The Downfall of Nate Ramsey

Downfall of Nate Ramsey Chapter 18

The Downfall of Nate Ramsey

By Kit Fortier (kitfortier@gmail.com)

Based on the characters and concept by Jasper Cooper © 2019

DISCLAIMER: This story is a gay fantasy; no part of it is based in fact, and none of the characters are intended to resemble real persons. This story chronicles the humiliating ordeals an 18-year-old high school senior is unwillingly subjected to. Some of these humiliations have a strong sexual component. If you are underage, or do not want to read about such matters, you should leave this webpage at once. Assuming you do not fall into either category (you should not have made it this far if you did), I bid you: onward!

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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: "Forgiveness is a Vice"

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Owen tossed the remnants of his device on his bed. He found the bulbous, metallic anal plug and the nipple clamps easy enough, but the sounding rod he'd shoved into Nate's dick was gone, likely kicked into a crevasse on the hay-strewn barn floor. He shrugged. He still had three more, and while they were a little bigger, so what? Nate was gonna get them all shoved in him at some point anyway—maybe even all at once—and this time, no one would be able to stop him from making the pain last for hours. All he'd have to do is solder the control box wires together, and his ingeniously cruel little toy would be ready for more fun.

He also had a score to settle with Troy or his tough fagboy Finn. One of them shoved an awl into his tire, and he'd had to change it out for his spare.

Whatever. He had bigger fish to fry.

He logged onto his computer and began uploading his videos from Nate's full day of getting fucked. It made him grin, seeing those beautiful tears fall down Nate's ugly-crying face. His whimpers and sharp shudders of pain only made Owen shiver with the rush of dominating a deserving scumbag so completely. His videos finally uploaded into his computer, and he copied them into his private file that had everything else he and the guys did, starting with the naked night run that got this ball rolling.

When he pulled up the webpage where everyone added their escapades of exploiting that arrogant fuckrag, Owen's eyebrows came together. The page was white with a single statement and some fine print. The statement read:

404 Page Not Found.

Owen shook his head. Bunch of cowards. Wes probably ordered Drew to kill the page, delete all the evidence. Owen had long suspected his teammates didn't have the guts to see things through, to dish out the justice Nate so richly deserved. That was why Owen had taken the precaution of downloading many of the videos to his own computer.

He rolled his pointer over Nate's special folder as if he were caressing it with his finger.

The others might be done, but he was far from it. His phone pinged. The guys were holding a meeting tomorrow night.

Meh. Fuck `em. He had much more pressing issues to tackle.

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Click. Select file spencer fuck mp4. Right click. Copy. Click. New file. Rename file Coming Out Party mp4. Right click. Paste. Click. Select file cumsucker avi. Right click. Copy. Click Coming Out Party avi. Right click. Paste. Click. Select file DP Spencer avi. Right click. Copy. Select Click Coming Out Party mp4. Right click. Paste. Click. Select Troy-Zack DP. Copy. Select Coming Out Party mp4. Click. Select file spencer rim mp4...

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He worked through the night, selecting the video clips that maximized Nate's facetime and emphasized his whole-hearted participation—no, _enjoyment—_of the perverse sex acts being committed. When the clips of Spencer giving it to Nate came up in his queue, Owen pretty much went with whole swaths of the video clips. Each clip made his heart sing with malicious pride, with a sense of empowerment that he had brought a self-proclaimed superstar stud to his knees, on his knees, on his back, against the wall like the cheap cumslut he really was... His favorite scenes were ones where Nate betrayed his true self beyond a shadow of a doubt, revealing himself to be a closeted fag who relished being fucked so much that he came repeatedly without touching himself while his ass was stuffed with cocks of both flesh and silicone. Every scene where Nate failed to keep his dignity, his body, his soul intact as he moaned and cooed like a bitch in heat, brought the red-head a smirk of ill-gained satisfaction. Nate would never live this down; soon everyone would know what a truly depraved queer he was. Owen no longer wondered why Nate had belittled him for years and ultimately stolen his beloved girlfriend—he now knew the answer for certain. It was all a despicable scheme to conceal Nate's own inadequacies as a man.

At long last, the video was complete. It took him hours, cutting and pasting direct from the source material. He wanted to get fancy, but the truth was he was shit at computers. Give him a truck engine or a tractor rig to fix and he was an ace.

The work on the video was sloppy—a real hack-job, but it would serve its purpose. If he wanted a polished, professional-looking video, he'd have to ask a tech wiz like Drew, but he already knew that idiot would turn him down and alert the others to scupper the grand-coming out he had planned for Nate. No matter—they would come to appreciate what he was doing for them, what they should've had the balls to do themselves.

Owen gathered up his materials and realized he had a few hours to spare before things would be set in motion. The menace hit play on his laptop and put the video on loop, turning it down so only he, in his bed, could hear it. He crawled onto his bed and closed his eyes, cradled to sleep with the sounds of Nate's pathetic moaning and squealing as he was rightly violated repeatedly by that blond fag. His lips twisted in a sneer; Nate just couldn't hide how much he loved having that big dick churn up his queer ass. When he woke, he was nearing go-time.

Owen knew Wes would hold warm-ups. He always did, because Coach insisted, even if the team was fine without. He was such a good little team captain like that, ever the apple polisher. That meant people would be in and out of the building, setting up for the outcome of the match—either a Marlins highlight reel, or the best plays of the championship game, maybe live interviews. But all he wanted was the screen. He'd provide the entertainment.

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Owen arrived at the school as he saw his teammates heading into the building. Dusty Ross-Jennings followed close behind them, catching up with the team and wishing them luck and how they think they'll do and blah blah blah. Owen waited until they were all out of sight before he parked his truck. He watched the game from behind the bleachers, gritting his teeth each time the Marlins scored thanks to Nate's well-timed assists. Owen knew there would be a university talent scout in the audience, probably waiting to offer Nate a scholarship on a silver platter. Everything came easily to that bastard. Well, not by the time Owen was done with him. Nate's future would be in tatters, and Owen would set fire to even those scraps for good measure.

When he was sure the team would clinch victory, he made his move and snuck upstairs to the AV booth.

Dusty had been on standby in the booth throughout the game to assist with video replays of key moments and any technical difficulties that could arise while the announcer provided a running commentary on the Marlins and their opponents' attempts to secure the championship trophy. When the team won, the jubilant announcer left the booth to celebrate with the team while Dusty remained behind to screen the highlights reel from his laptop.

That was when Owen seized his chance. Before the door could fully close behind the departing announcer, he stuck a foot in the gap and quietly let himself in.

Dusty, focused on setting up the highlights reel on his laptop, didn't even notice he had a visitor until it was too late. By the time he had noticed another person in the booth and looked up to see Owen's reflection in the glass plate, Owen swung the training sandbag he'd brought and knocked Dusty unconscious.

Owen dragged Dusty out into the hall and stashed him in the alcove just across from the booth door, propped up against the wall with his knees curled up to his chest. Owen then returned to the booth and saw that Dusty had already set up the video software. It was going to make his nefarious task so much easier. He plugged in his USB stick and got to work.

For someone lacking technical savvy, it only took a few minutes before he had everything ready to go. Dusty had really set him up for success.

The triumphant team and their supporters were anticipating a celebratory video. Owen would give it to them—not just the kind of celebration they were expecting. The video would celebrate Nate's reign. Owen was going to do what his teammates were too chickenshit to do. He was going to destroy Nate Ramsey. Not just what was left of his high school career. Not just what may have been left of his dignity. If Nate no longer belonged to him, if the menace didn't have Nate to tear into and violate like the fag whore he was, like Nate deserved, Owen aimed at the next best thing. He'd obliterate Nate's future, his life, instead.

With a self-satisfied smirk, Owen hit play on his compilation of Nate's greatest hits.

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A full-blown panic struck, and administrators and coaches swarmed the AV room like a murder of crows. The student who was supposed to present the Marlins' highlights was found seated on the floor outside the booth, stunned, rubbing the back of his head.

Coach Reilly went to open the door, but it was locked. Except this door in particular locked by key from the outside, and there was no one in the booth that anyone could see through the safety glass panels on both sides of the metal door.

They called for a custodian to come to the AV booth pronto, and one with the right keys showed. But as he tried to unlock it, the man found, to his horror, that someone had broken off a key inside the lock. Owen had done his homework. He had thought about wedging the door shut, but spotting the keys lying on the table, he'd had a better idea.

It took too many minutes for them to finally smash through the safety glass and unlock the door from the other side. Coach Reilly wanted to stop this insanity immediately. He needed it to. Nate was the unfortunate star of the show, its focus, its primary subject, and the video was doing more and more damage with every second it played. He rushed in, slammed the laptop shut and fiercely pulled all the cables out of it, cutting off the feed to the projector at last.

Whoever did this wanted to make sure that the video was seen from beginning to end, to leave no doubt in viewers' minds that Nate was an unapologetic cock-hound. The clips spliced together all involved Nate grunting and moaning, seemingly hungry for it, all while being anally and orally sodomized.

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Out on the bleachers, Nate buried his head between his knees. His heart hammered wildly, uncontrollably. He would have vomited, but the way he was folded over his diaphragm prevented him from doing so. Marsha was slapping him on the arm, the back, angrily demanding answers: "What's the meaning of this? Are you gay? Are you? Look at me! How could you do this to us?"

Mitchell managed to take hold of his wife. He was no less stunned by what he'd seen on the screen before the feed was pulled, but he knew devolving into hysterics would do no one any good. "Son," he said, "You need to make yourself scarce. If you have some other place to go, I suggest you go there. We need to get your mother calm, for her sake, for the baby's sake, before we can... address... this." He motioned at the screen, now blank momentarily, then repeating from the beginning, and quickly ushered his wife away before they witnessed a full replay of their son's debauchery.

Nate had gone from deathly pale to a furious, blotchy red. He looked as if he were suffering from an apneic episode—as if he had literally forgotten how to breathe. Wherever he turned, people pointed at him, whispering. Nate's grief-shocked mind saw people laughing, jeering, repeating words from the video. The awful cacophony of teasing and heckling had Nate clutching his ears, trying to blot it all out. At the bottom of the risers, Wes locked eyes with him—his face was flushed with recognition that something had truly gone terribly, terribly wrong.

This was not Wes's doing. Or Jason's, for that matter. Both looked at him with equal panicked distress. Drew and Ethan were fighting quietly, and Troy was nowhere to be seen.

Nate's first instinct was to get in his car and go. But his parents had driven him here—he'd parked his car in the garage. He could run home to get it—but he'd have to go into the house, and that was a bomb waiting to detonate at the drop of a hat.

A warm hand touched his shoulder. Spencer. Instinctively, Nate jerked away and bolted down the risers, leaving a deeply worried and utterly baffled Spencer amidst a crowd of stunned and concerned people—people who, in actuality, were not pointing and laughing at all.

On his way running out, the sounds from the lurid sex video had ceased. Someone must have cut the feed. But it was already too late. As he ran through the parking lot, students and adults alike were standing around, talking animatedly over videos on their phone. He didn't have to look hard to see the damn thing was posted online. He cried out angrily into the night, and straightaway his voice suffered for it.

The sunset cast a brilliant golden light on everything.

It was criminally beautiful for a dusky spring evening with more ugliness than Nate could bear.

Nate's mind was furiously ablaze with an influx of emotions and rapid-fire thoughts. The public humiliation had reached levels he never even knew existed, and it felt like someone had taken a hacksaw to the bottom edge of his heart and forced the rest of his organs through it. He wanted to end it—all of it, the jeering, taunting people, the crushing grip of his degradation. Nate looked around wildly and decided on a destination: The highway.

All the pain could come to a sudden end.

Nate got a couple blocks away from the school when a pair of arms surprised him, tackling him to the stretch of dirt between the city's edge and the main road leading to the overpass. A familiar voice practically shouted in his ear.

"Nate! Stop! Just... Stay, okay? Please?" Spencer held on tight, pinning the struggling boy to the ground.

"Let me go, there's nothing left, nothing left to save! It's over—it's all over! Let me go!" Nate wheezed, with no timber in his voice—just air. He couldn't even manage a loud whisper.

"No, baby, I won't," Spencer said, pushing back hard against the struggling young athlete in his grip.

"Don't call me baby!" Nate cried, finally breaking free. He rolled over on Spencer, flailing blindly, angrily, striking his ill-found friend pinned down between his legs.

"Nate, Nate—Enough! I don't understand! Those clips, I didn't know those were being recorded!" Spencer shielded himself only for so long before he grabbed Nate by the wrists and rolled him back into the dirt. He shoved Nate against the ground harder than he expected to, wincing at the thought he might have hurt his poor, badly broken boy.

"You forced me," Nate cried. His grief was the most heartbreaking thing Spencer ever heard. "You forced me into that."

Spencer shook his head. Something clearly hadn't been right with any of this. "I don't get it," he said as calmly as he could. "You're saying you didn't want any of that—with me? You asked me for it! You told me to do it! Nate! Please! Is someone... is someone blackmailing you?" The thought came to him in a flash. All the information pointed in one terrifying direction, and it made Spencer's worry shoot up even more for the sobbing teen on the ground.

Nate's grief spilled over. His pain had become rogue waves buffeting a poorly built harbor wall. "You, you... you..." Spencer let Nate's hands go and pulled him up, hugging him directly. The head of steam that propelled Nate out of the stadium and into the field near the on-ramp towards a permanent solution to this utterly horrifying problem had eroded away. The abject humiliation that was fueling him as he dumbly struck the only person on earth who cared about him, that even then had him pounding his fists impotently on Spencer's back, finally gave way to pure despair. Nate sank into the embrace, sobbing into Spencer's shoulder, clutching tightly in return as his heartbreak wrapped around them both.

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Late sunset faded to moonrise over the campus. The crowds had died away. Police were involved, as there was assault, destruction of school property, and all the ramifications of showing pornography to a stadium full of minors and their very angry parents.

Nate and Spencer were covered in the shadow of the bridge for the road above them. Spencer sat Nate down on the concrete railing as cars passed by them to get to the on-ramps, exiting the off-ramps. The whole sordid affair was laid out before Spencer, and it had been painful in so many ways to hear.

Spencer's eyes watered. He took on whatever grief he could from Nate in a valiant effort to share the boy's burden. Then his eyes watered for Nate's degradation, his humiliation. But when the mention of all the rape that had been inflicted on him began, Spencer felt ill. The nausea threatened to overwhelm him, but he fought through the moment to stay present and strong for the boy. By the time he reined in his breathing, he focused on Nate, who had shut down, staring at the road in front of him.

Spencer waited until Nate described his last day as a slave. He felt the nausea creeping up on him when Nate talked about the rape by double penetration on school campus. When Nate finished on the electrocution, he talked about the meeting, how the things they just saw had supposedly been deleted.

The two sat in silence for a little while when Spencer had a sudden, horrifying revelation. Nate had been blackmailed into having sex with him. Without realizing it, Spencer had unwittingly become a rapist by way of having sex with an unwilling high school boy. However convincing Nate had been then in order to try and save himself from further degradation, it was still a man having sex with another man against his will.

This time, he couldn't stop the wave of disgust that punched him in the gut. Spencer bounded off to the grass and let loose the contents of his stomach. It came with stinging tears, and the fit ended with the taste of painful bile when there was nothing left to heave.

"Spencer?" Nate's soft whisper pulled Spencer back, hastening him to recover for the boy at the middle of more pain than a boy should handle. Spencer didn't speak, but he looked Nate's way, and kept his eye contact.

"There's... There's no one for me. I c-can't go home."

Spencer had no clue just how much heartbreak he could take in a day. Nate's rusty voice, coupled with his grief, piled onto his misery, topped off with despair—He bit his own lip to keep from crying for his younger friend. The gravelly stutter became sobs choked with tears, and Spencer pulled him in again for another deep embrace.

"Is there anyone you could call? Any friends?"

Nate's arms were dead weight. He had nothing left in him. Numbness was beginning to seep in. "T.J., maybe. He was my best friend, but..." Nate's tears had left him. "He moved away. Years ago." Nate shuddered. "I couldn't call him anyway. My phone, my clothes—everything's back at the school, and I can't go back there. Not now."

Spencer closed his eyes with sad understanding. His last real friend was nowhere near, and time and distance separated them. With everything happening here, Spencer saw how Nate was alone. He wanted so much to kiss Nate, to show him he was loved—but in light of the confessions, of all the things he went through, Spencer kept his heart's desires at bay.

"Come on. We'll go to my dorm."

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Moonlight dappled the spaces between the shadows with pale blue light. Its touch fell over the city as campus security with flashlights ushered students and families away from campus, into the parking lots, and safely away from the school. Melanie stepped outside, needing some fresh air after seeing and hearing the entirety of that video before Coach Reilly managed to shut it off.

The whole time she and Nate were together—was it all a lie? She shook her head, reviling the idea that she had been a gay guy's beard, but the video raised more questions than she knew she didn't want answered. Melanie ruminated on it all, heading for her car near the entrance to the parking lot. Cars were backed up on the main road just past the parking lot entrance and exit.

After being on her feet all day, Melanie wanted to sit and think. She was near her car, but it would be stuffy, and her AC wasn't terribly reliable. Nearby planters were unoccupied, so she crossed to sit when a firm hand took her by the elbow.

"What the--? Owen?" she asked, stunned to see him. He hadn't shown all day, nor did he actually make it to the game. "Christ! Where have you been? Did you see all th—"

Owen cut her off before she finished. "Told ya. I said it. That freak was bad news to begin with. He's a complete and utter faggot. Did you see the way he went for it with that Zarowsky kid?"

Melanie's eyes widened. The nagging question at the back of her mind had been: Who was actually sick enough to screen Nate's gay sex tape at a high school event?

"Oh Jesus," she groaned. "You did this! You had something to do with the video, didn't you? What the hell, Owen? Sure, Nate was... Well, he has some demons, but he didn't deserve to be outed like that! Seriously, Owen? What the fuck?!" Melanie shook her head. Disgust was overtaking her.

Owen spent the better part of two days getting everything perfect. He'd spent hours trawling through reams of disgusting footage of Nate having shameless gay sex, selecting the most stomach-churning segments to garner maximum impact. He did all that to ensure that Nate's true colors were exposed to the world and Melanie would know her relationship with Nate had been a dreadful aberration all along—the product of a sick mind.

Except his girl was looking at him like he was the one with the sick mind.

"Honey, what is this? You know I'm just telling you the truth! Owen said. "That scumbag was just using you! After he stuck his dick in the way and broke us up, the fucker just used you as a beard!"

Melanie shuddered. "No, Owen. He and I actually had a nice thing going. You and I broke up because you were starting to scare me. You had to know where I was at all times. You scared off my friends and made my time your time. Nate didn't have anything to do with that. You were possessive, and it was suffocating!"

It was a poor choice of words. Melanie regretted them the instant they left her lips. Owen's thick, meaty arm shot out, and his large hand wrapped around the front of her neck. The look on his face was terrifying—a pitiable mix of sadness, psychotic love, jealousy, and worst of all, sadistic rage.

"O-Owen!" Melanie squeaked. The hand around her neck began to curl shut.

"Sweetie," Owen cooed. "You're mine. I'll never let you go, you hear me? I'll never—"

An elbow came crashing down on Owen's forearm, causing him to lose his grip and muscle control in it for a moment. He had been surprised, Wes and Jason tackled him from two sides, knocking the wind out of him as they fell to the floor.

"What the fuck, Owen? Do you know what you've done? You just tanked Nate's entire life!" Wes ground out, struggling to keep Owen down. Jason was trying the same, but their efforts never met in the middle where they'd be strong enough to keep the beast down.

Owen flung out his arms, breaking free from Jason's grasp, throwing him off, and slamming Wes on his back onto the concrete. He sprang up quickly in their disorientation and gave both a strong stomp in the gut.

"STAY DOWN!" Owen commanded. The boys at his feet had no choice, as they groaned around their stomachs, winded.

Melanie had recovered after struggling to get her breathing back when she saw Wes and Jason fall hard onto the asphalt. She shrieked, drawing people's attention, including that of her ex-boyfriend.

Owen looked up, locking eyes on Melanie's. She felt panic rise—everything in her body told her "Run! Run now!" She needed a public place—there were few cars in the parking lot, traffic was starting to thin, the grocery store had a rush for dinner... That was it. She took off across the street, quick to cross when cars sped by. Owen gave chase, screaming her name.

"Melanie!" Owen yelled. "Come back! Mela—" SKREEE-THUD. Silence. Thump, thump, thump.

Everything happened so fast. By the time Melanie looked back, wheels squealed, glass crashed, and Owen had disappeared. He was no longer close behind her. In his place, a late model SUV meant for a big family had come to a halt. A good few feet in front of it, Owen was face down, on the ground, bloodied, bruised, broken, and completely unresponsive.

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Hours had passed from when Jason called 911. EMTs collected Owen's unconscious body and sped off in their ambulance straight away to the hospital—specifically, to the hospital where Jason's father and Wes's mother worked. The boys headed back to Jason's house. Wes's mother told them that Owen's parents had been called and that he was in theater. She was not at liberty to share any more news without breaching confidentiality, but from her tone, the boys gathered that Owen's prognosis was not good.

The two spent those long hours waiting in silence. Late evening passed into early daylight when Wes's voice finally broke the unnatural stillness. He spoke to the floor with his head in his hands, addressing no one in particular.

"How did things get so messed up?" He corrected himself. "How did I let things get so messed up?

"Wes..." began Jason, but the blond teen wasn't hearing any of it.

"Did you see Nate run off? God knows what happened to him, what he was thinking. Owen took a blowtorch to his life before Coach Reilly and campus security managed to bust down the door and cut the feed."

"I know," Jason replied.

"Something like this, the cops are going to want to investigate. They were already talking to Melanie. They confiscated Dusty's laptop, too. They're going to find out, Jase. They're going to find out how all this came to be."

"I know."

"Owen is no Drew; he wouldn't have had the good sense to clear his home computer of whatever shit he downloaded from the site before it was taken down. It's only a matter of time before the police seize his computer and find everything—what we did to Nate." Wes took his head in his hands, pulling at his hair in high anxiety. "It's not like Nate has any reason to keep quiet anymore," he added with a beleaguered grunt.

Jason didn't respond immediately. He pressed a shoulder to the wall and stared out the window. Wes stood up, crossing to the other side of the window and mirroring Jason's posture.

"I can hear you thinking, Wes."

Wes let out a brief sigh.

"You know there was nothing you could have done to stop Owen from running after Melanie. He—"

"I should have stopped him when we started tearing into Nate!" Wes cried angrily, flipping a table. The ensuing clatter of family mementos hitting the hardwood floor rang noisily through the room. Jason hoped that the din wouldn't wake his sisters.

This was a whole other level of Wes being pissed at himself that Jason hadn't seen before.

"I should have seen it, Jase. Owen was already losing it by the time we got Nate in our net. All of us ganging up on Nate and pinning him down just made everything worse. And yesterday... I wanted to believe he was sincere about regretting what he did to Nate. But I should have known. I should have known better!"

Jason stared at the overturned table. He huffed as he shook his head, righting the table and collecting the knick-knacks that had scattered across the carpet.

Jason knew Wes was right. Had Owen been stopped, had someone just checked in on him, knowing how volatile he was, how hot he was to seriously fuck Nate up and over, they wouldn't be worrying. Then again, had they only kept the original dare low key and simple, they could have easily taught Nate a lesson without resorting to blackmail and rape.

Could have. Would have. Ultimately, didn't.

The front door opened, and Dr. George Archer walked into his home, his white doctor's coat folded over his arm. He gazed at the boys and shook his head sadly.

"Your friend is out of theater. His parents said it was okay to share the news with his teammates. We did the best we could, but his injuries were severe—his head, his femur, his collarbone... He's in an induced coma. We have to face the possibility that he may never wake up. The police wanted to talk to him, but that was impossible. I know it must be a terrible shock for you both, witnessing what happened. If you need to talk to someone, I know grief counselors..."

"It's okay, Dad," Jason assured him. "We have each other. You should go get some rest—you look exhausted from the surgery."

George looked from one boy to another and drew a sharp breath. "Yeah, I wouldn't mind some sleep if I'm honest. You boys look like you could use some too."

"In a bit," promised Jason. "We have to let the other team members know if Mr. and Mrs. Montrose said it was fine. Goodnight, Dad."

Wes finally spoke. "Thanks Dr. Archer. Goodnight."

George patted them both on the shoulder and went up to his bedroom, leaving the two teens to deliberate.

Jason cursed Nate under his breath. Goddamn Nate for getting under his skin. Goddamn him for having even the slightest thing to do with his little sister.

But in his heart, Jason knew he was being horribly unfair. What was happening now wasn't actually Nate's fault. Nate didn't release the video. He certainly hadn't recorded a second of it, either. That was everyone else. Nate was terrified out of his own mind of anything getting out. Judging from the way he ran out of the gym, from the way Nate's parents left him, the gang got their wish. Nate was humiliated, viciously hate-fucked by pretty much everyone he knew, and everything he struggled to keep down burst forth in an epically filthy, disgusting display that was only one eighth of the story. But it was edited to keep the guys off, leaving Nate holding the bag. He was truly destroyed.

Wes's voice once again broke the stillness.

"Remember what I asked," Wes said evenly. "If the cops really are involved, I'm taking full responsibility for all of it."

Jason shook his head. "That's noble, Wes. It really is. But you can't make that decision. We all had a part in this, so we're all in it together. I let my anger fuck me over when I fucked and hurt Nate back for hurting Jessie. It shouldn't have been like that. I could have reported him, and let the cops decide.

"But you? Me? Owen, Drew, Ethan, and Troy? We're featured stars in every little movie we made with Nate choking on or bouncing on our dicks. The truth will come out, and we're all going down together. That's justice. You can't take it all on yourself, Wes—because the evidence won't let you. The police won't let you."

Jason crossed to Wes. He looked him in the eyes and gave his soon-to-be-brother a remorseful but supporting hug.

"I won't let you."

Wes returned his best friend's hug and let his cheek rest on Jason's shoulder. He was grateful that he wouldn't have to weather the storm alone. At least he'd have Jason.

If there was a storm coming, Owen got lucky.

...Some luck.

*** *** *** *** ***

"I can go first," Finn said. "It's your first time, so you should know how it feels. I'll help you do it right."

Troy felt a telltale heat climbing from his chest to his cheeks. The two had arrived at this point after a frenzy of fallen clothes and cast off shoes. Naked, kissing, touching, exploring, Finn offered him the next step. One that he was reluctant to take.

Damn that Nate Ramsey, Troy thought.

The day hadn't been kind. In the showers, after practice, Nate had made a crack about watching out for Troy intentionally dropping the soap in hopes that one of his teammates would take him up his queer ass. Wes had remonstrated him for the homophobic remark, but Nate had countered that Wes had a duty as team captain to make sure the `real' men on the team felt comfortable while showering. It was Coach Reilly's appearance that ultimately made Nate shut up, but after he left, Nate sidled up to Troy to hiss in his ear about how he knew he'd hit a nerve because Troy was itching to get his fairy ass fucked like the girl he really was. Troy had rushed out of the locker room without even getting fully dressed, clutching his shirt in his hands. He hated that he'd let Nate get to him, to plant doubts in his mind about whether allowing himself to be fucked meant sacrificing his masculinity.

"Hey," Finn said, gently tapping Troy between the eyes. "I'm right here, handsome. Don't wig out on me."

Troy stared at the older teen, his friend, lover, and guru. Navigating the choppy waters of coming-out had been so much smoother thanks to him, and this was supposed to be the moment they consummated their relationship. He wasn't going to let Nate ruin it for either of them. "Are you sure?" Troy asked as he ran his fingers through Finn's night-black hair. "I mean, I know I'm the younger one here and all, so I thought—"

"There are no rules here, Troy. Well, okay. Maybe one rule. We don't hurt each other. What we do, we do because we want to, and because it makes the other feel good. Okay?" Finn asked, his voice hopeful. Troy didn't know it then, but Finn had his own misgivings about bottoming again. The only other time he'd done it, his adoptive brother, Parry, had been holding him down and violated him against his will. He pushed the traumatic memories of that night out of his mind, wanting to concentrate on replacing them with new, pleasurable memories of making love to the boy he adored.

Troy nodded. "Okay." Upon his agreement, Finn took Troy by the hand and pressed him against his bed.

"Lay on your back," the older boy instructed in a gentle tone. Troy did as he was told, all the while feeling Finn's fingertips slide over his naked front. Those strong, long, creamy-toned fingers homed in on his dick, which was hard and straining. The sound of foil tearing distracted Troy momentarily, followed by the feel of Finn's lips kissing the tip of his cock.

"Put your head on my pillows, baby," Finn said. Troy shuffled around until his head was propped up, and Finn was all he could see. Those green eyes were focused on performing the task of sheathing Troy's wanting cock. The snap of a cap on a bottle of lube informed Troy of what was coming—the cool touch of the gel being slathered onto the part of his body covered with a thin, protective skin.

"Look at me, okay?" Finn asked. Troy couldn't deny the beautiful boy who controlled his pleasure in this moment. Finn never looked away as he squatted over of Troy's dick and lined it up against his warm and waiting hole. The mount was slow, torturously so, but Finn prevented Troy from bucking into him by pressing his hands against the prone boy's core. Every twinge of pain brought back recollections of Parry's drunken brutality, but Finn persevered, pushing them aside to focus on Troy's handsome face, with its mix of awestruck delight and devotion.

The look Finn gave him was eating at his heart. Troy didn't think it was possible to love another boy as he did Finn in that instant. He lay in wonder of the moment, in anticipation of what it had in store for them. When Finn's skin was finally pressed against Troy's flesh, the older of the two leaned down to kiss the younger. They explored each other's mouths languidly, leisurely, with eyes wide open and smiles that lit up the room.

Then Finn began to move.

Oh dear god_, Troy thought. Finn bucked and undulated, giving Troy's cock the ride of a lifetime. Finn's own member waved in the air—an angry pink, and hard as a steel hammer. Finn's head was thrown back, with a look of wild abandon and bliss across his face. A thin hank of coal-black hair was plastered to the pale boy's damp forehead, giving him a casually disheveled look—but the moment was not about appearances. It was about feeling. Nothing was said between the two save for the sound of their breaths, their gasps, their moans. The tightness, the warmth, the_ feel of Finn's weight, the smell of his sweat, the heat from his focused gaze threatened to make Troy cum five times over.

Troy was privy to the flash that blossomed over Finn's chest, up to his shoulders, his straining neck. The boy was close. So was he. When Finn drove himself down, grinding himself on Troy's swollen dick, he cried out as volley after volley of hot seed splashed over Troy's chest, his neck, his face. Troy's climax came simultaneously as he filled the condom to the brim with his release.

But Finn was hardly done. He pulled off of the boy, dragging his lips, his tongue over Troy's cum and sweat dampened skin, gathering up his spunk and ending at Troy's mouth. Finn's taste exploded onto Troy's tongue as the older boy shared his release, and it drove Troy mad with hunger for more. In a swift move, Finn had unsheathed Troy's cock and dumped the condom's contents onto both their tongues.

There were more surprises to come, though, when Finn pulled away, slipping between Troy's legs and lifting them. The noises that came from Troy's mouth were inhuman—he saw bright flashes of light and felt shockwave after pleasurable shockwave pulsing from what very well may have been the center of his universe. Finn played Troy like a concert violinist with his tongue, his lips, even his teeth with gentle nips to the flesh around Troy's tender, tiny folds.

An eternity of warmth and heat swept over Troy when he realized he had been begging. Nate's insidious comments were long-forgotten. He begged Finn to take him—begged for Finn's cock inside him. Finn obliged. It had only been fifteen minutes since the last time he came, but Finn was drawing another climax out of him with every caress, every kiss, every flick of his tongue. The sounds of foil ripping and the squick! of lubricant sliding over latex filled the very brief space of time it took the beautiful, freckle-nosed, green-eyed boy to prepare himself before he entered Troy.

As the last true bastion of his virginity fell away, Troy was awash in an ocean of pleasure that was first driven by pain. But with each moment that Finn shared a most intimate space with Troy, the pain subsided into a dull throb, and then a wicked ache. An ache that Finn thrust away. The two were slick bodies with hands in sweat-dampened hair, kisses and caresses and moans. Troy knew in his heart, in that moment, his world was right. With Finn, it would always be right.

Troy's room was a flurry of clothes and easy-to-carry equipment. Finn stood at the door and watched his boy tear the room apart, stuffing random things into random backpacks and gym bags.

"Planning on a road trip?" Finn waited for a response. Nothing. "I'm guessing Alaska." Finn's half-hearted attempt at humor died on the floor in front of him when Troy grabbed him by the arms and pressed in for a desperate, soul-crushing kiss. Troy was too hyped up to notice that the kiss was not returned.

"I'm getting my stuff together," Troy rattled off. His rate of speech matched the galloping rhythm in his heart, which matched the frantic way he moved around his room.

"That's... obvious," Finn said, trying to follow the whirlwind in the bedroom. He knelt down, half-heartedly gathering up a pile of clothes at his feet.

"You don't understand, Finn!" Wes cried. His arms tensed close to his body, like he was about to force a boulder from his bowels. But the tension bled out, and Wes slumped where he stood, standing with his face in his hands.

"Everyone knows I'm gay," Troy said softly. "And when they open up that fucking laptop, I just know they're gonna find everything. They're gonna know..."

Finn stood staring at Troy's back. Troy's panicked breathing showed, and he tried to get it under control. When he did, he realized he had to say it. He had to say it now. Maybe then, just maybe, Finn might want to come with him.

It was all or nothing, now.

"I'm... I'm in love with you, Finn." Troy said. "I love you!" Finn blinked in response, expressionless. Troy took this to mean he was stunned. "Fuck! I'm a shit, I know. This is not the time or place to say it. But there is. I've fucked around with so many other guys before and while I knew you, but damnit, I keep coming back to you. Always and only you." He turned around and saw Finn. Troy hoped to see the beautiful, creamy-skinned, freckle-nosed boy's face looking up at him. But while he faced Troy, he was looking down, his eyes hidden by his jet black hair, as he took in the mess that was Troy's room.

More likely, his life.

Finn remained unresponsive as he slowly rose, which spurred Troy to fill the silence.

"Finn," Troy burst into a sob. "They don't show mercy on guys like me in prison. When they find out, and they always find out, what I did to get there, that I raped a straight guy? A lot? Fucked with his head? I won't last. I won't survive! I'd be a dead fag walking!" Troy's arms shot out and wrapped around Finn hard. He hugged the guy to whom he professed his love, unabashedly sobbing the whole time.

When Troy calmed significantly, he finally realized Finn hadn't returned the gesture. In desperation, he went for his next gambit.

"Come with me," Troy murmured over Finn's shoulder.

"What?" Finn asked. His flat, emotionless tone triggered a little panic in Troy.

"Come with me. We'll go someplace, together, just us. Canada! Plenty of places to go and blend in! I'd get a job, and I swear, I would cherish you and take care of you until we die!"

Finn's unsettlingly calm eyes locked on to Troy's wild, frightened ones. Troy's jaw would have dropped in surprise; what he saw had disconcerted him. It wasn't love. It wasn't disgust. It was clinical, so serious a look on a boy Finn's age. The light wasn't right. It seemed like laser-focused light in those clear green eyes.

"Don't run." Finn said quietly. "Just... don't run." He sounded disappointed. Disappointed that it even had to be said.

"Finn, I can't... I can't stay. Fuck!" Troy pulled Finn close, but this time was met with solid resistance. Finn pushed out of Troy's arms and took the gorgeous brunette by the arms.

"What you did," Finn exhaled his frustrations. "What you did was monstrous. I'd be lying to myself if I say I could look past all the terrible things you did to Nate. After what I've been through, what I know—I can't do it. That Troy is someone I can't even deal with. And right now, that's the only Troy I see. That's all I see, and I can't stand to look at him."

Troy felt slapped. Finn may not have physically done so, but the sting of the pain was there, all the same.

"Face this," Finn said, unaware of his own eyes watering as he emphatically appealed to Troy. "Face your mistakes. Own them. Don't run from them. You know you did wrong. I know you know it. You have to make this right. You don't have to do it for Nate. Do it for you. Deep down within you is the crazy, charming, handsome, creative, beautiful guy I fell in love with. He had promise. So much promise. This may hurt now, but it's punishment—not a death sentence. You'll survive. Prove it to me. Prove to me that you're still that guy I cared for and fucking do what's right."

Neither boy moved. Neither one flinched. The air stilled around them. The only sound in the room was of both young men breathing.

In the silent exchange of wills and hope, Troy crumbled.

"I can't! I love you, Finn! God I love you so much—but this?" Troy gestured wildly at the air, indicating anything and everything. "This is coming down, and it's going to come down hard. They'll eat me alive in there, use me like a, a thing, and probably kill me, by accident or on purpose! Don't ask me to let myself be killed for your love, Finn. It's not worth it!" The irony was not lost on Troy that being used like a thing is exactly what he did to Nate. Of course, it dawned on him two weeks too late. Troy stood before Finn, hopeful that the boy he loved would understand.

But just like that, the light in Finn's eyes that Troy had come to love went out. There was no warm glow. There was no furious fire.

There was nothing.

Finn stepped back slowly, wiping the tears that threatened to fall before they had the chance to. The pale-skinned boy sniffled a little before he spoke.

"Wherever you go, I hope you have a life worth living," Finn said plainly, without sarcasm, but without kindness. "When I think of you, I'll hope for that for you." He turned, walking out the room before quietly closing Troy's bedroom door with him still inside.

It barely took Troy five seconds before the revelation hit him. Finn said that he had fallen in love with him!

Troy burst out of his bedroom and took off through the front door. Finn's car was still parked behind his truck. In fact, Finn was seated behind the wheel of his car with his head on the steering column.

Troy knocked on the window, startling the green-eyed beauty. He motioned that he wanted in, and Finn turned to unlock the door.

The young brunette jock jumped in and closed the door behind him.

Both stared out into the early night sky. Fireflies danced lazily through the air in the periphery.

"I'm sorry," Troy said.

"You've been saying that a lot lately," Finn said sadly.

"I know." Troy niggled with a wrinkle in his jeans at a knee. "That life worth living you talked about..."

Finn breathed deep and shook his head slightly, from side to side. The movement was miniscule. So much that Troy missed it.

"I'll do it," Troy said at last. "I'll do it for you. I'll make it, I'll survive, so I can prove that I'm a better man. Anything, Finn. Anything. I love you."

Finn crossed his hands in front of him in his lap, as if in prayer. His head was bowed, which made the sounds of his breathing more pronounced in the otherwise soundless cabin.

"I've waited a long time for you to say that to me. I don't think you know how long I've waited."

Troy was so overwhelmed with hope that he reached out for Finn. But Finn shied away and spoke evenly.

"I don't think you realize how it means nothing to me now."

Troy's hand stayed afloat but stopped its progression. As Finn continued, Troy brought his hand back to his lap just in time to catch his own tears through what his beautiful boy had to say.

"What on earth makes you think I could love you now? How could I possibly love you back, when I saw what you and your friends—" Finn spat the word with revulsion, "—did? You did so many sick and horrible things—I can't even tell you how disgusted I am at what happened to him! How you treated him! How you treated Spencer! Setting him up for heartbreak just because he hadn't returned your love. It wasn't just Nate's life you helped ruin, it's Spencer's too. Did you think I could love a guy who could potentially hurt me like that? Humiliate me?" Finn's voice cracked. He was furious. Troy had never felt so incredibly small.

"I would never hurt you," Troy's voice trembled. He was unsure he said anything at all. "I could never... Do that to you."

Finn exhaled harshly. "But you could do it to someone else. And you did. Not just once, but repeatedly. And I cannot, will not support that." He reined in his anger, his disgust, his grief. "You were honest with me a few minutes ago," Finn replied with a cold calmness. "The you I thought I loved—he's only a figment of my imagination."

Troy felt himself stammering to say something, but Finn pushed on.

"The part of you I loved is buried too deep in a guy I can't even look at without thinking about the absolute hell you casually, willingly pushed on another human being—like he was nothing. Like they were nothing. I thought I could somehow look past it if you just... Did the right thing. But here you are, trying to do the right thing, because you think it'd please me."

"Won't it?" Every word was a tiny dagger plunged into Troy's skin. But he had to know. Where did he go wrong?

"It would," Finn admitted. "But this thing you'll do for me—that's not what I had in mind. I wanted you to do it because in your heart of hearts, it would be the right thing to do. It would come from you. But instead of owning up to your mistakes, instead of taking your punishment because it's only fair, you want to pin your hopes on me and make me the reason you do this? No. No, Troy." Finn's ire had built to a head. He took a calming breath before he continued. "What you said in your room? You can't take it back. I know now that you're only looking out for yourself, defending your actions and hiding from your guilt instead of taking responsibility for the evil shit you did. You forced my hand, and I've chosen to break this cycle."

Troy didn't have to think back too far to remember that Finn's tolerance for abuses were understandably low. The boy he loved, the pale-skinned, black haired boy with glittering green eyes—he had been a victim to rape himself. Troy knew where Finn was coming from. Finn could relate to Nate when all was said and done. From that shared, traumatic, life-altering experience, there was nothing Troy could do to change Finn's mind.

"If... If I go to prison, will you... Could you visit me, as a friend?" The desperation in Troy's heart overpowered his will to be strong. He needed Finn in any way he could get him, and if he couldn't have him as a lover, he would fight tooth and nail to keep him as a friend.

Finn didn't say anything. Troy's hopes faded like embers in snow.

"Maybe." Finn spoke to his steering column, his eyes focused forward.

It wasn't a "no." Troy had that, at least. He had hope enough for one more thing.

"Finn?"

"Yes?"

"Would you look at me?" Troy wanted to memorize the things he had taken for granted. He needed to see Finn's boyish, fair, freckled face. He wanted to lose himself for just a moment in Finn's clear, green eyes.

Finn didn't move.

"I think you should go now."

Troy felt a horrible rip in the universe between himself and the boy who once loved him. Finn looked out the driver side window instead of at him. The best that he could cling to had been the profile of Finn's reflection. An eye and his milky white skin reflected back at him. It wasn't the same.

All the colors in the reflection were muted. Pale imitations of the art that was Finn. Troy had nothing left to say. There was nothing left to say. He stepped out of the car, closed the door carefully, and walked back into his house on a much-too-beautiful-to-be-allowed spring night. When Troy got to the door, he turned. He'd hoped Finn would change his mind, that he would be right behind him with a hug and his strong, supportive words of encouragement. Instead, like Eurydice behind Orpheus, Troy turned, and Finn was gone. This was wrong. Without Finn, everything was all wrong.

*** *** *** *** ***

Daylight slid stealthily into Spencer's dorm room. He woke, unsurprised that the young man had slept curled in on himself, holding Spencer's arm as if it were a lifeline on stormy tides. It was just as well he was still sleeping. Spencer didn't want to upset him or push too hard on a recovery process the guy most likely wasn't ready for.

The night before, Spencer ushered a weary, broken and terrified young man into his room.

"Do you want to take a shower?" Spencer asked. He spoke softly, afraid that Nate might freak out at anything louder than a clap. The boy shook his head at the offer.

"I can't," Nate talk-whispered. "I might run into someone—and I...I..."

"It's alright," Spencer said. "You don't want to see anyone right now. I get it."

The tension that was visible in Nate's handsome frame faded out a little. Spencer saw the boy relax, which made him relax.

But Nate's protest stuck with him somehow. Did Spencer really want to risk seeing anyone? Especially after the release of that damned video? It didn't matter to him that the video was all about gay sex—everyone knew. It was just living down the thing, surviving it, coming out the other side healthy and whole.

Those were thoughts for another time. Right now, Nate demanded Spencer's focus.

He went into his dresser and pulled out the baggiest tee-shirt he could find for Nate, as well as a pair of shorts. Spencer thought to help Nate out of his clothes but decided against any actions that might possibly be misconstrued as questionable. Given what Spencer saw of the video, a great many assholes had done a great number of beyond questionable things to his poor boy. Instead, he put the tee-shirt and shorts in Nate's hands and turned his back. A rustling of clothes told Spencer the boy had done the rest. Part of it. Nate stood before Spencer in shorts, without his shirt on.

"Too warm," was all Nate said as he handed the shirt back.

Spencer accepted the returned shirt and collected Nate's damp uniform, his socks, and his jockstrap. It made him realize, in that moment, Nate had gone without undergarments.

On another night, the thought would have tantalized him. Tonight, he just wanted Nate to feel safe.

With his roommate gone for the weekend, Spencer decided to put Nate in Brody's bed. The last thing the poor boy needed was having to share a bed with another guy, the same guy who'd unwittingly violated him multiple times. It wasn't that he couldn't trust himself. He just wanted Nate to know that the boy could trust him, in spite of all that happened to him.

"I'm gonna grab some clothes and change in the showers," Spencer said. Before he could make for his dresser, Nate's warm hand closed around his wrist.

"Spence, come on. You don't have to do that. We've seen each other naked. Like, literally every part of each other!" Nate said, releasing his host. "It's silly to be all shy around me after all we've done. Just change here into what you usually wear to bed."

Spencer cocked an eyebrow. "Well, if I'm honest, I normally sleep in my underwear, but I didn't want you to feel uncomfortable—"

"Oh, jeez, Spence," Nate interrupted impatiently. "It's okay. Just do it."

The blond boy shifted awkwardly from one foot to another. He didn't want to antagonize Nate, but at the same time he was acutely aware of what he had on under his jeans. That morning, when Spencer returned to his dorm after seeing Nate off to his house, he had anticipated a huge win in Nate's game, and he had worn a bit of sexy underwear for the celebration and the passionate interlude they'd most likely have—but the fallout of the night's events had him wishing he'd saved the underwear for another day.

Well, no use trying to hide them now. If he stalled any longer, he risked making Nate feel like he was treating him with kid gloves. Sighing, Spencer decided to get it over with quickly. In quick succession, he pulled off his shirt, shoes, and socks. Then He undid his belt and his fly, and practically jumped out of his pants.

He was left in nothing but a pair of incredibly tiny, white bikini briefs. On any other guy, they might have just about fit, but Spencer's extra-long dick completely filled the pouch, bulging obscenely and leaving practically all of his golden pubes and a good two inches of butt crack on show. He self-consciously tried to pull the underwear up, but it caused one of his balls to pop out the side. Nate gave an ungentlemanly snort that he tried to disguise as a cough. Spencer glared at him in exasperation.

"I see why you wanted to change somewhere else," Nate observed. "That's a...a lot of exposed skin there." A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. Spencer relaxed, knowing Nate was not put out. He comically threw up his hands in defeat, hopping into his bed. The blond hastily covered up with his duvet, although it was a warm night, feeling foolish about his choice of underwear but reassured by Nate's nonchalance.

"Try to get some sleep, Nate. This will be different in the morning. We'll work something out, okay?" Spencer promised.

"I wish I had your faith, Spence," Nate replied sullenly. "but I don't really see how after all that's happened." He sighed loudly. "Thank you for letting me stay the night. I don't know what I would have done without you."

It broke Spencer's heart to hear Nate talk like that. "Hey, don't even mention it. I'll always be on your side, Nate. Always. Whatever you need."

Nate felt tears well in his eyes. He croaked in a watery voice, "I know. Thank you, Spence. Thank you. Goodnight."

"Goodnight, Nate," rejoined Spencer.

On a typical night, Spencer could close his eyes, take a few deep breaths, and be out like a light until morning. But tonight, he lay there, staring at the ceiling, with his thoughts keeping him from setting off his routine. Thoughts of Nate started off in sexy and seductive ways, but rapidly devolved into memories of holding him in the school parking lot as he sobbed against him.

The sounds of sadness in his head had become louder when he realized Nate was quietly sobbing in real life on the other side of the room.

Spencer's heart ached to hold the boy again, to assure him he's safe, to let him know someone cared for him. But he wouldn't initiate, for fear that Nate would think he was trying to take advantage of him. Spencer shook his head in his head, mentally pushing himself to keep away from the boy in order to help him. The sobbing came and went, and each bout ripped Spencer's heart just a little bit more. He had focused on the idea of Nate's grief so hard that he almost missed hearing the boy altogether.

"Spence," Nate whispered.

"Mm?" Spencer murmured by way of reply, feigning sleep.

"Can you... Can I get into bed with you? I could use someone to hold me," Nate said, his voice hiccupping on small sobs that perforated his request. "I... I don't have anyone right now, and I'm... I'm alone. I'm so alone." Nate cried once more. Spencer paused and bit his tongue to keep from letting his grief for his friend's pain take over. He knew it must have taken a lot for Nate to admit weakness, to admit he actually wanted another man, a gay man, no less, to hold him.

"I'm not sure that's such a good idea," he said hesitantly.

Nate gave a frustrated cry and sat up in bed, teary-eyed and exasperated. "Dude, I've had your dick. I've had your dick up my butt. Your bare dick. I sure as hell can handle you in those briefs!"

Spencer's inner voice was screaming at him not to do this—that he had to protect Nate from anyone who might hurt him, even himself. But compassion overrode the little voice, and Spencer relented. "Of course, Nate. Sorry. Of course, we can do that."

Before he could draw another breath to speak more, before he could even contemplate whether he needed to slip on a pair of shorts over his briefs, Nate had leapt out of Brody's bed and into Spencer's, wrapping his arms around the blond boy's waist, his fingers perilously close to Spencer's exposed ass-crack. Nate's face was nestled in the curly, golden shells of his chest hair.

For Nate, on any other day before he was enslaved, even touching another man's hairy chest would have caused him to freak out. But there was warmth here, and comfort, and security. Spencer would never hurt him—not like he'd been hurt before by the others. When he felt the older boy's arms cautiously encircle him, he sighed, sinking in even more.

The blond, well-tanned boy lay there with his arms around his raven-haired guest. Spencer was between kicking himself and comforting himself. The kicking side begged the question: What the hell are you doing? He's been brutalized! He needs help! He doesn't need you getting all up in his personal space like this! This is all kinds of messed up!

The comforting side said nothing. It was content to draw Spencer's attention to Nate's gentle snore. If he could finally get some sleep, put the god-awful day to bed, then it was the right move.

That was roughly seven hours ago. Spencer woke up at 6 o'clock on the dot. Nate was still in his arms, but there was something in his mouth that gave Spencer some concern.

It was his nipple. For Spencer, it was a definite hotspot with a direct line to his dick. He kept his breath from shuddering, even as Nate's lips pressed together as he swallowed in his sleep. But that little lip action was all it took to get Spencer's cock to harden up. It had popped out of the unfortunate bikini briefs, and to Spencer's horror, it poked against Nate's bare abs, leaving a trail of pre-cum in its wake.

Mustering his will, augmented by his guilt, Spencer managed to wriggle free of Nate's grasp. He felt the day before still on his skin, and then he realized he hadn't had a shower the night before like he normally would have.

That was the first order of business.

Spencer swept up a towel and wrapped it around his waist, only after tucking his sizeable erection into his briefs, lest he bump into any other early risers in the hall. Fortunately, it was early enough to be too early for the others to be up and about, which suited him perfectly since he really didn't want to encounter anyone who may have seen the lewd video from last night. He still didn't have a strategy to address the shit-storm that was undoubtedly heading his way. How would he ever explain away making a sex-tape that had been broadcast at a high school basketball game?

After gathering up his toiletries, Spencer tiptoed out of his room, quietly locking the door behind him. He padded to the floor's communal showers, spying no one—until he arrived and caught sight of Liam, dripping wet from a shower, completely naked, shaving his taut stomach at one of the sinks. It was a bit overwhelming—this muscle-boy blond guy denuding himself of body hair. When he applied shaving foam to his groin, Spencer could have tipped over from light-headedness from blood rushing south. Instead, he almost dropped his toiletry bag when Liam spoke to him.

"Hey," Liam said kindly. He paused in the midst of shaving off the annoying pubic stubble that had grown since his last manscaping session. The look on his face spoke volumes—Spencer had no doubt the video had already made the rounds.

"Hiya, Liam," Spencer said dumbly.

It could have been a huge inquiry, full of snide comments and banter that would be offensive to both Spencer and Nate. But Liam was never that guy.

"How are you handling things?" Liam asked.

Spencer stepped up to the sink next to his friend, resting his hip against the fixture. He was truly appreciative of the concern on the guy's face. "This is... I'm dealing. I'm more concerned about Nate, though. This whole thing for him is so utterly fucked up."

"You know, he's the fellow stripper I told you about, the one with the serious sexuality issues?" Liam said, resuming his task and taking more growth away with another clean stroke.

Spencer folded his arms across his chest and nodded. "I know. It's...it's a lot more complicated than you think. He told me everything last night. Look, thank you for asking," he said sincerely, "but I'm not up for talking about it. Not yet. Thank god Brody or Carly haven't seen the video yet, or they'd be back here in a snap wanting to help. I love `em, but that's not what I need right now. I just... I need a break. A time out. That's why I'm here so early—I was hoping I wouldn't run into anyone here."

Liam nodded as he soaked a hand towel, wrung it out, and wiped the remaining shaving cream from his now silky-smooth front side. "I get it," he said, tugging on his flaccid but chubby dick. "That's why I'm here right now, so I can get this," Liam flashed Spencer briefly with a coy grin, "done in peace. We don't have to talk if you don't want to. But maybe I can offer to distract you for a while?" The laid back stripper-slash-college student reached for a can of shaving cream. "Gimme a hand, will you? I can't really reach back there. Usually, it's Beth who helps me out, but we've gone three months without meeting, and it's getting a bit hairy, which isn't gonna get me a lot of love at the club." With a playful, dirty once-over, Liam ran his eyes over Spencer and chuckled. "Despite your current hirsuteness, I figure you've got experience, what with all those shaving parties high school swim teams have." The stud waved his razor around idly as he spoke.

Spencer laughed. The sound was almost alien to him. "You know, that's probably an urban legend. I can tell you we never did that on any swim team I was in!"

Liam shrugged. "C'mon, man. You know what to do, right? Don't hold out on me and play all innocent, now. I have no doubt that you know your way around a man's ass." Liam waggled his eyebrows, which only made Spencer's jaw fall open wider at the hilarious incredulity of the situation. With a centering breath, he held out his hand.

"Here, give it," Spencer said. Liam beamed as he placed the razor squarely across Spencer's palm.

"So, uh, how do you want me?" Liam asked, leaning into the sink and arching his back, which made his firm, muscular ass pop as he spread his legs wide. Spencer resisted rolling his eyes.

"Depends," he began, "on how thorough a job you want me to do."

Liam caught Spencer's attention in the long mirror across the sink counter. "Smooth as a baby's bottom, buddy."

Spencer nodded at his friend through the mirror and bent to be in a better position to shave. Liam passed him the can of shaving cream between his legs, giving his bits a playful jiggle as he smirked at his helper. Spencer marveled at his total lack of inhibitions in inviting an openly gay guy handle the most intimate part of his body and felt a surge of gratitude.

With a whooshing sound, a heap of shaving cream poured out onto Spencer's hand, which he generously slathered onto Liam's muscular globes. Fuck if that wasn't a turn-on. He carefully removed the hairs that had sprouted over the man's bum, and closer to the crack that seemed to radiate an inviting warmth. Each moment Spencer slid his hands over the firm globes of Liam's ass made him thankful his towel was hiding his hard-on, which had popped out of his briefs yet again.

But as Liam spread his cheeks a little more, giving his impromptu barber an eyeful of his winking hole, Spencer choked down his embarrassment. "You don't need me to go too deep, yeah?" he asked.

Liam shook his head and smirked over his shoulder. "You have to. You're gonna do a thorough job, remember?" He turned around, and to Spencer's surprise, the man was not quite entirely soft. His thick cock had thickened up a little more as he hopped onto the counter next to the sink and grabbed his ankles, giving the swimmer an up-close and personal view of his hole. True to his word, it was surrounded by a slight halo of gold hair. Spencer stared at it, ruminating on the humor of the situation, when Liam broke him from his reverie once more.

"You should close your mouth," he chided playfully. "I wouldn't want to teabag you by accident. Or would I?" The beefy blond arched an eyebrow at the leaner blond.

Spencer snorted. "You are incorrigible, buddy." He fired another shot of shaving cream into his hand and slathered it over Liam's hole. With one hand, he worked in the lather while he set the shaving cream on the floor with the other. When the lather had been thoroughly applied, Spencer started in with the razor.

The stud on the counter gave a slight shrug. "You know, I'm sorry that my fellow heterosexuals are just bogged down with so much insecurity. If they'd just keep an open mind, they'd enjoy themselves a lot more." Spencer glanced at Liam, who looked calm and composed. The man being shaved continued. "Most of those guys have never even experimented with prostate stimulation."

The razor slipped out of Spencer's hand for a moment, but he caught it before it hit the floor. Liam kept speaking as if he hardly noticed the slip-up. The poor guy holding the razor composed himself and steadied his hand before he continued with his task.

"It's the only way I can get Beth down there to shave my ass. She really isn't a fan of doing it, but the chance to finger my ass when it's slick with shaving foam usually brings her around." Liam prattled on as Spencer managed to find the will to keep his hand steady, lest he end up sending the guy to the hospital with a really funny story about how he got his ass-lips shaved off.

Liam continued, "Mind you, I still haven't agreed to letting her have at me with that strap-on thing she keeps trying to push on me. I'm up to four fingers, though I can tell you it's one hell of a tight squeeze—I even have the teeth marks on my pillow to prove it—but that thing she keeps threatening me with is even bigger than your giant dong."

Spencer had the unbidden fantasy of sliding home into Liam's hot little hole, making the straight stud bite down on his forearm as he fed every last inch of his enormous dick into that virgin ass and stifling the stud's moans with his mouth. With Herculean effort, he dispelled the steamy image with a firm shake of his head and shot a dirty look at the guy on the counter. "You're pulling my leg about that strap-on, aren't you?"

Liam gave Spencer an innocent look—one that had probably gained the guy a lot of free drinks for—his post-strip cool-down routine on the bar top. "Maybe," he shrugged, "maybe not. But it did take your mind off your problems, didn't it?"

It only took a moment for Spencer to realize Liam was right. He wasn't anywhere near that horrible little world that he was drowning in a few minutes ago. As he bent down to pick up the can of shaving cream, his towel loosened—more than enough for it to fall away. His traitorous dick was half out of his briefs and had been hard at work, staining the fabric below and turning it translucent with generous dollops of pre-cum. Hastily, Spencer grabbed his towel and wrapped it around his waist, but in glancing at Liam, he knew the guy got a good look.

"Okay," Liam said, "maybe that strap-on isn't quite as big as your third leg." He waggled his eyebrows at Spencer once more, who finally gave in and laughed.

"Fuck you," Spencer said, not meaning it at all.

Liam chuckled, but then straightened up a little. "Hey, joking aside, just... Hang in there, buddy. Sex videos aren't the end of the world. It's an ever-present worry in my line of work, but if I let the anxiety get to me, I'd never step into the club, much less make the money I need for med school. You'll get through this, I know." He laid a friendly, supportive hand on Spencer's shoulder. "And if you ever need someone to listen, if Brody's not around, my door is always open." Liam gave Spencer a warm squeeze. "Just uh, knock first, before you come in, okay? I wouldn't want you to walk in on anything embarrassing. In case you didn't already notice, I'm not nearly as well-hung as you are."

Spencer shook his head with a soft chuckle. "You do fine," he said with a snicker. Liam gave the swimmer a wink and left with his shaving kit and his towel slung casually over his shoulder, instead of around his waist. Whoever ran into him in the hallway would get an eyeful of the silky smooth, gorgeous hunk's ample cock flapping about with every confident step. Spencer sighed at the notion and turned the other way, walking into a shower stall with the full intent to blast himself with the coldest water the dials would allow.

*** *** *** *** ***

The magnitude of how alone he was would plague Nate throughout the night. He was lucky to have any moment's sleep at all, despite his brain constantly reminding him:

He had no friends, save for Spencer. Everyone he once called friends hated him and hate-fucked him.

He had no home, save for the room where Spencer had permitted him to stay the night. His parents couldn't bear to have him around, lest he kill his mother's unborn baby and further break her heart.

He had no future—save for the possible future as Spencer's live-in boyfriend.

He had to find a way to make Spencer keep him around. But without any kind of assets to speak of, he thought of the only thing his former masters said he was good for.

A hot body and two warm holes to throw a good fuck into.

Would Spencer have him, though? It would have been Nate's inclination never to be on the receiving end of a fuck again, but he was left with no options here. That he was even in this room was because he was there on Spencer's good graces. He couldn't afford to be picky in any way. If he wanted to show he was committed, in order to stay, Nate would have to allow Spencer to penetrate him.

In the brief moments that the young man left his dorm room, Nate resigned himself to that notion. In order for him to get anywhere in this world with what his tormentors allowed him, he would have to use the only coin left available to him. His body. Nate's negative mind had him outright ignore the positive—that Spencer was a genuinely caring boy with a heartfelt concern for his well-being.

Nate got up and made both of the beds in the room, getting them as neat as he could. He removed the shorts Spencer provided and folded them neatly, placing them at the foot of the bed. He rooted about in Spencer's bedside drawer for a tube of lube and gingerly applied a generous coating to his hole, wincing slightly as his fingers came in contact with the still-tender sphincter. He also came across a bottle of baby oil in the drawer and figured he might as well apply it too. The sheen of the oil made his muscles really pop, but the sensation of the oil on his skin made him feel like a desperate whore. He had to let Spencer know he'd take care of his every need as long as he didn't send him away.

The door opened. Nate steadied himself. Spencer quietly slipped in and turned to close the door behind him. When he faced the bed, he was shocked by what he saw.

"Nate? What are you doing?"

Nate didn't reply immediately. He slid up to the gorgeously tanned, blond boy and slipped his arms around him. Spencer felt little kisses on his neck, below his ear—moves that were meant to get him to react.

At the moment, it was working.

"Just want to make you feel good." Nate whispered as loud as he could. With the element of surprise, he managed to whirl the boy around and push him back onto his own bed. Pulling the towel off, he saw Spencer's cock, half-hard. He'd get it fully hard in a moment. His mouth slipped over the head, and Spencer moaned. Nate upped the ante, slipping his fingers between the damp warmth of the tall-and-tan boy's ass, circling his hole. That was as far as Nate got with his seduction attempt when he found himself pushed away, landing on his butt in the middle of the room like a discarded poppet.

And the dam broke. Nate couldn't help it. He cried.

"I can d-do this," he stuttered as he wept. "Please, I'll do whatever you want. Just g-give me a chance."

Spencer looked down at the defeated boy on the dorm room floor, horrified he reacted so harshly, and pained by the fact the boy had again been reduced to tears. He rushed to Nate's side, holding him close, willing him to calm down.

"Mom doesn't want me," Nate whispered sadly. "Dad told me not to come home. The team probably wants to kick my ass. I can't show my face at school. I can't show my face anywhere." Spencer squeezed the boy tighter. With shuddering sobs, Nate spoke into Spencer's shoulder.

"Please," Nate begged softly. "Please. I'll do anything you want, Spencer, anything. I'll be good. I'll keep everything neat, and... and... you can... you can have me, when you want, how you want... Just... Don't kick me out. Let me stay. Please? I'll do anything. Just ask."

Spencer gripped Nate's back tight as he returned Nate's embrace. The mere fact that those fuckers on his team made him believe his only worth was as a slave and a sexual punching bag made Spencer want to grab his roommate's baseball bat and go to town on the lot of those sick assholes. Nate's despair seemed to be enough for a hundred people, and it ripped at Spencer's heart. He rocked gently, shushing Nate, trying to calm the bubbling grief that possessed the boy, body and soul.

"Nate, look at me, listen to me, please," Spencer said. He waited for acknowledgment, which he got in the form of a nod that he felt on his shoulder. "From now on, you don't have to do anything you don't want, okay? I will never, never do to you what they did. I will never ask that of you, okay?"

Nate nodded again as Spencer continued. "Of course, you can stay with me. If I can't keep you here, I will definitely make sure you have a safe place to stay with a roof over your head and a warm bed to sleep in." Spencer thought of his bank account and figured if he just ate cafeteria food for a while, he could put that aside for Nate's needs. He'd pick up more shifts at the pool if he had to.

Nate shivered in Spencer's arms. This was all so much for a fucking kid to go through! Publicly outed in an utterly degrading, inhuman way, kicked out of the house by his own family, and a fear that any stranger would recognize him for the salacious, sex-crazed slut his so-called teammates made him out to be—this was a world so far removed from his own.

Spencer led Nate to his bed and motioned for him to sit. When the young man did, Spencer kneeled down on the floor in front of him, holding Nate's hands in his.

"I would be lying if I said I knew how you were feeling in this moment," Spencer began. "You have been through so much hell that people just being kind to you still makes you shy away, and that's... It hurts. It's not fair. You don't deserve that. But you can have peace of mind, Nate. You can take back your life by putting those evil, fucking shitheads behind bars."

Nate's eyes widened and he tried to pull away from Spencer, but Spencer adamantly kept him seated, holding his hands firmly but gently.

"No one... no one will believe me," Nate said. "They made sure of it. They posted the stuff that made me look like I wanted it to happen. I know these guys. Some of them are rich enough to hire the best lawyers. I can-can't go through that again in court!" Nate took a shuddering breath that spoke of a horrible realization. "They'll bring you in, too! They didn't do anything to hide you—the police will think you were in on it! I can't let them do that to you!"

Nate was in full-blown hysterics, even though his voice could barely keep up with what he was saying. Spencer shook his head and gently but firmly made Nate sit back down. He held him there, his eyes never leaving Nate's.

"What happens to me is not... It's not as important," Spencer said. "You have suffered and suffered. You were tortured and violated. And then to have this... lie thrust in everyone's face? Nate, you can't let them go. You'll spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder, living alone in shame and fear, and if you let that happen, they win."

Nate knew there was truth in what Spencer was saying, but after everything that had transpired, he had no confidence that things would work out for him. He could never come back from the exposure of his homosexual foibles with Spencer. How could he? Everyone he knew—his parents, his girlfriend, his buddies, his teacher—had watched him have wild, passionate, uninhibited gay sex. His former life was over, ruined, smashed into oblivion. He gazed helplessly at Spencer.

It was at that moment that someone knocked at the door. There was urgency in the knock.

"Nate? I know you're in there. Come on, let me in."

Before either of them could move, the person on the other side of the door tried the handle. Finding it unlocked, he threw open the door and strode in, stopping short only when he saw Nate and Spencer were naked at the bedside.

Spencer hastily reached for his discarded towel. Nate didn't move. He stared, gob-smacked, at the tall, disheveled-looking brunette who'd burst into Spencer's dorm room.

"T.J.?"

*** *** *** *** ***

"GAY SEX VIDEO SHOWN AT HIGH SCHOOL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME"

News outlets carried only censored screen-grabs of the video in question, with the faces of all the sexual partners blurred out, but there was enough information in the articles—a basketball player at McKinley High—for people to narrow down the possibilities. From there it was a simple matter of searching the internet and finding snippets of the video posted online by a few troublemakers who'd manage to whip out their phones to capture Nate's greatest shame for posterity. They did Owen's dirty work for him and made sure the beleaguered hunks disgrace wouldn't stop at the basketball court.

By the time the authorities were alerted to the online presence of clips from the video that had been broadcast at the game, it had made the rounds, circulating far and wide before censors on every social media site shut it down. All traces of it had been scrubbed shortly after, as if someone went out of their way to make sure the damage had been minimized. Trying to look for it in search engines got pretty much every other video like it, but not that one. The scrubbing wouldn't help much against those who had thought to download it, nor would it prevent them from re-posting snippets from it at some later date.

If the whole world hadn't already seen Nate Ramsey's body being violated six ways from Sunday, they would not be short of opportunities to do so in the future. As they say, the Internet is forever.

Within hours of the incident, the news had reached Fort Belvoir. Travis James "T.J." Powell was at his bedroom desk, staring in dismay at the sleazy screen-grabs that were being circulated without any attempt to hide the faces of the participants. He'd had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach the moment he'd seen the newsfeed, with its blurred-out images of Nate and Spencer. It took him all of thirty seconds to confirm his worst fears. He knew the face of the raven-haired teenager at the center of the scandal that was outraging his sleepy hometown of Mount Pleasant. Although time and distance picked away at the strong bonds they once shared, T.J. could never forget his childhood best friend.

He could only imagine what Nate was going through now, having his private sex life being so callously broadcast to the entire town at what should have been a moment of triumph, winning the state basketball championship.

He wanted to beat some serious ass. The bastard who had so cruelly outed Nate deserved a world of pain, and it still wouldn't compare to the pain that Nate must be experiencing from his very public humiliation. T.J. knew Nate's parents, and he knew the town they'd grown up in. It was not a welcoming place even for gay teenagers who were discreet about their sexual orientation. And there was nothing discreet about the way Nate had just been outed.

T.J. calmed himself with an effort. He was sure the authorities would catch up with whoever the sick fucker was who'd set Nate up. If not because they cared about Nate's welfare, then because they would want to arrest the broadcaster of obscene material.

The best thing to do would be to go to Nate and offer him whatever support he needed. Straight, gay, or bi, whichever way the guy identified, Nate was and would always be his friend. It was past 1:00 AM in Fort Belvoir, and it would take a solid five-hour block of driving to get to Mount Pleasant. It gave him plenty of time to think of where Nate might be. He'd tried calling Nate's phone, but it went straight to voicemail. He tried the landline, but it immediately went to the answering machine, which didn't surprise T.J. After a scandal like that, the Ramseys would have put their phone off the hook.

He would have to look for Nate, starting at his home—but intuition told him he was unlikely to find him there. He knew Marsha Ramsey to be both devoutly Catholic and hyperconscious of appearances; she would not have taken kindly to her son's forced outing. Perhaps Mitchell Ramsey had tempered her reaction somewhat, and Nate still had a roof over his head. He hated to think that his best friend was out on the streets, in an unfriendly town that would be thinking the worst of him just because he had the temerity to love another man.

Leaving a hastily-scribbled note for his parents on the kitchen table so they wouldn't worry, T.J. hopped into his jeep and set out for Mount Pleasant. He drove all night without stopping. When he arrived, the first place he drove to had been the Ramsey house. He was heartened to see Nate's car parked out front. Maybe he had misjudged Marsha Ramsey. Maybe she hadn't rejected her only child.

There was nothing to it. It was very early, but he could see a light on in the kitchen and he guessed that the Ramseys hadn't had much sleep. He took a deep breath, got out of his car and rang the doorbell. Its chime was so familiar, and when Mitchell Ramsey opened the door, T.J. had the same reaction to the layout of the foyer.

Mitchell looked worn and much older than T.J. remembered. His bloodshot eyes confirmed the lack of sleep. But he still had a smile of recognition for T.J.

"Who is it?" called a woman's voice from the kitchen, and then Marsha Ramsey came out into the foyer without waiting for her husband's answer.

T.J. realized she'd been crying. "T.J.?" she said hesitantly. "How ... why are you here?"

He spoke up. "I'm really sorry to bother you this early, Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey," T.J. said. "But I came as soon as I could. When I saw the video, I jumped in my car and drove all night."

At the mention of the video, both of Nate's parents cringed. Mitchell chose to focus on T.J.'s last words. "Jesus son, you must be exhausted. I think you'd better come in," he beckoned. As T.J. entered the house, he closed the door and led T.J. to the kitchen. "It's not a bother, but... Nate's not here." Mitchell's face darkened.

T.J.'s shoulders drooped. "Oh. I hoped he would be. Where is he?"

Nate's parents exchanged glances and then Mitchell sighed. "I'm afraid we didn't handle things well yesterday. It came as such a shock. We never imagined, not in a million years, that our boy would be ... homosexual." He had obvious difficulty getting the word out.

T.J. snuck a glance at Marsha and saw her expression was stony. "Do you know where he might be?"

Mitchell hesitated. "There is ... well, there's that boy. The other boy in, in the video. Spencer. He had an eastern European, maybe Polish or Slavic last name, something that started with Z. He told us he was a student at MPSU."

T.J. blinked in surprise. "You've met Nate's boyfriend? He introduced him to both of you?"

There was a strangled sound from Marsha Ramsey and she abruptly stood up. "I don't feel that well, Mitchell; I'm going to go back up to my room," she said and left the room with a curt nod at T.J. Despite having predicted that the revelation of Nate's sexuality would not have gone down well with her, T.J. was still taken aback by the abruptness of her exit.

"T.J.," Mr. Ramsey said softly, not wanting his wife to hear. "I'm sorry about Marsha. She really isn't coping with the revelation. It's terrible timing, and a terrible way for it to come out, too. She ... well, she's very conscious of how her friends will perceive this. She wasn't exactly accepting when the Courtlands' son came out, and now ... now, our own kid has just been outed in the worst possible way.

"To answer your earlier question, Nate didn't introduce Spencer to us as his boyfriend. He introduced him as a friend, and we didn't think anything more of it. Why would we? I know it probably sounds selfish, but I wish he'd dropped some hint, to give us some forewarning, some preparation, instead of having this whole thing come out of the left field. I don't suppose ... I don't suppose he ever discussed it with you?"

T.J. shook his head. "No, Mr. Ramsey, we never spoke about anything like that. I might've been his friend, but I don't think he was comfortable discussing it with me. If I'm honest, he always seemed pretty anti-gay. I suppose it was a self-defeating defense mechanism, a way to protect himself from those who would judge him unfairly." T.J. hadn't intended for his words to sound so harsh, but he couldn't conceal his disappointment at how the Ramseys were dealing with their son's sexual orientation.

Mitchell winced at the rebuke but accepted the truth in T.J.'s words. Being schooled by a teenager was mortifying but Mitchell had to appreciate the sincerity of T.J.'s friendship for his son. He knew there were a lot of other boys in Mount Pleasant who would've dropped Nate in a heartbeat upon learning he'd been sexually intimate with another boy. T.J., on the other hand, had driven across the state in the middle of the night to lend Nate his support. Mitchell was grateful for that.

"T.J., you're a good friend, and a good kid. I don't think I was ever that mature at your age. Would you ... would you do something for me, for my family? Would you help us find Nate? I can't leave his mom in this state and I've tried calling his cell phone, but it keeps going straight to voicemail. He's either switched it off or the battery's dead, and I really need to tell him... tell him that we're sorry, and that we want him to come home. He still has a home. He always will. He still has us. His mom just needs... time." Mr. Ramsey brushed his eyes as if he had something in them. T.J. knew what it was, but in kindness, didn't go out of his way to say. "Would you do that for us?"

Encouraged by Mitchell's heartfelt words, T.J. gave him a reassuring smile. "Of course, sir. I will find Nate and bring him home."

"Thank you, T.J. You don't know how much it means to me. Nate's my firstborn, and nothing will erase that. Now you must excuse me, I'll see to my wife, and try to talk her around."

T.J. nodded and showed himself out. As he got into his car, he noticed Marsha Ramsey standing forlornly at an upstairs window. He gave her a wave, but she didn't respond. He fervently hoped Mitchell Ramsey would get through to her. Starting his engine, he drove straight to Mount Pleasant State University. He didn't have a lot of information to go on, but he figured he had to try his luck. Campus security was no help; they refused to even confirm the enrollment of any student named Spencer Z, citing data privacy concerns. He was still trying his level best to turn the tide of the argument in his favor when a stunning, shirtless guy with wireless headphones around his neck and ridiculously short shorts (they barely covered his ass!) ran up to him. Bizarrely, he smelled of shaving cream. T.J. guessed that the totally smooth torso currently dripping with sweat was not naturally that hairless.

"Hey, sorry," the well-built blond guy said. "I couldn't help overhearing—why are you looking for Spencer?"

T.J. bristled at the inquiry. He decided to keep it simple. "Spencer's dating my best friend Nate, who isn't answering his phone, and I'm worried about him. I really need to know that he's alright."

The young man nodded in acknowledgement. "My name's Liam," he said, putting out a hand for T.J. to shake, and shake he did.

"T.J.," he replied.

"I had to know who's looking for Spencer. He's a buddy of mine."

T.J. understood. It was good that Spencer had people looking out for him. He wondered if anyone was looking out for Nate in that same way.

"Come on, I'll walk you over to MacPherson Hall."

It turned out to be the nearest building. Liam tagged T.J. through the main door and stopped in the foyer.

"T.J., would you tell your friend..." Liam seemed at a loss for words. "Tell him Woody said hi."

"I thought your name was Liam?"

Liam shrugged. "It's kind of a long story. Nate will know who you mean. Tell him I'm really sorry he got outed like that, and to stay strong. Spencer's a good guy; he's in the best hands possible."

T.J. could only nod. Liam gave him the room number and left.

*** *** *** *** ***

Nate stared at his friend. He looked just like he'd imagined, just three years older, a lot taller, a bit more filled out—but in every way the happy, healthy guy T.J. had always been.

For his part, T.J. gaped at the tableau of the two naked men and assumed he'd interrupted them in an intimate moment. He managed to find his voice. "Uh, sorry, I think I'm, um, interrupting. I'll give you guys a minute."

He turned to go wait outside the door but before he could, Nate had bounded up from the bed. "Wait! T.J.! It's really you!"

T.J. could only nod briefly before Nate flung himself at him, hugging him tearfully. He didn't seem to be aware of his own nudity, which astonished T.J. because Nate had always been very reluctant to undress in front of others.

It was a tad awkward to be hugged by a fully naked guy, but T.J. didn't hesitate in returning the gesture.

"Um, Nate? Maybe you want to put these on?" It was Spencer who pointed out the obvious elephant in the room. He'd taken the opportunity to pull on last night's jeans (nothing underneath, because he didn't want to waste time rifling through his underwear drawer) and now he held out the shorts Nate had folded away.

Nate turned red with embarrassment. "Oh shit. Sorry! Sorry, I forgot I wasn't ... I wasn't wearing anything." He quickly took the shorts from Spencer and slipped them on.

"It's fine," T.J. assured him. "Don't sweat it. I just wasn't expecting you to have gotten this buff. Damn, have you been living in a gym?"

"Well... It helps with basketball," Nate said humbly. Nate would have preened in the past, even badly joke with T.J. that he had a long way to go to catch up. But the thought didn't cross his mind.

He was just happy to see his best friend had come for him. "I can't believe you came. I didn't think you would ... want to ..." Nate's voice trailed off as he realized what it was that had brought T.J. to Spencer's dorm room.

"Why wouldn't I want to?"

Nate had no reply to that. "How'd you find me?" he asked instead.

"Well, it took a bit of detective work, but I managed, thanks to your boyfriend's deets from your dad and a fortuitous meeting with a guy named Liam, who also goes by Woody. He says hi, by the way," he told Nate. "He's really sorry you got outed the way you did and asked you to stay strong and not to worry because Spencer would help you through it. Speaking of which..."

T.J. turned his attention to the tall, tanned blond for the first time since he'd entered the room. He could see why Nate might be smitten with him. Spencer was a bona fide hunk. With his tall frame, fur-dusted torso and obscenely large bulge, he practically radiated masculinity. T.J. couldn't help feeling a little inferior. "You must be Spencer."

Spencer held out his hand to shake. "And you're T.J. Nate's told me all about you. Only good things, and I don't think he was mistaken."

Nate interrupted. "It sounded like ... you spoke to my dad?"

T.J. looked at him seriously. "Yes, that was the first place I went. Your parents ... they love you Nate. They want you home. Your dad wanted me to tell you he was sorry for the way he reacted in the heat of the moment, and that you'd always have your home and your family."

"Mom and Dad said that?" Nate asked excitedly.

T.J. hesitated. He decided honesty was best. "Your dad did. Your mom ... she was still in shock. Mr. Ramsey said he'd talk her around, that she just needed time."

Nate was on the verge of one too many fits of tears, but he pushed through and held back. He took comfort in his best friend's presence and the knowledge that he had still had a home, and a father who still cared about him, and at least two more people in his lonely corner. Things didn't look nearly as bleak as they had barely five minutes ago.

T.J. shoved his hands in his back pockets—a gesture Nate recognized immediately. It was his classic move since childhood whenever he was nervous and trying to break the ice.

"I'm kinda glad I moved away," T.J. said, "because girls here would never give me a second glance with all the guys who seem to be extremely good looking and also extremely averse to clothing."

It worked. Nate barked out a laugh, and Spencer cracked a grin. T.J. grabbed Nate by the shoulder affectionately, giving him a hearty squeeze and a friendly pat.

"Nate? I have to ask—because it may help you to say so." T.J. took his friend by the arms and walked over to Spencer's desk. He motioned at the desk chair to Spencer, as if asking permission to use it. The young man nodded, and T.J. sat Nate in the chair. He got down to his knees with a hand on Nate's shoulder. The whole thing looked as natural to T.J. as breathing.

When they had settled, T.J. cut to the chase. "Are you gay? Or bi?"

Nate stared ahead blankly. T.J. grumbled. "I hate that you had to go through this alone, man. Why didn't you tell me? You could have called! You should have! I'd definitely have supported you coming out!"

Nate was stunned. He was speechless about his own ignorance of his friend's own views.

"Did you think I'd be a homophobe? Did you think I'd hate gays because my parents are both in the Army? Is that it?"

Nate flinched at the line of questioning. He couldn't bring himself to look his best friend in the face. T.J. softened his tone and sighed. "Nate, look at me, please?"

He turned and set his eyes on T.J.'s. T.J. sniffled at the look of utter misery that was Nate's. "I would never hate. I would never do that to anyone, let alone to my best friend. Not when I have a godfather I love dearly who's gay; and certainly not after the experiences I've had."

Nate started in surprise. He'd met T.J.'s godfather, who was an Army buddy of T.J.'s parents. There had never been any hint that he was gay. T.J. continued. "You know, when my family moved away, I got a bit lonely, myself," T.J. said. Nate's eyebrows bunched in concern as T.J. pushed ahead. "One of the first friends I made was a gay guy. Prasad was no different than you or me—he just happens to like hot dogs over tacos."

Spencer snorted at the poor attempt at humor. Nate gave the tall blond some serious side-eye, and Spencer reciprocated with a playful shrug. He was finding T.J. extremely likable. T.J. waited until Nate said, "Continue, please."

T.J. obliged. "Prasad and I hung out more and more, and we got more comfortable with each other until one day, he came out to me. Well, came out isn't entirely accurate. He laid one on me." Nate's eyebrows shot up.

T.J. shrugged. "I'd had some inkling, of course, but in that moment I didn't respond ideally. I pushed him off me and that frightened him. Like I was going to beat the shit out of him, or out him to his family. Of course, I didn't do either. I told him it didn't bother me that he was gay, and that I saw him no differently. I obviously did too good a job reassuring him because he then had the audacity to ask me how I could be sure I wasn't attracted to guys when I'd never tried anything with one. I didn't have an answer to that and, well, curiosity got the better of me. I mean, Prasad's a pretty good-looking guy," T.J. said. "Not as good-looking as you two," he said, pointing between Nate and Spencer.

Spencer chuckled. Nate rather glowered a bit.

T.J. continued, "Anyhow, I figured if I was going to indulge my curiosity, it might as well be with Prasad. I trusted him, and I knew he wouldn't do anything I didn't want to happen. So, we ended up doing a few things. It started with kissing, then progressed to handjobs, and eventually blowjobs."

Now it was Spencer's turn to look intrigued. "You exchanged blowjobs, or it was just him blowing you?"

"I hate to say, `he started it', because that's how it kinda happened, but I went along with it. I mean, when someone does you a favor, it's only fair you return it, right?" T.J. scrunched up his face. "I'm afraid I wasn't very good at it, and after a couple of lousy blowjobs, Prasad decided it was better that I not chew his dick. But he did think of an alternative, one where my teeth and general lack of skill wouldn't get in the way. And that was how I learned about rimming. Damn! I did not know it could feel that good. Or that I could be good at it when my turn came. But getting Prasad to blow his load without even touching his dick – now, that was an achievement!"

T.J. looked at Nate to see if he was still checked in. Spencer was agog, his imagination running riot at the thought of the handsome T.J. eating out another guy's ass, but Nate's face was stormy. When their eyes met, Nate looked away.

"Nate, are you jealous?" T.J. asked in a lightly teasing tone.

Nate scowled and gazed down at the floor. He couldn't quite sort through his feelings, which were all over the place.

"Seriously, bro, are you jealous?" T.J. repeated sincerely.

"A little. Kinda." Nate admitted to the carpet. "I know you'd moved away and all. But you and I were friends for years, and you—you..."

T.J. raised an eyebrow. "I...?"

Nate huffed. "You didn't share any of this with me! It's like you had a whole other life without me, one that was fun and free."

T.J. laughed. It was a sound that warmed Nate's heart. He pulled Brody's desk chair over and sat with the other two in a close huddle. Before he spoke, T.J. took Nate's hands into his, as a good friend. "Oh, Nate. I love you man, I really do. But even back then, you would probably have freaked the fuck out. I mean, you had a hard time even getting down to your underwear when I wanted to go skinny-dipping! Do you think you really would have taken the news that I'd fooled around with another boy very well?"

Nate's cheeks reddened. He hesitated briefly before asking, "Does that mean you're gay, T.J.?" he asked without a hint of recrimination. "It sounds like you and Prasad got really close."

"Naw," T.J. said. "Don't get me wrong. I had fun trying new stuff, and I don't regret it for a minute, but I realized eventually that I didn't share the same depth of feeling for Prasad. He was disappointed, but we're still good friends, and since he met his boyfriend, he doesn't even moon over me. I know, how fickle, right? But Hans could give you guys a run for your money in the looks department; I think he has like a twelve-pack and he's a certified genius to boot. Prasad's parents love him. But I do know one thing. When he taught me about rimming, I was fuckin' hooked. He was the guy who introduced me to his sister, who's now my girlfriend. Priya and I do it all the time and it's crazy! It makes our moments together much more fun, you know? We're not held back by our inhibitions. We're free to explore each other's bodies. Priya knows how to get me off, and I do the same for her, and I would never have been that open with her if I didn't have Prasad for a friend."

"Dude, I can't believe you had sex with a pair of siblings!" Nate exclaimed, making a face. But he returned to a small, tentative grin. "I get it though. Spencer helped me figure stuff out," he added, cocking his head towards his newest friend.

Spencer nodded solemnly.

T.J. smiled. There was a comfortable silence between them. T.J. decided to press ahead. "Does this mean you're okay with gay people, Nate?"

Nate thought about it carefully. "Why wouldn't I be? One of my best friends in the whole fucking world is gay, and I don't regret that for a minute either." Nate released T.J.'s hands and linked up with Spencer's. Such a gentle yet intimate gesture, one that he would never have countenanced even for a second as recently as last week, but now it felt natural. Safe. Normal. Ideal, even. Who'd have thought?

Spencer spoke after a quiet moment. "Nate, do you want to tell him? About what we were talking, before T.J. came in?"

"Oh, and here I thought I'd interrupted your sexy times!" exclaimed T.J. "Are you ... are you still unsure about your sexuality, Nate?" he questioned. "You know you don't have to label it if you don't want to."

Nate breathed in deeply, and then exhaled at length. It was a few moments before he spoke. "It's not ... it's not exactly that, but it's one of the things I've been asking myself for a while now," he said. "I think, especially now, I'm trying to figure that out. Figure out what everything means without making stupid assumptions or going to dark places."

"Hey," Spencer began. He took Nate's hand in his in a warm, friendly gesture. "You're not alone, Nate. I want to help you, and so does T.J. Any way we can. And I don't think either of us expecting anything in return. But you do... you have to be honest with him, like you've been with me."

Nate squeezed Spencer's hand affectionately. "Thanks Spence. I know I can count on you. And on you, T.J. It's just, well, incredibly messed up, the way things have played out."

There was a lull. T.J. sat on one side of Nate and Spencer, quietly observing as Spencer put a hand on Nate's bare shoulder. Nate hadn't even flinched.

Nate was lost in thought, but T.J. would wait for him to find a way out of the maze. Nate felt nauseated at the prospect of having to tell his story for a second time, but he realized he would have to tell it again to his parents, again to Coach Reilly, and likely again to every admissions counselor at every university he'd apply to. But right now, his best friend wanted to know.

Nate took a deep breath and caught T.J. up on how things came to be. He spoke of how, in his best friend's absence, he'd gone down a boastful, horribly narrow-minded road, and how everything came to a head two weeks prior when he'd lost a bet and was forced into a dare—a dare which became humiliation, which became the anchoring blackmail event, which became a gangbang, which became slavery, which became degradation after degradation, culminating in the public broadcast of his sex video with Spencer. He spared T.J. and Spencer whatever else he didn't deem necessary. He spent an inordinate amount of time explaining how Owen had it in for him after the contemptuous way Nate had treated him and had `stolen' his girlfriend. How Jason blamed Nate for taking his sister's virginity and then blackmailing her into silence. How Troy hated him for the way he treated those who were not heterosexual. And how everybody else, from Wes downwards, had just wanted to take him down a few pegs.

"I pissed off a lot of people," Nate said. "A lot of people had a right to hate me."

T.J. couldn't believe what he was hearing. If he didn't know any better, he'd have thought Nate was making excuses for his tormentors. "Jesus, Nate—they didn't have the fucking right to rape you!" T.J. fumed. He had gone pale at the start of the tale, but the color had slowly returned to his face, turning darker and darker until Nate reached the part where Owen had electro-shocked him at which point T.J.'s fingernails dug so deep into his palms that he drew blood. Nate watched as his best friend leapt off the desk chair and stomped about. He looked like he wanted to put his foot through something. That seemed unbecoming of T.J. To Nate, he'd always been so cool and laidback. But this...

Well. It made sense. If Nate had found out that something like that happened to T.J., he likely would be feeling much the same way, if not impetuously worse. Spencer sat there, staring at and around Nate. His face had darkened like T.J.'s, despite having already heard it from Nate's mouth last night.

"T.J.," Nate called out. His friend looked at him. Nate held out a hand, palm up. T.J. came back to the empty chair and quietly took the hand Nate offered.

"They didn't have the right, but they did what they did anyway. And if I have anything to take from this, it's that I shouldn't have been such a jackass about who or what was gay, who was lower than me. I shouldn't have fucked around and rubbed people's noses in it. I'm not gonna judge anymore. I never should have to begin with. I think about that person I was, and I realize how much I dislike him."

"Nate ... you made mistakes. And I'm not saying I condone your behavior because, well, it was really not okay." Nate cast his eyes downwards in shame. But T.J. was not finished. "But the things you did, they were nothing compared to what Owen and the others did. That was pure evil. I cannot believe Wes, of all people, would go along with this! The Wes I knew was one of the good guys; what the hell changed? There is something seriously wrong with them, all of them.

There was a pause. "What you went through, Nate, no person should ever have to go through. Not even the worst person on the planet, and I can tell you Nate, you're a long way off from that. I, I can't say how much my heart breaks for you, buddy. I love you, Nate. I hope you know that." T.J. said.

Nate nodded. His vision blurred a little.

Spencer, who'd maintained his silence, letting the two longtime friends talk, quietly added, "For what it's worth, I love you too."

At that point, Nate's tears overflowed, and he gladly accepted the embrace of both boys.

The three stayed like that in silence for what seemed like a very long time.

"Since our hearts are on the table, I need you to know," T.J. began, "it's selfish of me, but I need to know if you plan on making those motherfuckers pay. I want you to have justice." T.J.'s hold over Nate's hands never faltered. He remained steadfast, even when Nate wanted to pull away.

"I agree," Spencer added. "You need to take them to court! I'll even testify if you want me to."

Nate shook his head, "I told you, no one will believe me! Whoever put that thing together made it look like I was begging for all that to happen. And Spence, you're in the video. Your face showed up! They'll put you away, too! I can't let them do that to you. I won't!"

Spencer shifted in his seat to face Nate. "Listen to me, Nate. Whatever happens to me is not ever going to be the same as what happened to you. You went through hell, and those bastards need to be punished for their crimes."

T.J. moved, nudging Nate and Spencer over, sandwiching the basketball jock between himself and the handsome tan guy with wild green eyes. Nate shifted to face his old friend. He felt long, warm, perfectly tanned arms wrap around him and press him close. Spencer wasn't letting him go, and neither was T.J.

Nate's best friend took his hands. T.J. spoke quietly, solemnly. "Do it for you, Nate. For your own peace of mind. After everything they did, you deserve that."

Nate stilled in Spencer's arms. The strength in Spencer's arms seemed to hold the world together. He wanted that. He wanted his strength back. He wanted his life back.

"I need to speak to them." Nate's whisper was resolute. T.J.'s face contorted into a look of great concern, and Nate swore he heard Spencer growl.

"There's no way you're going to see those fuckers by yourself, Nate. No way in hell. Let me get dressed and we'll both come with you for backup." Spencer gently pulled away from Nate, rummaging through his dresser for a clean shirt. T.J. moved out of his way, pushing the desk chair back and leaning against the desk while Nate watched in consternation.

"Spencer," Nate said firmly. T.J. focused on Nate. Spencer gave Nate his attention, knowing what was coming. "I'm going to see them alone." His tone didn't brook any arguments.

Spencer huffed. "Of course, you are. And we're going with you. We'll wait for you in the car until you're done talking with those assholes. I'm bringing Brody's baseball bat, and I won't hesitate to use it if they try anything funny."

Nate figured he could live with that. He didn't say it aloud, but he was glad for the safety in numbers. Spencer wanted Nate to carry his iPhone on his person since his own phone was still in his locker back at McKinley High. T.J., who'd finished texting Nate's dad to tell him Nate was alright, threatened to text Nate every five minutes, and if Nate didn't respond, he'd dial 9-1-1. That, in and of itself, was sensible, if not taxing. But Spencer added that he'd dial 9-1-1 and come in with his roommate's baseball bat, swinging.

It might have been a ruse on Spencer's part. It had certainly brought a wan smile out of Nate to imagine Spencer swinging like Tarzan (in a loincloth, of course) to dish out justice with a caveman's club to his ex-tormentors. T.J. nudged him warmly, and Nate found comfort in his friends looking out for him.

T.J. still had Wes's phone number on his own phone. Nate stared at the number for a few moments before dialing Wes up. When the line connected, Nate kept it simple. Call up the others and meet at the basketball park. No pleasantries, no "thank you". He was the one doing them a favor.

When they left Spencer's dorm room, he actually took Brody's baseball bat out from underneath his bed.

It didn't hurt to be at least a little prepared.

*** *** *** *** ***

When they arrived, Nate hopped out and headed for the court while Spencer parked his car just out of sight. Nate felt a lot more confident knowing his friends were there ready to help him.

In his heart, he knew the meeting wasn't likely to take a turn for the criminally bizarre. Jason might still have a bone to pick but having gotten kinder words at the meeting before the warm-up session from Wes, Troy, and Drew, Nate wasn't as anxious as he could have been.

Five teens walked up in the early afternoon sun. Nate approached, but stayed as one boy on the edge of a circle of six boys. It looked like they were about to engage in some schoolyard game.

But the time for games had long since passed.

"Where's Owen?" Nate asked abruptly. The other boys inched a little closer, having to work harder to hear Nate. It surprised him, then, when Jason offered to say something.

"You were gone when it happened," he began. "After the video got taken down, Owen attacked Melanie in the parking lot."

Wes picked up where Jason left off. "Jason and I tried to stop him from strangling her, but he overpowered us and chased her out into the street. He got hit by an SUV."

"My dad operated on him," Jason added. After a little pause, he said, "It's not looking good. He's in a coma, and he may never wake up."

Nate ruminated on that for a moment. Owen had tried to hurt Melanie? He must have totally lost the plot; he'd claimed to love her more than anything! And now Owen was severely injured, comatose and possibly dying? Nate felt a little cold for thinking so callously, but if Owen died, he died. He would occupy no real estate in Nate's head as a dead man compared to the horrifying presence that he had alive. Nate had no designs on getting anywhere near the psycho bastard for any kind of apology or resolution, nor would he attend the funeral if anyone thought to invite him.

"Coach Reilly managed to pull the video off the screen," Wes said. "Drew's been working hard to have all copies of the video scrubbed from, well, wherever the thing ended up."

"No one can go on the net and find it," Drew said. "It took me a few hours, but I scrubbed it. I can't help the ones who saved the video for themselves, but I've set it up that anyone trying to upload it ends up getting their copy deleted before it even gets online." Nate was supposed to find relief in that, but he couldn't be bothered to care. The damage had already been done. Drew took in Nate's frigid blue gaze and grimaced, looking elsewhere.

Ethan piped in stupidly. "The good news is that your name isn't in any of the news articles about the sex video that was broadcast at the game."

Nate scoffed sarcastically at Ethan. "Yeah. Guess I just have to wait five seconds and see which one of you shitheads goes running to the papers to fix that little mistake. Doesn't matter. Everyone at school knows what I look like, you fucking idiot. So do the people who recorded the video playing and posted it online!" The last bit, Nate spat at Drew, who flinched. Of course, not all the angles could be covered where the Internet was concerned.

Ethan bit his lip hard. In an effort to keep things from escalating, Drew quickly continued.

"Owen knocked out my cousin Dusty in the AV booth, hijacked his laptop to play the video, and broke the key in the lock to keep anyone from getting in to stop it."

For the umpteenth time, Nate experienced silence. No one spoke. Everyone seemed to have something to say, but no one wanted to say it.

"Nate, we're just waiting for the police to start questioning," Wes said. He was markedly agitated, very much removed from the calm face he tried to present when he arrived. "I know they're gonna talk to you. We have no right—" Wes paused to correct himself, "—I have no right to ask. But if you're gonna report anyone, just let it be me, okay? I'm responsible for this. As captain, I should have stopped it before it became a full-scale team hazing—"

"Speak for yourself, Wes," Ethan huffed. "I'm definitely less guilty than all of you. I never stuck my dick in his ass like you all did!"

"Yeah, you only made him suck your dick, which is still rape, you dumbass!" Troy yelled.

The five boys fell into an awful row as each one tried to out-shout the other regarding who was guiltier than who, for what reason, for what action. Nate thrust a fist into the air, which got the other boys' attention. He didn't have it in him to yell—no one would have heard him. Nate didn't get in Wes's face, but he did turn to him.

"Do you think the cops are gonna find only you fucking me in all those videos, Wes? No. I've seen the raw footage. You guys made sure I paid attention. Made sure I watched. Made sure I knew that you fuckers had me by the balls—and you laughed about it in my face. Every single one of you filmed something. You all had a part in this—a part of me. Shit, they even have the other guys on video who didn't fuck me but fucked with me! Dusty, the twins, Devlin, all of them! If they go after you guys, it's because you fucking brought it on yourselves. Fuck that. Fuck you! You all deserve to rot behind bars!" Nate was stretching his limits. Screaming himself hoarse under Owen's torture toys was not the smartest thing—but he didn't care about smart at the time.

Nate's attention was snagged by a frightened, choking cry. He turned to Drew, who was full-on red-faced, snotty, and crying uncontrollably.

"I didn—didn't think it would ever go this far! It was just supposed to be a joke, right? We just wanted to get back at you for all the times you'd been an asshole to us—it wasn't supposed to ever go this far!" Drew wept. Nate turned away from him without replying. He felt cold, but a righteous coldness. Instead, he turned back to Wes.

"I have to know," Nate started. "Why, Wes? Why did you do it? You were the captain. You said you should have been quick to stop it, so why did you start it? Why did you let it go on? Even T.J. doesn't get it. Why did you get in on that fucking... two-week-long gang bang?" Nate felt tremors, but not of fear or revulsion. Anger was brimming just beneath the surface of his skin. He didn't move. His eyes were trained on Wes's, and one thing he noticed: Wes looked anywhere but at Nate's eyes.

"I liked you," Wes whispered.

"What?" Nate exclaimed.

"I had a crush on you. A crush, okay?"

"What the fuck?" exclaimed Ethan. "Are you for real right now? You're a homo too? And you dragged us all into this mess because you wanted a piece of Ramsey's ass?"

"You pick such great friends, Wes," Nate said without a hint of mirth in his voice. He reeled from the revelation, but quieted when Wes had more to say.

"I thought, deep down, maybe we could... get you to enjoy it. Enjoy being with—"

"You thought raping me was the way to get me to want to be with you?" Nate cried. He would have screamed the incredulous thought if he could.

"Hey!" Jason snapped. "How could he do anything when you'd have called him a fag for wanting you? The way you fucked with a lot of people's heads? The least you could do is be grateful—Wes wasn't doing it because he hated you. Shit, I fucked you because you forced yourself on my sister!"

Nate's eyes widened. He was finally going to put this bullshit to rest once and for all.

"Maybe you might listen to me, now that you all have taken everything from me," Nate murmured. "I've got nothing left. You all stripped me of everything. My future. My self-respect. I don't even have my dignity, thanks to your fucking videos, so I've got no reason to lie to you.

"I never, ever forced myself on Jessie," he said, his manner dangerously calm. Even his gravelly whisper had an edge that made everyone step back an inch. "I don't do that. You all did. I took her virginity, yes. I played her and got her to beg for it like the asshole I was. When she tried to get all stalker on me, I threatened her with that photo, because she was gonna blab that I promised her all kinds of things just to get in her panties. I wasn't trying to blackmail her—I just trying to get her to leave me and my girlfriend alone!"

Jason sputtered. Wes's words on the matter had helped him connect some of the dots, as did his memory of the photo of Jessie's peaceful, sleeping face in bed, and Nate's admission connected the rest. Jessie never said in what manner Nate took her—she only implied it was bad, with her tears, with her silence, and Jason's blind, vengeful, unchecked anger did the rest.

Jason had hatefully brutalized Nate because he hurt his sister's pride, not because of anything remotely resembling justice.

Nate wanted to spit fire. A crushing, ruthless, two-week-long act of revenge based on a lie of omission, silly notions of what constituted a joke—he'd suffered mightily for a personality flaw that could have been fixed through counseling or therapy. But no, Owen was mistaken. Jason was mistaken. Drew was woefully naïve. Ethan was a toady, a stooge. And Wes? Wes thought violating Nate would bring them closer together.

Now all Nate wanted was to be as far from the sources of his trauma as possible.

"I wanted to come here and get your sides of the story," Nate said, low and evenly. "I wanted to know why you did what you did—because maybe, just maybe, I could have fixed it. But that doesn't matter now. There is nothing to fix. You wanted to break me, and now you've done that. You fucked my body, you've fucked my head, and now you've fucking ruined my life. You did things to me that I can't even tell my Mom, because it would devastate her and make her miscarry. That's how messed up, how sick, how fucking evil you all were. But hey—in the interest o_f making things even_—Troy, I'm sure you'd appreciate that—I have a proposal. Drew, get Jason naked. Ethan, strip Wes. Troy—record this shit. It's gonna be good." By this point, Nate was as loud as he could be.

Jason did a double take. Wes gaped at Nate. The other boys shared wide-eyed volleys of morbid surprise. They stood, dumbstruck.

"Did. I. Fucking. Stutter? You two asswipes, get these shitheads naked, now!" The fury in Nate's eyes threatened to level the park. "Troy—I swear you better get your fucking phone out and start recording this shit or there will be hell to pay!" But still, not a soul moved.

"Won't do it, huh? Let me make this easier for you. You can do as I say, now, or I'll get in the car right now and drive right on up to the cops. I'm itching to see the news stories on how you boys will get fucked left and right in prison. Shit, you're all gonna get so much action, you'll be sneezing up your bunkmate's spunk for years! You'll be comparing notes on different ways to try to keep your buttholes from leaking!" Nate felt triumphant in the moment. Troy flinched hard at the references. Ethan looked pale, and Drew went a little green.

"Just do it," said Wes quietly. Jason glanced at him and then nodded tightly. Nate watched as a trembling Drew peeled off Jason's shirt, his shoes, his socks, his pants. Ethan did the same for Wes, who stood stoically.

"You fuckers don't follow directions well, do you?" Nate growled. "You do know what `naked' means, don't you?" he said, in mocking remembrance of what someone told him at that very park two weeks ago.

In a cracking voice, Ethan spoke up. "We're out in broad daylight," he said. "Someone'll see—"

"Do you think I give a fuck if someone sees? You certainly didn't when this all started. I'm only repaying the kindnesses given to me!" Nate ground out. "Fuck it. Y'all are going to prison. I'm out of here."

"Wait!" Wes cried. He hooked a thumb beneath his boxer briefs and slid them off. With a nod to his best friend, Jason did the same with his boxers.

"Better," Nate said. "You, Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum," he called out, pointing at Ethan and Drew, "Go ahead and put a pair of underwear on your head. One apiece. Dealer's choice. Make sure you got a nose full of crotch funk. If I think you're holding out on me, you'll have to get naked too."

Both Ethan and Drew did as they were told. Nate nodded his approval. "Troy? You getting all of this? I don't want you to feel left out."

Troy frowned. His phone was out, but he decided against turning on the camera, keeping his back away from Nate at all times. "It's all on video, Nate." In his heart, Troy knew he had to stop this—to do the thing that no one did for Nate when this all began.

Nate stayed on the periphery, issuing his commands. "Wes, Jason, you two—come together. Face to face. No, no," Nate said, rushing forward to nudge them together so close that their chests touched. "This isn't the spring formal, there aren't any rules about keeping two feet between you and your girl. There. That's better, see? All nice and intimate. I want you two to kiss."

Jason snapped back. "What?"

"Oh now, you're having second thoughts about a little man-on-man action? I mean, where were those thoughts when you were fucking sticking it to me?" Nate said coldly. "Do it. Kiss. And make me believe you love it. Wes, I know you will."

"I can't!" cried Jason. "He's my best friend; he's—he's practically my brother!"

"How touching," sneered Nate. "Also, I don't give a flying fuck. If you're really as close as all that, sharing saliva won't hurt you."

Jason looked Wes in the eyes. He saw a silent plea in the captain's eyes. It's only a kiss, Jason thought. He moved closer to Wes, and Wes closed the space between them in return. Wes took Jason's face in his hands and moved in for the kiss when Jason nodded tersely, giving his tacit approval.

The kiss lasted a few seconds. It was clear the two had swapped spit.

"Isn't that nice?" Nate said, snapping a picture. The two naked boys jumped away from each other and glared at the one in control. "Oh, don't mind me. I'm thinking of starting a website. It'll be called `Mating Marlins'. It's got a nice ring to it. Enough chit-chat. You two, pick who plays top, and who plays bottom. Make it snappy."

Wes eyebrows almost disappeared into his hairline. "Excuse me?"

"For fuck's sake, has everyone gone deaf? Hey, Dingus! Doofus! Take that underwear off your heads, you look like idiots. No, don't toss `em. Stuff `em in your mouths. I think you need to taste what real men taste like. Like these two macho fuckers here." As Ethan and Drew gingerly filled their mouths with fabric, Nate continued on Jason and Wes.

"You guys fucked up my world," Nate said, hovering near the two naked jocks. "All for nothing. You left me with nothing. No home, no girl, fucking drugged and..." Nate's teeth ground together as he bit down what he was about to say about the damage done to his body. Instead, he moved on to other hurts the team inflicted on him. "I've got no prospects at higher education—because that sex tape shit will follow me to the grave. I want you two to feel what I felt. Get. To. Fucking."

Drew, shocked, yanked the underwear from his mouth and piped up. "Hey, Nate, don't do this!"

"Fuck you, shitbag," Nate snapped. "You wanted to watch me get raped, so now, you get to watch this..." He practically snarled at Drew, who quickly cowed in response. But his snarl turned to a smile when he addressed one of his intended victims. "Jason. Jase," Nate said, as if the two had been friends forever. "Prove to Wes how much of a best friend you are. Go on. Fuck him."

"Nate!"

"Come on, man!"

"That's wrong!"

A barrage of whiny boys begged Nate to stay his decision. As he did before, to silence the crowd, he raised his fist angrily.

"We are doing this, whether you like it or not," Nate growled. "You didn't give me a choice, but I am a gracious master. I'm giving you all a choice. All of you have to watch this. If I see anyone looking away, I'll go to the police. If you don't stick your dick up his ass and hate-fuck him like you did me, I'll go to the police. Those are your choices. And you better make it look good. None of this begging for mercy shit. Don't you dare go gentle on him, either, because you didn't go gentle on me! I want him screaming, I want him to get as good as I got, because I ain't having it!" Nate all but roared. "He wanted to be with a jock? You be that jock. He's already had me. You better make Wes enjoy it, too, you sick fuck. I know what it looks like when someone's faking it. Do all that, and I won't go to the cops."

Wes quietly moved into position in front of Jason. He pushed his ass in the air and buried his face in his arm on the ground. Jason stared at the broad back that belonged to his best friend. There was no desire here. No carnal needs based on power or degradation. He saw a friend, a brother, a human being, not a thing to be conquered. He couldn't imagine inflicting this pain on Wes. Yet somehow, he thought he could on Nate—the boy he held a woefully misinformed grudge against, the boy he actually did rape. Why didn't he see this two weeks ago? Why didn't he just hold his fucking temper? His breakfast threatened to repeat all over Wes' exposed backside. He was the farthest thing from aroused. Despite the warm day, everything was shrunk in fear as if it was freezing outside. He mustered a deep breath and shouted instead.

"No!" Jason cried. "I won't! I-I can't!"

"You're wasting time," Nate said menacingly. "This is time better spent fucking the shit out of him, if you know what's good for you."

Jason's eyes watered. Wes' mouth trembled. Troy spoke up.

"Nate, please," Troy pleaded gently. "You have every right to hate us. I don't blame you. You may have been a bastard, but we never, ever should have... violated you like we did. We shouldn't have raped you. But you don't want to do this," Troy stood his ground when Nate's icy, merciless gaze turned on him. For a brief moment, Troy saw Finn's eyes in place of Nate's—that clear green stare that spoke of indifferent, crushing disappointment. His next words were definitely inspired.

"What we did was monstrous," Troy said. "We're the monsters," he continued, pointing at everyone but Nate. "You're not. You don't have to be. Don't be, please. For your sake. If you do this, you will hate yourself."

The righteous anger in Nate's eyes transmuted to something else. They were still hard, but wild anger was replaced with purpose. Nate gave a curt nod as a gesture of defiance and self-assuredness.

"You're the monsters," Nate said, repeating Troy's sentiment. "What you did was... monstrous. Are you finally admitting that everything you guys did to me was unbelievably wrong?" Nate's gaze was hard as coffin nails.

Troy's face fell dramatically. "Yes," he said, resigned to acknowledging his mistakes. "I went blind. I never knew how much I could hate someone like I hated you. I see how twisted and sick it was. In my head, I thought if I could make you suffer worse than you made me suffer, I'd feel better about myself. I... I got high on your pain. Your humiliation. But yeah, I felt better for a little while, but as you saw, the truth came out. It came out, and every single thing I did to you was brought to light. And because of that, the high I was on meant absolutely nothing—because the boy I love..." Troy steeled himself from crying in front of Nate, though it took all that he had. "When he saw the horrifying, disgusting things I did to you to make myself feel better... He couldn't even bring himself to look at me when he broke up with me. He wouldn't."

Nate took that in and let it sit. He'd almost felt sorry for Troy. But his pity for these boys was in extremely limited supply. "That's what I wanted," Nate said. "One of you fuckers had to fess up, say what you did was wrong. It's about fucking time." Nate scanned the faces of the boys in the gang. None of them had the intestinal fortitude to look him in the eye. "Wes, get up. Jason. You two, get your shit on. I don't wanna see you fuck him. I've had enough of that in the past two weeks to last a goddamn lifetime. All of you—get the fuck out of my sight. Never look at me, talk to me, or so much as try to give me a nod in my direction. I don't know if I'm even welcome back at school after what Owen did, but if I am, I don't want to run into any of you. If I share a class with you, don't sit near me. Don't you fucking dare sit near me. That'll keep us from ever having to work with each other. I don't want to hear a word from any of you until I graduate, if I get to graduate after all this. Maybe they'll mail me my diploma. I still haven't decided what to do with you," Nate finished, pointedly.

The two besties scrambled to comply. Troy lingered for a moment, casting a sad glance at Nate who pointedly refused to give him anymore of his energy. Ethan and Drew left before Jason and Wes were able to buckle their belts. Troy left soon after. When Wes and Jason were straightened out, the two passed Nate, their heads down, their steps hurried. Nate stopped Wes as he approached.

"I'm not the monster here." Nate let Wes go. The captain looked over his shoulder at the boy who had been his slave, his toy, his crush. A question passed over the thoroughly chastened boy, and he had to ask. He let out a shaky breath and spoke.

"Nate... I know you probably won't ever forgive me. But if you could, please, please don't let the other guys who were in on this—the ones who didn't... Please, don't let the cops ruin their lives. It was my fault. I encouraged this. You don't owe me a thing. I'm just asking, begging you..."

Nate held up a hand and cut Wes off. He looked the boy in the eyes and searched them. At last, he spoke.

"You're right. I don't owe you shit."

Wes looked stunned. Nate really was gonna take everyone down. This was all his fault.

"I'll do what I can. I make no promises. I don't know what the police do in cases like this," Nate said evenly. "I still don't know if I'll go to the police."

Wes's look of shock faded to wary gratitude. "Thank you, Nate. I... I really am sorry." Wes turned to face his best friend who was waiting a few feet away.

Nate waited until they walked a good way away before pulled out his cellphone and deleted the photo of Wes and Jason kissing. "I'm sorry, too," he said to no one in particular. Sorry for being a fucking arrogant prick, a bully and a bigot. Things could have been much different if he'd learned humility, true modesty—but his actions had serious consequences. They weren't legal or morally acceptable, but they were consequences.

And those illegal and immoral consequences have consequences of their own.

Nate questioned what his role would be in the reckoning to come. He turned to leave the court, when an unwelcome trio caught up to him.

"Got a date for a gangbang in the park restroom?" Tripp van Hansen asked. He was, as always, accompanied by his goons, Leo and Gray. All three players eyed him disdainfully.

Nate resisted the urge to growl at the tall, blond, fair-weather friend. He had had it up to the neck and was in no mood to entertain Tripp's insults. "If I deny it, you won't believe me. If I say yeah, you'll fuck with me. It's a lose-lose for me, just the way you like it. So, think what you want, Tripp. I get it, I do. Making others suffer makes you feel great about yourself."

"Suck my jock, fagboy. That'd make me feel good, too." Tripp replied derisively. His company hooted at the apparent burn.

Nate resisted rolling his eyes. The confidence from his confrontation with his rapists was coursing through him. "I say it because I know. We were alike before all this shit began. I'm guessing it's because your mom had other things to do like spend your dad's alimony money, and your dad always came home after you went to bed, right?"

The question about Tripp's father poured a series of memories into Nate's head. He hadn't thought this clearly in a long time. Nate recalled hanging out with Tripp, how they ransacked Tripp's father's office for rare, expensive cigars that they later smoked in private, laughing. He remembered the scent of those cigars. That same scent filled the room where Nate's wealthy patron upstairs at the gay bar had sat and watched Nate lewdly penetrate and masturbate himself.

Tripp's father, the high ranking State Senator, was keeping a dirty secret from his vitriolically homophobic son.

"Since you're being so open about your blatant fag-bashing," Nate said, "I should tell you. Did you know that I worked at a gay strip club?"

Tripp snorted. "Bet you greased a lot of poles there. All them homos slipping their hands and dicks into your skanky butt crack."

"Aw, shit!" Leo laughed.

"Yeah! Tell that fag what's what!" Gray hollered.

Nate ignored the jab and Tripp's screeching monkeys. "I had a client—a special viewer who requested a solo performance from me. He paid handsomely, so I guess it means I'm good for something, right?"

"Yep, taking cum any way you can get it. Get to the point cocksucker."

"That client was... Oh! He was there Wednesday night," Nate offered cheerfully. "He really liked watching a guy young enough to be his son dance around naked for him."

Tripp made an exaggerated hand gesture to imply he was bored and waiting for the point. Leo and Gray snickered at their leader's callousness, but Nate caught the wary look in the blond teen's eyes.

He pressed ahead. "The next time you see your dad, you should probably ask him where he was this past Wednesday. My special guest's cigars were pretty fucking rank. Like the ones we had from your father's office. But hey! The guy really liked watching me. Got like $1,000 shaking my dick in his face. I guess he must have liked me a lot! He probably likes me a lot better than the closed-minded, narrow-minded, dickless, spineless homophobe who lives under his roof." Nate baited Tripp. But after the quick turnaround from friend to enemy, he couldn't bring himself to care. Tripp was a bigoted asshole—the very person Nate no longer wanted to be.

Tripp hadn't looked at all surprised at the news Nate had given him. In an instant, Nate realized Tripp had guessed his father's predilections all along. But that didn't mean he liked hearing it said aloud. Especially not in front of his stooges.

"No way," Leo cried. "Senator van Hansen isn't a homo!"

"Of course he isn't!" Gray countered. "That's what fags do—they say everyone's gay so they can try to get it on with normal guys! They're all fuckin' abnormal like that!"

"The only thing abnormal here," Nate spat, "is hating gay guys just because your dad's one." He turned his eyes on Tripp, who was glaring back, hard.

"You shut your mouth, fag," Tripp said in a low, warning voice.

"And if I don't?" Nate poked the bear. He couldn't help it. After two weeks of having his will dominated and decimated by assholes, it felt good for him to stand up for himself again.

Tripp launched himself at Nate, striking at him with anger and passion—but not landing blows that actually hurt. The two hyenas egged their leader on behind the scene. Still, Nate shielded his head as best he could, waiting for an opening, until someone lifted Tripp van Hansen off him like a plastic bag, and flung his tall, blond ass a good few feet across the parking lot where he fell on his butt hard while scraping up his forearms and elbows.

"Get the fuck out of here, asshole," T.J. said. Spencer was at his side, holding the business end of a baseball bat in Tripp's sneering face. "Don't let me hear you've come within a hundred feet of my friend. If that happens, even your senator daddy won't be able to save you from a platoon of my Army buddies." As T.J. talked, Spencer stood at Nate's other side, so that the boy was flanked by his own good friends.

Nate watched Tripp pick himself up off the ground, hissing as he brushed at his road rashes. As he gathered up his football, he murmured obscenities as he walked away. His bros trailed after, peppering Tripp with questions the snobby bastard didn't want to answer. Nate moved to lift himself off the ground when Spencer and T.J. both lent him an arm and pulled him to his feet. They didn't speak about what had happened on the basketball court.

*** *** *** *** ***

In the car, after the confrontation at the park, Nate's stomach squelched. None of the boys had eaten breakfast.

Spencer recommended food.

T.J, got all three of them takeout because neither Nate nor Spencer fancied facing the townspeople after the events of the previous night. The sun was at its highest for a late spring day. At Nate's request, T.J. drove them to the rocky bend of the river that had been special to T.J., and to Nate—before Drew defiled it with another blackmail-induced rape. Nate hadn't told them—he didn't want them to associate it with anything unpleasant. To that end, he wanted to make a new memory.

The three sat by the riverbank, gulping down the mountain of food T.J. had bought, soaking their feet, stretched out in the sun-dappled grass alongside the flowing water. T.J. brought Nate up to speed on life in Fort Belvoir, and Spencer talked about his hopes post-graduation. Nate simply listened to his friends, happy to hear them talk, happy to have them engage him, and each other, like friends.

Like human beings.

The sun had been approaching the horizon by the time the three made it back to T.J.'s jeep. T.J. offered to take Nate home. He told Nate that his parents wanted to talk, to clear the air. He promised Nate he'd be there for that.

It only took Nate a moment to deliberate before he agreed. Spencer insisted Nate could crash in his dorm room for as long as he needed, but Nate knew it wasn't sustainable. He had to go home.

T.J. said he had one more stop before Nate's house.

Nate had nodded off on Spencer's shoulder in the back of the Jeep. He needed the contact. When he woke, T.J. parked in front of one of the oldest buildings in Mount Pleasant's town square. He turned off his vehicle and stared straight ahead. Nate followed his line of sight and realized specifically what T.J. had parked in front of:

The M.P.P.D. Headquarters.

"Nate," T.J. said quietly, "If you want to make a police report, and if you want to be believed, it has to be now. It can't wait." The words were heavy in the stillness of the Jeep's cabin. Nate shook his head.

"But—" Nate said, though Spencer cut him off gently.

"We'll be here for you, Nate, no matter what you choose," Spencer said, tucking a hand behind Nate's neck in a comforting gesture. "But it's your choice, and your choice alone."

"You need to do what's right for you," T.J. added, taking hold of his best friend's hand.

With both Spencer and T.J. connected to him physically, Nate felt bolstered mentally. He looked at the brickwork of the police station's main entrance for a while. With a shaky breath, he looked at his friends. After looking both in the eyes, he stared out at the police station once more.

He thought about everything that had happened. Wes's plea to him. Owen's grisly fate. Drew's terror. His mother's rejection. His friends' support. His own shame.

Nate made his choice.

*** *** *** *** ***

The coin is in the air. Which way will it fall? Will the scale tip towards justice, or mercy?

Find out in the Epilogue!

Feel free to hit me up with your comments, your questions, your critiques, your compliments, if you like. Chapters 16-18 and the Epilogue were written with Jax's notes, his input, his approval. I'm simply putting it all together. kitfortier@gmail.com

If you'd like to drop the original author a line, Jax is happy to read up on what you have to say! jax.cooper@yahoo.com

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