Obiora’s eyes seemed to darken. The sight of it made Ejiro feel weird, his stomach flip-flopping all over itself. He looked away, strangely nervous.
“As much as I hate to admit it, it was well earned.”
“That must’ve hurt.”
“Fuck off.” Obiora laughed. “You thought about where you’ll be taking Sophia for your date?”
“I have.” He glanced at Obiora, and relaxed when he saw that whatever that look was of earlier, it was gone now.
Obiora raised both eyebrows, nodding his head as if to say, and?
Ejiro grinned, a slightly devilish thing. “This is a competition, Obiora. Of course I’m not going to tell you where I’m taking her.”
Obiora stared at him, his eyes intense. He was still smiling, but it was a small, barely-there thing. Ejiro suddenly felt put on display.
“You’re not at all what I expected,” he said quietly.
“And what did you expect?” Ejiro asked, rolling his eyes. “What was it you called me? Boring?”
“Evasive,” Obiora corrected. “Clearly, I was wrong. You’re just full of surprises.”
“That’s me. Shrek.”
Obiora’s laugh seemed startled out of him. “What?” he said, chortling. “Shrek?”
Ejiro blushed furiously. “I just mean—the onions thing—”
“Onions?” Obiora sputtered.
Ejiro blushed harder. “The layers—”
“Layers?” Obiora said, his voice pitched even higher.
“The metaphor!” Ejiro almost yelled. “Haven’t you watched Shrek? The bit where he was explaining to Donkey about how he had layers like …” He trailed off when he realised Obiora was clearly messing with him, Obiora nearly wheezing with how hard he was laughing. “Oh, screw you,” Ejiro said, but he was laughing too, splashing water at Obiora and making him yelp and dart away. “You are such a—a dick.”
“That must’ve hurt.”
Ejiro splashed him again. How had Obiora noticed he didn’t usually curse? Obiora laughed and splashed him back.
The sliding door of the mansion came open noisily, startling them out of their little bubble. Ejiro hadn’t even noticed when the sky had lightened, dark purple giving way to pale blue.
Chris Wu waved at them as he came down the steps, cheerful as always. “Good morning! How’s the water?” He was dressed for a swim as well, a towel thrown around his shoulders.
“Morning,” he and Obiora echoed.
“Water’s great,” Obiora answered, a matching grin on his face.
“Fantastic.” The Chinese-British man headed in the direction of the showers.
Obiora lowered his voice to whisper, “I’m pretty sure Chris Wu is like … ten puppies stacked on top of each other in a human flesh coat. Surely no one can be that happy all the fucking time.”
Ejiro snorted, even as he wrinkled his nose at the imagery. “A human flesh coat? That sounds disgusting.”
“You know what I mean.” Obiora splashed water at him.
Ejiro splashed him back. “You need to learn to stop judging people.”
“I’m not—” Obiora began indignantly.
