Page 127 of All the way home

Zach shakes his head. “I’d notice.”

“You wouldn’t. You’d be in your own little world ignoring everything else. Daydreamer.”

Heart beating in his throat, Zach shifts closer, a half-inch. Then he repeats, “I’d notice.”

Seriousness is etched into every inch of Kieran’s face. “You saying I stand out in a crowd?”

“Vividly,” Zach says, because apparently his filter is failing him, and he’s probably about to blurt out everything he thinks.

Which is a really, really dangerous game.

But Kieran’s smile is soft as he unfolds his arms and turns onto his shoulder, so they’re face-to-face.

And then it’s really obvious that they are not a platonic or respectable distance apart. There’s maybe six inches separating them, and they feel like liminal inches.

Inches meant to disappear.

Or maybe it’s all in his head.

“Well.” Kieran swallows, Adam’s apple bobbing. “I guess one of us is going to have to be brave now.”

It’s not all in his head.

So quietly he can’t even hear it, Zach exhales. “I guess so.”

Neither of them move.

Zach’s pretty certain he can hear his own heartbeat. “I’ve never been very brave.”

“Sure you have. You followed a total stranger around an airport for ten hours.”

Which is true. Zach did do that. But he’s not bold like Kieran is.

Small steps. He can—he can do this if it’s in small steps.

So he makes himself move toward Kieran, just by an inch, but that inch feels like a mile, because now they’re close.

Close enough that there’s no backing down.

“See?” Kieran whispers. “Brave.”

Zach’s dreaming, he’s sure of it. He’ll wake up back in his dorm room, and Kieran will be some figment of his imagination. The idea wraps a fist around his heart and squeezes.

If this is a dream, he doesn’t want to wake up.

Kieran’s mouth is an inch away. Less. He’s watching Zach almost hungrily, his eyes, his mouth, his eyes again, and it’s maddening.

“Are you . . .” Zach starts, and the second half of the question evades him.

“Am I what?” Kieran’s so close Zach can almost feel the words against his mouth.

Zach’s brain is just—done. He whispers, “Real?”

When Kieran laughs, Zach gets a rush of the spearmint on his breath. “I’m the wrong person to ask. Do I feel real?”

This might be heart failure. Zach leans in a hairsbreadth more and in the same moment, reaches blindly until he finds the back of Kieran’s hand, brushes his fingers against knuckles. “I’d say yes.”

Mere millimeters away now, Kieran seems—for once—struck speechless.