Work Text:
A persistent pain in his stomach brings Team to make an appointment at the hospital for the first time in his adult life. He procrastinates until his mother convinces him he’s hours from death, and then he emails his boss to tell him he needs to miss work next Tuesday.
His only other hospital experience—apart from visiting friends and family—was in university when he broke his wrist. He didn’t have to go alone then, but he’s twenty-four now, and he doesn’t need anyone to hold his (uninjured) hand this time.
Pharm offers to go with him, but Team can’t bring himself to accept. “I’ll be okay,” he says. “I’m not nervous.”
“Okay, but call me if you need me to pick you up or if you change your mind and you want company,” Pharm tells him. “Next Tuesday shouldn’t be too busy for me.”
Team says, “Thanks, buddy,” and waves to Dean in the background before they end the call.
The nearest hospital is on the coast, and Team’s older coworkers all assure him that it’s a good one. They’ve all been there either for themselves or, in more cases, with customers who’ve gotten injured out on the water in some way, so Team trusts their judgment. In the seven days between making his appointment and actually going to the hospital, the pain abates, but his mother makes him promise to get checked out anyway, so he drives over for his appointment the following Tuesday afternoon on a day when he’s not scheduled to take customers out on the boat.
The whole process is done in a little over two hours.
In sequence: he meets with a doctor, then he plays an RPG game on his phone, then he gives some blood, then he plays a farming game, then he gives a urine sample, then he texts Don to tell him he took his high score on the world-destroying game, then has a scan of his stomach done, then reads two pages of a book Korn recommended, and then finally listens to the doctor tell him that everything they did looks fine to him and that it was probably an infection that’s passed. Team receives a suggestion from the doctor to come back if the pain returns, some mild prescription medication, and then heads home.
All told, it’s an unmemorable visit, and Team’s most pressing concern by the end of it is that he’s hungry because he skipped breakfast.
It’s so unmemorable, in fact, that he forgets to tell Pharm how it went.
He picks up some takeout curry on the way hope, eats in front of his computer for a bit, sprawls out on his unmade bed, and finally falls asleep in a rectangle of sunlight for a light nap.
•
He used to keep a dream journal, but he stopped about four months ago.
He doesn’t remember his dreams anymore anyway.
•
He wakes up ninety-four minutes later to utter pandemonium cascading across the screen of his phone. Messages from Manaow and Pharm are pouring in almost simultaneously, and Team swipes Pharm’s open just to make the deluge stop.
He reads Pharm’s string of text backwards as he scrolls up through their chat window.
14:01 ’I’m so sorry, Team!’
That’s…not promising.
14:00 ’He might contact you.’
Even less promising.
13:59 ’P’Win was really worried, and I don’t know if you two are talking again, so I didn’t want to tell him anything too personal. Dean just told him you were there for something minor.’
No no no no no.
13:56 ’He and P’Dean were playing a game online and P’Dean let it slip that you were at the hospital.’
Noooooo.
13:53 ’If you get any messages from P’Win, I’m so sorry, Team!’
Pharm!
12:14 ’Just let me know, okay?’
12:12 ’Is everything all right? Do you need me to pick you up?’
11:40 ’Teeeam?’
11:19 ’How did the appointment go?’
Team reads through it all again, in chronological order this time, just to make sure he understands exactly what happened, and then glances at the back button of the app featuring a daunting (16) to indicate the amount of unread messages from other people waiting for him.
One of whom, apparently, might be Win.
Turning onto his front and burrowing the lower half of his face into his pillow, Team bites the bullet and checks the list of names and the number of messages they’ve sent to him.
14:05 Manaow (11)
13:57 Dean (2)
13:55 Mae (2)
And there at the bottom:
13:48 Win (1)
The sight of his name brings with it an amorphous, tangled snare of emotion. From Pharm’s worried string of messages, Team was expecting more than just one message from him. Then again, with the way things ended—
Team taps Win’s name.
13:48 ’Are you okay?’
Team stares at it, pulling his lower lip under his teeth, and forces a rough swallow.
His thumbs hover over the screen, but what can he say to that?
The months of silence between them, the last conversation they had in person, and the stiffness of their last texted exchange (’I think it’d be best if we don’t talk for a while’ from Team, and ’I understand’ from Win) has Team’s heart feeling coated in oil.
Team knows this about Win: he checks his messages frequently. Team used to watch him do it. Glancing at his screen every so often, even when it’d been hours since he last texted someone he wanted a response from. He always seemed to take note when people left him on read, even though he never commented on it. Team always wondered how much it bothered him—or maybe it didn’t.
He closes Win’s chat without responding and reopens Pharm’s instead.
•
The next day, he meets Manaow at the beach for lunch. A new strip of restaurants and shops have opened overlooking the shore, and she’s been so excited to eat there she made Team promise to go with her on opening day. Even after she started dating Del a week ago, she told Team, “You and I have plans, and I’m not going to be That Friend who bails on them just because my girlfriend is cuter than you, okay?”
They’re halfway into bowls of ramen, equally silent and reverent of the food quality, when Manaow smiles at the waves lapping the sand and sighs with utter contentment.
Team grins at her. “You’re so gross,” he says.
“Shut up,” she says sweetly. She closes her eyes as the breeze sifts through her hair. “Just because you’re a miserable slob doesn’t mean I’m not going to be happy in front of you.”
He rolls his eyes and dips his fingers into his broth, flicking it at her without shame.
“Team! Ew!“
He smirks at her. “Serves you right. You already reek, don’t be a jerk too.”
She dabs the complimentary moist towel against the moisture spots on her yellow shirt with a cluck of her tongue. When she gives up on salvaging it, she folds her arms in front of her bowl and quirks a sadder smile at him. “What did you say to P’Win?” she asks. “I heard he texted you.”
Team makes a low noise of annoyance as he slurps a collection of noodles into his mouth. None of his friends can keep a secret. He adopts an expression of total neutrality, and once he’s chewed and swallowed, he says, “I didn’t say anything.”
Predictably, Manaow gawks at him. “Team!”
He loses the fight with himself to roll his eyes. “Manaow!” he says, mimicking her affronted voice. He goes into the broth with his chopsticks for another swirl of noodles.
She says, “He was worried about you!” and gives him a look full of unfair judgment. “He still loves you, you know.“
Team says, “You don’t know anything about it,” and chomps his boiled egg in half. “It’s also none of your business.” He points his chopsticks at her face, almost touching her nose.
The Japanese woman at the table next to theirs glances at him with silent judgement Team recognizes that he deserves. With sheepish quickness, he puts his chopsticks down on the rim of his bowl and reaches for one of the pork skewers in the center of the table to keep his hands busy.
“I’d be worried about my exes if I found out one of them was in the hospital,” Manaow says. “I’d probably text them to make sure they’re okay, just like P’Win did. He didn’t overstep by doing that, did he?”
Team sighs. “No.”
“So why didn’t you answer?”
“I don’t know,” Team says. “I don’t know what to say to him.”
She rolls her eyes at him, making a noise of disgust. “How about just—‘I’m fine, Phi, thanks for worrying about me’. And if you want to keep talking to him,” she adds with a grin, “then you say, ‘How are things with you?’ or something. To indicate that you wish to continue the conversation.” She sets her chin on her demurely folded hands and smiles at him, clearly expecting praise for her advice.
Team stares at her beaming face without emotion for several seconds, then says, “I don’t call him ‘Phi’. I never have. Did you seriously never notice? You hung out with us all the time.”
She gives him an exasperated look and says, “‘Hia’, whatever, stop avoiding the subject!”
Team watches her continue eating and considers his options. He’s only told Pharm the details of his breakup with Win, and it might be about time he corrected Manaow’s misunderstanding of things since he knows she hasn’t gotten the right information from the people she’s already interrogated. Pharm definitely didn’t tell her; he can’t keep secrets, but he can misdirect people like a champion.
“He broke up with me,” Team says.
To Team’s astonishment, it hurts just as much as it did the last time he said it to Pharm over a year ago.
Manaow pauses mid-slurp and stares at him, a waterfall of noodles hanging from her mouth.
“What?” she cries, muffled.
Team forces a laugh and plucks a tissue from the simple wooden box at the end of the table, offering it to her with a raised eyebrow.
She wipes her mouth with it and asks, “Why?” with such distress, it sounds like Team’s the one breaking up with her.
Team casts a look around them, but only the Japanese woman seems to be in hearing range and now she has earbuds in. Smart decision.
Team says, “It just didn’t work out,” and looks away from her shocked face. The interior of this place is nice. With all the doors and windows facing the shore opened, the breeze and the distant laughter and shouting from the beachfront people, it’s a soothing sort of place to be. He could come here for his breaks from time to time, even though it’s a little expensive.
He didn’t have to worry about things like that when he was going out with Win.
The intrusive thought adds a layer of grease over Team’s already oily heart.
“I told him I wanted to be friends, but that didn’t work,” Team says. He makes a bitter noise in the back of his throat and, with horror, realizes his eyes are starting to feel sore with emotion. “You know, I think amicable breakups are a myth.”
“Your breakup with P’Win was not amicable,” Manaow scoffs. She takes a pork skewer from his plate and bites off the first cube with a wink. “That’s for lying.”
Team sticks his tongue out at her and ducks his head to focus on his food before his eyes get any redder.
“My breakup with P’Pruk was amicable,” Manaow says. “In that we still talk, we still like each other, and he introduced me to his new girlfriend last month. Was I nice? Yes! Am I happy for him? Yes! Am I secretly pleased that my makeup skills are stronger than hers?” She smiles serenely and dabs a pinky fingertip over her eyeliner without actually touching it. “Not at all!”
Team raises both eyebrows at her, refusing to show how amused he is.
She smirks at him. With a finger pointed viciously at his forehead, she says, “You got that look from P’Win.”
And damn it, she’s right. But he’s not going to give her the satisfaction of confirming that she is.
He grabs the last pork skewer off the serving plate and gnaws on the topmost cube. With his mouth half-full, he delivers a devastatingly cool, “Shut up.”
She laughs and picks up her phone, writing out messages to people while Team stares at the ocean and forces away the memory of Win taking him to a spot like this late at night and kissing him with their feet in the waves.
“He’s still single,” Manaow says. When Team glances at her, she offers him a tiny smile. “Del told me. She sees him sometimes. She said he’s fine, but he seems sad.”
Team nods, but he’s tired of talking about it, so he says nothing.
This time, she respects his reluctance and changes the subject.
•
The thing is, the truth is, even though Team knows the hour it ended, he doesn’t know when his relationship with Win started.
The first time they slept together has a very easy-to-remember date, since it was Team’s birthday, but the beginning of the relationship itself is nebulous at best. Team’s narrowed it down to four potential days and conversations, but he never asked Win and he sure as fuck won’t ask him now.
Win just started using the word “boyfriend” one day and when Team didn’t object, he never stopped. The first time Team heard it, he couldn’t believe his luck and decided not to press it by asking questions.
They “dated” for about half a year.
It was fun.
But even the fun was nebulous.
Team spent every day wondering which plank in the bridge would give under his next step.
•
Team started working for his company directly after university. A friend of a friend started a kind of adventure experience company with their base of operations in a renovated shack on the beach, and Team jumped at the chance to work near the water all day. Now, three years out from university and well into his twenties, Team has no serious complaints about his job. His coworkers are fun, his job is relaxing, and his boss is incredibly hands off compared to the bosses he hears about from friends and family.
Win said he envied him once while they were sitting on the beach under the light of a half moon.
“You make way more than I do,” Team said, rolling his eyes.
“That’s not necessarily a bad thing for you,” Win said.
“Uh huh.” Team put his hands together and gave Win a deeply sarcastic smile. “Thank you for dinner.”
Win offered him a small smile back and thumbed the corner of Team’s lips. “You had sauce on your face,” he said.
“Did not, pervert.”
Win licked his thumb and said, “Delicious,” with a smirk.
When Team pushed him over, Win dragged him down too.
•
On the drive back to work, Team thinks about Win’s message. Why did Dean even mention Team’s hospital visit to Win? What were they talking about that Team would even come up? Or was it something as simple as Dean talking to Pharm in the middle of playing his game with Win and then saying, “Sorry, Pharm might have to pick up Team from the hospital.”
Maybe it was just Win’s first impulse to reach out and express concern. He’d probably do the same for anyone he likes. It’s not as though he and Win hate each other now or anything.
After he parks, Team follows Manaow’s suggestion and writes, ’I’m fine, hia. Thanks for thinking of me.’
He thinks of the other part Manaow suggested. Of adding something to encourage the conversation to continue.
It has to mean something that Win’s still single.
Doesn’t it?
He could have had someone else within hours of their breakup if he wanted.
Unless Win just prefers being single now.
Maybe Team destroyed his whole outlook on relationships.
Team sends the message as is, leaves his car, and shoves his phone in his back pocket as he walks to the pier. His boss scheduled him to take a honeymooning couple out for a lunch in the yacht for a few hours, and then he can head home to pretend he isn’t on tenterhooks waiting for Win’s response.
If he hasn’t responded already.
Team doesn’t check.
He and Mork work together setting up the final touches on the yacht’s interior. There’s a surprise cake for the customers that Mork picked up from the bakery and is now chilling in the fridge, a playlist of artists they got from the customers’ travel agent, and a table set for a very fancy lunch that Team will be serving them.
When it’s all done, Mork busies himself at the steering wheel while Team sits on the pier to wait for the couple to arrive.
His phone might as well be a fire brand for how well he can ignore it.
He spots two women tentatively walking down the pier, curiosity clear in the way they lean to try and see the name of the yacht. Team grins, climbing to his feet as he waves them down.
The one he spoke to over the phone is Sandee, and her wife’s name is Kitty.
Inside the yacht, Kitty sheepishly asks for a phone charger and while Team takes her phone to plug it in, Sandee explains, “She’s waiting for our wedding photos and she’s been checking so much she drained the battery.”
Kitty says, “True,” with a smile and not a drop of shame.
“It’s one in the afternoon,” Sandee tells her, smiling. “That battery’s supposed to last ’til, like, eight.”
Kitty says, “I want to see our wedding photos, leave me alone,” and gently shoves her wife’s shoulder.
Team smiles. His mind, treacherous to him in a way it hasn’t been for months, calls up the possibility that the longer he ignores Win’s response—the one Win may or may not have even sent at all—the more the threat of Win meeting someone new increases.
They dated for six months, they’ve been broken up for six months—the last year has been a relentless cascade of high octane emotion. Team managed, miraculously, to keep Win (mostly) out of mind for almost a month before this, and now one message from Win—one simple question without a shred of obvious emotion to it—has shattered Team’s hard-won placidity.
Once he’s served lunch and talked to Kitty and Sandee about their honeymoon trip around the country, he gets out of their way and hangs out a few meters away with Mork near the steering wheel.
Mork, who doesn’t talk much in the first place, and even less when he’s on the job.
Team folds his arms and leans his back against the wall, allowing his eyes to settle on Sandee and Kitty for a while. In case he notices that they need something. Not because he’s lonely. And a tiny bit envious.
He doesn’t even want someone new. He never has. That’s never what it was about.
He thought Win wanted to keep things casual.
He thought he’d fallen and Win hadn’t.
He thought he wanted things Win didn’t.
…He thinks he thought that.
The truth is, he doesn’t remember anymore what he was thinking.
He’s told and retold the story to himself so many times over the past six months that he’s lost all of his objective memories of what happened and what he was thinking. Even Pharm only has Team’s initial version of things, over a month after the breakup itself. He’s tried to get more information from Dean, but apparently Dean won’t breathe a word of Win’s side to anyone—even Pharm.
Forty minutes into the trip, Kitty stands up from the table and retrieves her phone. Once she sits next to Sandee, they bend their heads close together as Kitty presumably checks her email. When the yacht turns and the wind curls inside, twisting Kitty’s hair into a whirl, Sandee says, “Turn your head,” and dutifully puts Kitty’s hair into a ponytail with the black tie wrapped around her own wrist.
“I’ll braid yours in a bit,” Kitty says, distracted as she refreshes her inbox with quick swipes of her thumb.
Sandee smiles and rests her chin on Kitty’s shoulder. “Thanks.”
“Ah!” Kitty cries, her smile broad. “They’re here! He sent them!”
Sandee says, “Hurry up,” and cinches her arms around Kitty’s stomach.
“I’m hurrying! It’s downloading.”
Team and Mork exchange an amused smile, then Team heads over to be nosy.
He peeks over Kitty’s other shoulder and says, “Wow,” with feeling.
Their wedding dresses were complementary shades of silvery blue and tawny amber, their hair done up like ornate braided masterpieces, and the first photo on Kitty’s phone shows them standing with their foreheads touching in front of a waterfall.
“He did such a good job,” Kitty says, her hand over her mouth.
Sandee tucks an arm around Kitty’s waist and kisses her cheek. “I’ll tell him his photos made you cry.”
“Not yet, but shortly,” Kitty says. “Very imminently.“ She rests her head on Sandee’s shoulder as she keeps swiping through the photos.
To Team, Sandee says, “Our friend Pete was our photographer.”
Team nods and says, “He’s talented.”
No one Team knows is into photography at that level. If he ever got married (to anyone) he’d have to hire someone.
Unless Win knows someo—
Stop, Team tells himself.
He returns to the steering wheel and remains there for the rest of the trip, leaving the happy couple to peruse their photos and walk around the outside of the boat, Kitty sitting on the topmost step with Sandee between her thighs, both of them comfortable and relaxed and starting down a path together that Team can’t see for himself.
•
On the walk home, Team tries to remember the breakup objectively.
As nebulous as their relationship had been, there was nothing nebulous about their breakup.
Win asked Team to meet him for lunch at an international food festival near the beach where Team works, and Team decided halfway into eating an especially spicy bowl of Indian curry to ask Win, “Have you ever thought about who you’ll end up with?”
They’d nabbed seats on a stone wall overlooking the sand and waves, and Team’s attention was two-thirds focused on defending his paper bowl from the ocean gusts threatening to upend it and the food inside it all over Team’s chest.
So he missed Win’s initial reaction, but by the silence, he figures Win looked confused by the sudden topic shift. They’d been talking about how difficult riding a bicycle in the sand would be, or if it would even work.
Win asked him, “What do you mean?”
When Team glanced at him, he found Win frowning, his eyes fixed on Team almost aggressively. Team put a spoonful of rice into his mouth to buy some time. Win kept staring at him, but his eyes flicked to the spoon and back to Team’s eyes as if to say, Really?
Mouth full, Team said, “I just think—”
“Maybe swallow first,” Win advised.
Team gave him an exasperated look but followed along with the suggestion, his last few chews exaggerated. He even opened his mouth to prove there was nothing left, and Win said, “Charming,” in a voice that made it clear he thought it was anything but.
Team heard the affection underneath it, though.
He pushed through the stab of uncertainty and said, “You know, like. Long-term, what are you thinking? I know you want to get married to someone once that’s been legalized.”
He watched Win’s expression this time, and knew he’d made a hit. He couldn’t tell if it was positive or negative, just that he’d cast a net without knowing if he’d catch anything and the net had gone taut.
Win licked his lips, then turned his face toward the sea. While that brilliant mind of his worked, Team felt dread pooling in his stomach.
What did I ask him that for?
(He doesn’t remember why he asked.)
(Maybe he does.)
The longer Win said nothing, the more the pressure between them built.
Team said, “Maybe I’m wrong,” cautiously. “I just know when you’ve talked to friends about it you look really into the idea.”
(He doesn’t know why he brought it up.)
(He doesn’t, really.)
Win nodded. “Yeah,” he said, vaguely. “I want to. Someday.”
Team waited for more, but then Win met his eyes and asked, “What about you?”
Team asked, “What about me, what? Marriage?”
Win’s expression began to show troubling warning signs. He wasn’t happy. Team didn’t know why or how bad it was yet, but he definitely wasn’t happy.
“Yeah,” Win said. “You’re not into it?”
(Maybe…that had been a question with more than one meaning.)
Team told him, “I don’t know. Not really, I guess.”
He still knows now with perfect clarity what he thought after that, because it was the dominant thought in the entirety of their Whatever Dynamic: I still can’t believe I get to hang out with you and sleep with you. What would marriage change? It doesn’t matter. It’s just a contract.
Win nodded, then studied the beach with a frightening level of intensity.
When he spoke next, he said, “Team,” like he felt nauseous even saying it.
Team said, “Yeah?” He’d reached the end of his curry, but he needed something to do with his hands and to keep his eyes busy, so he scraped the red-stained bottom of the paper bowl and tried not to breathe too strangely.
“You know you don’t have to force yourself,” Win told him. He glanced at Team only long enough that Team could see incomprehensible labyrinthian emotions in his eyes.
Team asked, “What’s that mean?”
With his plastic spoon, he sketched a white outline of a shark through the curry stains on the bottom of his bowl. Icy fingers carefully closed around his heart.
“I care about you,” Win said. “I want you to be happy.”
The sound of the waves augmented for some reason.
Team felt sick.
“Right,” he said. He peeked up at Win and found his gaze locked there, even though Win seemed intent on the waves again.
Then Win said, “I don’t know if we want the same things,” and in a single shrieking instant, all Team could think was:
Don’t.
and
Please.
•
He agreed to a breakup he didn’t want to agree to because the alternative was showing his hand. Showing how deep he’d fallen. Showing how unattractively needy he’d become in such a short time. Maybe worst of all: showing how little he’d understood what had been going on between them and ending up looking ridiculous and naive and inexperienced as a result.
Now he suspects that Win might have cared for him more than Team thought at the time.
But as Team has told himself many times:
If I fell like that for him, who’s to say it can’t happen again with someone else?
When he expressed this to Pharm a few weeks ago, Pharm nodded with an encouraging smile.
“Do you want help setting up a dating app?” he asked.
They were in Pharm’s living room eating bowls of homemade curry, and Team had to concentrate to avoid looking at any of the dozen reminders of Pharm’s boyfriend scattered around the space. From the many photos framed on the wall to the expensive souvenirs Dean brings back for Pharm from countries all around the world, it was a herculean task.
Team said, “I’m not into online dating. I know it’s how you and Dean met, but Manaow’s horror stories are probably more likely for most people.”
“Maybe Dean knows someone?”
“No,” Team said, grimacing. Anyone Dean could introduce to him has a high probability of knowing Win, too.
“Well—”
“I’ll just die alone,” Team said, patting Pharm’s knee. “It’s okay, Pharm. I’ll get a dog and a cat and live on a houseboat and talk to myself until I start talking back.”
He earned himself a dry smile from Pharm with that, and then they moved onto a new subject.
•
The first time Win spent the night at Team’s place, they didn’t actually sleep.
Team thinks about it more often than he’ll ever tell anyone.
But it’s normal to reflect on good sex. Just because Win’s his ex doesn’t make the sex retroactively bad, and it’s fine if Team thinks about it sometimes. There’s worse he could do. He could stalk Win online, and he doesn’t do that anymore.
They were in the nebulous area between dating and not dating for at least a month after they met at the surprise birthday party Dean threw for Pharm. Win zeroed in on him about halfway into the party and Team decided within twenty minutes to shake him, find Pharm, and demand to know if Win was actually into men or if he was just screwing with Team for fun.
Pharm left to ask Dean, but before he could make his way back with an answer, Win leaned on the wall behind Team and said, “You could just ask me.”
Team’s soul left his body. He curled his fist on the wall, breathed in deep, and turned around to glare at the smirk on Win’s lips.
After the party, Win showed up in the beachfront parking lot on his motorcycle to pick up Team from work a few nights a week. He knew Team’s company and he knew Team lived within walking distance, so the ruse was obvious from the beginning. The first night he appeared, Team asked him some questions to figure out Win’s motives, but Win teased him for asking and told him to hop on.
(There’s no stronger evidence of Team’s feelings, even that early on, than the fact that he let Win drive him anywhere on that thing more than once.)
They split dinner at a seafood barbecue place down the road with a view of the sun setting over the ocean, and then Win dropped Team off at his small beachside cottage.
Team remembers standing next to the motorcycle listening to the engine purr as Win’s eyes locked steadily onto his.
He wanted to ask a torrent of questions, all urgent and yet held back along with his breath.
The silence—and the staring—continued until Win, without breaking eye contact, turned off the engine.
Team realized it for the question it was, and he said, “You could come in for a bit,” and winced.
However, Win strangely didn’t take the opportunity to call him out on his awkwardness.
He followed Team inside, and the next day he drove Team to work twenty seconds down the street.
•
When Team arrives at his cottage, Win’s sitting on the front steps.
He’s on the topmost one with his arms around his knees. He looks very young like that, and yet Team is still frozen at the sight of him.
While Team was staring at the sandy path leading up from the beach as he walks, it seems like Win was watching him approach. His motorcycle is parked exactly where he left it every time he came over. There are tire tracks in the wet soil for the first time in six months.
“No one will tell me why you needed to go to the hospital,“ Win says. His voice is quiet in a way Team has never heard it before.
Team says, “It was a stomach infection, I think. It’s already gone.”
Win’s gaze drifts down to his knees. “Oh.” He nods, then stands. And stays.
If Team had any confidence at all in reading Win’s body language, he’d say Win doesn’t know why he’s still here.
“Were you worried about me?” Team asks.
Win says, “Yeah,” without much thought and pushes his fringe back from his face. He doesn’t like to tie it up when he wears his helmet, he says. Said. “I’m sorry I came over. I just thought I’d check on you.” He glances up at Team. “I guess I could have asked over text, though.”
“You did,” Team says. He licks his lips. “This morning. Did you get my message?”
Win nods. He shifts his weight from one leg to the other, and folds his arms over his chest. “I was going to write back, but I was, um. I couldn’t decide if—” He rolls a hand in a tiny circle, indicating there are different words he wants but he can’t summon. Finally, he gives a small breath of exhaustion and says, “I’ve spent the last six months trying to get Dean to tell me what you’ve told Pharm about me, but Pharm won’t tell him anything, and apparently even if he did, Dean still wouldn’t tell me.” He meets Team’s eyes with a kind of mine-cart-off-the-tracks determination. “I don’t know if we were ever on the same page—and I know that’s my fault, and I’m sorry that I never made myself clear—but I think where we went worst was thinking this was over before it was.”
The sound of the waves soothe the flare of slow-dawning shock in Team’s chest.
In that same quiet voice from the top of this surreal encounter, Win asks, “Did you ever realize you made me nervous, too?”
Team says, “No,” then, “What?” then, ”Why?” in rapid succession.
The first shadow of a smile curves Win’s mouth, and he takes one step down. One of three. “Because,” he says, “you’re hard to read—” middle step “—ornery—” bottom step “—and skittish.“
In an instant, Team stops himself from moving back the way his muscles were tensing to do. He didn’t realize how close he was standing to the steps, and now, by proxy, to Win.
“I don’t want to assume anything,” Win tells him. “So could you let me know whether I’m right or not that the way you’re looking at me means you don’t hate me?”
“I don’t hate you,” Team says. And, because he doesn’t know what his face is making Win think, he adds, “I didn’t want to break up with you, either.”
Win’s answering expression to that is beyond Team’s comprehension.
Before Win can make any assumptions, Team says, “I don’t care about marriage. It doesn’t matter, so it’s not a deal-breaker for me, but if I was ever with someone like you who wanted to, I would, because it matters to you.” Team wonders if his mine cart analogy is contagious. “I didn’t know you would break up with me over it, but I didn’t want to fight with you, so I just agreed to it, and I shouldn’t have, so I’m sorry.”
Win says, “I didn’t break up with you because you don’t want to get married,” so slowly, it sounds like he’s absorbing this concept for the very first time.
“What?”
Win stares at him, eyebrows pinched. “I broke up with you because you didn’t want me,” he says, blunt and curt.
When Team can’t find a response to that, he just says, ”What?” again, helpless and frustrated.
“You asked me who I want to end up with,” Win says. “You—” He stops and studies Team’s face as if Team is a person he’s met six times and still can’t put to memory. “What exactly were you asking me that for, if not trying to tell me you didn’t want to be with me long-term?”
“I didn’t…know you wanted to be with me…long-term,” Team says. He’s not sure when he blinked last. He sees disbelief clear as day on Win’s face and says, “My ambitions weren’t that high, okay?”
“Yeah, I know, I get it,” Win says, and the bitterness in his voice is the second shock to Team’s system.
“No,” Team says, “you really don’t. Not if you think I didn’t want you.” He takes the beaded bracelet Win always wears between his thumb and first two fingers and pulls until their arms rest in a deep V between them. “I was just happy to be dating you at all,” he says, and if he’s not mistaken, he sounds a little like Win did when he first spoke just a few minutes ago.
Win turns his hand, so Team releases his bracelet, and the first touch of Win’s palm to his own in over half a year has Team breaking eye contact just to watch it happen.
“I didn’t know long-term was an option,” Team says.
“Yeah,” Win says. “I get that now.” He squeezes Team’s hand tight and it’s a few seconds before his grip relaxes. “My fault. I thought I was being obvious about it.”
Team says, “You probably were,” and gives their jointed hands a small, experimental swing. “I just didn’t want to hope for too much.”
“Why not?” Win asks.
Team says, “I don’t know.” He does, but he doesn’t want to admit any more. His ego is on stilts as it is and admitting that he thinks Win is outrageously out of his league—wealthy, well-connected, ambitious, successful, gorgeous—will probably splinter the stilts to pieces.
Win lifts Team’s hand to his lips and, when Team only watches him do it, he touches a kiss to the space between Team’s third and fourth knuckles. “Going forward,” Win says, “I’m not going to be ambiguous about this. Understand?”
Team nods. He feels a smile twitch to life.
Win sees it and smiles wider. “Stop that,” he says, “I’m not done.”
Team smooths his face and says, “I want to keep dating you.”
“I was about to ask.”
“But you didn’t.”
“I—” Win rolls his eyes to the sky, sighs with exasperation he doesn’t mean, and pins Team with a stare until Team grins back at him, shameless for the first time in half a year.
Maybe longer.
“You didn’t say yes,” Team points out.
“You didn’t propose,” Win says, flat.
Team raises his eyebrows.
Win puts a hand over Team’s mouth and says, “Ignore that I said that. Let’s table that joke for a while.”
Team nods, and when Win moves his hand, he says, “Ask me again next year.”
Win blinks at him, mouth slightly ajar.
It seems the mine cart analogy may have spread to their jokes as well.
•
Later, Team slides the porch door open to swap out the smell of sex with the scent of brine. He stretches his arms over his head while Win, showered and naked on his bed, watches him with an emotion Team once mislabeled on purpose.
Simultaneously sated and starved, Team returns to him.
He’ll make Win drive him to work tomorrow, twenty seconds down the road.