Chapter 26: Simply Love

"See ya later," Travis kissed my cheek as we got ready to head to our respective homes. It was the end of another long & miserable day of school. We had decided to ditch the last few minutes of last period to meet up in the bathroom & just chill before being let out. I didn't know if he'd remember but this was the same bathroom that he had cornered me in that day he blatantly asked me if I liked him. I guess I would never know how well he knew me. Even BEFORE he really knew me did he already know I had liked him.

When I got home, I headed to my room & plopped down on my bed with my coat still on. After thinking for a moment, I stuck my hand down into the front of my pants & began to rub myself. I wasn't hard yet, & I hadn't even been thinking of anything. But hey, school sucks & I need a break.

Soon, I was fully erect & to relieve the tension, I undid my jeans. Still lying on my back, I fished out my hard member & started to stroke myself a bit faster now. I closed my eyes & went at it for a few minutes, every so often lifting my hips up off the bed. With my mouth slightly open, I started to breathe a bit heavier as I approached that oh so familiar tingling in my groin. I groaned softly as I started to reach orgasm. And as if some sort of curse from god, just as I was hitting climax...

I heard the front door open!

"Connor!"

I immediately stopped myself, but not before my body twitched in agony from being withheld from orgasm. I shuddered, turning my head into my pillow & moaning as I felt my tortured manhood throb in dissatisfaction & discomfort. I painfully grabbed at my sheets until my knuckles turned white & closed my eyes tight.

That's when I was reminded of somebody in the house. With a blur, I stuffed my sensitive boner back into my pants & buttoned them back up.

"I'm in my room," I called, my voice cracking.

A second later, I looked over to see Travis standing in my doorway.

"Hey," I said, a bit confused. "What's up? What are you doing here?"

He shrugged. "Eh. Decided I like ya too much to leave ya alone 'til tonight, so I turned around before I got home & came here," his eyes had a naughty little twinkle in them.

"Hahaha, so you're gonna hang out with me until then? What about when you need to get dressed?" I asked.

"Well, I'm gonna leave just in enough time to get ready at home. But otherwise, yup. I'm stayin' here for a bit."

"Well...." I began undoing my jeans again. "since you interrupted me during a moment of private time, you can help me finish what I started."

Travis walked over to the bed, climbed on &, pulling my head to his, brought our lips together.

*****

"God that gets better every time," I sighed as I closed my eyes, my head resting on Travis' chest.

"I try," he snickered.

"Not YOU, I'm talking about ME," I laughed.

"Ohhh you mean when you...ya know..."

"Mhm," I said proudly.

"That WAS pretty nice."

Just then, I heard the front door open. We rushed to get our clothes back on just in time to hear Chris come in, clearly with somebody. By the time they walked by our room, Travis & I sighed in relief.

"Good thing he didn't come in," Travis stated.

"It wouldn't be the first time he knew what we were doing," I blushed.

"Shit," he cursed. "I gotta get goin'."

"All right," I pouted.

"Don't worry, I'll see you tonight though."

With a soft kiss on my lips, Travis picked up his coat & walked out of my room to leave. I waited until I heard the front door close to get up & see what Chris was up to. I went to his room & could hear him & another person in there talking about something. I knocked on the door & heard him telling me to come on in.

"Hey pal, what are you up...to..." I stopped just as I saw who was with him. It was a girl. They were sitting on his bed side by side.

"Nothing," he answered. "This is Val. Val, this is my brother Connor."

"Nice to meet you," I smiled at her. She was a pretty girl. Short, curly brown hair & dark brown eyes hovering above two soft cheeks. I won't lie, I noticed she was a tiny bit on the not-so-tiny side. But that was ok.

"You too," she smiled. I liked her smile. It was....fun, if that could be used.

"So...do you need something?" Chris asked.

"No, just saying hi. Wanted to see who you had over."

"Ok. Well now ya know," he quipped.

"You guys need anything?" I asked, now wanting to be obnoxious.

"No, we're good bro, thanks," Chris glared at me, knowing what I was up to.

"Sure. So how do you guys know each other? Same classes?" I said, leaning against the doorway.

"Yeah, we're in the same art class. I mean, we KNEW each other before, but really only because we're in the same grade. Now we're getting to know each other a bit," Val replied. I liked her.

"Cool. What kind of stuff in art are you guys-"

"Connor," Chris grit his teeth. "We were about to work on some HOMEWORK so if you could, ya know..."

I nodded with a grin.

"All right. Well, I'll leave you two alone then," I said. And to top it all off...

"Behave yourselves."

I left before Chris flipped out & killed me.

Just then, my phone went off. Taking it out & looking at it, I saw that it was Travis saying hi. Geez, he was clingy.

Don't get me wrong, I loved talking to my wonderlicious boyfriend. But for now, I decided to take a nap & rest up for tonight.

**********

"Not quite a limo, but it sure beats walking," I joked as I got into the cab with Travis. We were both decked out in our snazziest suits & ties. I had on a pair of black pants and a suit coat with a navy blue button down shirt with a blue & green striped tie. Travis also had the suit with a black shirt & pearl white tie on. God he looked hot.

"Yeah well I had to save up to pay for where I'm takin' you," he smiled.

"Ooooooh. And where's that?"

He told me.

"Really? Wow, that's pretty...expensive," I said.

"Yup," he smiled.

On our way there, I decided to tell Travis of Chris' new potential love life.

"So guess what."

"What?"

"I think Chris might have a girlfriend."

"Yeah?" he sat up. "What makes you think that?"

"Well, after you left earlier, Chris was hanging out in his room with this girl Valerie. She's cute."

"What makes you think they're going out?"

"Well, they were like, as close as we are now on his bed & they were giggling & flirting & stuff. And plus, Chris REALLY wanted me to leave the room so they could 'study'," I finger-quoted.

"Aww, cute."

"Yeah. She's pretty. She's a bit...well, I guess that the thing. She's NOT 'just a bit' if you know what I mean."

He nodded. "Nothing wrong with that."

"Obviously. And it's a change from the idea that a girl's gotta be super skinny to be considered beautiful. Hate that about the world."

"Look at you," Travis said, scooting closer to me, "my little feminist."

"Stop," I chuckled. "To be honest though, I'm not sure if I like Chris having a girlfriend. He's still kinda young ya know? And what about if he starts having sex?"

"Well mom," he said, "that's his decision to make and yours to stay OUT of. But if you're really concerned, then talk to him about it. I mean you guys are probably the closest siblings of anybody I ever known."

"I guess."

We got to the restaurant after a little bit, paid the driver & got out. Walking inside, my heart secretly sank as I saw DOZENS of people waiting in line.

"Please tell me you got a reservation," I said to him.

"Don't worry, I made it like last week," he said. We walked up to the counter & told the woman that we had reservations.

"Sure," she replied. "It'll be about an hour & a half wait however."

Our jaws dropped.

"An hour & a half?!" Travis exclaimed. "But I made these reservations over a week ago!"

"I'm sorry sir, but even with your reservation, it'll take about an hour & a half. I can have some bread sticks brought over to you in the meantime if you'd like."

We looked at each other for a few moments, slowly deciding through our eyes if either of us really wanted to stick it out. Finally, we both shook our heads.

"Never mind. You can give our reservation to someone. Thanks anyway though," Travis told the woman.

We walked out of there. I looked at Travis. He looked so sad about the whole thing.

"Sorry babe...I didn't think even with the reservation would there be so many people."

"It's ok, really. Hey, maybe we can still find another place."

We saw our taxi still against the sidewalk. Guess the guy didn't have any new calls yet. We walked over, got in & reacquainted ourselves with the driver. Travis & I decided what place to try next. It was a less fancy, but still fancy, restaurant that my parents always talked about. They were spending the night on the Empire State Building this evening. So I didn't have to worry about running into them at this place. When we got there, there were still a ton of people. We told the driver we might be coming back, so to just hold on.

Walking inside, we made our way to the counter where the man in the suit looked exhausted.

"Excuse me?" I said. He looked up, sweating.

"Yes, hi. How can I help you?"

"Just wondering, how long is the wait?"

"With a reservation, it's an hour."

I sighed.

"And without...?" I said pathetically.

He shrugged. "To be honest kid, I have no idea. It's just...SO busy tonight I really don't know the answer to that. If you want my opinion," he leaned in & whispered "it's not worth it one bit."

I nodded. Turning to leave, I lightly took Travis by the hand & walked us back to the cab.

"Don't worry, we'll find a place," I said.

Restaurant after restaurant we searched. Every place was either not what we wanted, too busy or too expensive for what we had. I was sure Carlos, the driver (who by this time, we knew was divorced twice with four kids, living with his parents & working 3 jobs), was having a blast driving us around. After nearly a half hour of driving around the city looking for places, we decided to give up. We had Carlos pull over & drop us off. Travis was right when he said he could have easily afforded anything at the restaurant. But after all this, we spent nearly everything on the cab.

After the taxi drove off, leaving us standing there on the busy sidewalks of New York all dressed up, I looked at Travis. He looked so ashamed. I tried to help as we started walking.

"Well, I think Carlos is more screwed than we are. He can't even go home tonight to take out his third wife! Or is it his fourth?" I chuckled, attempting to cheer him up. Nothing.

"Travis, please don't be upset."

"Why shouldn't I be? I tried to do somethin' nice & have us go out to one of them fancy restaurants but I messed that up."

"You didn't mess that up at all."

"I didn't reserve it early enough."

I rubbed his hand with my thumb.

"Don't beat yourself up over it babe, really. I appreciate what you did. It was so thoughtful. And if it was ME who had made the reservations, wouldn't you be trying to make me understand I didn't do anything wrong?"

"I guess..."

"Right. So c'mon," I said cheerfully. "Take me on a walk."

We walked for a little while, neither of us saying too much. I couldn't tell if he was still upset about the whole restaurant thing, but I knew it wasn't his fault one bit. One thing I did regret though, was not having found a place to eat. I felt my stomach growl.

"I am awful hungry though," I said.

"Me too."

"What do you wanna do?"

"I dunno. I mean, even if we found a really nice restaurant that didn't have a long wait, we don't have much money."

We kept walking for a little bit. And then, as if by some miracle of the almighty, I happened to look up to see a big yellow 'M' jutting out from the line of buildings. I squeezed his hand a bit. "Travis, look."

He looked up.

We looked at each other. After a moment, we both smiled & began to crack up. We held each others hands as we bolted down the sidewalk.

***

Travis joined me at the small, plastic booth against the window. I moved my 20 piece chicken nugget, large fry & orange soda over to make room for his cheese burger, medium fry & milk shake. We started to dig in to our food before looking up at each other & smiling.

"And just enough money to give a homeless guy if we see one on our way back," he said.

I laughed. "Good."

"Sorry the night didn't turn out the way it was supposed to," he said. It was more of a general apology rather than an actual feeling of guilt however.

"Well," I ate a nugget, "I already had that feeling when that limo turned out to be a little shorter & more yellow than I expected."

He cracked up a bit & as we both laughed at the night, I raised my cup of orange soda, Travis following by holding up his cup of chocolate milkshake. As we mashed cups, I gave him a warm smile.

"Happy Valentine's Day Travis."

"Happy Valentine's Day Connor."

And it was the best Valentine's day I'd ever had.