Malik’s was a lighter canvas, practical for short commutes but not the long Midwestern winter. Still, a bead of sweat had started at the base of his neck, tracing under his shirt collar. He recognized the signs. Anticipation, anger, the kind of longing that came with physical proximity and denial.
Lincoln shifted, weight from one heel to the other. It was nothing, but Malik saw the ripple in his thigh through the tailored pants. Hands still pocketed, but now the left thumb stuck out, tracing a nervous half-moon on the seam. Malik wanted to touch that hand, not for comfort but to force some kind of reaction.
Instead, he said, “Four hours. That’s how long we’ve lasted without one of our usual arguments.”
Lincoln’s mouth quirked. “Is that a challenge?”
“It’s an observation.” Malik moved half a step closer, closing the distance so their shoes almost overlapped. He inhaled paper, dust, a trace of the cinnamon coffee Lincoln favored. Underneath, the scent of the man himself. It grounded Malik, made the library less a place and more a box, a testing site for what came next.
“You sure about this?” Lincoln asked, but the question didn’t sound like a warning.
Malik’s hand found the edge of the plaque, tracing the sharp seam between metal and wall. “I’m sure you want to keep pretending, but I don’t think you can do it anymore.”
Lincoln’s head tipped forward, gaze pinned to the carpet. The fingers of his right hand twitched in his pocket, then stilled. “What do you think happens if we stop?”
Malik’s chest pulled tight. “We find out.” The words felt heavier than the air itself.
The hiss of Lincoln’s breath through his nose reached Malik’s ears. Then Lincoln looked up, eyes meeting Malik’s full-on for the first time since the dedication ceremony an hour ago.
Malik took another step. Now only an arm’s length between them. Lincoln’s chin rose, defiance and surrender both. Neither man reached for the other, but the contact might as well have been skin to skin.
A door somewhere down the hall opened. A student’s voice, raised in laughter, then muffled as the door shut again. Lincoln’s jaw set harder. Malik braced, expecting retreat. Lincoln didn’t move.
Malik’s tongue pressed to the roof of his mouth, words stacking but refusing to emerge. He wanted to say:
If we’re going to keep up the charade, we might as well do it honestly.
Instead, he stepped forward again, until he could see the stubble on Lincoln’s jaw, the way his throat moved with each shallow swallow.
“You’re blocking the hallway,” Lincoln murmured.
“Move me,” Malik said.
Lincoln’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t step aside. His pulse throbbed visible in his neck, a small betrayal. Malik leaned in, enough that his chest brushed Lincoln’s shoulder, then let the contact linger. He could have made it a joke, but there was nothing funny about the heat under his skin.
Lincoln’s lips parted, and Malik recognized the microsecond when intent shifted from deflection to invitation. He didn’t seize the moment, didn’t break the tension. He let it ride out, savoring the instability, the sense that everything they’d built might collapse in this empty corridor with its bad lighting and mismatched floor tiles.
Lincoln didn’t move away. If anything, he pressed into the contact, making Malik aware of every inch of overlap. For a man who’d made a profession of detachment, Lincoln was terrible at hiding the truth. Always had been.
A minute, maybe less. Malik had stopped keeping track. All he knew was that when he pulled back, the imprint of Lincoln’s heat stayed on his coat, and the air between them had changed. Lincoln’s hand slipped out of his pocket. It hovered at his side, not reaching for Malik, not retreating either.
“We should get back,” Lincoln said, but the words lacked force.
Malik nodded. “Yeah.”
But neither of them moved for several seconds, both aware the next step would set something in motion neither wanted to call by name.
“This pretense wears thin.” Malik heard the words leave his mouth, saw the ripple they sent through Lincoln’s face via a tightened jaw, eyes darting left then right as if escape routes might open in the walls. The silence of the stacks amplified everything. Malik advanced, closing the last of the distance. He’d meant it as provocation, but the words were a confession.
Lincoln recovered faster than expected. “We agreed,” he said, voice raw enough to register as accusation. “For Emmy.”
Malik matched the stare, refused to drop his gaze. “You feel it too.”
Lincoln’s shoulders straightened, a last stand of dignity. He was an expert at denial, containment, the art of pretending all heat could be redirected into academic rigor. Malik had watched him do it across podiums, in faculty lounges, at the dinner tables of family and not-quite family. The man could box a feeling and shelve it for years, but Malik knew exactly where those boxes were stored.
Lincoln’s right hand twitched up, as if to gesture, then dropped. Malik recognized the impulse to reach for a lectern, a book, anything but the man in front of him. Malik gave him no out. He reached, fingers grazing the wool of Lincoln’s sleeve.A touch so light it might be accidental, plausible deniability if either wanted it.
Lincoln’s reaction was instant. His left hand clamped around Malik’s wrist, strong and unyielding. The move was defensive, but the contact lingered, thumb pressing into the pulse point just under the skin.
