Sighing, I meandered over until we stood side by side. He gave me a once over, speaking a silent question.

“I’m here,” I said. “What do you want me to do?”

“Don’t bother,” he chastised. “I don’t want to listen to you complain.”

“I won’t. I will be your model for the day!” I stepped in front of the camera. Said camera lowered, revealing Beau’s vexed eyes. “You should be honored. Post pictures of me anywhere and they’re bound to be a hit.”

Although if he photographed himself, they would probably do even better. He had the features for it while I was a lumbering basketball player that easily fell into the rugged athletic category. I had limbs for days.

“Fine,” he huffed.

He dragged his new model into position. I was posed around the church in whatever way he saw fit. Modeling seemed easy enough until I realized what that meant; Beau’s unwavering attention. Before the lens, I wasn’t Devin and that showed in his quiet and contemplative stares. He was fixated on me, the way I looked, the way I stood to how I held myself. I was a prop that he had no issue guiding this way and that while I had a lot of problems with it.

We were too close. His eyes were too bright, too round and attentive. His lips looked soft, almost inviting. His breaths were warm. Sweat clung to his skin so that it sparkled as if embedded with shards of glass that threatened to cut if I got too close. His hands weren’t smooth like porcelain, although they certainly looked the part. They were as rough as my own, calloused from many years of sports and rough housing. His touch wasn’t gentle because I wasn’t certain he really knew what gentle meant. He tugged or shoved or dragged me around yet the brush of his fingers over my blazing skin left sensations in their wake that I rather not think about.

Luckily, the torment of my senses ended when Beau deemed this area done. If Model Devin bothered him even a little, he didn’t show it. His fixation was on the pictures that he was mumbling about on the way back to the car. My fixation was on so much more.

“Where to next?” I asked once we returned to the air conditioned van. I think we both heaved a sigh of relief. Beau even fanned his shirt. I refused to let my eyes drift to his exposed abdomen.

“Are you hungry?” He questioned.

The clock stated that we had actually been aimlessly driving and taking pictures for a little over three hours. To answer his question, my stomach growled.

He chuckled. “Food it is.”

Beau recalled spotting a restaurant earlier that “piqued his interest.” The phrasing had me rolling my eyes, but I followed the brief directions he gave. On the drive, he didn’t speak much and that bothered me. We were alone and being civil, for once. We had more in common than expected and...and I wanted to know. I wanted to know more about him; what a stupid thought. Even if we weren’t friends, we already knew so much about each other.

But I wanted more. I was growing more greedy by the day.

“You never answered the question,” I said, earning Beau’s unwavering attention yet again. I hated how I had been craving it lately.

“What?”

“If you ever dated before, you never answered.”

He was taken aback enough to let the facade slip. He pursed his lips, eyes as wide as a kid’s in a candy store. Then they drew away, as did his demeanor when leaning his body against the door. “Maybe I didn’t answer because I didn’t want to.”

“Why not? We have each other to talk to now.”

“That doesn’t mean I want to talk.”

His admission stung enough to entice a flinch. The reaction didn’t go unnoticed.

“I didn’t mean that,” he blurted out.

I flexed my fingers against the wheel. “What did you mean then?”

Beau combed back his untamable mane. “I don’t get why you’re asking. We were never interested in each other before so why bother acting like we are now?”

“Not interested in each other?” I somehow half laughed and half snorted. He mumbled out more directions until I said, “Now you’re the one being an idiot. We’re constantly interested, only most of the time it’s not for very good reasons. Tell me right now that you know anyone better than you know me.”

He didn’t accept the challenge because we both knew that, even after all the shit we talked, we knew each other better than anyone else. We knew each other’s interests and their fears. That was what happened when you grew up together, when your lives have been so intertwined that it was hard to imagine a life without each other.

And yet that would be the case in only a few months. A few days ago I relished in the thought; now I wasn’t so sure how I felt.

“Fine,” he moaned. “I’ll answer if you answer.”

“You know I’ve dated.”

“Only Stacia?”

“Yep.”

“And did you...actually like her or...how did that work?” Beau practically whispered that out. He bit his lip afterwards when I howled in laughter.

“You never sounded so awkward in your whole life!”

“How else am I meant to ask?”

I would have answered, but I was too busy laughing.

He waved me off, grumbling, “Forget it then.”

“No, no, it’s fine.”

We pulled into the parking lot. Neither of us exited the vehicle though considering the topic of conversation.

“Uh, honestly, I really did like Stacia, a lot. With, um, with my sexuality I’ve found that I only enjoy, or rather, felt the sexual aspects with those I already have a bond with. It’s, well—” I twiddled with my thumbs in my lap, scowling. “Sometimes I feel...disgusting.”

“Why?” he asked.

At that moment, I realized that I was wrong earlier. Beau could be gentle. I saw it before on the beach. I was seeing it again in the car. His voice was faint and encouraging. It was a question that I could answer or drop.

Never in a million years did I imagine I would be speaking about this with Beau. Never in a million years did I think I would care about what he had to say.

“Because I only ever think about friends,” I answered with downcast eyes. “I can’t imagine a stranger or a celebrity and, I don’t know, I wonder how only a friend would feel knowing that I was thinking of them or dreamed of them. If they knew, would they be disgusted? Would they feel betrayed?”

I shook my head. “Sorry, that didn’t make sense.”

“It did, and it’s nothing to feel disgusting for. You clearly value your friends and don’t view them as sex objects. It just is what it is. I’m not much different.” Beau shrugged. “I felt disgusted when thinking of guys, especially those I crushed on that thought we were only friends. I get it.”

I get it; who knew three simple words could mean so much.

Beau stepped out of the car without another word, ending the conversation as quick as it started. I meekly followed until we were sitting in a booth with menus in hand. Our server got our drinks, giving us a few more minutes to decide on our lunch.

“I had one boyfriend,” Beau spoke out of the blue.

I nearly spilled my entire glass of pop. Beau cursed when an ice cube slid into his lap.

“Sorry, I was surprised,” I admitted around nervous laughter that didn’t help lessen the intense heat pouring from his stern scrutiny. “So, uh...you aren’t dating this boyfriend anymore?”

He shook his head. “Broke up about five months ago.”

“Really?”

Unfortunately, there could be many memories pointing to Beau’s secretive boyfriend or none at all. We hung out because of our parents, but it also wasn’t unusual to find ways out of the forced encounters. How many of them had more to do with Beau wanting to spend time with his boyfriend and how many were an attempt to not see me?

“Who was it?” I tried, grinning at his eye roll.

“None of your business.”

“Boo, you’re no fun.”

“You should know that by now.”

Peering over the menu, I caught his smirk; not taunting or one of annoyance, but of shared enjoyment. My palms were sweaty and it had nothing to do with the humidity.

I set the menu aside, crossed arms perched on the table. “Can I ask why you broke up then?”

“You already did,” he claimed. Rather than speak, I waited with skittish and impatient movements. “We just didn’t work out.”

“Because you didn’t like each other or another reason?”

“Plenty of reasons.”

I snapped my fingers. “Ah, so it was a bad break up.”

“Are any break ups good?”

“I wouldn’t say mine was bad. Stacia and I broke up because she moved so far away, not because we stopped liking each other.”

He gave a slow nod. Our server returned to take our orders. As usual, Beau ordered some sort of chicken meal. I would have complained about his childish palette yet again, but we had been on a role with this civility the last few days. I rather not ruin the record over chicken.

Although the discussion of dating ended there, that didn’t mean we were silent throughout the rest of lunch. In fact, there was quite a lot of talking and teasing. Shared laughs over our senior year, going over our plans for college that left a sinking sensation in my gut, even discussing the pro’s and con’s of our beach vacation; normal conversations between two that once struggled to do more than argue.

We were changing. We had been changing since day one. With forced cohabitation, no friends to tease us or prove ourselves to, after accidentally discovering then honestly sharing secrets, the fragile bond between us strengthened to almost fearful proportions. No longer was it a mere string that binds us, but rather a bridge that neither of us expected to build let alone cross.

Our feelings had much different plans though, and they didn’t care if we were ready to catch up or not.

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