Page 48 of Tutor With Benefits

“Right,” I say. “I’ve been thinking the same thing lately. Like, it’s been really nice having the girlfriend aspect of being with Tori, without having to deal with a lot of the boyfriend duties that have gone into things in the past. But then, I feel like the more I try to open my mind and go out and find another girl, the more I just want Tori.”

“Same,” Zach says.

“Glad I’m not the only one,” Cory chimes in. “I know we’ve all said before that we like the way this is going, but guys, I really hate to think of her going out with Johnny and the whole thing we’ve got going on coming to an end.”

“Right?” I agree. “It’s like I almost want to tell Johnny to back off and leave our girl alone.”

“I was hoping I didn’t sound psycho for feeling the same way.” Zach laughs.

But his laugh is hollow. For as much as we’re joking and laughing at each other, the bottom line is the same. We don’t want this situation to come to an end, and we can feel it happening. Tori has been very clear about what she wants from the beginning, and the whole reason we went into this situation was to make sure she got Johnny’s attention.

“I guess we should be proud of ourselves,” I say, trying to lighten the situation.

“Pretty sure I feel the opposite of proud of myself,” Zach says. “I meant to go into this with just the intent of having fun and having sex. I really didn’t think there was a chance to catch any sort of feelings with this girl.”

“If I knew I was going to fall for her, I would have stuck to my guns and insisted there was a better way to do things than for us to trade tutoring sessions,” Cory says.

“Well yeah,” I agree. “I mean, same. It’s not like any of us wanted to catch feels and have to deal with losing her per se after the fact. But I mean, we should be proud of ourselves for how fast we were able to pull this off. It’s just been a matter of a few weeks, and we have transformed our wallflower into one of the hottest girls in school. If notthehottest girl in school.”

“I’d say she’s the hottest,” Zach says. “And that’s why I can’t find another one to spend time on. I mean, that’s all I can figure. And it sucks. It’s not like I have to be with the hottest girl in school all the time, but you know how it is.”

“When the hottest girl in school is your own creation, it’s impossible to act like it’s no big deal to watch her go to someone else,” I say. “It’s not like we realized exactly who or what we were working with when we set out on this little endeavor.”

“I think that’s a massive part of the burn I’m feeling,” Cory says. “It’s not that I’m upset about her going off with this guy when he’s the whole reason she agreed to doing this with us. It’s more like I had no idea the kind of girl we were dealing with when we got started.”

“Pretty sure that’s where all of us are,” Zach chimes in. “I didn’t know how hot she really is, but I can tell you that I wasn’t expecting to make her the hottest girl in the school, state, country, whatever, then just turn around and let someone else have her. Like, I was pretty sure we were going to wind up with a nerd who was decent by the time we were done, but decent at best. Who the fuck knew she was going to turn into a swan at the end?”

“If I had, you can bet your ass I would have convinced her there was a way better guy out there for her than Johnny, and that’s me,” I say.

“And me.”

“And me.”

Both Zach and Cory add their own affirmations, and we skate our way over to the benches. The B team is once again going to take over the rink for their own round, and we’re roped into sticking around long enough to watch them. I’ve learned it’s pointless to try to get out of this part of the training, and I’m okay with that today.

I realize that the tension in my chest is because I’m feeling really frustrated about the situation with Tori. Bottom line is I don’t want to give up what we have with her.

And I don’t know what to do about that. I don’t know how to express that to her without coming off as being clingy or like we’re the ones who went back on what we said.

“You know what really gets me about it?” Zach asks as we all sit down on the bench.

“What?” I ask.

“Last night,” he says.

“What about it?” Cory asks.

“The fact that we had her come over to our place again, and we got pizza and we watched that movie together before we had sex. Of course, the night ended with some pretty bomb sex, but you know, it was far more than just having sex. It was like we were all hanging out in a real relationship with her and, well, sex wasn’t the priority,” Zach says.

“We acted like it was for the sake of having her come over for practice,” I say. “But I’m right there with you. Don’t get me wrong. I love the fact that we had sex and I really plan on doing it again with her at least once more before she goes riding off into the sunset with Johnny. But like, there’s a big part of me that would have been just fine with not having sex last night. I wouldn’t have felt like she was taking up our time or anything. It’s weird.”

“Fuck,” Cory says.

“What?”

We both look at him with raised eyebrows.

“You just said you want to have sex with her one more time before she goes riding off into the sunset with Johnny,” Cory says.