Page 72 of Summer Holiday Lifeline

Steven stopped chewing abruptly, staring at him like he’d just spouted state secrets. After a heartbeat, he chewed hard and swallowed. “You do?”

“Do you really have to ask that?”

“I mean, I know you’re interested. You’ve been here every day, but…”

“But what?”

Steven fiddled with the paper wrapper around his scone, not looking at Myles. “This is just a spring fling, right?”

“It was.” Myles put his own food down.

“Was? Has it changed?”

“It’s past the twenty-first of June, so technically, this is summer now.”

“But you’re still leaving in two weeks. Which I knew,” he said hastily, finally looking up. “So don’t worry. I knew that going in.”

“That was the plan,” Myles said.

“And now?”

“What would you say if I told you I was thinking of staying longer?”

“How much longer?” Steven’s eyes narrowed. The question was a dam between Myles and whatever Steven was feeling, but holding back.

If he had hoped for a more enthusiastic response, Myles answered honestly despite the disappointment. “I don’t know exactly.”

“So this is a summer fling, then?” The quirky smile Myles was hoping for didn’t make an appearance.

“I don’t know what to call it. Do we have to label it?”

“Are you staying because of me? Because if you are, then maybe yeah, we should figure out what this is, exactly. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Making out like teenagers isn’t the worst way to spend a summer, but if it’s going to be more⁠—”

“Do you want more? Because⁠—”

Steven held up a hand to stop him. “Did I say that?”

“Well, no. But…” Myles sighed. “I haven’t exactly rushed headlong into bed with you. I hope you know that has nothing to do with you and everything to do with me.”

“I got that, yes.” Steven smiled at him, and his signature crooked expression had an unexpected softness to it. “And don’t be so quick to say it has nothing to do with me, because it feels to me that we’re on the same page with the physical aspect. We don’t have to be in a hurry to fuck. We don’t have to fuck at all, ever, if we don’t want to. I wasn’t talking about sex. I can have sex with anyone. I can’t have—” he waved back and forth between them “—this with just anyone. But if this is why you want to stay…”

“It’s not only because of you.”

Surprisingly, some of the tension left Steven’s expression. “Why, then?”

“I looked into the classes at the Y you mentioned. They run them in four-week sessions over the summer. Shelly can start next week, which is technically in the middle of a session, but the person I talked to on the phone said it doesn’t really matter. Kids come and go all summer long, so…” He shrugged.

“Calgary doesn’t have a YMCA?”

“Of course it does.”

“But?” Steven put down his food too, and Myles watched his motion, annoyed with himself for derailing their breakfast.

“I don’t think Calgary is the right place for us right now.”

“Because?”

“Jet’s poor friend choices, for one, which, I’m thrilled to say, even he recognizes. He told me so this morning. Among a bunch of other things.”