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"I didn't think you were actually going to touch my face," Jay said. He sounded weirdly angry.
"I don't see what the big deal is," Mike said. "I just poked your cheek."
Jay scoffed. "Of course you don't get it."
"Are you gonna fucking explain it to me, or am I just gonna stand in your doorway all night while you keep being pissed and not explaining why?" Mike put his hands in his pockets and did an exaggerated lean on the doorjamb.
Jay rolled his eyes, but stepped aside so Mike could come in.
His apartment was perfectly neat and tidy, as it usually was nowadays, so much neater than it used be when there were dirty clothes and takeout containers everywhere. There used to be a distinct odor in Jay's apartment that sometimes hung around Jay himself, but ever since he started his self-improvement program or whatever it was, he'd started smelling better too. No more three-day-old Chinese food and mildew towels Jay. Now he was pomade and toothpaste and laundry detergent Jay.
Jay shut the door behind them, locked it, and turned to Mike with crossed arms and a furrowed brow. "Why do you insist on touching me all the fucking time?"
That. What. Wait. "I don't? Touch you all the time? What are you talking about?" Mike sputtered.
"Tonight, you poked my cheek. Ten minutes before that, you touched my back for like a solid minute when we were walking into the restaurant, which is why I ordered a glass of wine the minute we sat down--"
"I was leading you! I was showing you where to go--"
Jay rolled his eyes. "The waiter was showing us where to go. Half an hour before that, you put your hand on my arm because you wanted me to look at something, and then you left it there. An hour before that, you put your arm around my shoulders--"
Mike could feel his face turning a deep red. "I was being friendly! We're friends!"
"You left your arm there for like five fucking minutes, Mike! And like every fucking time you sit next to me in a booth, you do this thing where you drape your arm over the back of the booth, like you want to put your arm around me but you can't bring yourself to do it."
Mike took a breath, about to interject that it's not like that, even though now that Jay was laying it all out there, maybe it kind of was like that, which was blowing his fucking mind.
Jay could clearly tell that he wanted to say something. "No, Mike, shut the fuck up and let me finish. Whenever we go to the movies, you put your hand on the armest, and if I put my arm there too, you make it so that our arms are touching. When we take a shortcut through the park after work sometimes, if it's dark, you touch my elbow, and if it's light, you walk close enough so our arms bump together."
Mike swallowed. This was all too much. This could not all possibly be true. No one would touch someone all the time like that, unless. No dude would touch another dude like that, unless. Unless.
Unless.
"Can I sit down?" Mike said. He was suddenly feeling faint.
Jay's expression shifted from anger to confusion. It was clear that this wasn't the response he'd been expecting. "Um, yeah?"
Mike shuffled over to the couch and flopped down onto it, leaning forward to put his head between his knees. This could not be happening.
"Are you okay?" Mike could hear the concern in Jay's voice.
He just shook his head in response. No, he most definitely was not okay.
A minute later, Jay set something on the coffee table. Mike looked up, and saw a tall glass of ice water in front of him.
"You're probably just dehydrated," Jay said. The anger had left his voice, replaced with something that sounded more like resignation.
Maybe that was it. Maybe he was dehydrated. Mike picked up the glass and took a few good, long sips. The more water he drank, the more time he'd have to think of something to say.
It could not possibly be true. There was no way he could be--like that--with Jay? Impossible. They were just friends. Best friends. Best friends who couldn't live without each other and never wanted to be apart, ever. Best friends who liked to touch each other a lot--well, maybe that was just Mike, wanting to touch Jay, because now that Jay pointed it out, God, he really wanted to touch Jay right now, right this minute, right this second. But that was it, right? It was a completely normal friendship.
Just best friends who liked to spend every waking moment together and touch each other a lot.
Just best friends.
Just--
"Do I really touch you that much?" Mike said weakly.
Jay sighed. "Actually, it's more than that, that was just what I thought of off the top of my head."
Mike set his glass down onto the coffee table, then picked it back up and set it down on the cork coaster, because of course Jay had fucking coasters now, because he was civilized now, and there was no way he'd ever want to touch Mike as much as Mike wanted to touch him, even if Jay was gay, which, to the best of Mike's knowledge, he was, because he'd said so.
Was Mike gay? No, he liked pussy. Right? Except he hadn't dated a girl in like almost nine years, because why would he get a girlfriend when he had Jay? Jay was everything he needed, and sure, sometimes he missed sex, but he just jerked off a lot, and it didn't really matter what he thought about or watched when he jerked off, because everyone experienced changes in their preferences over time, right? And if he maybe liked porn with small twinks getting railed by big bear-looking guys, and had watched that category of porn exclusively for the past several years, that wasn't weird either.
Oh, God.
"I need a drink," Mike mumbled into his hands.
"No, you need to tell me what the fuck is going on with you." Jay sat down on the couch. Mike noticed that he didn't sit at the opposite end. In fact, he sat close enough that Mike could put his arm around him if he wanted. And he wanted, very much.
"I don't know if I can put it into words," Mike said. What was he supposed to say? I just realized I'm in love with you literally two minutes ago.
Actually, that didn't sound too bad, except he couldn't be sure that Jay would reciprocate. He seemed really mad that Mike liked to touch him all the time. Maybe Mike needed to redirect the questioning, so that Jay had to answer for himself!
"How come you don't have a boyfriend?" Mike said, turning to look at Jay, who was definitely close enough to touch.
"What?" Now it was Jay's turn to blush. His cheeks turned pink right away. "That's none of your business."
"Come on, man, if we're gonna be honest with each other..." Mike wasn't necessarily planning on being honest, though. It depended on Jay's answers.
"I don't know." Jay looked off to the side, which he always did when he was lying.
"You do want one, though," Mike said. "Don't you?"
"Well. Yeah. I guess so." Jay had turned from pink to red. "Wait, why are we talking about this? I was busy being mad at you!"
Now Mike held the cards. Or at least /some/ of the cards. "You were mad at me because I touched you too much. Is that it?"
"No, it's not--" Jay sighed, looking down at the couch, picking imaginary lint off of it. "It's just. For a straight guy... You sure like to touch other dudes a lot."
Now they were getting into it. Good. "And that bothers you?"
"Yes. No? I don't know." Now Jay was smoothing his hands up and down his pant legs. "It just sort of feels like...like you're messing with me, I guess."
Keep him talking. "What do you mean, messing with you?"
Jay turned to glare at him. "Isn't it obvious?"
Fuck. No. No, it wasn't obvious. "Uh...I don't..."
Jay rolled his eyes. His cheeks were still red, but he looked angry again, too. He was just staring at the turned-off TV, frowning, looking mad, and Mike hated it, that he was apparently the one to make him glare at nothing.
"Listen, Jay, I lost the thread, okay? I don't know what's supposed to be obvious because I just learned that I'm a fucking idiot like five minutes ago, so how about you just tell me, so I can make it better?"
"You really don't know." It wasn't a question.
"I really, really don't." (Mike really, really didn't.)
Jay sighed again, his hands clenching into fists at his knees. After a moment, he said, "I have. Feelings. And when you touch me. I feel the feelings."
That might have been the vaguest sentence ever uttered by a human, but Mike felt a glimmer of hope all the same. "Feelings. Like, good feelings?"
"Yeah, Mike, like good feelings!" Jay was acting all angry again, even though he was talking about having good feelings.
"Good feelings, like. Romantic. Feelings." Mike's heart was pounding now.
"Yes!" Jay shouted. "Yes, I have feelings for you, all right? Jesus Christ, Mike, yes, okay? Go ahead and laugh at me, I don't fucking care anymore. Just stop fucking touching me all the time if you're gonna keep being tragically heterosexual, and we're cool."
Jay moved to stand up, but Mike reached over and put his hand on Jay's shoulder, pushing him back down onto the couch. Jay didn't fight it. He just looked over at Mike, grim resignation across his face.
Mike's head was swimming. This was too much. Way, way too much. First, he found out that he was in love with Jay (although he had no idea how he didn't know, looking at it now), and then he found out that Jay had feelings for him too, all in the span of approximately seven minutes.
"What if..." Mike's heart was slamming against his ribs so hard that Jay must have been able to hear it. "What if I told you that I don't think I'm as tragically heterosexual as you think I am?"
Jay swallowed. Mike watched his throat bob. "I'd tell you to stop fucking with me."
"Okay, sure, but." Mike turned on the couch so he was facing Jay. "I'm not fucking with you."
"... Seriously?" Jay looked at him, searching his face for signs of sarcasm.
Mike gave him his most earnest look, the kind that he'd normally use for devious purposes, except this time he was being sincere. "Seriously."
Might as well finish the job.
"And furthermore, Jay," he continued, "I also feel feelings. And maybe I didn't realize that I was feeling those feelings until tonight, when you made me realize that I was feeling feelings."
"Feelings," Jay said. "Like romantic feelings."
"Yes. So can we stop saying the word 'feelings' now, please?"
Jay laughed, and a fraction of the tension left Mike's body, because then Jay was grinning at him, and his face was still bright red, but he didn't look mad anymore. "Is that why you're always touching me all the time?"
Mike looked down and realized that his hands were balled up tight against his sweatshirt. He forced them to relax, stretching out his fingers while he spoke. "I guess? Honestly, this is all news to me. Except, yeah, I guess it is why, because I really want to touch you right now."
"You can," Jay said. "But don't poke my cheek right now or I'll smack your hand away."
"I'll poke your cheek later, then," Mike said.