Straight as They Come, Kinda

6: Making Cereal = Excellent Cuisine

It was hard for Peter to look at himself. He wanted to avoid checking out what the aching parts of his body looked like. But he couldn't resist the urge when he stood in front of the mirror and his t-shirt came off.

Purple bruises dotted his side. They hurt slightly when he poked at them with his finger, nothing too bad. They were probably the result of Kyle kicking him without abandon when he had fallen.

He turned his back to the mirror and looked at the damage done there. A long scrape reddened his back, from beneath his right shoulder blade to the small of his back.

Peter heaved out a sigh and faced the mirror again, bending over the sink. He cupped his bandaged hands under the faucet and splashed water on his face. It hurt and it had him wincing at the prickling sensation.

His left eye was marred by a dark splotch, even darker than the pools of blackness his eyes had. His right eye was swollen and the skin around it tender. He rubbed his scraped chin with fingers that hurt when moved too quickly.

With caution, he slowly unwrapped the stained, wet gauze from his hands and flexed his fingers.

He tugged at the basketball shorts and closed his eyes when he pulled off the boxers. His drawn face heated up when he thought about what Colin had said. I'm definitely burning this as soon as I get home.

After a warm shower, Peter got dressed in the clothes he had slept in- boxers included. He couldn't just walk around without underwear in someone's house, could he?

With tentative steps, he left the room and found himself in a huge hallway. His head lifted to the high ceilings as he walked along the hall. There were framed photos of a smiling blond-haired girl hanging on the spotless cream walls. Peter assumed she was Colin's sister, the nurse who had cleaned him up.

He stared at the images, studying the girl's big grin. It was identical to Colin's, and thinking about Colin's smile made his stomach roll.

There was something about the way Colin smiled; the way one side of his lip turned up higher than the other, the way his brown eyes squinted slightly- it made Peter nervous. For reasons he was yet to point out.

Peter heard a voice from what he assumed to be the kitchen. He followed the sound and found Colin sitting at a dining table with a plate of waffles and a jug of orange juice.

"Yeah yeah, I won't forget to lock up. You worry too much," Colin mumbled with a roll of his eyes. As he was biting into a waffle, he spotted Peter standing in the doorway.

"Are you just gonna stand there and stare at me all day?"

Peter walked over to the table and pulled out a chair. He sat down and folded his arms across his chest. "You say that like there's anything worth staring at," he scoffed.

Colin lifted his eyes, head still bent towards his plate, and scrunched up his face. Slowly, he sat back up and wiped his mouth with a paper towel.

"You're gonna eat your words soon. Sooner than you think," Colin said as he reached for the extra plate of waffles he had made that morning. He had made them for Peter- not because he wanted to, only because Amy requested that Peter be fed.

"Honey?" Colin asked.

Honey? Did he just fucking call me honey? Peter opened his mouth, about to give Colin the telling off of his life when he got cut off.

"Don't get ahead of yourself. I'm only asking if you want any honey on this," Colin smiled, gesturing at the waffles. He stuck a knife in the jar of pure honey and let it drip from the knife. His eyes twinkled as he slid the plate to Peter after Peter had given him a meek nod.