“Just like when we were kids,” Isaac said. “I thought we could assemble it together? I wanted to do something kinda special, y’know?”
Julian swallowed. This was sosweet.
“I’ll clear the table,” he said, passing the box back to Isaac and pecking him on the cheek as he did so. Excited laugher bubbled up in his throat, childlike joy at such a simple pleasure making him feel lighter than he had in a long time.
Maybe Isaac…
As much as Julian didn’t want to get his hopes up, it was starting to feel like Isaac was serious about whatever was going on between them. Like he’d said, this wasspecial. This made him feel like he wasn’t just another notch on Isaac’s bedpost.
Not that Isaac had ever made him feel used, but he’d always assumed this was temporary. There was an end in sight. Once the tournament was over, Isaac would be free to go back to his life, having made the impact he’d been talking about.
Everyone would know he was bi, and that was the point, wasn’t it? Once he’d established that, he wouldn’t need a boyfriend anymore.
Or whatever Julian was to him.
Julian forced himself to push that thought aside. Isaac had done something nice for him, and he planned on enjoying it. Especially if they only had a little while left together.
“You want me to order dinner?” Isaac asked as he hovered a few feet from the table, waiting for Julian to finish clearing it.
“Please,” Julian said. “I’m starving.”
Once he’d completely cleared the table and transferred everything on it to the kitchen counter, Julian sat down and pushed the chair opposite him out with his foot, beaming eagerly at Isaac.
“You build, I’ll search?” Isaac offered, pushing the box over to Julian to open.
That was what they’d always done, playing to their strengths. Isaac was good at finding the pieces they needed, Julian was good at fitting them together. Sometimes they’d tried different things, but they’d always gone back to doing it this way in the end.
Like everything else about their relationship, it wascomfortable.
“Works for me,” Julian said, opening the box and tipping all the bags out, unfolding the instructions.
“Ooh, the bags have letters now,” Isaac said, holding one of them up. “Guess we start with bag A?”
That sounded logical, but Julian flipped the instructions open all the same, wanting to be sure.
“Yep, bag A,” he confirmed, excitement welling up in his chest.
He felt like a kid all over again, doing innocent, kid things with his best friend.
“You’re looking for a grey plate with, uh…” Julian counted silently, running his finger over the diagram like he had years and years ago. “Six studs one way, eight the other.”
Isaac handed it to him a second later. “And two green bricks that’re one wide, six long,” he said, and again, received them almost immediately, Isaac beaming at him when he looked up.
They got into the rhythm of working together easily, memories of a time when things were always like this between them, and they were practically inseparable flooding back to Julian with every brush of his fingers against Isaac’s, every soft laugh they shared.
He remembered falling in love with his best friend. The fear, at first, thedismaythat Isaac would know, and once he knew he wouldn’t want to be friends anymore.
Julian had carried that fear for a long time. Hell, he was still carrying itnow, still afraid that if Isaac knew how he really felt, he’d leave.
Part of him still wanted to say it. Especially now, when Isaac was being so sweet, and it was soeasybetween them, and Julian could barely remember feeling more loved than he did now.
The risk that it was all in his head, that he was misreading Isaac’s friends-with-benefits affection for him as something more, that was too much to take. Losing Isaac now, so soon after they’d gotten back in touch… that wasn’t an option.
“Time to put the tires on,” Isaac said eagerly, having already set them aside earlier. For whatever reason, this had always been his favorite part of building cars, so he always did it.
The buzzer rang just as Isaac snapped the last tire into place. He rose from the table without a pause, beating Julian to it.
“That’ll be food,” he said. “Do you know that the Lego company are the world’s biggest manufacturer of tires?”
