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He frowns, heading to the free weights. “Why not? Corrine said you go to New York a lot.”
“He doesn’t call me or anything, he just expects me to show up and, I don’t know, not burst into a flame of awkwardness over the fact that we haven’t had a relationship in years.” I follow. “I just go to New York to be alone without being alone. But this isn’t about that. This is about me wanting to claim the free bed in your room since Taj is apparently a nonissue.”
“What was your plan if Taj was going?” He starts lifting, but his form is all wrong. I wouldn’t know if Coach Hartl hadn’t insisted that all bases do weight training twice a week during practice.
I put my hand on his lower back, surprisingly not grossed out by the wetness there, and push. “Stand straight.”
He stops. Looks at me over his shoulder even though he’s standing in front of a full-length mirror. Adjusts. His arms grow tight, release. “What was your plan?”
“My plan was to sleep on the floor.”
He stops again, laughing. “Oh, come on. Your plan would be tosayyou’d sleep on the floor, but then you would have wormed your way into my bed, andIwould have ended up on the floor.”
I step in front of him, point the camera right in his face. “You say that like I wouldn’t have shared.” My cheeks heat at the admission, but he ignores it.
“You didn’t used to when we were kids,” he says.
“Well, you had cooties.”
“That didn’t stop you from sleeping in my cooties-infested bed.”
“Beds are cootie-free zones. Only human boys are incubators for them.”
“Now that’s a documentary I’d watch.”
I fix his form again. “Are you saying you’re not going to watch this one?”
He winces, setting down the weights. “Fuck no. You think I want to see my sweaty face in 1080p?”
It’s a relief to hear. I won’t have to recut the documentary to exclude the financial hardship plot if he’s not going to watch. “You certainly like your face otherwise. Your Instagram is seventy-five percent selfies.”
He narrows his eyes. “You don’t follow me on Instagram.”
“Yes, I do.” I freeze.
“No...” A corner of his lips turns up. “Do you creep on me?”
“No! How do you know I don’t follow you unless you’re constantly checking?”
He bites his lip, holding back a smile.
“Youcreep onmystuff, too,” I say, lowering the camera.
“So you admit it. You’ve been checking on me.”
“Look.” I exhale a laugh. “It was mostly to see what pictures you were posting with Corrine, but then it became a habit.”
And it was so so so so hard not to like any pictures. I would have died if I accidentally liked a picture and got caught stalking through all the years of photos he’s posted since we stopped being friends. The other twenty-five percent that isn’t his face are beautiful photos he’s taken: still lifes, portraits, live-action shots from shows. There was, for a brief blip of high school life, a time when a lot of the photos were of Corrine. We both had a habit of using her for our creative endeavors.
“Why wouldn’t you just follow me?” he asks.
“Why didn’t you follow me?”
We stare at each other for a moment. He pulls his phone from his pocket, unwinding his earbuds from around it, and swipes and taps.
“Problem solved,” he says.
My stomach does a weird flip. It can’t be excitement or anything. I mean, it’s Holden. I’ve seen him cry over dropping a Fudgsicle. He’s not someone to get excited over. It’s probably just guilt that it’s a semipublic reflection of our... friendship? Is that what this is?
