Oh Boy! (BL)

14 - The Love That Is Not One (2/3)

"Oh, well, we didn't mean to keep our love a secret for much longer, you know!"

Nonsense.

"Of course, it was love at first sight!"

Nonsense.

No matter which words left Holland's mouth they had been - and would always be - absolute nonsense. So, of course, I had volunteered to get the four of us some water when Cooper began wrapping up the interview. While waiting for the vending machine to spit out the last of the four water bottles, my thought kept drifting back to the interview I just had survived. For more than thirty-five minutes, she had told us stories about her and Clay's perfect relationship. She even made up a fairytale-like story about their imperfect-turned-perfect first date at Bob's diner. If I hadn't been so repelled, I would've been impressed by her creativity.

Clay's contribution to the feature article had been limited to murmuring an encouraging yes or uttering a vehement no whenever he disagreed with a part of Holland's stories or one of Cooper's questions.

All of this was fake...and yet, we were going to publish it.

It felt wrong; for more than one reason.

Careful not to move my right arm too much, I reached down into the vending machine with my left hand. The cool surface of the final water bottle had just made contact with my palm when an amused voice made me look back up.

"I thought you could need a helping hand." With both hands in the pockets of his light blue jeans, Clay was strolling down the empty hallway towards me. His hair was a stylish mess, and the navy long-sleeved shirt embraced his muscular chest perfectly. He tilted his head with an amused look on his handsome face. "But I guess you can handle it just fine."

I followed his gaze to my hoodie's front bag in which I had stuffed the remaining three bottles. Since I could only use the arm that did not disappear under my hoodie, I'd had to become creative. I bit my lip...yeah, I looked like an emo-kangaroo.

Still, Clay took the final bottle from my hand like the gentleman he was.

"I thought you wanted to look through the answers again?" I wondered on our short way back to the office.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him shrug. "It's just a stupid article." I knew Holland had a different opinion on that... "And...well...I wanted to ask you something."

We ground to a halt in front of the editorial office. Even though the door was closed, I could hear Holland and Cooper argue, though no details got through to me.

"What did you wanna ask me?" I asked quietly.

"I'll tell you if you look at me."

Sighing, I raised my eyes after a moment.

"Better." Clay smiled. "And now tell me: do you have plans for this afternoon?"

I blinked. "Today?"

He lifted his brow.

That's what he said. Gosh, get yourself together, Ken!

I opened my mouth to answer him, but Cooper chose that exact moment to rip open the office's door. "There you are! I'm dying of thirst!"

I hurried to take one water bottle out of my front bag, but instead of just taking it, Cooper carefully pulled me back inside the office.

"Take a seat, there are only ten minutes left to take a first look at the outline." With one hand on my healthy shoulder, Cooper pushed me down on the rightmost chair and sat down next to me in front of the computer; leaving Clay with no other choice but to sit down next to Holland.

Uncomfortably, I took out the remaining water bottles and passed them along while Cooper was already babbling about the feature's outline.

I kept quiet when he told us about his plans for the upcoming photoshoot, and when he read out the fake answers to the interview that I'd scribbled down on my notepad. I got a look at a lot of red annotations that Cooper must've made while I'd been at the vending machine.

Everything went smoothly, and I was almost certain that we'd end this any minute so I could ask Clay what he wanted to ask me when the school bell ended the lunch break.

Clay practically jumped up from his chair to leave for his next class, as did I...or I tried to. But Holland was waiting for me in the hallway where she grabbed me by the collar and pulled me...right into the girl's restroom.

There were no girls in there, thank goodness.

With a heavy frown on her pretty face, Holland pushed another envelope against my chest. I grabbed it before it could slide to the ground. "One thousand for him talking to me, as promised."

The only thing I could do was nod like an idiot.

Holland sighed. "I don't think that this will work, Ken."

I blanched. "What?"

"Oh, please. Even a nerd like you should've noticed that we didn't click at all!" She whined and turned to look at herself in the large mirror over the line of sinks. "Not even when I talked about that stupid author he likes."

Well...no wonder they didn't click when one of the things she did talk about was their shared love for...J. R. R...Martin...and his Harry Potter series...

*shudder*

I gulped. "So...?"

"So?" She snorted. "We'll finish the feature and that's it."

That's it...

I yelped when I stumbled against the bathroom wall because my legs suddenly gave in. But the pain in my shoulder was nothing compared to the panic slowly building in my mind. "What...what do you mean?"

Holland didn't even bother looking at me when she turned around to leave the bathroom. "That, little Ken, means that our deal is off."