“I may not be ready for some physical affections,” they said.
“That’s okay. How about I follow your lead on that,” he said, and they squeezed his hand.
“Thank you.”
“Of course, Zef. You don’t have to thank me for that. Anything that happens between us, whether it’s physical or otherwise, should onlyhappen because we both want it to.” He slowly flipped his hand over, giving Zef the chance to move away. When they pressed their palm to his instead, he smiled triumphantly and closed his fingers around their hand, rubbing his thumb over their smooth skin. “Good or bad?”
Zef tracked the swipe of Bryce’s thumb and smiled. “Good tingles.”
“That’s real good.” They sat like that for several minutes, hands clasped on the table between them. “Are there any Mantodean courtship traditions I need to know? I don’t want you to miss out on anything.”
“I will make you a list,” they said cheekily, and Bryce laughed. “You should do the same. I do not want to miss any human courtship rituals.”
“I can do that, if you want me to.” They nodded, so he did too. “Okay, it’s a deal.”
They tightened their grip on him and moved their hands side-to-side. “Shake on it.”
A phone buzzed, interrupting their moment, and Zef retrieved theirs from their robe pocket. Whatever they read on their screen had them whistling in alarm as they shoved to their feet, nearly upending their chair.
“Oh no! I have forgotten something important.” They tugged Bryce to his feet. “You must get dressed immediately.”
“Okay, is something wrong?” he asked as Zef ushered him to the mouth of the hallway.
“No, something I think will be very good, but I forgot completely in the face of our… romantic development. Now, go dress quickly!”
Catching Zef’s hand, Bryce stopped them from retreating. “Thank you for having breakfast with me.”
They trilled in pleasure as he squeezed their hand before their phone buzzed again, and their doe-eyed expression turned to panic once more. “We do not have time for your voluptuary ways,” they cried as they pushed his shoulder with two of their other hands. “Make haste.”
“What the hell doesvoluptuarymean?” he asked, but Zef was already disappearing into their room.
He dressed in three minutes and was in the living room searching whatvoluptuarymeant when Zef’s door opened, and they rushed past him. “Come, Bryce,” they said as they slipped their feet into their loafers. They were dressed in jean overalls over a loose button-up with polka-dots on it, and they had fastened their hair in a high ponytail.
Their neck was long and elegant, and Bryce was half-obsessed with it. “Your hair looks nice like that,” he said as he followed Zef into the spring morning.
Touching their hair behind their ear, they avoided eye contact as they said, “Oh, thank you. You look very handsome in your flannels.”
“Thanks,” he said.
As they walked to the tram stop, Zef texted on their phone with their upper hands as their lower hands swung with their long strides. He eyed their hand, weighing the pros and cons of taking it and lacing their friends together. They had held hands briefly before, but he had also agreed to follow Zef’s lead when it came to physical touch and affection.
Plus, they were distracted and stressed out right now, and he didn’t want to freak them out more by trying to hold their hand in public.
Burning with curiosity, Bryce barely resisted the urge to peek at Zef’s phone as they rode the tram toward Envy station. They kept huffing and puffing as they texted with someone, but since they were purposefully not telling him anything about what they were doing on the tram or where they were going once they got to the station, he didn’t ask who they were talking to. He assumed it was all connected, and he would figure it out eventually.
At the station, they waited outside the gates where travelers scanned their tickets or public transportation cards. Zef tucked their lower hands into their overall pockets and studied the thin Sunday crowd milling through the gates. They checked their phone periodically, but whoever had been blowing it up with messages had fallen silent.
“Are you gonna tell me what’s going on now?” Bryce asked, knocking their elbow with his.
“No, it is a surprise,” they said.
“For me?”
Zef nodded. “Of course. It cannot be a surprise for me because I am clearly in on it.”
“Okay, sassypants,” he muttered, and they frowned at him.
After nearly ten minutes of watching the comings and goings of travelers, Bryce caught a glimpse of a familiar poofy head of thin, light pink hair winking in and out of sight in the crowd, and he froze.
