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Hollis had to get Will R.’s address from Yulia. Walt spent Saturday watching TV and napping off and on. Mr. and Mrs. Brown had gone to the city for a romantic day together, and Walt wanted to take advantage of the emptiness in the house to be lazy in the common areas.

He hadn’t answered Hollis’s question the other night, but he seemed happier now, or at least more content.

Currently, they were eating olives Mrs. Brown canned two years ago like they were potato chips.

What are you going to dress me in for the party? Hollis asked over I Dream of Jeannie .

Black, Walt answered immediately. You don’t wear much of it for school, so it’ll make an impact.

He rustled up one of Hollis’s ma’s sweaters and some black dickies from a couple of years ago that he’d let out during the first week. Instead of borrowing Hollis’s pa’s cologne, he rifled through Mrs. Brown’s dresser to find a perfume that suited him better.

Scents don’t have gender. Your pa’s stuff is too metallic for you.

Hollis watched while Walt iced beneath his eyes and brushed out his hair. He eyed the purpling marks around his throat.

Are you going to cover that?

Walt paused mid-brush.

You gonna need me to?

He looked Hollis dead in the mirror, then raised a single brow. Hollis wasn’t sure what Walt wanted him to say to that.

Walt went back to brushing.

“I gave you the scarf on the first day, but we’re done with that now. Don’t do things you’re ashamed to show,” he said out loud. “You’re gonna treat me reckless from now on? People are gonna look at it.”

You didn’t have to give me control. What did you think I was going to do with it? Hold your hand?

Walt huffed. You could, if you wanted.

What the hell is that supposed to mean? You’re lucky I didn’t gouge our eyes out, Hollis snapped.

Walt put the brush down on the sink. You wanna try it?

What?!

Walt sighed.

He laced Hollis’s hands together, resting his elbows on the porcelain, then deliberately locked his gaze on them in the mirror. The closest they could get to looking back at each other.

It chilled Hollis to the marrow.

His palms felt warm, there was stickiness from the pomade. Walt gave him his arms back, made it his choice to keep their hands locked together. Hollis could control his own face now too. His neck.

At all the points where he and Walt touched, it felt strange. It itched at first but rapidly escalated to something violent and electric.

Hollis looked between their embrace and himself in the mirror frantically, seeking explanation, but Walt said nothing. Their fingers twitched against the sensation, but Walt didn’t let go.

Instead, Walt slid his right hand up, and Hollis’s nerves jangled sweet and discordant. This touching and being touched and touching all at once meant something, but Hollis didn’t know what. It scared him and made their breath come fast and hot. Hollis tightened their grip with a gasp, like grabbing a branch while falling from a tree.

He stared into the mirror at his own face, cheeks burning, eyebrows twisted in confusion. Walt’s sad brown eyes that no one had noticed—not even his ma—gazed back at him. Old and sure.

Walt separated their fingers but kept their palms close, then delicately touched their fingertips together. Each ridge of Hollis’s fingerprints scraped harmonious like angels screaming, and Hollis’s knees failed him.

Their hands separated to catch them, slamming to the tile floor.

Walt picked them up off the ground.

What was that?

It was us.

What do you mean it was us? Why did it feel like that? Why doesn’t it feel like that all the time? What did you do to me?

Walt pressed Hollis’s lips together, tight and unhappy. He went back to getting ready like he hadn’t just rocked Hollis’s world. Finished brushing their hair, then checked the time on Hollis’s phone. But Hollis could feel him turning over inside, like a dog in a crate that was way too small. The panic of it.

Walt, stop. What was that? How, why—

Walt put Hollis’s keys and wallet in his pocket and headed downstairs to get their coat.

I shouldn’t have done that.

WALT, STOP.

FUCKING STOP !

Walt shrugged on their coat and opened the door. It wasn’t even close to the time the party was supposed to be. It was barely eight o’clock.