Controller

I can't do it. I can't keep chasing Jamie. After hearing he and Michael that night I've avoided him. What could I do? Obviously a relationship is never going to work out for us. My mid-term grades sucked, I'd been so busy feeling sorry for myself that I didn't study. Now, I had to kick it in the butt to get my grades up.

Then there was Eli. How in the hell am I going to handle Eli. The kiss was sweet, but then the stuff happened with Jamie and Michael. I don't want to hurt him. I really like Eli. He's a great friend. The kiss, I can still feel his touch, and sweet kiss. The warm feeling it created lasted for awhile. It wasn't fair to string Eli along.

Looks like I'm going to go through college celibate.

I sat back from my desk and looked at my room. This is a pit. First thing, clean this shit up. With a goal I dragged myself up, and started. First the clothes were gathered and tossed into the laundry basket. Once the first layer of crap was gone, my energy returned.

The odds and ends of junk mail, newspapers and other debris were tossed. Cleaning had a cathartic effect on me, my mood was lightened. Vacuum, I needed to vacuum the carpet.

Without thinking it through, I was knocking at Eli's apartment door. He opened the door and his face froze in a neutral mask.

"Hey Nate. What's up?"

"Yeah. Hey, Eli. I'm cleaning my room. Can I borrow your vacuum?"

Eli cocked an eyebrow and a tiny smirk formed on his lips. "I guess." He paused for a few minutes then his eyes twinkled. "If you'll clean my room too."

I studied his room for a second. There wasn't much to clean. Playing along with Eli's teasing might help our friendship. I'd almost avoided Eli as much as I had Jamie. Eli hadn't done anything wrong and I'd acted like a jerk.

I grinned at Eli, then my mouth got me in trouble again. "Sure! And when I finish, you can take me out to eat."

Crap. Now I'd stepped in it. We stood in silence. Eli's gaze met mine until my gaze slid to the floor. The time had stretched out endlessly when Eli spoke. "Okay. I can do that. Pizza. My treat."

I lifted my stare back to Eli, surprised to find a grin.

Eli continued, "Of course, that means you clean the bathroom, too."

I'd been played, and Eli damn well knew it. I scowled at him and crossed my arms over my chest. "I call bullshit. It's not even your bathroom."

"Sure it is. I just share it with Ryan. So technically it's my bathroom."

"Why do I feel like I've been had?"

Eli lifted his hands and shrugged. "You can say no. There is always the option to say no to a proposal."

My lip twitched, and Eli mimicked me. A moment passed, and he made his eyebrows dance across his forehead. Damn it, Eli. I'm trying to be serious.

He stuck his tongue out at me, and curled it.

A snicker slipped out before I snapped my frown back in place.

Eli put his thumbs in his ears, stuck out his tongue and gave me a razzberry.

"Damn it, Eli!"

"Damn it, Nate!"

I couldn't hold out any longer, I started laughing. Once I had my laughter back under control, I answered him. "Okay. Fine! I'll clean for you."

#

I settled into the seat, enjoying the aroma of fresh baked bread and oregano. I'd been here before. Eli might have even known it was a favorite of mine. It was a stereotypical college pizza place. The decor dated back to the 60's when it was built. The same family had owned the place since then, probably why the food tasted so good.

Eli sat down opposite me in the booth, cleaning his hands with the paper towel. He glanced up and frowned. "What?"

"I was just wondering if you hit the toilet in there. Cause from the pee on the floor of your bathroom, you never hit the toilet."

Eli chuckled and tossed the rumbled paper towel onto the table. "Not me. That's Ryan. He can't aim worth shit."

"Nasty. Both of you. Just freakin' nasty."

Eli chuckled again and all conversation about dorm bathrooms stopped when the waiter took our order. The relaxed conversation helped our connection begin to reform. In what felt like moments, the pizza arrived and we were devouring it like hungry beasts.

Both of us had almost finished our second piece when we heard. "Brian. Brian! Oh, God! He's choking!

A young kid was holding his throat, his face crimson. My mind struggled to encompass the emergency. I turned back to Eli, and realized he was gone.

"Hold still. Quit fighting me!"

My focus spun back to the emergency and found Eli. He had his arms locked around the kid, who was starting to sag. Eli yanked his hands into the boy's stomach. The boy flopped like a rag doll. No response. The result didn't change the second or third time. With a huge tug, Eli tried again while the entire restaurant held their breath. This time the child coughed and the piece choking him came free.

A crush of people descended on Eli and the kid. Eli returned to our booth after much back slapping and congratulations. He sat down, his face red and his eyes dancing.

"That was freaking amazing. I didn't know what to do," I said.

Eli grinned at me. "Boy scouts. I did pretty well on the life saving stuff."

"Well, you were phenomenal. Good work with the scouts."

Eli gave me a bright smile, which dimmed. "Yeah. Scouts. They were great until I came out, and they threw me out."

#

"Hey, knock it off!"

I slowed my pace down the sidewalk, peering across the darkening campus. That voice sounded familiar. I was already late for class, but I knew it was so familiar. I turned slowly, trying to hear it again.

Nothing.

Shit.

I closed my eyes, hoping it would help me locate the person. The sound of unsteady footsteps came my way. I eased closer and was almost hosed as some guy puked just in front of me. He hung onto a tree and barfed two or three times. I hate the smell of vomit. It makes me gag and then I'm puking too. It's not good.

As the guy stood upright, he wiped his mouth along his arm. The strands of spit coated his sleeve and glistened in the growing moonlight. Gross.

"Dude, you okay?"

He looked at me, silent, then he muttered something I couldn't understand.

"What?"

"I said the bitch dumped me. During class. She texted me."

"Hey, man. I'm sorry to hear about it—"

The voice echoed out again. "Asshole! Stay the fuck away from me!" This time I recognized the voice. It was Eli. Damn it, can things get any worse?

"Sorry, that's my friend. It sounds like he needs help." I hated to leave the guy. He was only standing up with the help of the tree.

"Hey! Give me that back!"

Definitely Eli.

I spun and ran in the direction I'd heard Eli. I found myself in one of those weird unusable spaces that happen at universities when they add on to buildings they already have.

Without thinking, I ran into the dark space, and almost face planted against a brick wall on two legs. It only took a second to see that three guys had Eli cornered. His fists were up, and a look of determination on his face. He might have been half the size of the smallest of the three cornering him, but he wasn't giving up. Damn. Brave guy.

"Hey, Eli. Need some help with these assholes?" I hoped the bravado would surprise the thugs enough for us to escape.

The next thing I knew, I was setting on the concrete rubbing my jaw. I'd been wrong. I managed to scramble out of the way of the boot coming at me and got to my feet in time to see Eli land a beautiful front snap kick. He got only a grunt in response.

They're going to find our bodies in the morning!

I punched the mobile wall, and my fist disappeared into his ample paunch, with no effect. The fight intensified. Eli and I held them off for a few minutes, before we were pressed into the corner. Suddenly the guy I was fighting groaned and dropped to his knees. Someone was standing behind him, apparently on our side.

Our rescuer jumped on one of other two and quickly had him on the ground, pummeling him. Eli and I worked in concert on the last guy, which actually didn't last long. Once the odds weren't wildly in his favor, he deserted the other two.

We turned back to the mobile mountain, to find that he'd left too. Our savior was standing over the third guy, who lay on the ground moaning. In silent agreement, we moved away from the dark corner where the fight began to the well lit pathway. As we moved under one of the campus lights, I saw my puking buddy staggering toward us. I guess I'll baby sit him home.

I turned back to thank the guy who'd saved our asses, and was struck speechless.

Michael?

#

I slogged across campus, on my way to beg for a better grade. My thoughts weren't on my destination, they were on Michael. Stumbling for words, I'd blurted out 'Why'd you help us?' He's usually such a jerk, and I never have been able to get over what he did to Jamie. He'd blown off the question of why he helped with a shrug and left Eli and I staring at his back as he walked away. I still hadn't been able to get anything from him. I'd asked Jamie, but he replied with a smile and shrug.

By the time I'd ran through Michael being the odd hero. I realized I was standing at Dr. Davidson's door, exactly where I didn't want to be.

I did not want to talk to this professor. I'd tried in the past. I had. But for some reason he made my skin crawl. He was friendly, very friendly. But he always seemed to be touching everyone. He'd squeezed my shoulder once, I felt like I needed to wash with a scrubbing pad to get his touch off me.

But now, I was failing his class. The only choice I have is to go talk to him. I hoped he would let me do something to raise my grade. What was the worst thing he could do to me? I'm already failing, you can't do worse than flunk. I'd screwed around and now the deadline had passed to drop the class.

I stood outside the professor's office and remembered another weird thing. None of the other people shut their doors during their office hours, but Davidson did. The whole thing just creeped me out.

I reached up to knock softly on the door.

"Hang on. Give me a minute."

Shuffling, clicking and a couple of chimes came through the door. It took him a solid minute or two to finally open the door. What the hell?

The door opened a large crack, and an eye glared through at me from the dim room. "Yes? What do you need?"

"I'm Nathan Jensen. I'm in your beginning chemistry class. I had some problems with the midterm and came to talk to you."

Another awkward pause, then the door opened further. Davidson held it and motioned me inside. My eyes adjusted to the gloom as he made his way back to the desk and sat down. His eyes were partially lit from the computer screen as he typed in a few bursts. I used his diverted attention as an opportunity to look around the room.

Nothing unusual. Pictures of a woman and smiling kids, probably his family. A couple of bookshelves filled to bursting. The odd certificate or award on the wall. Nothing to trigger the level of unease knotting my stomach. His desk was clean, none of the usual piles of ungraded papers, mail and other debris faculty allowed to accumulate. Not on his. All he had was a large calendar with items printed over in tiny handwriting dominated his desk, a pencil holder perfectly filled with what I was sure were needle sharp pencils, and another photo of the typical American family.

"Yes, I can see we do need to talk."

I snapped back to the present, and the little smirk of a smile he was wearing now. His fingers steepled in front of him as he studied me. This time his stare really was creeping me out. Finally his eyes met mine. "So, Mr. Jensen. It's going to be very difficult for you to pass this course. What were you looking to accomplish in speaking with me?"

My mouth went dry. What did I want?

"Extra credit." I squeaked out.

The smirk on his face grew, and then his eyes definitely raked up and down my body, pausing at my crotch for several moments. A cold chill went through me, my cock shriveled like a raisin at the thought of him touching me again. This time his eyes never met mine, they just evaluated me like I was a piece of meat.

"What, exactly, were you hoping to do for 'extra credit'?" he asked. The emphasis he put on the words 'extra credit' made the direction of the conversation obvious.

I stumbled to propose something. Anything other than what was becoming obvious he wanted. "A paper maybe? Yeah, an extra credit paper. I could write you a paper, ten pages? Or even fifteen?" A plan. I was relieved to have come up with something.

I watched as he stood, walked to my side of the desk and leaned back against it. The smirk never left his face as he moved far too close. His crotch was directly across from me and panic rushed through my system. Oh my God, he's propositioning me!

Without breaking eye contact, he slid his hand up his leg and grabbed his crotch and started groping himself. We sat in silence for several minutes his he played with an obviously hardening cock. He stroked it through his loose cords when he spoke again. "Do you have any other ways that you can think of to earn extra credit, Mr. Jensen?"

Panic flared through my whole body. I just wanted out of his office, screw the grade. This guy wanted to trade sex. Holy shit, I can't believe this is happening to me.

I grabbed my backpack and lurched from the chair, almost touching his leg as I fled. I tried to move as if a sexual predator hadn't trapped me. I opened the door, paused for a second and managed to rattle off, "Thanks for your time. I'll think about what I could do."

With that I left, mortified and terrified. What had I gotten myself into?

#

Eli's anger was plain as he paced the room at a furious speed. "He actually was playing with himself? What the hell! He's a sick bastard."

"Shh, I don't want anyone else to know what happened. He'll flunk me for sure."

Eli froze, his eyebrows curving to a V-shape in the middle of his forehead. "Flunk you? You're worried about him flunking you?"

I couldn't believe how angry Eli was. I didn't know what I felt. It had been so nasty, but it had turned me on a little too, which made me sick to my stomach. I had to pass this class, and Davidson had been clear what I needed to do for a passing grade.

"We have to report this. He's probably doing this to other students. That's just sick, man."

I grabbed Eli's arm as he swung by again and pulled him to a stop. "Eli, I can't. He'll flunk me. I can't fail this class. It's too late to drop it without a grade too."

Eli took a deep breath and made a visible effort to calm himself. "We can't let him get away with this, Nate. Surely there's something you can do without giving him the power over you." He stood quietly as he obviously considered his options. With a nod of his head he looked at me. "I know one of the councilors on campus. She'll know what to do, and keep you from taking the blame."

I barely had time to grab my jacket before we shot out the door. Campus flew past as Eli pulled me to whatever destination was obviously strongly imprinted in his mind. We took shortcuts through buildings I didn't even know existed. Shortly we were racing toward a formal looking four-story building that practically screamed administration.

We sped down the marble floored hallway flanked on either side by darkly somber wood panels. I dug in my heels and pulled Eli to a stop.

"Eli, where are we going? I don't want to cause a big uproar."

Eli nodded his head firmly. "Yes, you do. No one should be able to do what Davidson did to you. It's, it's, well, it's abuse. Just talk to Heather. I swear she won't put you in any kind of bind."

I was completely rattled now. I'd been upset about the whole thing. That's why I'd told him in the first place. But now, now it was getting out of control. I wasn't sure about this. When I looked at Eli, all I saw was fierce determination. "Okay, I'll talk to this person. But please don't pressure me to do something I don't want to do."

Eli frowned at me for several moments and then sighed. "You're right. I shouldn't pressure you." He shot me a small smile. "But since we're already here..."

I threw up my hands and laughed. "Okay, okay. I give. I'll talk to her."

The next thing I knew the Eli Express had taken flight again. But only a few turns and twists later we were in a set of offices that were the exact opposite of the formal hallways marching in regiment through the rest of the building. While Eli blurted out something to the student at the desk I looked around the room. There were posters, photographs and images of smiling students. The thing that was immediately obvious, this wasn't the typical white bread mix of students. Some photos were only of people of color, every race on campus was represented.

It finally dawned on me. Eli had taken me to the campus diversity office. Shit! This is exactly what I didn't need.

"Hi, Nate. Glad to meet you."

I looked up to see a tall dark haired woman smiling at me and holding out her hand. Her alto voice was very comforting. I shook her hand without a word.

"Eli says we need to talk. Let's go to my office."

We followed her down an interior hallway to a bright spacious office proclaiming Heather as the director of LGBT Services for campus. She motioned us to a small round table as she settled into one of the chairs and gave me her focus. "So, what happened? Eli didn't go into detail."

I scowled at Eli, who looked completely un-repentant. After gathering my thoughts, I turned back to her. "I suppose so. But like I've told Eli a dozen times now, I don't want to cause trouble. I have to pass this class."

Heather moved slowly and sat her pen down beside the pad of paper. Her face had shifted in that instant to deadly serious. "We will protect your privacy, Nate. But why don't you tell me what happened."

I glowered at Eli and turned back to her. "It's really embarrassing. And what if I misunderstood. It's his word against mine."

Heather took a deep breath, laid her hand on my and squeezed. "Why don't you tell me everything and I'll decide. Don't be embarrassed to tell me anything."

I sat for a minute and considered. I still wasn't sure, and with more time I was less certain what really had happened. Steeling myself to an unpleasant task, I began telling Heather about his encounter with Dr. Davidson. Neither she nor Eli said a word as I went through the entire episode again. When I finished, Heather's face had the same look of anger as Eli's had.

She stood and moved to a filing cabinet and flipped through folders for a moment and pulled out a particularly thick one that she spread out on her desk. "Dr. Lynn Davidson, Chemistry department, right?"

I nodded, wondering where this was going. "Yeah, that's the one."

Heather sat for quite some time and looked at me until I was squirming under her gaze. "Nate, I need your help..."

#

I resisted the urge to tug at the microphone strapped to my chest. This whole thing felt like a scene out of a Bond movie, but by now I'd been prompted by Heather and the campus police until I was sick of it. I'd talked to Eli non-stop about what I was expected to do. My gut still clenched at what we were trying to pull off. Eli wanted to come with me, but the cops wouldn't let him. Not a huge surprise.

Heather. I blame Heather for getting me all mixed up in this. Her and her damn folder. Tons of people who'd had problems with Davidson, but they didn't have enough evidence to charge him. I made the mistake of not walking out when she explained her scheme. In the end, the set up required people from all over campus. The help from the cops made me even more nervous, but everyone assured me, regardless of the outcome, my academic career wouldn't be hurt.

I took a deep breath and stared at Davidson's door. This was it. I braced myself and knocked. Again shuffling and odd noises seeped through the door for a few moments before opening. Our eyes met, and Davidson broke into a nasty smile.