Wesley walked me back to my dorm building after anime club let out. I still felt flushed, my skin tingling from the memory of having been pressed so close against him, and the cool brush of the night breeze was a relief. "I've barely watched any anime," I said. I was babbling, awkward, completely thrown off by how much I hadn't hated the last couple of hours. "Like, maybe one episode of…what was it, Noro…Naru…N-something that my friend showed me one time, but I couldn't get into it. I really liked this, though. My dad and I were always into comics together, but maybe it's time I gave anime a real shot."

Wesley had been walking beside me, quietly letting me prattle while he looked around at the trees and the faces of buildings. I wasn't even sure he was paying attention to me until—for once—he actually asked me a question. "Oh yeah?" he said in a distinctly non-angry voice, and I became suddenly very aware of his eyes on my face. I was glad for the darkness to hide the fact that I was blushing again. "What comics were your favorites?"

I rubbed the back of my neck. Shrugged. "Spider-man," I confessed. "My dad would always buy me the new issues, and we would read them together. I still have a bunch of the old ones, but I haven't read anything new since…"

I stopped. I hadn't meant to bring us here. A new kind of ache opened up in my chest.

Wesley hesitated. I thought maybe he was going to let the subject drop, and for a few moments, there was only the sound of our footsteps on the concrete. Then he asked, "…Since when?"

I swallowed. I'd been the one to crack the lid on this particular box of demons, and anyway, it's not like it was a secret. There was no real reason for Wesley not to know. I said, "Since my dad died."

Wesley said nothing. What had I expected? Did I even want him to say anything? He'd been my tormentor since I'd met him. It's not like I wanted him to comfort me—right?

Then Wesley stopped walking. I stopped, too, though I suddenly wanted to put as much distance between us as possible. I studied a crack in the sidewalk as a way to avoid looking at him, but he ducked his head to catch my eye and I ended up looking at him anyway.

There was nothing angry in his eyes. Nothing hard or hurtful. Gently, he said, "I'm sorry you had to go through that."

I felt myself crack open. In that moment, Wesley could have pried me apart and looked inside. He could have picked apart the pieces of me and done whatever he liked with them, and a part of me sort of wanted him to do it. I drifted, unmoored in the space and the silence, at a loss for what to say. He was still looking at me, burning me up. I had no idea how to get this conversation back on track. "Welp," I said, turning away from him and starting off down the sidewalk at almost a powerwalk. It wasn't far now to the dorm. "Nothing like a dead dad to ruin the conversation!"

Wesley didn't move. I only made it a couple of paces before I stopped, sighed, and circled back around to him.

"You know," he said, "you don't have to fill up the silence with jokes all the time. It's okay not to say anything."

He halfway smiled at me—just a tiny curve of one corner of his mouth, and it was a good thing it was okay not to say anything because my throat closed up and I didn't think I could speak. I swallowed and nodded, and neither one of us said anything else until we made it to my dorm building.

I stood in front of it, looking up at the ugly front of the building, and a piece of me wanted to stay out here with Wesley. "Good night," I said, and I hurried for the door.

"Good night," he answered.

I'd almost made it inside when I heard him call my name: "Carter?"

I froze with my hand on the door handle and looked back at him. All I could see was his silhouette, a question mark of an outline standing just beyond the circle of the security light. "Yeah?"

"Don't be late for breakfast."

He faded into the shadows before I could come up with a response.

Sean and I had art history first thing the next morning. We'd been in a rush to get ready, so I didn't notice until we settled down in our seats that instead of one of his usual wrinkly t-shirts, he'd opted for a polo with some kind of multicolored lightning design on it. Or maybe it was supposed to be feathers? I wasn't sure. Looking closely, I could see that his unibrow was gone, too.

"Hey, man," I said, waving my hand at his whole getup. Class hadn't started yet, so I had a couple minutes to unravel the mystery of Sean's fashion choices. "So, you got church today, or...?"

Sean elaborately rolled his eyes and made a show of looking all around us. Then he leaned in close to me and whispered, "You gotta dress to impress, my dude." He gave my own choice of t-shirt and jeans a very deliberate once-over.

I raised an eyebrow at him, refusing to take the bait. He sighed, jerked around in his seat some more, and then said, "C'mon, C-Becks, you wanna pull the ladies, you gotta put in some effort."

I snorted. I would have thought that Sean would figure it out by now—since he was, you know, living with me. "Not really my target audience," I said.

Sean made a dramatic little silent ohhhhh with his lips. "Well," he said, "the lads have standards, too. You know. As a lad myself. Let me know when you're ready for Sean's Free Fashion-Advice Special."

I thought of the maybe-flowers-maybe-paint-splatters confetti-colored shirt he'd had me wear to the party, and I suppressed a laugh. "Oh yeah. You'll be the first to know if I have questions."

He narrowed his eyes at me and started to say something else when Angela blew in like a tornado and threw herself into the seat Sean had saved. "Nice shirt," she said to Sean with sitcom timing that made me crack up. Angela blinked at me. "What?"

"Nothing, nothing," I gasped.

She stared at me a minute longer while Sean rubbed at his temples. Then she asked, "Did you guys do the reading? I still can't remember the difference between Manet and Monet. Maybe we should start a study group."

"Yes!" said Sean immediately, and I choked on another laugh.

"Yeah, sure," I said. "Sounds great." Good for Sean. Maybe there was something to his weird shirt tricks. Originality, at least.

Soccer practice that day began with an announcement from Coach. "It's on your schedules," he said, "so you should already know this, but our first away game is on Sunday. We'll be leaving from here on Saturday, so if you didn't see the calendar and made plans, you better cancel them now."

For once, I was on top of things. I'd remembered the away game and had nothing scheduled for the weekend. I was looking forward to it—but nervous, too. Wesley and I would be rooming together, as per Coach's instructions. At least things seemed to be kind of on the upswing.

Or so I thought.

Coach had another scrimmage lined up for today. He'd put Wesley and me together for everything so far, and sure enough, we were on the same team this time. My job was to set up plays for Wesley, and I was excited. I thought for sure we were going to crush it.

The game started out well enough. We thwarted a goal and kept the ball solidly on the opponent's end of the field. Then the ball came to me. I passed it to Wesley—pretty well, I thought—and then Patrick swooped in from nowhere and stole it for the opposition.

Wesley threw up his hands in frustration. "Come on!" he yelled.

Patrick hammered off towards our goal, cackling. "Better luck next time, suckers!"

I put out a hand in Wesley's direction. "Hey man, it's cool. We got this. Early times yet."

To my surprise, he hit me with a weaponized glare and snapped, "You better." Then he took off after Patrick.

I winced. What had happened to Wesley being nice to me?

Still, we were holding our own. I tried to concentrate on the game. I could sort out whatever was going on with Wesley later—hopefully.

The ball came back to our end of the field, and I had it again. Wesley was open, but so was the goal. Why add an extra step? I had a shot, and I took it, but the ball went wide and rolled out of bounds.

"Oh my god!" Wesley cried, advancing in my direction. "Why didn't you pass the damn ball, Carter? I was right there! I was open! That's your job, dickhead!"

I flinched. Past Wesley's shoulder, I saw Coach glaring at us, his brows low and heavy as thunderheads. I remembered his warning that he would kick us both off the team if we couldn't figure out how to get along, and I wondered if Wesley was about to ruin everything for both of us.