The Night that Changed Everything

My senior year at [university] was a very exciting year. The choir’s normal spring break tour was being replaced by a trip to Italy during Christmas break. During the fall semester we took several mini-tours over weekends to help raise money for our trip.

My favorite part of choir tours was staying at host family’s homes. Most of the time a family would take one or two choir members. But this one time…a family took six of us. Their house was amazing. I walked in behind Ravi. Christian was also grouped with us along with Gavin, Cameron, and the director’s son Mark. There were five bedrooms for the six of us. The host mother said that two of us would need to share a bed in the guest house. Ravi grabbed my arm and followed her to our quarters.

Christian was pissed. He stormed off in the other direction following the others. Cameron looked back too. Cam was gorgeous. I had a bit of a crush on him, and I think he knew. He had long curly locks of hair the brushed in front of the lightest blue eyes I have ever seen. He had a body that would make Adonis jealous. He often flaunted it while running around our neighborhood. Anyway, Cam looked back and gave me a little wink as Rav and I walked towards the guest house.

The guest quarters was a small house in the back yard….the main house wasn’t even in sight. The host mother told us that she would drop the others off first and come back to pick us up. As was the case at the end of most tour days, we were exhausted and it was late.

Without a doubt, that was the best night of my life. It didn’t take long at all before Ravi was on top of me engaging in the hottest make-out session ever. He never kissed me like that before, and never did again. Rav slid next to me and proceeded to remove my remaining articles of clothing. That night, in that bed, his hands played me. There were moments that I was rendered speechless. Breathing being our only communication. Shoulders, arms, legs, chest…nothing was left untouched. It still replays in my mind. I long for the feelings that I had that night. Likewise, I explored his body in ways that I never had. His small frame was surrounded by well defined muscles covered by smooth dark skin. I miss the way it felt. We both respected each other. Nothing too scandalous was done. However, it was obvious that we both wanted it, but we always stopped short. (so to speak)

That night, I believe I experienced the culmination of our cumulative feelings toward each other. That was the first night that I considered I was gay, and felt ok with it. I awoke in the morning to find Ravi in my arms with my hands interlaced with his. Both of us experiencing the normal gentleman's morning issue. ;)

Breakfast came too soon. The six of us gathered in the kitchen. Christian was of course acting in his normal passive aggressive manner. (Middle School Girl) Gavin was starting to figure things out, and Cam was beside himself with excitement. Cam was always supportive of my friendship with Ravi when no one else liked him.

So that was it. That best night of my life…

Et tu, Ravi?

I have always been a flirt. A huge flirt. On rare occasion my flirting gets me into trouble. This was the case one afternoon after my voice lesson. As I left the studio I noticed that Cali, a first year student, was taking a nap on the couch while waiting for her lesson to begin. Cali and I were friends, but we didn’t really spend much time together outside of the music department. I sat down next to her and started to play with her long blonde hair. She awakened with a smile. I mentioned something about going back to my room to take a nap, and before I knew it she was following me. I didn’t remember anything about a “group nap,” but I wasn’t entirely opposed to the idea either.

Ravi had a girlfriend (and me on the side), so why couldn’t I have a girlfriend. Cali was obviously interested, so after a few outings and social events we became the newest couple on campus. This particular coupling came as a surprise to many of my friends. Cali was, quite literally, not the kind of girl I would take home. She was a bit of a hussy. This didn’t bother me too much as I honestly had no intention of an emotional investment. The problem, however, was that I was not interested in a physical investment either.

We started doing things together with Ravi and his girlfriend of the week. Later that semester, Cali pledged the sorority that was attached to my fraternity. Convenient. This allowed us to spend a large amount of time together.
Even though we each had a significant other, Ravi and I would still occasionally get together. Just the two of us. Sometimes it was a movie, but more often it was just time spent together in one of our rooms just doing nothing.

Cali and I had planned to spend an evening “in town.” I couldn’t get a hold of her. I tried calling her room, but there was no answer. (This predated the prolific use of cell phones) As I was walking out to my car I noticed Cali pull into the parking lot. Ravi was with her and got out of the car before she pulled into the space. He walked directly towards me with his head down. Embracing me in a tight embrace he said, “You need to go spend time with your girlfriend.” As he let me go and turned toward his house, I noticed that his eyes were glassy with tears.

Perplexed, I got in Cali’s car. She pulled out of the lot and onto the interstate without saying a word. We had been dating for almost three months at this point. I never knew her to be this silent for this long. Finally she broke her silence and said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done what I did.”
She never told me what she did, but I knew. I asked her to take me back to school. She dropped me off at my house, and as soon as she rounded the corner I walked straight across the grassy lot to Ravi’s.

Curled up on the end of his bed, Ravi didn’t even look up as I walked into his room. I sat and stared at him.

“Why are you here?” he whispered. “You need to be with Cal.”

“No. You need to tell me what the hell is going on.” I didn’t move. I waited.

Ravi moved closer and laid across my lap.
“I slept with her, Josh. I slept with your girlfriend.”
I didn’t say anything. I took his hand into mine.