Nodding, Greg crossed the room and sat on the edge of the bed. It was like there was some debate he was having with himself in his own head, but when Marsh reached out to touch his leg, he seemed to arrive at some sort of resolution. He fit himself into the space left by Marsh’s body, and it wasn’t the first time Marsh had had someone in his bed. It wasn’t the first time he’d had
Greg
in his bed, but it was different now. Better, for all that they weren’t here to have sex.
Clamping down on the things it wasn’t the right time to say or do or feel, Marsh reached over Greg to turn off the light. In the darkness, he retreated to his own side of the bed.
And it was easy, wasn’t it?
He settled down on his back, then turned onto his side, facing away from Greg. Greg put an uncertain hand to his waist, and Marsh closed his eyes. “Yeah.”
Then Greg was melting down, pressing his chest to Marsh’s spine, sliding his arm over and around until it splayed across the center of Marsh’s chest. Marsh grasped that palm and pulled Greg’s arm in tighter, and what did he care that he wasn’t usually the smaller spoon?
Lying there, with Greg holding him in the dark, his heart grew and grew until it filled his ribs. Until it was bright enough to light the room and light his life, and anything felt possible.
Even the idea that Greg might want Marsh exactly the way Marsh wanted him.
Chapter Seventeen
Marsh awoke to an empty bed. It took him a second to remember why that was wrong. He frowned as he blinked his eyes open, pushing the covers off and looking around, and yeah. Definitely alone. Groaning, he rolled onto his back and rubbed the sleep from his eyes before flipping onto his other side, and, oh.
The other pillow smelled like Greg, like warmth and whatever he put in his hair. Marsh buried his face in it and breathed in deep. It hadn’t been a dream. Greg had been here. He’d slept beside Marsh, curled around him, and it had been…perfect, really.
After a few long minutes of dawdling like that, Marsh pushed himself up. It was already midmorning, and the sun was pouring in through the slats in the blinds, so it wasn’t any wonder Greg was gone, but still. Disappointing. He reached for his phone, only to come up with a piece of paper. Confused, he picked it up and unfolded it.
Had to head in to campus early to do some last-minute prep. See you later tonight.
-Greg.
PS—You’re gorgeous when you’re sleeping.
Marsh read through the handwritten words a couple of times, his lips curling up more and more with every pass. Greg had stayed and he’d left a note, and suddenly Marsh didn’t feel quite so bereft after all. Still nervous, of course, and there was that lingering rankle of irritation. He would have liked to have met Greg’s parents, and he would have liked to have seen Greg speak, but that was okay. Maybe the next time something like this happened, they’d be on more solid ground.
Or maybe they’d have nothing to do with each other, but it was too early in the morning, and Marsh was feeling too hopeful and good to really think about that right now.
He refolded the note with care and tucked it under the corner of the base of his lamp for safekeeping, then went through the messages on his phone. There was another email reminder from the bursar’s office, and a missed called from his coach, and two missed calls from Yulia. He winced as he cleared the alerts. It was all stuff he could put off until later. He rested his phone on his chest. It was a light day for him—just a couple of classes in the late afternoon. He had a few more articles to get through before those classes, but he had time.
With a groan, he levered himself up and grabbed a change of clothes. Somehow, he made it through his morning routine without too much distraction. Shower, breakfast, coffee. The house was empty, so he sat at the newly cleared space at one end of the dining room table with some of his reading and a notebook as he devoured a bowl full of Cheerios.
The articles he had to read were dry as hell, but he made better progress than he had the night before, his thoughts only going to Greg and how he was doing every now and then as opposed to every other freaking second. He was just starting to get on a roll when the doorbell rang. He pressed the button on his phone to check the time, his brow furrowing. It was too early for the mail, and the UPS guy usually came later, too, with those endless boxes of books and electronics and stuff for the resident geeks in the house. Huh.
The doorbell chimed again, and Marsh set down his highlighter, then rose, grabbing what was left of his coffee before padding to the door.
He opened the door to a head of blue hair and two raised eyebrows. “Yulia? What are you—”
Instead of answering, she thrust a bright-green flyer at him. He took it without really thinking, already starting to scan over the text, and as he did, his stomach did a somersault.
“So?” he asked, pushing the paper back at her. His voice cracked, and damn. He’d thought he was cool with this, but apparently not.
“‘So?’” she parroted. “You recognize this, right?”
Like he could possibly not. “Yeah, it’s the…thing the engineering department is doing.” Symposium, he wanted to say. Conference.
Thing
worked, though.
Yulia tilted her head to the side and put her hands on her hips. “The one your boyfriend is talking at this afternoon.”
“He’s not my—”
“And that his parents are here to see.”
“Yulia…” He trailed off, because what was he supposed to say?
Rolling her eyes, she took the flyer back from him, scanned it for a second and then pointed at a line of text at the very bottom. “The ‘thing’ that is open to all university students?”
Oh. Right. Greg had said something like that, hadn’t he? That only people from other universities had to register. But still, what did that have to do with anything? “So?”
“Seriously?” She looked at him like he was missing a couple hundred brain cells. “So you don’t need an engraved invitation to go to something that everyone in the whole damn school is welcome at.”
“I don’t think…” What? That Greg would be okay with him showing up? That Marsh would understand a single word coming out of his mouth?
Nothing good could come of this. It was presumptuous and weird, and Greg hadn’t once made any kind of indication that he wanted Marsh to be there. Even if he didn’t mind, afterword he might try to ask Marsh what he thought, and then he’d really find out how much of an idiot Marsh was.
“No,” he said, shaking his head.
“Why the hell not?”
“Because…”
Because I’m scared.
He didn’t even have to say the words. Understanding was written all over her face. Her expression softened, if only by a little. “Marsh. How would you feel if he showed up to one of your games?”
And it was a crackling lick of warmth that unfurled itself in his chest. Some of the guys had their girlfriends in the stands cheering for them, and Marsh had always thought that would be nice.
Not content to wait for his answer, Yulia poked him in the arm. “Would you
tell
him you wanted him to go?”
Oh. Yeah, with things the way they were right now, Marsh wasn’t sure he would. But was that really the point? Marsh knew how
he
felt about Greg. It was Greg’s feelings about Marsh that were so hard to figure out.
But last night, Marsh had thought…he’d hoped.
Marsh gulped and worried the inside of his cheek with his teeth. He darted his gaze from the flyer to Yulia’s face. “You really think he wouldn’t mind?”
“You really wanna date a guy who doesn’t want his boyfriend to be there to support him?”
Marsh’s stomach stopped somersaulting just long enough to turn to ice. Because he’d known full well he’d been selling himself short this whole time, but, seriously, Greg wasn’t the kind of guy to fall in love with the dumb jock. Greg was better than that.
But maybe Marsh was better than the kind of guy who would accept that from someone he…loved. Maybe Marsh was making a terrible mistake assuming Greg would be so shallow.
Marsh stepped away from the door but left it open for Yulia to come inside. “You know, you’re annoying when you’re right.”
“You’re just mad because I’m smarter than you are.”
“And you’re just mad because I’m prettier.”
Yulia closed the door behind her. She reached up and tugged on his neck to pull him down so she could plant a big, loud kiss on his cheek. “Go make yourself a little prettier.” She let him go, gesturing at the track pants and T-shirt he was wearing. “Your boyfriend’s session starts at one.”
With that, she took a seat on the couch and started up the PlayStation. When he hesitated, she gave him an expectant look.
Right.
He had someplace to be, and soon. He had a…well, a maybe-boyfriend to support.
And some parents he might have a chance to make a good first impression on.
“You ready for this?”
The whole row of seats shook as Ronnie plopped himself down next to Greg. Greg held up a single finger, keeping his gaze trained on the printout of his slides as he finished silently mouthing what he was going to say. When he got to the bottom of the page, he nodded to himself. There was just the conclusion left to go, and he had that more or less down. Folding the papers in half, he lowered his hand and looked up.
Ronnie was smirking at him, and Greg just had to roll his eyes. He glanced over his shoulder and breathed out a long sigh.
The lecture hall had started to fill up while Greg had been practicing, and Chu and a couple of other bigwig professors were milling around the front of the room near the lectern. Only a few minutes left to go. Greg had been sitting there for about half an hour, practicing his speech and trying to settle his nerves. Great lot of good that had done.
“What time is it?” he asked.
“Five ’til.” Sounded about right. Ronnie tilted his head toward the back of the room. “Your parents say hi.”
Reflexively, Greg twisted around in his seat, searching until he found them sitting a dozen rows from the top. As soon as his mom caught his eye, she grinned and waved maniacally. Good grief. It was like Greg was still twelve the way he wanted to sink down in his seat and pretend he didn’t know her. He was better than that, now, though, more mature. He gave an embarrassed little wave back before turning to face front and dropping his head into his hands.
“Remind me why I told them it would be cool for them to come for this again?”
“Because you’re their precious little baby and you secretly love it?”
Fair enough. Greg grunted in answer and shook his head, striving once more for calm. Why did these things psych him out so bad? He was fine, talking in front of people. He’d done it a hundred times before, but those few minutes beforehand, the adrenaline always made him jittery and weird. He vibrated his leg up and down to try to burn a little of it off and tugged at his tie. Was it hot in here? Why was it always so damn hot?
“Hey,” Ronnie said, and there was a question in his voice. “Where’s Marsh?”
“Marsh?” Greg jerked his head up, and suddenly the room wasn’t too hot at all. The blood draining from his face probably had something to do with that. But seriously, why would Ronnie be asking that?
Ronnie scrunched up his face. “Isn’t he coming?”
And Greg probably looked like an idiot as his jaw worked without any words coming out. He blinked a couple of times, trying to get it together. Finally, he managed, “Why would he?”
Ronnie’s brows darted up toward his hairline. “Um. Because? You’re giving a super important talk at a prestigious conference?”
“But.” The whole idea was completely failing to compute. “It’s on engineering.”
And now Ronnie was the one looking at Greg like he was out of his mind. “So?”
“So, Marsh doesn’t care about that stuff. It’s boring, and he’s…” Greg trailed off. Marsh was cool, and nothing about this was even close. It was hopelessly boring and lame, and Marsh had a million better things to be doing, like…
Like…
Oh, hell. A dozen conversations they’d had over the past few weeks swam through Greg’s mind. Marsh asking about this conference. Asking about his speech, and about his parents, and did Greg want to practice in front of Marsh, and Marsh’s eyes had shuttered so damn fast when Greg had said
no thanks
. Because it was boring. Because Marsh didn’t care, and Greg kept slipping into technobabble. Right? Not because…
Greg turned to Ronnie, and the panic seeping in was of a totally different sort. “Was I supposed to ask Marsh to come?”
“You
didn’t
ask Marsh to come?”
Oh, hell. Oh hell, oh hell, oh hell. Suddenly, all those little questions took on a different meaning. What if that closed-off look wasn’t boredom? What if Marsh had been just waiting for an invitation, and Greg had been too dense to even realize? Had he hurt Marsh’s feelings, or— It seemed impossible.
“Shit.” Greg fumbled for his phone. Maybe if he texted Marsh now—
“Oh, there he is.”
Greg whipped around, and he could hardly breathe, because, yes, that was Marsh. Marsh, in black slacks and a button-down and looking profoundly uncomfortable as he scanned the room. Greg’s lungs constricted another inch, because Marsh’s friend, Yulia was leading Marsh to a seat in the back, and she had her hand on his wrist, her poise all confidence and purpose, like she was the one leading him along.