"Are you ready?" Blake's eyes twinkled as he teasingly hovered the cursor above the Excel file that contained the latest batch of grades for Nick's economical models course.

Nick groaned. "No. No, I'm not ready."

"That's too bad, because your grade is already here and I, for one, am dying of curiosity."

"This is not fair—it came online way faster than the last time!" Nick complained. "The professors aren't supposed to already be done with grading the next day."

"I'm going to open it," Blake threatened.

Nick swore and turned away from the laptop, despite having much more confidence in the outcome this time. He and Blake had done another study session in the school library after the first one, and Nick had definitely recognised the questions and knew the answers while he was writing the quiz. Immediately after he'd felt like he did well, but the doubt in the back of his mind that he hadn't was still there. Alot was riding on this, and with each fail it would get harder to raise his grade. If he didn't do significantly better than last time, Nick knew he'd have an even tougher job—an almost impossible one.Even worse: it meant he'd failed while Blake had put so much time and effort into helping him study. It would feel like an even worse failure.

"I opened the file," Blake told Nick sing-song. "I'm going to look up your name in the list now."

"Blake, stop it!"

Blake only laughed and continued what he was doing with Nick's computer. "And I found you in the list. Do you want me to tell you, or do you want to look at it yourself?"

Nick pulled a face at Blake while still carefully avoiding looking at his laptop screen. Blake was usually quite expressive, but it sucked that he was also very good at not showing what he thought or felt when he wanted to. Blake kept his expression completely blank, giving nothing away about Nick's grade.

They held a staring competition until Nick was finally the first one to cave. "Fine, you tell me," he said.

Instantly, Blake's lips broadened into a wide, beaming smile that looked like it couldn't have been contained much longer anyway. "Nine out of ten," he said. "And fun fact: congrats, babe, you got the highest grade in the entire class."

Nick's mouth almost fell open. "What? Really? I haven't been top of the class in anything since kindergarten."

"Well, you are now. Thanks to me and my help, of course."

"Pretty much, yes," Nick admitted.

Blake scoffed, leaned in, and pecked Nick on the cheek. "Hey, you're supposed to protest and tell me you did all the work, not feed my ego further. That's dangerous business."

Nick chuckled. "Okay, it was a team effort."

"Good enough. I'll take it."

Blake grinned, and both of them started leaning in to make out, but before their mouths could find each other, the laptop in front of them loudly notified them of a new message in a group chat. Blake seemed to glance at the screen automatically. When his eyes stayed trained on the laptop, Nick also turned to look.

He instantly wished he hadn't. He also wished he'd never ever hooked up his chats to his computer. Although he'd mostly done it to not miss Alex' replies about their gaming night while in class, all the other chats automatically gave notifications too. Including the football chat.

Nick watched on in horror as the guys showed themselves from their worst side.

"@Nick how's your bitch?"

"@Nick you fucking her yet?"

The messages kept coming, one worse than the other and everyone piled on. At some point, someone even asked Nick to send any nudes he got. Blake's eyes stayed glued to the screen and glided across all the lines popping up in the notification boxes.It took a few seconds before Nick snapped out of his shock. He reached out and slammed the laptop shut.

An awkward silence followed.

Nick just stared at his hand on top of the laptop. This wasn't the first time he'd felt ashamed of other people knowing he was in a chat with people who talked like that. He'd felt similar with Emma, and always kept her away from it, despite her never really being the target of truly disgusting comments. She was friends with most people in the football chat too, and that seemed to gain her some immunity. Blake had no such immunity. Nick knew all too well if he scrolled up far enough, he'd still find memes and fag remarks made about Blake while they were still in high school.

He knew it was wrong before and had looked away. But he'd never felt as ashamed about it as he did right now. The longer the silence between him and Blake lasted, the worst Nick felt until he could no longer take it.

"They're idiots," Nick blurted, just to break the silence.

Blake snorted. "Tell me something I don't know."

Blake didn't sound upset, but Nick couldn't tell what he was thinking. It couldn't be anything good. After that moment they'd sharing on campus during which Blake told Nick he knew Nick was a different person now suddenly rang hallow.

If Nick was still standing by, looking away and ignoring his 'friends' making comments he didn't agree with, was he truly any better now? He couldn't have it both ways: claim he'd changed without making any effort to actually show it. Even if that meant conflict.

Nick knew what he had to do.

Squaring his shoulders with renewed resolve, Nick opened the laptop again, while Blake just sat there and watched what he was doing. Nick navigated to the football chat, then the settings, and moved his cursor to the 'exit chat' button.

"Wait, Nick, you don't have to do that."Blake put his hand on Nick's hand that held the mouse."If you're, like, doing it for me, you don't have to in any case. I don't care about them. It could actually be kinda funny, watching their morally deprived, braindead comments and lament a future in which these people probably become managers."

Nick couldn't even bring himself to smile at Blake's joke. "I am partially doing it for you," he replied. "But I do have to do this."

Nick turned back to the screen. If he left, that'd be it. He wouldn't ever go back, despite the guys undoubtedly questioning why he left in private chats. He could ignore all of those, or answer them only with what was the truth: I'm not returning to the football team when I go home, so I shouldn't be here.

"Nick..." Blake said.

"No, it's okay," Nick interrupted before Blake could say more. "It was a done deal already— the friendships and the football. Leaving is only making it official."

Strangely, Nick didn't feel any hesitation anymore. He felt nothing as he clicked the 'leave' button. After confirming, the chat vanished from his overview right away. Nick closed the laptop.

"I needed to let it go already," Nick said, looking over at Blake. "It was over when I took the plane. And it was definitely over when I kissed you. I can't date you and be friends with them. I knew that already."

Nick frowned. Finally, he felt himself getting a little worked up, but not for the reasons he'd expected. It wasn't about leaving— it was about why he hadn't left earlier. Nicks voice grew firmer as he went on. "I don't want to be friends with people like them. I don't even want to talk to them."

Blake was no longer smiling. But there was something even better, something warmer than the usual spark in his eyes. His hand was still resting on top of Nick's hand. And maybe for the first time ever, even if Blake said it wasn't necessary to leave, Nick felt like he had done something very right with Blake by deleting that chat.

It was confirmed when Blake kissed him next, with more intensity and passion than ever before. Nick couldn't tell whether it was because he had alleviated some of his own guilt, or because Blake changed. Either way, their kiss hit completely different. It was more comfortable and more exhilarating at the same time. Nick's pulse raced. Even if this wasn't their first kiss, this was the one that would stay ingrained in his memory forever.

Blake broke their kiss but stayed close. His fingers were tangled Nick's hair, and he tilted his head so their foreheads were lightly touching.

"Okay, like..." Blake paused, releasing a shuddering breath that fanned across Nick's face. "Don't take this as any sort of pressure because it's not, so take your time. But I'm totally ready whenever you are to take you to my bedroom."

Blake smiled, but from his half-lidded eyes, Nick could tell he was dead serious. It was suddenly one-thousand degrees in the apartment. Nick's face burned. His entire body burned. He'd wanted to say yes nights before but he'd chickened out.

He wouldn't make that mistake again, even if his stomach lurched with nerves. "I need to take a shower first," he stammered.

Blake let out a laugh. "Why, babe? I'm just going to make you sweat again anyway."

Nick floundered, stammering several half-complete and incoherent words, and Blake laughed some more. "I'm joking." He thought for a moment. "Well, not about the sweating part. Just don't take too long showering."

Blake untangled his fingers from Nick's hair, but his eyes were dark with lust and made a shiver travel down Nick's spine.

"Oh, fuck it," Nick muttered. He threw his arms around Blake and stood, lifting Blake off the ground. Blake yelped in surprise but didn't resist. He dug his fingers into Nick's shoulders in surprise, and quickly wrapped his legs around Nick's waist to support himself.

"Jesus, Nick," he breathed into Nick's ear. "You're always going from zero to one-hundred."

Blake was somehow a lot lighter than Nick had expected him to be, so the hoisting him up went a little more roughly than Nick had intended.

"I'm so—" he started apologising, but Blake cut him off with a kiss.

"No," he told Nick firmly, his face flushed and his lips swollen from making out. "None of that. Take me to my bedroom right now."