When David finally stumbled into the living room, hair tousled, the t-shirt he’d worn to bed hanging over one shoulder, Jonathan poured coffee and planted it on the table before him. He had his phone in his hand, and Jonathan assumed he’d read the results of yesterday’s challenge. Possibly watched all the other winning entries.
David sipped his coffee, lounged back in his chair, and turned his head toward the ceiling. A laugh morphed into a groan; his body tensed, and relaxed. Like he was finding a way back into himself—the himself he knew how to be. Who knew what came next.
Jonathan gave him the space, not touching, not demanding anything of him. He focused on the next challenge.
“That Word is Love,” David read from his screen.
“Brings the Beatles to mind.”
David started humming, and then stopped. “Or Sophocles.”
Jonathan held up a cue card: One word frees us of all the weight and pain in life. That word is love.
“Of course you already thought of that.” A smile played at those lips. Was it the light or were they still reddened from last night?
“. . . Jonathan?”
“Hm?”
A dimple appeared. “So this is what you’re like distracted?”
Jonathan looked up into deep eyes, like a still harbour, life lurking just below the surface. Life that wanted to leap from the water but feared being caught. “I know how to stop you talking.”
The chair shuddered under David’s laugh.
The shrill ring of a cell phone interrupted them, and David snapped forward in his chair, answering. “Nash?”
A frown touched his face; it only deepened as the seconds passed.
“I see.” A grimace on his paling face; a look flashed at Jonathan. “I’ll grab the next flight.”
He ended the call. The quiet thickened. David’s voice rasped. “The landlord wanted to speak with me.”
Jonathan tensed.
“He’s had an offer on the terrace.” Hands scrubbed over his face. “Fuck. I need another two weeks. I can buy it if—”
Jonathan stood and turned David’s chair, a harsh rumble over the hardwood floor. Worried eyes searched the middle-distance; Jonathan hooked a finger under David’s chin and steered his gaze to him. “We will win this.”
“What happens if we don’t?”
The question was a knife to his stomach. He heard the missing words. What happens to us if we don’t?
David couldn’t stay here. He’d do what was right. He’d go back. Find a way to look after them.
Jonathan couldn’t move, either. He had Savvy to take care of. This was their home, their support system, their roots. Friends and relatives. School.
Nash’s voice entered his mind, chilling him into a shiver. He found jobs for all of us.
Even if they did win, nothing would change. This was as much as he could ever hope for. Long distance. Trips.
The fear every weekend might be the last.
He closed his eyes. Last night he’d barely slept, mapping their future to the last pages of a romance novel. They’d make this their home; this bedroom would become their bedroom. All their mornings would be shared. They’d help Savvy through their teens, balance each other out. David would be a reprieve when Jonathan got too strict. And Ben—they could hang out every other weekend, maybe go on trips. They could take in other kids who needed a good home. They could teach dance together, like his parents had.
All this, after just one kiss. One everything kiss.
Still, one kiss.
Stupid.
He dropped his fingers and David snatched them back. He spoke low, not quite a promise but something close. “Listen to me, Jonathan.”
He opened his eyes.
David squeezed his knuckles. “If they don’t have to pay rent, they won’t need me as much. They will be okay.”
Green eyes searched his. Do you understand what I’m saying?
David could base himself here. Trips to them. Not the other way around.
The grip around his fingers tightened.
All that stood between them was the money.
The town was full of nooks and crannies tagged with scrawls of the word. Carved into the magnolias on Moa Street, graffitied under the barnacled wharf, scratched on a park lamppost. Engraved on the big horseshoe at the stables. LOVE was everywhere; they’d promised the world they would find fifty of them before the town bell chimed midday. At midday, David had to leave for the airport.
Wading into freezing water; climbing damp trees, slithering under verandas, shaking off cobwebs, blowing warmth into one another’s hands. Savvy filmed it all. Ten, twenty, thirty. The first LOVEs were easy to spot. At forty, the hunt was on. At forty-two, David’s laughter diminished by half.
Inside the public loo. Forty-three. Forty-four.
The stop sign pole. Forty-five.
Thirty minutes left. They looked at one another inside the gazebo, Courtship Crossover in their sight. No, that one would wait. The finale. The other four first.
David’s eyes sparked. He grabbed Jonathan’s arm and pulled him down the gazebo steps, through the square, and over the primary school gate to the back field. They stumbled over stumpy grass toward lengths of wire fencing holding back sheep.