It didn’t bother him. He’d known Sage for a couple of years. Now Sage had him rethinking those thoughts about only being attracted to women. Had he been attracted to Sage all along, and it took him being drunk and his clumsy kiss to bring it to light?
Locker room chatter rolled around him as he sat and thought. Someone complained about a TA, someone else about a roommate who kept burning things, making their apartment smell like shit. He took a quick shower, pulled on jeans and a clean shirt, and walked back with his hair still damp under a beanie.
The apartment smelled like coffee when he entered. Sage stood at the stove with a pan and a wooden spatula. He’d shoved his hair off his forehead and still looked half-asleep.
“Gym hero,” Sage said.
Bryce nodded to the kitchen chair on its side. “You still fighting the chair?”
“It’s loose again.”
“Let me.”
Sage stepped aside. Bryce flipped the chair, tightened both screws, checked the wobble, and set it upright, then checked it again. “Solid,” he said.
“Show-off,” Sage said, but he was smiling. He slid scrambled eggs onto two plates along with some toast. “Here you go.”
Bryce took his plate from Sage. “Thanks.”
They sat at the table eating eggs and toast and drinking coffee. When they were done, Bryce asked, “What’s your day like today?”
“Lab at nine. We need to hold the LED chain for five minutes for the checkpoint. Gage thinks the weak joint was the third from the end.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah,” Sage said. “I re-flowed it yesterday, but I want to check it again. You?”
“Bio at ten. If I live through that, I’ve got to study until noon. I’ll bring lunch.”
“Good.”
Sage packed his bag. He checked his notebook, the small toolkit, and a roll of tape. Bryce watched him do it the way he always did.
“I’ll see you later?” Bryce asked at the door.
“Yeah.” Sage paused at the door, then leaned in and pressed his mouth to Bryce’s. With a grin, he pulled his beanie down and left.
Bryce cleaned up the last of the crumbs, shut the light, and grabbed his own bag. Campus was already busy by the time he arrived, with students rushing around or standing in small groups talking.
Bio was a grind. The TA threw a set of kinetics problems on the board and told them to work them out. People talked too loudly. Dan sat at the back and drummed his fingers until the TA told him to stop. Bryce stuck with it. Vmax, Km, error bars. He spent two minutes helping the student next to him redo a graph, then finished his own. When someone tried a joke about closet doors, he didn’t look up.
Later, he texted Sage.Grabbing food. Anything you don’t want?
No olives. Anything else is fine.
Bryce typed out and sent his reply.No olives. Gage?
Chicken salad with mayo.
The deli on Sixth was half full. He ordered the sandwiches, grabbed two bags of chips and three waters. At the register, the cashier made small talk about the weather, and Bryce nodded in agreement before moving on.
When Bryce entered the lab, he spotted Gage sitting at the bench with a roll of blue tape stuck to his wrist. Sage leaned over the board with the iron cooling in its stand. His face was calm in a way that meant he was concentrating hard.
“Lunch,” Bryce said, putting the bag down.
“Bless you,” Gage said, already reaching for it.
Sage didn’t look up right away. He tapped the joint with the iron, set it down, and flexed his fingers. Then he saw the food and smiled.
