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A.J. shook his head. “Of course not.”

“I don’t hate you, either. Never gonna happen, Robolad. So just forget about that one, like.”

A.J. looked up from his hand, something close to a smile on his face now. He reached out and touched the back of Bren’s hand like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to.

“Just, please don’t hide stuff from me again, OK? I know I don’t always act like it, but I’m tougher than I look.”

Pride flared in Bren at the fire in Arlo’s eyes.

“I’ll try. Just remind me if I forget somethin’s important enough to share, yeah?”

Arlo smiled as he nodded, but he looked like he was trying not to roll his eyes. “OK, but what about the other stuff?” he asked as Bren linked their fingers. “One of us is going to have to give up their whole life and move.”

Bren shrugged.

“How the hell can you shrug at that?” Arlo sighed.

He shrugged again, unable to hold the grin back.

“OK, I’m re-thinking this thing about hating you.”

Bren pulled Arlo closer and kissed the spot where their hands met.

“I don’t know what’s gonna happen. But I know if we break up because of shite that might happen I’ll fuckin’ hate myself.”

Arlo went into that weird Arlo-y part of his head for a while, but when his eyes focused again, he nodded. “Me too.”

“Right. So we both agree breaking up now because we might break up in the future is fuckin’ stupid?”

Arlo nodded and met Bren when he leaned in for a kiss. “So much stuff is going to have to go right for us to work out,” he said.

Bren shrugged again.

“God made me ginger. Figure he owes me for that,” He leaned in and kissed Arlo’s forehead and didn’t flinch when his lips came away slick with nerve-sweat. “Maybe that’s how you wound up in Glenbridge. Divine intervention, like.”

They locked eyes and laughed at the same time. A greenhouse laugh. His favourite.

Their lips met, and a warmth spread through his body that had nothing to do with being out in the sun for three hours.

The world was blurry when the rumbling in his stomach forced Bren back to his lunch.

“Oh, and not to spoil the moment or anythin’,” he managed through a mouthful of sandwich, “But I’m an Irish ginger, so I’m definitely going to flip you off again, like. Just means I love you.”

Arlo looked like he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to take that. Then he leaned in and grabbed a crisp right out of Bren’s hand and flipped him off.

Yup, he could never hate this one.

13

“Hey, dummy!”

Bren didn’t look up as he waved Nat off, leaning back into the pillows at the head of his bed. It turned out to be a mistake because, after a fluttering sound he couldn’t identify, something cuffed him upside the head. First Mickie had to get off Call of Duty early, now he had to go to A&E to check for concussion.

“The fuck?”

“Sorry, dude. I thought you’d, you know, look up.”

He picked up the black composition book that had hit him and flipped through it. The pages that weren’t dedicated to doodles of everything from band logos to sprawling landscapes were filled with complicated equations.