ANTHONY’S POVAs soon as we – Blake, Claire, Dante and I – stepped inside school the next day, I could tell that there was a dynamic shift in the way things used to be. Dante, Luke and Blake walked like they didn’t care about the stares that people were giving them. Claire was texting furiously on her phone, completely unaware of the environment she just walked into. I seemed to be the only one who was anxious and worried about the kind of backlash Blake and his crew were sure to get for humiliating the guys on the team by not showing up to their party.It was all over the students’ forum, how Blake ditched the party in favor of the arcade. I had no idea who took the picture, but there was a colored photograph of all of us in Playmates, the arcade close to the amusement park that Claire liked to go to. Their gazes said it all; Blake Lindell has forsaken the basketball team.“Frustrating piece of shit!” Claire’s rage filled but tiny outburst distracted me from the faces of the students
BLAKE’S POV“Were you aware that your teammates were having a party after school today?”Anthony was pretending to be focused on whatever he was doing with the clay in the Clay Room and was not looking at me. I would have attributed that to the fact that I was too handsome to look at and if he did people were going to see the love in his eyes, but the fact that it was just us two in there made me cross that off my list of reasons why my boyfriend had been ignoring me since I came to drag him to the cafeteria.“No, I wasn’t.” His response was short and curt. Even when we were not talking to each other, he never responded to me like that. I must have done something to piss him off. He once told me I had the tendency to piss people off without even meaning to.My mouth opened to call him ‘sweetie’ but I stopped halfway through when I remembered he said I shouldn’t call him that in school. To be honest, that stung a little, and also when he didn’t let me kiss him in the parking lot earlie
ANTHONY’S POVIt felt like the first day of first grade all over again, except this time, my parents weren’t trying to pry my fingers off the hinges of my father’s car door after dropping me off.I was wearing Blake’s (new so no one would know that I spent the night with him) clothes and one of the new pairs of sneakers he got me for Christmas. My stomach was doing jumping jacks like a professional and I wanted to throw up every single drop of water I had chugged down this morning at Blake’s insistence. Since my parents were STILL not worried about me and hadn’t bothered to enquire about my whereabouts, I had crashed over at the hotel Blake’s father set us both up in the moment we got back from Boston. The only downside to having to sleep on the same bed with my boyfriend was the fact that his father dropped in on us every five minutes to ensure we were keeping it PG 13 even though he masked it up by saying he just needed help figuring out how to maneuver the new website for our count
BLAKE’S POVAnthony was acting weird. Don’t get me wrong, the kid was weird on a regular, but he was acting weirder than usual. He didn’t eat a single thing after the topic of that kid from conversion camp was brought up and I noticed how tensed he got when my grandfather said he didn’t think being gay was natural. I think that scared him a bit, but I couldn’t be certain if that was the main reason he was throwing up in the upstairs bathroom immediately after desert was served when he didn’t even eat anything.“Sweetie? Are you alright in there?” He had locked the bathroom door the moment he got in, hindering me from following him inside. I was forced to wait outside while I listened to him hurl out his insides in the toilet bowl.There was no response, but a few moments later, he unlocked the door and opened it for me. His face was damp and he smelled like toothpaste.“Are you okay?” I asked as he walked over to the bathtub. It was filled with water and my grandma’s bath soap that sm
ANTHONY’S POV“Tony! It’s so good to see you again. How are you?” I embraced Marlene, Blake’s grandmother as she hugged me. She didn’t smell like a grandmother (cookies and cream and mothballs). She smelled like the mall at Christmas mingled with sandalwood and a bit of old paper. “I am so glad you’re joining us for Christmas this year. I haven’t seen you in almost three years.”“That would be my fault,” Blake said and hugged her after I did. She gave him a big, wet kiss on his cheek and I thought that she may not smell like a grandmother, but she did act like one.“We are having a few guests over to dinner with us tonight. I’m sorry, but most of them are old boomers like myself and your father.”“Hey!” James whined in protest. “I am not old. I am barely touching forty.”“Dad, everyone here knows your age. Lying about it just makes you look pitiful.”“I don’t think you’re an old boomer,” I said and I meant it. Marlene Lindell was sixty-something, but she didn’t look a day over forty.
BLAKE’S POV“We will be spending New Year’s at your grandparents’ house. We’ll be there for just two days so I expect you to be on your best behavior, Blake.”“Dad, when have ever not been on my best behavior at grandma and grandpa’s?” I batted my lashes at him and smiled. He gave me a flat look.“No mention of your suspension from school or that you put someone in the hospital. Again.” Tony grinned sheepishly and ate a spring roll. He was so adorable, I wanted to bite him.“Also…” There was an awkward pause as my dad looked from me to Tony. “If you can just keep it quiet about your relationship while we’re there, that’ll be great.”Silence. Uncomfortable silence that did not sit well with me.“You don’t think they’ll be cool with me dating Tony?”“To be honest, I don’t really know what your grandparents view on LGBTQ is but I do not want to spend this New Year finding out about it. I’m not saying you should hide it forever; I’m just asking that you not make it obvious while we’