Chapter Four

I was standing in front of the full-length mirror trying to figure out if I looked good enough for my date with Seven. I was wearing a red button up shirt (top two buttons left undone) with a black and white striped cardigan and both had the sleeves rolled up thanks to the absurd weather. I had settled on loose grey skinny jeans and my favourite pair of shoes, black and white oxfords.

A shy boy with white blond hair, expertly swept bangs that just touched the tips of his lashes stared back at me. His turquoise eyes wore guilt, but his Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, hoping it could make it all better.

"Ready for your hot date?" TJ snickered into his palm like the bastard he was. He was eating a bowl of cherries and his lips were stained bright red making him look even more amazing then he already did. I watched him carefully as he popped a cherry into his mouth and then spit out a clean seed with not a strand of cherry flesh on it.

"Just shut up." I grumped.

"Oh, oh, oh! Ryan, look at this!" TJ cried like a child before show and tell. He took one of the cherries with the stems on them and waved it around so I could see. He rose his eyebrows suggestively before letting the cherry roll around on his full red lips.

"Is this some kind of lip-porn?"

"Shut up and watch."

"I don't want to watch this." TJ grunted. He popped the cherry into his mouth and then spit out the seed. Then I saw some movement behind his lips because his tongue bulged delicately in his cheeks. And then he held out his pink tongue and there was the cherry stem tied into a knot.

"What the hell?" He held out the stem so I could see it. He plucked the stem off of his mouth and put it on his hand so I could examine it. It was tied so perfectly, I couldn't believe he had done it with his tongue.

"Mason taught me." TJ said proudly.

I nearly choked. Mason wasn't exactly the hook-up king so I wonder how the knowledge came to him. Maybe he learned because he was an only child. I had overheard Mason remarking to TJ that when you're an only child you have plenty of time to yourself to do things. I guess Mason practiced tying cherry stems with his tongue whenever he felt lonely.

"Well I gotta go." I spritzed a few sprays of cologne on both sides of my neck, behind the crooks of my knees and over my head. "Wish me luck."

"I'm going to tell Holiday." TJ's turquoise eyes narrowed. His mouth was in a smile, but his eyes weren't. I doubt that he was just joking. TJ may be close but there was a rivalry. And then he smiled with his eyes and I felt a little relief wash over me.

And then he strolled toward me and brushed my hair out of my eyes. His eyes got serious and his mouth got soft the same way it always did when he was about to kiss someone. He grabbed my shoulders and whispered in my ear; "You're going to be a wonderful lover, Brian."

And then we laughed until I felt like grew abs. TJ had abs, but not me. He hugged me tightly and then before he had time to leave the room with a cherry scented flourish, the doorbell rang.

TJ and I fought to get out of the bedroom and luckily his bowl of cherries had been placed on the counter or else they would've been thrown to the floor. I grabbed the back of TJ's 70's basketball shorts (He was obsessed with those things. He has a pair in every colour and combination imaginable) to keep him from advancing. I guess I had grabbed his underwear too because the perfectly rounded tops of his butt gleamed at me.

"Stooooop!" TJ cried between laughs.

He shoved his finger so far up my nose my eyes watered and with me temporarily blind, he ran down the stairs, pulling up his shorts. And then his leg buckled beneath him and he bounced down the stairs on his butt. He collapsed at the foot of the staircase in laughter. Tears rolled down his cheeks and he was doing that laugh where your mouth is open but no sound is coming out.

I gingerly walked down the stairs, stepped over TJ and carefully opened the door. Seven was standing on the doorstep, grinning from ear to ear. It was the prim and proper Seven who greeted me at the door. "Are you ready to go?" He held out his arm like a gentleman, but I didn't take it. I'm not all for public displays of affection. Besides, what if someone out of my tiny circle of friends saw me with Seven? They would tell Holiday and then Holiday would've been so angry he would probably run across the Pacific Ocean just to wreak havoc.

"Stay alert, stay safe!" TJ cried from the living room. He then ran up to Seven with his eyes all fluttering about in that ways of his when he's really excited. He pressed a condom into Seven's hand and I nearly passed out from shock.

"Get lost!" I screamed and slammed the door shut behind me. My cheeks were burning now. Seven was smiling as though he thought the whole thing was funny. I was sure he was going to look at me like a freak, but he was willing to look past that.

"So where are we going tonight?" I asked Seven. He and I were walking down to the movie theatre which was called Silver City. It was only two blocks away so the walk wasn't going to be all that horrible. It was still July now and the days were sticky and hot. At night it got a little cooler, but not very much, just by a couple degrees. All of a sudden I was regretting my double-layered outfit.

"The movies. We're seeing-"

"Harry Potter?" Ever since the finale of the film franchise came out, everyone I knew was giving it rave reviews. Hunter had seen it once and snuck into it at Silver City three times to watch it again, and after every time he told me it was honestly one of the best films he ever saw, ever.

"No. Uh. . . Silver City has this little thing where they play classic - or old - movies every week. The tickets are pretty cheap and I got us some for Hamlet; the 1990's one with Mel Gibson."

"WHAT THE HELL? You said you had tickets!" I wanted to scream but I restrained myself. Mel Gibson? I think he might've made racist comments, but I don't really keep up with celebrities. Let alone old leathery ones like Mel Gibson.

"Well, we did read the book in summer school English." I said politely.

"Yeah. My brother is a total Shakespeare freak." This was a first. Up until then, I had never heard Seven ever mention his family or life at home. I was intrigued now.

"You have a brother?" I asked, raising a brow? The side-walk we walked on was right next to an extremely busy road which always had cars streaking past on it. I remember TJ, Dad and I were walking on it to Chapters on a rainy day. One of the cars fish-tailed and nearly drove up onto the side-walk and Dad didn't hesitate to put himself between the car and me. For the rest of the walk Dad told us to walk on the part of the side-walk farthest from the road and it was the most self-less thing I had ever seen.

Seven rolled his eyes. "I have four brothers and two sisters." His arms were left bare by his pale green cardigan and his freckled forearm brushed against mine.

"Well you're parents sure banged them out, didn't they?" I said with a little laugh. "I have two brothers and two sisters and sometimes I contemplate laying down in the road. I couldn't imagine your situation."

Seven and I laughed. "Are your brothers as cute as you?"

I shuddered at the thought of having to evaluate Klaus on sexual appeal. Everyone knew TJ was so hot Abercrombie and Fitch would die for him to model on their bags, there was no second guessing that. Though, I didn't want to tell Seven that TJ was my twin brother. What if he started harassing TJ? TJ has a boyfriend, after all.

"They're my brothers! I can't tell you if they're hot or not! Do you want me to sound like some incest filled freak and be all like 'Oooooh my brothers are so hawt!'?" I asked him. His finger-tips brushed past my knuckles and I shoved my hands in my pocket. I didn't want to risk touching him again. It brought back memories of when Holiday and I had first started going out. That flutter I got when his hand would brush past mine; it felt a lot like that.

"Yeah, pretty much," Seven nodded. "I was thinking you and I could start a band. We could call it Seven and the Babe because I'm Seven and you're a babe."

"You must have the logic of a seven year old if you think I would ever be in a band with a name like that."

"So if I changed the name then you would?"

"I'd give it thought."

"Good! So what do you play?"

"I know some stuff on the piano so I guess I could play the keyboard." "Why don't you sing?" I turned red. From the time when I was four up until I quit when I was fourteen, I was in this all-boy choir for a cathedral in Toronto. We weren't even Catholic but the choir director begged my parents to let me be the choir because he needed my voice. Normally we wore blazers during casual mass but if it was a special occasion we wore dark blue gowns and little ruffs. I thought it was so embarrassing and thought it was terribly tedious but TJ was apparently jealous. He wanted the attention I had gotten. When I had turned eleven that was my prime as a choir boy. The choir director was always praising my voice and telling the others to listen to mine as an example and he gave me more solos then I knew what to do with. I think it was because I was the only boy soprano, not because I was actually good. When puberty hit my voice dropped just like I dropped the choir from my life.

"I can't sing." I croaked.

"My foot you can't sing. You talk like you have a nice voice." Seven looked at my forearm and followed it down to where my hand was balled up in my pocket.

I've always thought that movie theatres were magic buildings. They were so tiny, but then there were these ridiculously gigantic rooms with huge screens and rows upon rows of comfy seats. Fitting one in such a small looking building was magic, I could never fathom how they got ten in there. Now that I'm older, I know better, but I don't want to lift the veil of magic my childhood had left.

Once we got to the movie theatre Seven held open the door for me and when I opened my Jack Skellington wallet (the awesome one with the chain that hooks to your belt loops) he pushed the money away. "The tickets are cheap enough. I'll pay." He whispered.

Seven escorted me to a completely empty theatre. There wasn't a single soul in the whole place. It was like that one time that Mom, TJ and I went to go see the Polar Express three months after it came out.

"It's too packed in here, huh, Ryan? We're gonna be lucky if we get to sit on the stairs." Seven joked. He followed me to the place I always chose when I went to see movies. The very top row of seats and right in the middle. Those were the best because no one was dangling their feet on the back of your chairs and you could see the whole theatre laid out before you.

"I'm going to go get popcorn and stuff, alright?" Seven had waited until I was sitting down before he announced that.

"I'll come with you." I began to sit up and then he pushed me down by my shoulders gently.

"What if someone takes our seats?" Seven couldn't even say that with a straight face. He was trying but it looked like he was chewing a wasp and the corners of his mouth twitched.

"Like who? The ghosts?" I gestured toward the empty seats. "And if you say yes to the ghost thing it's over. You can't leave me in a ghost filled movie theatre."

"Ryan, I finally got you to go out with me. I just want you to relax and have a good time. So let me do this for you, okay?"

"Okay," I sighed. "But if you buy me that red slushee that tastes like cockroaches I'm going to sit on your back and use your body as a toboggan to go down the theatre stairs." I called after him as he jogged down the stairs.

"How do you know what cockroaches taste like?"

"Don't test me Seven! Your back looks like a comfortable toboggan seat! I'll do it!" I screamed after him.

"Is that a promise or a threat?" And with that I heard the theatre doors close.

I sighed and slumped down into my chair. I remember my history teacher had said if you used a flashlight you could see bedbugs in the chairs. Bedbugs were gross but I didn't care that much. I wanted to enjoy this night, even if that meant having to watch Mel Gibson in tights.

My phone vibrated and I didn't hesitate to pick it up. "Hello?"

"Hey Ryan, what's up?" It was Holiday.

"Uh . . ." You know. Just sitting in the movie theatre with a guy that likes me while you're all the way across the Pacific on another side of the world waiting to come back me see me. "Hanging out."

"I'm just polishing my medal." And then he chuckled. "Honestly, I'm just chilling in the hotel room. My coach says I should get some sleep because we're getting flight tonight which is tomorrow morning for you guys. I can't sleep 'cause I'm so excited." I wanted to smile but at the same time I wanted to burst into tears. He was eager to come home. He'd probably give me some expensive souvenir and then kiss me and tell me how much he loved me. I couldn't take it. The guilt was too much.

But then again, it's not like I'm going to let Seven kiss me. It'll be just two friends on a little outing. No big deal, right? "I saw your performance. You were so amazing!"

Holiday chuckled sheepishly, then he sighed heavily. "Thanks. Did you see when I fell?"

"When you tried to do the quad? Yeah. I know you're going to get it one day, okay? At least you tried. They nearly killed Evan Lysacek for winning the gold medal and not attempting a quad."

"True." I heard the sound of keys clacking in the background. "I've booked the hotel for us the Tuesday after I get back."

"Today's Friday! That's so close!" I felt like the magic movie theatre was closing in on me. The walls were bowing toward me and the person talking in the commercial took on a distorted sound.

"What's wrong with that? Why do we have to postpone it forever?" Holiday asked. It was almost like he was whining.

"I just think . . . what if I'm not ready?" I squeaked. What if it was all uncomfortable? What if it hurt? How was I supposed to tell Holiday I didn't like it? Or worse, what if he liked it and I didn't? Just thinking about it made my palms sweat.

"Then we don't have to do that. We can do other things that will still leave your purity intact." He giggled naughtily and I could hear him smirking through the phone.

I had nearly forgot. All of a sudden Tuesday didn't seem to weigh so much for me and I felt much better. In fact, I was down-right excited. Holiday could've told me that he was booking the hotel for tomorrow and I would've still wanted it to be sooner.

"Oh, yeah! Good. We finished Lord of the Flies in English class." I told Holiday and he snickered on the other end.

"How'd you like Piggy's death?" Holiday had spoiled the ending for me the moment I had told him that I was reading Lord of the Flies he told me that Piggy died and I wanted to choke him.

"It was so stupid because you ruined it for me before I read the book. But they were so mean to him, cracking open his head with the rock!"

"And then in the 1990's movie Roger said he didn't know it was going to kill him, but did you see that rock? That was one hectic rock!" Holiday and I started to laugh just as Seven came up the stairs with the food.

"I'll call you back, okay?" I said to him. I knew it was Seven even before I saw him because there was pretty much no one else that was coming into these theatres. "I love you."

"I love you more." And for a moment, I didn't doubt that for a second. "Bye." The line went dead and I shoved the phone back into my pocket. "Seven, what the hell! Why did you just get one bag of popcorn? And one drink? At least you got some candy I like." I cried, pointing at the box of jujubes.

"Well I was thinking we could be getting all snugly watching Ophelia and Hamlet kiss. You'd be in the mood, but you are far too shy to say anything so when our hands meet in the popcorn bag, I won't let go." Seven explained as he sat the popcorn in my lap and began unwrapping two straws. "And this one drink has two straws. Yours is green, but if you drink from my straw it's okay. It'd be like we sort of made out."

I face-palmed.

And then the movie began. It was typical boring movie stuff. The camera moving over a boring landscape and clunky dark castle. 1500's funeral procession and then King Claudius rubbing dirt over old Hamlet's body. And then ugly old Gertrude enters the picture with some cloth strap that goes around her chin, whilst she cries fake tears. And then Mel Gibson as Hamlet strolls right on in wearing black clothes.

I read a Hamlet manga back in grade nine and they depicted Hamlet as pretty hot which I don't say much about guys. But there was something very off-putting about Hamlet/Mel Gibson's beard and close cropped light brown hair. Not how I thought Hamlet should've been at all.

I turned to Seven who was immersed in the movie. The wide screen was reflected in his brown eyes. "Did you really get this play when we read it in English class?"

I liked Shakespeare. In grade ten when we did Macbeth I was getting nearly perfect on every single test and I actually understood it. Hamlet was so much more different. I understood some of it, but I really couldn't wrap my head around it. "Not so much."

"Yeah me too. I was so happy when we finished it." Seven said. Just as he said that Gertrude walked into the room with Hamlet. They talked for a little, Gertrude sounded like she was moaning every word that she said. Then Hamlet got on his knees and Gertrude followed him. They talked and then Gertrude kissed his forehead in motherly affection. Then his eye-lid and then she wrapped her lips around his and they sucked face for a good two minutes.

"WHAT THE HELL, MAN!" I screamed. I turned to Seven. For the whole play Hamlet was griping about Gertrude and Claudius getting married, saying that it was incestuous. And then he goes swallowing his mother's lips! What kind of dumb logic was that? "Was I the only one who saw that, or did you see them kissing too?"

Seven nodded, his torso shaking with giggles. He took a big sip of our drink and then a handful of popcorn. "Should we get out of here, or what?"

"And go where, exactly?"

"To another movie theatre. We can sneak into Super 8 or Kung Fu Panda 2 or Bridesmaids," Seven suggested with a full mouth.

I looked at him for a bit, studying my options. What if we went outside and we got caught? What kind of date would we have then? They'd kick us out of the theatre and the next movie theatre was a good hike away.

Seven scrunched up the popcorn bag and shoved it underneath his shirt. He noticed me looking at him, alarmed and then he smiled. "I've got to be stealthy."

"You look like you're eight months pregnant."

"Shut up. I can't sneak across the hallway trying to balance a bag of popcorn in my hands," He insisted.

I stood up and Seven held out his hand. "I'll escort you down the stairs, m' lord." He looked so ridiculous with his potbelly and his hair all slicked back. I wanted to laugh.

"Just put your hand down. I can walk down the staircase myself." And to punctuate all that, I jerked my left hand in the opposite direction and nearly tumbled down the stairs face-down.

We couldn't be bothered to be running around the hallway checking each and every theatre to see what it was playing. We just darted into the theatre directly across from us, and luckily it was Kung Fu Panda 2. It was pretty enjoyable. Seven and I only touched hands twice in the popcorn bag.

The night was pretty much complication free. At least until Seven was walking me home and stopped in front of my door.

"Well, I had fun," I said. He was standing in front of me with his hands clasped behind his back. He was studying me carefully. It was like he was looking for some sign that would let him know it was okay to make his next move.

"Yeah me too," He said breathily. "We should do this again, shouldn't we?"

I sighed. "Seven, you know we can't." Seven had to know that this was just a one-time thing. I was never going to do this to me, Holiday or him ever again. Even though I never cheated on Holiday, I still felt like I did. I couldn't go around sneaking behind Holiday's back no matter how harmless it seemed.

"So what was this? A pity date?" He cried. He looked defeated and I couldn't bring myself to say anything more. Should I hug him? Should I run back into my house?

"I'm sorry, Seven." Against my better judgement, I put out my arms to hug him, but he was motionless. The closer I got to him, the more still he became, until he looked like a despondent statue. All of a sudden he grabbed me by the collar of my shirt and pulled my face toward his. He kissed me so hard, it felt like his teeth were going to push mine in.

I was so shocked, I couldn't move for a moment. He still had my shirt collar bunched up in his fists and I pushed him in his chest, trying to get him away from me, but he was strong. He grabbed my hands and held them over my head and pressed me to the side of the wall.

"Stop! Get off of M-mf!" I tried to scream but he kissed me again. His tongue darted forcefully in my mouth and I wished that I could become nothing so I wouldn't have to go through it anymore. I wished that my spirit could float out of my body and come back when it was all through. I didn't want this. Was this it? Was he going to what I thought he was going to do? Right in front of my own house too. He wouldn't. He didn't have the nerve. Seven Evans couldn't be that type of guy.

He pulled away and kissed my chin, and then the left side of my neck. And then it felt like he was biting into my neck and my eyes blurred with tears. Was I bleeding? If felt like it. I felt like he was going to pop my flesh between his teeth, but when the pain escalated to a point where I couldn't help but whimper, he pulled away.

"Explain that to your dumb boyfriend." He looked at me with his eyes, they were flickering with anger. His wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and stormed off.

I ran back into my house and locked the door behind me. The kitchen and the hallway were pitch black and the only light was coming from upstairs. That meant Mom and Dad were going to bed for the night.

I jogged up the stairs and I was intercepted by TJ. "Ooh, How was your- WHOA!" TJ's turquoise eyes grew wide and his slender finger pointed toward my neck. "You said you weren't going to kiss Seven."

I sniffed and wiped my eyes on my sleeve. "What? What's there?" I pushed past him and we filed into the washroom. TJ and I both looked into the mirror and his eyes were focused on my neck.

Already turning purple, there was a hickey forming on my neck.

There were so many complications for this chapter. First I forgot to publish it on Thursday, and then I was having a mini anxiety attack over how Seven behaved in this chapter. The next update will be published on Friday. Or at least some time around then ;D -VladGirl13