Page 34 of Garbage

No, if he was, Quincy was sure he would have known.

Could he get Evan to be his boyfriend? And how? What did it mean, anyway?

He was starting to research it, but he put a mental bookmark in the topic when CC reached across the table with his claw arm and picked up a chip from the mostly empty plate of nachos.

Quincy watched him closely, but no one seemed to think it was odd. Then again, CC’s arms hadn’t been designed to pick up rot and refuse from the gutters.

“I never understood food,” he announced. He picked up a chicken wing with another arm. “Like, is there really that much difference between all the different types?” Icons scrolled across his face: pizza, ice cream, apple, taco, croissant, bacon, cupcake, sushi, speeding up until they became an indistinguishable blur. “Just… why?”

His face flashed a big question mark.

Yue slapped his shoulder. “Because they’re tasty. And I suppose they have different nutrients that humans need.”

CC lifted the chip to Yue’s lips. “This has nutrients that you need?”

Yue accepted the chip, pulling it into his mouth with his lips and tongue. “Yeah.” He patted his ample belly. “Gotta keep up my weight.”

CC nuzzled his face against Yue’s forehead with a kiss emoji.

Quincy just watched, transfixed. Yue had eaten food from CC’s pincers. His lips had brushed the curved points.

Evan had told Quincy that his ancillary arms were fine. He’d even touched them, and encouraged Quincy to cook meals with them for him to eat.

Feeding someone with them was… Quincy didn’t even know what it was, but it somehow made his mind more relaxed, while his body felt tight and excited.

He wasn’t sure he’d ever be confident enough to touch Evan’s mouth with his dirty pincers, but seeing CC do it opened up whole new worlds of possibility.

If Evan was alright with it, of course.

Evan would probably think it was weird.

Why would Evan want someone to put food into his mouth with creepy pincers when he could do it himself with a fork?

Yue seemed to object, too, when CC tried to shove the chicken wing against his lips. “No! You can’t just feed me that.” He batted CC’s arms away. “There are bones in…”

He ended up with most of the chicken wing stuck in his mouth and rolled his eyes before fishing it out. “You have to hold it like this and eat the meat off the bones.”

“I thought they were like cherries. Don’t you just spit them out?” CC’s face lit up with a pair of cherries, then a ball tossed into a basketball hoop, ending with a ding.

Quincy could produce all sorts of sounds like that, as the audio files weren’t hard to find. He’d just never wanted to. He wasn’t sure he wanted to now, either. He liked being human-ish, but he didn’t want to be one. Not if it meant changing who he was. He hadn’t realized until now that he didn’t want to be more robotic, either.

“They’re not like cherries.” Yue shook his head. “Haven’t you seen me eat chicken wings a hundred times?”

CC shrugged. “Food is boring.”

“I like food,” Quincy offered. “I’ve been learning to cook.”

Evan squeezed his waist. “By learning, he means that I get to come home most evenings to a five-star restaurant experience.”

“Ooh!” Ben leaned in. “What’s on the menu? And when am I being invited over?”

Quincy didn’t realize this was a joke at first, but he promised Ben he could come over any time, only remembering afterwards that he should check with Evan.

Even nodded with a smile, like this was something they shared and Quincy had done it right. He liked doing things right. And he liked Evan’s friends. Maybe they were even his friends now.

Quincy fell into comparing recipes with Yue, while the others figured out the bill.

The night was cool as Quincy walked home with Evan, their arms brushing from time to time.