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Wylan strained to haul in the last of the supplies the Dregs needed. Agreeing to help with this job had been a terrible idea. His arms were sore, his back ached, and the worst part was he already knew he’d carried in less than anyone else.
He staggered the rest of the way and then finally set down the heavy box, all but collapsing against it as he caught his breath.
Behind him, someone snickered.
He turned and glared at Jesper, who smirked back at him. Typical. Of course it had to be Jesper who would see him like that.
“Not used to manual labor?” Jesper asked, stepping closer to trail his fingers lightly along one of Wylan’s aching and lamentably small biceps. “Too much for your delicate merchling arms?”
Wylan pulled away, cheeks flushed. His heart hammered, and he tried not to think about how heated he’d felt lately whenever the tall boy invaded his personal space.
“Who cares?” he asked, in no mood to be mocked when he already felt miserable over how much he’d struggled. “At least I got it done.”
“That’s a matter of opinion,” Jesper said.
Wylan scowled and turned to leave.
“Oh come on, merchling, I’m only joking.”
He walked faster and tried to ignore the footsteps following him.
“Are you really that sensitive?”
“I did my best,” he said, even as his gut twisted with the familiar pain of his best never being enough.
Jesper caught up to him. “You know what your trouble is?”
Maybe if Wylan ignored him, he would go away.
“It’s these skinny little arms of yours. You need more muscle.”
“I don’t need you to tell me that,” Wylan said.
“Then you should do something about it, merchling, don’t just stand around hoping.”
“What are you going to do, suggest I work out?”
“Now there’s an idea.” Jesper raised his eyebrows and grinned. “What do you say? Me and you, shirts off, working up a sweat?”
Wylan blushed.
“But first you need more meat on these bones.” The other boy poked him in the side.
He yelped and squirmed away.
“See?” Jesper poked him again. “I can feel your ribs!”
Wylan nearly retorted that the other boy was just as skinny as him, but he bit the comment back. The unfortunate fact was that it wasn’t the same sort of lean build at all; Jesper was skinny like someone in shape and toned, while Wylan was skinny like someone who just happened to be small.
“Barrel food not good enough?” Jesper asked with another smirk. “You miss that rich mercher fare?”
“I eat plenty,” Wylan said.
“Obviously not.”
He rolled his eyes. “Do you have a point with this, or are you just trying to annoy me?”
Jesper put his hand over his heart. “I want to help, merchling.”
Sure he did.
“So what do you say?” Jesper asked. “Dinner? Tonight? My place?”
Wylan’s heart skipped a beat. He stopped walking and blushed furiously as Jesper winked at him and then turned and sauntered away.
Dinner?
With Jesper?
No one had ever asked him out to dinner before. He didn’t know how he should dress, or what he should expect, or what was expected of him.
But one thing he did know was that he wouldn’t miss this evening for the world.
#
Jesper stretched and cracked his knuckles. There was a strange feeling in the air, like a hum of electricity. It felt like luck. Tonight would be a good night for him, he was sure of it. A few hands of cards, a couple spins of the Wheel, and he’d have more kruge than he ever imagined, enough to pay off his debts and more besides.
The good places would start opening up soon, so he checked to make sure his revolvers were loaded and then grabbed what kruge he had. By the time the evening was over, he’d have tripled that or better.
Someone knocked on the door.
Jesper frowned. This was a strange time for a visitor. Hopefully this would be quick. He walked to the door and opened it.
Wylan stood there, his expression somewhere between lost and panicked.
“Merchling?”
“Um. Hi.”
He was about the last person Jesper expected to see outside his door this late in the evening. Jesper stepped back to let him in, and the other boy shuffled inside, his cheeks pink for no apparent reason.
Jesper waited for him to say explain why he’d come.
No one spoke.
“Uh…” He rubbed the back of his neck. Surprise evening visits from Wylan were a good opportunity for jokes, but he really wanted to get going to catch those card games.
“Am I early?” Wylan finally asked.
“Early?”
“For dinner.”
Dinner?
Dinner?
For one of the few times in his life, Jesper was at a complete loss for words. Wylan never took his teasing seriously—at least, he didn’t think he did. His comment about dinner had been one in a long line of flirty comments to make Wylan blush, yet apparently he’d taken it as a genuine invitation.
He’d had been in such a hurry, he hadn’t taken a good look at the other boy when he entered. Wylan’s clothes were normal, but everything about him looked a little neater, a little fresher; even his hair looked like he’d done something to it.
Jesper had never in a million years imagined Wylan would accept his offer to go out for dinner, and certainly not that he’d put in a special effort to look nice for him.
“Ah.” The silence had stretched on too long. Wylan’s gaze faltered, and he glanced down at the ground. “You, ah…” He was still flushed, but the anxious enthusiasm in his face faded into something sadder and hurt. “You were joking, huh?” His lips twitched in the manner of someone about to force a laugh despite really wanting to cry.
“No!” Jesper said quickly. “No, of course I wasn’t joking! What do you take me for?”
Oh, he felt horrible, he felt like the world’s worst philanderer. He never intentionally broke hearts, and pretending to invite someone out to dinner assuming they’d laugh it off as a gag suddenly felt like the nastiest trick to play. He just… never thought Wylan would want to, at least not without a lot of coaxing—like Jesper actually steering him into a restaurant and sitting him down at a table. He didn’t expect Wylan to show up at his door of his own volition.
“I just, ah…” There was no way he’d be able to have dinner and still make money tonight. The allure of Makker’s Wheel called to him, just a few streets away. He had to get rid of Wylan quickly so he could get going. “Tonight is…”
But if he asked to put it off until tomorrow, Wylan would assume he was right, that it had all been a big joke, and he’d never show up for dinner again.
And technically that was right, except that Jesper hadn’t meant it to be mean-spirited, and he really hadn’t expected Wylan to look so nervously excited about having dinner with him.
Farewell, winnings. Tonight a merchling’s happiness would have to come first.
“Tonight hasn’t been my best day for cooking,” Jesper said. “So you’re not early, I was just hoping I had a little more time.”
He probably had a tablecloth somewhere, or at least something he could pretend was a tablecloth. Candles might be nice, and he could dig up a few if he tried hard. Was… was that the sort of dinner Wylan expected, a candlelit evening for the two of them? Did all that blushing hide genuine interest after all?
If things might actually click between him and Wylan, he had to do this thing right. Throwing together a few bites to eat and hoping to get Wylan in his bed afterwards wasn’t the right way to do it. Not with him.
“Why don’t we go out for dinner instead?” Jesper asked.
“It’s okay,” Wylan said, “honest. If this is a bad time, I can leave.”
“No way, merchling, you aren’t getting out of dinner with me that easily. I know a great place we can go. They make the best waffles—” Jesper winced. “You probably don’t want waffles for dinner, do you?”
“Waffles are fine.”
“Great!” Jesper took a deep breath and struggled to reclaim control over the situation. “And afterwards, maybe we can come back here and”—he winked—“see what happens.”
Wylan blushed scarlet.
This might turn out to be a good night after all.
#
This was turning out to be a terrible night. Wylan followed Jesper into the small, crowded building where he’d assured him they served the best waffles in Ketterdam and then to a small table for two. Wylan sat down across from the other boy, but he wished he was anywhere else. With any luck, he could eat his waffles quickly and then escape.
It was painfully obvious that Jesper hadn’t been serious when he asked him out to dinner, and his efforts to pretend otherwise just made it worse.
He didn’t need Jesper to go on a date with him out of pity. This was his own fault for being stupid enough to think someone who flirted with everyone actually meant it when he asked to go out with Wylan.
“Time to order, merchling. What kind of waffles will you have?”
“Which do you recommend?” Wylan asked, because he’d spent the better part of the afternoon planning out how to avoid reading any menus while they were out.
“They’re all delicious, and it’s my treat.” Jesper gave him a considering look. “But if you really want me to choose, there’s a blueberry kind I bet you’d love, with a sweet blueberry syrup.”
“Then I’ll have that,” Wylan said.
“Placing all your trust in me?”
“You know this place best.”
Jesper grinned. “I can introduce you to all sorts of wonderful things.”
Wylan blushed and glanced away.
When their waffles arrived, the evening somehow became even more awkward than it had already been, incredible though that was. The blueberry waffles were indeed delicious, but the syrup had a tendency to drip down his fork and onto his hand, and every time he licked his fingers, Jesper gave him a suggestive look from across the table.
Plus, they were eating in silence. Because, of course, they didn’t have enough in common and they weren’t even supposed to be on a date.
This was absolutely miserable. Wylan stabbed his fork into his waffle and ignored the syrup coating his fingers yet again, because if Jesper gave him that look one more time, he might pass out.
“How are they?” Jesper asked.
“They’re good,” Wylan said. “Very tasty.”
“You look tastier than anything here.”
Wylan blushed.
“You’ve got syrup on your fingers.” Jesper leaned across the table toward him. “Want me to do something about that?”
“No.”
Jesper snickered. “Fine, fine… This chocolate syrup tastes better anyway.”
Wylan frowned. “You have chocolate?”
“What, you were so focused on yours, you didn’t hear what I ordered?”
“I guess not,” he said.
“Here.” Jesper held up a forkful of waffles, dripping with chocolate sauce, and held it out. “You can try some, but just a bite.”
Wylan stared at the offered fork.
“Relax, merchling, you’re not going to catch anything from me.”
“That’s not—” He shook his head and leaned in, face on fire as he let Jesper feed him a forkful of waffles.
He was barely aware of the taste, too conscious of Jesper’s fingers mere inches from his mouth and the intimacy of sharing food. The other boy’s gray eyes lingered on him, and Wylan pulled back with a blush.
“Here, I’ll, uh, you too.” The stammered words made him even more flustered, and of course this was stupid since Jesper had definitely eaten the blueberry waffles before since he recommended them, but Wylan scooped up a forkful of waffles nevertheless.
He held it out and did his best to disguise how badly his hand was shaking.
To his relief, Jesper politely ignored the fork wobbling up and down in the air and leaned in to accept the offered bite. He smirked as he did so, and Wylan nearly dropped the fork entirely.
“Delicious,” Jesper said.
Wylan stared at his fork and wondered if he was really expected to put it in his own mouth after it had just been in Jesper’s.
He felt flushed and a little dizzy and oddly happy nevertheless, and so it was to his great horror that he heard himself saying, “You really didn’t mean it when you invited me for dinner, did you?”
Jesper stared at him.
“Sorry, forget I—”
“I wanted to have dinner with you,” Jesper said over him. “I just never thought you’d be interested. So yeah, it was a joke, but only because I didn’t think you’d accept a serious invitation.”
It was a small distinction.
In the end, it had still been a joke.
But small or not, it made all the difference in the world.
Wylan didn’t stop smiling for the rest of dinner.
#
All things considered, it had been a good evening. It was too late to get in on any good games, but the change of plans proved to be worth it after all.
“Next time I’ll do it right,” Jesper said, as he and Wylan walked back together. “Candles, tablecloth, the works.”
“I’ll be looking forward to it,” Wylan said.
They walked the rest of the way in comfortable silence, but as Wylan turned to leave, Jesper hesitated. “Wait a minute, merchling.”
Wylan stopped and turned to face him again. “Yes?”
Maybe the evening should end like this. But Jesper thought about how sad Wylan looked when he realized the invitation hadn’t been a serious one—and how happy he’d been when he learned Jesper really had wanted to have dinner together.
Jesper stepped closer to Wylan and reached out to cup his cheek gently.
The other boy blushed, that nervous anticipation from earlier visible in his face again.
He moved in slowly, to give Wylan enough time to back away if he wanted, then kissed him. His lips were soft and warm, his returning kiss clumsy, and Jesper had never felt more alive. He kissed him again, softly, and then slowly pulled away.
“Thank you for a wonderful evening,” he said.
“Yeah.” Wylan sounded dazed. “Yeah, you too.”
“See you tomorrow.”
“Y-Yeah.”
Wylan finally turned and walked away, and Jesper realized he was grinning like he’d won the world’s biggest jackpot. Maybe this really had been his lucky night. At last he turned and headed home himself, but his thoughts were on Wylan. Him and a merchling, who would have thought?
He already knew he was going to ask Wylan out again.