fuck Robin. That didn’t make him gay.

Gradually their friendship continued to grow, along with Jack’s infatuation, which was reaching an uncomfortable level of obsession. So much so that Jack invited Robin to come over to his house and watch some films and get drunk or stoned or so, and Robin accepted almost excitedly. Jack’s father and his wife would be attending a business dinner, meanwhile Henry, Jack’s little brother, would be spending the night at a friend’s house. Though they would have the entire house for themselves, Jack still insisted on watching the films on the wide-screen television in the basement (firstly for more privacy away from possibly gawping neighbours, and secondly because it was cosier and had wide-screen television, obviously). They had rented some six films and bought two cases of beer (which they had finished off between them), and were engaged in watching the last film of the temporary collection, Clockwork Orange, somewhere around two in the morning, when Robin seemed to begin to doze off a little next to him on the basement sofa. Coming into a comfortable sleep, Robin fell sideways onto Jack, snoring softly, face against the other boy’s chest, hand resting unconsciously on Jack’s thigh. Jack groaned inwardly. Damn sleeping boy wasn’t making this easy. A sudden impulse to do a certain something made his stomach tighten. No…he couldn’t… Silently he weighed the possibilities: if he did, he could end up blowing any possibility of a further relationship and severe the relationship completely due to Robin finding it to be even further betrayal than previously on account of them being even better friends now, and there would be no way for Jack to be able to hide behind the excuse that he had been ‘overwhelmed’. But then again there was always the chance that Robin had become so attached to him because subconsciously, or maybe not even so subconsciously, he wanted to expand on what happened in the locker-room that day, and really did want this certain something to happen. Then again, it was too risky, the outcome was either all or nothing. The best thing to do was abstain from doing anything, that way he could maintain his much appreciated relationship with Robin and the refreshing proximity, along with the added minute possibility that another relationship may evolve. That’s at least what a semi-sane person would do… But Jack wasn’t sane….in the least…

‘Fuck’, he cursed under his breath and dove down to kiss Robin, snaking his tongue between the immobile lips and exploring the sleeping mouth. Robin seemed to wake with a bit of a jerk. He had been subconsciously leaning into the kiss, but now he tried to pull out of it, still a bit confused and dizzy, seeing as he still had a plentiful amount of alcohol in him. It was taking a great deal of energy to try and figure out what was going on. He still couldn’t quite understand, but it was nice, so he pushed back with his tongue and engaged in some short animated snogging before he came to his senses. Jack had pushed him back on the sofa so that he came to rest comfortably on top of him. Robin tried to push him off gingerly, in his sleepy drunken state, but Jack, far more sober than he, kept his head firmly in place.

To Jack’s utter surprise, after several minutes of delicious kissing, all the more thrilling due to how forbidden it was to kiss another boy, Robin gave up his attempts to push him off, instead, now, he could feel a distinct smile curling around the lips against his, and then a laugh breathed against him like many little fluttering feathers. Jack was the one he pulled up, looking down at Robin who was laughing with his eyes still closed. Confusion seemed to be the key emotion of the month. Robin’s large, heavily outlined, grey eyes fluttered open, slightly misted over with alcohol. He grinned, still laughing slightly. Jack furrowed his brow. ‘What?’ he asked, not amused by whatever was entertaining Robin so. The kiss had been really nice, even better than nice, amazing—spiced with the excitement that, according to the bible, he would be going to hell for it. Robin sat up, threw his black hair back and laughed aloud. ‘What?’ Jack insisted with growing concern. Robin looked at him unseeingly, a very provocative smile around his lips. ‘Jack,’ he began with a thick, alcohol and lust jaded voice. ‘I get it: you’re gay. You don’t have to try and prove it every two seconds.’ Jack pouted. ‘I’m not gay…’ he defended unconvincingly, feeling his cheeks grow an unpleasantly deep shade of crimson and was thankful that it was dark. The credits of the film had just started rolling on screen. Robin reached over the side of the sofa to fish out the last remaining beer, which he offered to share with his slightly disturbed and confused mate. ‘You need a beer,’ he said.

It hadn’t just been the alcohol which had caused this odd reaction, Robin had laughed because it was too funny. It was more than obvious that Jack fancied him, which he had to admit was quite flattering, and was so overwhelming that he could hardly contain himself. In Robin opinion, the whole affair was hilarious.

They turned on MTV2 and were watching quietly, sipping beer, but Robin hadn’t noticed that he still bore a silly grin. Jack glared, taking a swig from the shared beer. ‘Tell me what’s so funny, oh gothic one, or I may just have to sacrifice you.’ Robin laughed some. ‘Oh…nothing much,’ he shrugged innocently. ‘Just you.’

Jack narrowed his eyes. ‘I’m funny am I?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Robin said cheerily, stifling another spout of laughter. ‘Quite.’

‘May I ask why?’

‘No, you may not.’

‘I’m gonna ask any way.’

‘I’ll hurt you,’ Robin pointed out in good humour.

‘Not if I do so first,’ Jack added mischievously, inching closer to him, a bit of a scary animalistic gleam in his green eyes.

‘Oh, noooo.’ Robin feigned a terrified shiver and a swoon. Then suddenly, despite himself, everything he thought he was and everything he had warned himself against for the past few weeks, the last few years actually, he fell onto Jack and kissed him. Shyly, sweetly, mouth opened only slightly. A conscious kiss. Jack had soft lips, a bit thinner than Robin was used to; he had tasted of beer, and Robin could feel the stubble against his cheek when kissing him, it hurt, but wasn’t entirely unpleasant; different. Robin pulled back almost instantly, biting his own bottom lip, looking on at Jack unsure.

Jack looked stunned, positively gaping at wide-eyed Robin, who looked a bit scared at himself, as if his body had momentarily been possessed and had disobeyed any order his brain had given it. Jack was too shocked by what had happened to think or do anything. His mind was numb, meanwhile some part of his brain was disporting and letting off fireworks as it would be the fourth of July. The combination only added to his strangling confusion. But no one looked more confused than Robin, whose emotions seemed to rage from insecurity, to anger, to desolation, adoration, back to insecurity, and then to extreme horror. Remaining at utter terror, he raised himself hastily and awkwardly from the sofa, sending some of the things that had been on his lap tumbling to the floor. He gawped unseeingly at some unoriginal emo band singing melancholically on screen. ‘I gotta go…’ he mumbled, and took off before Jack could come to his senses, leap off the sofa, grab the boy in his arms and give him the snog of his lifetime. Jack cursed at the sofa pillow and punched it; the pillow glared back indignantly. ‘Why the fuck do I never get what’s going on!’ He demanded to know from the outraged pillow, who in turn shrugged and decided to ignore him. Jack growled at it and threw it at the television which currently displayed some scantily clad pop singer.

It had of course been a total lie that Robin had had to go. Well, no, not entirely, Robin defended in his own head. I had to go to save my ever fading sanity and what little of it is left. He threw on a Sonic Youth record and collapsed onto the living room sofa. The music was far too loud for a quarter to three in the morning, but it didn’t really matter since there was no one there to tell him to turn it down. He stared at a dead potted plant on the window sill. He was ever so confused, and growing more so with every second that went by in which he didn’t have an answer. But then again, he didn’t even know what the questions were, so how could he possibly have answers for them! He rolled over on the sofa and buried his face in the cushion. That little voice at the back of his mind was saying ‘any sex is good sex’ again, receiving almost sadistic pleasure from seeing Robin cringe every time he said it. ‘Motherfucker,’ Robin said into the cushion, and because of it being muffled ended up sounding more like ‘Mmmhmfhmrr…’ He didn’t really know who he was saying it to. To the little voice, to Jack, to himself… Maybe he was just saying it in general, as if to life or so. He just didn’t really understand what was going on. With him, with the world, with everything, with Jack… Robin wasn’t angry, or even depressed, just horribly confused. He raised his head slightly to look around the dark room, barely illuminated by an eerie green glow from the 24/7 diner sign across the street. ‘I have to bring this up with my psychologist,’ he said decidedly to the wallpaper.

Saturday… Robin had fallen asleep at four in the morning where he had fallen desolately on the living room sofa. He awoke now at one in the afternoon, eye-makeup smeared halfway down his face, feeling bleary, slightly hung-over, and sore from the odd position he had slept in. Damn sofa… Now he sort of threw a pleading glance at the digital clock. Said one in the afternoon, a Saturday, the nineteenth of April… With great difficulty, Robin raised himself from the sofa, visibly stained by his eye-shadow and eyeliner, and dragged himself into the bathroom to freshen up. He showered, changed his clothes, applied fresh makeup, had breakfast (soda and a Milkyway bar), and sat on the stained sofa staring desolately at the wall once more. ‘Bugger…’ he whispered emptily to the stillness of afternoon light in the room. He started when the phone rang. ‘Bugger!’ He cursed and dove for the phone, then hesitated, his hand hanging over the ringing phone tentatively. Slowly he sat down, staring menacingly at the phone.

Ring!, it screamed at him. He grit his teeth and pretended he hadn’t heard it. Ring! It was starting to get annoyed now. Ring! Ring! Ring! Shut the fuck up!, Robin thought in deepest frustration. Ring! Beep! Robin breathed out a sigh of relief that it’s annoying ring was no longer present, and his own voice filled the room. ‘Robin Baxter. Leave a message if you value your life.’ Beeeeeep! Silence for a moment, in which Robin bit his lip expectantly. A breathed out sigh and then a familiar voice which seemed fill the entire flat and then some, just merely with the fact that it was the voice Robin least wanted to hear at the moment but had been so sure would be. ‘Umm… hey, Rob… Err…pick up, I know you’re there.’ He waited a moment, a moment in which Robin found an empty bottle and threw it at the answering-machine. ‘Come on, Robin,’ Jack pleaded, acquiring that sincere tone again. ‘I just want to talk… about what happened last night…’

‘Bugger!’ Robin cursed at himself as he went to pick up the phone and the answering machine automatically shut off. ‘I’m not gay,’ Robin stated harshly and matter-of-factly before Jack had time to say anything or continue his persuasive babble. ‘Okay…’ Jack replied timidly, as if to not scare Robin away.

‘Then way do you insist so!’ Robin demanded desperately. The boy stood up on the sofa and bounced on it nervously.

No answer, then a cough. Then Jack’s cocky voice. ‘You kissed me, if memory serves.’

Robin felt himself grow pale. ‘You started,’ he stammered.

‘But then stopped. And then you started again…’

Robin started saying something but choked on it and stopped. He could almost hear Jack’s grin through the receiver. It seemed then a stream of words broke the damn of Jack’s lips and just came flooding out, crashing against Robin’s ear. ‘I understand, you’re not gay. I’m not either. I don’t see why you have to say it every two seconds, because I’m starting to find it offensive, and I really don’t see what it has to do with anything, and blah blah blah…’ Robin tried to drown out his voice with the silence of a safe place in his head, but inside his head that little voice was disporting again, and screaming throughout his mind at the top of it’s little lungs, ‘any sex is good sex, any sex is good sex!’ Jack wouldn’t stop, nor would his goddamned head, and he felt his hands trembling. His body felt as if it were flowing up and down a roller-coaster, and he felt a few seconds away from vomiting. ‘Shut – up!’ Robin screamed suddenly, quieting both Jack and the little voice. Both awaited his next words expectantly. The boy who just moments ago had demanded attention was suddenly at a loss for words. ‘I…err… you see, I, umm…’ The little voice was unimpressed. Robin glared at it and tried to gather his thoughts. ‘You see, I’m…confused…’

‘Okay…’ Jack breathed.

‘And you’re not making it any easier,’ Robin told Jack sourly. ‘And umm… I was a little drunk last night and… err… see, impulses are weird things… err… But you see my point is.’ With that the air positively rang with expectation. Robin felt his hands were shaking. ‘My point is…’ He searched the room for something that would help him. Damn it. Nothing. ‘My point is…’ Robin sighed deeply and pouted at his sneakers treading the already soiled sofa. ‘I don’t have a point…’

Jack sighed into the speaker. ‘I see,’ he said with almost startling understanding. There was a pause in which Robin felt horrible about himself and very embarrassed about not having a shockingly reasonable point. He always made very good points. ‘Want to meet for pizza?’ Jack offered, the last trace of cockiness evaporated entirely.

‘Sure,’ Robin shrugged and fell onto the sofa, defeated. ‘What time?

The two boys met at the local pizzeria, the one the gang always went to. But it was Saturday, and there was little to no chance of meeting any of the lazy bastards there. They ordered a medium pizza of pepperoni and cheese and shared it, along with two Root-beers and some chips—which was a far better breakfast than the one Robin had had that morning. However good breakfast/lunch may have been, Robin seemed to be sulking through the whole of it. Somewhere halfway through, Jack asked between greedy gulps of pizza and soda, ‘You’re confused?’

There had been silence the entire time they had been eating, and the sudden broken stillness made Robin jump slightly. As he managed to register the words, small jets of colour shot into Robin’s miserable face. The blush suited him, made him look alive and pretty, rather than the deathly pale he had grown accustom to. ‘I—yeah…’ he admitted quietly.

‘What about?’ Jack insisted gently. He wasn’t just a nosy bitch, and wasn’t just asking because he thought it was polite or proper to persist. He did it because he was genuinely curious and concerned. He honestly cared about Robin, and the boy currently seemed to be going through a genuinely difficult time.

Robin seemed to struggle for words. ‘You see…it’s hard for me, Jack. See, it’s like this—’ All the while he spoke, he peered around the pizzeria for anyone who might be listening. ‘All my life I was sure of this one thing, you know. I was sure I was this thing. Not only that, but I knew I was this thing. I couldn’t be anything else. I knew what I was, that is what I was. There was no doubt about. At all. No doubt in my mind whatsoever. Never. No doubt. And now… For the first time in my life I’m really that certain anymore if I am this thing. The first time. Never before. And I hate it, Jack.’ Here he looked him hard in the eye, his grey eyes seemed cold and stone like. ‘I hate not being sure of this one thing I always knew I could rely on, because it was the one and only thing that was real, you know? That was true. I knew that. That was the only thing I knew that was really true. But not now… No, now, it might just be the exact opposite. And that fucking scares me shitless.’ He breathed out as if he had been trapped underneath a fallen bookcase for days and the firemen had just now come and lifted it off him. Jack was extremely impressed.

‘Anything else?’

‘Yes, actually,’ Robin smirked morbidly. ‘I…’ He hesitated, not liking the look of a group of rowdy teenagers. ‘Can we speak hypothetically here? See, I have this friend. And he has a friend who’s not entirely straight and has dropped lets say an abundance of hints that suggest he fancies him, that is, my friend.’ His cold grey eyes narrowed and Jack received the specific message of something like ‘don’t you dare in anyway imply that my friend is me’. Robin continued. ‘But my friend doesn’t know what to do. He’s confused… Because he isn’t sure about himself anymore, so he can’t just turn away, but he can’t really go ahead because it might just be the biggest mistake of his life. And my friend, you see, asked me for advice, and I… don’t know what to tell him…’ His voice lingered in a hopeful kind of way.

‘I think…’ Jack began, then paused, then took a few bites from off his pizza and said, ‘I think you—that is, your friend… shouldn’t do anything. For the meantime,’ he added, catching a glimpse of Robin’s expression. ‘He should just…wait it out, you know. Let things run its course, see where the friendship takes them…Then we’ll see after that.’ He shrugged and smirked at Robin’s discrete gape. He finished his pizza and emptied his soda. Robin had a small stomach and only finished a slice and a half, along with only half of his extra-large drink. Though he always only drank half or less than that of extra-large drinks, he always ordered those, because he liked the option of having as much as could be offered if he wanted it, though he never did. Jack, instead, received a sense of accomplishment with finishing his drinks and meals, which is why he always went to the maximum of everything—accomplishment helped him to feel like a person some times. Robin didn’t need small senses of achievement to feel like a person; he felt like a person most of the time anyway. And sometimes he wished he didn’t. Feel like a person, that is. Because he didn’t really feel like he truly was one. Most of the time, at least.