My Mafia Boytoy

Chapter 6 - Citrus

The main difference between a party and a get together are the cups. A get together has the canned beers, but a party has that and the red plastic cups that could be filled with anything, especially spiked.

A woman in a bralette and leather skirt passes me, holding said red plastic cup, and dives into her friend's arms. Or I thought was her friend. It's a lesbian couple. Their lips melt together and I look away.

Leo barely acknowledged me when Oliver arrived, just took Oliver and dashed, and I can't blame him. I've been in the corner. Watching the lights. Getting pummelled by the music. Trying not to melt into a pile of fatty tears and blubbering.

What kind of boyfriend throws a party after semi-breaking up with his girlfriend? Or maybe ex. Yeah. This is ex behaviour. I'll keep my hopes high. The sooner they break up, the sooner Yazmin will love me again.

I don't care though. Certainly.

The beer tastes like hand sanitizer and I normally avoid alcohol. But the punch tastes funky and people have probably cast their grubby fingers inside.

Oliver said he'd be right back. I don't know what compelled me to go to a party with him. Everyone I go with always ditches me. Yazmin has ditched me at places so many times it's not even funny.

I get why she wants a man to love her, then. Except I don't care if it's a man. Anyone will do, whose love language refrains from ditching me outside places they take me to. I look up for the lesbian couple again, but partygoers have shifted and obscure the view.

'Samara? Is that you?'

My shoulders slump as I come face to face with Derek.

'Are you alright?' He asks, liltingly, and he's a man I can appreciate, a man I can stand.

‘Yes. I just need air.'

His following touch on my shoulder crumbles something crucial. I anchor to his side. There are silent steps, pushing past warm, annoying bodies, yet I barely recall how we got from the corner of that cramped dorm party to the main stairwell of the dormitory building.

We sit on the top steps. I rest my head on his shoulder. His cologne flows into me, new metal and dried citrus bloomed together, pricey, probably worth a chomp of my full-ride scholarship here. I briefly hope it imprints on me.

‘Did Yazmin come with you?' A fair question. I don't go anywhere without her. She’s my lucky charm who tends to fly ahead and leave me behind.

'Not here.'

'You’re on the rocks?'

‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

He pauses, long enough I know he’s calculating his words, formulating them to flow out in the prettiest simplification. 'I've had my disagreements with my best mates. I get it.'

‘How'd that end?'

'We call sometimes, keep in touch, but we're not nearly as close as we were before.'

'That sounds miserable.'

'It was at first.'

'And now?'

'I got over it. But I don’t think your situation is that terrible. Sorry to keep circling back to it.’

'It’s fine, but my situation could be.' I sniffle. 'Am I obsessive?'

He's quiet. 'No. Nothing like that.'

‘She told me that I was obsessed with her.’

'You're just both impassioned. That's all. It's admirable on your end.' He runs a hand through my hair and tugs me closer to his soft clothed shoulder.

I curl arms around his long torso, burying my nose on him, shutting my eyes. It feels kiddish, maternal in the grip. I ache for home, for a hand to run through my hair like this, to tell me I’m not in the wrong despite me knowing better.

I wasn’t completely in the right, either. But that barely matters. Oliver makes petty thieves look like saints. He riled me up, ruined my moods, and Yazmin noticed, and blamed me. Everything led back to Oliver in the end.

‘Can I tell you something?’ My voice is leaky, not following directions.

‘I’d hope so.’

‘You can’t tell anyone.’

His fingers skate down my black hair, warm and heavy, and a shiver ripples through me. ‘Okay.’

I really love his voice. Never understood why Yazmin ridiculed it. I swig the remainder of the bitterness from my cup and crunch it into my pocket.

Derek’s no Yazmin. A positive, for once. He’s acted nothing but kindly to me. I should have warned him first, should have fretted. He would have appreciated it.

Staring into his pale blue eyes, I reimagine that gunshot. Imagine Oliver’s dirty hand on Derek’s clean, citrusy shoulder. Imagine what Derek would do, how he wouldn’t believe me, and if he does, how I’d spread the sickness of my fear onto him. I would be torturing him or making a fool of myself.

‘Nevermind.’

‘No, no, no. Tell me. You can’t just say that then leave me out of the know.’

‘I—It’s big, Derek. I don’t know. And it’s not worth sharing, yet.’

‘Sam, anything you want to say is worth sharing to me.’ His hand swoops my black hair back behind my ears, a warm, tender thumb sliding away the wetness from my cheeks.

‘What if it’s disgusting?’

‘You couldn’t disgust me.’

‘I could.’ If I could disgust Yazmin, I could disgust anyone.

‘Try me.’

I stare down. This is the opposite of maggots and honey, that rotten and sweet expression the employees gave me when I witnessed the murder freshly, that face Yazmin tossed at me when we went to Q&Q as if I wasn’t looking out for her.

But Derek was just honey. Clear and amber, chunked with rich honeycomb. So innocent, so new, so unresentful. I want to preserve him without his colony of understanding turning against me.

‘I don’t like Oliver,’ I whisper, like Oliver is tuned into the walls.

‘Oliver?’ His brows crinkle. ‘Why Oliver?’

‘He’s been following me around. Just this week, he was waiting outside my department to catch me after I got my TA work.’

A pause. ‘That is weird. Have you talked to him?’

‘No.’

‘Do you want me to?’

‘No. Just want you to be around me if he’s there. I don’t really know why I followed him to this party. I guess I wanted to talk to Leo.’

‘And how’d that go?’

I snort. ‘He blew me off.’

‘Why’d you plan to talk him?’

‘Apologize. I think. Or interrogate.’

‘Honourable. I can get you there.’

Derek stands, a hand reaching out for me. I take it. We begin back to the party, the song thundering out of the room. They mollified the guy meant to be monitoring the dorms with booze earlier.

‘Can you stay when we go? Oliver’s with them and I don’t want to be alone with guys who hate me.’

‘I wasn’t planning to ditch, Sam. And I’m sure they don’t hate you.’

I barely hear the second part over my heart leaping into my throat for the first sentence.

Our hands are still linked. He walks me like that up the stairs. And maybe, this party isn’t so horrible. Maybe whatever goes down with Leo and Oliver and whoever else is upstairs won’t kill me.

And maybe, I could let Derek know everything, sooner or later.