Nick was woken up by Wes, who was arguing with David right in front of his seat. He pulled Jeff closer when he started to wake up, hoping that he would go back to a deep sleep, but there was no hope for that. Jeff sat up quickly and looked at Nick with a frown.
"Will you two shut the hell up? I was having a wonderful dream. Argue later." With that, Jeff put his head back on Nick's shoulder and closed his eyes. Nick laughed at the shocked faces on Wes and David and mouthed sorry to them. Jeff whispered to him after they turned around again. "Thank God. I thought I was going to have to make them get off the bus." Jeff smirked and spread out as much as he could, laying his head in Nick's lap. Nick looked down at him fondly.
"Go back to sleep, Jeffy." Nick brushed the hair out of his face and leaned down to plant a kiss on his forehead. Jeff closed his eyes again and Nick felt his body relax.
Nick had felt awful about last night, especially after seeing how exhausted Jeff truly was. He traced the dark circles under his eyes gently and Jeff sighed in his sleep, turning his head to Nick. He couldn't help but smile widely. He hadn't realized he was gay until he met Jeff. It was still odd to him how one boy could change his life so completely. When they first met, Jeff had a boyfriend, and Nick found himself extremely jealous, but didn't know why. A few weeks into their friendship, Jeff came home late crying and Nick stayed up holding him the whole night, even after he fell asleep. That was the first time Nick thought he may have fallen for the boy. He looked down at the boy in his lap again. He noticed that Jeff had gripped his shirt tightly and there was a crease in his forehead. Nick grabbed his hand and gently moved it from his shirt, laying both of their hands on Jeff's chest. The crease disappeared and Nick sighed. He knew Jeff was having trouble sleeping, so he gently rubbed his thumb over the back of his hand like he did earlier that day. Jeff seemed to relax even more at the touch.
Before long, they arrived at Dalton and Nick found himself unable to wake up Jeff. He wanted him to make up for losing so much sleep so he asked Wes to grab his bag and he would meet him in his room. Nick picked Jeff up, surprised by the light weight, and slowly moved off the bus and up to the dorm room. Jeff snuggled into his chest, groaning a little at being moved.
"Shhhh. It's okay. I've got you." Nick whispered to Jeff while walking into his room. He set Jeff in his bed, going over to Wes, who was sitting on the edge of Nick's bed.
"Your bag's on the desk. I have to go home for the rest of the weekend. I see you two have finally realized what we all realized months ago." Wes stood up and smirked at Nick. "Good job, dude." Wes left the room and Nick scooted against his headboard, looking over at Jeff, who was hugging his pillow tightly. He saw that the crease was back and that he was making small noises in his sleep. Nick went to the bathroom and then joined Jeff in his bed, replacing the pillow happily.
"Nick." For a moment, Nick thought Jeff had woken up, but he was very much still asleep, so hearing his name made him jump a little. Nick pulled him closer and kissed the top of his head, hoping it would calm him down enough to actually rest. Nick knew from sharing a room with him for the past five months that when Jeff had nightmares, he had the worst nightmares. He often went days without sleep because he was so afraid of them coming. Nick started to mindlessly play with his hair, thinking about the first time he had seen Jeff.
Nick had been concentrating on his homework. Trigonometry was his hardest class and therefore took up most of his weekday afternoons. Someone opened the door, but he didn't look up.
"Wes, did you have any trouble with question 34 on the Trig homework?" He started to erase all of his work after arriving at the incorrect answer.
"I'm not Wes, but Trig happens to be my best subject. Need some help?" Nick jumped at the unknown voice and turned to see a short, blonde boy standing in the doorway, smirking.
"I'm Nick. Uh, who are you?" Nick shook the boy's hand, blushing profusely for some reason.
"Jeff. I'm your new roommate. Want some help?" Jeff walked into the room and over to the desk. "Oh this is easy. Here, you just add that to both sides of the equation and then divide by the numerator of that part of the equation. See?" Jeff wrote out the steps and Nick stared disbelievingly.
"How do you know that?" Jeff looked up at the tall brunette. He really was quite attractive. What was he thinking? He had a boyfriend.
"I took Trig last year at my old school. I was in the honors program. I'd be willing to help you with that if you can help me with French."
"Deal." They shook on it and smiled. This would be the beginning of a great friendship; Nick could tell already.
Nick felt Jeff stir below him, bringing him out of his thoughts. He looked down and saw Jeff crying. "Jeff? What's wrong?" Nick lifted his head with his fingers to see Jeff's red face and tears streaming down his face.
"You have to promise me you won't drink anymore, especially if you don't have someone to get you home safely." Jeff pulled Nick closer to him and sobbed into his chest. Nick rubbed Jeff's back and felt tears come to his eyes.
"Shhh. It's okay baby. I promise I won't go out to drink anymore. You're fine. It was just a bad dream." He kept rubbing his back until Jeff calmed down. Jeff sighed and Nick kissed his forehead. "I love you."
He hadn't meant to say it. He didn't want Jeff to freak out. He knew it was true though. Jeff grinned from ear to ear and pulled Nick down to his level to kiss him. He pulled away a few moments later.
"I love you too. Thank you." Jeff blushed. Nick touched his face, working his hand to the back of his head and curling his fingers in his hair.
"I should be thanking you." Nick kissed Jeff passionately for a few minutes until there was a knock at the door. They pulled apart slowly, both smiling and feeling happier than they could ever remember.
An hour later, Nick, Jeff, and David were sitting on the floor playing Monopoloy and joking around.
"So, boys, when's the wedding?" Nick and Jeff both looked down, blushing, and David started to laugh. "Well, you've been as close as possible since I got here, and I assume that you're looking at each other like that because you finally realized you're in love." David laughed again.
"Fine, David. If you must know, we have realized this." Jeff looked over to Nick and squeezed his hand. David made a gagging noise.
"Would you two like to be alone or would you like to continue to make me sick?" David made a disgusted face and Nick and Jeff laughed loudly.
"You're always welcome to actually stay in your room. We know you miss Wes when he's gone, but there's no need to bother us." David stuck out his tongue. "Mature, David."
David stood up and bowed. "It was a pleasure playing out our future with you gentlemen. Have a wonderful evening." He walked out of the room, Nick and Jeff laughing at him as he went. The door shut, leaving them alone for the rest of the night.
They cleaned up the board, grabbed sodas from the mini fridge, and sat on the bed.
"So what do we do now?" Jeff tapped his hand against his leg.
"Anything you'd like. We've got the whole night." Nick leaned over and kissed Jeff's cheek, but Jeff caught him and pulled him on top of him.
"Can we stay like this?" Jeff started to kiss Nick deeply and Nick couldn't help but kiss back. They stayed like that for most of the night, eventually drifting off. They both had huge smiles on their faces, and they clung to each other all night long.