“Chinese?” I asked.
His face lit up, genuine. “You read my mind.”
We ordered from the same place we always did. While we waited, Brandon leaned against the counter and told me abouta client who’d insisted on calling him after midnight the night before, like it was reasonable. I listened, nodding, asking questions, letting him unwind. He did the same when I talked about my day, about a student who’d cried over a math test and another who’d made me a card.
When the delivery arrived, we carried everything to the couch without bothering with plates. The coffee table already had the remote and a blanket folded lazily over one corner.
We sat cross-legged on the couch, boxes balanced between us, knees bumping occasionally. Brandon insisted on giving me the last crab rangoon even though I told him I didn’t need it. He always did things like that, small, unannounced kindnesses that made it hard to hold a grudge.
“What are we watching?” he asked, mouth full.
“Crawl,” I said immediately.
He grinned. “Perfect.”
Survival movies were our thing. Something about watching people endure impossible situations made everything else feel smaller, more manageable. We liked horror too, but survival films were the sweet spot, danger without monsters you couldn’t fight back against.
The movie started, and we ate in companionable silence, occasionally reacting at the same moment, groaning when the characters made bad decisions, laughing when our heroine survived the giant crocodile, something she clearly shouldn’t have.
Brandon leaned closer at some point, his shoulder warm against mine. I rested my head there without thinking about it. Hisarm came around me naturally, like it always did when he was relaxed, his thumb tracing slow, absent circles against my arm.
Halfway through the movie, I realized I was smiling for no reason.
When the credits rolled, we carried the empty boxes to the kitchen and stacked the leftovers in the fridge. Brandon rinsed his hands and started the coffee maker without asking, while I pulled out the popcorn kernels.
We moved around each other easily, no collisions, no awkward pauses. I poured kernels into the pot; he measured coffee grounds with unnecessary precision.
“You know,” I said, “I still can’t believe you haven’t seen House of Wax.”
He looked up, offended. “I have seen movies. Just… maybe not that one.”
“It’s a crime,” I said. “We’re fixing it.”
He laughed. “All right. Surprise me.”
The popcorn finished popping just as the coffee did. We carried everything back to the couch. The lights stayed low. The blanket came up over our legs.
House of Wax started, and Brandon reacted exactly the way I expected, mocking commentary at first, then slowly getting sucked in despite himself.
“Okay,” he admitted quietly, just as wade got killed on screen, about twenty minutes in, “this is actually kind of great and disgusting.”
I felt vindicated.
At some point, I shifted so I was sitting sideways, my legs draped across his lap. He adjusted without comment, one arm wrapping around my waist, the other still holding his coffee. His chin rested lightly against the top of my head.
I could tell when he started getting sleepy. His responses lagged. His breathing deepened. His hand stilled against my side.
I paused the TV and waited a minute to be sure.
“You’re falling asleep,” I said softly.
“No, I’m not,” he murmured, already halfway gone.
I smiled and shut the movie off completely.
“Come on,” I said, tugging his hand. “Bed.”
He groaned but let me pull him up. He kicked his shoes off by the door without aiming, and I nudged them into place with my foot as we passed.
