It had become their little tradition to use these pet names for each other. Nobody else understood the reference, but Joe and Oscar did, and although it was a good time with the rest of the group, Oscar was glad to head down to the street with him. Maybe he’d been unfair to think of them as Aaron’s friends. They were and they always would be Aaron’s first, but in a strange and unexpected turn of events, Oscar had found himself loving Joe a little better than most people he knew.
“Tobe’s actually just competitive,” Joe explained while they waited for their kebabs and sipped on ice cold sodas. “They’re the sweetest thing. Riley really looks up to them.”
“Looks up to you, too,” Oscar said, swinging his legs beneath the bench.
Outside, the streets were dead. This was not the living part of town on Saturday nights, and everybody else had gone to sleep. A delivery man rolled in on a motorbike, ready to pick up the order that preceded theirs.
“I’m a big brother too, you know.”
“You should have invited them tonight,” Joe said. “If you get along.”
“Oh, yeah. Lina’s amazing,” Oscar replied. His phone buzzed, stopping him from the long-winded story he’d planned to tell about Ryan.
Luke SkyRacer: Hey, I was talking to Phil. Do you guys ever wanna have a video call? Like a…digital double date? I’d love to meet Aaron, and Philip would like to talk to you properly instead of just shouting hellos from across the house
A light sparked in Oscar’s chest, weaving a tapestry that told him perhaps he and Aaron could have all of it—their friendships, joint and separate, together and shared. He smiled down at his phone, preparing a reply.
“What are you smiling at?” Joe asked. “Don’t tell me he’s texted you he misses you already.”
“I mean, he surely does,” Oscar said, narrowing his eyes at Joe. “But it’s actually Lucas. You know, I told you about all his gaming, but I’ve never spoken about the other things you have in common.”
“Is he a gymbro, too?” Joe asked, and his laugh brought spring to the end of September, reminding Oscar just how well he liked him.
“Yeah,” Oscar replied, mouth twitching. “Something like that.”
19
DOUBLE DIGIT[AL]
With Lucas’s marathon and all the training that came before it, the video call was pushed back a few weeks, and by the time Aaron and Oscar sat side by side on his favorite part of the dining bench to finally have their digital double date, they were both bundled up in sweaters, Aaron with his hands wrapped around a mug of coffee, Oscar sipping hot chocolate.
TheSpace Invaderstheme began to play, earning Oscar an arched eyebrow, but he was far too excited to respond, so when Lucas’s camera finally loaded, Aaron was still looking at him with an expression straight out of a meme.
“Chico!” Lucas clapped his hands, mouth splitting into a grin.
He wasn’t sitting at his desk this time, but on a beige couch with a wall of books and pretty ornaments behind him. Philip sat beside him, looking much younger than Oscar had always perceived him from the brief glimpses crossing behind Lucas’s chair or in the small, round profile photo they had together from the previous year’s Pride march.
“Hey, Team Jacob,” Oscar said, leaning back into the bench. “Philip.”
“Hello, Oscar.” Philip had a smooth deep voice that matched his persona.
A college professor in the humanities, Philip had straight blond hair that he normally combed to the side, but on this afternoon, it flopped casually over his forehead. He wasn’t wearing one of the blazers or sweater vests Oscar had glimpsed him in so many times, but a short-sleeved T-shirt with a small designer logo embroidered on the right breast. It was no surprise they could wear such light clothes in the coldest parts of autumn. Philip and Lucas had money.Propermoney. They probably had the kind of heating that made their home feel like summer all year round.
“This is Aaron,” Oscar said, realizing he had spent far too long snooping and eyeing the fancy frames that sat on the shelves behind them.
“Hi,” Aaron said, giving them a wave.
“I suppose you’re the reason my reading stack has grown taller and taller,” Philip replied, his mouth curving into a mischievous smile that lit up his entire face. Lucas rolled his eyes, slapping him on the arm affectionately, and Philip’s response was a chuckle warm as the sun filtering through their living room window. “This one’s been broody and moody and mopey ever since Oscar stopped showing up for their intense gaming nights. And it has, of course, fallen to me to entertain him.” Philip’s glance turned in Oscar’s direction on the screen. “Please correct it. I need to catch up with my reading.”
“It’s actually my fault more than anything. You’re right,” Aaron said, setting down his coffee mug.
His eyes were so blue. Oscar would have liked to snoop a little more on Lucas and Philip’s home, but now his eyes snagged on Aaron’s smiling face in the bottom right corner of the screen. This was the cornfield chase he’d imagined. He was that little boy from from the space film again, and he was running through the maze. Oscar would never stop running,not if Aaron was the moving point on which his eyes were fixed.
“Lover boy’s mesmerized,” Lucas said, snapping his fingers. “Chico! Hey!”
“What?” Oscar rolled his eyes at his best and oldest friend.
Lucas wouldn’t mind him being a brat for a minute. Really, he’d seen him in worse moods and at worse moments. Oscar wasn’t too proud of the fact he’d called Lucas while he bled all over his bathroom floor that one time he’d done it. Two years had passed since then, but he’d never forget what Lucas had looked like as he’d sat and calmed him down, hanging up from his work call to fix Oscar’s mind and guide him through fixing his skin. Lucas had been so gentle with him then, so loving. On that particular evening, Oscar had been a slew of characters he’d seen in different movies, looking for a ray of light, anything to hold onto, and Lucas had stepped into the role of a life float. He’d done a pretty good job of it. Papa-adjacent. And then he’d convinced him to call Christina.
