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Pajamas
Author's Note - Yes, another one-shot. I'm trying to finish all my previously-started short stories before the end of the year. There's only one left after this, so, yay? And then a longer piece, that I promised, probably starting in January.
“I always behave!” I told him, making a fair attempt at being innocent. Derrick scoffed. He knew what I was thinking about – or he thought he did. Okay, he knew that I was thinking about his totally sexy twin brother, Daniel. Yeah, they're twins, so technically Derrick and Daniel both had the same striking black hair and gray-green eyes. They were both the same height – 5’11”, a whole three inches taller than me – and about the same build, not quite skinny, but not fat or really muscular either. But Daniel… he had that sexy emo-swish hair that hung over his right eye and tight jeans and he was hot. Derrick was nerdy, like I was, and he never really did anything to his hair, and he pretty much always wore khakis and polo shirts. We got along great, since we were both smart guys, and kind of geeky, but Derrick didn’t have that certain something his brother had that made him sexy.
“And you’d better bring an actual pair of pajamas this time,” Derrick warned, “I don’t want any of that sleeping-in-boxers thing. Fucking grossed the shit out of me last time.” Oh, yeah, and Derrick’s got quite a dirty mouth. Not that his brother doesn’t, but coming from Derrick, who looks like the kind of guy that would fix your computer or snort when he laughs, it’s kind of weird. Derrick doesn’t snort when he laughs, and he doesn’t have a clue how to fix computers, but he looked like someone who would.
“Well, it’s hot at your house,” I whined.
“No, it’s not. You just want my brother to catch you half-naked. Bring pajamas, asshole. We’re eating at five, so if you want food, you’d better head over,” he said.
“Okay, I’ll be right over!”
“Pajamas!” Derrick said before we hung up. I did the quickest packing I’d ever done, mostly because I love Derrick’s house so much. And I wanted food.
Something was burning when I walked into Derrick’s house. Obviously Daniel had gotten near the stove. He was sexy as hell – but he was the kind of guy that could burn water.
“I think we’re calling out for Chinese,” Derrick told me when I walked into the kitchen. Daniel was pulling a pan out of the stove. I couldn’t tell what it was originally, but it was charred as hell, and there was smoke everywhere. Luckily someone (probably Derrick) had turned on the fan, so the smoke was dispersing quickly.
“There’s nothing wrong with my garlic bread,” Daniel argued, “it’s just a little… black, that’s all.” He looked at Derrick, who just rolled his eyes.
“You can eat that piece of shit if you want, but Wade and I are having Chinese,” he said, “which should be here in ten minutes, since I was smart enough to order it when you turned that fucking stove on,” he added. Daniel pouted, and it was totally sexy. Everything that he did was sexy to me, though. Today, he was wearing a pair of skinny black jeans and a black t-shirt that said “My Chemical Romance and the Black Parade” on it in white letters. Daniel was a big My Chemical Romance fan. Our musical tastes were quite different (I lean more towards the oldies, like Elton John, the Beatles, and Billy Joel, if you were asking, which I know you weren't), as were our tastes in pretty much anything, but I knew that when Daniel and I got together, our differences would be sorted out and everything would be happy.
“And there’s the food now,” Derrick said as the doorbell rang. He went to answer it, and I stayed in the kitchen, watching as Daniel dumped his burnt garlic bread in the trash and put the dirty pan in the sink. I wanted to say something to him, something witty and interesting that would make him laugh. But I couldn’t think of anything.
Derrick reentered the room a minute later, with the Chinese food in hand. He set the bags on the table and started pulling out containers. Having been here dozens of times, I knew what to do, grabbing enough plates and silverware for the three of us. Each of us grabbed our own plate and started spooning egg rolls and fried rice and all that other greasy-but-delicious Chinese food onto the plates.
Daniel took his plate and walked upstairs to his bedroom, leaving Derrick and I in the living room, free to pick our own movie. I was kind of disappointed that Daniel didn’t want to stay with us, but I didn’t say anything about it.
“Oh, stop looking so sad. God, I wish you would get over that stupid fucking crush,” Derrick said, rolling his eyes and he plopped down on the couch. I curled up in the corner with my food on my lap and looked at him.
“You’re like a drooling school girl whenever Daniel’s in the room. Hell if I know what you see in him, but it’s really fucking annoying,” he said, sighing loudly, before he punched the play button and the movie started. I decided to keep my mouth shut and not argue with Derrick. I mean, he didn’t get that this wasn’t just a crush. I was in love with Daniel. You’d think he’d understand this. Hadn’t he ever been in love before? Couldn’t he see how perfect Daniel and I would be together? I ate my food, sulking just a little bit.
We watched the rest of the movie and ate our food in relative silence. Or, at least, I was silent. Derrick kept commenting on parts of the movie, like we always do. Except I was kind of mad at him from what he’d said, and I didn’t reply to anything that he said, and I ignored him.
The movie finished and Derrick got up to turn it off. He looked over at me.
“Stop sulking, Wade,” Derrick said, “and let’s go upstairs. I want to show you the new level I’ve designed,” he added. Derrick was a computer nerd in the sense that he liked using it to create stuff, and currently he was working on some computer game thing, and he always wanted to show me what he’d been working on. So, even though I was still mad at him, I took care of my plate and then followed him upstairs to his bedroom, taking my backpack full of my overnight clothes with me.
So we spent the better part of the evening looking at Derrick's new level on his computer game, which I didn't really care about, since I'm not a computer game kind of nerd. I am the kind of nerd that can read Emily Dickinson or William Faulkner and think it's better than sex. Not that I have ever had sex or anything, because, well, being an English-and-History nerd does not usually get one a lot of dates.
Eventually, I was yawning enough that Derrick decided I wasn't interested, and he said that we should probably go to bed. There wasn't any school tomorrow, though, because of the whole "weekend" thing, so it wasn't like we had to get up early the next morning, but I was kind of tired as it was.
I had brought pajamas this time, but conspicuously absent was my pajama top. I'm not saying that I forgot it on purpose, but if I happened to get up in the morning, and Daniel was having breakfast when I walked into the kitchen, there was the possibility of him seeing my naked chest and being overcome with lust for me. Well, it could happen.
"I thought I told you to bring fucking pajamas," Derrick said, as he pulled on his own pajama pants.
"I did," I said, "I'm not naked," I added, looking down to double check. Derrick rolled his eyes and rummaged through his bureau for a minute.
"Put on a fucking t-shirt," he said, tossing one at me.
"No thanks," I said, and threw it back at him.
"What is your fucking problem?" he asked, sounding a lot angrier than I had ever heard him sound before. This only made me defensive, because I hadn't done anything to warrant any anger from him, had I?
"I don't have a problem. You're the one yelling at me," I replied, trying to keep my voice calm because I did not want to get into an argument over pajamas.
"If you would stop fucking mooning over my brother, maybe I wouldn't have a problem. I don't know how many times I have to tell you that he's NOT FUCKING INTERESTED!" Derrick shouted this last part, and I was sure that if anyone in the house had been sleeping (namely, Daniel, because the boys' father was working most of the time) they weren't sleeping anymore.
"Why does it even fucking matter to you? Why do you even care who I like? If you got a problem with me being gay, then why do you invite me over?" I asked, because that was really the only reason that I could come up with for Derrick's outburst.
"It has nothing to do with you being gay. It's just that you're so fucking focused on getting my brother to like you that you don't even pay attention to what's right in front of you," he said, and then he said something else, but his voice was so low that I couldn't hear what he said.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," I replied, but I got a weird feeling in my stomach at the look on his face. He wasn't angry anymore, but there was something else there, and I couldn't tell what it was.
"Goddamn it, Wade, are you that fucking blind?" he asked, and before I could really figure out what was happening, he stepped up and held my face in his hands and kissed me. And I was so shocked that I couldn't do anything for a full minute, but he still hadn't stopped and I was thinking well this is nice. I let my eyes close and then his tongue was in my mouth and it tasted like orange chicken, which would be weird normally, except it didn't feel like it to me and I found myself kissing him back, and his hands moved to hold the back of my head. I didn't know what to do with my hands, and I just sort of rested them on his hips.
And then it was over and I was staring dazedly, into the face of my best friend.
"You kissed me," I said, because I couldn't think of anything else to say. I'll admit that I haven't had a lot of kisses in my lifetime, but that one definitely beat them all.
"I love you, Wade and I don't know how you couldn't see that," he said, and now he didn't sound angry, just defeated. I was definitely still feeling the aftereffects of that kiss. I mean, seriously, where did he learn that?
"Are you going to say anything or am I supposed to just stand here like an idiot?" Derrick asked, and the trademark hostility was back, though it was more annoyance than violent anger.
"How about you kiss me again?" I asked, and reached for him. Derrick took a step back and crossed his arms over his chest. I pouted.
"Please?" I asked. He rolled his eyes.
"Just like that, huh? One fucking kiss and you've changed your mind?" he asked, because he obviously didn't believe me. Well, I wasn't sure if I believed myself, but I did know that I wanted to kiss him again.
"Another one wouldn't hurt," I said, grinning, "why does it matter, Derrick? I mean, you're my best friend so it's not a huge leap into being my boyfriend. We get along, don't we?" I asked, tilting my head.
"I'm going to bed. You can sleep on it and we'll talk more in the morning," he said, and turned away to climb into his bed. As usual for me, sleeping over at Derrick's house meant a sleeping bag on the floor. So I crawled into my sleeping bag and waited for Derrick to turn the light off. He did, and I lay there, not the least bit tired, and mind still spinning from the kiss.
After what seemed like an hour, but was probably only five minutes of lying there with nothing to do except think, I unzipped the sleeping bag and got out. Without speaking, I stood up and walked over to Derrick's bed.
"Wade, just go to sleep," he said, rolling over to face the wall. I pulled the blanket back and slid in next to him.
"What are you doing?" he asked, twisting around to look at me. I just pulled the blankets up and tucked my arms around him.
"Spooning," I said, "And it's a much more comfortable way to sleep instead of on the floor in a sleeping bag." I nuzzled my head into the back of his neck, which smelled like soap. I could feel him tense up, but he didn't say anything to me.
"Don't worry about it," I said, "just sleep, and we'll worry about everything else in the morning," I told him. He shifted, and then he rolled back over and was facing me. It was dark, but I could see his eyes that were open, and he was looking at me. Then he smiled and put his own arms around my waist.
We fell asleep that way, and when I woke up in the middle of the night, our legs were entwined, and Derrick had a smile on his face. Yeah, this was definitely better than anything would be with Daniel...