Harvard raised an eyebrow. “And what is that?”
“You’re really cute,” murmured Aiden, and leaned in.
His lean was arrested when Harvard laughed. “Ha! That’s such a line. These things really work on your guys?”
Overcome by the magnitude of this insult, Aiden snapped, “Invariably!”
Harvard rolled his eyes. “I hate to tell you this, buddy, but I think they’re letting you get away with substandard lines because you’re cute.”
Aiden paused, torn between being deeply offended and ridiculously flattered.
Harvard bit his lip, seeming to think this over.
“I guess if you guys both know you’re just playing around, what you say doesn’t really count,” he offered. “That’s why people call them lines, like the things you say in a play. I know this isn’t real, but…”
Aiden tried to keep his voice soft, to be understanding. “But it’s practice for being real.” His mouth twisted on the name, but he forced it out. “For Neil.”
Harvard winced. Aiden supposed it might feel a little weird, to hear the name of the boy he actually liked, while tangled up with another. For Harvard, who was so good, it might feel close to cheating.
Aiden didn’t want to say the name or hear it or think it. Harvard seemed to be struggling with a thought, and Aiden waited to hear Harvard tell him what he wanted. That was all Aiden wished to know or to do. What Harvard wanted.
“Have you ever… liked anyone for real?” Harvard asked in a voice that started low and sank with every word, until it almost disappeared on the word real.
Aiden didn’t trust himself to speak, so he only nodded.
“What did you say to him?”
“I never said anything to him,” Aiden answered slowly. “But there were things I wanted to say.”
“Like what?” murmured Harvard, then shut his eyes, lashes black silk fans against his cheekbones. “You don’t have to say. Not if it hurts. You don’t have to.”
It hurt, but this would be Aiden’s only chance to say all the things he wanted to say. He wouldn’t get another.
Life always hurt, but Harvard was the only one who could ever make it feel better.
Aiden leaned in toward Harvard as close as he could get, so close that every breath was like a storm in the tiny space between them. The blood beneath his skin seemed like thunder, every faint electric impulse turned to dangerous lightning, and every whisper to a desperate shout.
Aiden whispered: “Listen.”
25: HARVARD
Aiden was very close, and it was very distracting. His shirt was off in all the ways it could be off while still being nominally on. At least if the shirt had been entirely off, it could’ve been normal, part of the everyday routine of getting dressed and undressed in the dormitory. Instead of this deliberate gesture toward nakedness. Half of Aiden’s hair had come loose and was floating in the narrow space between them, the silky ends brushing Harvard’s cheek. Harvard was having difficulty breathing.
But Aiden had asked him to listen, and Harvard always tried to do whatever Aiden asked of him. Harvard swallowed, and made an encouraging noise.
“I don’t believe in love that never ends,” said Aiden, his whisper clear and distinct. “I don’t believe in being true until death or finding the other half of your soul.”
Harvard raised an eyebrow but didn’t comment. Privately, he considered that it might be good that Aiden hadn’t delivered this speech to this guy he apparently liked so much—whom Aiden had never even mentioned to his best friend before now. This speech was not romantic.
Once again, Harvard had to wonder if what he’d been assuming was Aiden’s romantic prowess had actually been many guys letting Aiden get away with murder because he was awfully cute.
But Aiden sounded upset, and that spoke to an instinct in Harvard natural as breath. He put his arm around Aiden, and drew his best friend close against him, warm skin and soft hair and barely there shirt and all, and tried to make a sound that was more soothing than fraught.
“I don’t believe in songs or promises. I don’t believe in hearts or flowers or lightning strikes.” Aiden snatched a breath as though it was his last before drowning. “I never believed in anything but you.”
“Aiden,” said Harvard, bewildered and on the verge of distress. He felt as if there was something he wasn’t getting here.
Even more urgently, he felt he should cut off Aiden. It had been a mistake to ask. This wasn’t meant for Harvard, but for someone else, and worse than anything, there was pain in Aiden’s voice. That must be stopped now.
Aiden kissed him, startling and fierce, and said against Harvard’s mouth, “Shut up. Let me… let me.”
Harvard nodded involuntarily, because of the way Aiden had asked, unable to deny Aiden even things Harvard should refuse to give. Aiden’s warm breath was running down into the small shivery space between the fabric of Harvard’s shirt and his skin. It was panic-inducing, feeling all the impulses of Harvard’s body and his heart like wires that were not only crossed but also impossibly tangled. Disentangling them felt potentially deadly. Everything inside him was in electric knots.
“I’ll let you do anything you want,” Harvard told him, “but don’t—don’t—”
Hurt yourself. Seeing Aiden sad was unbearable. Harvard didn’t know what to do to fix it.
The kiss had turned the air between them into dry grass or kindling, a space where there might be smoke or fire at any moment. Aiden was focused on toying with the collar of Harvard’s shirt, Aiden’s brows drawn together in concentration. Aiden’s fingertips glancing against his skin burned.
“You’re so warm,” Aiden said. “Nothing else ever was. I only knew goodness existed because you were the best. You’re the best of everything to me.”
Harvard made a wretched sound, leaning in to press his forehead against Aiden’s.
He’d known Aiden was lonely, that the long line of guys wasn’t just to have fun but tied up in the cold, huge manor where Aiden had spent his whole childhood, in Aiden’s father with his flat shark eyes and sharp shark smile, and in the long line of stepmothers who Aiden’s father chose because he had no use for people with hearts. Harvard had always known Aiden’s father wanted to crush the heart out of Aiden. He’d always worried Aiden’s father would succeed.
Aiden said, his voice distant even though he was so close, “I always knew all of you was too much to ask for.”
Harvard didn’t know what to say, so he obeyed a wild foolish impulse, turned his face the crucial fraction toward Aiden’s, and kissed him. Aiden sank into the kiss with a faint sweet noise, as though he’d finally heard Harvard’s wordless cry of distress and was answering it with belated reassurance: No, I’ll be all right. We’re not lost.
The idea of anyone not loving Aiden back was unimaginable, but it had clearly happened. Harvard couldn’t think of how to say it, so he tried to make the kiss say it. I’m so sorry you were in pain. I never guessed. I’m sorry I can’t fix this, but I would if I could. He didn’t love you, but I do.
Maybe a kiss was the wrong impulse. Harvard drew back, only to see Aiden’s face darken.