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“I don’t mean this,” says Ranger, shaking his head. “I meant, thank you for being with me. Today. And so many other days like it.”
“That’s the job,” says Axel, smiling lopsidedly. “Sworn and sacred duty, remember?”
“Don’t give me that,” Ranger huffs. “Whatever obligation you might have once had toward the people of Earth, you have more than fulfilled it. There are doubtless other planets out there in need of saving, other perils…”
“This crazy planet keeps me more than occupied,” Axel protests. Ranger laughs ruefully.
“Don’t I know it. I guess what I’m trying to say is, I’m glad you stuck around.”
Ranger’s hand, Axel realizes, is still on his: grip firm, hot, unyielding.
“Ask me,” he says, almost choking, as if, after all this time, he has just learned he is unable to breathe in Earth’s atmosphere.
“Ask you what?” Ranger says. Is it Axel’s imagination, or does he sound breathless, too?
“Why I stay,” says Axel, edging forward slightly.
“So many bad guys,” Ranger murmurs. “So many people in need of saving.”
“One,” Axel whispers. “One person.”
Ranger’s lips are on his before he can finish the thought, and he responds hungrily, kissing him with every ounce of the fervor he has repressed since he first laid eyes on him in that crater in the valley. How strong and brave he had looked. Axel had fallen twice that night.
“Richard,” he whispers into his friend’s cheek.
“Axel,” Ranger whispers back. With one hand, he reaches under Axel’s shirt, ghosting his fingertips along the grooves of his abs. With the other, he deftly unbuckles Axel’s belt. “Axilon P’Shar.” His hand reaches into Axel’s underwear, closing around him with such assuredness that all Axel can do is gasp into the crook of Ranger’s neck. “Axilon the Brave,” Ranger says, pushing Axel backward onto the couch and sinking to his knees.
“My prince,” he whispers, keeping his gaze fixed up on Axel while lowering his mouth onto—
“April.”
April slammed the laptop shut at the sound of her name, neck snapping up to face Will, who stood in the doorway to the screaming cupboard.
“What’s up?” she asked.
“Anything good?” he asked, gesturing at the computer. “Let me see.”
“It’s not done yet.”
Will knew enough not to push. He had come straight to the shop after Patrick had left him at the cinema, mind and pulse racing. His first instinct had been to find April and Jordan and debrief them in giddy detail like they were all adolescents giggling at the back of a school bus. But as he made his way up Corporation Street, the specifics of what had happened began to blur in his mind—Who had initiated the kiss? Had it really felt as exhilarating as he was remembering? Could things like this even happen to a person like him?—until the entire thing felt like a daydream. And then, of course, there was the way Patrick had practically bolted afterward. By the time Will walked into Gilroy’s, nodding to Yvonne behind the counter, and found April busy typing away in the cupboard, his burning impulse to tell her everything had faltered. He doubted that Patrick would appreciate Will spilling his private business. And this was just so typically him, getting carried away prematurely.
So they’d kissed. So what? People kissed all the time. For a lot of gay men, kissing was like talking about the weather or playing cards: something they did to pass the time until a better option came along. Only somebody truly naive would go running to gush to his friends about snogging a man at the grand age of twenty-nine.
He was too excitable, he knew. Too intense, according to some guys.
Too much.
“Why are you even here?” April asked, slipping her laptop under her arm and shimmying past him in the cramped back room to flick on the kettle next to the sink. “You don’t work Mondays.”
“I…forgot.” He stood there awkwardly, knowing exactly how odd he was being. “I should go! And enjoy my day off. So. That’s…” He made a big deal of pivoting toward the front of the shop. “That’s what I’m going to do.”
“OK,” said April, expertly uncapping the tin of teabags, placing one in a mug, and filling it with hot water, all one-handed. “See you later. Weirdo.” She placed her laptop on the small counter while the tea steeped, and as Will left the room, he heard her mumble to herself: “Now. Where were we…”
* * *
•••••••••
How soon was too soon to text somebody after making out in the back of a cinema? Will tutted at himself instinctively even as he silently posed the question. How juvenile. How 2003 of him. How deeply stupid this all was. And yet none of those very true things stopped the question from doing shaky laps of his mind, like a nervous student driver stuck on a roundabout.
