Suite Mates (bxb)

Chapter 12

Jame's POV

"I lied through my teeth for you!" I burst out, pacing the space of my tiny dorm room. Ryan was perched on my bed, filing his nails. Noah was spinning in his spinny chair, trying really hard to pretend that Ryan wasn't present.

"Thank you!" Ryan said with a delighted grin.

"No, not thank you! Jeez, Ryan." I sighed and deflated onto the bed. "I almost blew your entire operation with Derek yesterday. He knew that I wouldn't be asking about his emotional preferences without your influence. He asked me point blank if you put me up to this!"

Ryan tilted his head and gave me a blank look. He came to life when he suddenly began digging through his little bag, but it was just to grab lip gloss and reapply it. "I don't understand your concern."

"He knew you were involved!"

Ryan sighed and shook his head. "James, you're overthinking this. Why wouldn't I have put you up to that? I'm the one who introduced the two of you, just so you can talk about that stuff. I figured you'd be better at playing the part of a concerned friend."

Oh, right. In my own whirlwind of sex with Derek, I'd forgotten that in the end we were supposed to be 'bros'. As Ryan put it. I still wasn't sure why Ryan was allowing me to sleep with Derek, because it seemed counterproductive to his overall plan, but I would rather find a balance between bro and bed partner than ditch the whole operation.

"Oh," I said. At this point I'd thought about the situation so much that nothing was making any sense anymore.

"Yeah, oh. Goodness," Ryan huffed, reapplying lipgloss. Again. "So what did you end up telling him?"

"I told Derek that you told me that he needed to talk about that stuff to get it off his chest," I said in one long breath. This entire situation was doing loops inside of my brain.

"That's perfect! Okay, and now you're a close friend of Derek's right?" Ryan asked.

That was one way to put it.

"Which means he thinks that he has two concerned friends telling him that he's too emotionally distant!" Ryan finished, without bothering to wait for my answer. "It's perfect. It's so perfect!"

"It's fucking odd is what it is," Noah spat. "I still don't understand why you're bothering with this guy. He's literally not interested in you, pipsqueak."

Ryan huffed and crossed his arms, but I didn't miss the way he practically jumped to have Noah's attention. The two of them had an odd relationship, where they ignored each other for the most part, but were always ready to verbal assault each other.

"Go play your Fortnite," Ryan snapped. "I'm getting the man of my dreams."

Noah haulted in his spinning, which was when I knew it was going to go downhill. There was no way this would end pretty, but there was nothing I could do about it.

"No, you little freak," Noah growled, "you aren't. You're guilting James into weirdly stalking your best friend. Or supposed best friend. I can't imagine you're a good friend if you're willing to manipulate him like this."

"I'm not manipulating him!" Ryan huffed. He stood up off my bed and pointed a skinny finger in Noah's face. "Derek and James are friends now, what's wrong with that? And if Derek wants to give James some information, who am I to stop him?"

"You're fucking delusional," Noah snapped. "Get out of this room, pipsqueak the freak. You've overstayed your welcome."

Ryan made an irritated noise and stalked out, slamming the door on the way out. I turned to say something to Noah, but then Ryan poked his head around the door. "Thanks for all your help, James!"

And then he slammed the door again.

"Great," I groaned.

Noah rolled his eyes and turned back to his computer. "I actually am going to play Fortnite, so I guess we can give pipsqueak the credit for a good idea. For once."

"What's the deal with you guys?" I sighed. "I know what we're doing with Derek isn't exactly kind, but what do you care?"

Noah sighed and waved a hand noncommittally. "It's not you, it's not the situation. It's pipsqueak. He rubs me the wrong way for some reason. He's always in here batting his lashes at you and then talking about this weird friend of his."

"...Batting his lashes?"

Noah whirled around in his chair and gave me a deadpan stare. "James, don't be delusional. From what you told me, pipsqueak was bawling his eyes out because he got flat-out rejected by this guy. There's no way he's still chasing after him. Especially because he spends all his time talking to you about Derek rather than talking to Derek himself. He's after new meat."

It took me a minute to connect the dots, but when I did I was floored. "Wait, you mean me?"

"Yeah, genius. Ryan doesn't give a damn about Derek. He's after you."