7. Chapter 7 #4
“Ah, you’re freaked out.” I sag, removing my arm from his chair as I try to retreat back, but he grabs onto my bicep.
“No! No, it’s not that. It sounds like you could be ace, or demi, but she’s smart to not pressure labels. She sounds cool.” He falls silent, his hand still on my arm but his teeth still pinch his lip.
“What’s wrong then?”
After the longest second of my life, he sighs. “Are you still friends with Brody?” He pulls a face as he speaks my old classmate's name and I can’t help but snort.
“What? Nah. I don’t think I’ve seen him since school. He’s probably still in Scotland.” This seems to placate whatever clouded his thoughts, as the crease between his brow smooths and the faint outline of a dimple pops as his smile returns.
“Good.” Is all he replies before placing the last piece of his cookie into his mouth, lifting his eyebrows as he chews and I don't know what to make of it. Good because? I'm not sure how to finish that train of thought.
He asked more questions about Mum, growing up and for now we dance past my sexuality crisis.
I'm pretty relieved because I rarely open up about how my mum's practice affects me.
So I might not be one hundred percent straight, but that didn't mean my parents figured it out before I did.
They were just super open minded about never missing out on all opportunities.
A subject most teenage boys definitely don't want to hear.
For some reason I gravitated towards women and forgot completely about Brody, until a masked man made me question everything.
We finish our coffees and the overwhelming smell of spiced sweets and brewed chai reminds me of the first time we met. Thankfully my clothes are dry this time, but I’m wearing his hoodie. I like the smell of it and maybe I had fallen asleep in it the first night.
“Oh I forgot, sorry man I have your hoodie. I'll wash it and I can give it back to you? Are you planning on staying at the gym?”
Miles gives me an unimpressed look which I can't decipher, until he chastises me. “I am not a man kinda guy, Cassie.”
“Oh, turn your nose up at Miley but now who's the one dishing out nicknames?” I laugh, knocking his shoulder with mine.
Still glaring but with half of the heat, he presses into my shoulder but keeps his weight fallen into my side.
“Don’t give if you can't take.” Time seems to slow before my eyes as he leans forward, his lips lifting into a smile as bright as when the morning sun hits the ocean and lightly touches his nose against mine.
“Keep the hoodie. It looks good on you.”
All I can do is nod.
We finish up the rest of our coffee and Miles arranges his notes for his morning class, lightly explaining the book they're currently dissecting. The conversation is so easy and I can't help but compare to how Grace never really let me in on what she was writing. I asked constantly, but she always waved me off like the insight into her life wasn’t of any importance. It’s honestly refreshing to be let in this easily and he might not understand how much it means to me, even if it's over something as trivial as his class reading assignment.
Whilst he tucks everything into his backpack, I take our tray to the bin, depositing our rubbish and hand the empty mugs to a barista.
He’s all ready to go when I make it back to the table, a weird pang in my chest about our coffee-date being over.
Date? A familiar flush pulled tight at my skin, because I may have spontaneously made this more than what he might think it was, in my head.
“My class is in the west block, where is yours?” His question makes me break from my brief anxiety induced thoughts.
“I'm in north, but the path cuts past west so I could walk you?”
Miles beams. “I’d really like that.”
As we exit the coffee shop, we start down the street towards our university and I can't push down how much I want to see him again.
“Come to open mic night this Friday.” Shooting him a sidewards glance, his hands are tucked into his jeans as we walk and his smile pulls into a smirk.
“Come again?”
“My friend Jemmy runs a bar in town and twice a month she throws an open mic night. We like to get a group together, have some drinks, which are half price and some of us get up and sing.”
His eyebrows jump in surprise. “You sing?”
I hold down my next blush, feigning confidence. “I diddle.”
“Can I come if you promise to never say the word diddle again?”
I laugh. “Sure, I promise to remove it from my vocabulary. What other words do you recommend as its replacement?”
“Oh, there's par-take, dip your toes in, try your luck at, play in, have a go at–I could go on. In other contexts it means to dupe, trick, bamboozle.”
We laugh and chat for the entire walk to class, which goes too quickly, but I love glimpsing his giant brain.
I soak in his intelligence and it makes me happy that he doesn't doubt mine.
Sometimes I can be quiet whilst someone does the talking, but It's not like that with him, and I can't stop thinking about that for the rest of the week.