Page 32

When Cohen and I had arrived back at Roaring Mechanics after the raid, I hadn’t thought twice about his shifty eyes. The way he’d hesitated for a moment before leaving. How he’d cast one last look at me before driving off. Now it was all I could think about after what Sawyer had claimed.

Cohen likes me?

I was second-guessing both his actions and my reactions—why I cared whether or not I looked presentable, or why I was so upset by the case of mistaken identity on Insta.

He had those sus eyes again as we sat on the floor of the bachelorette pad.

His gaze kept lingering on me like it had last night, on my mouth every time I ate a handful of yogurt-covered raisins.

When I’d catch him, he’d quickly turn away as though he was afraid I’d yell at him again.

I watched him out of the corner of my eye as he spoke. “Carmen’s campaign is picking up speed now,” he was saying. His expression was hopeful, beaming with confidence, even though I had doubt.

He wasn’t Mason. With bedmas_22, I’d let my guard down only to find out he was Cohen.

The same guy who’d been a nightmare to me until this summer.

The same guy who was the reason I’d joined mathletes.

The same guy I’d crushed on hard. The same guy who risked being caught in a raid and helped me during my freak-out.

“Founder’s Day is in a little over two weeks,” he added with such tenacity that it made my pulse quicken. “But it’s more than just an election.”

“What do you mean?” Kennedy asked.

“Ever since that rally Buchanan had,” he replied, “it’s become more than just a mayoral race.” He finally caught my eye and nodded sheepishly. “There’s more at stake.”

I felt my face redden, and Sawyer prodded me with the same smirk she’d given me earlier. It’s obvious there’s something between you two.

“So,” Sawyer began, still watching me skeptically, “how can the QSA help?”

“Y’all wanna help?” he asked. Kennedy and Sawyer nodded, and then he looked to me. “You too?”

“Y-yeah,” I stammered, and a faint smile chased away his worry lines. It was as though he and I were the only ones in the basement. “I, uh, I caused such a mess…and it would only be fair to salvage what I can.”

“But you didn’t,” he assured me. “Your speakeasies are the reason Carmen actually has a chance at winning.”

A vote for Bedolla won’t amount to anything. My father’s unwavering certainty made me nervously tug at the collar of my shirt. “All I did was make the mayor look better.”

“That’s not true, Zeke…” He trailed off.

We both shared a look that said we weren’t going to talk about everything that happened.

Not now. “He would have found some way to give himself the upper hand. But by breaking up the speakeasy, he pissed off a lot of people in town. People who could vote for Carmen.”

“You think so?” My voice was quiet, the power shift between us like an ocean tide rising and falling.

“People have been quiet for far too long in Beggs, and now they’re speaking up.”

Before, politics went over my head, but now it was making sense. “Then how can I help?” I asked.

Someone coughed, and the intense stare down between Cohen and me was broken. “What he means,” Sawyer started, “is how can we help?”

“Yeah,” I corrected, my face on fire. “I meant the QSA.”

“We did get some new members signed up,” Kennedy said. “We could all get together and do something to help Carmen.”

“Like make more campaign signs?” Sawyer offered, and Kennedy nodded excitedly.

“That’s a great idea,” Cohen said. “We need to get them up as soon as possible.”

“On it,” Sawyer promised.

She grabbed her tablet, and it was like the QSA planning sessions for Pride all over again.

Her thumbs flew over the screen as Kennedy scooted closer, pulling out a pen and notebook from her tote.

It left me to sit there on my own while they discussed a plan of attack.

I didn’t know what I could do that’d be useful instead of making everything… messier.

“What about me?” I asked, eyes downcast.

“You should throw one more speakeasy,” Cohen said without hesitation.

“What?” I balked at him. “I just told Sawyer I won’t do that. Not after what happened. I’ll just screw it up again.”

“No, you won’t.” He shook his head firmly.

“You won’t be doing it alone, either, and what if…

What if we didn’t hide it? We could…Wait, we could make it a rally for Carmen in the town square!

” I shot him a confused look, and he continued on in excitement, more so to himself.

“Yeah, that would work, and I still have the QSA parade float in my garage. We could decorate it for the campaign—”

“Are you sure?” I cut in.

“Zeke,” he began, smiling in a new way that I almost didn’t recognize, “you’re a genius, and we got this…but only if you feel comfortable.”

A genius? I thought. He hadn’t called me that since I won us the mathletes competition. Back before everything fell apart. The versions of me were overlapping again, the past mixing with the present. All that was missing was the future.

“I, uh.” He kept smiling like he believed in me, and it was the first time in a long time that someone had. “But, uh.” I tried again. “How exactly would it work…if we did?”

“First, we’d tell Carmen the QSA will organize a rally,” he jumped in, confidently taking charge.

“We can reserve the town square, make sure the mayor can’t fault us for anything.

” He scratched at his bedhead and licked his bottom lip in thought.

I hated to admit it, but I found this side of him attractive.

“You can post to your Insta with the time and date like you did with the other speakeasies. We’ll get as many people there as possible and make it feel like a big party. ”

“It can’t be a party,” I countered, now aware of how much hard work the QSA had done this year. “If we do it, it should mirror the QSA’s original plan for Pride Day.”

“Zeke, I love that idea,” Sawyer inserted, flashing me a grin.

“What if we had a voter registration drive too?” Kennedy suggested. “Most of our senior class will support her because of Buchanan’s new One Lifestyle bullshit.”

“That’s wonderful, Ken.” Cohen beamed, and then to me in a softer tone, added, “See, we got this.”

The rich brown of his eyes was warm. Too warm, too sultry to look away from. It was setting me on fire, and I could feel Sawyer watching me from behind her tablet. There was an undeniable blush on my face.

Do I like him back? Did I ever stop?

Upstairs, a doorbell sounded, and Kennedy got to her feet. “Pizza’s here,” she announced, reaching out to help Sawyer up. “We’ll go, um, grab it while you two figure out if we’re gonna do this or not.”

They left quickly, and I knew they’d be gone awhile. That they would find a hidden place upstairs to make out until the pizza turned cold. Their footsteps echoed up the basement steps, and both of us fell into silence as the door shut.

A few moments passed, and I could feel Cohen watching me. Waiting on me to address the big gay elephant in the room now that it was just us. “Uh…they’re totally gonna suck face,” I finally mumbled.

“No doubt,” he said.

I cleared my throat to ask about Carmen’s campaign again, anything to keep this from getting weirder.

He looked up at me through his eyelashes, and I could see his face in the moonlight.

Hear him confessing it was him on Instagram.

I had been so mad at him last night…but now I was angry at myself.

I’d just assumed it was Mason messaging me—I hadn’t even asked before spilling my guts in his DMs. Despite that, Cohen wasn’t Z-stepping.

Maybe he really did mean everything he’d said.

Before I could stop myself, I blurted, “Why bedmas_22?”

The question caught me off guard, and by the looks of it, him too. His face was red, his gaze shifty again. “Because,” he said quietly, “we won that math competition with B-E-D-M-A-S.”

“We… oh. ” I’d suggested to use that formula for the problem. Brackets, exponents, division, multiplication, addition, subtraction, and…it’d worked. He and I beat Geometry Derick to the punch. “Guess I didn’t put two and two together.”

“It was our math joke,” he said, a new softness to his voice. “I honestly thought you knew it was me because of my username. I didn’t know that you and Mason were a thing—”

“There’s nothing between me and Mason,” I rushed out.

“I mean, I thought there was. But really it was something between you and me.” I blanched, backtracking.

“Not that I meant there is something between you and me. It was us flirting—” Fuck.

I just put a name on what we’d been doing, and I couldn’t take it back.

“It was kinda nice not fighting,” he commented carefully.

There was weight to his words. Their implication only thickened the tension in the bachelorette pad.

We’d met so many times here in Sawyer’s basement, but nothing was the same now.

There was no way I could fight with Cohen like before.

Because I wasn’t the same either. It was as though all the parts of me—Anthony and Zeke and whoever the hell I was now—were trying to coexist in this new reality.

“I don’t wanna fight anymore,” I said through the rush of thoughts.

“Then let’s do something else instead,” he said quickly, face reddening. “I mean, work together on another speakeasy…”

“I, uh,” I tried to say, blinking away memories of my birthday dinner and the mayor’s rally and raid. “What if, um, we did it and something bad happens again because of me?”

He reached out, and his hand touched my knee. I watched as his fingers squeezed reassuringly while he said, “It’s okay to be afraid, Zeke. I’m afraid too, but knowing that I’m not the only one…That makes me feel like I’m not alone.”

I glanced up to see him peering at me through his lashes.

My eyes began to burn from the intensity of his hopeful expression.

The same expression I wore when I stared at the newspaper tacked up on my bedroom wall, at the protester who had been caught mid-scream as he marched in the name of Pride.

I’d spent so long keeping my head down and keeping to myself and keeping quiet.

But that guy was who I’d always wanted to be.

If Cohen thought that I was like him, that one last speakeasy was worth it, then I had to get loud too.