"Thad's got lacrosse training until six tonight which means my room will be free until six tonight," Nick said suggestively to Jeff during the last few moments of their last class of the day.

"We're going to have to most of that then, aren't we?" he grinned. "I'll be there in ten."

The bell rang and Jeff put his books from the day in his room before walking as fast as he could without running to Nick's room.

Jeff barely had the door closed before Nick was pressed up against him, lips mashed against his own as he was pushed back into the door.

"I've been wanting to this all day," Nick said, moving his lips down his boyfriend's neck.

"Bed," Jeff said, not trusting himself to say anything more without moaning from his boyfriend's amazing mouth. He shoved Nick slightly and they found the bed, breaking contact as little as possible and shedding their blazers.

Nick's lips found Jeff's again as they sat on Nick's bed, the blonde pushing his boyfriend into the wall slightly. Nick's hands roamed across his boyfriend's back and Jeff trailed his hands along Nick's waist.

Nick sucked at the pulse point on his boyfriend's neck and the blonde arched his neck, panting in pleasure. Nick's hands untucked Jeff's shirt and began undoing the buttons. Jeff kissed down his boyfriend's face while he worked, making Nick smile.

The last of Jeff's buttons were undone, but Nick was too impatient to undo his own. He pulled his own uniform shirt over his head and began to slide his boyfriend's off his shoulders.

"Stop," Jeff shook his head, avoiding eye contact with the other boy.

"Too fast?" Nick asked.

"No, just… sorry, I should go," Jeff said quietly, standing up and pulling his blazer back on, hastily doing up the buttons in his shirt. "You did nothing wrong," he added, answering Nick's unspoken question.

"Come back later?" Nick offered, walking over to his boyfriend.

"Probably not," Jeff shook his head, opening the door.

Nick frowned but accepted Jeff's fleeting kiss goodbye. He sighed, leaning on the doorjamb, and watching his boyfriend disappear down the hallway.

"Put a shirt on, dude," David said as he walked past.

OoOoOoO

Nick distracted himself for a while with homework and going over some sheet music, but after a while nothing could stop his thoughts from trailing back to Jeff. Things had been going swimmingly between them, but the second he went to take his shirt off, it was like a switch flipped off and he became so closed off. He could have brushed it off as not being ready to make out shirtless – which would be completely understandable – but it seemed like something else.

Nick made it nearly two hours before he found himself in front of Jeff and Trent's door. He knocked and Trent called out for him to come in.

"He's in the bathroom," Trent told him. "He seemed kind of upset, did you two get into a fight or something?"

"No, he just went kind of weird before," Nick said, frowning concernedly.

"Do I want to know what you were doing?"

"We were just making out and I went to take his shirt off–"

"Oh," Trent nodded, comprehending more than Nick did.

"What?"

"Uh…" Trent looked shiftily around the room, trying to find a distraction from Nick's curiosity.

Nick chewed in his bottom lip, debating between finding out what Trent meant and barging in to the bathroom to bathroom to speak to Jeff directly. The need to see his boyfriend won over, Nick knocked on the bathroom adjoining the dorm room before opening it and stepping inside.

It took a few moments to comprehend the sight in front of him when he went into the bathroom. Jeff was sitting on the lid of the toilet, his shirt on the floor by the door. His face was red and tear-tracked but he didn't seem to be crying anymore. The sight that caught Nick's eyes before all of that was Jeff's left arm. Horizontal scars ran up and down his forearm in varying degrees of fadedness – some looked months or years old, some weeks and days, and there were a few still bleeding.

Jeff looked up when Nick walked in, his big, wet eyes full of fear and panic. Nick took slow steps towards his boyfriend and bent down to wrap his arms around Jeff's shirtless body.

"I'm sorry," Jeff said quietly.

"You have nothing to be sorry about," Nick shook his head, releasing his boyfriend and leaning against the sink.

"I was going to tell you eventually," Jeff admitted. "I don't know when, but I was going to."

Nick nodded, unsure what to say next. "Sorry for barging in, I should have–"

"No, don't be," Jeff cut his apology off. "I'm sort of glad you did. The guilt of keeping it from you would have eaten me alive, especially after tonight."

"Have you told anyone else?"

Jeff shook his head. "Trent knows, but he sort of saw it rather than me actually telling him, and he's the only one that knows."

"Come here," Nick held out his hand. Jeff took it, standing up and allowing himself to be enveloped in his boyfriend's arms.

"You don't hate me for it?" Jeff asked timidly, his chin resting on Nick's shoulder.

"Of course not," Nick leant his head against his boyfriend's. "I don't really understand it, but I could never hate you."

"Really?"

"Of course." Nick stepped back slightly, his right arm trailing down the outside of Jeff's left, holding his hand and bringing the scarred forearm to his lips. "I love you." It was the first time he had said those words to his boyfriend, but he meant them. He gently kissed some of the scars on Jeff's forearm. "And nothing's going to change that."

Jeff was crying again, but these seemed to be a different kind of tears than before.

"Do you want to go back into your room and talk?" Nick asked gently. "Not that I'm not enjoying your bathroom, but maybe we could kick Trent out?"

"Sure," Jeff chuckled.

Trent wasn't in the room when they went back, most likely giving the pair the space they needed. They sat down opposite each other on Jeff's bed, Nick still holding Jeff's left hand.

"Do you mind if I ask you about why…"

"About why I started cutting?" Jeff finished for him. "I started a few months before I came to Dalton. I was just miserable all the time, school sucked and everyone hated the gay kid." Nick squeezed his hand comfortingly, having gone through a similar experience before finding sanctuary at Dalton. "I never quite got it when other people talked about it, but one day the blade was just there and I tried it and it felt… not good exactly, but almost exhilarating. It's kind of hard to describe, but it was a distraction and it seemed to help so I kept doing it. I sort of stopped once I came here, but every now and then something will push me over the edge."

"Is your arm the only place you–"

"No," Jeff shook his head. "On my legs too, but not as much."

"Next time something happens and you feel like you want to hurt yourself again, please talk to me?" Nick requested. "I don't care where I am or what time it is, I want you to tell me and I'll do everything I can to make you feel better."

Jeff nodded, shifting over on the bed to lean his head against Nick's shoulder again.

"I love you, too," Jeff said.