Page 90 of Checking Out the Librarian

They went through the arrival routines, unlocking Connor’s front door, slipping off their shoes, carrying Connor’s gear through the kitchen to the back mudroom, watching Ribby push his face into the food bowl, watching Ribby slurp water, and remembering to get themselves glasses of water to offset the drinks they had each had, which had been more than usual for Thursday night.

It was almost ten o’clock. Jonathan had entered the phase of life where ten p.m. was checking door locks and drinking water time. He was so fucking grown up, and grownups handled things that were awkward. So be it.

“I have something for you.”

“But it’s your birthday! I’m supposed to give you things.” Connor looked nervously at the entry to the living room, back at Jonathan, back to the living room, and then again at Jonathan.

There might be something in the living room.

“You can, I promise. But first, I have this for you.” Jonathan pulled a yellow business document envelope, the depressingly official-looking type with a metal clasp, out of his messenger bag. Holding his test results in his hand felt charged with meaning; if he put them back in his bag, nothing would change.

“Not a beer.”

Jonathan gave him a searing look, but it bounced right off. “It is better than beer.”

“No gonna lie, that’ll be hard, now that I started thinking about beer. And fries. Why am I thinking about fries?”

“It might be the aforementioned beer you consumed. Open the envelope.”

“Whatever you say.” His brow furrowed as he looked at the single sheet of paper. “Lots of words. Lots of all caps and abbreviations. But not a beer. Or a bear.”

“It’s my test results. Like we talked about getting last week.”

“Oh!” Connor kept staring at the paper, but Jonathan didn’t think he was absorbing it.

Jonathan’s stomach would not settle. No more two-cider nights on top of sugary treats, because he did not like feeling this wound up and jittery. The glowy part had been nice, but this was not. He took a deep breath. “I’m good on all of it, HIV, Herpes, Hep B and C.”

“All the Hs. Like HGTV!” Connor giggled.

“Connor.”

“What?” The big hazel eyes looked at him, waiting for him to speak. Connor’s eyes were like another slice of cake, no way to refuse the sweetness that snuck up on you until your stomach hurt. Those eyes left him without a way to say no. None.

“Do you have your results too? We discussed this.”

“There’s something I have to tell you.” He clasped his hands in front of his chest and gave Jonathan his best Ribby-wants-something look. “I can’t give you a paper like this.”

His stomach dropped into a pit familiar from his years on the ice, but that he’d believed had been erased from his life when he didn’t have to wait for scores, wait for judgments. This couldn’t be happening. Connor couldn’t have—he was on PrEP, he’d said so. “Why not? What’s wrong?”

“Because it’s 2025 and there’s this thing called…wait a minute.” He fumbled with his pocket and brought out his phone. “Digital health records.”

“Fuck you.” He whirled away, had to get away from these whipsaw feelings that he hated. He hated all the feelings, up and down and back and forth, they could just be gone.

“Aww, honeycake, your annoyed face drives me nuts, you know that, right?” Connor followed him to the living room, clearly not comprehending that Jonathan needed to be away.

Jonathan didn’t even comprehend, so of course Connor couldn’t.

“I really, really like it when you squish up your nose like a cranky cat. Or grumpy cat. That’s it. Grumpy Cat.”

“I am not—” Jonathan halted at the sight of two wrapped presents on the coffee table.

One was the size of a clothing box, and Connor had folded and aligned the silver, black, and white striped paper so precisely that the stripes came together on the ends to create a rectangle, not one inch of misalignment. The bow was a mix of white tulle and silver and black ribbons frothing across more twisted silver and black ribbons that crossed the box.

But it was the much smaller box next to it that froze Jonathan in the doorway. Wrapped in coordinating glossy black paper, it had a simple silver ribbon looped across the top and held in place with a silver sticker. It was jewelry-size levels of smaller.

Connor had done all this for him, cake, gifts, wrapping that looked like it required an internet tutorial, and here he was huffing away like a diva without an oat milk double cappuccino.

He whirled again, and Connor was right there, close enough to bite.