DEDICATION: 2rad4life :)

[37]: "Boyfriend."

I couldn't move.

I tried to comprehend Harvey's words and process what he had just said, along with the fact that he was kissing me, but it was like my brain had short-circuited. I wanted to respond, to kiss him back, to jump up and down in joy and yet push him away at the same time and grill him because what was he even talking about!?

Was he playing a joke on me?

"Gideon?" Harvey pulled back and looked into my eyes, his expression confused. His fingers swept messy locks of hair away from my forehead, his other thumb caressing my stubble-covered jaw, "Is this not okay? Do you want me to—"

"What do you mean?" I placed my hand on top of his, searching his eyes, "What did you mean when you said that, Rem? Because it sounded an awful lot like—"

"Like I wanted to be your boyfriend?" Harvey smiled, soft and sweet, his azure eyes lit with so much emotion that I felt like I was hallucinating. Never in my life had I imagined an outcome where someone would look at me with as much affection as he did at that instant.

Heck, and to imagine that the someone was actually Harvey freaking Remington, the guy I had hated hating? To be on the receiving end of all that brightness and the genuine warmth he carried around that I had been so damned envious of?

That was above and beyond anything I could've ever hoped for.

It was the happiest moment of my life.

"Harvey . . ." I shook my head. I realized my hands were shaking as I lifted them up and held his face in between my grasp. "Is this really happening?"

"Yes, Dion."' Harvey said, his smile widening, "Will you be my boyfriend?"

My heart felt like it would burst out of my chest with the sheer happiness bubbling inside of me.

I love you.

The words were on the tip of my tongue, but I knew this was neither the time nor the place. Harvey had only just confessed that his feelings for me had taken a turn in the romantic direction. To say them now would create a disaster that we wouldn't be able to work through.

"It's all I've ever wanted," I whispered, our lips meeting in a breath-hitching kiss. My intent had been to keep it simple and chaste given our surroundings, but our need for each other won over our restraint straight away, making us wildly grasp at each other as our tongues battled for dominance.

Looked like Harvey didn't feel like being submissive this morning.

Well, I always did have a thing for a good fight.

"Mmph," Harvey growled as I shoved him against the nearest desk, feeling it topple slightly with our combined weight as I pushed myself closer. I quickly forced myself to pull away and motioned to the furniture, panting, "Sit."

He looked disoriented as he glanced around and realized what I meant, before nodding and jumping on. Just as I opened my mouth to ask him to do so, his legs came around my waist in a silent command as he pulled me closer. I smiled as I met his lips. "Nice move, boyfriend."

Harvey smiled at that, our teeth clashing as neither of us could stop the grins that took over our faces. "Thanks, boyfriend."

I ran my hands up his muscled back as our lips collided once again, tongues dancing fluidly like they had done this a thousand times before. Harvey took control without preamble, running his hands through my hair and grabbing a fistful. He yanked and pulled at it in time with the brush of his tongue against mine as he mercilessly ravaged my mouth, leaving me begging for more as I rubbed up against his dick, almost vibrating with the primal need consuming me.

Clothes off. Now.

I felt a weird vibration against my thigh, and for one stupefying second, I wondered when Harvey had gotten the time to whip out a sex toy. And then it belatedly registered that it was, indeed, coming from my pants' pocket, and that there was no reason to get excited because it was just my frigging phone.

"Your phone." Harvey gasped as he pulled back, nudging me with his thigh, "It's ringing."

"Ignore it." I went for his neck, placing little, wet kisses along the side of his jaw as I dragged my lips down.

"Okay, but—uh!" Harvey groaned, stopping mid-sentence to throw his head back and give me more access as I bit and suckled on the juncture his neck met his shoulder. "That feels—" He couldn't complete his sentence as another choked sound escaped his lips, his hands fisting on the locks of my hair he held.

That's when my phone chose to start vibrating again.

I extracted myself from my new boyfriend—Holy shit, Harvey Kincaid-Remington was my boyfriend—out of breath as I rested my forehead against his, "Damn it."

Harvey chuckled quietly at my frustration, and I couldn't help but smile at him as I yanked my cursed phone out and answered without bothering to check who the hell it was.

"What?"

~

"So this is what the walk of shame looks like." Lyle raised his eyebrows as he pushed away his tray with leftovers, putting his elbows on the table with the smuggest look of amusement I had seen on a human.

"It's not the walk of shame if the guy you were with is your boyfriend." I rolled my eyes, dropping my tray into my usual place. Harvey put his tray down as well, but instead of sitting down, he placed a hand on my shoulder and kissed my cheek. He then pulled my chair back for me, his eyebrows going up as he waved his hand. "After you, boyfriend."

I beamed. I wondered fleetingly if I should feel uncomfortable that he was treating me like he would treat a girlfriend, but dismissed that thought. It was just society and years of being taught stuff like "Boys don't cry" that paved way to such ridiculous notions. Harvey was merely being his kind-hearted and sweet self, and whoever said that a guy shouldn't do little gestures for his boyfriend just because he was also a boy was nuts.

My pride couldn't be masked as I took a seat, waiting for him to sit down before turning my attention back to my astounded best friends. "Cat got your tongue?"

After a very entertained Lyle and Ryker had demanded we make it to the lunch hall and get something into our stomachs to "reenergize" after all the stamina that we must've apparently lost in doing whatever we had been doing—they had only assumed that after I had told them that we had worked through Harvey's panic attack a little while ago—he and I had decided it was best to stop before we went at it right there on the floor.

Not that I minded but it would've been a very awkward few days as we recovered from the hell it would bring on our backs and knees.

Lyle, as usual, was the first one to recover. I noticed that Talon was missing, but I had met him at English this morning, so I knew he wasn't absent from school. "So, wait?" The guy in white chortled, "You guys are married, but you're calling yourself boyfriends now? I fail to see the logic, young ones."

Axel chucked a paper towel at Lyle's head, grinning as well. "I think they mean for real, doofus."

"Of course, we get that," Ryker said sarcastically. The number of times the two of them used "We" instead of "I" never failed to bewilder me. They were like a married couple, but one who was clueless to the fact that they were actually married. "You've admitted that you're in love with each other." He lowered his voice to a fierce whisper, "Why not just make the marriage real?"

My heart thudded against my chest all of a sudden, Lyle's careless assumption spiking a real fear in me for a moment that I had been caught.

"That would be a disaster." Harvey joked, his tone light to mask the impact of his words. I noted his lack of comment on the 'L' word and decided to let it slide for now as there were more important details to address. He didn't have to worry about wounding my feelings, because I agreed with him wholeheartedly. To skip the boyfriend step and move to marriage would be the ultimate suicide of this relationship.

Talk about going too fast, too soon.

"Exactly." I put my drink down and reached for my guy's hand—I wanted to squeal like a little fanboy every time I remembered he was mine for real—meeting his eyes with what felt like the hundredth smile in as many minutes tipping the corners of my undeniably swollen lips up. We had fixed each other's hair and straightened our clothes before coming here, but the-cat-that-ate-the-canary grins on our faces and the telltale hickey on Harvey's neck were impossible to hide.

It wasn't like I wanted him to hide it, anyway.

He was mine and I would gladly scream it from rooftops because that was how high I felt at the moment.

"One step at a time." I leaned forward a pressed a kiss to his lips, but it turned hot and heavy pretty quick, and the groans of "ew, gross" from the group were what forced me to pull away before it went too far.

"Okay," Ryker clapped his hands, eyebrows waggling teasingly as he glanced between Lyle and Axel, "Fork it over. Come on."

What was happening?

"Aw, man!" Lyle cried, standing up to pull his wallet, 'cause yes, his jeans were sometimes that tight. "I'm making you buy my dinner for the next hundred years. Or wait, I'll just demand a really expensive Christmas gift. Yep, this hundred will be mine again."

Wait.

No. Way.

"Thank God, I only said twenty." Axel rolled his eyes and handed the money over, and Ryker plucked the bill out of his fingers with a winning smile. He turned back to Lyle with a scoff, who was still pretend-sorting through his wallet to delay the inevitable. "The gaming console I got you last year was like 450 bucks, Thorn," Ryker looked endlessly amused, the love in his eyes as he gazed at a pouting Lyle, unmistakable. "—and the white jeans I had to replace for no reason last month? I don't even wanna say how much it cost, so yes, I already spend more than $100 on your presents."

I couldn't believe I hadn't seen this coming.

"Whatever." Lyle's cheeks turned slightly red as he looked away, clearing his throat as he handed over the money, "It's not like you're any better. You went all the way to freaking Dubai to buy a suit for your brother's wedding."

"I didn't—"

"You guys bet on us!?" Harvey caterwauled, his normally deep voice high with shock, "Are you frigging kidding me, now!?"

"I'm afraid they're not." I smiled, unable to help myself. I wanted to be exasperated, really, but years of hanging around these idiots had taught me better. There was always a bet going on about something, and it was no surprise there had been a wager over us.

"But that's just—ugh," Harvey groaned, rolling his eyes with fake repugnance, a touch of that playfulness I adored making them shimmer like blue stars, "You know what? I'm betting on all of you. In fact, I'm gonna start a pool later and invite the entire school to join."

Oh, it was gonna be a chore to keep my hands off my boyfriend, alright.

"But what about us?" Axel grimaced uncomfortably, "I mean, you can't tell everyone stuff that's private—"

"God, he's kidding." I swallowed my food, glancing sideways to exchange yet another grin with my man. "Right, babe? Tell him before he loses his shit. And don't worry, Axel, Talon is nowhere around."

"Right." Harvey said, merriment illuminating his expression, "Chill, bro."

"W-wait." Ryker pushed himself up from his reclining position and leaned forward, his eyebrows knitted together uncertainly. "Talon is—" He shook his head as if to free his mind from the tangle of thoughts it was stuck on, his frown deepening, "What did you even mean?"

Shit.

"Um, Ryk. About that." Lyle's expression grew serious, and from the resigned look his dark eyes took on, I knew he knew as well. Axel had never attempted to keep Talon a secret from anyone except Talon, so it was confounding that Ryker was yet to be clued in. "Talon is—"

"Talon, what?" The guy in question beamed down at all of us from behind Lyle; startling the hell of out me. Everyone scrambled to come up with a believable answer, but Talon's huge grin just got impossibly bigger. "Wait, don't tell me you guys know, already! I just heard!"

It took me a second to put two and two together and realize why he was in such a good mood. And then it struck me—wow, I couldn't believe I had completely forgotten about that—so I rose up from my seat, wiping my hands clean of stray food crumbs before reaching out and patting Talon on the back heartily, "Congratulations, man!"

A moment of silence passed before everyone realized something must be up and decided to play along. Lyle copied my enthusiasm in a creepily real manner, and if it weren't for me being absolutely sure that there was zero chance of him knowing already, I'd have believed he really was excited.

Since when was he so good at putting on masks?

"Awesome, man." Lyle gave Talon a hug before everyone else shook his hand and settled in, "I'm so happy for you."

"Thanks." Talon still couldn't stop the grin overtaking his face, "I can't believe you guys knew and didn't tell me. Professor Gilmore had to pinch me multiple times to get me to believe her news because this is unreal. I absolutely didn't see it coming."

I laughed, "Right. I was the same when Mr. Goldman told me this morning that I had been selected to compete in the final round of the HACCT."

"Right. Hacked." Axel repeated, smiling as if he knew exactly what it was.

My shoulders shook with silent laughter. "Yeah." I composed my expression to a grin, trying to hide my amusement, "The Hillbridge Annual Creative and Cultural Tournaments."

"Of course." Harvey nodded along for a second before his eyes bugged out in an almost comical manner. "Wait, what? Did you just say Hillbridge!? That's, like, the best university, ever."

"Exactly." Talon chimed in, bouncing in his seat, "And it's on the east coast, baby! Woo-hoo!"

"And since the school will be covering your travel and accommodations . . ." Harvey trailed off, the reason for Talon's over the moon happiness finally dawning on him. "I'm basically going on a vacation, yep." Talon finished for him, pulling up his collars and patting himself on the back like a dork.

"Didn't know you played the guitar, let alone awesome enough to qualify on a national level," I added for the sake of my friends' knowledge because I knew that any moment now, one of them would blurt something out that was irrelevant to Talon's victory and blow their cover.

I noticed everyone's eyes widen with wonderment as soon as the words left my mouth, but thankfully, Talon was focusing on me, so he didn't seem to have noticed. "There's a lot of things you don't know about me, K.R." He winked, chuckling, "But, thanks. I've been playing since I was seven."

"You should play for us sometime." Axel smiled at Talon hesitantly, to which the guy nodded with a happy grin, his eyes lingering on the redhead a second longer.

Interesting.

"Wow." Ryker breathed. "I've never been to the east coast."

"But you went to the UAE to shop and vacay-ed at Southern France and—"

"That doesn't mean I've been to the east coast, dumbass." Ryker flicked Lyle's forehead, rolling his eyes. "You're still tan from your trip to New Zealand. Have you been to the east coast?"

Lyle was silent for a moment. "Fine. You win."

"Man, you guys are like . . . crazy rich." Harvey chuckled, "I've never been to the east coast either, and that's 'cause I've never stepped out of California."

Awkward silence befell Ryker and Lyle as they tried to come up with a reply to that.

Fuck. I realized how insensitive we must've sounded only then. As someone who had seen the inside of a private jet more number of times as opposed to a bus or a subway, no amount of material luxury fazed me anymore. To me, it was no big deal to travel to anywhere in the world, because most of the said time had been spent with me being cooped up in the hotel room and waiting for my parents to get back from whatever work they had had to attend to. As I had gotten older, I had chosen to go out and explore the cities with their P.A. or whoever else had been available, and while seeing new things had been undoubtedly remarkable in ways I couldn't describe, it had lacked that charm everyone kept talking about and had never completely made me happy. Because holidays were meant to be "family time" and everywhere I turned, there were people clustered together with loved ones while I was halfway across the globe, alone in a strange city with parents who were too busy building their empire somewhere.

But to someone who hadn't been anywhere, I'd look like nothing but a rich snob whining about white-boy problems.

To top it all off, I wasn't even white.

"It's settled then." I declared, making a split-second decision right then. Five pairs of confused eyes turned in my direction.

Harvey downed the last of his drink and spun towards me, just as the warning bell signaling the end of lunch hour in five minutes rang through the air, "What is?"

"We're all going on a trip." Yes, it was going to take some convincing to do before I could make them all agree to take part in the open auditions that were also scheduled to take place—a few days before the date of the final tournaments in order to select the 'wild-card entries' for all the contests—but I was sure that with some coercion and friendly nudging, I'd be able to pull it off. I smiled confidently, the plan already formulating in my head.

"A trip?" From the way Harvey and everyone else looked at me like I was crazy, it was clear they thought I had just been kidding. Looked like I had my work cut out for me.

"Yeah. Let's go to the east coast."

P.S. Who else is so ready for the next episode of The Flash?

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