Logan nodded slowly. That explained more than he’d expected.
“He didn’t feel like he was competing,” Logan said.
Tommy turned his head.
“What did he feel like?”
Logan didn’t answer immediately. He replayed the image in his mind , the way Chase had moved, deliberate but not showy. Attentive without crowding.
“Focused,” he said finally. “Like you were the only thing in the room.”
Tommy swallowed.
“Does that bother you?”
Logan searched himself for the easy answer, the one that would end the conversation cleanly.
It would be simpler to say yes. Simpler to call it a mistake and retreat into safety.
But that wasn’t what sat in his chest.
“No,” he said, steady. “What bothered me was realizing I hadn’t seen that version of you in a while.”
Tommy’s fingers curled lightly into the sheet.
“You think I was better with him?”
Logan shook his head.
“I think you were more yourself.”
The distinction mattered.
Tommy went very still at that.
“I didn’t feel like I had to win,” he said after a moment.
There it was, the thread that ran through all of it.
Logan exhaled slowly.
He understood competition. Understood what it meant to perform strength until it became automatic. He’d spent years building himself into someone solid, someone dependable, someone people leaned on.
He wasn’t afraid of losing Tommy.
What unsettled him was the possibility of becoming predictable, the safe place Tommy returned to after feeling alive somewhere else.
He brushed his thumb along Tommy’s shoulder.
“What are we doing?” Tommy asked.
Logan held his gaze.
“We’re not closing the door,” he said.
Tommy’s expression shifted, relief, surprise, something warmer.
“But we’re not blowing it open either,” Logan added. “If this keeps going, it’s intentional.”
