Archive of Our Own

Tyler is pretty sure the back of Mark's shitty van wasn't designed for human occupancy.

Then again, he's not entirely sure the rest of Mark's shitty van was designed for human occupancy, either.

There are two rows of actual seats, both nearly full by the time Tyler climbs in, which leaves him with the remaining patch of floor behind the last row and in front of the rear doors.

It's fine.

Not comfortable, exactly, but fine.

They're driving several hours out of town to see a band that isn't really worth driving several hours out of town to see. The tickets were cheap. The venue is small. Under ordinary circumstances, it probably wouldn't qualify as an event.

They've made it one anyway.

The band's music is already blasting loudly enough through the speakers that everyone has to talk over it, which means everyone is yelling. Joints are making their way from hand to hand. Somebody keeps laughing hard enough to set everybody else off without anyone knowing what they're laughing about.

Tyler is wedged onto the floor in the middle of all of it, perfectly content.

Except Mark can't fucking drive.

"Jesus Christ, Mark."

His complaint disappears beneath several others as the van hits another rough patch of road and Tyler bounces hard enough to feel it through his teeth.

"Road!" somebody yells.

"I see it!"

"Then why'd you hit it?"

Mark turns the music up.

Apparently that's his answer.

The van's suspension isn't helping. Every crack in the pavement travels directly through the floor and into Tyler's ass, and every turn Mark takes seems to come as a personal surprise to everyone inside the vehicle. Tyler braces a hand against the wall as Mark takes another one.

"Fuck!"

He slides several inches anyway.

By the time they reach their final stop, Tyler has accepted that this is simply how he's going to die.

The side door opens.

"You fuckers didn't save me a seat?"

Tyler can't see much from where he's sitting, just another body standing outside beneath the weak spill of a streetlight before somebody in the middle row moves enough to let the guy climb in.

"There is a seat," Mark says.

"Where?"

"In the back."

A pause.

"That's not a seat."

"Tyler's back there. Go sit with him."

"Oh, cool. The floor."

The door slides shut again.

Tyler watches the newcomer awkwardly maneuver around knees and bags until he finally makes it over the last row. He lowers himself into the small amount of floor space beside Tyler and settles back against the rear doors.

For a second, they're just two shapes facing each other in the dark.

"Hi," the guy says. "I'm on the floor with you."

Tyler laughs. "Hi."

"I'm Josh."

"Tyler."

Mark starts moving again before Josh has completely situated himself, and Josh immediately slides sideways into Tyler.

"Whoa—shit. Sorry."

Tyler catches himself against the door and starts laughing again. "Yeah, you gotta prepare yourself back here."

"I see that."

"We got the good seats."

Josh seems to look around at the bare floor. "The premium package?"

"Front row."

"Best view in the house."

"Exactly."

It is, objectively, a terrible place to sit. Tyler doesn't particularly care.

It's dark enough that Josh is mostly pieces whenever they pass beneath the streetlights—a cheek, the edge of his nose, dark shapes and brief impressions—and then he's gone again, swallowed by the dim interior of the van. Tyler gets his voice more than anything. His laugh. The easy way he talks.

Josh is remarkably easy to talk to for somebody Tyler met approximately three minutes ago on the floor of a moving vehicle.

The moving vehicle continues to be the problem.

Mark takes another turn and Josh crashes into Tyler. They shove themselves apart, laughing, only for Tyler to get thrown into Josh two minutes later.

"Sorry."

"You're good."

Another turn. Another collision.

"Jesus fucking Christ, Mark!"

From somewhere up front comes, "What?"

"Learn to drive!"

"I know how to drive!"

The entire van erupts in disagreement.

Josh is laughing beside him, his shoulder pressed against Tyler's while they wait for the road to straighten out again.

Eventually, they stop apologizing. There doesn't seem to be much point. They keep getting thrown into each other anyway, and after enough attempts at independently bracing themselves against the walls, Tyler turns toward Josh.

"This isn't working."

"No."

"We need a system."

"What?"

"Buddy system."

That breaks him.

Josh folds forward laughing, and Tyler starts laughing because Josh is laughing, which makes both of them considerably less prepared when Mark swerves around something in the road.

They slam sideways together.

"See?" Tyler says. "We're stronger together."

"Okay. Buddy system."

They reposition themselves against the rear doors, shoulder to shoulder, arms pressed together, their combined weight making them at least marginally harder for Mark to fling around.

It actually works.

Sort of.

"This is better."

"Much safer."

Mark takes another turn too fast.

They both slide.

"MARK!"

Mark ignores them.

Josh starts laughing again. Tyler does too.

By the time somebody announces that they need gas, the buddy system has survived several turns, two potholes, and one braking incident that sends both of them halfway toward the last row of seats.

Mark pulls beneath the fluorescent lights of a gas station. Doors open almost immediately, and everyone starts piling out at once, talking about bathrooms and drinks and cigarettes and whatever else they apparently can't survive the rest of the drive without.

Tyler stays where he is.

So does Josh.

Within a minute, the van is almost completely empty.

Under the fluorescent lights of the gas station, Tyler finally gets a proper look at Josh.

Oh.

New information gathered.

Josh is extremely attractive.

Not abstractly attractive. Not in a way Tyler can casually register, appreciate, and then move on with his life.

He's really fucking pretty.

Not even pretty in a particularly delicate way. Masculine pretty. Dark eyebrows beneath pink hair, strong features, a face Tyler has apparently been sitting beside for the last stretch of highway without possessing all the necessary information.

Tyler's brain flatlines for a second.

Which is ridiculous.

This is still Josh. Same guy he's been talking to. Same guy he's been laughing with. Same guy Mark has repeatedly launched into him through vehicular negligence.

Except now Tyler can see him properly.

And apparently that changes things.

Josh glances over.

Tyler looks away.

Cool.

Great.

He pulls his knees up and rests his chin against one of them, giving his arms somewhere specific to be because, for reasons he doesn't particularly care to examine, he'd really like to touch Josh's hair.

Not even anything complicated.

He just wants to put his hands in it.

Which seems like an intrusive thing to do to someone he's known for less than an hour, so knees it is.

Tyler looks over again.

Josh is already looking at him.

Their eyes meet.

Josh looks away this time.

Oh.

Tyler doesn't know what that means.

He does know it happens again.

And then again.

Neither of them says anything about it. The awareness simply enters the van with them and stays.

Josh pulls out a small bag of weed and papers and starts rolling a joint while they wait for everybody else to come back. Tyler watches his fingers work, catches himself doing that, and redirects his attention somewhere else.

For approximately five seconds.

By the time everyone piles back into the van and Mark gets them moving again, Josh has lit it. The cherry brightens whenever he takes a hit, periodically illuminating his face in the otherwise dark van.

This is not particularly helpful.

Josh lowers the joint.

"Do you smoke?"

"I could."

Josh pauses.

Tyler pauses.

What the fuck kind of answer was that?

"I mean—" Tyler shakes his head. "Not really."

"Not really?"

"I've done it."

"And?"

Tyler shrugs. "Being high was fine. Good, actually. Everything tasted amazing. Then I fell asleep."

"Sounds terrible."

"No, that part was great. It's this part." Tyler gestures toward the joint. "I hate coughing. It feels like my lungs are trying to leave."

Josh laughs.

"I'm serious. I coughed so hard the last time that I decided being high wasn't worth having my chest hurt for an hour."

"Fair."

Josh takes another hit.

"No peer pressure."

Which should be reassuring.

Instead, Tyler discovers that he's not entirely sure he objects to being peer-pressured by Josh.

Interesting.

He files that information away with the rest of tonight's increasingly concerning discoveries.

Mark hits something in the road.

The entire back of the van jumps.

"Jesus—"

Tyler gets thrown sideways just as Josh pitches toward him. They collide, Josh catches himself against the rear door, and something small goes bouncing across the floor.

"The joint!"

It rolls several feet forward before stopping.

Neither of them immediately goes after it. They're too busy trying not to become projectiles.

"MARK!"

"What?"

"Nothing!" Josh yells. "You're doing great!"

Tyler starts laughing.

A hand rises from the driver's seat in response, middle finger extended.

It takes another minute before the road settles enough for Tyler to crawl forward and retrieve the joint. He picks it up, looks at it, then looks at Josh.

Josh raises his eyebrows.

Tyler looks back at the joint.

Fuck it.

He puts it to his lips and takes a hit.

For approximately two seconds, everything is fine.

Then his lungs attempt the escape he'd warned Josh about.

Tyler folds forward coughing.

"Oh my God."

Josh is laughing.

"Fuck you."

"I didn't say anything!"

Tyler coughs again and blindly holds the joint toward him. Josh takes it.

"Nope."

"You okay?"

"No. Nope. Still terrible."

"You took a pretty big hit."

"Because I don't know what I'm doing."

"I gathered that."

Tyler finally manages a full breath and leans back against the doors, eyes watering.

"See? This is why I don't smoke."

"Point proven."

For once, Mark manages to keep the van relatively steady.

The highway stretches out ahead of them, and the chaos settles with it. Conversation from the front becomes background noise. The music keeps playing. Streetlights pass rhythmically overhead, briefly illuminating the back of the van before dropping it into darkness again.

Tyler's chest stops burning.

He looks over.

Josh is looking at him.

Light.

Dark.

Josh looks away.

Tyler does too.

A few seconds pass.

Tyler looks back.

So does Josh.

Okay.

Tyler knows why he keeps doing it. That's become embarrassingly obvious. Josh is pretty. Tyler likes looking at him. Simple enough.

What Tyler doesn't know is why, every time he gives himself permission to look again, Josh seems to be doing exactly the same thing.

Neither of them is subtle enough to make the attraction invisible.

Neither of them has said anything that requires them to acknowledge it, either.

So they don't.

Then Mark takes one of the big curving ramps onto another highway, and whatever peace existed in the back of the van immediately ends.

"Oh, fuck—"

Tyler barely gets a hand down before the turn sends Josh sliding across the floor.

Josh hits him almost full-body.

Tyler catches him on instinct and immediately falls backward under the additional weight, shoulders hitting the floor hard enough to knock a laugh out of him.

"Jesus Christ."

Josh is laughing too.

For a second, that's all it is.

The latest installment of Mark Trying to Kill Them.

Josh catches himself with both hands against the floor, one on either side of Tyler, leaving Tyler flat on his back beneath him.

"MARK!"

There's no response from the front.

"He's gonna fucking kill us," Tyler says.

"I know."

Neither of them is laughing quite as hard anymore.

Because Josh hasn't moved.

Tyler looks up at him.

Josh looks down.

Oh.

There it is again.

That thing from before.

Except there isn't a streetlight and several feet of space between them now.

Josh is right there.

Close enough that Tyler can actually examine the pink hair he's been trying very hard not to touch. Close enough that Tyler suddenly becomes aware of where his own hands landed when he caught him.

Close enough that there is absolutely no reason for Josh to still be hovering over him.

One second passes.

Maybe two.

Josh's eyes flick briefly downward.

Then he pushes himself back.

"Have you ever done a shotgun?"

Tyler's brain is still somewhere on the floor.

"A what?"

Josh settles cross-legged across from him again.

"A shotgun."

"That did not help."

Josh laughs.

"With weed."

"Oh."

Tyler sits up.

Still nothing.

"No."

"It's smoother."

"What is?"

"The hit." Josh lifts the joint. "I take it, then you inhale it from me."

Tyler looks at him.

"How?"

Josh gestures vaguely between their faces.

Oh.

Oh.

"You just get close," Josh explains. "I blow it to you. You breathe it in. You shouldn't cough as much."

Tyler processes this.

This is probably a terrible idea.

Josh's face would be very close to his.

This is definitely a terrible idea.

Because Josh's face would be very close to his.

"Okay."

Josh's eyebrows lift slightly. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"All right."

Josh brings the joint to his mouth.

Tyler watches the end glow. Josh lowers it, leans forward—

And Tyler abruptly understands that close meant close.

There isn't really anywhere useful to look. Josh's eyes seem too intimate from here. His mouth seems significantly worse.

Tyler settles for somewhere around the bridge of his nose.

Josh exhales slowly.

Tyler breathes in, then immediately pulls back.

He waits.

Nothing.

No violent coughing. No sensation that his lungs are attempting to turn themselves inside out.

"Oh."

Josh grins. "Better?"

"Way better."

"Told you."

Tyler looks at the joint.

Then at Josh.

"Again?"

Something changes in Josh's smile.

"Yeah."

The second time is easier.

Tyler knows what's coming now. Josh leans in, Tyler stays put long enough to inhale, and when he moves away again, he doesn't retreat nearly as far.

The third time, Josh comes closer.

Tyler notices.

He isn't sure whether Josh actually does it or whether Josh's face simply feels closer because Tyler is beginning to get pleasantly fuzzy around the edges.

Either way, he doesn't move back.

The next time, Tyler closes some of the distance himself.

Their eyes meet for half a second.

Josh almost loses the smoke because he starts laughing.

Tyler does too.

"You're wasting it."

"You're laughing!"

"So are you."

"Because you are."

They manage eventually.

Barely.

By the fourth hit, Tyler is very fucking high.

Warm. Heavy. Happy.

Josh's face keeps drifting pleasantly in and out of his immediate vicinity, and Tyler has largely stopped questioning why he likes that so much.

The highway rolls beneath them.

Josh takes another hit. Tyler leans forward before he even has to.

And neither of them remembers the most important variable in this entire experiment.

Mark.

The van jerks.

Josh pitches forward.

Tyler does too.

Their mouths collide.

It's not graceful. Their lips hit a little too hard, noses nearly knocking together, and Tyler makes a startled sound against Josh's mouth.

They pull back—

Barely.

Just enough to correct the collision. Just enough that their mouths aren't mashed awkwardly together anymore.

And then neither of them goes any farther.

Tyler freezes.

Josh does too.

The accident is over.

Their mouths are still touching.

There is one tiny, suspended fraction of time in which Tyler knows perfectly well that Mark's driving no longer explains this.

Josh's chin tips forward.

Barely.

Tyler's does the same.

And their lips press together just a little harder.

Then Josh pulls back.

He immediately starts coughing.

Tyler stares at him.

One second.

Two.

And then he completely loses his fucking mind.

Maybe it's the weed. Maybe it's the absurdity of what just happened. Maybe it's the fact that they've spent the last several minutes hovering around each other's mouths only for Mark's shitty driving to finally finish the job for them.

Probably all three.

Tyler folds forward, laughing so hard his stomach hurts.

"Dude."

Josh is still coughing.

"Dude."

"What?" Josh manages.

"We just met."

That gets the beginning of a laugh out of Josh between coughs.

Tyler points at him as though the rest of his argument requires visual emphasis.

"And then we just kissed."

Josh breaks.

Whatever coughing fit he'd been trying to recover from turns into helpless laughter, and that only makes Tyler laugh harder.

"I know."

"We just fucking met!"

"I know!"

They're both howling now. Tyler falls sideways against the back doors, Josh nearly folding himself in half beside him.

"This date is going really fucking well," Josh manages.

Tyler's head snaps toward him.

"Date?"

That makes Josh laugh harder.

"This isn't a date."

"I know."

"We're on the floor of Mark's van."

"Great first date."

Tyler shoves at his arm.

Josh shoves back.

Neither of them is capable of recovering for another minute.

Eventually, somehow, they do.

The laughter burns itself down into occasional leftover snorts and stupid little giggles. The van rattles beneath them, and Tyler becomes aware of the joint still between Josh's fingers.

And then, unfortunately, he becomes aware of Josh's mouth again.

He looks at the joint.

Looks at Josh.

"So..."

Josh raises his eyebrows.

"Shotgun me maybe one more?"

Tyler considers.

"Or two?"

There's a tiny pause.

Then Josh says, "Yeah."

Tyler doesn't know what, exactly, the way he says it does to his insides.

He's too high to investigate.

Josh takes another hit.

This time, when he leans forward, Tyler meets him halfway.

There isn't nearly as much hesitation anymore. Josh exhales, Tyler breathes in, and their faces stay close for one lingering second afterward before Tyler pulls away, already grinning.

Josh starts laughing.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"What?"

"You're laughing."

"So are you."

"Because you are."

Tyler decides this is reasonable.

The next one goes about the same way. Maybe even a little smoother.

Josh leans in.

Tyler leans in.

Smoke passes between them.

Nobody kisses anybody.

Nobody gets launched across the van.

Successful research.

They still pull apart giggling.

By the time the joint has burned down to something neither of them particularly wants to negotiate with anymore, Tyler is pleasantly, thoroughly stoned.

Josh puts it out.

And that's that.

No elaborate excuse appears for them to keep putting their faces together.

Tyler doesn't look for one.

Neither does Josh.

They just return to the buddy system.

Tyler settles back against the rear doors, shoulder against Josh's, their arms pressed together. Josh leans into him.

Tyler leans back.

Apparently kissing someone does not disqualify them from the buddy system.

Good to know.

For a while, Tyler is simply having an absolutely wonderful time.

He isn't entirely sure what they're laughing about anymore. Josh laughs, Tyler starts laughing because Josh is laughing, and Josh sees Tyler laughing and laughs harder, which makes Tyler laugh harder.

Neither one of them seems capable of identifying where the original joke went.

At some point, there probably wasn't one.

Then, somewhere in the middle of this, Tyler's body delivers a message of catastrophic importance.

He stops laughing.

His stomach feels fucking hollow.

Oh my God.

Tyler sits up.

"I'm so fucking hungry, guys!"

Nothing from the front.

Josh immediately starts laughing again.

Tyler ignores him.

This is serious.

"SNACKS!"

Josh folds over.

"I need them!"

"Tyler—"

"I NEED THEM NOW!"

Josh is nearly incapacitated beside him.

Tyler looks toward the front of the van, appalled by the complete lack of urgency being demonstrated by everyone else.

No one responds.

+

When they finally stop and park at the venue, Tyler struggles spectacularly to get himself out of the van.

The rest of the group watches this process with increasing amusement.

Mark looks at him, eyebrows furrowed. "Dude. What the fuck happened to you?"

Tyler, now possessing essentially no barrier whatsoever between thought and speech, decides to provide a concise report.

He points accusingly at Mark.

"You suck at driving."

Then he points at Josh.

"This guy's extremely pretty."

Then he points at himself.

"I need a lot of snacks."

Three facts.

All apparently of equal importance.

Mark looks from an incredibly stoned Tyler to an also incredibly stoned Josh, who is visibly failing to hold in his laughter at Tyler's declarations.

It doesn't take much detective work.

"You got him stoned, didn't you?"

By this point, Tyler has wandered away from the immediate group and is leaning against the side of the van, apparently satisfied that his contribution to the investigation is complete.

Josh doesn't answer.

Instead, he straightens with enormous statesmanlike dignity and points at Mark.

"And you, sir, are a fucking terrible driver."

"TERRIBLE!" Tyler shouts from several feet away.

Josh glances toward him, then, apparently encouraged by the enthusiastic support of his distant political ally, hooks a thumb over his shoulder in Tyler's direction.

"He's really pretty, too."

Tyler blinks.

Oh.

"SO PRETTYYY!" he yells.

Josh somehow manages to remain serious.

"We need snacks."

"SNACKS!"

The Back-of-the-Van Party has officially established its platform:

Pretty guys.

Better driving.

Immediate snack access.

Nobody else acknowledges their newly formed two-man government.

The group simply starts walking toward the venue. Nobody interrogates them about calling each other pretty. Nobody asks what the hell happened between them in the back of the van. Nobody seems particularly interested in assuming responsibility for either of them anymore.

Tyler doesn't follow.

He stays where he is, leaning against the van, perfectly content.

Josh watches everyone else leave, then looks back at Tyler.

And instead of following them, he wanders over.

Tyler smiles at him.

It feels like a very good smile.

Soft and warm and probably a little stupid.

Josh takes one look at him and starts laughing again.

"What?"

Josh shakes his head, still laughing.

Apparently Tyler doesn't even need to do anything anymore.

"They're leaving us," Josh tells him.

Tyler looks toward the departing group.

He is profoundly unconcerned.

"They don't have any snacks anyway."

Josh considers this.

"We can go get snacks."

Problem solved.

+

By the time Tyler and Josh finally make it inside the venue with everyone else, Tyler has acquired snacks.

Several of them.

This improves his circumstances considerably.

The band they're seeing is, objectively, kind of shitty.

Tyler does not care.

Neither, apparently, does Josh.

For the first part of the show, Tyler is still high enough that everything maintains some of the ridiculous hilarity of the van ride. The lights are incredible. The bass is incredible. The snacks had been incredible. At one point, Tyler is reasonably certain the floor itself is incredible.

Everything is fucking incredible.

Gradually, though, the fuzziness starts to fade. Tyler's head clears. His energy comes back. The exhilaration of the crowd takes over where the weed leaves off, and somewhere along the way he stops being particularly high at all.

He doesn't stop having fun.

Neither does Josh.

Tyler also discovers very quickly that he is an atrocious dancer.

Actually, calling what he's doing dancing might be generous. Mostly he bounces. His head jerks around. His arms keep going into the air with very little consideration for the safety of the people surrounding him.

At one point, someone beside him moves away.

Then someone else does.

Tyler does not notice that he is gradually being granted his own small perimeter.

Josh does.

Tyler knows because every time he looks over, Josh is fucking losing it.

"What?"

Josh shakes his head.

"What!"

Josh only laughs harder.

Fine.

Tyler keeps dancing.

Eventually Josh stops merely watching Tyler make an ass of himself and joins him.

And somehow Josh is worse.

"Oh my God," Tyler yells.

Josh throws both arms into the air.

Tyler immediately does the same.

Now there are two of them.

Whatever protective perimeter the crowd had established around Tyler expands accordingly.

They bounce around with absolutely no rhythm, occasionally colliding with each other, recovering and continuing as though this is an intentional part of the choreography. Every time Tyler catches sight of Josh doing something particularly stupid, he starts laughing. Josh sees him laughing and gets worse on purpose, which makes Tyler worse, which gets Josh going again.

It is, Tyler realizes somewhere along the way, basically the exact same stupid feedback loop they got trapped in earlier.

Except Tyler isn't really high anymore.

That thought catches for just a second.

Then Josh does something inexplicable with both shoulders that should probably disqualify him from ever dancing in public again, and Tyler loses the thought completely.

He's having too much fun.

By the end of the first set, some of their manic energy has finally burned itself out.

They work their way closer to the stage. The crowd gets denser as they move forward until the space between bodies disappears and Tyler finds himself pressed shoulder to shoulder with Josh again.

Arm against arm.

Shoulder against shoulder.

Tyler looks down at the point of contact.

Then at Josh.

Oh.

He knows this.

"Buddy system activated!"

Josh immediately doubles over laughing.

Tyler grabs his arm.

"No! You're killing the buddy system! Come back!"

This does not help.

Josh bends farther forward.

"Josh!"

He can barely hear himself over the crowd, but that isn't going to stop him.

"We're stronger together!"

Josh completely loses it.

Tyler watches him for approximately half a second before he starts laughing too.

"Fuck you," Josh manages.

"I'm trying to keep us alive!"

"From what?"

Tyler opens his mouth.

Nothing.

He looks around at the concert as though the threat may identify itself if given sufficient opportunity.

"I don't know!"

Josh laughs even harder.

It doesn't matter.

The buddy system has been activated.

Eventually Josh straightens again, still laughing, and their shoulders knock back together.

There.

Much safer.

By the end of the concert, though, even that energy is gone. Tyler's tired. His legs hurt. His throat hurts from yelling, and the terrible dancing has slowly disappeared into little more than movement with the crowd.

Josh is still beside him.

Somewhere during the last song, their arms settle together again.

Neither one moves away.

They just stand there, arm to arm, swaying vaguely with the music.

+

When the concert ends, Tyler and Josh buddy-system their way through the departing crowd.

The buddy system isn't particularly necessary anymore, but that has apparently stopped mattering. Somewhere between Mark's driving and the packed venue, walking shoulder to shoulder has simply become how they move when there are too many people around.

They lose the rest of the group almost immediately.

Neither of them seems especially concerned, because before they make it anywhere near Mark's van, Tyler spots one of the last concession stands still open.

He stops.

Josh nearly walks into him.

Tyler points.

Chili cheese fries.

Josh looks at the sign, then at Tyler.

He nods.

No further discussion is necessary.

They acquire an enormous container of them.

Then Tyler discovers the strawberry-lemonade slushies.

More specifically, Tyler discovers the largest strawberry-lemonade slushy available and decides immediately that this is the one they need.

It is fucking enormous.

Tyler can barely fit both hands around it.

Josh looks at the cup.

Then at Tyler.

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

Josh considers him for approximately half a second.

"Okay."

They do not get another one.

Apparently they don't need another one.

Tyler takes the first drink and passes it to Josh without thinking about it. Josh takes it just as easily, drinks, then hands it back.

The slushy becomes communal property.

So do the chili cheese fries.

By the time they finally make it back to the van, everyone else is already there waiting for them.

Mark looks annoyed.

Tyler doesn't care.

He has chili cheese fries.

He and Josh climb back into their original terrible accommodations, settling onto the floor behind the last row with their food between them and the enormous slushy carefully guarded in Tyler's hands.

Mark looks back.

"Don't get that shit all over my van."

Josh doesn't even hesitate.

"Then fucking learn to drive."

Tyler immediately starts laughing.

The Back-of-the-Van Party remains politically active.

+

Leaving the venue means stop-and-go traffic, so initially Tyler and Josh are able to eat without much trouble.

They sit on the floor with the enormous container of chili cheese fries between them, picking at it from opposite sides. The strawberry-lemonade slushy travels back and forth just as easily.

Tyler drinks.

Passes it to Josh.

Josh drinks.

Passes it back.

Neither one ever acknowledges whose drink it technically is.

It doesn't seem to matter anymore.

"Oh my God."

Josh makes an equally obscene noise beside him.

"I know."

"These are so fucking good."

"I know."

Tyler takes another fry.

"Oh my God."

From somewhere toward the front of the van, Mark turns the music up.

Tyler looks at Josh.

Josh looks at Tyler.

Tyler takes another bite.

"Fuck."

Josh starts laughing.

The music gets louder.

By the time they finally escape the traffic around the venue and reach the highway, most of the fries are gone.

So is most of the slushy.

Unfortunately, most is not all.

Tyler feels the van accelerate. He slowly looks down at the remaining fries, then at the enormous cup in his hands.

Then at Josh.

"Oh no."

Josh understands immediately.

They both grab for the fries.

Tyler braces the slushy against his chest.

Mark resumes his NASCAR impression.

Their emergency procedures are ineffective.

The van jerks.

The fries go first.

"Oh, FUCK—"

Then the slushy.

Cold strawberry lemonade splashes across Tyler's shirt and arm while chili and cheese scatter across both of them.

For one stunned second, neither moves.

Tyler looks down at himself.

There is cheese on his arm.

He looks at Josh.

Josh has chili on his shirt.

There is probably food somewhere on the floor.

Possibly the doors.

Definitely somewhere Mark explicitly told them not to get it.

Tyler looks toward the front.

The music is far too loud to yell over.

He looks back at Josh.

Josh looks at him.

Tyler starts laughing.

Josh goes with him almost immediately.

Tyler wipes uselessly at his shirt, which only seems to spread the strawberry lemonade around.

"Great."

Josh is still laughing.

"You look good."

"Shut up."

Tyler bumps his shoulder into Josh's.

Josh bumps him back.

Then, without discussing it, they settle against the rear doors again.

Shoulder to shoulder.

Arm against arm.

Sticky this time.

Buddy system.

Apparently it works just as well covered in chili cheese.

+

Eventually, there isn't much left to do.

The chili cheese fries are gone. The slushy is gone. Tyler isn't high anymore, and whatever energy the concert left buzzing through him has finally burned itself out.

For what might be the first time all night, the back of the van is quiet.

Not actually quiet. The music is still playing toward the front. Tires hum against the highway. The van rattles whenever Mark finds another imperfection in the road to drive directly over.

But Tyler and Josh have gone quiet.

They're still where they've been for most of the drive, shoulder to shoulder against the rear doors, arms resting together.

Buddy system.

Tyler's eyes slip shut.

He opens them again.

A few minutes later, they close.

He opens them again.

Eventually he decides this is stupid.

Tyler scoots a little lower against the doors, trying to find some version of comfortable on a floor that has spent several hours proving it doesn't have one. His head tips sideways, and his temple comes to rest against the outer curve of Josh's shoulder.

Tyler notices.

For maybe half a second.

Then he decides it's comfortable.

That's about as far as the thought gets.

Josh doesn't move away. He doesn't put an arm around Tyler. Doesn't make anything of it. Nothing about the position changes except that Tyler's head now has somewhere to go.

His eyes close again.

The van keeps moving beneath them.

Every so often Tyler drifts close enough to sleep that his head starts to slip, only for Josh's shoulder to catch it again.

Eventually Tyler stops waking up when it happens.

Somewhere beside him, Josh seems to be losing the same fight. His head dips forward once, comes back up, and a while later it happens again.

Tyler is barely awake enough to notice.

By the time Mark has been driving long enough for the highway to become nothing but darkness and passing lights beyond the windows, neither of them is fighting it anymore.

Josh's head has fallen forward.

Tyler's has fallen sideways, his temple still resting against Josh's shoulder.

The back of Mark's shitty van is still uncomfortable. The floor is still hard. Tyler's neck is absolutely going to hate him later.

But Josh is warm beside him.

And sometime before Tyler can have another thought about any of it, he falls asleep.

+

They're eventually shaken awake.

Tyler comes to slowly, his brain thick with sleep and his neck immediately filing a formal complaint about whatever position he's been keeping it in.

For a few seconds, he doesn't know where they are.

Then things return in pieces.

The van.

The concert.

Josh.

Josh, who is moving beside him.

Tyler blinks himself a little more awake.

They've stopped.

This is Josh's stop.

Josh has to get out.

For some reason, that information takes a second to settle between them.

The night has simply kept going until now. The drive. The weed. The concert. The food. The laughing. Falling asleep against each other.

There was always another thing after the thing they were doing.

Until suddenly there isn't.

Now Josh is leaving.

Tyler's half-conscious brain reduces the situation to something considerably simpler.

Josh leaving.

Josh leaving now.

Josh leaving sucks.

Josh doesn't seem particularly eager to move either.

For a few seconds, neither of them does.

Then Josh finally shifts toward the doors.

"It was really good to meet you."

After everything they've said to each other tonight, Tyler somehow has absolutely nothing useful available.

"Yeah."

He clears his throat.

"You too."

Josh smiles.

Then he crawls out of the van.

The doors close behind him.

Tyler sits there.

Mark starts driving.

Tyler continues sitting there.

Something is wrong.

His brain, apparently operating on a substantial delay, begins attempting to identify the problem.

Josh is gone.

Yes.

He's aware of that.

Josh went home.

Also aware.

Tyler wants to see Josh again.

Obviously.

So—

Tyler's eyes widen.

He doesn't have Josh's fucking number.

"Oh, shit."

He turns toward the rear doors.

Apparently waiting for Mark to stop again is not an acceptable solution.

Tyler throws them open.

Someone toward the front yells, "What the fuck?"

Tyler jumps.

The van has barely started moving, but his landing is still considerably less graceful than he would've preferred. He stumbles forward several steps before catching himself.

Behind him, everybody starts yelling at once.

The brakes squeal.

"TYLER!"

He ignores them.

Josh has only made it partway toward his door when the commotion makes him turn around.

Tyler starts toward him.

"Hey!"

Josh stares.

"What the fuck are you doing?"

"I'm getting your number."

Josh continues staring at him.

Tyler doesn't understand what's confusing about this.

"I wanna hang out."

For one second, Josh just looks surprised.

Then his whole face changes.

The surprise breaks into a grin.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Okay."

Tyler holds out his phone.

Josh is already laughing when he takes it.

He types in his number, hands the phone back, and Tyler looks down long enough to make sure it's actually there.

Josh.

A phone number.

Excellent.

Problem solved.

"Okay," Tyler says.

Josh's grin gets wider.

"Okay."

Tyler turns around and heads back toward the van, where several people are apparently waiting to discuss his recent decision-making.

He doesn't particularly care.

He has Josh's number now.

That's the important thing.

And later, when Tyler has considerably more time to wonder whether throwing himself out of a moving vehicle to get some guy's number might have been a little fucking much, he'll remember Josh's face.

Surprised, yes.

Amused, definitely.

But smiling before Tyler had even handed him the phone.

Josh hadn't looked like he wanted Tyler to leave him alone.

Not even a little.

+

Tyler and Josh actually stay in contact.

Not constantly.

There isn't some immediate transition into texting each other from the moment they wake up until somebody falls asleep with a phone in his hand. They have jobs. They have lives. They get busy.

But they text.

Enough that the concert doesn't become one bizarre, isolated night involving weed, an accidental kiss, chili cheese fries, and Tyler throwing himself out of a moving vehicle.

Josh remains there.

Not physically, exactly.

Just present.

A message here. Another one later. Sometimes a conversation lasts a while. Sometimes it doesn't.

It becomes normal surprisingly quickly.

Then, the following week, Josh sends Tyler one message that matters considerably more than the others.

Can I come over this weekend?

Tyler answers immediately.

Yes.

No hesitation.

No internal debate.

Of course Josh can come over.

Unfortunately, Tyler then has an entire day available to think about the fact that Josh is coming over.

This proves to be a problem.

At the concert, Tyler hadn't had time to anticipate anything. Josh appeared. They clicked. They got high. They accidentally kissed. They deliberately put their faces extremely close together several more times afterward. They had an incredible night.

Tyler threw himself out of a moving vehicle.

Everything simply happened before Tyler had enough time to get inside his own head about it.

Today, he has time.

Way too much fucking time.

By afternoon, Josh coming over has somehow transformed from something Tyler is excited about into an event Tyler apparently needs to prepare his entire life for.

He tries to clean, then isn't sure what actually needs cleaning. He picks things up, moves them somewhere else, forgets why he moved them.

At some point, Mark wanders into the kitchen just in time to watch Tyler put a box of cereal into the refrigerator.

Tyler closes the door.

Turns around.

Starts walking away.

Mark watches him go.

"Hey."

Tyler stops.

"You know cereal doesn't go in the refrigerator, right?"

Tyler looks back at him.

Then at the refrigerator.

"Yeah."

He makes no move to retrieve it.

Mark's eyebrows pull together.

"What is up with you?"

"Nothing."

"Tyler."

Tyler exhales.

"Josh is coming over tonight."

Mark continues looking at him.

Tyler becomes increasingly aware that Mark is looking at him.

"What?"

"Dude."

"What?"

"You're sweating."

Tyler looks down at himself.

Great.

Another problem.

"I should probably shower."

"Okay."

"I haven't done laundry."

Mark blinks.

"I don't think I have any clean clothes."

"Tyler—"

"Should I do laundry first? Because if I shower and then I don't have anything clean, that's stupid. But if I start laundry now, then that's gonna take—"

"Tyler."

"—and I don't know what time he's—"

"Stop."

Tyler stops.

Mark points at him.

"Breathe, man."

Tyler does.

Once.

It doesn't accomplish much.

Mark stares at him for another second before apparently deciding a different approach is necessary.

"You literally threw yourself out of a moving vehicle to get this guy's number."

Tyler's mouth closes.

"And for whatever unhinged reason," Mark continues, "he actually gave the insane Houdini reject his number."

Tyler frowns.

"Houdini reject?"

"Not the important part."

"It feels a little important."

"Tyler."

"Okay."

Mark gestures vaguely at all of him.

"So chill the fuck out."

And, annoyingly, that works.

Because—

Oh.

Right.

Tyler remembers Josh turning around.

The surprise on his face when Tyler came running back toward him.

Then the grin.

Josh had taken Tyler's phone, put his number into it, and handed it back still smiling.

And then he'd actually used that number.

He'd kept talking to Tyler all week.

More importantly, Josh was the one who'd asked to come over tonight.

Tyler hadn't cornered him into anything.

He hadn't invited himself.

Josh wanted to come.

The tightness that's been slowly building inside Tyler all afternoon loosens a little.

"Okay," he says.

Mark nods.

"Okay."

"I should still shower."

"That's probably reasonable."

"And find clothes."

"Also reasonable."

Tyler heads toward his bedroom.

He makes it about three steps before Mark calls after him.

"Tyler."

"What?"

"The cereal."

Tyler stops.

Turns around.

Walks back to the refrigerator.

"Right."

Mark shakes his head and leaves him to it.

And once Tyler finally makes it back to his bedroom, he discovers something else.

He does, in fact, have clean clothes.

Several, actually.

They've been hanging in his closet the entire time.

+

Eventually, Tyler gets himself together.

He showers.

He finds clothes.

Clean ones, even.

By the time he's dressed, his hair is mostly dry, and the cereal is back where cereal belongs, Tyler has managed to convince his nervous system that nothing particularly catastrophic is about to happen.

Josh is coming over.

That's all.

Josh is coming over.

Tyler is fine.

Then someone knocks on the door.

Every bit of progress Tyler has made immediately abandons him.

His stomach drops.

His heart kicks hard against his ribs.

Oh.

Fuck.

This is actually happening.

Tyler stands there for one stupid second before making himself move. He crosses the apartment, reaches for the door, and opens it.

Josh is standing on the other side.

And Josh is holding an absolutely irresponsible amount of pizza.

Tyler stares.

There are several boxes stacked in his arms, far more pizza than two people could reasonably need unless Josh has misunderstood the evening and believes Tyler has invited an entire recreational softball team.

Josh lifts the stack slightly.

"I didn't know what you liked."

Tyler looks at the pizzas.

Then at Josh.

And just like that, the anxiety is gone.

Not reduced.

Not carefully reasoned away.

Gone.

Because Josh coming over had been something Tyler could spend an entire afternoon worrying about.

Josh is just Josh.

The guy from the back of the van.

The guy Tyler spent an entire concert laughing with.

The guy who gave Tyler his number after Tyler launched himself out of a moving vehicle to get it.

The guy standing outside his apartment with enough pizza to feed them until Tuesday.

Tyler knows this guy.

Josh smiles at him.

"Hi."

Tyler smiles back.

"Hi."

He steps aside.

Josh walks in.

Tyler closes the door behind him.

Easy.

Of course it is.

+

The first time Josh comes over doesn't turn out to be particularly special.

Not because Tyler doesn't have a good time.

He does.

It's just that there is a second time.

And then another.

Somewhere along the way, seeing Josh stops requiring advance planning. Sometimes Josh comes over after work. Sometimes Tyler texts him when he's free and discovers Josh is free too. Sometimes they actually go somewhere.

Sometimes they don't.

There are nights when other people are around and nights when it's mostly just the two of them occupying Tyler's apartment while Mark occasionally wanders through and reminds them that he lives there too.

They text when they're apart.

Not constantly.

Neither of them seems interested in documenting every waking hour of his life for the other.

But Josh remains there.

A message while Tyler is at work.

A stupid picture.

A conversation that starts about one thing and wanders so far away from the original subject that Tyler couldn't identify it later if somebody paid him.

Then they're together again.

Nobody asks how often they're supposed to do this. Nobody establishes a schedule. There isn't a conversation where they decide they've become close.

It just becomes increasingly unusual not to see Josh when Tyler has the opportunity.

They don't decide to become inseparable.

They just don't not hang out.

And somewhere underneath all of this is the other thing.

The thing Tyler discovered beneath the gas-station lights when he'd finally gotten a good look at Josh.

Josh is extremely fucking pretty.

That information hasn't changed.

Tyler hasn't forgotten the shotguns, either, or the accidental kiss that stopped being entirely accidental for the last second or two.

None of it disappeared.

It just stops requiring his immediate attention.

Because Josh isn't only the really pretty stranger from the back of Mark's van anymore.

He's Josh.

Tyler knows what makes him laugh now. He's learning what kind of mood Josh is in before Josh actually says anything. He knows which stories he's already told him and which ones Josh will ask him to tell again anyway.

There are jokes that don't make sense to anybody else because explaining where they came from would take too long.

The buddy system survives the van.

So does everything else that somehow started back there.

Tyler doesn't spend much time thinking about how quickly any of this happened.

He's too busy becoming accustomed to Josh being there.

They're too busy becoming them.

+

At some point, Tyler and Josh get stoned together again.

They're sitting on Tyler's bed with their backs against the wall, passing a joint between them.

Or, more accurately, Josh is doing most of the smoking.

Tyler has discovered that he still vastly prefers the arrangement they worked out in the back of Mark's van.

Josh takes a hit and leans toward him.

Tyler leans in automatically.

The smoke passes between them easily.

No nervous retreat afterward. No sudden awareness that their faces have gotten very close.

They've done this before.

More importantly, they know each other now.

Tyler settles back against the wall.

"Mark's not gonna make us kiss this time."

Josh looks at him.

"I mean..."

Tyler waits.

"You never know what could happen."

Tyler stares at him.

Josh's mouth twitches.

And Tyler loses it.

He folds forward laughing.

That gets Josh laughing, which immediately makes Tyler worse, and within seconds they're both gone.

Neither of them is even laughing at the original joke anymore. Josh laughing is funny. Tyler laughing seems to be equally funny to Josh.

The system feeds itself.

From the bedroom next door comes Mark's voice.

"Can you two shut the fuck up?"

Tyler slaps a hand over his mouth.

Josh does the same.

They look at each other.

For approximately two seconds, this works.

Then Josh makes one tiny strangled noise behind his hand.

Tyler's shoulders start shaking.

"No," Tyler whispers.

Josh squeezes his eyes shut.

"Don't."

That does it.

They break all over again.

"Jesus Christ!" Mark yells through the wall.

Tyler collapses sideways onto the bed. Josh is trying to laugh silently now, which has somehow made him look like he's being physically injured.

"Go somewhere else if you're gonna do this shit!"

Tyler stops.

Not laughing.

Just stops.

He lifts his head.

Josh is still recovering beside him.

"That's a fucking good idea."

"What?"

Tyler sits up.

"We should go somewhere."

Josh wipes at his eyes.

"It's like three in the morning."

"I know."

"Where are we going?"

Tyler considers this.

He has absolutely no idea.

They could walk around.

They could—

Oh.

"Playground."

Josh looks at him.

Tyler nods, increasingly certain.

"Playground."

There's a pause.

Then Josh gets off the bed.

Apparently that's enough discussion.

Tyler follows.

A few minutes later, they're outside, walking through streets that feel considerably different at three in the morning. Everything is quieter. Hardly any cars. Most of the windows they pass are dark.

Tyler knows exactly where they're going now, which feels impressive considering the amount of weed currently interfering with the rest of his navigation systems.

The playground isn't far.

Josh walks beside him without requiring much explanation for why two grown men need access to playground equipment in the middle of the night.

When they finally reach it, Josh looks through the darkness at the empty swings and slides.

"This is—"

"Best idea ever."

Josh looks at Tyler.

Tyler looks back.

"Best idea ever," he repeats.

And for a while, he's right.

They fuck around on the playground like they've somehow been granted exclusive three-in-the-morning access to the greatest recreational facility ever constructed. Tyler tries things that were clearly designed for people substantially smaller than he is.

Josh joins him anyway.

Everything is funnier than it has any right to be.

Eventually Tyler discovers the swings.

He sits down and looks at Josh.

"Push me."

Josh laughs.

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

"You're an adult."

"Push me."

Josh walks around behind him.

"You're gonna regret this."

"No, I'm not."

Josh pulls the swing backward and lets him go.

Tyler immediately decides he was right.

This is fucking fantastic.

Unfortunately, Tyler has failed to account for one minor design flaw in this arrangement.

His legs keep swinging backward toward the person standing behind him.

This becomes relevant approximately thirty seconds later.

Tyler swings back.

His foot connects solidly with Josh.

"Oh, shit!"

Josh goes backward.

Tyler twists around as much as the swing allows and watches him disappear onto the mulch.

"Josh!"

"I'm good!"

Tyler needs to stop.

Immediately.

He jams his feet into the ground.

This is not how stopping a swing works.

His shoes dig into the mulch, his momentum continues without him, and suddenly Tyler is sliding backward off the seat.

There is one brief, useless moment in which he understands exactly what is about to happen.

Then his ass hits the ground.

Hard.

"Fuck!"

Somehow, Tyler ends up sprawled backward between Josh's legs.

Josh has managed to sit up by then.

For a second, they just stare at each other.

"Are you okay?"

Josh looks down at him, then at the empty swing still moving slightly behind him, then back down at Tyler, who has apparently just catastrophically dismounted playground equipment designed for children.

"Are you?"

Tyler considers this.

His ass hurts.

Otherwise—

"Yeah."

He shrugs.

Then, because he's already down here and moving seems unnecessarily complicated, Tyler lets his head loll sideways until it comes to rest lightly against the side of Josh's knee.

"I'm sorry for kicking you."

Josh snorts.

"It's okay."

Then he lies back down.

Tyler stays exactly where he is.

For a little while, neither of them moves.

The playground has gone quiet around them.

Then Tyler looks up.

Oh.

There are stars everywhere.

"Whoa."

"Whoa."

Tyler turns his head slightly against Josh's knee.

"Did you just say whoa?"

"Did you?"

They start laughing, but it fades quickly when Tyler looks up again and—

Seriously.

Whoa.

The sky is fucking beautiful.

So they lie there in the mulch far longer than any reasonable person would willingly lie in mulch, occasionally pointing things out overhead.

"That one's moving."

"No, it's not."

"It's definitely moving."

"That's a plane."

"It's not a plane."

"Tyler."

"What?"

"Planes move."

"So do other things."

"What other things?"

Tyler does not currently have that information.

"Space things."

Josh nods as though this is a perfectly respectable contribution to the discussion.

Their stoned astronomy department continues its research. Several additional lights are identified. None are conclusively classified. One may be a satellite. Two are probably planes.

Tyler remains suspicious.

Eventually, however, another problem begins making itself known.

The ground beneath him is not actually ground.

It's thousands upon thousands of tiny pieces of wood.

Tyler shifts.

Something immediately pokes him through his shirt.

He shifts again.

Another piece attacks.

"How many splinters do you think we're gonna get?"

Eventually the mulch wins.

They migrate to one of the picnic tables nearby.

Tyler climbs onto the tabletop itself and sits with his legs dangling over the edge. Josh takes the bench beside him, close enough that Tyler's shoes occasionally brush against his leg when he swings his feet.

For a while, neither of them says anything.

They don't need to.

The playground is empty. The night is quiet. Tyler's high has settled into something warm and heavy, and after all the laughing and yelling and falling off things, sitting here doing absolutely nothing with Josh feels pretty fucking good.

Eventually Tyler sighs.

"I don't wanna go home."

Josh looks up at him.

Tyler considers the grave danger awaiting him there.

"Mark's gonna yell at me again."

Josh laughs.

"He probably is."

"I don't need that kind of negativity in my life."

"You kicked me and then fell off a swing."

"That was different."

"How?"

Tyler thinks about it.

"I don't know."

Josh laughs again.

Then he shrugs.

"Just come home with me."

Tyler's foot stops swinging.

There's a beat.

Josh adds, "Nobody's there to yell at us."

Oh.

Tyler looks down at him.

For some reason, that lands somewhere warmer than it probably should.

Not because Tyler has been waiting for Josh to invite him over.

He hasn't.

Until this exact moment, Tyler isn't sure he's ever even thought about the fact that he's never been to Josh's place. Josh comes to his. They hang out in Tyler's room. Mark wanders around in the background. Sometimes other people are there. When Tyler and Josh go somewhere else, they go out somewhere.

That's simply how things have happened.

But—

Come home with me.

Tyler suddenly finds himself considering what that means.

No Mark in the next room. No friends wandering through. No strangers around them. No crowd. Nobody eventually telling them to shut the fuck up.

Just Josh.

Just him.

Something small and warm turns over in Tyler's stomach.

He really, really likes that idea.

So he goes.

+

Once he's inside Josh's apartment, Tyler realizes he never actually imagined what it would look like.

He doesn't stand there taking inventory. There are things on the counters. A few dishes that haven't made it out of the sink. Furniture that looks like people actually sit on it. Things left wherever Josh apparently leaves them when nobody is coming over that he feels the need to impress.

Nothing has been staged for Tyler's arrival.

Josh just lives here.

For some reason, Tyler likes that.

He'd never thought much about what Josh's place might look like before tonight, but there's something strangely satisfying about finally seeing it. Like a curiosity had been sitting somewhere in the back of his head without ever bothering to identify itself.

Now he knows.

This is where Josh goes when he goes home.

And Josh brought him here.

By the time the sun is probably considering coming up, Tyler is exhausted.

Josh brings him a pillow and a blanket for the couch without making much of it, and Tyler doesn't make much of it either. He lies down, pulls the blanket over himself, and the couch gives slightly beneath his weight.

Tyler shifts once, nestles his head into the pillow, and has just enough time to register something surprising.

This is really fucking comfortable.

Maybe the most comfortable thing he's ever laid on.

That seems excessive.

Tyler is too tired to investigate.

He falls asleep.

+

Tyler wakes to a noise he doesn't recognize.

Not a loud one.

Just—

Creak.

His eyes stay closed.

A second later, there's the tiny plastic squeak of a light switch somewhere nearby. Then the refrigerator opens.

Tyler lies there, still mostly asleep, listening to someone move around in the kitchen. Water running.

Josh.

Right.

He's at Josh's.

The thought settles into place without requiring anything else from him.

Eventually the refrigerator closes. The water stops running. Something moves across a counter.

And then Tyler smells coffee.

His eyes open just enough to find the time on a clock on the wall.

One something.

Jesus.

One in the afternoon.

Tyler closes his eyes again.

He should probably get up.

He doesn't.

Instead he rolls onto his other side and faces the back of the couch, burrowing farther beneath the blanket. He presses his face into the cushion until breathing through his nose becomes slightly less convenient.

Whatever.

He's comfortable.

And that's when he notices it.

The couch smells different.

Not strongly. Not like cologne or detergent or anything else Tyler could name if somebody asked him.

It just smells like—

Here.

Like Josh's apartment.

Something worn quietly into the cushion from being sat on, slept on, lived around.

Tyler doesn't spend enough time awake to figure out why he notices.

He only knows that he does.

From the kitchen comes another soft clink.

Tyler pulls the blanket a little higher over his shoulder, presses his face farther into the cushion, and goes back to sleep.

+

When Tyler wakes again, it's closer to two.

He stays still for a moment, blinking himself slowly back into the room.

Josh's room.

No.

Josh's living room.

Right.

Tyler rolls onto his back just in time to see Josh passing through it.

Josh isn't tiptoeing. He's not doing that exaggerated careful walk people do when they're trying so hard not to wake someone that they somehow become louder.

He's just moving quietly.

Tyler watches him make it almost all the way across the room.

"Hey."

Josh startles a little and turns.

"Hey."

His hair is rumpled. He looks about as awake as Tyler feels.

"Do you want some coffee?" Josh asks. "I fell asleep again, but I think it's done."

Tyler stares at him for a second.

"You made coffee and went back to sleep?"

"Yeah."

Tyler accepts this information.

"Okay."

He pushes himself upright, runs a hand through his hair, and follows Josh into the kitchen.

The coffee is, in fact, done.

Tyler pours his black.

Josh pours his.

And then Tyler gets to witness something terrible.

Josh opens the refrigerator, gets out a huge container of creamer, and pours.

Keeps pouring.

Tyler watches.

Josh finally stops, puts the creamer down, and stirs.

Okay.

That's—

A lot.

Josh looks into his cup.

Something about what he sees apparently disappoints him, because he reaches for the creamer again.

Tyler lowers his own coffee.

"Dude."

Josh glances at him.

Another stream of creamer disappears into the cup.

"What?"

"How often do you run out of creamer?"

Josh considers the question while stirring.

"I don't know."

"Like, per week."

That gets a laugh out of him.

"I don't buy it every week."

"You sure?"

"Pretty sure."

Josh lifts the spoon, examines the color, and seems finally satisfied.

Tyler looks from Josh's coffee to his own.

Josh's is barely recognizable as the same beverage.

"How long does one of those even last you?"

Josh shrugs.

"Sometimes it doesn't make it two weeks."

Tyler laughs.

"Yeah, no shit. You keep making coffee lighter than my skin."

Josh takes a sip and seems perfectly happy with the abomination he's created.

Then he shrugs.

"Your skin color's not bad."

Tyler pauses with his own cup halfway to his mouth.

Josh walks out of the kitchen.

Tyler stands there for another second.

Oh.

Okay.

He looks down at his coffee.

Then toward the doorway Josh just disappeared through.

Tyler follows him.

+

Josh returns to the living room and sets his coffee on the table.

Then he sits down directly on top of the blankets Tyler slept under.

Apparently they're not Tyler's bedding anymore.

They're just couch blankets now.

Tyler follows him over. He moves the pillow out of the spot where his head had been and sits down cross-legged, leaving a comfortable amount of space between them. After a second, he picks the pillow back up and settles it across his lap.

There.

Josh drinks his horrifying coffee.

Tyler drinks his normal one.

For a while, neither of them says anything. They're both still somewhere between awake and asleep, and conversation requires more commitment than either of them currently possesses.

Eventually Josh asks, "Do you work today?"

"No." Tyler takes another drink. "Do you?"

"No."

"Nice."

"Yeah."

That's the entire conversation.

A few seconds later, rain starts hitting the roof.

Softly at first.

Then considerably less softly.

Tyler looks toward the window as it gets louder, rain beginning to drum steadily against the building.

Josh doesn't move except to lean forward and retrieve his coffee. Then he slides farther down into the couch.

Tyler watches the rain for another second.

Okay.

He settles a little deeper too.

Neither of them says anything about it.

For a while they just sit there listening to the rain, drinking coffee with the television still off.

Tyler could probably go back to sleep sitting upright.

Josh turns his head.

"Food?"

Tyler considers.

"Yeah."

Josh nods.

Another several seconds pass.

"That means I have to find my phone."

Tyler looks at him.

"I'm not cooking."

"You don't want me cooking."

Josh laughs.

Tyler doesn't elaborate.

There are things Josh doesn't need to know yet.

"But that still means I have to get up and find my phone."

Tyler offers no assistance whatsoever.

Instead, he uncrosses his legs and stretches them out across the couch.

"TV first?"

Josh considers this alternative to accomplishing anything.

"Yeah. If you can reach the remote."

Tyler looks at the remote.

It's on the coffee table.

Unfortunately, it's on the wrong side of the coffee table.

He stretches an arm toward it.

No.

He leans farther.

Still no.

Standing up would solve this immediately.

Tyler grabs the edge of the coffee table and drags the entire thing toward the couch.

Josh watches him.

Tyler picks up the remote.

"Got it."

"Good job."

"Thanks."

The television comes on.

Tyler doesn't know what's playing.

He doesn't care enough to find something else.

The pillow ends up against his chest again. Josh remains sunk into the couch beside him. Outside, the rain keeps coming down.

At some point Tyler closes his eyes.

He's not planning to sleep.

He's just resting them.

When Tyler wakes up again, the rain is still falling.

So apparently that went well.

Josh eventually locates his phone.

Food eventually appears.

The day moves forward without either of them doing much to help it along. They eat, watch television, talk when they have something to say and don't when they don't.

At some point Josh disappears into his room and comes back carrying clothes.

"You want these?"

Tyler looks at them.

Then down at what he's still wearing from last night.

"Yeah."

Josh hands them over.

That's it.

Tyler changes.

The clothes fit well enough.

They're comfortable.

And Tyler is perhaps slightly more pleased about wearing them than the situation reasonably calls for.

They're Josh's.

That's probably why.

Tyler considers that for approximately two seconds.

Then doesn't.

The day keeps going.

Late afternoon eventually becomes evening.

Tyler is still there.

Nobody has discussed this.

At no point did Tyler ask how long he could stay, and Josh never mentioned when he expected Tyler to leave.

The invitation from last night just never seems to expire.

Eventually Tyler becomes vaguely aware that he should probably go home.

Probably.

Not because he particularly wants to.

It just seems like something he's supposed to do at some point.

He looks over at Josh.

"Do you think Mark's still gonna yell at me?"

Josh laughs.

"Probably."

Tyler sighs.

Josh considers the problem for approximately half a second.

"Well, not if you just stay again."

Oh.

Tyler looks at him.

Josh looks back.

And apparently that's an option.

+

Eventually Tyler and Josh do, in fact, return to their separate lives.

Technically.

They work. Their schedules get busy. They text when they can, but not constantly. There are hours when Tyler doesn't know what Josh is doing, and presumably Josh doesn't know what Tyler is doing either.

Nobody dies.

There are even entire days when they don't see each other.

Which is normal.

Tyler knows that.

He's busy. Josh is busy. They have jobs and friends and things that occasionally require them to exist in different places.

It's fine.

It just takes Tyler a little while to realize that he doesn't particularly like it.

Not in some catastrophic way. He's not lying awake at night staring tragically at his phone. He's not wandering around thinking about Josh every second of the day.

He just—

Misses him.

Tyler discovers this mostly through little things.

Something happens that would make Josh laugh, and Tyler wants to hear him laugh at it. He gets home exhausted and remembers how easy it was to be exhausted at Josh's. He watches something terrible on television and somehow it's considerably less entertaining when nobody else is there to tell him how terrible it is.

Even doing nothing feels slightly different.

Tyler has gotten used to doing nothing with Josh.

He's gotten used to Josh's voice somewhere nearby. Josh laughing. Josh moving around. Josh existing within reasonable bothering distance.

And now he isn't.

Tyler notices.

A few days into this, his phone rings.

Josh.

Tyler answers.

"I think Mark's gonna start yelling at me again."

There's a beat.

Then Josh laughs.

"Is he really?"

"No. I'm lying."

Josh laughs harder.

Tyler smiles into the phone.

"Wow."

"Yeah."

"That's pretty serious."

"I know."

"What'd you do?"

"Nothing."

"So he's gonna yell at you for nothing?"

"Probably."

"Sounds dangerous."

"It is."

Josh considers the situation.

"Well, you know what to do."

Tyler's smile gets bigger.

Yeah.

He does.

"Do you work?"

"No. They gave me a couple days off."

Tyler sits up a little straighter.

"Oh."

His eyes drift toward his closet.

"What a coincidence."

It is not a coincidence.

Tyler is already getting off the bed.

"See you soon."

"Okay, I'll—"

Tyler hangs up.

He drops his phone onto the bed, pulls a small duffel from his closet, and starts packing. A couple shirts. Underwear. Socks. Something to sleep in. Toothbrush.

He stops and looks into the bag.

Probably enough.

This is considerably easier than the last time he went to Josh's.

Mostly because last time Tyler hadn't technically planned on going to Josh's at all. He'd gone to a playground at three in the morning and somehow ended up asleep on a stranger's couch.

Well.

Not a stranger.

Not anymore.

Tyler knows where he's going now.

He knows the couch he'll sleep on. He knows where the bathroom is. He knows Josh will make coffee, ruin his own with creamer, and leave Tyler's alone. He knows he can wake up at one in the afternoon, roll over, and go back to sleep without anybody wondering why he's still there.

More than that, he knows what being at Josh's feels like.

He doesn't have to wonder whether he's welcome. Doesn't have to think about what being alone with Josh will be like.

He's already done it.

He's slept there. Woken up there. Eaten there. Spent an entire day doing almost nothing there and somehow never once felt like he was waiting for the appropriate time to leave.

Josh doesn't make him feel like a guest.

So this isn't preparation for some event.

Tyler is just packing to be at Josh's.

That's considerably easier.

He zips the bag.

+

The weekend doesn't become an event.

Tyler goes to Josh's.

And then he's there.

They eat when one of them remembers they're hungry. Something is almost always playing on the television, although neither of them could probably say what half the time. They talk when they have something to say and sit quietly when they don't. Josh wanders into the kitchen, and Tyler follows him sometimes for no particular reason.

They spend a considerable amount of time recovering from work by accomplishing absolutely nothing.

It's great.

Tyler knows where the cups are now.

That seems like information he's acquired.

He also learns that Josh can spend an impressive amount of time looking for something that's approximately three feet away from him.

"Where's my phone?"

Tyler looks at the coffee table.

Then at Josh.

Then back at the coffee table.

"I don't know."

Josh checks between the couch cushions.

Tyler watches him.

"Have you seen it?"

"No."

It's directly beside Josh's coffee.

Josh gets up and checks the kitchen.

Tyler could help.

He doesn't.

There's something interesting about seeing how long this can continue.

Josh comes back.

"Did I leave it in the bedroom?"

"Maybe."

Josh stops.

Looks at Tyler.

Tyler looks innocently back.

Then Josh's eyes drop to the coffee table.

"You dick."

Tyler starts laughing.

"You walked past it twice."

"You said you didn't know where it was."

"I wanted to see how long you'd look."

"That's fucked up."

"You were doing really well."

Josh throws a couch pillow at him.

Tyler learns something else:

Josh has surprisingly good aim.

Josh, in return, learns that Tyler packs everything he needs except whatever he suddenly needs.

Tyler has clothes. Underwear. Socks. Something to sleep in. A toothbrush.

He does not have deodorant.

He could have sworn he packed deodorant.

"You packed a whole bag."

"I know."

"And no deodorant."

"I didn't know I was going to need deodorant."

Josh stares at him.

Tyler realizes the weakness in his argument approximately one second too late.

"I mean, obviously I knew I was going to need deodorant."

"Okay."

"I just didn't know I wasn't going to have it."

"That's usually why people pack things."

"Can I use yours or not?"

Josh lets him.

Neither discovery changes anybody's life.

The television does occasionally manage to capture their attention.

Usually because one of them decides something happening on it is stupid.

By Saturday night, they're halfway through an episode of something neither particularly likes when a character makes a decision Tyler finds so catastrophically idiotic that he sits forward.

"No."

Josh looks over.

"No fucking way."

"What?"

"Why would he do that?"

Josh looks back at the television.

"Because she told him to."

"That's not a reason."

"It's literally the reason."

"It's a bad reason."

"Still a reason."

Tyler points toward the screen.

"He knows she's lying."

"No, you know she's lying."

"He should know."

"How?"

"Look at her."

Josh looks.

"What about her?"

"She looks like she's lying."

"That's just her face."

Tyler turns toward him.

"You can't say that."

"I just did."

"That's terrible."

"You said she looks like a liar."

"Because she's lying."

"So now you're profiling liars by face."

"I am not profiling liars."

"Sounds like you are."

"This isn't about her face anymore."

"It was absolutely about her face."

"No, because now we're talking about his judgment."

"What about it?"

"It's terrible."

Josh considers this.

"Okay, yeah. He's an idiot."

"Thank you."

They miss the next several minutes discussing whether there should be some kind of licensing requirement before people are allowed to make important decisions.

By the time Tyler looks back at the television, two people who were previously enemies appear to be kissing.

He frowns.

"When did that happen?"

Josh looks equally lost.

"I don't know."

"Did we miss something?"

"Probably."

Neither rewinds it.

The show continues without them.

So does the weekend.

Night arrives.

Then somehow two in the morning arrives.

Then three.

They keep doing this to themselves.

By the second night, Tyler isn't entirely sure what they're watching anymore.

Something bad.

Definitely bad.

He's sunk into his usual side of the couch, tired enough that moving seems unnecessary. Josh is beside him, equally useless.

At some point Tyler notices they're sitting closer than they were before.

Not dramatically.

There's still room between them.

Just less of it.

Tyler doesn't remember either of them moving.

Maybe they didn't.

Maybe they've been slowly migrating toward the middle of the couch all night.

They seem to do that.

Not opposite ends. Not even comfortably spread across all three cushions like two people with perfectly functional concepts of personal space.

Somehow they keep ending up halfway on and around the middle cushion, leaving perfectly useful couch real estate abandoned on either side.

Nobody established this arrangement.

It's just where they sit.

Tyler looks down.

His arm is resting against Josh's.

That isn't particularly new.

They've been thrown against each other in a van. Fallen asleep shoulder to shoulder. Spent an unreasonable amount of time within each other's personal space.

But this is different for one very simple reason.

Nothing put them here.

No shitty driving.

No crowded concert.

No lack of room.

There's an entire couch.

And they're using considerably less of it than they need.

Tyler looks back at the television.

Okay.

A few minutes pass.

Maybe longer.

His shoulder stays against Josh's.

Eventually Tyler shifts.

Barely.

A little more shoulder.

A little more arm.

Just enough to let slightly more of his weight settle sideways against Josh.

And immediately Tyler knows he did that on purpose.

For perhaps a second, he's aware of himself in a way he wasn't before.

Was that weird?

He doesn't move back.

He isn't embarrassed, exactly.

It's only a tiny flicker of uncertainty because, until now, most of their physical closeness has come with some kind of explanation attached.

Mark's driving.

A crowded concert.

Shotgunning.

Exhaustion.

Falling catastrophically off playground equipment.

Falling asleep.

Even this thing they've developed on Josh's couch seemed to happen without either of them deciding it should.

But this—

Tyler wanted another inch or two of Josh.

So he took it.

Before Tyler has to decide whether he's supposed to do anything with that information, Josh shifts too.

Not away.

Into him.

Just slightly harder.

Josh doesn't look over or say anything. He simply settles his shoulder more firmly against Tyler's and keeps watching the television.

Oh.

Okay.

Whatever had briefly tightened inside Tyler lets go.

He settles too.

Warmth collects along the places they're touching.

That's nice.

Tyler decides that's probably all he needs to know about it.

For another few minutes, they continue pretending to watch television.

Eventually Tyler looks down at where their arms are pressed together.

Then at Josh.

"Are we buddy-systeming bad late-night television?"

Josh glances at him and seems to consider their position.

"Yeah."

Tyler starts smiling.

"Why?"

"This show sucks."

"Okay?"

Josh gestures vaguely toward the television.

"You need extra support for shit like this."

Tyler laughs.

"Emotional support?"

"Yeah, dude."

"Okay."

That settles it.

Buddy system.

Established precedent.

If anything, having acknowledged what they're doing makes it easier to stop pretending they aren't doing it.

Tyler lets himself lean a little more comfortably into Josh.

Josh accommodates him without hesitation.

And that's it.

They keep watching.

Or not watching.

Tyler loses track.

His eyes keep closing for increasingly long stretches before he remembers to open them again.

At some point his head tips sideways and his temple finds Josh's shoulder.

This time Tyler doesn't even bother correcting it.

His hair brushes Josh's neck.

A little while later, Josh's head tips toward his, his cheek coming to rest lightly against the top of Tyler's head.

Nobody puts an arm around anybody.

Nobody deliberately curls closer.

They don't need to.

They're simply falling asleep in the position they chose while they were still awake.

And somewhere in the last hazy moments before Tyler loses consciousness, there's something almost familiar about it.

The back of Mark's van.

His temple against the outside of Josh's shoulder.

Two exhausted strangers who had somehow spent an entire night becoming less strange.

Except this isn't the back of Mark's van.

Nothing knocked Tyler into Josh.

Nothing made him stay there.

Tyler moved closer because he wanted to.

Josh met him there.

And this is just where Tyler sleeps when Josh is beside him.

+

The weekend eventually ends.

Tyler goes home.

Back to his own apartment. His own room. His own bed.

A bed that has presumably served him perfectly well for years.

Tyler lies down.

And something is wrong with it.

He rolls onto his side.

No.

Other side.

Also no.

Back.

He adjusts the pillow, pulls the blanket higher, kicks it down again, flips the pillow over to the cold side.

Better.

For approximately twelve seconds.

Tyler stares at the ceiling.

What the fuck?

Nothing is actually wrong with his bed.

Same mattress. Same pillow. Same blankets. Same Tyler.

And yet it isn't nearly as comfortable as he remembers it being.

He tries another position.

Nope.

His bed sucks now.

This is new information.

Tyler lies there for another minute before his brain provides an obvious comparison.

Josh's couch.

Which is ridiculous.

Josh's couch is a couch.

His bed is a bed.

Beds are specifically designed for sleeping. His mattress has one job, and until approximately forty-eight hours ago Tyler had believed it was performing that job adequately.

And yet.

Josh's couch.

Apparently superior.

Tyler rolls over again.

Still sucks.

He reaches for his phone.

Stops.

There is, for perhaps the first time, a little self-consciousness attached to the impulse.

Not because he thinks Josh doesn't want him around. Josh has given him absolutely no reason to think that.

But it's the middle of the week.

They work. They have their own apartments and their own lives and generally spend at least some time existing separately inside them.

Tyler isn't going to just appear at Josh's door because his mattress has suddenly developed an inferiority complex.

So he texts him instead.

«my bed sucks now»

The response comes a minute later.

«so you prefer couches now?»

Tyler stares at it.

His brain immediately supplies:

Only yours.

No.

Absolutely fucking not.

That thought can go directly into the basement with everything else Tyler is currently declining to investigate.

He types:

«maybe I do now»

Josh answers:

«sounds like you know where the better couch is»

Tyler smiles.

Well.

That's all he needed.

«OMW»

+

Tyler shows up at Josh's carrying his own pillow, his blanket tucked under one arm.

Josh opens the door.

Looks at Tyler.

Looks at the pillow.

Looks at the blanket.

Looks back at Tyler.

"My bed sucks," Tyler explains.

"Yeah, you mentioned that."

Josh steps aside.

Tyler walks in.

That's the entire discussion.

Bringing your own bedding to someone else's apartment on a Wednesday night apparently doesn't require one.

Tyler carries his things over to what has become his couch. His pillow goes down on one end. His blanket joins the blankets already there.

Josh watches this happen.

"You settling in?"

Tyler looks at him.

"I brought one pillow."

"Right."

"And a blanket."

"Very temporary."

"Exactly."

Josh nods.

Tyler can't tell whether he's being made fun of.

Probably.

It doesn't matter.

Tyler has work tomorrow.

So does Josh.

There is no weekend stretching ahead of them. No excuse involving Mark yelling at anybody. No playground at three in the morning. No unusual circumstances that have stranded Tyler here.

It's a work night.

Tyler came anyway.

They don't do anything particularly interesting. The television comes on. They eat something. At some point Tyler remembers that he should probably set an alarm.

Eventually they're tired.

Josh gets up first.

"I'm going to bed."

"Okay."

"Don't let the superior couch keep you up too late."

"Fuck you."

Josh laughs on his way down the hall.

Tyler settles under his blanket.

And the couch remains vastly superior to Tyler's defective bed, because he falls asleep without much trouble at all.

In the morning, his alarm goes off.

Tyler wakes up at Josh's.

Gets ready.

Goes to work.

That's it.

Nothing happened.

Which is perhaps why Tyler doesn't immediately notice that something has.

Staying at Josh's is no longer something reserved for weekends.

No strange circumstances put him here. Nobody invited him to stay because it was three in the morning.

Tyler wanted to sleep at Josh's.

Josh wanted him there.

So Tyler came.

Tyler can just come here now.

+

Migration happens quietly.

Not every night.

Tyler still has his own apartment, his own room, his own allegedly defective bed.

He still lives with Mark.

Technically.

But staying at Josh's stops being unusual quickly enough that Tyler couldn't identify exactly when it happened.

At first, he brings clothes. A shirt for tomorrow. Clean underwear. Socks. Whatever he'll need before work.

Then one morning Tyler gets dressed and realizes the shirt he's pulling over his head is one he left at Josh's several days ago.

He pauses.

Looks down at himself.

Oh.

Apparently that's here.

Fine.

He wears it.

Another shirt gets left behind later. Then a pair of sweatpants.

Tyler remembers the sweatpants the next time he's packing to go to Josh's, considers retrieving them—

and doesn't.

Why would he?

They're already where he's going.

Carrying the same shit back and forth starts to feel stupid, so things stop making the return trip.

Not much.

Nothing dramatic enough to look like moving in.

Just Tyler debris.

A shirt. Another shirt. Socks. The sweatpants.

Eventually there's enough Tyler debris accumulated at Josh's that Tyler throws some of it into the washer.

He doesn't ask.

It doesn't occur to him that he should.

He needs clean clothes. There is a machine specifically designed to make clothes clean.

Seems straightforward.

Josh walks past while Tyler is loading it, glances into the laundry room, and keeps going.

He doesn't seem to find this noteworthy either.

Good.

Tyler's clothes get washed.

Then dried.

Then, instead of being packed into a bag and transported back across town, they stay.

Somewhere along the way, his things begin acquiring places.

Not official places.

Josh never ceremonially opens a drawer and presents Tyler with newly acquired territory. There is no solemn transfer of closet space.

Things simply keep ending up somewhere and then returning to that same somewhere often enough that eventually that's where they belong.

Tyler knows where his clean clothes are.

He knows where his pillow is.

He knows which blanket he usually grabs.

There are things he no longer bothers bringing because they're already at Josh's.

Tyler still has an apartment with Mark. He still pays his half of the rent. He still goes there.

But increasingly, going there involves walking into his room, finding whatever he came for, and leaving again.

Sometimes Mark is there.

Sometimes they hang out.

Sometimes Tyler actually stays.

His life hasn't relocated completely.

It's just developed a very obvious center of gravity.

And that center of gravity lives in Josh's apartment.

Tyler doesn't think about that either.

Until one day he gets off work exhausted.

He's hungry. His feet hurt. The day has been too long, and all Tyler wants to do is go home, take off his shoes, and stop being required to accomplish anything.

So that's what he does.

He goes home.

It's only after he's already heading there that his brain catches up.

Josh's.

He's going to Josh's.

Right.

Tyler considers the correction for approximately two seconds.

Whatever.

He keeps going.

He doesn't need to examine why the first word had been home.

There are plenty of perfectly reasonable explanations.

Most of his comfortable clothes are there now.

His pillow is there.

The couch doesn't suck.

Josh is there.

That last one probably doesn't need any additional investigation.

Basement.

What matters is that when Tyler is finished with the day, Josh's apartment has become the place his body starts taking him before his brain bothers discussing the itinerary.

And Josh contributes to this too.

Tyler isn't repeatedly inserting himself into somebody else's routine.

There is room for him because Josh keeps leaving room for him.

More than that—

Josh expects Tyler.

That becomes obvious in little ways.

If Tyler texts that he's coming over, the door is unlocked when he gets there.

The first few times, Tyler still knocks.

Eventually he stops.

Not because Josh formally tells him he doesn't have to.

Knocking just starts to feel unnecessary when Tyler already knows he's expected on the other side.

So he arrives.

Opens the door.

Walks in.

"Hey."

Sometimes Josh answers from the kitchen. Sometimes the couch. Sometimes somewhere farther inside the apartment.

Tyler drops whatever he's carrying wherever his things currently belong and finds him.

That's it.

No receiving a guest.

No transition between arriving and being there.

Tyler simply enters and resumes existing.

At some point, without anybody announcing it, Josh's apartment stops functioning like a place Tyler visits.

Tyler has started functioning like one of the people who lives there.

Nobody has officially said so.

+

Mark, naturally, notices the migration.

It would be difficult not to.

Tyler barely fucking lives with him anymore.

He's still there often enough to technically qualify as a roommate, but Mark increasingly sees him in brief appearances.

Tyler comes home, disappears into his bedroom, emerges carrying something he apparently needed, and starts leaving again.

One day Mark watches this entire process from the couch.

"Do you live here anymore?"

Tyler stops.

Looks at him.

"I still pay rent."

Mark laughs.

"I didn't ask if you still pay rent."

"I do."

"Congratulations."

Tyler continues toward the door.

Mark calls after him.

"You paying rent at Josh's too?"

That makes Tyler stop again.

"No."

"So you pay to live here."

"Yeah."

"But you live there."

Tyler turns around.

"I live here."

Mark looks around the apartment as though searching for supporting evidence.

Then back at Tyler.

"Do you?"

Tyler opens his mouth.

Nothing particularly useful arrives.

Because financially?

Yes.

Absolutely.

His half of the rent gets paid every month.

Practically—

Okay.

That's a little harder to defend.

Most nights lately, Tyler sleeps on Josh's couch. Some of his clothes are there. His pillow is there. He does laundry there. He gets off work and, more often than not, goes there without particularly thinking about it.

Tyler frowns.

Mark looks unbearably pleased with himself.

"Shut up."

"I didn't say anything."

"You were about to."

"I really wasn't."

"You were thinking it."

"Probably."

Tyler leaves before Mark can become any more correct.

But the conversation follows him.

Not in an upsetting way.

More like Mark has pointed at something Tyler hadn't bothered looking directly at before.

He really doesn't spend much time at his own apartment anymore.

And when Tyler imagines, just briefly, not having that apartment at all, the thought doesn't produce the reaction he expects.

He likes living with Mark.

Mark is his friend.

This has been home for a long time.

But if, for whatever reason, it stopped being home tomorrow, Tyler knows immediately where he'd want to go.

Josh's.

More specifically:

Josh's couch.

The thought comes easily enough that Tyler almost laughs.

Naturally, it's the couch.

The one that apparently ruined his own bed.

Tyler doesn't turn that into anything bigger.

He doesn't decide he should move in with Josh. He doesn't assume Josh would ask him to. He doesn't start planning the transportation of furniture.

It's simply another piece of information Tyler discovers about himself.

His permanent address changing doesn't sound particularly frightening.

Not when somewhere else already feels like home.

+

By now, walking into Josh's apartment is completely unremarkable.

Tyler gets off work.

Goes home.

Josh's.

Whatever.

The door is unlocked because Josh knows he's coming, so Tyler lets himself in and drops his things where his things go.

"Hey."

No answer.

Tyler doesn't think anything of it.

Josh is here somewhere.

He wanders farther into the apartment, following the faint sounds of movement until Josh appears in the hallway coming out of his bedroom.

Tyler stops.

Josh isn't wearing a shirt.

Oh.

Tyler's brain experiences what can only be described as a catastrophic archival event.

Oh.

Oh shit.

Right.

Josh hot.

Josh pretty.

Josh shirtless.

This is not new information.

Tyler has known Josh is attractive since a gas-station light illuminated his face in the back of Mark's van and temporarily destroyed Tyler's ability to answer simple questions.

He never forgot.

It just stopped being particularly relevant most of the time.

Because Josh became Josh.

His best friend. His favorite person to do absolutely nothing with. The person whose couch ruined Tyler's bed. The person he misses when they go too long without seeing each other. The person whose apartment Tyler walks into without knocking.

Home.

Somewhere along the way, all of that became so much bigger and more immediate than really fucking pretty that the original information got boxed up and moved downstairs.

Not discarded.

Archived.

Somebody has just located the boxes.

And they are hauling those fuckers upstairs.

Tyler stares.

Josh says something.

Tyler has absolutely no idea what.

His eyes have stopped cooperating.

Chest.

Stomach.

Back up.

Down again.

Jesus Christ.

There is nothing subtle happening here.

Tyler knows that.

Knowing does not appear to improve the situation.

Josh stops whatever he'd been saying.

Tyler finally drags his attention upward.

Almost makes it to Josh's face.

Doesn't quite.

"Oh..."

Excellent start.

Tyler tries again.

"Hello."

Unfortunately, the greeting appears to be directed somewhere around Josh's abdominal region.

There's a beat of silence.

Tyler becomes aware that he has just said hello to the torso of a man he sees almost every fucking day.

He closes his eyes briefly.

Great.

When he opens them again, he finally manages to locate Josh's face.

Josh is looking at him.

And Josh knows.

He has to.

There is simply no interpretation of the last several seconds in which Tyler was examining the wallpaper behind him.

But Josh doesn't call him out. Doesn't ask what he's staring at. Doesn't make Tyler explain himself.

There's only the smallest change around his mouth.

Not quite a smile.

Enough that Tyler sees it.

Then Josh glances down at himself.

"I was gonna put a shirt on."

Tyler nods much too quickly.

"Cool."

Josh looks back at him.

Another tiny pull at the corner of his mouth.

"Unless you think I shouldn't."

Tyler's brain leaves his body.

"What?"

Josh is already walking past him.

"I said I need to find a shirt."

That is absolutely not what he fucking said.

Tyler turns and watches him disappear into the bedroom.

For perhaps three full seconds, Tyler stands alone in the hallway.

Motherfucker.

Josh returns wearing a shirt.

Everything is normal.

Mostly.

Tyler needs approximately eight seconds to restart before he follows Josh toward the living room.

The basement archives have experienced a serious security breach.

And Tyler is now carrying one inconveniently restored piece of information upstairs with him.

Josh is his best friend.

Josh feels like home.

And Josh is still extremely fucking pretty.

+

The strangest thing afterward is that nothing actually changes.

Josh doesn't start behaving differently around him.

Neither does Tyler.

Mostly.

They still work, come home tired, eat whatever requires the least amount of effort, and watch terrible television. They do laundry. Talk until much later than either intended. Sometimes don't talk at all.

Tyler still walks into Josh's apartment and drops his things where his things go. Still steals space on the couch. Still wears Josh's clothes when his own happen to be in the washer.

Still feels completely, almost ridiculously comfortable here.

Nothing has changed.

Except now Josh reaches across him for the remote and Tyler notices how close his face gets.

Oh.

Josh's arm rests against his while they're watching television.

Tyler notices the arm.

Josh hands him a clean shirt.

Tyler takes it and, for no useful reason whatsoever, becomes intensely aware that he's about to put Josh's shirt on his body.

Okay.

None of these things are new.

Tyler is.

Or—

No.

That's not right either.

Tyler is paying attention again.

The basement security breach was not successfully contained.

This is mildly inconvenient.

Because once Tyler starts noticing, he discovers that he has become worse at something he used to be exceptionally good at while stoned out of his fucking mind.

Flirting.

On the night they met, Tyler had pointed directly at Josh in front of several other people and announced that he was extremely pretty.

No hesitation.

No shame.

Barely any functioning motor skills, admittedly, but tremendous confidence.

Now Josh can look at him for half a second too long and Tyler's entire vocabulary leaves through an emergency exit.

It's ridiculous.

Worse, Tyler begins to suspect Josh knows exactly what he's doing.

There's enough plausible deniability built into Josh's behavior that Tyler can't prove anything.

But there are moments.

Little ones.

Tyler comes out of the bathroom one evening wearing one of Josh's shirts because most of his own clothes are in the dryer.

Josh looks up from the couch.

His eyes travel over Tyler once.

Not dramatically.

Just enough.

"That one looks better on you."

Tyler stops.

Looks down at the shirt.

Then at Josh.

"What?"

"My shirt."

"I know it's your shirt."

"I know you know."

Tyler waits.

Josh looks back at the television.

That's the entire conversation.

Tyler stands there another second.

"What does that mean?"

Josh glances at him.

"What does what mean?"

"You said it looks better on me."

"Yeah."

"And?"

"And it looks better on you."

Josh returns his attention to the television.

Tyler hates him.

Tyler sits beside him.

Closer than necessary.

The problem is, this isn't actually new.

That realization arrives slowly.

Tyler starts remembering things he'd never bothered filing under anything important.

The first morning he slept here, standing in this same kitchen while Josh poured half a container of creamer into his coffee.

You keep making coffee lighter than my skin.

And Josh, without missing a beat:

Your skin color's not bad.

Tyler had laughed.

Moved on.

Filed nothing.

His internal archivist has apparently been drinking on the job.

Then there were the shotguns in the van.

Josh moving closer.

Tyler moving closer.

The accidental kiss neither of them pulled away from quite as quickly as the accident required.

Later, when Tyler told Josh Mark wasn't around to make them kiss again, Josh had answered:

"I mean... you never know what could happen."

Tyler had laughed himself stupid.

He hadn't filed that under anything either.

Maybe he should have.

Because Josh has been slipping tiny pieces of flirtation into their friendship for a while.

Tyler just hadn't been listening for them.

Now he is.

And once Josh seems to realize Tyler is listening—

Well.

There might be a few more.

They're folding laundry on the couch one night.

Or Josh is folding laundry.

Tyler is technically participating, but mostly he's creating piles of clothing based on a classification system that makes sense exclusively to him.

Josh picks up one of Tyler's shirts.

"This yours?"

"No."

Josh looks at him.

Tyler looks at the shirt.

"Oh. Yeah."

Josh laughs.

"You don't even know what clothes you own anymore."

"I have clothes in two houses."

The sentence leaves Tyler's mouth before he thinks about it.

There's a tiny pause.

Two houses.

Tyler keeps folding.

Or pretending to.

Josh does too.

"Yeah," Josh says.

Easy.

Like that's completely normal.

Like Tyler didn't just accidentally describe Josh's apartment as one of the places where his clothes belong.

Something small and warm moves through Tyler's chest.

Then Josh picks up another shirt.

"This one's mine."

"I know."

"You wear it more than I do."

"It's comfortable."

Josh looks at him.

"You're comfortable in my clothes?"

Oh, fuck off.

Tyler narrows his eyes.

"You know what I meant."

"I didn't say anything."

"You did it with your face."

Josh laughs.

"My face?"

"Yes."

"What did my face do?"

"You know."

"I really don't."

"You're an asshole."

Josh is grinning now.

Tyler throws a sock at him.

Josh catches it.

Still grinning.

Then he goes right back to folding laundry as though he hasn't done anything at all.

Tyler hates this.

Tyler loves this.

Tyler would like Josh to stop immediately.

Tyler will be personally offended if Josh stops immediately.

Josh never pushes too hard.

That matters.

He never mentions Tyler staring at him shirtless. Never traps Tyler inside one of these moments and demands an answer. Never makes him feel stupid for freezing or blushing or suddenly becoming fascinated by an object across the room.

Josh drops a comment and lets Tyler hear it. Sometimes he lets him squirm for approximately the amount of time that remains funny.

Then he moves on.

And because Josh moves on, Tyler can too.

Mostly.

The friendship stays exactly where it was, firmly in the foreground.

Josh is still Josh.

Tyler still wants to tell him stupid things that happened at work. Still wants to hear him laugh. Still wants to sit beside him when neither of them has anything worth saying.

Still wants to come here when he's tired.

Still thinks of this place as home before remembering that technically it isn't.

The attraction doesn't push any of that aside.

It settles into it, threading itself through things that were already there.

An arm against his is comfortable.

And now Tyler likes the arm.

Josh leaning over him is familiar.

And now Tyler notices the face attached to the person leaning over him.

Wearing Josh's clothes feels natural.

And now, occasionally, Tyler remembers whose clothes he's wearing and has to deal with that information too.

Those things can exist at the same time.

Tyler doesn't have to choose between wanting Josh near him and wanting Josh.

They're beginning to feel suspiciously like the same thing.

+

One evening, Tyler gets off work and goes home.

Josh's.

He doesn't correct himself anymore.

By the time he gets there, the door is already unlocked. Tyler lets himself in, drops his things where his things go, and kicks his shoes off beside the door.

"Hey."

"Hey."

Josh appears from somewhere farther inside the apartment, and there's something slightly different about him.

Not weird.

Not nervous.

Just—

Tyler narrows his eyes.

"What?"

"What?"

"You're doing something."

Josh laughs.

"I'm standing here."

"Suspiciously."

"Okay."

Tyler watches him for another second.

Josh apparently decides not to defend the suspicious standing.

"I forgot to show you something."

"What?"

"Come here."

That's enough information for Tyler.

He follows.

Josh leads him across the living room toward the sliding glass door. Tyler has obviously seen the door before. He's lived approximately seventeen percent of his recent life on the couch directly across from it.

What he has never bothered to notice is what exists on the other side.

Josh pulls the blinds open.

Tyler stops.

"You have a balcony?"

Josh looks at him.

"Yeah."

Tyler looks through the glass.

Then back at Josh.

"How did I not know you have a balcony?"

"Like I said. I forgot to show you."

Tyler stares at him.

He has clothes here. He does laundry here. His pillow lives on Josh's couch. He knows where Josh keeps the cups and which cabinet door has to be lifted slightly before it'll close properly.

Somehow, an entire portion of the apartment has escaped him.

"You've been hiding square footage from me."

"I haven't been hiding it."

"I basically live here."

Josh's mouth twitches.

Tyler realizes what he just said.

Neither of them addresses it.

Excellent.

Josh opens the door.

"Come on."

Tyler follows him outside.

The balcony isn't huge. There's enough room for them without requiring any complicated negotiations, which is all Tyler needs from architecture these days.

Behind the apartment building, the property gives way to a thin stretch of woods. Josh walks to the railing and rests his forearms against it.

Tyler joins him.

He looks out.

Trees.

He waits.

Still trees.

They're nice trees. Healthy-looking. Very committed to the whole tree thing.

Tyler glances at Josh.

Josh is looking out over them.

Tyler looks back.

Maybe there's a deer.

There isn't.

"Trees?"

Josh laughs.

"Just watch."

"I am watching."

"No, you're complaining."

"I'm observing."

"Be patient."

Tyler sighs dramatically and settles his arms on the railing beside Josh's.

"How long?"

"Not long."

"That's subjective."

"Tyler."

"These trees better do something incredible."

Josh bumps his shoulder lightly against Tyler's.

"It's worth the wait."

Tyler looks at him.

Josh doesn't elaborate.

Fine.

Tyler waits.

For a while, absolutely nothing happens. The trees continue their breathtaking performance as trees, and Tyler is approximately thirty seconds from providing live commentary when he notices something changing behind them.

Light.

The sun has dropped low enough that warmth is beginning to collect along the horizon.

Tyler quiets.

Slowly, almost too gradually to catch while it's happening, the sky changes.

Gold first.

Then orange bleeding outward behind the darkening trees.

The sun slips lower, disappearing somewhere beyond the branches, and what had looked like an ordinary stretch of woods a few minutes ago becomes almost black against the light behind it.

Pink catches higher in the sky.

Then something deeper underneath it.

Tyler stops thinking about the trees.

Stops thinking about work.

Stops thinking about anything, really.

He just watches.

Beside him, Josh doesn't say anything.

And that's when another part of it settles over Tyler.

Josh knew.

He's stood here before. He's watched this happen from this balcony, probably more times than Tyler could guess. He knew what those perfectly unimpressive trees would look like when the sun dropped behind them.

And tonight, for whatever reason, Josh had looked at Tyler and remembered:

I haven't shown him yet.

Something warm moves quietly through Tyler's chest.

Not because the sunset means anything.

It doesn't have to.

It's beautiful.

Josh knew it was beautiful.

And Josh wanted Tyler to see it.

That's enough.

They stay there while the colors deepen.

Eventually Josh leans slightly toward him, his shoulder bumping Tyler's.

It's barely anything.

They've touched more than this. They've fallen asleep on each other. They've occupied approximately one-third of a perfectly functional couch for reasons neither of them has ever adequately explained.

But this feels different.

Quieter.

Josh looks at him.

"I told you."

Tyler turns his head.

Josh is already watching him.

And there it is again.

That thing Josh keeps doing now.

Something offered so softly Tyler could pretend it isn't being offered at all.

Except Tyler doesn't particularly want to pretend this time.

He looks back toward the sunset.

Their forearms are still resting close together on the railing.

Tyler moves his.

Just enough to press it lightly against Josh's.

Then he turns his hand over.

Palm up.

His fingers uncurl.

He leaves it there.

Open.

For one heartbeat, nothing happens.

Tyler doesn't look down.

He doesn't look at Josh.

He doesn't take it back.

Then Josh's hand slides into his.

Tyler's fingers close.

Josh's close with them.

And—

Oh.

There is absolutely no plausible deniability available for this one.

Tyler almost smiles.

Maybe he does.

He doesn't know.

He only knows Josh's palm is warm against his and their fingers fit together easily enough that neither of them has to adjust much.

Nobody says anything.

For once, Tyler doesn't need the joke.

Josh doesn't give him one either.

They just stand there, hand in hand, watching the last of the light disappear behind the trees.

And the strange thing is how little changes.

Tyler doesn't feel like he's crossed some enormous invisible line.

Josh is still Josh.

His best friend. The person Tyler wants beside him when something is funny and when absolutely nothing is happening. The person whose couch ruined his bed. The person whose apartment became home so gradually Tyler hadn't noticed until his own brain started calling it that.

And now Tyler is holding his hand.

That's all.

That's everything.

The colors begin to fade. Orange gives way to something darker. The trees become silhouettes. The first traces of night settle over the space beyond them.

Neither lets go.

There isn't a van throwing them together.

There isn't a crowd.

Neither of them is high.

Nobody has fallen off playground equipment.

Nobody is asleep.

Nothing happened accidentally.

Tyler wanted Josh's hand.

So he opened his own.

Josh wanted to give it to him.

So he did.

Simple.

Tyler rests a little more of his weight against the railing. Josh's shoulder remains warm beside his.

Their hands stay joined between them.

And the sky goes dark.

Neither of them asks what happens next.

They don't talk about holding hands either.

Eventually the sky gets dark enough that there isn't much left to look at, and Josh says something about being hungry.

Tyler is also hungry.

So they go inside.

That's it.

Josh lets go of Tyler's hand to open the sliding glass door. Tyler follows him into the apartment, and Josh closes the door behind them.

They stand there for approximately half a second.

Then Josh reaches for Tyler's hand again.

Oh.

Okay.

Tyler gives it to him.

Apparently they're still doing this.

They make it halfway across the living room before Tyler looks down at their hands swinging slightly between them.

"This is gonna make getting food harder."

Josh looks down too.

"Probably."

Neither lets go.

Tyler looks at him.

Josh looks at Tyler.

"Do you want to let go?"

"No."

"Me neither."

Well.

There goes that solution.

They continue toward the kitchen.

Holding hands turns out to be remarkably inconvenient when two people are attempting to accomplish separate tasks. Tyler needs a cup. Josh needs his phone.

The phone is on the other side of the room.

This creates an immediate logistical problem.

Josh starts walking toward it.

Tyler's arm follows.

Then the rest of Tyler follows because apparently that's what they're doing now.

"Seriously?"

"You could let go."

"You could let go."

Josh keeps walking.

Tyler goes with him.

Neither lets go.

By the time Josh retrieves his phone, Tyler has determined that this is stupid.

He also likes it very much.

Both things can be true.

Eventually hunger forces them to temporarily separate.

Temporarily.

Because later they're back on the couch, food spread across the coffee table, something terrible playing on television, and Tyler is halfway through explaining why one of the characters is objectively the stupidest person ever written when Josh's hand appears beside his.

Not dramatically.

Josh doesn't look at him.

He just leaves it there between them.

Palm up.

Tyler stops talking.

Looks at it.

Then at Josh.

Josh continues watching television as though he has not just placed a very obvious invitation approximately four inches from Tyler's thigh.

Tyler puts his hand in it.

Josh's fingers close around his.

And Tyler continues.

"Anyway, if you hear a noise coming from your basement and six people have already disappeared in your basement, maybe don't go into the fucking basement."

"Maybe he's gonna find them."

"Josh."

"What?"

"They're dead."

"You don't know that."

"We watched them die."

"Maybe they're okay."

Tyler stares at him.

Josh squeezes his hand.

Tyler loses approximately fifteen percent of his argument.

"Don't do that."

"Do what?"

"That."

Josh looks down at their hands.

"Holding your hand?"

"No."

Josh waits.

Tyler realizes he has absolutely no intention of explaining further.

"Shut up."

Josh smiles.

The movie continues.

So does the hand-holding.

+

It doesn't become A Thing.

Which is to say, it absolutely becomes a thing.

It just doesn't become a thing they discuss.

The next few days look remarkably similar to the days before them. They work. They come home tired. They eat whatever requires the least cooperation from either of them. They watch terrible television and become unnecessarily invested in people neither of them likes.

Tyler continues sleeping on Josh's couch often enough that his own apartment has become somewhere he occasionally visits to prove he still pays rent there.

Nothing changes.

Except their hands keep finding each other.

The balcony isn't repeated like some ceremony. They don't recreate the sunset. There is no official second hand-holding.

They're walking somewhere one afternoon and Josh reaches over.

Tyler takes his hand.

That's all.

Another night they're sitting on the couch and Tyler does it first. Another time Tyler is complaining about work and doesn't even realize he's reached for Josh until Josh's fingers are already threaded through his.

It becomes startlingly easy.

There are variations. Sometimes their fingers interlace. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes one of them catches the other's hand for only a minute. Sometimes they stay that way until one of them has to pee and an unfortunate separation becomes medically necessary.

And then Tyler discovers that Josh doesn't understand the standard operating procedure for holding hands.

One hand should be sufficient.

Josh has two.

This appears to bother him.

They're on the couch one night when Josh takes Tyler's hand.

Normal.

Fine.

Tyler continues watching television.

Then Josh brings his other hand over too.

He settles Tyler's hand between both of his and lowers the entire arrangement into his lap.

Tyler looks down.

One Josh hand underneath.

One Josh hand over top.

Tyler hand in the middle.

He looks at Josh.

"What are you doing?"

Josh glances down.

"Holding your hand."

"That's excessive."

"Is it?"

"You only need one."

"I've got two."

That is—

Technically true.

Tyler looks back at the television.

"Seems greedy."

Josh rubs his thumb once across the back of Tyler's hand.

Tyler's brain goes strangely quiet.

Oh.

He doesn't mention that.

A few minutes later, Josh does it again, a slow pass of his thumb over Tyler's knuckles.

Tyler sinks a little farther into the couch.

This is deeply suspicious.

The television gets softer somehow.

Not actually.

Tyler is just becoming less interested in hearing it.

His shoulders loosen. His head finds the back cushion. Josh's hands are warm.

Really warm.

Tyler's hand is completely surrounded by them, and everything inside him that had been buzzing after work seems to be gradually deciding it can stop now.

Tyler blinks.

Long.

Opens his eyes.

Josh is watching him.

"What?"

"Nothing."

Tyler narrows his eyes.

Josh's thumb moves over his hand again.

Tyler's eyes close.

Motherfucker.

"You know what you're doing."

"What am I doing?"

Tyler opens one eye.

Josh looks offensively innocent.

"Whatever this is."

"Holding your hand?"

"With unnecessary amounts of hand."

Josh laughs quietly.

Tyler closes his eye again.

"You're making me tired."

"I don't think that's me."

"It is."

"You worked all day."

"Didn't matter before."

Josh's hands tighten gently around his.

Tyler feels himself sinking another inch into the couch.

"See?"

"See what?"

"You're doing it again."

Josh laughs.

Tyler no longer has enough energy to pursue justice.

Warm Josh hands around Tyler hand apparently means:

Everything is fine.

Powering down now.

Unfortunately, this creates another problem.

Because Josh is still flirting with him.

Tyler knows that now.

That knowledge has not made Tyler any better at dealing with it. If anything, awareness has made the situation significantly worse.

Before the basement archives reopened, Josh could say something vaguely flirtatious and Tyler's brain would happily allow it to pass through customs without inspection.

Now everything gets flagged.

A look.

A comment.

The particular little smile Josh gets when he knows perfectly fucking well what he's doing.

And Josh knows Tyler knows.

Which makes him worse.

Not dramatically worse. Josh doesn't suddenly start delivering pickup lines across the kitchen. He remains committed to plausible deniability.

Unfortunately, Tyler is becoming familiar with the method.

One morning Tyler emerges from the bathroom dressed for work, still trying to fix his hair with his fingers.

Josh looks up from his coffee.

His eyes move over Tyler.

Then back up.

"You look nice."

Tyler stops.

"Thanks."

Perfect.

Normal response.

Excellent work.

Then Josh adds, "You usually look nice, though."

Tyler's brain immediately catches fire.

Josh drinks his coffee.

Tyler stands there.

He could say something.

He should say something.

There are probably hundreds of possible responses available in the English language.

Tyler knows many English words.

None arrive.

So he walks over and holds out his hand.

Josh looks at it.

Then up at Tyler.

Tyler wiggles his fingers impatiently.

"Give me your hand."

Josh starts smiling.

"You want to hold my hand because I said you look nice?"

"No."

"Okay."

"Give it."

Josh does.

Tyler closes his fingers around Josh's.

There.

Problem solved.

He has successfully responded to the situation without saying anything humiliating.

Josh looks down at their hands.

Then back up.

His smile gets worse.

Tyler points at him with his free hand.

"Don't."

"I didn't say anything."

"Your face did."

"What'd my face say?"

"I don't know. Something annoying."

Josh laughs.

Tyler keeps holding his hand.

It takes him several repetitions before he realizes he has made a tactical error.

Because Josh learns.

And the lesson Tyler has apparently taught him is:

Flirting with Tyler results in Tyler grabbing him.

This does absolutely nothing to discourage the behavior.

They're waiting for food one night when Tyler complains that he's starving.

Josh looks over.

"You get mean when you're hungry."

"I'm always mean."

"Not to me."

Tyler glances at him.

Josh is smiling.

Small.

Easy.

Tyler knows that smile now.

"No."

"What?"

"Don't."

"I didn't do anything."

"You were about to."

"Was I?"

"Yes."

Josh considers him.

"Maybe I like that you're not mean to me."

There it is.

Tyler stares at him.

Josh waits.

Tyler has nothing.

Absolutely fucking nothing.

So Tyler reaches over and takes his hand.

Josh immediately laughs.

"Oh, that's what we're doing?"

"Shut up."

"I was just talking."

"No, you weren't."

"I definitely was."

"You were doing the other thing."

"What other thing?"

Tyler squeezes his hand harder.

Josh's smile becomes unbearable.

"Flirting?"

Tyler's face gets hot.

He hates him.

This is terrible.

Tyler moves closer and steals Josh's other hand too.

Now Josh can't do anything.

Presumably.

Josh looks at both of his hands currently imprisoned by Tyler.

Then at Tyler.

"You know, this isn't really discouraging me."

Tyler freezes.

Oh.

Oh, fuck him.

Josh starts laughing.

Tyler drops one of his hands solely so he can cover Josh's face with his palm.

"Stop."

Josh is laughing against Tyler's hand now.

"You're an asshole."

That only makes it worse.

Tyler tries very hard to remain annoyed.

Unfortunately, Josh is warm beside him, one of their hands is still linked between them, and Tyler can feel Josh smiling against his palm.

Something stupid and bright expands inside his chest.

His own mouth betrays him.

Josh pulls his face away just enough to look at him.

"You're smiling."

"I'm not."

"You are."

Tyler puts his hand over Josh's face again.

"Can't see it now."

Josh laughs harder.

Perfect.

Problem solved.

Mostly.

Because Tyler is beginning to understand something.

Words still aren't particularly reliable when Josh catches him off guard.

Maybe someday they will be.

For now, Tyler has found another language.

Josh says something that makes his heart do something embarrassing, and Tyler reaches for him.

Josh looks at him in that particular way Tyler still doesn't know how to answer, and Tyler takes his hand.

Tyler wants something he doesn't quite know how to ask for yet.

He opens his own.

And every time—

Josh answers.

Maybe that's why Tyler keeps doing it.

Not because words don't matter. Not because Tyler will never need to say any of this out loud.

Just because, right now, this works.

His hand reaches.

Josh's meets it.

And increasingly, Tyler doesn't have to think about reaching at all.

+

Work runs late.

Really late.

It's an entire shit show.

By the time Tyler finally gets out, he's tired, hungry, and close enough to his actual apartment that going there makes considerably more sense than driving all the way to Josh's.

So that's what he does.

He goes back to the apartment he pays rent for.

Mark is still awake when Tyler walks in. He looks up from the couch.

"Oh my God."

Tyler stops.

"What?"

"You live here."

"Shut up."

"I thought you moved."

"I pay half the rent."

"Yeah, you've mentioned that."

Tyler gives him the finger and keeps walking.

He's too tired to do much else. He showers, changes, and falls into the bed that still isn't as comfortable as Josh's couch, which remains objectively offensive.

Whatever.

It's late.

Tyler can survive one night.

He considers texting Josh.

He doesn't.

It's already after midnight, and Josh had work today too. He's probably asleep. Tyler doesn't want to wake him just to announce that he isn't coming over.

It isn't like they have some formal arrangement anyway.

Tyler never said he'd be there tonight.

Josh never asked.

They don't report their locations to each other.

Nothing is wrong.

Tyler puts his phone down, turns off the light, and tries to sleep.

His bed still sucks.

Maybe less than it did before.

Still sucks.

Tyler is considering whether his pillow has somehow personally betrayed him when his phone starts vibrating on the nightstand.

He groans and reaches blindly for it.

The screen lights his face.

1:07 a.m.

Josh.

Tyler is awake immediately.

He answers.

"Hey. Everything okay?"

There's a pause.

Then—

"Dude."

Josh sounds tired.

Not wrong.

Not upset, exactly.

Just tired.

Tyler waits.

"You didn't come home."

Something inside him goes completely still.

Josh keeps talking before Tyler can answer.

"I kept thinking I heard the door."

Tyler sits up.

The room around him suddenly feels very quiet.

"I didn't know you were waiting for me."

"Neither did I."

That lands somewhere Tyler doesn't have a name for.

He looks around his bedroom.

His room.

His things.

His apartment.

The place he has lived for years.

And all he can hear is Josh saying:

You didn't come home.

Not come over.

Not show up.

Home.

"I got out really late," Tyler says. "It was almost midnight, and I was already over here. I figured you were asleep."

"I was trying to be."

Tyler smiles faintly.

"I didn't want to wake you."

"Well, you did keep me awake."

Tyler's smile disappears.

Not because the words hurt.

Quite the opposite.

Because he understands.

Josh wasn't awake because Tyler had bothered him.

Josh was awake because Tyler hadn't.

Because somewhere along the way, Josh had gotten used to the same things Tyler had.

The door opening.

Tyler dropping his shit.

A voice from the living room.

Another person moving through the apartment.

The knowledge that Tyler was there.

Tyler could make fun of him.

Normally, he probably would.

There are hundreds of things about Josh that Tyler considers legally available for harassment: the coffee, the inability to locate objects directly in front of him, his television opinions, the fact that he apparently needs both hands to hold one of Tyler's.

This isn't one of them.

Tyler likes this too much.

He holds the phone a little closer.

"Sorry."

"It's okay."

"No, I should've told you."

Another pause.

Josh is quiet enough that Tyler can hear him breathe.

Tyler looks toward the clothes he dropped on the floor when he came in.

Then toward the small duffel sitting near his closet.

"I could—"

"Yeah."

Tyler stops.

Josh doesn't.

"You should be here."

No joke.

No plausible deniability.

Just that.

Tyler gets out of bed.

"I'm coming."

He hangs up.

+

Morning at Josh's has a routine now.

Tyler wakes up on the couch and remains there for a while on principle. Eventually he hears movement from the kitchen—a cabinet, the refrigerator, something set down on the counter.

Tyler opens one eye.

Coffee.

Okay.

He gets up.

Josh is standing at the counter when Tyler wanders into the kitchen, looking approximately as awake as Tyler feels.

Which is to say:

Not.

His hair is a mess. He's wearing sweatpants and an old T-shirt, and his eyes look like they haven't entirely agreed to participate in the day yet.

Tyler leans against the doorway.

"Morning."

Josh looks over.

"Hey."

That's all either of them has available.

Tyler wanders closer.

Josh pours coffee into two mugs. Tyler's gets pushed toward him untouched.

Good.

Josh has learned.

Then Josh reaches for the creamer.

Tyler watches.

Pour.

Stir.

Josh looks into the mug.

Tyler already knows what's coming.

"No."

Josh pours more.

"Josh."

"What?"

"Stop."

Josh looks at his coffee.

Then at Tyler.

"It's fine."

"It's not coffee anymore."

"There's coffee in it."

"Where?"

Josh stirs.

"Right there."

"Prove it."

Josh ignores him.

Tyler picks up his own mug and takes a drink while Josh examines his creation.

There is still too much visible evidence that coffee was involved.

Josh reaches for the creamer again.

Tyler lowers his mug.

"Jesus Christ."

"What?"

"You're gonna have to start buying that by the gallon."

"I do."

Tyler looks at the container.

Then at Josh.

"That's upsetting."

Josh smiles sleepily and adds another splash.

The coffee changes another shade.

Tyler watches him stir it.

It's such a stupid thing.

He's seen Josh do this before. Several times. Enough times that Tyler knows the process now—knows there will always be the first pour and then the completely unnecessary second one. Knows Josh will inspect the color as though there is some precise scientific threshold his coffee must reach before it becomes acceptable.

It's a Josh thing.

Like losing his phone while practically touching it.

Like taking Tyler's hand in both of his.

Like the particular laugh Tyler gets when he says something Josh wasn't expecting.

Like leaving the door unlocked when Tyler is coming home.

Nothing remarkable.

Nothing Tyler could explain to another person in a way that would make it sound important.

Josh is standing in his kitchen ruining coffee.

That's it.

Tyler loves watching him do it.

The thought is so simple that Tyler doesn't even stop to examine the wording.

He just looks at Josh.

Rumpled hair.

Sleepy eyes.

Stupid pale coffee.

Josh.

And Tyler wants to kiss him.

Oh.

Well.

That's considerably easier than most things Tyler's brain has made complicated lately.

"Josh."

Josh turns toward him.

"Yeah?"

Tyler puts his coffee down.

Then he kisses him.

No warning.

No speech.

No opportunity for the basement archives to file an injunction.

Just—

Josh.

Tyler.

Finally.

Josh responds so quickly the spoon in his hand doesn't survive the event.

It hits the counter.

Bounces.

Hits the floor.

CLATTER.

Neither of them gives a shit.

Josh's hands find Tyler's waist and pull him closer.

Tyler makes a startled little sound against his mouth because—

Oh.

Okay.

That's allowed too.

His hands land somewhere around Josh's ribs.

Then one moves.

Because Josh has a chest.

Tyler has been aware of this.

There was an incident.

Archives were breached.

Reports were filed.

But Tyler can just—

Touch him now.

Excellent.

Unfortunately, this discovery distracts Tyler from the actual kissing.

Josh moves one way.

Tyler moves the other.

Their noses bump.

They adjust.

Wrong adjustment.

Try again.

Tyler nearly smiles into Josh's mouth.

Josh does smile.

Which makes everything significantly less functional.

They separate by approximately an inch.

Josh is grinning.

Tyler is too.

Neither seems interested in stopping.

So Tyler kisses him again.

This attempt begins better.

For about three seconds.

Then Josh tilts his head at exactly the same moment Tyler changes direction, and they bump noses again.

Tyler breaks first.

A laugh escapes him.

Josh immediately starts laughing too.

"No, wait."

"I'm trying."

"I know."

"You're moving."

"You're also moving."

"Well, yeah, Tyler. That's generally—"

Tyler kisses him again solely to make him stop talking.

This works.

Briefly.

Then Tyler becomes aware that Josh's hands are still around his waist, Josh becomes aware that Tyler is laughing again, and the entire operation collapses.

They pull apart.

Tyler drops his forehead against Josh's shoulder.

Josh is laughing hard enough that Tyler can feel it through his chest.

"This is going really well."

"Shut up."

"I think we got worse."

"We've been doing it for like thirty seconds."

"Long thirty seconds."

Tyler lifts his head.

Josh's face is close.

Really close.

Which isn't new.

Except now Tyler knows he can kiss it.

That is extremely useful information.

So he does.

Again.

This one is softer, mostly because neither of them attacks it with quite as much enthusiasm.

It works better.

Not perfectly.

Josh's nose still gets in the way. Tyler hasn't figured out what the fuck he's supposed to do with his head.

But Josh's mouth is warm, his hands are warm, Tyler's fingers are curled lightly into the front of his shirt, and absolutely none of the technical deficiencies seem important enough to stop.

When they separate again, Josh stays close.

His hands are still resting at Tyler's waist.

Tyler's are still on him.

For a second they just look at each other.

Then Josh glances toward the floor.

The spoon is lying several feet away.

"Casualty."

Tyler looks.

"Didn't make it."

"I liked that spoon."

"I'm sorry for your loss."

Josh looks back at him.

"Are you?"

"No."

"Yeah."

Tyler smiles.

Josh does too.

And something about this is almost absurdly good.

They kissed.

They finally kissed.

And Tyler isn't panicking.

Nothing has become strange.

Josh still looks like Josh. The kitchen is still the kitchen. There is still an obscene cup of coffee sitting on the counter.

The only significant difference is that Tyler now knows what happens when he kisses his best friend.

Apparently:

Property damage.

Josh looks thoughtful.

"We're kind of bad at that."

Tyler laughs.

"We are not."

"We definitely are."

"We had some strong moments."

"We hit noses twice."

"That's because your nose was in the way."

"My nose is attached to my face."

"Sounds like a design flaw."

Josh laughs.

Tyler looks at his mouth.

Josh notices.

That little smile appears.

The one Tyler has learned means Josh knows exactly what Tyler is thinking and is going to be insufferable about it.

"So?"

Tyler narrows his eyes.

"So what?"

"You gonna give up?"

Tyler stares at him.

Oh, fuck this guy.

He catches the front of Josh's shirt and pulls him closer.

"Practice makes perfect."

Josh barely has time to smile before Tyler kisses him again.

+

The first kiss changes remarkably little.

Which, Tyler decides sometime around noon, is probably the strangest thing about it.

He and Josh kissed.

Several times, actually.

There had been casualties. They had established that neither of them was particularly good at it.

And then Josh picked the spoon up off the floor.

Tyler drank his coffee.

Josh drank whatever dairy-based beverage he continues insisting is coffee.

The day continued.

There is no conversation. No sitting across from each other at the kitchen table asking what this means. No sudden reorganization of their relationship.

Josh is still Josh.

Tyler is still Tyler.

They just—

Kiss now.

Tyler discovers this about twenty minutes later.

He's standing at the sink rinsing out his mug when Josh passes behind him.

Tyler turns.

Josh looks at him.

Neither says anything.

Tyler leans slightly.

Josh automatically meets him halfway.

A small kiss.

Quick.

Easy.

Then Josh keeps walking.

Tyler watches him go.

Huh.

Okay.

Apparently that's a thing.

Later they're on the couch. Tyler's feet are up on the coffee table, and Josh has one of Tyler's hands enclosed between both of his.

That part isn't new.

Tyler has learned not to fight it, mostly because something about having his hand enclosed in both of Josh's makes his entire nervous system behave like somebody has flipped a large switch labeled:

POWER DOWN.

Josh's thumb moves absently over one of Tyler's knuckles.

Tyler opens one eye.

Josh looks over.

Then his thumb does it again.

Tyler knows perfectly fucking well what happens next.

His shoulders are already loosening.

His head sinks farther into the couch.

"You're doing it."

"I'm holding your hand."

"Excessively."

Josh glances down at the hand currently surrounded by both of his.

"I like this one."

"My hand?"

"Yeah."

Oh.

There it is.

The fucking button.

Tyler stares at him.

Josh's expression remains perfectly innocent.

The bastard.

Fortunately, Tyler has recently developed a highly effective defense against this.

He turns his hand inside Josh's grip, catches Josh's fingers, and pulls.

Josh comes willingly.

Tyler kisses him.

There.

Problem solved.

When Tyler pulls away, Josh is smiling.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You're doing something."

"I'm sitting here."

"You said that last time."

"Still true."

Tyler narrows his eyes.

Josh squeezes his hand.

Tyler kisses him again.

This system is, unfortunately, doing absolutely nothing to discourage Josh.

If anything, Tyler may have created an incentive program.

By midafternoon they've kissed enough times for Tyler to notice they're getting better at it.

Not astonishingly better.

Nobody should be awarding medals.

But noses are sustaining fewer direct impacts. They've stopped trying to move simultaneously in four different directions. Tyler is beginning to learn the way Josh tilts his head, and Josh is beginning to anticipate Tyler.

Sometimes Tyler leans in and Josh is already there.

Sometimes Josh starts toward him and Tyler meets him before either has consciously decided who's doing what.

And the strangest part is how quickly it becomes ordinary.

Not meaningless.

Never that.

Tyler likes it far too much for that.

But ordinary in the same way holding Josh's hand has become ordinary.

Available.

Something they can do because they want to.

Kissing doesn't replace anything.

Josh still traps Tyler's hand between both of his. Tyler still puts his head on Josh's shoulder when he's tired. They still argue about television.

They still forget they're supposed to be watching it because they've somehow gotten into a completely unrelated argument about whether Tyler could successfully fight a goose.

"You couldn't."

"I absolutely could."

"They're mean."

"So am I."

"They can fly."

"So?"

Josh looks at him.

Tyler looks back.

"What?"

"That's your defense against flight?"

"I have arms."

Josh starts laughing.

Tyler loses his argument almost immediately because he starts laughing too.

Ten minutes later neither of them remembers what they were watching.

Twenty minutes after that, Tyler kisses Josh because he feels like it.

Then puts his head back on Josh's shoulder.

Josh takes his hand.

Nothing has gone anywhere.

They've just added something else.

+

Sometime later, Josh looks toward the clock.

"I'm hungry."

Tyler doesn't move.

"Congratulations."

"Are you hungry?"

"Obviously."

"You want to go get something?"

Tyler turns his head.

Josh is still holding his hand.

"Where?"

"I don't know."

"Strong plan."

"We could get Mexican."

Tyler considers this.

"Yeah."

"Okay."

Josh starts to get up.

Then—

"There's that place over by—"

Tyler looks at him.

Something about Josh's face.

Or his voice.

Or possibly Tyler is simply feeling significantly more confident now that he's spent an entire day discovering that kissing Josh is not only permitted but apparently encouraged.

His smile starts before he can stop it.

"Are you asking me on a date?"

Josh stops.

There is a very small pause.

Tyler watches the thought visibly arrive.

Not panic.

Not discomfort.

Just recalculation.

Oh.

That is an option.

Josh looks at him.

"Yeah."

Tyler's eyebrows lift.

Josh's smile grows.

"Actually, yeah."

"Oh."

"I am."

Tyler beams.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yeah."

Josh stands there another second.

Then:

"Cool."

Tyler laughs.

"You look very pleased with yourself."

"I just got a date."

"With somebody who was already going to dinner with you."

"Still counts."

Tyler considers that.

Fair.

They're dating now.

That was easy.

+

Their first date is Mexican food.

Which is appropriate, because nothing about their relationship has thus far suggested that their first official date should involve candlelight, tiny portions, or anybody wearing uncomfortable shoes.

They get a booth and order too much food.

Josh discovers that Tyler considers the little salsa dish placed between them to be a challenge rather than a condiment.

"It says hot."

"I can read."

"I'm just making sure."

Tyler dips another chip.

Josh watches him eat it.

"Well?"

Tyler chews.

Swallows.

"It's fine."

Josh tries it.

There is a pause.

Tyler sees the exact moment regret enters his body.

"You okay?"

"Yep."

Josh immediately reaches for his drink.

Tyler grins.

"You're crying."

"I'm not."

"Your eyes are watering."

"Different thing."

"You're crying because of salsa."

"It's spicy."

"You challenged me."

"I didn't challenge you."

"You said, 'It says hot.'"

"That was information."

"Hostile information."

Josh laughs into his drink.

By the time the food arrives, Tyler's foot has somehow ended up against Josh's beneath the table.

He doesn't remember putting it there.

Josh doesn't move his.

So they eat like that.

Ankle against ankle.

Sometimes knees bumping.

They talk about work. Then somebody at the next table says something that reminds Josh of a story, which reminds Tyler of something else, which somehow turns into an argument about whether Tyler could live successfully in the wilderness.

"I could."

"You couldn't fight a goose."

"We have moved on from the goose."

"The wilderness has geese."

"Not all wilderness."

"Some wilderness."

"I'm not moving to goose wilderness."

Josh laughs so hard he nearly drops a chip.

They stay after they're finished eating, long enough that the table is mostly empty except for glasses, abandoned napkins, and the remains of the salsa that has defeated at least one member of their party.

Neither mentions leaving.

Eventually they do.

But neither of them seems particularly interested in going home yet.

Which is ridiculous.

They are going to the same home.

Still.

There's a store nearby, so they wander into it.

They don't need anything.

This becomes immediately obvious.

Tyler puts on a hat that makes him look like somebody's elderly uncle on vacation.

Josh tells him it's flattering.

Tyler tells Josh he's a liar.

Josh finds sunglasses approximately three times too large for his face.

Tyler looks at him.

"No."

"You don't like them?"

"You look like an insect."

"A cool insect?"

"No."

Josh keeps them on.

Tyler finds another pair and puts them on too.

Josh looks at him.

"Now you look like an insect."

"Yeah, but I'm pulling it off."

"You're really not."

They buy nothing.

Eventually there are no more reasonable excuses available for wandering around, so they go back to Josh's.

Their date is over.

Technically.

They arrive outside the apartment. Tyler waits while Josh reaches for his keys.

Except Josh doesn't.

He stops in front of the door.

His hands slide into his pockets.

Tyler looks at him.

Josh rocks slightly on his heels.

"So."

Tyler waits.

Josh looks almost solemn.

"I had a really good time tonight."

Tyler blinks.

"...Me too?"

Josh nods.

"Good."

Another pause.

Tyler has no idea what the fuck is happening.

Josh looks down briefly, then back at him.

"I was wondering..."

Tyler waits.

"If maybe I could see you again sometime."

Silence.

Tyler stares at him.

Josh's face is admirably sincere.

Almost.

Almost.

Then Tyler understands.

Oh, this motherfucker.

Tyler immediately adopts what he hopes is an appropriately coy expression.

"I don't know."

Josh nods gravely.

"Okay."

"I'm pretty busy."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Josh glances toward the apartment door.

The apartment in which Tyler's pillow, blanket, and approximately thirty percent of his wardrobe currently reside.

"That's unfortunate."

"It is."

"Could I call you?"

Tyler pretends to consider it.

"You've got my number."

"I do."

"Maybe I'll answer."

Josh's mouth twitches.

Tyler is fighting for his fucking life now.

"Maybe?"

"We'll see."

"Okay."

Josh nods.

"I don't want to pressure you."

"I appreciate that."

Another solemn nod.

Tyler lasts approximately two more seconds.

Then:

"So..."

Josh looks at him.

"Do you kiss on the first date?"

That nearly gets him.

Josh's face breaks for half a second before he manages to recover.

"Only if you won't respect me in the morning."

Tyler makes an undignified noise.

Josh starts laughing.

"You fucking—"

Tyler catches the front of Josh's shirt and kisses him.

Josh is still smiling when their mouths meet.

And this one—

Oh.

This one's better.

Not perfect.

Tyler isn't sure perfect is something they're particularly interested in anyway.

But easier.

They've had a day of practice.

They know a little more now.

Josh's hand settles naturally at Tyler's waist. Tyler knows which way Josh is going to tilt his head before he does it.

Nobody sustains a nasal injury.

Promising.

Tyler's fingers loosen against Josh's shirt.

The kiss lasts longer than the ones they've been trading all day.

Not because either of them is trying to make it significant.

Because neither seems particularly interested in ending it.

When they finally separate, Josh stays close.

Tyler can feel Josh's breath against his mouth.

"Better," Josh says.

Tyler smiles.

"Way better."

"Practice."

"Research."

"Important research."

"Very."

Josh kisses him once more.

Shorter.

Soft.

Then he pulls away and finally takes his keys out.

"So..."

Tyler watches him unlock the door.

Josh glances over his shoulder.

"Would you like to come inside for some wine?"

Tyler stares at him.

Josh opens the door.

To Josh's apartment.

Where Tyler basically lives.

Tyler looks through the doorway.

Then at Josh.

"Wine."

"Yeah."

"You don't have wine."

"I might."

"You absolutely don't."

Josh steps inside.

"I could have wine."

"I was here yesterday."

"Maybe I bought some."

"When?"

Josh pauses.

"...Today."

"We were together all day."

That does it.

Josh folds.

Tyler does too.

By the time Tyler gets through the door, they're both laughing too hard to continue the performance.

Josh closes it behind him.

Tyler drops his key ring in its usual spot, kicks off his shoes, and starts toward the couch.

Home.

Except Josh catches his hand before he gets very far.

Tyler turns.

Josh pulls him back just enough for one more kiss.

Apparently dates end that way.

Good to know.

Then Josh lets him go.

Nothing else changes.

They are still best friends.

Tyler still lives on Josh's couch.

They still hold hands.

They still do absolutely nothing together better than Tyler has ever done absolutely nothing with anybody else.

Except now they kiss.

And apparently—

They date.

+

Dating does not make Tyler and Josh more interesting.

They go places now with the understanding that sometimes going places is a date.

That's mostly the difference.

There is no sudden improvement in wardrobe.

Nobody begins making reservations.

Tyler does not become the kind of person who arrives carrying flowers.

He does, however, become the kind of person who arrives carrying absolutely nothing and lays on his horn outside Josh's apartment.

This happens a couple weeks into dating.

Josh is waiting for him at home.

Tyler worked later than he did, which means Josh has already showered, changed into pajama pants, and settled comfortably into the reasonable assumption that Tyler will eventually walk through the door.

Tyler is late.

Not alarmingly late.

Just late enough that Josh eventually calls him.

Tyler answers immediately.

"Hey."

"Where are you?"

HONK.

Josh goes quiet.

HONK HONK.

"...Tyler."

"What?"

HONNNNNNK.

The sound comes through the phone.

It also comes through the apartment walls.

Josh gets up.

"Are you outside?"

"No."

Another honk.

Josh walks to the window.

Tyler's car is sitting outside.

Tyler is visible behind the wheel.

Still holding his phone to his ear.

Still leaning on the horn.

And absolutely fucking delighted with himself.

Josh hangs up.

Tyler honks again.

Josh disappears from the window.

Tyler waits.

Then honks once more for reasons known only to him.

A minute later, Josh comes outside wearing pajama pants, a T-shirt, and the expression of a man who has already accepted that this is his life now.

Tyler beams at him through the windshield.

Josh opens the passenger door.

"I could hear that through the phone."

"I know."

"And outside."

"I know."

"You know apartments have neighbors, right?"

Tyler ignores this.

"I wanted to take you on a date this time."

Josh pauses halfway into the car.

That changes his face.

Not enormously.

Just enough.

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Tyler is still smiling, apparently extremely pleased with whatever plan he's concocted.

Josh looks down at himself.

"I'm wearing pajama pants."

"I like your pajama pants."

"You don't know where we're going."

"I planned it."

"That doesn't make the pajama pants less relevant."

"Do you want to change?"

Josh considers this.

Then looks at Tyler's ridiculous, excited face.

"No."

He gets in.

Before he even reaches for the seat belt, Josh leans across the console, catches Tyler lightly behind the neck, and kisses him.

Tyler makes a pleased little sound against his mouth.

When Josh pulls back, Tyler looks even more insufferably happy.

"What was that for?"

"You came to get me."

"Yeah."

"For a date."

"Yeah."

Josh kisses him once more.

Quick.

"Okay."

Tyler starts the car.

"You should put your seat belt on."

"You should stop honking outside my apartment."

"No."

"Then I guess we're both taking risks."

They leave.

+

This becomes dating.

Not the honking specifically.

Although Tyler does threaten to make that a tradition.

Dating, as it turns out, looks suspiciously like everything they were already doing with slightly more intentional departures from the apartment.

They find cheap concerts.

Nothing impressive.

Local bands in small venues where the floor is sticky and somebody's amp is always louder than it has any right to be.

The first time, Tyler realizes halfway through that they're standing shoulder to shoulder in a crowd listening to a band neither of them has ever heard of.

He looks at Josh.

Josh looks at him.

Tyler smiles.

"This feels familiar."

Josh's mouth twitches.

"Nobody's driving us home in a van."

"Thank God."

"And I'm not shotgunning anything to you."

Tyler considers him.

"We could."

Josh laughs and bumps his shoulder.

Tyler catches his hand.

They watch the rest of the show that way.

Sometimes they go bowling.

Tyler discovers that Josh becomes considerably more competitive when rental shoes are involved.

Josh discovers that Tyler considers the little arrows on the lane to be unsolicited advice.

"You're supposed to use them."

"I know where the pins are."

"Clearly."

"I got seven."

"There are ten."

"I know how many fucking pins there are, Josh."

Josh bowls a strike.

Tyler hates him for approximately nine seconds.

Then Josh returns to the seats looking smug, and Tyler catches the front of his shirt and kisses him anyway.

"Was that congratulations?"

"No."

"Felt like congratulations."

"Shut up."

Sometimes they get stoned before a movie.

They make it less than halfway through.

The problem isn't even that the movie is particularly funny.

The problem is that Tyler whispers something to Josh.

Josh laughs.

Tyler hears Josh trying not to laugh and starts laughing because Josh is laughing.

Josh sees Tyler shaking silently beside him and loses whatever remained of his self-control.

Someone shushes them.

This makes everything approximately six hundred times worse.

By the time an employee asks them to leave, Josh has tears running down his face and Tyler cannot look directly at him without folding in half.

Outside the theater, they stand beneath the marquee trying to recover.

"We got kicked out."

Josh nods.

"We're adults."

"Yep."

"We paid money to see that."

"Yeah."

"We don't know how it ends."

Josh looks at him.

Tyler looks at Josh.

They both start laughing again.

Sometimes they get food and eat it at a park.

Tyler throws a french fry toward a bird.

Josh looks at him.

"Don't feed them that."

"I'm helping."

"You're giving a bird a french fry."

"It's food."

"It's barely food for us."

Another bird arrives.

Tyler gives that one a fry too.

"Look. I'm a bird feeder."

"You're not a bird feeder."

"I'm feeding birds."

"That doesn't make you a bird feeder."

"What the fuck do you think a bird feeder does?"

Josh stares at him.

Tyler gestures toward the growing collection of birds.

"I'm supporting the local ecosystem."

"You're giving wildlife sodium."

"Environmentalism."

"That's not environmentalism."

Tyler throws another fry.

"Tell that to my thriving community."

Sometimes they wander through stores and buy nothing.

Sometimes they wander through stores and somehow come home with something neither of them remembers deciding they needed.

They go to parks.

Restaurants.

Cheap shows.

Nowhere particularly important.

And sometimes their date consists of leaving Josh's apartment for food, deciding they're too tired for whatever else they'd planned, coming straight back, and falling asleep against each other on the couch.

Those count too.

Tyler knows because he asks.

"Was that still a date?"

Josh, already half asleep with Tyler's hand enclosed between both of his, answers:

"Did you have fun?"

"Yeah."

"Then yeah."

Tyler thinks about that.

Seems reasonable.

Maybe that's why dating Josh feels so easy.

They don't have to become people who date.

They already know how to be Tyler and Josh.

They know how to laugh together.

How to waste time together.

How to sit quietly.

How to turn a trip for food into three hours somewhere neither intended to go.

How to be exhausted beside each other.

How to have fun when nothing particularly fun is happening.

Dating doesn't give them any of that.

It doesn't create the thing between them.

It just gives them another word for it.

And, occasionally, an excuse for Tyler to sit outside Josh's apartment leaning on his horn like an asshole.

+

Dating Josh is easy.

Life, unfortunately, continues being life.

There are still shitty days.

Work does not become less capable of sucking simply because Tyler has somebody to kiss when he gets home. People remain irritating. Schedules remain exhausting. Cars need gas at inconvenient times. Bills continue arriving with absolutely no regard for anybody's happiness.

Sometimes Tyler gets hungry enough to become unreasonable before realizing the problem is that he hasn't eaten since breakfast.

And sometimes one of them comes home in a bad mood.

The first few times, there is a small amount of adjustment.

Not conflict.

Just learning.

One evening Tyler comes through the door already irritated.

Nothing catastrophic happened.

Actually, that's part of the problem.

It was one of those days made entirely out of tiny things. Everybody needed something. Nothing worked the first time. Somebody asked Tyler a question approximately six seconds after he had already answered it.

Then traffic was terrible.

Then he dropped his keys outside Josh's door.

By the time he gets inside, Tyler is so profoundly done with participating in the world that even taking off his shoes feels like an unreasonable additional demand.

Josh looks over from the couch.

"Hey."

"Hey."

Tyler drops his things.

One of them falls over.

He stares at it.

Leaves it there.

Josh watches him for another second.

"Bad day?"

"Stupid day."

"Ah."

Tyler kicks off his shoes and wanders toward the bathroom.

He needs to change. He needs to wash his face.

Mostly, he needs approximately twenty minutes during which nobody requires Tyler Joseph to have a personality.

So he takes his clean clothes with him and shuts the bathroom door.

Not angrily.

Just completely.

Done.

He changes. Washes his face. Sits on the closed toilet lid for a while afterward because standing is an optional activity and Tyler is currently declining.

Nobody knocks.

Tyler notices that.

Not negatively.

Actually—

Thank God.

Eventually he comes back out.

Josh is still on the couch. The television is on. Josh looks over when Tyler appears but doesn't immediately ask whether he's okay now, what happened, or whether Tyler wants to talk about it.

He just lifts a takeout menu from the coffee table.

"Food?"

Tyler stops.

Considers the question.

"Yeah."

"Your usual?"

"Please."

Josh picks up his phone.

That's it.

Tyler doesn't sit beside him yet. He's not ready for that part. Instead he wanders into the kitchen, gets some water, and spends another ten minutes doing absolutely nothing useful.

By the time the food arrives, the sharpest edges of the day have started wearing off.

They eat.

Josh doesn't ask.

Tyler eventually starts talking anyway.

Not about the important emotional ramifications of his difficult day.

About fucking Greg.

"And then he asks me where the thing is."

Josh chews.

"What thing?"

"Exactly."

Josh pauses.

"What?"

"He says, 'Tyler, where's the thing?'"

"What thing?"

"I DON'T KNOW."

Josh starts laughing.

Tyler points at him.

"Thank you."

"For what?"

"That's what I said."

"You just yelled 'I don't know' at him?"

"Not initially."

"Eventually?"

"Eventually."

Josh laughs harder.

Tyler feels himself beginning to smile despite every effort not to.

"And then he points at it."

Josh waits.

"It was behind him."

"Oh no."

"Directly behind him."

Josh covers his mouth.

"So I spent ten minutes helping a grown man locate an object that was six inches from his own ass."

That does it.

Josh folds forward laughing.

Tyler watches him.

There.

Better.

Not because Josh fixed anything.

Greg remains an idiot.

Work still sucked.

Tomorrow continues existing against Tyler's wishes.

But Tyler is fed now.

He's home.

Josh is laughing.

The world has become slightly less offensive.

A little later, they're on the couch.

Tyler finally lets himself lean sideways.

Josh's arm comes up automatically.

Tyler settles underneath it.

Neither mentions the twenty minutes Tyler needed by himself first.

Those twenty minutes didn't cost him this.

Good.

They get better at it.

Not because they establish rules.

There is no household meeting.

Nobody creates a chart.

They just pay attention.

Tyler learns that when Josh is unusually quiet, immediately asking him what happened is almost never useful. Josh learns that Tyler occasionally needs to complain for five uninterrupted minutes about something objectively insignificant before he can let it go.

"You don't have to fix it."

"I haven't said anything."

"I can feel you thinking solutions."

Josh looks at him.

"I'm literally eating."

"You're solution-eating."

"I don't know what that means."

"Good."

Sometimes closeness helps immediately.

Sometimes it doesn't.

Sometimes Josh comes over, barely makes it through the door, and folds himself against Tyler before he's even fully taken off his shoes.

Other times he needs a shower.

Sometimes Tyler needs Josh's hand. Sometimes he needs twenty minutes in the bathroom, or a trip to the store by himself, or to sit somewhere without being spoken to until the inside of his head stops sounding like somebody shaking silverware in a drawer.

Josh has versions of the same thing.

Neither option becomes dangerous.

That's the part Tyler appreciates most.

Space doesn't become rejection.

Silence doesn't become punishment.

A bad mood isn't evidence of some invisible problem growing between them.

If Josh doesn't want to talk, Tyler believes him when he says he doesn't want to talk. If Tyler needs to be alone, Josh lets him be alone.

Nobody follows anybody through the apartment demanding access.

Nobody makes the other person's shitty day responsible for reassuring them.

There are things they learn simply through getting it slightly wrong first.

Josh once tries to cheer Tyler up approximately seven minutes too early and receives a look so profoundly unappreciative that he slowly puts the television remote back down.

"Not yet?"

"No."

"Okay."

Twenty minutes later Tyler walks over, takes Josh's hand, and sits beside him.

Josh doesn't say:

Oh, now you want me?

He just moves over.

Another time Tyler follows Josh into the kitchen while Josh is irritated and continues talking because Tyler has incorrectly determined that distraction might help.

Eventually Josh turns around.

"Dude."

Tyler stops.

Josh closes his eyes.

"Love you being here."

Tyler waits.

"Can't listen to you right now."

Tyler considers this.

Fair.

"Want me to shut up?"

"Very much."

"Okay."

Tyler shuts up.

He even leaves the kitchen.

Mostly because standing silently three feet away from Josh would somehow feel significantly more annoying.

Later Josh finds him on the couch and drops down beside him.

"Hi."

Tyler looks over.

"Can you listen to me now?"

"Probably."

"Excellent."

And that's it.

No injury.

No apology tour.

No emotional autopsy.

They learn the difference between:

Go away.

And:

Give me a minute.

They learn that somebody can need distance without wanting less of the person they're taking distance from.

They learn that sometimes caring for each other means getting closer.

Sometimes it means food.

Sometimes it means listening to a fifteen-minute rant about fucking Greg.

And sometimes love—or whatever exact word Tyler is currently not dragging into direct sunlight for examination—looks remarkably like leaving somebody the fuck alone.

Until it doesn't.

+

One evening, Josh calls Tyler near the end of the workday.

Tyler answers while gathering his things.

"Hey."

"Hey."

That's enough to make Tyler pause.

Not because Josh sounds terrible.

Just different.

Quieter.

Tyler knows his different kinds of tired now.

"You still at work?"

"Yeah. Leaving in a minute."

Tyler waits.

Josh doesn't offer anything else.

Tyler doesn't ask.

After a second, Josh says, "I'll probably be home around six."

"Okay."

Another small pause.

"You coming over?"

There it is.

Tyler's expression softens.

"Yeah."

"Okay."

"I'll see you there."

"Yeah."

They hang up.

Tyler doesn't spend the drive trying to diagnose Josh through four seconds of telephone audio.

Maybe something happened.

Maybe nothing happened.

Either way, Josh wants him there.

So Tyler goes.

Josh gets home first.

By the time Tyler reaches the apartment, Josh's car is already outside. Tyler knocks, and a few seconds later the door opens.

Josh looks at him.

"Hey."

"Hey."

That is definitely enough.

Bad Day Josh.

Not mildly annoyed Josh.

Not tired Josh.

Not Josh-hasn't-eaten-and-is-about-to-discover-that-this-is-the-entire-problem Josh.

Bad.

Tyler doesn't ask what happened.

Josh steps aside and lets him in.

Tyler drops his things where his things go and kicks off his shoes.

Josh makes it approximately another minute before disappearing down the hallway.

A moment later, the shower starts.

Okay.

Tyler settles onto the couch and turns on the television.

Or tries to watch it.

He isn't actually absorbing much.

He cares that Josh is upset.

Some part of him wants to know why. Another part wants to find whoever caused it and determine whether they're available for a strongly worded conversation.

But neither impulse requires immediate action.

Josh knows where Tyler is.

The shower runs for a long time.

Eventually it stops.

Tyler hears movement down the hallway.

Then nothing.

Josh doesn't come out.

Okay.

Tyler stays where he is.

One leg stretched along the back of the couch, the other hanging partly off the edge. Some terrible show continues happening in front of him.

He changes the channel.

Finds something equally terrible.

Changes it again.

Eventually he stops bothering and lets some guy explain how a house was renovated incorrectly.

Twenty minutes pass.

Maybe thirty.

Tyler isn't counting.

He's not anxiously monitoring the hallway.

Concern is not insecurity.

Josh is having a bad day.

Their relationship isn't.

Eventually Tyler hears bare feet against the floor.

He looks over.

Josh comes into the living room with damp hair and clean clothes.

He looks tired.

Not work tired.

Something deeper.

Tyler doesn't sit up.

Doesn't ask:

You okay?

Obviously not.

Josh walks to the couch.

Tyler's legs are occupying most of it.

Josh puts a hand around one ankle and moves it.

"Rude."

Josh says nothing.

He sits down between Tyler's legs.

Tyler watches him.

Josh turns and begins trying to fit himself into the available space.

There's no graceful way to do it. Tyler is sprawled across most of the couch, and Josh apparently wants access to considerably more Tyler than the current configuration allows.

One arm slides behind Tyler's back.

The other tries to get around his waist.

Tyler understands.

"Oh."

He lifts himself slightly.

Josh gets his arm underneath him.

Then both arms close around Tyler's waist.

Hard.

Not painful.

Just—

Hard.

Josh pulls him close and holds on.

Tyler's expression softens.

Josh squeezes once more.

Then some of the tension seems to leave him.

Not all of it.

Enough.

"There you are," Josh says quietly.

Oh.

Tyler lets himself settle back into the cushions.

There isn't anything he needs to say.

After a while, Josh lifts his head.

Tyler looks down.

Josh presses a kiss to the center of Tyler's chest.

Not quick.

His mouth stays there for a moment.

Warm through Tyler's shirt.

Then Josh lowers his head again and settles his cheek against Tyler's chest.

Tyler's hand moves automatically.

Josh's hair is still damp from the shower.

Tyler combs his fingers through it.

Slowly.

Again.

Josh's eyes close.

Tyler keeps going.

The television talks quietly to itself.

Something is apparently very wrong with the foundation of that house.

Neither of them gives a shit.

Tyler doesn't know what happened today.

Maybe Josh will tell him later.

Maybe he'll tell him in ten minutes.

Maybe tomorrow.

Right now, Josh doesn't need to explain why he came back.

Tyler understands that part.

He needed to be alone.

So Tyler let him.

Then he needed Tyler.

So Tyler was here.

Nothing happened to them while Josh was down the hallway.

The apartment didn't become uncertain.

Tyler didn't disappear.

Their relationship didn't require maintenance during the time Josh couldn't participate in it.

Josh had left it here.

Safe.

Waiting.

Exactly where he put it.

Tyler's fingers move through his hair again.

Josh's arms remain loosely around his waist.

And slowly, beneath Tyler's hand, he relaxes.

Home doesn't always mean coming back happy.

Sometimes it just means knowing you can come back like this.

+

Tyler still has an apartment.

This remains legally and financially true.

Practically, the situation has become increasingly difficult to defend.

He pays rent.

Faithfully.

Every month, Tyler gives Mark his half of the money required to maintain an apartment in which Tyler now spends approximately no time.

He still has a bedroom there.

Technically.

Mostly, he uses it as storage.

Every so often Tyler remembers something he owns that hasn't yet migrated to Josh's and has to go retrieve it.

Sometimes Josh comes with him.

Mark has opinions about this.

One afternoon Tyler lets himself into the apartment with Josh behind him.

Mark is on the couch.

He looks up.

"Hey."

"Hey."

Then Mark sees Josh.

His expression changes immediately.

"You."

Josh stops.

Looks behind himself.

Then points at his own chest.

"Me?"

"Homewrecker."

Tyler keeps walking.

"Oh my God."

Josh, meanwhile, looks delighted.

"Me?"

"Yes, you."

"What'd I do?"

Mark gestures broadly toward Tyler.

"This."

Tyler stops halfway down the hall.

"What the fuck does that mean?"

"You stole my roommate."

Josh looks at Tyler.

Then at Mark.

"I didn't steal him."

"You absolutely stole him."

"I still live here," Tyler says.

Mark looks at him.

"No, you don't."

"I pay rent."

"That is not the same thing."

"It's usually a pretty significant part of living somewhere."

"Sleeping there helps."

Tyler points toward his bedroom.

"My stuff is here."

Mark looks toward the bedroom.

Then back at Tyler.

"For now."

Josh laughs.

Tyler glares at both of them and disappears down the hallway.

He came for a few things.

That's it.

There is absolutely no reason this needs to become an event.

He finds the shirt he was looking for.

Then remembers another shirt.

Actually, he should probably grab a couple more while he's here.

His duffel is still in the closet.

Convenient.

Tyler pulls it out.

A few shirts go in.

Then a sweatshirt.

Some underwear.

Socks.

He looks around.

His room has begun developing gaps.

Not dramatic ones.

His furniture is still here. His bed is still here. The room still unquestionably belongs to him.

It just looks a little like somebody has been very slowly robbing him.

Tyler, apparently.

From the living room, Mark yells:

"NEED HELP CARRYING YOUR FURNITURE OUT?"

Tyler closes his eyes.

"No!"

"YOU SURE?"

"YES!"

"JOSH CAN PROBABLY GET ONE END OF THE MATTRESS!"

Josh's voice follows.

"I'll help!"

"Fuck both of you!"

Tyler hears them laughing.

Assholes.

He looks around again.

Then notices the extra pillow on his bed.

Tyler already has a pillow at Josh's.

He does not need another pillow at Josh's.

He picks it up anyway.

There is no meaningful thought process attached to this decision.

Pillows are useful.

Josh has an apartment.

Apparently that's sufficient reasoning.

Tyler grabs a couple other things from his dresser, slings the duffel over one shoulder, and tucks the pillow under his arm.

Then he returns to the living room.

Mark looks at him.

Looks at the duffel.

Looks at the pillow.

Slowly looks back at Tyler.

Tyler stops.

"What?"

Mark says nothing.

"Don't."

Still nothing.

"Mark."

Mark turns to Josh.

"You see this shit?"

Josh looks at Tyler.

Then at the bag.

Then at the pillow.

"Yeah."

"And?"

Josh considers the question.

"He forgot some stuff."

Mark stares at him.

"You have no remorse."

"For what?"

"Homewrecking."

Josh smiles.

"No."

Tyler walks toward the door.

"I hate it here."

Mark immediately points at him.

"SEE?"

Josh starts laughing.

"That's not what I meant."

"No, I think you've made your position pretty clear."

"I still pay rent!"

"Stop saying that like it helps!"

"It does help! You like the rent!"

Mark pauses.

That, unfortunately, is true.

Tyler sees victory.

"Exactly."

Mark points at him.

"You are the best roommate I've ever had."

"Thank you."

"You're never here and you keep paying me."

"Fuck you."

"Quiet. Clean. Financially responsible."

"I'm leaving."

"I know. That's your best quality."

Tyler opens the door.

Josh is still laughing behind him.

Mark calls after them.

"Don't be a stranger!"

Tyler turns around.

For approximately half a second, the sentiment sounds almost sincere.

Mark ruins it.

"Actually, be a stranger more often. This is working out great for me."

Tyler gives him the finger.

Mark waves.

"Love you!"

"Fuck off."

"Drive safe!"

Tyler leaves.

Josh follows him into the hallway.

The door closes behind them.

For a few steps, neither says anything.

Then Josh looks at the pillow underneath Tyler's arm.

"You know you already have one, right?"

Tyler looks at him.

"You offered to carry my mattress."

"I was being supportive."

"You were conspiring with the enemy."

Josh takes the duffel from Tyler's shoulder before Tyler can object.

"Homewreckers are supportive."

"Apparently."

They keep walking.

Tyler carries the pillow.

Josh carries the bag.

Neither of them discusses the fact that Tyler went into the apartment he still pays to live in and came out with another load of his belongings.

Josh doesn't ask where Tyler intends to put them.

Doesn't ask whether they're staying permanently.

Doesn't ask why Tyler needs another pillow at his apartment.

Why would he?

They get into the car.

And take Tyler's things home.

+

For a long time, Tyler has maintained one incontrovertible fact about Josh's apartment.

The couch is excellent.

Josh Couch defeated Tyler Bed months ago and has remained undefeated ever since.

Tyler has slept on it willingly, repeatedly, and with enough enthusiasm that some of his belongings now permanently live within several feet of it.

There is nothing wrong with the couch.

Unfortunately, there is something wrong with Josh.

Josh keeps leaving.

Every night.

At some point, no matter how comfortably they're tangled together watching television, Josh eventually yawns, stretches, kisses Tyler somewhere convenient, and says some variation of:

"I'm going to bed."

Then he goes to his bedroom.

Like an asshole.

Tyler remains on the couch.

Alone.

This arrangement has worked perfectly well for months.

Tyler has recently decided he hates it.

Not the couch.

The couch remains innocent.

It's the sudden absence of Josh that has become a problem.

Tyler can spend an entire evening with Josh pressed against his side, Josh's hand around his, Josh's fingers absentmindedly tracing over his knuckles while they argue about something neither of them will remember tomorrow.

Then Josh gets up.

And Tyler's entire body seems to go:

Wait.

Where the fuck is he going?

Apparently becoming accustomed to affection has had unforeseen consequences.

Tyler likes having Josh near him.

More specifically, Tyler has become extremely greedy about having Josh near him.

This would be easily solved by saying:

Stay with me.

Tyler does not do this.

Instead, several nights later, Josh stands from the couch.

"I'm going to bed."

Tyler looks up.

"Wait."

Josh stops.

Tyler had not anticipated getting this far.

"What?"

Excellent question.

Tyler's brain begins manufacturing emergency bullshit.

"I think something's wrong with your couch."

Josh looks at the couch.

Then Tyler.

"What's wrong with it?"

Tyler looks down too.

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

"I think it might suck now."

Silence.

Josh's mouth twitches.

Motherfucker.

He knows.

Tyler narrows his eyes.

Josh, mercifully, does not point out that Tyler has spent months evangelizing about this exact piece of furniture.

Instead, he folds his arms.

"Okay."

Tyler waits.

"How do we determine whether my couch sucks?"

Tyler hadn't planned that far either.

"Research."

"Research."

"Yeah."

Josh nods very seriously.

"We should probably be thorough."

Fuck him.

Tyler loves him.

Not relevant.

Basement.

"Obviously."

Josh sits back down.

And thus begins the least scientifically rigorous study ever conducted.

+

The first problem becomes immediately apparent.

Josh's couch is perfectly comfortable for one grown man. It is perfectly comfortable for two grown men sitting beside one another. It is even reasonably comfortable for two grown men leaning all over each other while pretending to watch television.

It is not designed for two grown men attempting to sleep on it simultaneously.

They try anyway.

At first they lie side by side.

This lasts approximately thirty seconds.

"Move."

"Where?"

"Over."

"There is no over."

"Make over."

"Tyler, that's the floor."

Tyler looks.

Josh is correct.

They rearrange.

Josh turns onto his side. Tyler wedges himself beside him.

Better.

For about four minutes.

"Your elbow is in my kidney."

"That's not your kidney."

"How do you know?"

"Your kidneys aren't there."

"Are you a doctor?"

"Are you?"

"I'm the patient."

Another rearrangement.

Somehow Tyler ends up halfway on top of Josh.

They both go still.

Oh.

This is—

Actually.

This is pretty good.

Tyler settles experimentally.

Josh makes a strangled noise underneath him.

"You make a better couch."

"No."

"You do."

"My spine disagrees."

Tyler puts his head down on Josh's chest.

Josh's arm comes around him anyway.

"Your spine's dramatic."

"My spine is being medically rearranged."

Tyler closes his eyes.

Josh's fingers move lazily through the hair near the back of his head.

"Comfortable?"

"Very."

"Great. I'm dying."

"Quiet. Science."

Josh laughs underneath him.

Tyler feels it against his cheek.

Somehow, despite every ergonomic argument against it, they fall asleep.

+

Tyler wakes on the floor.

He doesn't know when this happened.

One moment, presumably, he was asleep on Josh.

The next moment currently available to his memory involves staring at the underside of the coffee table.

He lifts his head.

Everything hurts.

Josh is still on the couch, one arm hanging over the edge.

"Josh."

Nothing.

Tyler pokes the dangling hand.

"Josh."

A noise.

"I fell off."

Josh's eyes remain closed.

"Research."

"This couch sucks."

"Need more data."

Unfortunately, Josh is correct.

Peer review demands replication.

So they do it again.

Not immediately.

They're idiots, not animals.

But another night comes.

Josh starts toward his bedroom.

Tyler looks at the couch.

Josh looks at Tyler.

"Research?"

Tyler opens his arms.

"Research."

This time Josh lies down first, and Tyler fits himself into whatever available Josh-shaped geometry remains.

It is terrible.

It is wonderful.

Tyler sleeps with Josh's arm around his waist and one of his legs trapped somewhere between Josh's, and sometime during the night his face gets smashed against Josh's shoulder.

Neither complains enough to stop doing it.

Their mornings acquire a routine.

Coffee.

Creamer crimes.

Tylenol.

"How's your neck?"

"Bad."

"Mine too."

"Research tonight?"

"...Yeah."

The scientific community suffers.

Eventually there is enough evidence that continuing the experiment becomes indefensible.

One night they're sitting together when Josh yawns.

Tyler notices.

Josh notices Tyler noticing.

Neither moves.

Tyler is already waiting with his arms open.

Josh looks at him.

Then at the couch.

Then back at Tyler.

"I think we have enough data."

Tyler lowers his arms slightly.

"You think?"

"Yeah."

"What's the conclusion?"

Josh considers.

"Couch sucks."

Tyler nods solemnly.

"Couch sucks."

Several seconds pass.

Josh's thumb moves over Tyler's knuckles.

"We could test the bed."

Tyler looks at him.

There it is.

Simple.

Obvious.

No joke covering it completely this time.

Tyler could make one.

He almost does.

Instead he squeezes Josh's hand.

"For science?"

Josh smiles.

"Obviously."

Josh stands.

Tyler expects him to start toward the bedroom.

He doesn't.

He reaches down and picks up Tyler's pillow.

Then Tyler's blanket.

Tyler watches him.

Something about that hits differently than the invitation itself.

Josh doesn't tell Tyler to bring his things.

He takes them.

Carries them down the hallway himself.

Tyler follows.

He has been in Josh's bedroom before. That's not what makes this different.

Josh crosses to the bed and puts Tyler's pillow down beside his own.

Not temporarily on the mattress.

Not tossed somewhere until they figure things out.

Beside his.

Then he spreads Tyler's blanket over the bed with the rest.

Tyler stands there looking at it.

His pillow.

Josh's pillow.

Side by side.

Oh.

Josh sits on the edge of the mattress.

Looks at Tyler.

Raises both hands.

Opens and closes them at him.

Grabby hands.

Tyler laughs.

"Seriously?"

Josh does it again.

Tyler goes.

He doesn't even pretend he isn't going.

Josh catches him around the waist the moment he's close enough and pulls him between his knees. Tyler's hands settle automatically onto Josh's shoulders.

"This is very professional," Tyler says.

"We're researchers."

"Right."

"Extremely respected."

"By who?"

Josh looks up at him.

"Each other?"

Tyler snorts.

"Barely."

Josh kisses him.

Just once.

Soft and familiar now.

When he pulls back, he doesn't let Tyler go.

"Bed?"

Tyler looks at the two pillows again.

Then down at Josh.

And the answer is so easy that it almost feels strange that it took them this long to ask the question.

"Yeah."

The couch hasn't actually gotten worse.

Tyler knows that.

Josh knows that.

The research was fraudulent from the beginning.

The couch didn't change.

Tyler just stopped wanting to sleep somewhere Josh wasn't.

And Josh had been waiting for him to figure out how to say it.

Even if the best Tyler could come up with was:

Your couch sucks.

At first, they don't actually do anything.

Which feels strangely appropriate.

Josh gets under the blankets.

Tyler gets under the blankets.

And they lie there.

Beside each other.

In a perfectly normal bed.

A very comfortable bed, actually.

Tyler stares at the ceiling.

This should be excellent.

The mattress is significantly wider than the couch. Nobody's elbow is inside anybody else's organs. Tyler's neck is positioned at an angle generally approved by the human skeletal system.

His pillow is here.

His blanket is here.

Josh is here.

Everything is objectively better.

Tyler frowns.

Something is wrong.

He shifts.

Still wrong.

Adjusts his pillow.

No.

Moves his leg.

Nothing.

Josh turns his head.

"You okay?"

"There's something wrong with your bed."

Silence.

Tyler can feel Josh looking at him.

"What?"

"Your bed."

"My bed."

"Yeah."

"What's wrong with it?"

"I don't know yet."

Josh makes a quiet sound that might be a laugh.

Tyler ignores him.

This is serious.

He shifts again.

Rolls slightly onto his side.

Better.

Not fixed.

Tyler moves approximately two inches toward Josh.

There.

Improvement.

Interesting.

Josh notices.

"Did that help?"

"A little."

Tyler moves another inch.

Josh's mouth twitches.

Tyler narrows his eyes.

"Don't."

"I'm not doing anything."

"You're doing something with your face."

"I'm lying here."

"Smugly."

Josh laughs.

Tyler inches closer.

"This side of the mattress might be defective."

"Which side?"

"This part."

"The part you're moving away from?"

"Yeah."

"That's weird."

"Extremely."

Tyler moves closer again.

There is still an absurd amount of empty mattress behind him.

Josh glances at it.

Then at Tyler.

Tyler ignores this evidence.

"I think it slopes."

"It doesn't."

"You don't know."

"I sleep here every night."

"And you've never noticed?"

"Apparently not."

"That's concerning."

Josh is openly smiling now.

Tyler keeps going until his knee bumps Josh's leg.

He stops.

Oh.

That's considerably better.

Josh looks down at the point of contact.

Then back at him.

"Any improvement?"

Tyler considers.

"Some."

"Still defective?"

"Severely."

"Wow."

"I know."

Josh nods thoughtfully.

Then lifts an arm.

Tyler looks at it.

Looks at Josh.

Josh makes the smallest motion toward himself.

An invitation so obvious that Tyler's entire investigation immediately loses what little scientific credibility it had left.

Oh.

Right.

Tyler goes.

He moves into the offered space, and Josh's arm comes around him immediately.

Tyler settles against his chest. One of Josh's legs shifts against his. Josh's other hand finds Tyler's side and rests there.

Tyler goes still.

Not because anything feels strange.

Because nothing does.

There.

That's—

Oh.

That's it.

His body relaxes almost embarrassingly fast. His shoulders loosen. His face settles into the warm space beneath Josh's chin.

Josh adjusts around him, pulling him a little closer.

Tyler lets out a long breath.

"Fixed it."

Josh's chest moves with a quiet laugh beneath his cheek.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"What was wrong?"

Tyler closes his eyes.

"Structural issue."

"Obviously."

"Major design flaw."

"Good thing we caught it."

"Could've been dangerous."

Josh's hand moves slowly over Tyler's back.

"You're welcome."

Tyler smiles against him.

For a while, that's all there is.

Warmth.

Josh's breathing beneath his ear.

A hand moving lazily along his back.

Tyler's arm resting across Josh's middle.

Their legs finding comfortable places around each other without either of them having to negotiate where anything goes.

And this time there is no excuse.

That's the part Tyler notices eventually.

The couch had been too small. That had been the entire premise of their extremely fraudulent research.

Two grown men.

Not enough room.

They'd ended up tangled together.

Except now there is room.

So much fucking room.

Tyler could roll away from Josh twice and probably still remain comfortably on the mattress. Josh could sleep on his side without Tyler anywhere near him.

Nothing is forcing them together.

No moving van.

No crowded concert.

No playground accident.

No undersized couch.

No research.

They don't even have exhaustion to blame yet.

They're awake.

They know exactly what they're doing.

Tyler wanted closer.

Josh opened his arm.

Tyler went.

And now Josh is holding him because Josh wants to hold him.

Tyler is wrapped around Josh because Tyler wants to be wrapped around Josh.

That's all.

The simplicity of it settles somewhere warm inside him.

Josh's fingers drift into his hair.

Tyler makes a quiet, involuntary sound and presses closer.

Josh's hand stops.

Then does it again.

Tyler opens one eye.

"Don't abuse that information."

"What information?"

Motherfucker.

Tyler closes his eye again.

A few seconds later, Josh's fingers move slowly through his hair.

Tyler decides he'll address the problem later.

Much later.

Possibly never.

His hand finds Josh's where it rests against his side.

Their fingers tangle together.

Warm Josh hands.

Josh body.

Perfectly functional mattress.

Everything is fine.

Powering down now.

Tyler is almost asleep when Josh shifts just enough to press a soft kiss into his hair.

No joke follows it.

Tyler doesn't make one either.

He only squeezes Josh's hand once.

Then settles.

The couch was where they learned how easy it was to fall asleep touching.

The bed is where they stop pretending they need a reason.

There is an entire mattress available to them.

They choose each other anyway.

+

Sleeping in Josh's bed becomes normal remarkably quickly.

That probably should feel stranger than it does.

Tyler's pillow is beside Josh's now. His blanket has joined the general ecosystem of blankets already on the bed.

He no longer waits on the couch while Josh eventually disappears down the hallway.

When they're tired, they go to bed.

Together.

Apparently that's just something they do now.

The first few nights, Tyler notices it.

Notices himself following Josh into the bedroom.

Notices pulling back the blankets on his side.

His side.

Jesus.

Notices turning out the light and knowing that when he reaches across the mattress, Josh will be there.

Then even the noticing starts to fade.

It becomes routine.

A really fucking good routine.

They don't always immediately curl around each other. Sometimes Josh lies on his back while Tyler sprawls beside him. Sometimes Tyler reads something on his phone while Josh is halfway asleep. Sometimes they talk.

Sometimes they spend twenty minutes trying to remember the name of an actor from a movie neither of them even likes.

Sometimes Tyler is nearly unconscious before Josh gets into bed and responds to the mattress dipping by lifting an arm without opening his eyes.

Josh goes underneath it.

Other nights Tyler gets there first.

Josh climbs into bed.

Tyler makes grabby hands.

Apparently this has spread.

Josh laughs and goes anyway.

They hold hands under the blankets.

They kiss goodnight.

Sometimes the goodnight kiss becomes several goodnight kisses.

Sometimes several becomes enough that neither of them appears particularly committed to sleeping anymore.

And somewhere along the way, Tyler realizes something else.

They've gotten really fucking good at kissing.

Not objectively, maybe.

Tyler has no intention of assembling an independent panel for evaluation.

But Josh knows him now.

Knows the tiny adjustments Tyler makes without thinking. Knows when Tyler wants another kiss because Tyler follows him slightly when he pulls away.

Tyler knows Josh too.

There isn't any of that first-kiss confusion anymore.

No noses colliding.

Considerably fewer dental emergencies.

No spoon casualties.

They found the rhythm.

More importantly, they found everything that happens around it.

Josh smiling against Tyler's mouth.

Tyler laughing because Josh tried to say something without actually stopping the kiss first and produced absolute nonsense.

A kiss interrupted because one of them remembers something completely unrelated and apparently it has to be discussed immediately.

Hands become part of it too.

Not cautiously anymore.

Not always with some enormous awareness of:

I am touching Josh.

They simply touch.

Tyler's hand beneath the back of Josh's shirt because he likes warm skin under his palm.

Josh's fingers slipping beneath Tyler's shirt at his waist.

Hands along backs.

Sides.

Chest.

Hair.

Faces.

Sometimes affectionate.

Sometimes playful.

Sometimes distinctly less innocent than either of those things.

And still—

Normal.

Apparently.

Nothing about wanting Josh more makes Tyler want the rest of him less.

He still wants the hand-holding.

Still wants Josh's fingers in his hair.

Still wants to fall asleep against him.

Still wants to annoy him while he's making coffee.

Still wants to hear every stupid thing that happened during Josh's day.

Desire hasn't displaced any of it.

It's simply found somewhere to live among everything else.

+

One night they're kissing in bed when Tyler becomes particularly aware of that.

They're already close.

They usually are.

Josh is on his side facing him, one hand warm beneath Tyler's shirt. Tyler has an arm around Josh, fingers moving idly against his back.

Nothing about it feels particularly new.

Until Josh pulls him closer.

Tyler goes easily.

Their legs shift together beneath the blankets.

Josh's hand moves.

Tyler's does too.

And suddenly the closeness feels different.

Not alarming.

Not unexpected, exactly.

Just—

More.

Tyler notices.

So does Josh.

Neither moves away.

Josh kisses him again.

Slower this time.

Tyler feels something warm gather low inside him and, instead of immediately examining it from seventeen different angles, lets himself have it.

This is Josh.

Josh's mouth.

Josh's hands.

Josh holding him.

There is nowhere here Tyler doesn't feel safe.

And apparently safety does absolutely nothing to diminish wanting someone.

If anything—

Well.

That's useful information.

Tyler kisses him again.

His hand moves over Josh's side.

Josh draws him closer.

And for a little while there isn't anything funny about it.

They're simply there.

Learning.

Wanting.

Finding another version of the closeness that has been building between them since the back of a shitty van.

Eventually Tyler pulls back just far enough to look at him.

Josh's eyes open.

Tyler considers him.

Then:

"Do you think you'd still like me without clothes?"

Josh blinks.

There it is.

Moment ruined.

Perfect.

"Probably."

Tyler's eyebrows rise.

"Probably?"

Josh's mouth twitches.

"But I guess we won't know until it happens."

Tyler stares at him.

Oh.

Research.

Motherfucker.

Tyler narrows his eyes.

"Well, I would also need to know if I still like you."

"Without clothes?"

"Yes."

Josh looks genuinely thoughtful.

"Didn't we already do that?"

"No."

"You saw me shirtless."

"That's different."

"You forgot how to talk."

Tyler's face immediately heats.

"You can't prove that."

"I watched it happen."

"No, you didn't."

"You said hello to my stomach."

"I was tired."

"You'd just gotten home from work."

"Exactly."

Josh starts laughing.

Tyler puts a hand over his face.

"I hate you."

Josh catches his wrist.

Pulls Tyler's hand away.

Still smiling, he kisses his palm.

"No, you don't."

Tyler looks at him.

And there it is again.

That fucking thing Josh does.

A joke.

A little flirtation.

Then something so casually tender Tyler doesn't know what to do with himself.

Except now he does.

Tyler threads their fingers together.

"No," he says quietly.

He doesn't.

Josh's smile softens.

The humor has done what it needed to do.

It carried them through the brief moment when something new became visible.

They don't need it anymore.

Josh kisses him again.

Tyler answers.

And this time, when their hands begin exploring again, neither pretends not to understand where this could lead.

They've spent months learning how to be close.

This is another kind.

So they take their time with it.

They let themselves want.

Let themselves discover.

Let affection and attraction become increasingly difficult to separate until Tyler isn't particularly interested in separating them at all.

There is laughter because they're still them.

There are moments of awkwardness because bodies are bodies and neither of them has suddenly become supernaturally graceful.

There are pauses.

Kisses.

Hands finding each other again.

And eventually, together, they choose to go further.

Not because the story between them has suddenly changed.

Because it hasn't.

That's almost the strangest part.

Tyler wants Josh.

Josh wants Tyler.

They trust each other.

They've already learned a hundred smaller ways their bodies fit together.

This is simply another one they're finally ready to discover.

+

Afterward, nothing breaks.

That's what Tyler notices.

There is no enormous silence.

No panic arriving ten minutes late.

No sudden need to establish the geopolitical boundaries of their relationship.

Josh is still Josh.

Tyler is still Tyler.

They're still in the same bed they've been sharing.

Tyler's pillow is still beside Josh's. His blanket is still tangled somewhere among the others.

Josh's hand finds his.

Tyler lets their fingers lace together.

For a while they lie there quietly.

Then Josh's thumb moves across his knuckles.

Once.

Again.

Tyler feels his entire nervous system begin its familiar descent toward:

Everything is fine; powering down now.

He smiles.

Even this didn't replace anything.

Sex didn't replace kissing.

Kissing didn't replace cuddling.

Cuddling didn't replace holding hands.

Holding hands never replaced friendship.

Nothing gets thrown away.

They just keep finding new things and making room.

Another kind of affection.

Another kind of trust.

Another way Josh can touch him.

Another way Tyler can answer.

Another intimacy added to the collection.

Tyler closes his eyes.

Josh is warm beside him.

Their hands remain tangled between them.

And eventually Tyler falls asleep exactly where, by now, he expects to wake up.

Home.

+

Nothing particularly dramatic happens afterward.

Which, by now, Tyler has learned is usually how the important things happen.

They continue.

They work.

They come home tired.

Josh continues committing crimes against coffee. Tyler continues commenting on them as though someday his criticism might inspire reform.

It doesn't.

They watch terrible television. Hold hands. Kiss. Go on dates. Sleep together. Have sex.

Sometimes they spend entire evenings practically attached to each other. Sometimes Tyler is doing something in one room while Josh is somewhere else, and neither thinks anything of it.

Sometimes life requires them to exist separately.

They have different schedules. Different friends. Different obligations. Mark still exists and occasionally requires assistance with something, usually accompanied by enough complaining to make Tyler briefly reconsider the value of friendship.

They go places without each other.

They do things without each other.

Then they come home.

That part never stops feeling good.

Nothing about their relationship becomes more real because they've slept together.

It was already real.

It was real when Tyler missed Josh after a few days apart.

Real when Josh stayed awake because Tyler hadn't come home.

Real when Tyler's belongings began quietly colonizing the apartment.

Real when their hands found each other on a balcony.

Real when Tyler stopped sleeping on the couch.

Their physical relationship didn't create anything.

It caught up.

Another thing added to the collection.

And life continues.

+

One afternoon Tyler is gathering his things to leave when Josh looks up from the couch.

"Where are you going?"

"Mark's."

Josh nods.

"What for?"

"Rent."

There's a pause.

Not a particularly dramatic one.

Just long enough that Tyler looks over.

Josh is watching him.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"That's a lie."

Josh considers this.

"Kind of."

Tyler waits.

Josh sits forward, forearms resting against his knees.

"You know you don't actually live there anymore, right?"

Tyler stares at him.

"I pay rent."

"Yeah."

"So technically—"

"No."

Tyler points at him.

"That's how rent works."

"I know how rent works."

"Apparently not."

Josh laughs.

"I'm serious."

"So am I."

"I know. That's why I'm asking."

That takes some of the humor out of Tyler's answer.

Not all of it.

Enough.

Josh isn't telling him what to do.

Tyler knows that immediately.

There's no accusation in his voice. No annoyance that Tyler is still paying for somewhere else. No territorial bullshit about where Tyler is supposed to belong now.

Just a question that's probably overdue.

Josh looks toward the hallway.

Toward the bedroom where Tyler sleeps every night.

Then back at him.

"You haven't stayed there in, what, a month?"

Tyler thinks.

"That's not true."

"When?"

Tyler continues thinking.

Josh waits.

"...I went there Tuesday."

"You picked up your jacket."

"I was there."

"For eleven minutes."

"You don't know that."

"You texted me when you got there and when you left."

Oh.

Right.

Tyler frowns.

"Still counts."

Josh smiles.

"Okay."

Tyler looks down at the wallet in his hand.

The thing is, Josh isn't telling him anything Tyler doesn't know.

Tyler doesn't live with Mark anymore.

Not really.

He hasn't for a while.

He's just never officially stopped.

"I don't want to screw him over," Tyler says.

Josh's expression changes immediately.

"I know."

And he does.

Mark is Tyler's friend. They had an arrangement before any of this happened. Mark agreed to an apartment expecting Tyler's half of the rent every month, and Tyler isn't going to disappear one day and leave him responsible for money he hadn't planned on paying.

Josh doesn't suggest that he should.

Instead:

"Have you talked to him?"

Tyler looks at him.

"About actually moving out."

"No."

"Maybe you should."

Probably.

Mark is already referring to Josh as a homewrecker and offering to help Tyler carry out his furniture.

This conversation is unlikely to devastate him.

Still, saying it makes the thing official in a way that slowly transporting his possessions across town somehow hasn't.

Tyler looks around.

His shoes are by the door.

His jacket is hanging nearby.

There are clothes in the laundry.

His phone charger is plugged into the wall.

His pillow is in Josh's bedroom.

Most of Tyler's life has apparently been answering this question while Tyler wasn't paying attention.

"Yeah," he says.

Then he notices Josh.

Something is wrong.

Not bad wrong.

Different wrong.

Josh looks—

Nervous.

Tyler's eyebrows pull together.

This is unusual enough to require investigation.

"What?"

Josh looks down.

"Nothing."

"You already used that one."

"I know."

"So?"

Josh rubs his hands against his thighs.

Tyler watches.

Okay.

Very weird.

"Josh."

"I got something for you."

Tyler waits.

Josh doesn't move.

"...Okay."

"Like a while ago."

"How long is a while?"

Josh winces slightly.

"Like a month."

"A month?"

"Yeah."

"And you didn't give it to me?"

"No."

"Why?"

Josh looks at him.

And there it is.

The nervousness again.

"I don't know."

Tyler's voice softens without him meaning it to.

"Okay."

Josh reaches into his pocket.

For one ridiculous second Tyler has absolutely no idea what is happening.

Then Josh opens his hand.

There's a key resting in his palm.

Tyler looks at it.

Then Josh.

Then the key again.

His brain doesn't immediately put the pieces together.

"What's that?"

Josh's mouth twitches.

"A key."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Tyler looks at him.

Josh almost smiles.

Then doesn't.

And Tyler understands why.

This isn't nothing.

"It's for here," Josh says.

Oh.

Tyler looks down again.

The key suddenly seems considerably heavier than it did three seconds ago.

"I had it made about a month ago."

"You said that."

"Yeah."

"You've had this for a month?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

Josh gives him a look.

Tyler knows that's not what he meant.

"Why didn't you give it to me?"

Josh is quiet for a moment.

"I didn't know if it was too much."

That gets Tyler.

Not visibly, he hopes.

Probably visibly.

Because Josh has never made Tyler feel like too much.

Not once.

Tyler arrived and stayed.

Then stayed longer.

Then came back.

Then brought a pillow.

Then clothes.

Then more clothes.

Then apparently became a particularly affectionate cockroach and proved impossible to remove from the premises.

Josh never made him feel like he was taking something he hadn't been offered.

And apparently, all this time, Josh had been worrying about exactly the same thing from the other side.

Whether asking Tyler to stay might be too much.

Tyler reaches out.

Josh puts the key in his hand.

His fingers close around it.

And for once Tyler doesn't immediately rescue himself with a joke.

Because he understands what Josh has actually given him.

Until now, Tyler has always been welcome here because Josh welcomed him.

The door was unlocked because Josh knew he was coming.

Tyler came home because Josh was home.

But this—

This means Tyler doesn't need Josh on the other side of the door.

He doesn't have to announce himself.

Doesn't need to check.

Doesn't need permission.

His things are here.

His clothes.

His pillow.

His stupid blanket.

His toothbrush.

His life.

And now he can open the door himself.

Tyler looks around the apartment.

"Most of my stuff's here anyway."

It's an inadequate sentence.

Josh understands it.

"Yeah," he says.

Tyler looks at him.

"I'm staying."

Something in Josh's face softens.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Tyler looks down at the key again.

"I guess I should tell Mark I'm actually moving out."

"Probably."

Tyler steps closer.

Josh's hands find his waist.

Tyler bends and kisses him.

Nothing dramatic.

Nothing desperate.

Soft.

Familiar.

Home.

When they separate, Tyler stays close.

Josh's forehead rests briefly against his.

Decision made.

Then Tyler looks down.

At the key.

His brain returns.

"I should make sure it works."

Josh closes his eyes.

Tyler brightens.

"We haven't tested it."

"It's a key."

"It could be defective."

"I tested it."

Tyler recoils.

"You tested my key?"

"It's a copy of my key."

"That is not scientifically relevant."

"It is literally scientifically relevant."

"No. We need independent replication."

Josh looks at him.

Tyler is already heading toward the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Outside."

"I gathered that."

Tyler opens the door.

"Stay here."

"Why?"

"In case it doesn't work."

"Then I'll open the door."

"Exactly."

Josh stares at him.

Tyler steps into the hallway.

"Don't interfere with the experiment."

"I wasn't planning to."

"Good."

Tyler closes the door.

Josh hears the lock engage from the other side.

Silence.

The key slides into the lock.

Turns.

The door opens.

Tyler's face appears.

"Works."

"Great."

"Yeah."

Experiment concluded.

Except Tyler closes the door again.

Josh stares at it.

Silence.

Several seconds pass.

Then—

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.

Josh closes his eyes.

He walks over.

Opens the door.

Tyler is standing on the other side looking absolutely delighted with himself.

"You have a key."

"I know."

"So why are you knocking?"

Tyler is already laughing.

"I wanted to see if you'd let me in."

Josh stares at him.

Tyler laughs harder.

And then Josh is laughing too, because apparently this is his life now.

This ridiculous fucking man standing outside his own front door with a perfectly functional key in his hand.

Josh reaches out.

Grabs Tyler by the front of his shirt.

And pulls him home.

Tyler barely makes it across the threshold before Josh kisses him.

He's still laughing into it.

So is Josh.

The door closes behind them.