At the top of the stairs, Jared looked up into a large glass dome that showed the stars. No one could see this from downstairs. Adam tugged lightly on his hand and led him down a short set of steps and to the far side of the house, where a bedroom suite wrapped around the building.
“Is this your room?”
“Yeah.”
“Who was the architect for this place?” Jared asked, standing at the top of the stairs and looking into the forest through the bedroom windows. “It’s incredible.”
“My mother,” Adam said and finally let go of Jared’s hand. “She’s in Paris at the moment, working there. She’s great.”
Jared decided not to ask anything else, instead walking down into the room that had clearly been designed to be minimalist, and had then been taken over by a teenage boy.
The walls were the color of whipped cream, and the floors were natural wood, matching the furniture. A long, curved, steel desk had a Mac desktop on it, the wide screen dominating, and a laptop was on the unmade bed. One whole wall was taken up by windows that looked like they could be folded back, opening the room to the elements.
“There’s actually a balcony out there,” Adam said. “You just can’t see it from here. Bathroom’s down there. Let me show you out here.”
Jared followed Adam. He didn’t really have a reason to refuse.
What might have been a playroom for a younger child was now a game room, complete with a low black leather sofa and an enormous television. It all started to make more sense. The house was a little too shiny, too perfect to look lived in by a family. This was where Adam’s family existed, hidden away upstairs while the ground floor served as a beautiful, modern art showroom.
“This is awesome,” Jared said with a grin. “Do you play GTA?” Conquering Grand Theft Auto was one of his personal challenges for this school year.
“When I have time. Which isn’t as much as I’d like,” Adam admitted. “Even though my mom’s out of town, she sends tutors round most days.”
“Why do you have a tutor?”
“Because,” Adam said lightly, though Jared thought he could see something lurking under the cool exterior, “I’m going to Harvard. I need to keep my grades up.”
“Oh. So, you get left alone too,” Jared said without thinking.
“I suppose. Where are your folks?”
“My dad’s in New York. Mom’s in Michigan.”
“That where you grew up?” Adam crossed to the sofa and flopped on it, clearly inviting Jared to follow.
“Michigan? Yeah. I’ve been in Texas for the past year, then my dad wanted me to get decent grades too, so I got sent here.”
“Don’t worry, Clare filled me in on all the sordid details,” Adam said, throwing his leg over the arm of the sofa. “What I don’t get is, why here? If your dad is in New York and so are your sisters, wouldn’t it make more sense for you to go a school there?”
“To be honest, I didn’t ask,” Jared said, sitting down and trying to avoid looking at Adam’s crotch. And failing. There was a considerable bulge. “My options were either stay in Texas for another year or go to this random private school in Washington and live with my aunt. It was an easy choice.”
“I guess so. What was military school like?”
Jared rolled his eyes. “Don’t ask. Please.”
Adam laughed. “I’ve got this idea in my head that it’s all yes, sir, no, sir, then the slutty boys exchanging blowjobs behind the barracks at night.”
“I wish. It was really homophobic actually, which is probably not that surprising. My dad thought a year of ‘hard labor’ would somehow make me straight.”
“I’m not sure how that’s supposed to work….”
“No, me either.”
They were both quiet for a minute, watching the rain slip down the windows, then Adam stood up quickly.
“Do you want a drink?” he asked.
“Um, yeah. Sure. There’s a bottle of Jack downstairs that I left with Ryder. I don’t know if there’s anything left.”
Adam nodded. “Give me five.”
He walked over to a wall, and Jared watched, intrigued, as he pushed one of the wood panels, and it easily slid to one side. When Jared murmured “holy shit” under his breath, Adam shot him a cocky grin.
“Secret staircase down to the kitchen.”
“Your mom is seriously awesome.”
“The remote for the TV is over there,” Adam said, nodding to a table. “Help yourself. I won’t be long.”
He didn’t bother to slide the panel back into place, so after a few minutes Jared stood and dared to take a look. The staircase was narrow, but not uncomfortably so, with bluish lights fixed into the ceiling, lighting the passageway. He hadn’t seen a doorway in the kitchen, so he didn’t know where it came out, but it was cool. Really cool.
Jared turned the TV on and found a rolling-news channel that provided fairly decent background noise. If nothing else it could spur a conversation on current affairs.
When Adam returned via the main part of the house rather than his secret staircase, he had the half empty bottle of whiskey, a bottle of Pepsi, a packet of double-stuffed Oreos, and a ziplock bag Jared guessed had come from Chris. There were two joints tucked safely inside.
“Are you warm enough?” Adam said as he carefully set his stash on the coffee table. “I’m going to grab a sweater if you want one.”
“Oh,” Jared said, only then realizing he was rubbing his bare arms. “Yeah. Sure. If you don’t mind.”
“No worries.”
He returned a few minutes later with a Harbor Academy hoodie and a Seahawks sweatshirt, throwing the latter at Jared and keeping the former for himself. It took a few minutes for drinks to be poured. Then they leaned back with feet on the coffee table and a general feeling of wellbeing.
They watched the news for a while in companionable silence, then Jared reached for the weed.
“You mind if I light up?”
“Not at all. It’s your junk, dude.”
“Nice,” Jared said. “My liquor, my junk—”
“My house. My
