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One
“Oi, mate. Are you going to share or what?”
Shiloh tucked his sandwich close to his body like he was about to be forced to fight to the death to keep his lunch. “Absolutely not.”
“Has anyone ever told you how cruel you are?” Jules asked, sinking lower in his seat.
Shiloh rolled his eyes and took a massive bite of his food, grinning in Jules’s direction. The light was coming in through the window just so, which made the entire room completely washed out, making him unable to see anything except where Jules’s shadow contrasted with the sun’s rays. Not that he really cared. There was very little in this meeting he gave a single fuck about.
The headmaster had it in his head that all the teachers needed to attend these godforsaken workshops to keep up to date with education techniques, presumably ignoring the fact that nine-year-olds were just tiny sociopaths who weren’t clever enough to do more than emotionally torture them all year long.
And by the time they either sprouted into fully-fledged psychopaths or outgrew their vicious tendencies, they’d be well out of Shiloh’s classroom and torturing form teachers. Frankly, he’d made the best idea when he started studying education, though his best friend thought he should have just come to work with him in his bakery. Of course, Dom had been on about it since his parents had turned over the keys and high-tailed it back to Naples. Dom didn’t seem to care at all that all Shiloh had to do was be near a tray of bakes and they’d burn down to tiny lumps of coal.
Dom had never cared about that sort of thing. He and Shiloh had been attached at the hip since they were seven, and Shiloh had been absolutely arse over tit in love with Dom—the quiet sort of unrequited love—since he was sixteen and coming to realize he was gayer than the day was long. Dom had always humored his crush, Shiloh figured, since he’d never called him out on it, and Shiloh knew he was obvious.
He’d never given anyone the time of day who Dom didn’t approve of, and every date he’d attempted to go on over the last several years had ended with him either on Dom’s sofa eating leftover cookie dough or on the phone with him wondering why his life was such a shitshow. It was a rhetorical question because Shiloh knew damn well no one would ever measure up to his baker, but Dom was kind enough never to bring it up.
Someday, Shiloh knew he’d be standing at an altar watching Dom marry the love of his life, relegating Shiloh to the weekend friend who’d show up for Sunday dinner with whatever produce and eggs his dad’s farm had managed to produce that week. And he’d do it all with a smile, ignoring the way he’d be slowly dying inside.
But that was a fate he’d resigned himself to when they were sixteen, and Shiloh had walked in on Dom kissing Sarah.
Luckily, it hadn’t worked out with her. She was now going on her eleventh year of dating the asshole in the seat next to Shiloh in the meeting, and if she were to ever accept a proposal, it would be one from Jules. But the fact remained, even when Dom had come out as bisexual—three years after Shiloh had quietly and sobbingly confessed he was gay—Shiloh would never be the man for him.
And that was fine.
Really.
He had his friendship.
And his sandwiches.
“You act like they’ve been blessed by the Virgin fucking Mary,” Jules mumbled, and Shiloh could hear him rustling around in his bag.
Shiloh just grinned as he finished half the sandwich, then tucked it back into the bag and fished around for what he knew was lying at the bottom. An intricately and perfectly folded bit of paper with a message on the inside.
He pulled it out and ran his thumb over the creases, tracing out the shape of the swan that Dom had left him. There would be a note inside as well, but since he couldn’t see it, he’d wait until they got on the train.
It wouldn’t say anything profound. It would either be some filthy limerick, or it would be a request for Shiloh to bring him back some bao buns from their favorite spot over on Piccadilly that neither of them could be arsed to unless they had business in London.
“How much time have we got?” Jules asked.
“No idea. Can’t see shit in this room with all the shades up. What time is it?”
“Oh, erm,” Jules hummed for a second. “Just gone half eleven.”
“Then four hours,” Shiloh said. “Why the hell are we having lunch so early.”
“Because this fucker is a sadist, and we should have gone out with everyone else,” Jules said.
Shiloh raised his brow and turned to face the foggy blob that was his friend. “You insisted you wanted to stay back for a chat.”
“Right. That is to say…I did, in fact, ask you to stay back.”
“You sound weird. Are you on drugs? Did you get high before this started?”
Jules laughed. “Fuck me, no. But I probably should have. I feel like I might vomit.”
Shiloh pushed his chair back slightly. “These are new shoes.”
