Page 52 of Ring Rust

Jasper snorted. “Gross. Micah is not my type.”

“Good. More of you for me, then.”

“Ry—oh, hey Jas!” Beni said, passing through the living room with a basket of clean laundry. “What are you doing here?”

Maybe for the first time in his life, Jasper was relieved by Beni’s loud presence. Ryan’s vibe had shifted to something fond and affectionate, and he didn’t know how to handle that. Jasper had come over for one purpose only, and that was to set thingsback to what he hoped would become their new normal, so their babysitting adventure wasn’t awkward.

“Just came to drop some things off. I’m heading out here in a minute.”

Ryan looked at Beni with his good eye. “He brought me my cherry pitter.”

She cackled at a classic Beni volume. “Bless you, Jasper. Don’t know what we would have done without it here, heading into the dead of winter. Our cherry tree is just bursting.”

Jasper rolled his eyes. “Alright. I’m leaving.”

“I’m just giving you shit. I’ll leave you two alone. Ryan, come find me when he’s gone. I want to show you how to log into Nina’s school portal.” She disappeared down the hallway and closed her bedroom door.

“You don’t have to go. She’s just being a dickhead.”

“I should go. I just wanted to stop by, you know, since we’ll be together a lot starting in a few days.”

“Yes, we will,” Ryan said.

“I’m sorry, again. For being a dick. We can just forget all that happened.”

“You can, if you’d like. But I’m keeping it tucked away up there,” Ryan said. He closed his eyes and smiled.

“Stop it.”

“I can’t.” His smile grew.

“Stop thinking about it!”

“Oops, your shirt just came off?—”

Jasper threw a pillow at Ryan’s chest. The corner hit his bruised eye instead.

Ryan groaned. “Ow! God, okay! I’ll stop imagining it!”

“Oops! I’m sorry! Are you okay?” Jasper scrambled across the couch to move Ryan’s hand, inspecting the spot the pillow hit.

“I will be,” Ryan said, closing his eyes again. “Uh oh, there go your pants…”

“Okay. Goodbye, Ryan.”

Ryan laughed and waved goodbye, tossing a few kernels of popcorn in his mouth as Jasper closed the door behind him.

Chapter Fourteen

Beni and Stevie’scars were both in the driveway when Ryan arrived at Jasper’s. It forced him to park and walk five minutes uphill to the house, an irritating start to what was sure to be a challenging two weeks where Ryan was forced to be in close, cozy, domestic proximity with Jasper.

Not that it was a hardship under normal circumstances. Hewantedto spend time with Jasper. A lot of time.

After the party, Ryan had been sure things were over for good. Even if they hadn’t been, he was sure he couldn’t handle the uncertainty of Jasper’s feelings towards him. The sex they had that night, if one could call it that, did nothing but cloud Ryan’s mind with horny, desperate longing.

But then, Jasper brought him that bag of items he could have thrown in the trash. Ryan never would have known. Thathadto mean something.

Despite Ryan’s optimism, he knew winning Jasper over was going to take a lot of effort. But, if the sisters’ vacation was going to be anything other but awkward for everyone, not putting in the effort wasn’t an option. This felt like the perfect chance toconvince Jasper they belonged together and this breakup had been a terrible mistake.