I don’t know why, but it was difficult to face Jon the next morning. It was as if I knew something about his best friend that could shatter his life if he knew. Connor had been his friend for as long as I could remember. He had always been in my life, too. Connor was the main reason I knew I was gay.
Jon and Connor came into the bedroom after playing basketball all afternoon. Both were wet with sweat. Jon pulled off his shirt and announced, “I’m going to jump in the shower.” He then removed his shorts and underwear and then left the room.
Connor sat on the edge of Jon’s bed and talked to me. Mostly he asked me why I was lying in bed and reading a book. Connor was just beginning to grow taller, and his muscles were becoming very defined. As we chatted, he removed his shirt, showing off his tanned, muscular body. I tried not to stare, but I would get occasional glances at him as we talked.
Jon returned from his shower and told Connor he could take one. I watched out of the corner of my eye as he stood and pulled down his shorts. It was the first time I had seen him naked since he was about nine. I glanced over quickly at my brother to make sure he wasn’t looking before I watched Connor leave the room naked.
It was that day I realized I might be gay. Watching Connor undress made me excited. After that, I had the biggest crush on Connor. I had been carefully guarding that secret. I still can’t believe what happened yesterday.
When Jon drove up to Connor and Ross’s house, Ross ran out and jumped in the front seat. “Where’s Connor?” Jon asked.
“He wasn’t feeling good,” Ross explained. He then looked back and winked at me. I turned and looked out the window wondering why he had winked.
Ross and Jon talked about the football game that night. Jon was concerned about Connor being sick, but Ross assured him that he would be playing. I was surprised when Ross turned around and asked me if I was ready for my sleepover with Jeff. I couldn’t remember mentioning it to him.
“I guess,” I replied.
“If he’s lucky, he’ll get some,” Jon laughed. I started to respond, but Ross looked back and slightly shook his head. He then diverted Jon’s attention from my spending the night with Jeff by talking about a new cheerleader on the squad.
“I wouldn’t mind hooking up with her a few times,” Jon replied excitedly.
“Debbie would like that,” Ross said jokingly.
“What she don’t know won’t hurt her,” Jon laughed.
Ross laughed and said, “Yeah, but what she does know might hurt you.”
“Right,” Jon replied. Just then, we pulled up to the front of the school. When I got out, Ross opened the passenger door and climbed out.
“I’ll get out here,” he informed Jon as he closed the door. My brother shrugged his shoulders and pulled off.
As I started walking up to the building, Ross grabbed my arm and stopped me. He looked around to make sure no one was nearby. “We gotta talk.”
I looked at him suspiciously. “About what?”
Ross looked around again. “About what happened yesterday with my brother.”
My eyes widened. “He told you?” I almost squealed.
“Shhhh.” Ross grabbed my arm and led me into the school. “We can’t talk here.” I followed him down the hall toward the gym. He entered the coach’s office, and I watched as he talked to the football coach. The coach pointed to a door and Ross nodded. He then motioned for me to enter. I cautiously entered, nodded at Coach Ruffin and then followed Ross into a workout room. He turned on the lights, went over and sat down on a bench.
I walked over and sat down beside him. “About yesterday,” Ross began, “Connor thinks he messed up and made a big mistake.”
“He told you what we did?” I asked incredulously.
“Yeah,” he replied. “I’d told him to be careful, but he wouldn’t listen.” I just sat and stared at him. I didn’t know how to respond. I wasn’t sure just how much Connor had told him.
As if he could read my mind, Ross said, “Listen, it’s okay. I know Connor’s gay.”
“He told you?”
Ross laughed. “He didn’t exactly tell me. I caught him late one night on that website you guys play around on.”
“You know about that?” He laughed and shook his head.
“You got a nice body.” My face began to turn five different shades of red.
“It’s okay,” he laughed when he saw how embarrassed I was. “Connor and I share a bedroom, like you and Jon. When I saw him camming that night, he came out and told me he was gay and that he got off watching other guys on cam. We’ve talked a lot since then. I’m cool with it.”
“You are?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “Connor’s my brother. I love him.”
“You don’t care he’s gay?”
He smiled warmly. “No more than I care that you’re gay,” he laughed. “You are gay, aren’t you?”
“Are you?” I wanted to be careful before I came out to him.
“No,” he laughed. “I’m hopelessly straight.”
“So, you’ve seen me?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “I guess,” he replied. “Connor sits at the computer and does his thing. I usually watch television and don’t pay any attention to him.”
“He cams in front of you?” I couldn’t believe how open Ross and Connor were in front of each other.
He shrugged his shoulders. “Sure, why not. He's my brother. I've seen him naked all my life.”
“But...” Ross interrupted me.
“Anyways,” he continued, “He showed me this guy last week and told me he thought it might be you.”
“How did he know?”
“You gotta be more careful, Dude,” he warned. I gave him a puzzled look.
“Why?”
“Connor told me that him and Jon came in your room last week when you were in the bathroom,” he explained. “When he looked at the computer screen, he said he saw the chat room you guys are on.”
I remembered that night. I was afraid I had left my screen open when I heard Jon and Connor upstairs. Connor was standing next to my desk when I entered. There was nothing on the screen, so he must have minimized the screen before Jon saw it.
My face reddened as I thought about what Ross had said about watching Connor. “So you’ve watched us?”
“Naw.” I let out a slight sigh. “He had me look at the screen when he thought it was you. But naked guys aren’t my thing, so I really didn’t care.”
I was becoming puzzled over our conversation. If he didn’t care, then why was he making a point of knowing I was camming with Connor. “Why are you telling me all this?”
“Okay,” he replied. “That’s why I brought you back here so we could talk in private.” I nodded my head. “Connor doesn’t want Jon finding out he’s gay.”
“So he’s never told him?”
Ross started laughing. “Are you kidding? You know your brother.” I nodded my head.
“Anyways,” he grabbed my arm. “He’s afraid after what happened yesterday, you’ll tell Jon.”
“I won’t say anything,” I promised. “I couldn’t do that.”
A relieved look appeared on Ross’s face. “Good. I told Connor we could trust you. He’s not out and he doesn’t plan to come out until after college.”
“Me, too,” I replied.
Suddenly, I became puzzled once again. “What?” Ross asked when he noticed my expression.
“But Connor talks about girls all the time,” I said. “If he’s gay, then why does he date?”
“He has to,” he responded. “Don’t you understand?”
“Not really,” I said. “I don’t want to date.”
“But Connor is popular at school.” When he saw the sad expression on my face, he apologized. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. What I meant was Connor is a star athlete. Girls are always surrounding him. He dates, but he never does anything with them.”
“So that’s all bull in the car when he talks about having sex with girls?”
Ross laughed. “Pretty much.” I was thinking back to all the times he had talked about getting sex on the weekend. He had been lying the whole time so that Jon wouldn’t find out the truth about him.
“But he’s been with guys?” I asked.
Ross laughed. “He’s been with a few other football players on the team. No one knows about it, though.”
“Who?” I asked excitedly. Going to football games on Friday nights just became more interesting if I knew that several of the players were gay.
“Nopes,” he laughed. “I wouldn’t out them, no more than I would out you to them.” He laughed again when I frowned.
“Ask Connor,” he suggested. “Maybe he’ll tell you, but I won’t.”
Just then, the bell rang for first period. We had already missed our homeroom and would have to go to the office to sign in late. He stood and extended his hand to me, pulling me to my feet.
He looked at me and smiled. “I’m glad we had this talk. You and Connor are both great guys. I wouldn’t want to see either of you get hurt. Just don’t tell Jon, okay?”
“I won’t,” I assured him.
When we left the room, the coach was gone. As we walked down the hall, Ross reached out and stopped me. “One other thing,” he grinned widely. “If you and Connor do something, I don’t want to know about it.” He turned and walked down the hall laughing.
My mind was in a haze the rest of the morning. Jeff was acting like a giddy little girl in first period, but I tried to ignore him. I was still trying to improve my grade from that report I failed.
It was difficult to concentrate, though. I still couldn’t believe that Connor was Indyboi. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. When I first saw Indyboi on cam, he was a mysterious guy. I joined to chat and watch him on screen. It was intended to be just harmless fun.
But I know him. That changes everything. I couldn’t decide if it was better to know that Connor was my mystery boy, or if it would have been better that he remained a mystery. I really wasn’t sure I could cam since he knows who ElmerFudd is.
I was also confused by Ross’s comment about doing something with Connor. He has been unapproachable for years. He was a fantasy, someone I could close my eyes and imagine having sex with. Now, I can have sex with him. We almost did the other night. Everything had happened so fast. He was trying to have sex with me before Jon got back in the room.
But it did happen, and I’m scared. What if Connor asks me to have sex with him? He’s three years older than me. Ross said he has had sex with other guys. I wouldn’t begin to know what to do. He has to know I’m a virgin. Maybe he would understand.
And what if my brother finds out? What if we are careless? Things have to be different now. I can’t look at Connor anymore the same way I did. We've seen each other naked. How can we hide that from Jon? I'm glad Ross knows. At least we don’t have to hide it from him.
Jeff seemed to skip beside me on the way to my second period. We don’t have the same teacher, but his room is next door to mine.
“Where were you this morning?” He asked as we walked down the hall. “I waited by your locker, but you never showed.”
“Sorry,” I apologized, “but something came up and I got to school late.”
He looked at me excitedly. “You brought the games though, right?”
“Yeah,” I assured him. “I brought the games. But I don’t know when we’ll get the time to play them since I’ve got to help you milk the friggin’ cows.”
He threw his arm around my shoulder. “It won’t be that bad. Besides, we’ll have a chance to be alone.” I glanced quickly at him wondering what he meant.
I was walking to third period by myself when someone walked up beside me and threw his arm around my shoulder. I looked up into the beaming face of Connor. “Hey, Little Buddy. How’s things?”
“Okay,” I replied as I pulled away from his embrace. I knew that Connor didn’t think anything of it. I had seen him walking down the hall hundreds of times with his arm around Jon. But I wasn’t Jon. People would wonder why Connor was talking to me.
He stopped me and looked worriedly into my face. “We’re cool, right? Ross said everything was all right.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I looked around to see if anyone was listening to us. I leaned in and said softly. “It’s just kind of weird, don’t you think?”
He started laughing as we started to walk. “Weird, yeah, but in a good sort of way.” He looked over and stared into my eyes. “God, Woody, I’ve wanted you for so long.”
I stopped and looked up at him in disbelief. “Who? Me?”
He looked around and grabbed my arm. “Keep walking,” he whispered. As we walked, he continued to talk. “You don’t get it, do you?”
“Get what?”
He gave me like half a wink. “You’re really cute.”
“Me?” I shrieked loudly.
“Shhhh,” he said as he looked around again. “Listen, we can’t talk about this here. Like you know, I’ve got a game tonight. Can you cam tomorrow?”
I shook my head. “I’m spending the night at Jeff’s.”
“Right,” he said. He looked at me and grinned. “Are you and him..”
“No!” I replied quickly as my face reddened. He started laughing. “You’re cute when you get embarrassed.”
Just then a teacher hollered out, “Get moving. The tardy bell rings in thirty seconds.”
Connor asked, “I gotta go. Sunday then?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I’ll try.”
“Cool,” he exclaimed as we both started running to our classes.
Jeff was acting really goofy at lunch. Even Kate noticed it and gave me a couple of weird looks. “We’re going to have fun this weekend,” he said excitedly as he looked at me.
Kate raised an eyebrow. “What do you have planned? Any fun games?” I kicked her under the table. “Ouch!” She hollered.
“I gotta milk cows,” I told her.
I almost choked on my milk when Anna said, “You going to play with their teats?”
I looked quickly over at Jeff. “Oh, right,” he grinned. “Didn’t I tell you we don’t have a milking machine?” Kate was roaring with laughter at the astonished look on my face.
“You mean we have to pull on their utters?” I looked over as Anna let out a loud burst of laughter.
“It’s udders,” she giggled. “Not utters.”
I couldn’t believe it when Kate muttered rather loudly, “He probably wants you to pull on something else.”
It took Jeff a couple of seconds to comprehend what she had said. “Yeah,” he laughed. “Maybe that too.” Kate’s eyes flew open.
“What!”
I glanced at Jeff. “What!” I shrieked.
Jeff started giggling. “I’m just joking,” he said as he looked at us. “It’s just a joke.” Kate looked at me and wiggled her eyebrows.
Our conversation drifted back to the usual. Anna was obsessed over an algebra test. Everyone knew she would ace it, but it didn’t stop her from her fretting about it.
When the bell rang, we got up from the table. As we walked away, Kate leaned in and whispered in my ear, “You’re going to get some this weekend. I just know it.” She giggled as she looked at Jeff who was a few steps in front of us.
“Shut up,” I replied. I looked at Jeff’s back and wondered if I really would.