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“I didn’t lie about everything,” Miles hurried to explain. “When I said I was jealous, that was the truth. But I’m more than just a tiny, tiny bit jealous. I hate the idea of you liking anyone more than me, and I know this makes me sound a little psycho and a lot possessive, but I want you all to myself.” Miles took a deep breath. “The truth is, I love you.”
“As a friend.”
Miles shook his head. “That was a lie. The way I feel about you…it’s not the way normal people feel about friends.”
Beckett’s brows had lifted slightly, but the rest of his expression remained the same, as if he was trying not to react. As if he was waiting for Miles to let him down again.
“It’s true,” Miles said. “How…how do you know the difference between platonic and romantic feelings?”
Beckett exhaled. “You want to kiss him, for one,” he replied after a moment. “You want to touch him. You want to look after him. You want to comfort him when he’s upset. You want to make him laugh. You want to fall asleep with him in your arms. You want to walk with him, even if you don’t talk about anything, because you simply enjoy the presence of him beside you. You want to take him to watch the sunset. You want to warm up his hands when they’re cold because he forgot his sleeping bag.”
Miles mouth went dry. “That last one’s awfully specific,” he said.
The corner of Beckett’s lips curled into a small smile. A beautiful smile.
As Miles looked into Beckett’s eyes, he flashbacked to their kiss on the first night, their kiss the previous night, the way they’d woken up in each other’s arms, the way Beckett held his hands, them kissing in the meadow, Beckett carrying him in the ocean even though Beckett usually hated skin-contact—
Beckett’s mysterious crush, who he’d see at the library, who he’d help get books from the highest shelf—
The mystery guy who had freckles and was tall but not as tall as Beckett, who was clever and ambitious but oblivious, especially about people and their feelings—
“Miles,” Beckett said, just as the realization was dawning on him. “The one I’m in love with is you.”
Miles stared. Then laughed. It felt as if a dam had cracked inside him, letting out all of his fear and anxiety, and relief flooded his body, but also joy and shock. He laughed so much until tears gathered in his eyes, laughed until Beckett chuckled too, deep and rumbling.
“I don’t have a lopsided smile,” Miles said when he’d calmed down enough to speak.
“Oh, yes, you do.”
“I do not! I don’t have blond hair either.”
“It’s blond,” Beckett said. “That’s the whole reason Callum and Wesley called you blondie.”
“It’s brown,” Miles grumbled. Then, because he couldn’t pretend to be grumpy for long, he broke into a wide smile. “I love you too, Beckett,” he said, kissing him.
Beckett tugged him closer as their lips parted. They kissed each other deeply but slowly, like they had all the time in the world. When they’d pulled away, their faces so close they could feel each other’s exhale, Beckett said, “I thought you knew. I thought you knew it was you last night. That’s why I kissed you. That’s why I—” he stopped himself.
“Gave me the best blow job of my life?” Miles finished, brushing Beckett’s cheek with his thumb.
Beckett blushed. He was the cutest. “Yes,” he said. “That’s why I kissed you this morning, why I held your hands. Why I told you about the guy I was in love with. I thought you were teasing me. I thought we were playing a game.”
“I should have figured it out,” Miles conceded. “But in my defense…”
“Yes?” Beckett prompted, nudging Miles’s knee with his own.
“Firstly, the description was inaccurate. Lopsided smile. Blond hair. But more importantly, I would’ve had to be conceited to think you were talking about me. Before this trip, I never thought you saw me as anything more than a friend. I didn’t even know whether you’d had sex or jerked off. And besides, you were so ambiguous about this mysterious guy. You used third person pronouns! Of course, I’d assume you were talking about someone else.”
“I was trying to be subtle.”
“Subtle,” Miles repeated. “Even though last night you went into great detail about how hot and sexy you found him. How much you wanted to fuck him—”
At this, Beckett squirmed.
“No sane person would conclude, ‘oh, the guy Beckett’s talking about? That’s me’. You’d never risk saying such dirty stuff directly—”
“I said that stuff because I thought you knew I was talking about you. You kept encouraging me to tell you all my fantasies. I thought you were into it.”
“I was into it, but not because I thought they were about me. I asked you about your fantasies because…because I’m a creep.”
