Again.
“Good boy.”
His eyes close.
His eyes close for one second and open again, and in the one second his face does something I have not seen on it yet, which is relief. A small, sharp relief. A horse getting a hand on its neck after a loud noise. A kid told, by a voice that is not his father's,you are doing a thing right.
His throat works.
“Okay,” he says.
“Okay.”
I look at him.
He looks at me.
He is in my room. He is twenty years old. He is Paul Laurent's son. He is the kid I told the bar I was going to fuck and I am now in a rented room with him, and he is looking at me like a deer ata hunter who has not raised the gun yet, and I am looking at him like I do not need to raise it.
I run a hand through my hair. It is still damp at the roots from the gym sink.
“One question,” I say.
“Yes.”
I make myself keep my hand at my side.
“Ask you a question first, sweetheart.”
“Yes.”
His hands settle at his sides.
“Is it true?”
“Is what true?”
The lamp on the table clicks once as a bulb filament settles.
“What Magnus said on the ice. What your dad probably told Phoenix. What I have been telling myself in every mirror for a week is the reason I cannot let this alone. Have you been with anyone before?”
He looks at the floor a long time.
He is not stalling. He is choosing the version of the answer he is going to give. I watch him choose. I watch his mouth decide that the truth is shorter than the lie.
“No,” he says.
“No what?”
“No, I haven't been with anyone.”
His hands tighten at his sides.
“At all?”
“At all.”
His throat works.
