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Ben strained, but all he could hear was the wind. “No.”
“I have ears like a dog,” Nova said, making grabby hands at Ben until their fingers connected. “That Jerome guy’s on the phone having a total tantrum. Let’s watch.”
Ben thought maybe he should feel a little bad about what had happened in the bar, but frankly, the guy deserved it. They crept to the edge of the roof, then leaned over the short cement barrier, and Ben could just make out Jerome’s figure pacing back and forth behind his car.
“Can you hear what he’s saying?”
“I think he’s talking to his grandma. He keeps saying nanny,” Nova whispered. “Oh no, I think he’s crying.”
Ben turned his face and hid it against Nova’s shoulder. “I feel like an asshole. What we did was not nice.”
“He told you he corrected a judge, and he thinks he knows more about being Jewish than you,” Nova murmured back. “He said women in Starbucks gave him a standing ovation for being better at feminism than they were. The guy’s a douche.”
Ben couldn’t really argue there. “I didn’t know you heard all of that. The bar was swamped tonight.”
Nova hummed, leaning his head close to Ben’s so their temples knocked together, and it was the nicest Ben had felt in so long. “It was busy, but I promised I’d be there to protect you. I wasn’t going to leave you high and dry. And clearly, you needed me.”
Ben let out a heavy sigh. “This whole thing is turning into an unmitigated disaster.”
Nova reached down and grabbed Ben’s hand, leading them back to the cushions. When Ben sat, Nova dragged his closer before getting comfortable. Ben did his best not to read into it, but he was starting to fail at that task. Nova was a little flirty, and that was the nature of his job, but it was difficult not to get ideas when Nova was so touchy and sweet.
“Did your brother ever get back to you?” Nova asked after a short stretch of comfortable silence.
Ben laughed bitterly. “No, but I’ve given up calling him. He talks to my mom every day, so I know he’s not dead. And I know he knows I’m pissed. I wish he’d take a little responsibility for all this.”
“But you will be here tomorrow night, won’t you?” Nova’s eyes were wide, curious, and so beautiful in the soft light of the glowing heaters.
Ben toyed with the top of his cup, then took a drink before answering. “I don’t know. I keep telling myself they can’t all be so bad, but these guys are proving me wrong one by one.”
“Who’s up next?” Nova asked, scootching a little closer.
Ben ignored the way he felt with Nova all but pressed against him, and he pulled out his phone, firing up the app. Once it loaded, he clicked on the next name in his calendar and waited for his profile to show. “Charlie,” he said, then handed the phone over to his friend.
Nova’s brow furrowed as he read the guy’s bio, then shook his head. “I think that might be the dickhead who used to trashcan me every time he saw me in the hall. That shit lasted my entire freshman year.”
“Trashcan you?”
Nova rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you know, where some big, jock asshole throws you into a trash can?”
“Good God,” Ben breathed out.
“I guess you weren’t bullied much as a kid,” Nova said.
Ben shrugged. “My entire high school was made up of Jewish nerds with overbearing parents and pressure to become rabbis after graduation. I definitely wasn’t popular, but I don’t think I stuck out enough to draw attention.” He hesitated, then reached over, feeling bold as he put his hand on Nova’s wrist and gave it a squeeze. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”
Nova hummed and stretched his legs out so far his shoe knocked against Ben’s. “It was what it was. My sister and I were the product of neglect, so we were the smelly kids. We didn’t have running water a lot or a washing machine. We were underfed and greasy, so we were easy targets.”
Ben’s chest ached. “I’m sorry.”
“It was what it was. We left home, and I had my glow-up junior year of college. I discovered weed for a while, so I managed to put on some weight and stopped looking so emaciated. My roommate showed me how to take care of my curls and buy better than the dollar bottle of shampoo at the campus Walgreens, and I learned how to do laundry. I met some good people who reminded me that I deserved better than my past. It was nice.”
Ben wanted to tell Nova he wished he could have been there—that he wished he had some way of taking away young Nova’s pain. But he knew better than that.
Instead, he smiled very softly and shifted a little closer. Their hands hung between their cushions, and when Nova stretched, their fingers brushed, then curled around each other, and neither of them pulled away. “My brother always hated me because I got to be lazy with my hair. I got mine from my dad,” he said, tugging on his straight, brown locks. “He got the curls from my mom’s side. I never told him how much I wished I could trade.”
Nova cocked his head to the side, then nodded. “You’d be cute with curls.”
“Cuter?” Ben chanced.
