His eyes flicked away. “Well, uh, yes.”
“Then why didn’t you say anything?”
Leo flinched. “I didn’t want to embarrass you. I figured you were just a touchy guy.”
“I kissed your neck,” I said. “I asked you if I could kiss your neck, and you said yes.” A thought occurred to me. “Are you even gay?”
“No. Are you?”
“Yes,” I said, with increasing impatience. I took a breath to reel it in because, despite this being the most mortifying moment of my existence, it wasn’t an excuse to lose my temper. “Yes,” I repeated, more calmly, “hence the LULL post to find a boyfriend.”
“Oh. Right. Yes.”
“If you’re not gay, and you didn’t think this was a date but a platonic and spontaneous hang out, why did you let me kiss your neck?”
I thought of how I’d asked him, my voice soft and low. My bedroom voice. I was trying to seduce him, and now I wanted tomove to a different country and change my name and get facial reconstruction surgery.
“Well, I…” Leo began, mumbling.
“If you say you didn’t want to embarrass me, I swear to god —” I started.
“No, that’s not it. I mean, maybe a little bit. But it felt…nice, I guess. Even though I’m straight,” he added. His body relaxed as he shifted closer to me. “Hey, what’s the big deal? If you think about it, it’s kind of funny.”
I covered my face with my hands. “It’s not funny,” I replied, voice muffled. “I’m so embarrassed I want to cry.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “I’m flattered you think I’m attractive enough that you wanted to kiss me.”
“I thought you were making a move, inviting me here.” My voice sounded precariously close to a wail. “The whole time we were playing Minecraft, I was waiting to get to it.”
“To…have sex?” Leo asked.
“Yeah.” Even covering my face with my hands didn’t assuage my shame. “I did wonder why you seemed so focused on the game, but that’s because — oh my god.”
A feather-light touch on my arm made me lower my hands.
“It’s okay,” Leo said. He’d moved to the edge of the bed, so he was right in front of me. “You’re acting like it’s worse than it actually is.”
“No, I’m not. Itisthis bad.”
“It isn’t,” he said calmly. “I’m not judging you. I don’t think you’re weird or insane. We had a fun time, didn’t we?”
“I guess,” I admitted after a second. Then I thought of the way I’d looked up at him with sultry eyes and fought the urge to collapse to the floor.
Get a hold of yourself.It’s only the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened in the history of human civilisation.
“It’s a funny story,” Leo continued. “In a few weeks, you’ll be laughing about this.”
“I doubt it,” I muttered.
He touched my arm once more before letting go. When I looked at him, he gave me a soft smile. “It really is okay,” he said. “Look at the silver lining — we’re friends now.”
“You still want to be friends after all this?”
“Why not? I like you.”
The words distracted me from my embarrassment for a millisecond. I tried to keep a neutral expression. “Do you really want to be friends with someone who was prepared to fuck you?”
Leo shrugged like it was nothing, but his eyes flickered away. “It’s no big deal, just a side-effect of the misunderstanding.” He smiled. “If you’re cool with it, then I am.”
