“Sweety….”

	I squirmed and clutched my blanket tighter.

	“Sweety. Hey, I’m gonna head to work, okay? Are you going to be okay here with just Kasey?”

	“Kasey…?” I mumbled, my eyes struggling to open.

	[i]He stayed the night....[/i]

[i]	…Because of what happened yesterday.[/i]

[i]	[/i]I nodded and mumbled a yes before closing my eyes.

	She leaned forward and kissed me on the forehead. I snuggled into my blanket and lied there, waiting for sleep to carry me off once again.

	[i]Kasey is down there right now, isn’t he...?[/i]

[i]	[/i]I squirmed a bit and then flipped onto my side.

	[i]She said we didn’t have to go to school today. So I guess we’re getting a three day weekend….[/i]

[i]	[/i] I flipped back onto my back. 

	[i]My mom and dad will be at work pretty much all day, too. Meaning we’ll have the house to ourselves....[/i]

[i]	[/i] I flipped back onto my side. 

	[i]She saw us last night. She saw Kasey… snuggling with me.[/i] 		My eyes opened and I forced myself to sit up. I looked over at my clock, groggy and a bit nauseous. 

	[i]So tired….[/i]

[i]	[/i]I had only slept a few hours, and I felt it in every inch of my body, but for some reason I couldn’t make my mind shut off. Every time I tried to fade into the darkness, I saw Kasey, either snuggling against me or gazing at me with his red cheeks and that dumb, loopy smile. Or I saw him lying on the couch, drool probably dribbling down his lips....

	[i]Maybe I should check on him.[/i]

[i]	[/i]I got up and moved downstairs, into the living the room. He [i]was [/i]lying there, curled up in the blanket dad had laid on top of him.

	[i]No drool, though. [/i]I thought, smiling to myself. But my smile faded a moment later. [i] Tired….[/i]

[i]	[/i]I sat down on the couch in front of his legs and continued to watch him, admiring how peaceful he looked while asleep.

	[i]He’s so warm I can feel his heat through the blanket, and through my pj’s and underwear too….[/i]

[i]	[/i]The world started to waver. His face grew blurry. My eyelids drooped and my body got weaker.

	[i]I’ll just… rest my eyes for a minute.[/i] I let myself fall over and I curled up in front of him, on the edge of the couch. [i]So comfy….[/i]

[i]	[/i]

[i].[/i]

	Something tapped on my back.

[i]	[/i]I stirred.

	It tapped on my back again. 

	My eyes slowly opened. I jolted upward the moment I realized where I was. I turned around and found Kasey looking back at me, his lips pursed tight.

	“O-Oh, sorry! I didn’t mean to fall asleep!”

	“It’s fine.” He said with a strained voice.

	“I just came down to check on you, and….” I paused and blushed. “And I… I guess I was pretty tired.” I laughed.

	“Yeah.”

	“I didn’t mean to fall asleep, though. It's just, once I sat down it all hit me.”

	“Mmhmm… i-it's fine.”

	I cocked an eyebrow at him. “Um... are you okay?”

	“Yeah,” he said, biting his lip now. “Um, Peter, could you please get up?”

	“G-Get up? Um, yeah….”

	Kasey gave me a wide-eyed look of worry and immediacy the moment I got to my feet. He ripped off the blanket, revealing his body, which was pushed back to the edge of the couch, pushed a bit down into the cushions.

	[i]Wait, what's he doing...?[/i]

[i]	[/i]Kasey had one hand pressed down tightly over his crotch. He sat up quickly, but carefully, and then darted to the bathroom across the room, keeping his hand firmly planted the entire time.

	[i]Oh.[/i] [i]He just had to pee….[/i]

[i]	[/i]I stared over at the hallway curiously. My lips curled into a smile. 

	[i]He... held it because he didn't want to wake me up....[/i] 

	Kasey returned several minutes later. He sat down next to me and sighed. “Damn, that was a little too close for comfort.”

	“Thanks for not waking me up….” I said, blushing.

	O-Oh, um, yeah, don’t worry about it!” He laughed. “I hate waking people up.”

	“Heh, same here.” My eyes inadvertently went down to his shorts.

	[i]They’re pulled up a bit… and so… tight….[/i]

[i]	No! Stop it! You’re being gross! Stop looking at him like that.[/i]

[i]	It’s not right. Even if… even if he knows now. Even if you know now.[/i]

	I swallowed. The word was ticklish, even to think it. 

	[i]Gay.[/i]

[i]	[/i]“So, uh,” Kasey scratched the back of his head. “How did I end up here?”

	“Hmm?” I cocked my head at him. “My dad carried you in?”

	“Oh….” He blushed. “He carried me, huh…? But, um, I meant like, what happened? All I remember was getting some kind of weird mask from the dentist and then I fell asleep.”

	I looked back at him, mystified at first. A strange, gripping pain worked it’s way up my chest. [i]He doesn’t remember.[/i]

[i]	[/i]“You… um… we just… came here, after. After the dentist. You feel asleep really fast.”

	“Oh.” He looked down at his lap. “I guess that makes sense.”

	The pain in my chest intensified until I thought I’d cry, but before any tears could well up, I realized something.

	[i]If he forgot, that doesn’t mean he suddenly isn’t… gay. He might still be gay for me. He… probably secretly wants to... um, be gay together.[/i]

[i]	Which means we can do it all over again.[/i]

[i]	[/i]I held back my smile, but the urge to smile faded a few moments later, when another thought dawned on me.

	[i]Unless he only wanted to snuggle because of the drugs…. [/i]

.

	After realizing we had the whole day and the whole house all to our own devices, we promptly did the most logical and exciting thing our young, energetic selves could think of: we turned on early morning television.

	The only thing we could find other than bad cartoons and Whoopi Goldberg complaining about shit nobody cares about was an old sitcom. We watched in silence, though I couldn't help but steal frequent glances over at Kasey—and I had a feeling he was doing the same with me.

	[i]Those shorts.... Ugh![/i]

[i]	Why are they so freakin' tight![/i]

[i]	[/i]I forced myself back to the television. The characters in the show were all in a beach house playing cards. The game was 'strip-poker,' and it appeared that whenever you lost you had to remove an article of clothing.

	I thought about playing strip-poker with Kasey.

	[i]I wonder what he looks like in his underwear.[/i]

[i]	I wonder what kind of underwear he wears underneath those shorts....[/i]

[i]	UGH STOP THINKING![/i]

[i]	[/i]“Um.”

	I turned toward him. He was staring at the television, blushing. 

	“That actually looks pretty fun.” He continued.

	A silence lingered between us for several moments.

	“You... you want to play strip-poker?” I asked, astonished.

	“I dunno,” he giggled boyishly. “I just think it could be fun, you know? Really embarrassing, though!”

	I swallowed. “I... um... I... guess if we're g-gonna play, we'd have to, to um, maybe do it with something other than poker.”

	He turned to face me, a peculiar expression on his face.

	“We could maybe... do it with a video game....” My voice got lower as I spoke.

	His eyebrows pursed a bit, and then his eyes widened. “O-Oh! Did you think I meant right now?”

	My throat tightened and heat flooded into my face.

	“I-I meant, like, at some point! Maybe! I didn't mean, like... now.” He chuckled again and turned away, blushing. “I mean, unless you want to play it, ha ha....”

	“O-Oh,” I mumbled, a hint of humor past all my embarrassment. “I was... kinda scared there for a moment! And I mean, um, I wouldn't want to do it.... Not unless you did.”

	And then there was another silence. He was staring at the television, but I could he wasn't watching it any longer.

	“So...” he began, slowly, nervously. “You do want to play?”

	“I... would play, maybe. If you want to.”

	“...How would you wanna do it? I-I mean, like you said, we can't do poker.”

	“What about a fighting game? Loser has to remove a piece of clothing...?” I suggested.

	And then there was another silence.

.

	“I don't want to play any more!”

	“Come on,” I urged. “Don't be like that....”

	“But I suck at this game!”

	“Yeah, well... we flipped a coin, didn't we?”

	“Yes! But you didn't have to pick the worst game in the world.... You knew I'd lose.” He crossed his arms over his bare chest. 	I'd won 3 rounds in a row so far. The first two he'd removed a sock, and for the third, he'd removed his shirt.

	[i]The only thing left is those shorts.... [/i]I thought, licking my bottom lip. [i]It's weird that I want him to take them off so badly, since I like seeing him wear them so much.[/i]

[i]	[/i]“You were gonna pick [i]Out of Control Philosophical Dissidence Manifesting Into Political Chaos: Something We All Recognize and Are Deeply Afraid of, Yet Can Do Nothing About, [/i]and I really suck at that game.... So it's only fair.”

	“I was not....”

	“Heh. How about we do one more game. If you win, I'll remove both my socks and my shirt. So three items for your one.”

	He looked down at his shorts, blushing intensely. “Mrrrm,” he groaned. “I dunno....”

	“You're wearing underwear, right?” The question made my face a little hotter, and it made my eyes a bit wider.

	He looked at me. “Yeah.”

	“Then nothing to worry about. It's just underwear. And that's only if you lose.”

	“Ugh, fine! One more stupid game....”

	My heart pounded against my chest. [i]He actually agreed.... He's gonna have to take off his shorts....[/i]

[i]	[/i]And a few minutes later, just as I predicted, he lost.

	“Noooo!” He cried. “Come on! That was so dumb, this game is so cheap!”

	“Hey, you did better this time! You almost got me!”

	He looked over at me and frowned. “Do I really have to take off my pants?”

	I nibbled my lip and smiled a bit. “A deal is a deal.”

	He pursed his brow at me and sighed. “Fiiiine.” He got to his feet and looked down unsure at the shorts. “Can't believe I gotta do this....”

	I swallowed and watched him intently. 

	[i]He's gonna do it. He's actually gonna do it! I'm gonna see Kasey's underwear![/i]

[i]	[/i]He pulled the shorts down in one slow movement, slowly revealing more and more of his body with each second. His face was glowing red, and I imagined mine was too.

	The shorts hit the floor. He stood there, tense, his legs close together and his hands balled into fists. “H-Happy...?” He asked.

	“Yes.” I replied, my voice far more serious than I'd intended it to be. 

	He seemed to pick up on this, as he blushed harder and looked away.

	[i]I can... see his...[/i]

[i]	[/i]The underwear was tight against his body, form-fitting. The band around his waist was black, with the brand name '[i]THE OFT FORGOTTEN VIRTUES OF CAPITALISM IN A CHANGING ERA' [/i]in white letters all around it. The underwear itself was a gray.

	“That's... cool underwear.” I said, transfixed by the sight.

	“Y-Yeah? They're... boxer-briefs. I recently switched to 'em.”

	“Oh, that's cool. I wish my mom would get me something like that.”

	“W-Well, um, what kind of underwear do you wear?” He asked. “Wait, don't tell me....” He bit down on his bottom lip. “Show me.”

	“Show you...? B-But... I didn't lose.”

	“So...?”

	I waited for him to go on, to explain his question. To tell me why it didn't matter that he'd lost our game. But it occurred to me that his question stood as it was.

	[i]So what? Does it really matter that he won...?[/i]

[i]	[/i]I stood up and pursed my lips. I reached for my pajama pants and hesitated. “They're... kind of embarrassing.”

	“I'm standing here almost naked.” He replied.

	I laughed. “Okay, I... I guess that's a good point.” I swallowed hard, and with one, tense but swift motion, I dropped the pjs to the floor, revealing my white briefs.

	[i]It's just underwear, [/i]I told myself. [i]A b-bulge and underwear.[/i]

	He stared at me, wide-eyed. “O-Oh.... You wear... whity-tighties.”

	I blushed even harder. “Yeah, well, my mom won't buy me boxers.... Or... those.” I looked at his underwear again, and noticed something slightly different from the front.

	[i]It makes it a little easier now that I know I'm not the only one who's... enjoying this.[/i]

[i]	[/i]He noticed that I noticed and turned away again, bashfully bringing his thighs a bit closer together. We both stood there awkwardly for a few moments before he sat down on my bed and covered his groin with both hands.

	I sat down next him, but made an effort to rest my hands on my thighs.

	[i]If he wants to look... he can.[/i]

[i]	[/i]He looked off to the side, away from me, clearly too embarrassed to look me in the eyes.

	“So,” he went on, swallowing. “What now?”

	“I dunno....” I paused. “We could play another game.”

	Now he looked at me. Eyes wide with shock and his lips parted a bit. “A-Another game?”

	I looked back at him and stared for several seconds—I then began to laugh. “I didn't mean like, another game of [i]that. [/i]Like not more of the, uh, striping.”

	“O-Oh! Oh,” he chuckled. “You just meant... like a game.”

	“Yeah....”

	I felt slightly vindicated at the thought he'd made nearly the same mistake I'd made not even an hour ago. It leveled a playing field I wasn't even aware existed until this very moment.

	“Yeah,” he turned away. “I wouldn't want to do another round. Not unless you wanted to do that or something.”

	Silence lingered between us for several moments.

	[i]Did he just.... Does he actually want to...?[/i]

[i]	But what's after this? What's left to take off?[/i]

[i]	[/i]I looked down at my briefs with wide, worried eyes.

	[i]One of us would be naked....[/i]

[i]	[/i]“I-I mean I'm not, I'm not, um, saying I want to er... or anything like that....” He stammered. 

	“...If we did it, one of us would be naked.”

	“Um, yeah....” He mumbled back.

	“...What game would we play?”

	His head slowly turned back in my direction, though he still wasn't facing me. I looked down at his boxer-briefs again. 

	[i]He's really... um... enjoying himself right now.[/i]

[i]	I can't believe this is actually happening.[/i]

[i]	I can't believe... what's about to happen.[/i]

[i]	[/i]“I dunno. The stakes are high. It def couldn't be something either of us has an advantage in. We'd have to have equal chances.”

	“Yeah,” I responded. “Something we could both win or lose in.”

	A long silence pervaded. I struggled to find the right suggestion, but I was too nervous to think straight.

	[i]If we stay silent too long, he might just call the whole thing off-[/i]

[i]	[/i]“Um, what if we... just both do it.”

	“Y-You... You want to get naked?”

	“N-No! I j-just meant... that if we both do it it'll... it'll be more fair that way?”

	I nibbled on my lip. “Yeah... I... I guess so.”

	“And, you know, we don't have to get [i]naked. [/i]We could maybe just flash each other... or something....”

	“Flash each other?”

	“Yeah,” He looked over at me, his eyes taking a momentary detour to my briefs. “Like, we just show each other what we look like naked for a few moments, and then we put our underwear back on.”

	The tension I'd only just then noticed in my chest lightened a bit. “That sounds a lot easier, actually....” I laughed. “Easier than sitting here naked.”

	He smiled. “Y-Yeah!”

	After a bit more deliberation and stammering and awkward silence, we both got to our feet. We both stood uncomfortably in front of each other—he was pigeon-toed and had one hand covering his erection; I had one hand forced straight down with the other across my belly, clinging to it's opposite forearm.

	“So... you said you'd go first?” He said, looking me up and down.

	“Yeah....” I whispered back. I put my hands on my waist and slipped my fingers beneath the waistband of my briefs. My whole body tightened—my [i]whole [/i]body. I swallowed, and pulled the thin fabric drawers down.

	They ran into an obstacle on the way down, so I had to make an embarrassing effort to slip them past my member, letting it dangle out exposed in front of Kasey. He stared at me, wide-eyed, his whole face red.

	I thought about holding my briefs there, maybe pulling them up a few moments after letting him see me uncovered, but I knew I was setting the precedent for he would do. With that thought in mind, I let them drop to the floor.

	“So... here I am.” I said, smiling bashfully. “I'm... naked.”

	“Wow....” He said, underneath is his breath.

	“Wow?” I repeated.

	He looked up at my eyes, a look of shock in his face. “I j-just meant that... um... you know. It's... it's really wild. That we're doing this, is all....”

	“Yeah.” I smiled again.

	“I guess it's my turn.” He tried to laugh, but the sudden exhalation only made it clear how nervous he was.

	I nodded.

	Kasey nodded and gripped the waistband of his boxer-briefs. He pursed his lips, looked down at him, and then pulled the underwear down past his member in one swift motion.

	The sudden sight of him exposed made whatever blood had not yet been distributed into my various appendages rush straight to my face.

	“It's big,” I said, reflexively.

	He paused and looked up at me, squatted down a bit, his face one of near terror.

	“S-Sorry.” I said.

	He swallowed and let the boxer-briefs drop to the floor. He stood up straight.

	“It's okay.... Thanks. Yours is big too.”

	“Thanks....”

	We stood there for a bit, both of us nervously looking away at first, but soon we were admiring each other. I decided to take the initiative. 

	I reached down and moved my member out of the way so he could see my testicles. 

	He took a step forward. “O-Oh. So that's what another boys... um, balls look like.”

	“Yeah....” I looked up at him expectantly.

	He swallowed and reached down to do the same. He moved his shaft out of the way and let me look at his testicles as well. Both of us were still hard, in my case, almost to the point of discomfort.

	[i]But it's a good discomfort. I've never felt anything like this.[/i]

[i]	I want to... do something else. But I don't know what....[/i]

[i]	“[/i]Maybe we should get dressed now?” He suggested. “It would be super weird if one of your parents came home and found us like this....”

	“Oh, yeah. That would be.... Ugh, let's not even think about that.”

	“Maybe we could... hang out in our underwear for a little while? They're not supposed to be back anytime soon, right? And that should be a little easier to explain.”

	“You want to? I think that would... really comfy.”

	“Yeah,” he said, smiling. “Me too....”

	

[i]	[/i]