“Excuse me?” I said, with mock horror. “You think I don’t always live in a state of perfect cleanliness?”
“I remember our dorm rooms, Hunter,” he said. “I admit, no, I do not think you live in a state of perfect cleanliness. I once found a pair of your boxers inside the minifridge.”
“Okay, that was a one-time thing, and I can’t fucking believe you still remember that.”
“Remember it? I tell people about it all the time,” he said.
I furrowed my brow at him.
“Kidding. I can joke around sometimes too, you know,” he said.
“I will remind you that the underwear were clean, I had been drunk when I accidentally placed them in there, and it was not a part of some sex thing. Cold balls aren’t really a turn-on for me.”
“Of course, of course,” he said. “But still. Your place looks great. I mean it.”
I nodded. “Before Caleb lived here, the coffee table always used to be approximately one-hundred percent old cups, stacks of mail, receipts, pizza boxes, you name it. But that isn’t really something my brother can tolerate.”
“He’s got a strong personality,” Gavin said.
I thought of the last time Caleb and Gavin had interacted—Caleb had truly been mean two nights ago, even if he’d been right.
“I know he does,” I said. “But he loves you.”
Gavin nodded, his eyes downcast for a moment.
“So. Anyway. Goals,” I said emphatically. “Are those good goals? Exercise, eat right, yadda yadda?” I asked.
“The water one is especially good,” Gavin said with a nod. “People never realize how important it is. But you also have to make the goals totally your own. Just because those are common ones doesn’t mean you have to choose those.”
“Alright… make the goals my own. Got it,” I said. I was trying hard to take this seriously, to stay on task, to think about anything other than Gavin’s proximity to me. I loved having him sitting near me, but I also remembered all too well how weird things had felt the other night.
This was better. When we had things to do together that weren’t talking about the bridge project, when we had drinks that were essentially the polar opposite of gin and tonics.
Tea and self-improvement were safe. Alcohol and kisses just led to strange desires and nothing good.
I opened my notebook, flipping past the first few pages.
Gavin glanced over. “Were you drawing?” he asked, seeing the little sketches.
“Not really,” I said, flipping back. “Just doodled pictures of Meatball in between grading lab reports at some point. Students like it when I doodle dogs on their work instead of giving them Fs, but parents don’t take too kindly to it, so I try to keep it to a separate notebook.”
“Remember when you drew on my chemistry homework and Ms. Martinez complimented it?”
“I remember it well,” I said. “She said you had ‘a real talent.’ I guess she really must have liked little drawings of armadillos.”
“God, your armadillo phase,” he said.
“They’re an amazing animal!” I said. “Maybe that should be one of my goals, actually. Draw more armadillos as an adult.”
He puffed out a laugh.
“Alright. So. ...Goals. I don’t know where to start. Maybe my first goal should be to learn how to write goals.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” he said. “I do have a few tips. Specificity is so important when setting goals. Instead of ‘drink more water,’ for example, ‘drink five glasses of water a day’ is much more specific and a metric you can track.”
“Ugh, don’t say the word metric, I hear it way too much at work,” I said.
“Are you kidding? I love metrics,” Gavin said, sinking back into the couch, a smile on his face. “I have Excel spreadsheets for all sorts of things.”
“Yeah, but you’re a goddamn CEO. Of course you do.”
“I have one for everything, though. For tracking how quick all my runs are, for keeping a yearly tab on my goals, all of it. I make charts.”
“Gavin, no,” I said, laughing and shoving him away.
“I’m going to turn you into a goal-setter, just you wait,” he said. “It’ll change your life.”
“Cool. Here we go, goal one: take all of Gavin’s underwear and stick them in the fridge overnight.”
“You will do no such thing,” he said.
I took a deep breath, looking at the blank page in front of me. “Okay… um… I’ve always wanted to try brewing my own beer at home, I guess,” I said.
“That is perfect,” he said, turning toward me, leaning his head on his fist. “So how can you make that more specific? What would the first step be?”
“Ordering the brewing kit supplies,” I said.
“You’re rockin’ it, Hunt,” he said.
“You’re talking to me like I’m a member of your team or something,” I lamented.
He shook his head slowly, keeping his gaze on me. “I’m just talking to you like I care about you,” he said.
I hoped he couldn’t see the heat that rose on my cheeks. I looked down at my notebook, scribbling down the goal.
“What’s your first goal?” I asked him.
“I think my first one for today is to work on shaving some more time off my mile,” he said, writing quickly and neatly in his leather notebook.
“What is it now, like, seven minutes?”
“A little under six,” he said.
“Christ.”
He shrugged. “When I first started goal-setting so many years ago, my exercise ones were more like ‘run ten minutes without stopping to heave on the side of the road.’ These things take time.”
“That’s fair,” I said. I chewed on the end of my pen, mulling over what my next one should be. I started scribbling on the page while Gavin looked on.
“That’s one I’ve needed to work on for… oh, my whole life,” I said.
“Take dating more seriously,” Gavin said, reading the words on my page. He nodded. “Sure. Got to be more specific, though.”
“I knew you were going to say that. I don’t know how to make my dating life better, though. If I knew that, then this wouldn’t be a goal, it would be something I’d already done.”
Gavin watched me for a moment. “Well, firstly, what do you mean by that? What does ‘more seriously’ mean to you?”
I shrugged, trying to think of an answer but coming up short. “I guess… just… stop fucking around with hookups so much, and try to find someone who will actually be my person.”
“Your person?”
I nodded, turning a little toward him on the couch. “Y’know, like, my rock. My home. Not just someone who fucks me hard and then I never want to talk to again. There’s already too much of that in my life.”
Gavin’s expression was completely blank, like he was purposely trying not to react to my words. “What steps are you going to take to achieve this goal?”
I pushed him lightly on the shoulder. “Stop being the goal robot and be my friend. What steps do you think I should take?”
Gavin sighed, shaking his head with an animated shrug. “Join a dating app? I don’t know.”
“I’ve tried that before and it didn’t really work,” I said. “You try dating on an island this small. My pool of gay men is really running out.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Damn. I wish I had a pool of gay men.”
I snorted and he finally cracked a smile.
“Maybe one goal is enough for you tonight, since you’re just starting out,” Gavin said. He lifted his notebook, writing a few more things down before slipping his notebook away again.
“You’re not going to tell me what your last ones were?” I asked.
He shook his head, his eyes dark. “You wouldn’t want to hear about them.”
Oh. Bridge stuff. Of course.
I could tell that Gavin was closing off again, that the comfort of the evening was wearing off as soon as he started t
hinking about the real reasons he was on the island.
But I didn’t like that. I didn’t want that. I kept finding myself wishing Gavin and I could forget about the project, forget about allegiances and who we had become as adults, and just enjoy each other’s company. It was so easy when we found ourselves forgetting about the rest of the world. We became completely in rhythm, clicking into place together.
That was gone now.
And part of me felt like I had to clear the air between us before we could move on. Before we could truly be Hunter and Pepper again, reach a place where I knew we both wanted to be.
“Listen,” I said suddenly, breaking the short silence that had filled the air. His eyes flitted toward mine.
“What’s up, Hunt?”
I bit my lower lip. “I’m… sorry for kissing you the other night.”
The look of shock on Gavin’s face was momentary, but I was watching him so close that I caught it from a mile away.
“What?” he asked.
“Oh please, you’re not going to act like you don’t remember—what I did when I was drunk? I kissed you, Gav—”
“I remember,” he said quickly. “Trust me.”
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I know it was out of line, and insane, and I honestly hadn’t had that much to drink in… well okay, I had that much to drink the night before, but that’s not my point—”
“It’s fine,” he said, his voice brisk. He waved a hand like he was telling a cashier he didn’t want a receipt.
“Is it, though?” I asked. “I feel bad that I acted out like that.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “It was… enjoyable. I was drunk, too.”
“You sound like a robot again,” I said, lifting an eyebrow. “You don’t have to pretend it was enjoyable. I’m not going to do it again.”
He swallowed. “I’m not pretending,” he said. “It was enjoyable, and I wasn’t… upset by it. Surprised, God yes, but I understand. It was a one-time, drunken mistake. I didn’t expect you to do it again.”
I let out a long breath. “You sure?”
“Completely.”
I didn’t know how to feel about Gavin casting off the kiss as just a “mistake.” Theoretically, I should have felt the same way—it was a mistake, and I never wanted to ruin our friendship by kissing him when I shouldn’t have been. But a part of me hated that the door was closed on the subject now. Saying it was a mistake and having him agree meant that it wouldn’t happen again.
And I was surprised at how sad the idea of that seemed at the moment.
“Oh, thank God,” I said. “I felt so bad. I was ready to declare myself the worst friend of all time. Win a Guinness Record for it. Have my picture in the dictionary next to ‘bad friend.’”
“I don’t think that’s quite how the dictionary works,” Gavin said, smiling politely.
“It sure as hell isn’t,” I said. “That’s how fucked up my mind was. I will say, though—now that we’re cool—you’re a damn good kisser, dude.”
Gavin’s cheeks flushed a bright pink.
“Aww, come on,” I said, grinning at him. “You’re my best friend. I can tell you you’re a good kisser. God damn, you must make a lot of guys happy.”
“Not that many,” he said with a quick shake of his head.
“Well, you made me happy,” I said sinking back on the couch.
I had no idea how to interpret Gavin’s expression. He’d been relaxed just a few moments ago, but now…
Now he was a deer in the headlights again, staring at me like he’d forgotten how to speak.
8
Gavin
Stop thinking about when Hunter kissed me.
That had been my final goal for the day.
And almost immediately after I’d written it, resolved to get things back to normal and forget about the kiss, Hunter had let me know what was on his mind. It had been a mistake, just like I’d thought, and he didn’t want to do it again.
I could have dealt with that. I could have been sad, moved on, and eventually forgotten about the kiss again.
But having him so close to me, telling me that I was a good kisser, was just twisting the knife.
“I’m really glad you came over tonight,” he said, curling up with his arms wrapped around his knees on the couch. “I mean, I’m sorry you had to flee your own new place, but, I’m glad we got to talk.”
I cleared my throat. “Yeah, it’s good,” I said.
That’s all I could manage at the moment. Monosyllabic, meaningless words.
“Do you want to teach me some yoga moves?” he chirped, grinning at me.
“You hate that kind of thing,” I said.
Really what I meant was I can’t watch your incredible body move like that right now, or I might cry and get a boner all at once.
“Yeah, but now I’m all inspired,” he said, suddenly popping up off the couch, heading to the open rug at the center of the room, and bending to try to touch his toes. “First you get me started on the goal-setting, now I’m craving yoga, too… who’s the bad influence now?”
As Hunter bent lower and lower and I started to feel like I might lose it, the front door of the house swung open.
“Oh my God, how many times do I have to tell you to check the mail when you get—oh. Hi, Gavin.”
Caleb swung the front door shut behind him, noticing me on the couch. He was carrying a clear plastic to-go container with a slice of pie inside, and he was damp from the rain, no sign of a raincoat or umbrella.
“Why is your ass in the air, Hunter?” Caleb asked, eyeing his brother exhaustedly.
Hunter rose to a standing position, stretching his neck from side to side. “It was supposed to be time for yoga, but now there’s a disruption, so all of my cultivated calm is gone.”
“Sorry, not sorry,” Caleb said. “Brought a slice of lemon meringue. Landon said the lemon wasn’t lemony enough.”
“You’re an angel,” Hunter said. “And Landon’s an idiot. Nothing’s ever perfect enough for him.”
“He cares about perfecting his baking skills more than he cares about time, money, or anything silly like that.”
“It looks amazing,” I added.
Caleb looked at me sidelong. “Gavin.”
“Yes?”
“Still doing the bridge?”
I paused for a moment. I didn’t want to talk about the bridge right now—nothing could sound worse, actually.
But I also wasn’t going to back down.
“I am still ‘doing’ the bridge, yes,” I said. “No plans to stop.”
Caleb nodded once. “All right. See you later then,” he said. He ascended the staircase at the side of the room, taking it two stairs at a time, and then disappeared up the second narrow set that headed to the attic.
Hunter and I shared a look.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I just shook my head and shrugged.
“We should probably go to sleep,” he said, picking up the box of pie and carrying it to the fridge.
I brushed and flossed in the little bathroom attached to the living room and then situated myself on the couch, pulling the throw blanket over me. Hunter emerged from the kitchen soon after, and looked at me with his head cocked.
“What? Come on, Gavin.”
“Hmm?” I said, tucking a decorative pillow behind my head.
“You’re not sleeping here,” Hunter said with a shake of his head. “It’s uncomfortable.”
“I used to sleep here all the time,” I said.
“Yeah, but that was when you were, like, ten years old and your body was the size of a pea pod. You also slept in my room a lot in high school.”
“Right,” I said, shifting on the couch. Hunter wasn’t wrong—the couch was comfortable to sit on, but I didn’t come close to fitting on it, length-wise.
“C’mon. Just come sleep in my bed.”
My face already felt so hot. “I’m not going to inconvenience you like th
at.”
“Trust me, it’ll be worse if you’re out here. Caleb gets his two-in-the-morning cravings for melted chocolate chips or whatever the hell he eats—I hear him puttering around down here almost every night. He might accidentally sit on you in the dark.”
I let out a breath. “Are you… sure it’s okay?”
He furrowed his brow at me. “Are you still hung up about the weirdness from the other night? We’ve gotten through so much more than a stupid kiss in our friendship. If you’re cool, I’m cool. If you’re more comfortable out here, be my guest, but you’re always welcome in my bed, Pepper.”
I scratched the back of my neck. “It would be a lot better for my spine… and my REM cycles,” I said.
He nodded. “I’ve slept on this couch before. I can tell you right now that your spine would stage a mutiny against both of us if you slept here.”
“Okay,” I said, standing.
I followed him up the stairs. I hadn’t been up here in years—even when I had come to visit Hunter on rare occasions on the island over the past decade, we hadn’t had much reason to go up to the second floor of his place.
His room looked vaguely like I remembered it from years ago—one blue accent wall, surprisingly soft patterned sheets, and a shelf full of knick-knacks at the side of the room. Unlike the living room, where Caleb had free rein to keep everything neat and tidy, Hunter’s room was a little messy.
“I see you still have the Hunter Touch in here,” I said, gesturing at a small pile of clean clothes on a chair in the corner.
“Hey,” he said. “I’ll have you know that those are not only clean, but I’ve fully intended on folding them for… the past week.”
He smiled, shutting the door behind him.
And then we were in his room alone, just the two of us. It was something that used to be commonplace when we were kids, but now it felt like the room had a kind of charge in the air.
A charge only I was aware of, most likely.
I liked being in a space alone with him. He didn’t bother turning on the lights, simply sliding into bed and letting out a long, animated sigh of pleasure after lying down. I took off my shirt—I couldn’t stand sleeping with it on—and slid into bed next to him.
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