Page 92 of The Villains of Winter

“Sex never felt meaningful before you.” James asked him if that made sense. Elliott had been his sexual awakening that James could even be attracted to another man. He spoke with candor. “I am bicurious and I want to explore it with you.”

Throughout his life, James was reckless with romance and sex; he’d never had to earn it, therefore he was careless with love given in his hands. He had entirely platonic friendships with men–Knox and Finch–without any non-platonic feelings or subliminal romantic intentions with them. Elliott was his revelation.

His curiosity was insatiable.

James asked, “I needed you to know that. What do you think of it?”

James found himself shy in front of Elliott all of a sudden. Would Elliott want to continue an explicit relationship with him? He’d been physically naked in front of Elliott before, but he’d rarely been internally naked with him.

He feared what he might say.

Belatedly, Elliott realized James had come out to him. “Every part of me wants to explore the curiosity within me with you.”

He was bicurious as well. Good. “I’m glad.” James sounded relieved, he’d been worried that he imagined their mutual desire in his sensual frenzy.

Elliott didn’t know what he experienced was bicuriosity. There was no word for it in him. He never thought of his sexuality before. Sexuality was not something openly spoken about in Banebury, Connecticut.

Homosexuality wasn’t condemned, neither was heterosexuality expected. It was deemed rather brash, young, and attention-seeking behavior to declare any sexuality. Even weddings were quiet affairs. Marriage was meant for prestige, it had very little relevance with sexuality. Sexuality was the one of the rare internalities in Banebury that one could hold sacred only to oneself. No one else had to know one’s sexuality, it belonged only to them.

As inchoate feelings of romantic intimacy arose in him, bicuriosity arose with it.

“When did you know?” James asked.

“When you kissed me in the laundry room.” Elliott reflected on it for the first time. “When did you know you were bicurious?”

James’s entire face pinkened. He considered lying at first. “After I drank of you on your bed, you gazed up at me sweetly.” I was smitten. I was irreversibly taken with you.

Elliott felt as though James opened a new universe to him. Emotional attraction mattered to him most. As long as his heart was in it, he knew the love would feel right.

As far as James was concerned for himself, James was Elliott-sexual. All he knew was Elliott.

Elliott gazed up at him with adoration and it only reminded James how much Elliott looked up to him as an upperclassman. Elliott venerated him.

“Elliott, you can’t look up at me like that.” James pressed his hot breath against his ear. “It makes me want to fuck you. Hard. I can barely restrain myself around you.”

“Fuck me then.” Elliott liked the thought of trying it himself afterward. “I want to be inside of you.”

James smirked in return, “I’m versatile.”

​​ CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

JAMES WAS INTOXICATED WITH SENSATION. Infatuation. His mind was tangled in Elliott when Kitty spoke to him, her words piercing through his thoughts like a javelin.

“You’re wearing someone else’s cologne.” Before James could mention it was perfectly normal to borrow a cologne, Kitty went on. “You’re wearing his ties with the teeth marks in them. You’ve never worn his ties before. You’re with him. You’re sipping his college mug instead of yours, even though you don’t drink high-sugar energy drinks. You’re trying to hide the fact that you’re with him. All of his exes did the same thing.”

“His exes?” James tripped over the soil. James led her through the beautiful prairies of campus. That afternoon, he wanted to surprise her with Elliott.

For their final year of high school, the prospective students that applied to the Crucian League as psychology students were secluded together for the year to examine every aspect of human psychology with each other. Where they somehow became even more pretentious as they psychoanalyzed everyone, further armed with scholastic knowledge. Before Kitty left for the year, James thought to reunite them at least once. Now he couldn’t speak under her direct gaze. His tongue tangled.

“Are you dating my brother?” Kitty asked at last, excitement consuming her eyes. Elliott found happiness?

James cleared his throat. “That’s not the surprise.”

Elliott was smitten, and it was written all over his face in cursive. A calligraphy of love. James always believed himself to be surreptitious, adept at secrecy.

He hadn’t anticipated Kitty deciphering him.

Kitty was rarely wrong. She was right about the drinks. He hated the erratic, hyperactive energy drinks, it felt like lightning buzzed beneath his skin, but he loved the taste of it on Elliott’s mouth every morning.