He had never felt this way about anyone—certainly not in so few days. Could it really have been less than a week since Logan first came crashing into his life like a wave too vast to see coming? It felt impossible. Adrian couldn’t remember a time before him. It was as if Logan had always been there, threaded into the fabric of his memory, hidden in the silences between breaths, waiting.
He’d had crushes before, fleeting and harmless, like sparks flickering out before they could catch. But this, this was different. This was gravity. This was being pulled without resistance, drawn not just to Logan’s laugh, or his body, or his smile in the sun, but to the very atoms that made him. He was already lost to him, entirely and without defense. And the strangest part was, it didn’t scare him.
It felt like surrender.
It felt comforting, like finally being home after spending years searching for it.
He didn’t move. He didn’t want to break this moment, this feeling of suspended time, so he just listened to Logan’s slow and steady breaths. Sunlight glinted through the blinds, catching on Logan’s sandy-colored hair, falling messily across his forehead and cheeks. Adrian’s fingers itched to reach over, to brush those strands back, but he stayed still, watching instead, committing this picture to memory.
Eventually, Adrian sat up carefully, trying not to disturb Logan. He glanced down, noticing his shoes neatly placed beside the bed—shoes he didn’t even remember removing. He felt a quiet gratitude fill him. Logan, it seemed, had taken care of the small details, even as he himself drifted off.
After splashing his face with cold water in the tiny bathroom, Adrian slipped out of the cabin, heading back to his own to take a quick showerand change into something more comfortable. He needed to be ready; there were still things he wanted to do before they left Hawaii.
After finishing at his cabin, he made a brief stop to rent a motorbike before heading to the local grocery store. With the engine humming beneath him and the island wind tousling his hair, he rode down the gently curving road along the coastline, catching glimpses of the vibrant blue ocean through the palm trees. He paused at a small market and selected a modest bag of groceries: fresh eggs and butter, sweet bread, some bacon, a handful of mangoes, avocados, and a pineapple. As he moved through the space, a quiet excitement stirred inside him, an almost giddy kind of tenderness.
Without a second thought, he halted at a roadside cart and ordered two coffees. Adrian quickly learned that Logan required caffeine to function upon waking, and that was non-negotiable. When he finished ordering, he handed the barista the reusable glass travel cups that Logan had bought them a few days back. It had been just their third day together. Adrian remembered it with impossible clarity: the morning sun still sharp over their shoulders as they stood waiting for their drinks, Logan rolling his eyes at the barista reaching for paper cups and plastic lids. Without hesitation, he grabbed two large glass travel cups from a display near the counter and told the barista to use them as if it were nothing. Like it was obvious. As if they were going to continue doing mornings together.
“Single-use is bullshit. I can’t stand it anymore,” Logan had muttered, waving off Adrian’s raised eyebrow. “Microplastics, landfills, all that crap ends up in the ocean. And the ocean’s home. You don’t trash your home.”
Adrian had laughed. Logan might’ve thought it was at the reusable cups, or his impromptu environmentalist speech. But it wasn’t. It wasthe helpless kind of laugh that comes when something hits you too hard and too fast, because in that moment, it only confirmed what Adrian had already begun to suspect.
Logan was perfect.
And the idea of having a cup to share morning coffee with him made Adrian’s chest crack open, sharp and sweet. It wasn’t about the object. It was about what it meant: that on day three, Logan had already pictured mornings. He’d already imaginedmore.
That small gesture wrecked him.
It terrified him.
It gave him hope he wasn’t ready for.
And still, they used the cups, kept them in Logan’s cabin since they always met there anyway. Or maybe Logan kept them there so Adrian would have a reason to come back.
Maybe that was just wishful thinking now.
They had eaten out for nearly every meal since arriving. Today, he wanted to make something, however simple. The cabin’s kitchenette was barely functional, more of a suggestion than a space to cook, but that didn’t matter. He could still throw something together.
Inside the cabin, Logan was still sound asleep, sprawled across the bed in a relaxed, tangled position across the bed. Adrian chuckled softly to himself, setting the bag down in the compact kitchen. He rummaged through the supplies he had gathered, laying them all on the counter. As he turned to find a pan, he sifted through the cabinets until he uncovered a weathered skillet that he had washed before using.
Adrian cracked the eggs into the buttered skillet. He scrambled a few with a wooden spoon, then fried the rest until the edges crisped justslightly. It wasn’t the prettiest meal, he’d never been much of a cook, but when he stole a small piece and let it melt on his tongue, he smiled. It tasted right.
He laid the eggs onto mismatched plates, then set the skillet back on the burner and dropped in the bacon, which he knew Logan would like. Next, he sliced the pineapple, avocados, and mangos, laying the pieces carefully beside the bread he’d warmed on the pan’s edge.
The cabin filled with the hum of breakfast coming to life, eggs, fruit, coffee, and crisping bacon. Adrian paused for a moment and looked toward the bed.
Logan hadn’t stirred.
Still sprawled in the tangled sheets, one arm slung above his head, face turned toward the window, breathing deep and even. The clink of utensils, the low hiss of the skillet—none of it reached him. Adrian’s gaze softened as he approached the bed, hesitating a moment before he reached out to Logan. “Lo,” he murmured, voice soft as the morning light. “Morning.”
Logan stirred, his eyes fluttering open. He squinted, his lips curving into a faint smile as he focused on Adrian’s face, as though still drifting between dream and waking. “Really?” he whispered, barely awake, a spark of warmth in his eyes.
“Yup.” Adrian nodded, his gaze lingering on Logan, tracing the unruly strands of hair falling across his forehead. It took all his restraint not to reach out, to let his fingers trail through that sunlit mess.
Logan was a force of nature, a storm in human form. He was the ocean’s pulse, the wild tides that rise and crash with unyielding urgency. Every movement, every glance, was a wave, a tide pulling relentlessly forward, unpredictable, raw. There was a fire in his eyes, an intensity that burnedlike the sun at noon, scorching and bright. He was the sun on the horizon, an endless surge of energy that could neither be tamed nor ignored. His spontaneity was like the wind—wild, untamed, impossible to predict. Every spark he ignited blazed across the sky, and Adrian couldn’t help but be pulled into its orbit, helpless to resist. In contrast, Adrian was the anchor, the quiet depths of the sea, the part of the ocean that stays still while the world above swells and churns. He was grounded, with his feet planted firmly in the sand, the steady ebb and flow of tides beneath him. Where Logan was fire, Adrian was water, calm but vast, holding everything in gentle sway. They were opposites, like the pull of the moon on the sea—Logan, the tempest that never stayed still, and Adrian, the unshakable calm that always held him, no matter how wild the storm.
But Adrian was mesmerized. How could he not be? Logan burned with a fire that could never be contained, a fire that made the air around him crackle with energy. Adrian stood in awe of it, the heat of it seeping into his bones. He couldn’t help but be drawn in by the tide, the irresistible force of Logan’s spirit, a force that swept through him like the ocean’s waves, crashing over him with a power that left him breathless, unable to look away.
“I smell food,” Logan mumbled, eyes drifting closed again, his voice hoarse and edged with sleep.
