I Dare Not Ask Who's Been Helping You Fall Asleep

Determination had set in. Although Alex was on his way to becoming Jasey’s next boy toy, I knew that Alex still needed me to help him make her his. It was the only way to still stay close to him. So I convinced him that I knew what girls wanted and in turn convinced myself that I knew what Alex wanted. I had deluded myself into thinking that what he really wanted was someone like me. He just didn’t know it yet…

I held my breath as Alex blinked his eyes slowly. He began to speaking in incoherent words that came sputtering out in random intervals. This was exactly how I expected him to act when I told him the news, the news that Jasey liked him back. He was shocked. That much was predictable. What I hadn’t expected was how volatile I would feel.

I wanted to explode. There was nothing I wanted more than to tell Alex how I really felt, but that wasn’t an option. Not when his most anticipated dream was being fulfilled.

Alex’s cheeks warmed and he smiled at me. This was the happiest I had ever seen him, like a little kid on Christmas morning. Did Santa come through this year buddy? In this case, I was Alex’s Santa giving him what his heart desired most. Fuck was making Alex happy for the sake of my own happiness really worth it? I was in misery.

I looked at the ecstatic glow that seemed to surround him. His light brown eyes that usually looked so murky were now bright and excited. His lips were wet. It seemed like just the simple fact that Jasey liked Alex gave him some weird shot of confidence, and really who could blame him. Jasey was a tough girl to get.

I eyed the new Alex.

That’s when I decided that despite my pain, this was all worth it.

He wrapped me in a huge hug that squeezed the life out of me. Vaguely, I smelt ivory soap and something else that I couldn’t detect. I felt his warm skin of his neck against mine.

It was definitely worth it.

He was still my friend, a friend who still believed that he needed my help when I knew very well that he would be fine on his own. That was a minor detail that I would keep to myself for the time being. He didn’t need to know that. Not anytime soon at least.

------x------

“What’s going on between them anyways?” Lisa asked Jack.

They were both sitting at opposite sides of her living room couch. Apparently, sleeping next to someone in bed made things awkward. Luckily, that wasn’t the case between Alex and me.

“It’s a long fucked up story. You already know that Alex likes Jasey right? Well, Jasmine promised to help him get her, but she like… transformed him into some hot beast and now I think she’s fa—”

Ahem. I cleared my throat urgently. Jack had gotten one thing wrong. I didn’t fall for Alex after he became a ‘hot beast,’ I had fallen for Alex the first time I laid eyes on him.

Jack sat up straighter like he had been caught stealing bubble gum from a store. Alex and I had just return from Lisa’s back yard where I had broken the news to him. As promised, I was going to give another lesson. I really had no idea what we would take about today.

The stared at me expectantly like they had that first night when I had given them sex tips only this time there was a third pair of eyes. I started to entwine my fingers into the shaggy carpet that I sat on. I crossed my legs Indian style. Finally, I looked back up at them. “Um… what do you guys want to talk about?”

Yup, exactly like last time.

They stared back at me clueless. Let’s not all talk at once. Please, one at a time.

I rolled my eyes.

“How about we make a to-do list?” I suggested.

“Like a list of girls we’d want to ‘do’ because, if so, I already know who I want to be on the top of mine.” Jack said with a wink.

“Flattering Jack, but no.” I took out my crumbling notebook and flipped to an open page.

I tapped my pen to my lip in deep thought. I looked at Alex for inspiration and found him staring off into space, his thoughts elsewhere.

In my quick, loopy scribble I began to write things we could talk about. I quickly crossed out sex. I didn’t feel like talking about that anymore. This time I wanted to focus more on relationships since it seemed like only a matter of time before Alex and Jasey would hit it off. I shuddered at the thought. Not even five minutes had passed before I was ready. I tried to get everyone’s attention, because everyone seemed lost in their own world.

Alex was thinking about… well, my bets were on Jasey.

Lisa was texting someone… she looked bored, but then she looked up at the two guys sitting on either side of her and smiled.

Jack was curling his lips up in some strange way as he attempted to sniff his upper lip… at least he never failed at keeping himself entertained.

I stood up and Jack immediately stopped.

“You guys ready?” I asked.

“Yeah, everyone except lover boy.” Jack snickered.

Lisa nudged him lightly and he awoke from his daydream.

“I’m just going to say some things and then I’ll just take questions.” I don’t really know what made me such an expert to these guys, but I couldn’t very well back out now. I had come too far. They had no idea that I really only had minimal experience.

But I did know what I wanted in a guy.

And it wasn’t hard to figure out what guys wanted.

“We’re going to talk about relationships. You know, boy meets girl, boy ask girl out, bada bing bada boom there’s love. Whatever, that’s all a conspiracy; rarely do thinks happen like that which I assume all of you have figured out by now. The reason being that every single girl you’ll ever meet will never be the same and she’ll never want the same things, the same goes for boys.” I added remembering Lisa.

“Some girls.. or guys.” This was getting hard to explain for both genders. “want to do the deed and then have nothing to do with you. It’s in your best interest to never presume this in a person; well assuming you’re looking for a good fuck or whatever, because that could be bad, especially if you end up actually liking that person. Which leads me to my first point…”

Jack yawned.

I paused. “Am I boring you?”

Jack yawned again as if saying yes, but then he said, “No, you could never bore me.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Especially when you’re talking about fuck buddies. I just haven’t gotten enough sleep.”

“I wasn’t talking about fuck buddies.”

“But you implied…”

I placed my hands on my hips. “No, I didn’t.”

“Oh here they go again.” Lisa giggled.

Jack leaned forward to where he was sitting on the couch. “I guess what I was trying to say is that I’m looking for a fuck buddy.”

“You wish.” I scoffed.

He grinned, “All the time, babe.”

“Will you two stop all your flirting is making me nauseous?” Alex groaned.

I turned around and pretended to check my notebook. As I blankly looked over my notes I couldn’t help but smile and I had no fucking reason why.

I turned back around, the smile completely gone, and a frown in its place. “As I was saying, my first point is to never start a relationship with sex, because that’s all it’ll be based on. How can you take a step backwards from sex? You can’t. Don’t give in so easily. I know that’s what you mostly say about girls, but it’s true for guys too. How are you going to feel if a girl stops having sex with you?” I kept asking questions without letting them answer. “Like you suck at having sex that’s what. I know how insecure guys can get. You’re just better at hiding it. By then the relationship is on a downward spiral. Guys would rather break up with a girl than admit that he thinks he’s doing something wrong.”

Jack was staring at me intently. He was either trying to undress me with his eyes or he thought that by staring at me hard enough all the stuff I had just said would sink into him.

Alex looked like he hadn’t heard a single thing I had said the past ten minutes.

I tried to hide the disappointment in my face. I doubted Alex would have seen it anyways, but I knew Jack would.

I didn’t want to do this anymore.

The only reason I had agreed to this lesson today was to help Alex. I had deluded myself into thinking that once he realized how much I helped him get what he thought he wanted he would end up seeing what he really wanted. What he really wanted would be me according to my theory. However, the simple fact that I couldn’t even hold his attention for longer than a second anymore was really starting to worry me.

Maybe I didn’t know what guys wanted.