Page 12

Not with you.

Jasper didn’t look too closely at the warmth those words stirred in him, taking a long drink of moonshine. He bit back his laughter when Konrad mirrored him. “Easy there. It’s strong stuff.”

“I assure you, I am quite tolerant. I was born in a country without a legal drinking age.”

Konrad crossed his legs, and his socks were the same dark red as his shirt, making Jasper’s lips twitch. It seemed like such an excessive amount of effort just to come have dinner at someone’s house, but he guessed he should be glad Konrad had at least skipped wearing a tie. This probably was dressed down for Konrad.

The timer went off and Jasper went to take dinner out of the oven. He made them both a plate and brought them over, his smile sheepish as he passed Konrad his. The plates didn’t even match. “Nothing fancy,” Jasper warned. “Just roasted trout and rice with vegetables.”

Konrad tried a bite and chewed slowly, even taking another moment once he’d swallowed. “A lemon vinaigrette. And fennel? Delightful.”

Jasper felt himself smiling and closed his lips around his fork to smother it. He had expected his cooking to be politely tolerated, not praised. They talked in passing over dinner, but it pleased him how much more interested Konrad was in eating than talking. Konrad was also drinking moonshine like water, and by the time Jasper stacked their empty plates together, he could swear there was a bit more color than usual in Konrad’s cheeks.

Jasper swayed to the left a bit when he stood up. He looked down at their jars and ah, his was nearly as empty as Konrad’s.

“May I see your work?” Konrad asked.

The question took Jasper by surprise. He looked over from putting their plates in the sink and saw Konrad eyeing the sketchbook on his desk. Jasper had never even let Hiyori look through his sketchbook. The work there was raw, unrefined.

It was personal.

“Okay.” Jasper felt Konrad watching him as he went to pick it up off the desk, and their fingers brushed as Jasper handed it to him. “Be gentle.”

It was only partially a joke. Jasper didn’t mind his finished work being criticized, especially by those who could offer feedback he could learn from, but his sketches were unpolished and imperfect. They could become designs, but in their current state, they might as well have been his own blood, poured straight onto the page.

Konrad opened the sketchbook on his lap and started looking at one page at a time. Jasper sat next to him again, awkwardly silent, wishing he’d put on music or something, so he wasn’t just watching Konrad look at his work. Sometimes, Konrad would trace a line with his finger, his gaze so intent that Jasper almost feared he could see each emotion buried in the blackness on every page. There were a lot of animals, plants, trees, living things rendered in harshly inked lines and shaded in shadow-dark charcoal.

“Beautiful,” Konrad finally said.

Jasper gave a short, harsh laugh. “It’s messy.”

“It’s honest.”

Konrad closed his sketchbook with care and placed it on the coffee table. He turned sideways on the couch, one foot still resting on the ground, and Jasper mirrored him. Just like he had a tendency to do at the restaurant. Jasper ran his thumb over his other nails, enjoying the smoothness. Hiyori had repainted them earlier that day, so there were no pits and ridges from chipped polish. She’d said she was just bored, but Jasper doubted the timing was a coincidence.

“Do you like flowers, Jasper?”

Obviously he liked them from an aesthetic standpoint, given the ones tattooed on his arm and the drawings of them Konrad had just seen, so he assumed Konrad was inquiring about the real ones.

“I like them outside, not in here. Way too many of them are toxic for dogs. Visually, though, I like irises the best.” Jasper rested his head sideways against the back of the couch. “What about you? Something exotic, I imagine.”

“Actually, I have an appreciation for the classic romanticism of red roses.”

“Didn’t have you pegged as a romantic.”

Konrad didn’t smile, but there was mirth in his eyes. “And here I thought my penchant for candles would give me away.”

Jasper laughed. If he wasn’t drinking, the comment might have flustered him, but he was relaxed enough to recognize that Konrad wasn’t saying he was trying to be romantic with Jasper specifically. He looked down at his lap and played with the lowermost rivets in his sleeve. When he glanced back up, Konrad was watching him. Jasper laughed again, twisting the end of his sleeve around his finger. “What?” he asked, smiling for no particular reason.

“You’re lovely.”

Heat rushed to his face. Okay, maybe he could still get flustered. “Thanks?” His laugh was nervous and almost… giddy. Konrad’s attention felt heavy and warm, like a blanket. Even if his words were spoken through the filter of inebriation. He may not feel the same as he would sober, but Jasper wasn’t sober, either. So he just let himself enjoy it without overthinking it for once. “Do you wanna watch a movie or something?”

“I would love to.”

Jasper got up to turn off the lights, a little unsteady. “Take your shoes off and stay awhile.”

It was just something his dad used to say to him when he walked around the house without taking his shoes off, but Konrad seemed to take it as a request and untied his shiny dress shoes, then sat them neatly on the floor next to the couch. Jasper grabbed the remote on his way to rejoin him. There really wasn’t much on TV, and he sipped his moonshine while he scrolled through the guide, looking for a movie that he could stand watching. He gave up and put on an Andy Griffith marathon.