For a moment, Jake and Hamilton both froze, their eyes locked on each other.
Then Hamilton looked up to see who was standing over them in the hallway.
"Finn!" Hamilton cried, relief filling his voice. He rose up onto his knees,
allowing Jake to flip over onto her stomach so that she could look up and see
for herself. She scrambled onto her knees, but accidentally pushed herself right
up into Hamilton's crotch.
"Ow!" he cried, bending over in pain.
"Oh, sorry!" Jake crawled forward away from Hamilton and sat back on her ankles
in front of him.
Finn just shook his head at this. They were quite a site -- Jake and Hamilton,
dripping wet, dressed in ridiculous superhero outfits, crouched together in a
puddle in the otherwise dry corridor.
"Why do I always find you two in the most compromising of situations?" he
wondered aloud.
Hamilton had recovered from his encounter with Jake's tailbone enough to ask,
"Finn, what are you doing here?"
"I could ask you the same thing, Hamilton. Dormitories are off-limits during
winter break."
"We're... just visiting. But you're supposed to be off skiing."
"There's a blizzard headed for Moosehead, so I'm stuck here for a couple more
days. Jake, I thought you were going to Paris."
"My mom canceled on me, so I'm staying with the Flemings."
"Really? How convenient... Well, I'm sure it's no big deal for the Flemings to
have another young male in the house, right?" This caused both Jake and Hamilton
to look down guiltily. "But, Jake, are you sure it's such a good idea to be
carrying on this charade right under the Dean's nose?"
"It's a better idea than being alone for Christmas," Hamilton interjected.
Finn sighed. "I suppose that's true."
Jake looked up at him. "Finn, the day after tomorrow is Christmas Eve. You're
not going to be stuck here for Christmas, are you?"
"That remains to be seen."
"You should come to our house," Hamilton said immediately. Jake looked at him,
and he shrugged slightly.
"Thanks, Hamilton, but it sounds like your house is already pretty full."
"No, I insist. You at least have to come for dinner on Christmas Eve. It's our
big feast. And despite what you may have heard about my mother's cooking, she
makes a great goose."
Finn started to object again, but then pondered this for a moment and said, "I
would have to get an invitation from your parents before I'd consider it. But it
does sound like it might be an interesting evening." He turned to go. "By the
way, you two are welcome to stop by my room if you need to borrow a hairdryer
before you go back out into the snow."
He walked back down the hallway and disappeared around the corner.
Jake whispered, "Hamilton, are you sure it's such a good idea, inviting Finn
over?"
"Come on, Jake. We can't let him be alone for Christmas. You wouldn't be here if
he weren't protecting you, and his job could be on the line for that. We both
owe him bigtime."
"Yeah, you're right." But she felt guilty enough masquerading in front of the
Dean and his wife without Finn their to watch.
Hamilton turned so that he was face-to-face with Jake again, the hunger creeping
back into his eyes. "Do you think we could get back to where we were before we
were interrupted?"
"I don't know, Hamilton." She stood up, resisting Hamilton's attempts to keep
her next to him. "It might be kind of hard to re-create that -- Oh, my God!! Is
that your dad?!"
Hamilton whirled around in the direction she was looking. Jake immediately made
a dive behind him and scooped up both water guns. Before Hamilton even realized
what was happening, she was unloading both barrels all over him.
"Hey, that's not fair!" he yelled, crouching down and shielding his face from
the deluge.
"How do you like them apples, Fleming? You may have the brawn, but I've got the
brains!" She backed away from him slowly, and then, at a safe distance, she
turned and ran off down the hallway, holding her guns up, laughing maniacally,
and squirting water into the air as she went.
Hamilton smiled as he watched her disappear around the corner, ready for a good
game of hide-n-seek. She was every imaginary friend he ever had, but so much
better, because she was flesh and blood, her smile was real, and her laugh
filled the hallways and resonated in the oak paneling of that dusty old Rawley
building.
* * * * *
An hour later, after chasing each other all over the dormitory, they ended up in
Finn's apartment suite, drying off in front of his fireplace. They'd skipped
lunch and were starving, so Finn tried to find something for them to eat.
"You don't entertain much, do you?" Hamilton asked, as Finn set the plate of
Cheez Whiz and Ritz crackers down on the coffee table in front of the fire.
"Sorry. This is a bachelor pad."
"Hey, he has IBC Root Beer," Jake said, twisting the cap off a bottle. "You
can't beat that."
Hamilton looked around the room and spied a stack of bluebooks on Finn's desk.
"Did you already grade the exams?" he inquired, squirting cheez onto a cracker.
"I'm just about finished."
"How'd we do?"
Finn looked pointedly at Hamilton and replied, "You'd have done better had you
read all the books."
Hamilton felt his cheeks flush. He hoped that in the ruddy glow of the fire it
wouldn't be noticeable.
"But," Finn continued, "you got extra points for the creativity of your essay
topics. I never would've interpreted the Knight's Tale to reveal Chaucer's
opposition to the Crusades." He nodded approvingly. "However, you will both find
out your grades after break, when everyone else does."
"So what about Christmas Eve dinner? You coming?"
"I don't know." Finn hesitated a moment, staring into the fire. "I'll have to
talk to your mother."
* * * * *
Jake and Hamilton returned home through the back door and into the kitchen. Kate
was already getting dinner ready, boiling water and trying to open a jar of
spaghetti sauce.
"There you two are! I was wondering where you'd disappeared to."
Hamilton took the jar from her and twisted the lid off as he said, "We had to
drop by the dorms - Jake forgot something - and guess who we ran into?" He
handed her back the open jar.
"Whom?" she asked, correcting him.
"Finn. He's stuck here, so I thought we should invite him to Christmas Eve
dinner."
CRASH!
The jar dropped out of Kate's hand and smashed to the floor, splattering tomato
sauce everywhere. Jake and Hamilton jumped back, then rushed forward to help her
clean it up.
"No, I'll get it," Kate said, waving them away. "I don't want you tracking
broken glass all over." She grabbed a roll of paper towels.
"So, Mom, is that OK?" Hamilton asked.
"You want me to invite Finn to have Christmas dinner with us?"
"Well, technically, I already invited him. I just need you to formalize it."
"You just went ahead and invited him without asking me?"
"Yeah, what's the big deal?"
"Well, you know, it's a family thing..."
"But Jake's here."
Kate smiled warmly at Jake as she replied, "Jake's your best friend. He's like
family."
"But we always have guests for Christmas dinner. I thought you and Finn were
friends."
"We are, but... I have to plan these things. A goose only feeds so many people.
It's not like a turkey."
"So we'll get another goose. Is there like a goose shortage or something?"
"No, I...it's just..."
"What?" This came from Dean Fleming, who walked into the kitchen and rested a
paternal hand on Jake's shoulder as he surveyed the scene. "I invited Finn for
Christmas Eve dinner," Hamilton said.
"Finn? Is he knocking around the dorms all Christmas again?"
"Yeah."
"Well, that'll be great! The more, the merrier. And I can find out from him just
how you're been doing in English." The Dean looked down at the broken jar oozing
red sauce all over the bright linoleum, and he smiled. "I hope that means we
don't have to have spaghetti again. Jake, how do you feel about ordering pizza?"
"I live for pizza, Sir."
* * * * *
Kate decided that dinner that evening would be informal, so Jake and Hamilton
were allowed to eat their pizza in the living room in front of the TV. Hamilton
looked through the stack of videos his mother had brought home for them and
chose 'Galaxy Quest.' After the movie, he and Jake raided the game closet and
got stuck in a marathon game of Monopoly that finally ended at two in the
morning with them mutually disavowing the very notion of personal property and
pledging to join a commune.
Upstairs to bed at last, Jake once again leaned the index card against the door.
"She's not going to come in," Hamilton insisted.
"I want to be sure. But this time, if you get up to go to the bathroom, put the
card back."
"So this means we're doing Ozzie and Harriet again tonight?" he asked,
glowering.
Jake sighed and sat down next to him on his bed. He looked away, and she ran her
fingers through his hair. "Hey..." she whispered. When he finally raised his
eyes to hers, she continued, "We can stay in your bed for a little while."
A slow-creeping smile diffused Hamilton's sullen features. He grabbed her hand
and pulled it down around his waist, pulling her toward him in the process.
Their eyes closed and their lips met, and Hamilton felt like it'd been forever
since the last time he'd kissed her. The wetness of her mouth was thirst
quenching for him. He pressed up against her hungrily, pulling her with him as
he lay back on the bed. Then he leaned forward so that he was on top of her.
Although they'd never had proper intercourse, they had for months been
practicing their own version of sex - fully clothed, rubbing over each other.
Sometimes, when they were sure no one was going to come knocking on the door,
they'd lose some of the clothing. On a couple special occasions they'd lost all
the clothing. But for Hamilton, it was three months' worth of foreplay, and he
was ready for the real thing.
So it was no surprise to either of them when his fingers crept over her stomach
and under the waistband of her panties. What was a surprise was how quickly she
grabbed his hand and pulled it out.
"What's the matter?" Hamilton whispered.
"I just... I thought..."
"What?"
"I thought we were reliving your childhood."
Hamilton smiled lustily. "There are some very un-childlike things that I want to
do to you right now."
"I thought you wanted me here because you never had a brother or sister around
for Christmas."
"Huh?"
"Someone to play with. You know, on Christmas morning..."
"We have plenty of time to kill before Christmas morning. Can I help it if I
can't keep my hands off of you? I've got a girl in my house, Jake. In my
bedroom. A girl my parents don't even know about, because she's hiding in plain
sight. It's like a dream. It *is* a dream. I mean, but, it's *not* a dream. It's
real. Do you get what I mean?"
"Um, I got the girl part. And trust me, it's not that I don't want to..."
"So what's the problem?"
"We have ten days together. We should pace ourselves."
Hamilton buried his face in her neck and exhaled deeply. "Jake, you don't know
how hard it's getting to stop."
"No, Hamilton, I *do* know. That's why we shouldn't get started. You know, we're
celebrating a holiday in which a young woman finds herself in an unplanned
pregnancy."
"But then she gets visited by an angel and it all turns out for the best." He
lifted his head up to grin at her, but she wasn't smiling, and his own smile
faded away. "So you're saying it would be different if I had a condom?"
"Do you have a condom?"
"No."
"Yeah, it'd be different."
Hamilton sighed again and rolled over onto his back. Jake laid a hand on his
chest, but he pushed it away. She looked at him, but he wouldn't meet her eyes.
"Hamilton, you're not mad, are you?"
He didn't answer. What he did do was stand up, scoop Jake up in his arms, and
plop her down on the trundle bed. Then he shut off the lamp and climbed into his
own bed, turning his back to her.
"Goodnight, Jake," he said curtly.
Jake didn't respond. She lay there in the dark, biting her lip. She couldn't --
she wouldn't -- tell him that she wanted to keep going as much as he did.
Then Hamilton looked up to see who was standing over them in the hallway.
"Finn!" Hamilton cried, relief filling his voice. He rose up onto his knees,
allowing Jake to flip over onto her stomach so that she could look up and see
for herself. She scrambled onto her knees, but accidentally pushed herself right
up into Hamilton's crotch.
"Ow!" he cried, bending over in pain.
"Oh, sorry!" Jake crawled forward away from Hamilton and sat back on her ankles
in front of him.
Finn just shook his head at this. They were quite a site -- Jake and Hamilton,
dripping wet, dressed in ridiculous superhero outfits, crouched together in a
puddle in the otherwise dry corridor.
"Why do I always find you two in the most compromising of situations?" he
wondered aloud.
Hamilton had recovered from his encounter with Jake's tailbone enough to ask,
"Finn, what are you doing here?"
"I could ask you the same thing, Hamilton. Dormitories are off-limits during
winter break."
"We're... just visiting. But you're supposed to be off skiing."
"There's a blizzard headed for Moosehead, so I'm stuck here for a couple more
days. Jake, I thought you were going to Paris."
"My mom canceled on me, so I'm staying with the Flemings."
"Really? How convenient... Well, I'm sure it's no big deal for the Flemings to
have another young male in the house, right?" This caused both Jake and Hamilton
to look down guiltily. "But, Jake, are you sure it's such a good idea to be
carrying on this charade right under the Dean's nose?"
"It's a better idea than being alone for Christmas," Hamilton interjected.
Finn sighed. "I suppose that's true."
Jake looked up at him. "Finn, the day after tomorrow is Christmas Eve. You're
not going to be stuck here for Christmas, are you?"
"That remains to be seen."
"You should come to our house," Hamilton said immediately. Jake looked at him,
and he shrugged slightly.
"Thanks, Hamilton, but it sounds like your house is already pretty full."
"No, I insist. You at least have to come for dinner on Christmas Eve. It's our
big feast. And despite what you may have heard about my mother's cooking, she
makes a great goose."
Finn started to object again, but then pondered this for a moment and said, "I
would have to get an invitation from your parents before I'd consider it. But it
does sound like it might be an interesting evening." He turned to go. "By the
way, you two are welcome to stop by my room if you need to borrow a hairdryer
before you go back out into the snow."
He walked back down the hallway and disappeared around the corner.
Jake whispered, "Hamilton, are you sure it's such a good idea, inviting Finn
over?"
"Come on, Jake. We can't let him be alone for Christmas. You wouldn't be here if
he weren't protecting you, and his job could be on the line for that. We both
owe him bigtime."
"Yeah, you're right." But she felt guilty enough masquerading in front of the
Dean and his wife without Finn their to watch.
Hamilton turned so that he was face-to-face with Jake again, the hunger creeping
back into his eyes. "Do you think we could get back to where we were before we
were interrupted?"
"I don't know, Hamilton." She stood up, resisting Hamilton's attempts to keep
her next to him. "It might be kind of hard to re-create that -- Oh, my God!! Is
that your dad?!"
Hamilton whirled around in the direction she was looking. Jake immediately made
a dive behind him and scooped up both water guns. Before Hamilton even realized
what was happening, she was unloading both barrels all over him.
"Hey, that's not fair!" he yelled, crouching down and shielding his face from
the deluge.
"How do you like them apples, Fleming? You may have the brawn, but I've got the
brains!" She backed away from him slowly, and then, at a safe distance, she
turned and ran off down the hallway, holding her guns up, laughing maniacally,
and squirting water into the air as she went.
Hamilton smiled as he watched her disappear around the corner, ready for a good
game of hide-n-seek. She was every imaginary friend he ever had, but so much
better, because she was flesh and blood, her smile was real, and her laugh
filled the hallways and resonated in the oak paneling of that dusty old Rawley
building.
* * * * *
An hour later, after chasing each other all over the dormitory, they ended up in
Finn's apartment suite, drying off in front of his fireplace. They'd skipped
lunch and were starving, so Finn tried to find something for them to eat.
"You don't entertain much, do you?" Hamilton asked, as Finn set the plate of
Cheez Whiz and Ritz crackers down on the coffee table in front of the fire.
"Sorry. This is a bachelor pad."
"Hey, he has IBC Root Beer," Jake said, twisting the cap off a bottle. "You
can't beat that."
Hamilton looked around the room and spied a stack of bluebooks on Finn's desk.
"Did you already grade the exams?" he inquired, squirting cheez onto a cracker.
"I'm just about finished."
"How'd we do?"
Finn looked pointedly at Hamilton and replied, "You'd have done better had you
read all the books."
Hamilton felt his cheeks flush. He hoped that in the ruddy glow of the fire it
wouldn't be noticeable.
"But," Finn continued, "you got extra points for the creativity of your essay
topics. I never would've interpreted the Knight's Tale to reveal Chaucer's
opposition to the Crusades." He nodded approvingly. "However, you will both find
out your grades after break, when everyone else does."
"So what about Christmas Eve dinner? You coming?"
"I don't know." Finn hesitated a moment, staring into the fire. "I'll have to
talk to your mother."
* * * * *
Jake and Hamilton returned home through the back door and into the kitchen. Kate
was already getting dinner ready, boiling water and trying to open a jar of
spaghetti sauce.
"There you two are! I was wondering where you'd disappeared to."
Hamilton took the jar from her and twisted the lid off as he said, "We had to
drop by the dorms - Jake forgot something - and guess who we ran into?" He
handed her back the open jar.
"Whom?" she asked, correcting him.
"Finn. He's stuck here, so I thought we should invite him to Christmas Eve
dinner."
CRASH!
The jar dropped out of Kate's hand and smashed to the floor, splattering tomato
sauce everywhere. Jake and Hamilton jumped back, then rushed forward to help her
clean it up.
"No, I'll get it," Kate said, waving them away. "I don't want you tracking
broken glass all over." She grabbed a roll of paper towels.
"So, Mom, is that OK?" Hamilton asked.
"You want me to invite Finn to have Christmas dinner with us?"
"Well, technically, I already invited him. I just need you to formalize it."
"You just went ahead and invited him without asking me?"
"Yeah, what's the big deal?"
"Well, you know, it's a family thing..."
"But Jake's here."
Kate smiled warmly at Jake as she replied, "Jake's your best friend. He's like
family."
"But we always have guests for Christmas dinner. I thought you and Finn were
friends."
"We are, but... I have to plan these things. A goose only feeds so many people.
It's not like a turkey."
"So we'll get another goose. Is there like a goose shortage or something?"
"No, I...it's just..."
"What?" This came from Dean Fleming, who walked into the kitchen and rested a
paternal hand on Jake's shoulder as he surveyed the scene. "I invited Finn for
Christmas Eve dinner," Hamilton said.
"Finn? Is he knocking around the dorms all Christmas again?"
"Yeah."
"Well, that'll be great! The more, the merrier. And I can find out from him just
how you're been doing in English." The Dean looked down at the broken jar oozing
red sauce all over the bright linoleum, and he smiled. "I hope that means we
don't have to have spaghetti again. Jake, how do you feel about ordering pizza?"
"I live for pizza, Sir."
* * * * *
Kate decided that dinner that evening would be informal, so Jake and Hamilton
were allowed to eat their pizza in the living room in front of the TV. Hamilton
looked through the stack of videos his mother had brought home for them and
chose 'Galaxy Quest.' After the movie, he and Jake raided the game closet and
got stuck in a marathon game of Monopoly that finally ended at two in the
morning with them mutually disavowing the very notion of personal property and
pledging to join a commune.
Upstairs to bed at last, Jake once again leaned the index card against the door.
"She's not going to come in," Hamilton insisted.
"I want to be sure. But this time, if you get up to go to the bathroom, put the
card back."
"So this means we're doing Ozzie and Harriet again tonight?" he asked,
glowering.
Jake sighed and sat down next to him on his bed. He looked away, and she ran her
fingers through his hair. "Hey..." she whispered. When he finally raised his
eyes to hers, she continued, "We can stay in your bed for a little while."
A slow-creeping smile diffused Hamilton's sullen features. He grabbed her hand
and pulled it down around his waist, pulling her toward him in the process.
Their eyes closed and their lips met, and Hamilton felt like it'd been forever
since the last time he'd kissed her. The wetness of her mouth was thirst
quenching for him. He pressed up against her hungrily, pulling her with him as
he lay back on the bed. Then he leaned forward so that he was on top of her.
Although they'd never had proper intercourse, they had for months been
practicing their own version of sex - fully clothed, rubbing over each other.
Sometimes, when they were sure no one was going to come knocking on the door,
they'd lose some of the clothing. On a couple special occasions they'd lost all
the clothing. But for Hamilton, it was three months' worth of foreplay, and he
was ready for the real thing.
So it was no surprise to either of them when his fingers crept over her stomach
and under the waistband of her panties. What was a surprise was how quickly she
grabbed his hand and pulled it out.
"What's the matter?" Hamilton whispered.
"I just... I thought..."
"What?"
"I thought we were reliving your childhood."
Hamilton smiled lustily. "There are some very un-childlike things that I want to
do to you right now."
"I thought you wanted me here because you never had a brother or sister around
for Christmas."
"Huh?"
"Someone to play with. You know, on Christmas morning..."
"We have plenty of time to kill before Christmas morning. Can I help it if I
can't keep my hands off of you? I've got a girl in my house, Jake. In my
bedroom. A girl my parents don't even know about, because she's hiding in plain
sight. It's like a dream. It *is* a dream. I mean, but, it's *not* a dream. It's
real. Do you get what I mean?"
"Um, I got the girl part. And trust me, it's not that I don't want to..."
"So what's the problem?"
"We have ten days together. We should pace ourselves."
Hamilton buried his face in her neck and exhaled deeply. "Jake, you don't know
how hard it's getting to stop."
"No, Hamilton, I *do* know. That's why we shouldn't get started. You know, we're
celebrating a holiday in which a young woman finds herself in an unplanned
pregnancy."
"But then she gets visited by an angel and it all turns out for the best." He
lifted his head up to grin at her, but she wasn't smiling, and his own smile
faded away. "So you're saying it would be different if I had a condom?"
"Do you have a condom?"
"No."
"Yeah, it'd be different."
Hamilton sighed again and rolled over onto his back. Jake laid a hand on his
chest, but he pushed it away. She looked at him, but he wouldn't meet her eyes.
"Hamilton, you're not mad, are you?"
He didn't answer. What he did do was stand up, scoop Jake up in his arms, and
plop her down on the trundle bed. Then he shut off the lamp and climbed into his
own bed, turning his back to her.
"Goodnight, Jake," he said curtly.
Jake didn't respond. She lay there in the dark, biting her lip. She couldn't --
she wouldn't -- tell him that she wanted to keep going as much as he did.