The Holt Conundrum

fourth april

It's April and Holt meets Ben.

I never brought Ben to our apartment, partly because I'm worried about them meeting and also because Ben doesn't have a roommate so when we do get together we don't have to be quiet about it.

I don't see myself having noisy sex with Holt in the apartment.

I thought Holt would be gone for the day, so Ben came by in the afternoon, and now we're making dinner and Holt suddenly walks in.

"Hey Boo, I'm starving do you wanna order Chinese?" he announced as he walks into the kitchen and then he kinda freezes when he sees us, or well, Ben.

And suddenly I feel super stressed out and I don't know why. It's not like I owe anything to Holt when it comes to my boyfriends. I can bring any boy I want here. It's not like he's catching me cheating, but it kinda feels like it.

"Hi you must me Holt, I'm Ben," he immediately introduces himself, ignoring Holt's deer-in-a-car's-headlight expression, and he's all smiles.

Holt takes a second too long to answer, sort of blinking slowly. "Hi, nice to meet you."

"We're making Pad Thai. If you're starving you can join us, there's plenty of food to spare," Ben adds.

And finally Holt reboots and he slowly smiles and agrees and suddenly I'm sitting at the counter eating with Ben and Holt and it's just weeeeeird.

Nothing bad happens, they're both smiling and chatting and they seem to be getting along, but there's just something off and I can't quite put my finger on it.

After we're done eating, Ben helps me clean up and then gets ready to leave. He need sot wake up early tomorrow so we already agreed we wasn't staying the night.

We kiss goodbye with Holt sort of lurking behind in the hall.

After I close the door behind Ben, I turn around and roll my eyes at Holt. I want to slap him in the face with a glove, like some eighteen-something stock character wearing a shirt with a ruffled neck and tights.

I walk pass him.

He follows me. "I don't like him."

I stop. Turn around. "What?"

"Why aren't you guys boyfriends yet? He should have mentioned something. It's fishy. I don't trust him."

Ugh. Stupid Holt. This is none of his business. "Vaginas are fishy. Ben is a babe and he's not the only one in the relationship. I haven't brought up the boyfriend thing either. Am I fishy?"

Holt scratches the back of his head and he can't quite look at me in the eyes. "Look, there's just something off about him, okay."

"What?" I press. I swear to god...

"I don't trust him... And since you've started seeing Ben, I don't know..."

"What?" Sometimes I really want to shake Holt and tell him to use his fucking words.

"It's like I barely see you anymore," he admits.

Holt is like a single child that's just gotten a new sibling. That's all this is really. He's annoyed that he doesn't have all of the attention anymore. He'll get used to it. "Well, that happens when someone get themselves a boyfriend. Get a girlfriend, we'll double date."

I don't know if I really mean that. I haven't magically stopped being attracted to Holt because I'm seeing Ben. I haven't stopped loving him. That's never going to happen. I've had a couple of inglorious moments when I've thought about Holt while being with Ben. I'm not proud of it. But I think I'm getting better now.

And sure, the prospect of seeing Holt with some stupid girl isn't that exciting to me, but it would be better if we were both in relationships.

"You just said he's not your boyfriend though," he points out.

I throw my head back in annoyance. "Jesus Christ Holt."

I'm gonna punch him. Maybe not right now but it's gonna happen soon and it won't be pretty. Shouldn't he be happy for me? I'm his best friend.

"Ben makes me happy, that should be enough for you," I tell him.

"He's going to hurt you, he doesn't deserve you."

"Ugh, Deserve. That's such a disgusting concept. It's a cop out to use when you have no good reason to not get with someone."

"Well then, he's not good enough for you."

Uuuuuugh. "Ridiculous concept again. He's quite good to me. Now if you'll excuse me, I have bed sheets with bodily fluids to go wash," I tell him and walk pass him to my room.

I'm not sure why I said that exactly, why I tried to get him mad or jealous. It's not like that's going to magically change his sexual orientation.

I'm just petty I guess. And I'm angry that he's reacting like this. Holt is never going to date me so why should he care about whoever does?

Holt stays hidden in his room for the rest of the evening.

And I worry about how my relationship with each boy will affect the other.