Fay and Dondre

"Two pounds?!"

"I'm exaggerating," she soothes, tucking the rest of the keychain into the cupholders between us. "I probably should let some of those go though, huh? Still have my first set of house keys on there from a place I don't even live anymore."

"Which one?"

"The sunflower one, with the night sky background."

I study it, and get lost in thought while pressing it solidly into my hand.

"What are your plans? After graduation."

I look back up at her and let the keys slip back into the cupholder. "Same deal. Although I feel like, once I get out, I'm not gonna want to go back for my Masters."

She smiles slyly, tired eyes flickering over to mine. "Don't worry, I'll hold you accountable."

I smile a lot harder than I need to at that.

...

Fay

One week after we turn the final project in, I sort of have an answer. Just go with it. Fuck it all. And fuck him, too, that's the most important thing. Fuck him repeatedly.

After the first of my finals, I find Dondre taking the last of his stuff out of the lockers in the Honors student lounge, and hesitate to walk in. I don't know if I was looking for him or not. I step inside and do my best to ignore the blood rushing in my ears.

"I do like what I see."

"Huh?" He straightens up, looking confusedly over at me before understanding. His smile comes in slow, but strong. I can't return it; my heart is beating too fast for me to concentrate.

"I knew it," he cheeses, reaching a hand out to me and drawing me closer. "Where you want our first date to be?"

The nervousness breaks, and I giggle and peck him on the lips, but he catches my face and holds me there. I blink, the fluorescent lights above making it seem like he's got me under a spotlight.

"I want a real kiss," Dondre tells me. I smile and nod, all too eager to please if it means standing in his arms a second longer. He lets go of my face and I pop up against him, feeling his arms wind around my waist as a warm puff of air from his open mouth enters mine.

"Mm," he murmurs in approval, turning us towards the lockers and gradually pressing me back into them. He keeps taking long, strong pulls from my lips, pulling back to look at me every once in a while.

I'm trying to play my part, but when he starts shallowly dipping his tongue in and out of my mouth, I start feeling a haze cloud my mind, and heat seeps hot into my blood like warm honey.

"You okay?"

It takes a moment for me to register that he spoke aloud. He's panting, hands no longer at my waist but kneading at the backs of my thighs, the shadowy valley of skin where the heat of my arousal is starting to pool.

I nod, smiling frailly, and pull his head back down to mine for more. This time around I'm pliant in his arms, and dazed. I don't know why just kissing him feels so good.

He grips the bottom of my ass and I make a sound in my throat that makes his gaze darken. I want it to grow desperate over me; right now I feel like a butterfly pinned against a corkboard. I snake a hand to the front of his jeans and cup what's there, and his body shudders over mine.

...

Dondre

"Whoo, okay, Fay. You skipped like two bases." She nods giddily, still pressed against the gray metal and beginning to push her hips against something that isn't there. Yet. But I gotta stop.

I keep falling further and further into her, the soft sighing breaths and warm skin. She's so... I don't know. She's open to me. I keep imagining what she wrote, what she would do with me. How bad she wants all of me.

But her laugh in my head is even more vivid, just bouncing around with remembered glimpses of her squinting, smiling eyes. If she spoke now, she'd have that grainy huskiness in her voice that I've gotten to know in the later hours of the day; the one that pulls at my stomach.

Her fingers flex around my dick, pulling me back, and it finally becomes too uncomfortable to bear. I reluctantly pull one hand from where I'm teasing her, unbuttoning and unzipping my pants on a sigh.

I go back to crowding her against the wall, only to hiss against her lips when she makes first contact.

"Better?" she asks, her first words in a long while. Her voice is husky just like I thought, low and private.

I nod, looking for a joke to cut the mood, but I can't help but lean back into her, the soft heaven of her fingers wrapping around my dick and the wet sounds of her lips. I trace my hands back over her ass, deeper to where the cleft of her lips are, and feel her breasts jump with her intake of breath.

I can't stop myself. I'm gonna fuck her against these lockers, and I hope nobody walks past because I'm not stopping for them.

Her thumb and forefinger circle the head of my dick, and I grunt against her lips, regaining some clarity with the urgency that it jumps with in her grasp. "Fay, we gotta stop."

"Mmhm," she sighs, finally finding purchase on my leg to run her hips over. The heat from between them is almost overwhelming, and probably just as wet, if I decide to fuck around and find out.

I bring my hands around and press them into her hips, pinning them back against the lockers. Maybe without the grinding, we can stay like this a little longer. "Stay there, please," I tell her, closer to begging than she probably knows. Her eyes are unspeakably deep, and I imagine diving into her and not coming back up for air, not until I'm drenched.

Our lips aren't meeting anymore; it's just her pumping her fingers around the head of my dick, I realize. I'm beginning to roll into her grip, and she's just smiling complacently, head cocked back against the lockers with me vainly trying to finger her through her jeans.

I feel everything building.

...

Fay

A hand appears next to my head, the dull thump echoing down the empty row of lockers.

"Fay, stop it."

I jump like I've been burned, pulling my hands from his unbuttoned jeans and shrinking against the lockers behind me. "Okay."

His hand slides down from the metal to my shoulder, nestling under my jaw. "No, sorry. I just- I- we can't do this here," he says frantically, searching my eyes for answers he doesn't have.

My gaze sort of helplessly slides down towards the rigid pole I had almost worked out from his jeans. He follows my gaze and runs his hand up and down my side apologetically. "I couldn't stop if we started now," he says more than a little bashfully.

I blink, and all at once remember where we are. A ten by ten room with orange carpet, two dingy couches, and a short-circuiting microwave. "Shit."

Humor floods back into his eyes, even through the strain I see on his face. "You had me fighting for my life, girl, I gotta be careful where I ask for a kiss next time."

I'm expecting shame to flood in, but there's just an overwhelming sense of satisfaction, mixing with the want I have for what's still hard and hot in front of me. "I guess so," I smile, lips now puffy from his. "You gonna let me go?"

He swears and steps back, looking towards the cracked door as he tries to adjust himself to fit down his left pants leg, then just flips it up against his stomach and arranges his clothes loosely around it.

"That looks painful," I add, unhelpfully.

He glances up at me and sneers. "No shit." I hold back laughter, but actually feel a little bad. I want to offer to help him get rid of it. In fact, I think about it intensely as he ties his jacket around his waist and swings his bag over his shoulder.

"I could-" I begin. He shakes his head before I can continue, lips pressed together like an old man's. Again, I'd laugh if I didn't have the sensation of his fingers attempting to drill into me at the forefront of my mind.

"We need to leave this place before I find out exactly what you 'could' do," Dondre tells me firmly. I move to walk next to him and realize just how ready I was and still am for him, my lower lips gliding against each other slickly as we make our way down the hallway.

...

Dondre

I'm almost mad at her, as she matches my hobbled stride so easily. I don't touch her at all as I walk her to her car, and when she asks if she'll see me again this weekend, I tell her I'll text her later tonight.

I don't know if I sound cold, but it's all I can do. I could've dragged her into the two bathrooms we passed on the ground floor, or shoved her into the supply closet across the hall from where we had our last class and peeled those fucking jeans off of her to get at what I know I need now.

She drives off, and I autopilot to the bus stop, through the twenty minute ride home. I walk past the living room where Jazz is asleep with his head on Pharrell's chest. Pharrell waves at me and I nod, hearing him turn down whatever he's watching, probably content to settle down under Jazz and stay there all night. I wonder if they're official as I close my bedroom door behind me, pulling my sad withering dick out of my pants and cradling my sore balls.

A tepid shower does nothing for it, not even when the water runs frigidly cold. So I pull my phone out, feeling like trash as I pull up the pictures I took that day. I look at my name on the blurry screen and imagine her saying it; needlessly forcing her down onto my bed and driving into her from behind while she screams it loud and long.

My dick swells back to life again in my hands, and I rummage through the drawer next to me for Lubriderm to make my fist feel like what I voluntarily rejected less than an hour ago.

Those lips were so warm. I could've made her kneel, stretch them around me while I hammered everything I had into the back of her throat. Instead, I eventually spurt hot heavy ropes across my shirt, grunting with a jaw clenched against a much louder, weaker-sounding moan.

...

Fay

The shame comes in as I finally find a parking space, walking into the squat little house I share with Lily and feeling the cool, wet, and unattended space between my legs greet the cold air.

She's gone again, as usual, either with her boyfriend or her sister. I still feel weird walking into an empty house, even though I should be used to it by now. I was going to move back home after graduation, but maybe I should just get an apartment and find a roommate. One that'll actually live with me.

I step into a scalding shower and think, for the millionth time, about just calling him over. I know, obviously, it was a good call to step away and not fuck in the student lounge. I just want to know why he didn't ask to come over tonight. It was even dark enough to make it work in the car.

But if he didn't want to, he didn't want to. Why didn't he want to?

I step out of the shower and still feel the fevered heat running across my nerves. He was surrounding me in that little room, and still he was the one shaking. I was sure of that. I wanted him to fall apart in my hands.

I don't think I was being pushy... I distinctly remember him making the first moves, after that first kiss. Maybe he was joking about a date, maybe he just wanted to know that I was attracted to him. He just didn't know just how attracted to him I actually am.

As I envelope myself in my blankets against the cold, I resolve that he doesn't want me in the same way. Maybe he didn't want to hurt my feelings by taking something he didn't really want.

Or is that low self-esteem speaking? I don't fucking know. I feel the heat centering itself back between my legs, and note that the ache in my stomach never went away. But... kind of as punishment for being so greedy... I ignore it.

...

Dondre

"You look like shit."

"I know." I shiver at the frigid air sapping heat from my face, having just splashed cold water on it and brushed my teeth. Jazz watches me raid the fridge for the last yogurt and the apple juice that Pharrell ordered but never drank from pizza night.

"Rushing?"

"Yes."

He flips his eggs almost in slow motion while I chug my juice, drops threatening to spill over my lips.

He speaks again, a few moments later. "What happened last night?"

I stop my search for the last pack of ramen to look at him. "What?"

"Pharrell said you came in all angry, looked like something got you tight. I know you got class with Fay, so I figured I'd ask," he shrugs, nonchalantly. "You good?"

I lick my lips, mouth suddenly dry even though my empty bottle is still in my hand. "I'm a dick," I tell him.

He blinks. "Never known you to be a dick."

I shift back into action, finding two packs of noodles behind Jazz's minute rice and stuffing them both into my bookbag's side pocket. "Well, something in particular about this one girl makes me one, I guess."

Jazz's face finally splits into a smile, eyebrows rocketing up to his hairline. "Don't that mean something?"

"And this is the convenient point where I hustle out of the room because I'm about to be late," I mutter, leaving him to peacefully slide his eggs onto slightly burnt toast.

I sit beside her in Hammond's lecture. She barely turns her head to acknowledge me, and the pit of my stomach drops to see her profile. She might be angry. I was supposed to text her last night; I should've said something after the way I acted.

I don't pay attention to anything until Hammond walks up to us and gives us our individual score charts. An A for me, and at least an A for Fay, from what I can see over her shoulder. It prompts the first smile of the day from me and Hammond continues on, patting me on my shoulder.

"You both worked great together this semester," he says aloud, and I see Fay's whole face for the first time today as she beams up at him. She doesn't look at me though, instead concentrating back on the front of the class like she's got blinders on.

I hurt her.

...

Fay

I'm too fucking embarrassed to even say a word to anybody today. Overnight, that little bit of doubt turned into mortification, and I woke up with a gutful of shame. Just threw myself at him so easily and smiled goofily as he turned me down. I'm so happy we only have finals left.

I almost sprint out of that room when Hammond gives his little nod of dismissal. I'm trying to pretend Dondre doesn't exist... it was made easier by the fact that I didn't have to stare at his head for ninety minutes. Now I just have to hide somewhere on campus.

"Fay."

"Fuck," I grumble, not as under my breath as I had hoped to go.

"What?"

Dondre falls into step with me, his long legs eating up the ground as I attempt, then quickly give up outpacing him.

"What's up?"

"I'm sorry I didn't call you last night."

I feel betrayed by myself as tears threaten to prick at the corners of my eyes. I force them down, feeling ridiculous. "It's all good, Dre," I smile. "Probably woulda gone south anyway."

He's silent for a beat as we wait at the crosswalk. I wish it had been our second lecture so I could've just ducked straight into my car. "What you mean?"

I hurry across the broad white lines in the road, wishing he'd go away, feeling my voice get thick. "I dunno, I didn't... I don't think you... want..."

As soon as we get across the road my keys are snatched from my hand. "Let's go," he says gruffly. The pit of dread in my stomach is unbearable as he grabs my empty hand and pulls me towards my car.

"Get in, Fay," I hear. He's brought me to the passenger side, and I don't object to it. He turns the engine over and cranks the heat on, and I watch my hands fumble in my lap.

"I'm sorry I flipped last night."

I look up, determined to keep it together. I have too long a history of falling apart to hope for it, though. "You didn't flip."

He looks at me, face mournful and unsmiling. "I didn't even want to touch you. I didn't want to touch you just now."

I blink, eyes probably shiny. "Are... are you actively trying to make me cry?"

"NO, no, Fay, listen... I was about to drag you off anywhere I could. I had to go home and... I didn't want to do it like that, not with you. You had to know how much I wanted you. Want you."

His eyes won't meet mine, which is understandable. I probably look like I'm about to burst into tears. But, the thrill his words are giving me are teasing at my senses.

"I wouldn't have minded."

His eyes shoot up, brows low over long lashes.

"I wanted you," I say with more emphasis. "I almost threw a fit driving home."

He shakes his head, eyes boring a hole into the center of my chest now. "I have to tell you something."

...

Dondre

There's no logic in telling her now. We have another lecture to attend, the third to last class we have here before we graduate. She's already about to cry, how would she even drive home? Why am I making her cry?

She's waiting for me to continue.

"I knew you liked me already."

"...Well, good for you." she says morosely.

I feel that I Am Garbage feeling come over me again, the one that's been plaguing me since I started talking to her.

"Fay, I read what you wrote about me." Everything goes silent. I just stare at the rise and fall of the letters on her hoodie, unable to read the whole word.

"You left the drive open on your account in the computer center one day, and I saw my name and I read it. I already noticed you before then, but... the day I talked to you, asked you out for coffee? That's... that's the reason. I think."

I see the bottom of her face bobbing in and out of my vision. She's nodding. "Easy target."

"Fuck no. It didn't make you easy, Fay. It just..." I try to clear my throat. "What you wrote about me made me want to be around you, and it made me want to... please you. Not just in a sexual way. And it sounds really creepy out loud. So fucking creepy. Because knowing you wanted me made me hot as hell too."

"What does that have to do with you flipping on me last night? Do you think it earns you points?"

She doesn't have anymore tears in her voice, but she sounds so cold. I've probably lost her, but I just want the truth out at this point.

"I've felt like shit since I started talking to you. Which I should. I wanted to tell you that I knew from the first day, but I was a coward, because I just knew it'd all be over then, you'd never give me the time of day." I take a breath. "It's all over anyway, I guess. Just... I hurt you now a lot more than I ever would've if I had just fucking said something that first day."

I hear a shaky inhale and exhale, and wonder what would've happened if I just never opened my mouth, just let myself sink into her warmth. I see the letters on her chest jump and look up to her face. There are no more tears in her voice because they're trailing down her cheeks. She's crying silently and holding back from sobbing outright. How was this the right thing to do?

...

Fay

"Thank you for telling me. Can you leave, please?" I know he's watching the tears stream down my face, and I can't pretend I'm not damn near fatally wounded by his confession. I watch him unfold himself from the driver's seat and walk back across the street. I don't know where to.

So. I muse to myself with a wet face, knowing it's useless to clean up until the tears stop. It'll just make my face red and swollen, I know from experience.

He'd seen me before, maybe made note of the little things that were attractive about me. Never thought about me beyond that. Came to the same computer as me one day, read my childish, simple admission, and decided it was the best chance he'd ever get. Or no, that's not how he saw it.

He said that was the reason he asked me out for coffee that day. Was it also the reason he kept speaking to me, and being nice to me, and asked me if I liked him? Was it the reason he kissed me?

By the time I'm done crying, I have forty minutes until the next lecture starts. It takes me thirty-seven to decide I'm not going.

...

Dondre

She's not in class. I walk stiffly to my seat and think about why I even showed up.

My leg won't stop bouncing as Hammond passes out a last review of the topics for the final, wordlessly handing me two. I feel tears prick the corners of my eyes and can't stop seeing the tears on her face. I sat there and told her the truth, and I didn't even say sorry.