The Wingman by A. Poland

Chapter Fourteen

Even with Lorcan snoring softly from the floor nearby, Nathan slept soundly. He would even hazard to say it had been the best night’s sleep he’d ever had.

Even if that was a blatant lie and the title belonged to when he was ten and had eaten too many s’mores at camp, then passed out for twelve hours. Lorcan, at the time even more nervous around people their age, had stayed with him until he woke up. And then they’d shirked the day of scheduled activities to play Pokémon in the cabin.

Nathan lay on his side and looked down to Lorcan sprawled on his back, arms stretched out over his head and an adorable double chin going on. Lorcan used to sleep in the bed with Nathan when they were much younger and both half the size they were now, and apparently Nathan hadn’t kicked as much.

Come to think of it, Miles had never said anything about kicking when Nathan was in the tent with him. So either Miles had chosen not to mention it or Lorcan had been bullshitting Nathan.

Nathan didn’t ask. Not that Lorcan had given him much opportunity when he eventually woke up, far too eager to return Miles’s jacket than linger any longer than necessary. Nathan figured the whole thing was behind him. He’d tried his best to keep them apart, to catch Lorcan’s eye and break the barrier from friend to boyfriend.

And look what happened instead. He’d gotten lost, injured himself, and learned what an opossum was. Not exactly the success story Nathan had been hoping for.

Over the next few days, he didn’t let himself dwell on it, keeping himself busy. Ben had mentioned wanting to try to grow a vegetable patch out back, so Nathan researched the best kind of soil and tried to dig out a flower bed. He was successful, right up until he hit a layer of rock and broke the shovel.

Lorcan drove him out to a garden center, and Nathan invested in the strongest shovel they had—because that rock had just declared war.

Not once did Lorcan mention Miles. Which was odd, considering Lorcan loved his deep conversations in the car. Nathan didn’t question it out loud as he knew that would be unlocking Pandora’s box.

Anyway, Nathan was something of a Lorcan expert, so he knew one of three things likely had happened.

If Lorcan and Miles had hooked up, he would have heard about it.

If Miles had turned Lorcan down (like that would ever happen), Lorcan would have kept quiet about it and licked his wounds in private.

Similarly, if Lorcan had lost interest, he wouldn’t have thought to mention it.

So, Nathan brushed it off as one of those things he’d mention in a couple of years—the two of them lounging on a beach, engaged—and Lorcan would ask, Who? And then they’d laugh and order more drinks.

Of course, Nathan knew the whole “engaged” thing was a long shot, but a guy could dream. Fantasies that seemed a long way away from his current reality as Nathan perched on his bed, thumbing through his phone notifications.

Frowning, Nathan noticed he had an email. It wasn’t from Saint Andrews or UCLA. Hell, it wasn’t even one of those spam emails urging him to claim his millions of dollars from a Nigerian prince.

Instead, he read Miles Mitchell.

Miles Mitchell? Wow, what a name.

Nathan wondered how Miles had gotten his email, and then some part of his mind reminded him of the Google Calendar event for the camping trip—seriously, who did that for social events?—and he read on:

Hey!

How are you doing after the weekend? Lorcan dropped off the jacket, thanks for sending him with it. Just found out there’s a documentary film festival this Friday. I was thinking of going, if you’d be interested?

Miles

Nathan blinked, then read it again. And to make sure, Nathan read it a third time.

Was Miles asking him out?

The moment that thought sprang to mind, Nathan instantly disregarded it. He probably only wanted to meet up because he was interested in some insider scoop on Lorcan or he wanted to hang out as friends. He wasn’t asking Nathan out. People didn’t do that.

Nathan got people to ask Lorcan out; it was how things were at this moment in his life. And Nathan was just fine with that.

So, Nathan got up, made himself a cup of coffee, and returned to his computer before thinking fuck it and replying:

Hey, man

Sure, I’m game for that. Time and place, and I’m there. Here’s my number because I am not old enough to keep in contact by email.

Nathan

Then he put it out of his mind, another priority taking over.

The vegetable patch turned out to be an even bigger operation than Nathan intended.

He broke the second shovel—the Digmaster 5000, too ostentatiously named to be any good, Nathan realized a moment too late—and abandoned that particular patch of land. Turning to the other side of the garden, Nathan started digging again with a shovel he’d picked up at the Dollar Tree.

He didn’t find any deeply embedded rock, but he did find an intricate burrow system belonging to ground squirrels.

Ground squirrels, as Nathan quickly found out, didn’t particularly like people digging holes in their home, and Nathan promptly sprinted back into the house—vexed squirrels likely hot on his heels.

Nathan was pretty sure he’d never heard his dad laugh as hard as he did. But Nathan got his own back when Ben decided to try to coax the squirrels out of the garden with the offering of crunchy peanut butter. It backfired, and the squirrels reigned triumphant, now armed with said peanut butter, which they happily dragged back to their burrow.

I think we might have to go back to the drawing board, Ben commented once he’d come back inside, a deep frown on his face and a large streak of dirt on his back from his fall trying to evade the squirrels.

Nathan knew where he’d inherited his clumsiness, at least.

There was a piece of paper now pinned to their fridge titled: How to Conquer the Ground Squirrels. It included subsequent subsections such as Ideas and Weaknesses???

So far, they had no listed weaknesses and one idea. The idea was to offer individual peanuts and lead them across the road to the Ferns’ house. Kind of like Hansel and Gretel with the breadcrumbs, but minus the witch and cannibalism.

Nathan thought that luring two feisty ground squirrels to their neighbors’ garden was only fair, considering the last petty action had been the Ferns running over Lorcan’s mom’s petunias. Considering how proud Mrs. Ortiz was about her petunias, ground squirrels seemed like a lesser evil.

Or maybe Nathan was just trying to justify the plan to Ben, who was less than convinced and unwilling to put aside his morals for sweet revenge.

Nathan considered roping Lorcan in, but he’d been busy lately with a new summer job at his dad’s call center. Nathan still wasn’t sure how that worked out, seeing as Lorcan was terrible on the phone. Whenever they ordered food for delivery, Nathan was always the designated caller after Lorcan had once said “Love you” to the person on the line.

So, in the absence of Lorcan at his disposal whenever he was bored, Nathan wanted to make the most of the time he had with him. Plotting how to get rid of squirrels didn’t necessarily count as quality bro time.

It had been two weeks since the camping trip and a week since Miles had emailed him to make plans. So when Nathan’s phone lit up beside his knee as he sat cross-legged in Lorcan’s room—beating the hell out of him on his Xbox—Nathan was momentarily distracted.

“Who’s that?” Lorcan asked, only briefly glancing to Nathan before cursing under his breath as his on-screen avatar plummeted off a cliff.

“Uh, no one,” Nathan lied. Why had he lied?

He put down the controller for a moment, knowing full well Lorcan had no chance of winning even if Nathan’s attention was elsewhere.

Lorcan dropped the topic anyway, consumed by the game and his singular aim of not falling off of any more cliffs.

Hi, it’s Miles. The Jane Goodall documentary looks good! 7pm Friday, the Royal?

Nathan took a sharp intake of breath. The thing with Miles. Between the battle of the ground squirrels and making the most of his relatively limited time with Lorcan, he had completely forgotten about the plans they’d made.

It was as if everything that had happened the weekend of camping had been pushed to the back of Nathan’s mind, locked away with a key. It had been such a disaster that Nathan was happy to shove it with other such embarrassing memories.

Like the time he’d fallen asleep on a stranger on a bus (and drooled) or just about any time he’d misinterpreted Scottish sarcasm. Those kinds of memories.

Nathan worried his lip between his teeth for a moment before shooting back a response.

See you there!

Nathan could never say no to a bit of Jane Goodall.

*

He ended up not telling Lorcan about his plans with Miles. It wasn’t as though he was maliciously keeping it from him; Nathan just wanted to avoid Lorcan breathing down his neck about the whole thing. Chances were, if Nathan told him, he’d don a ridiculous disguise and see what they got up to. Maybe even casually appear from the bushes after Nathan had told Miles about how flexible Lorcan was, and then they’d scamper off into the sunset.

Or something like that.

So Nathan went by himself; he took a bus and walked the rest of the way. Even with a clean driver’s license under his belt, Nathan would only drive if there was no alternative. And as long as Nathan had two functioning legs—his injuries now healed—and the journey was mostly flat, then he could walk it. He did miscalculate the journey time and turned up late. It was only by twenty minutes, so it hadn’t crossed his mind to send Miles a text.

Nathan quickly regretted that decision the moment he spotted Miles leaning up against the coral-blue walls of the Royal, looking every bit the rock star Nathan had thought he was when he first saw him, especially wearing his trademark black jacket. The soft frown on Miles’s features made guilt swirl in Nathan’s gut for not giving him a heads-up.

“Hey!” Nathan called out upon approach, watching Miles’s frown quickly transform into a relieved smile. Nathan jogged the last few steps toward him. “Sorry about that, man. Bus took longer than expected. Public transport, right?”

“Oh, did you have to come far?” The frown was back again, causing a crease between his brows. “I could have given you a ride.”

“You can save me the bus fare and give me one back,” Nathan assured him. He clapped Miles on the back, and they set off toward the theater entrance. “So, what do you know about Jane Goodall?”

“Just that she has something to do with monkeys…”

“Oh man, you’re in for a treat.”

Turned out, so was Nathan. He’d watched Jane Goodall interviews before, seen her work, read the articles. But there was nothing like watching a documentary on the big screen. And, as it transpired, there was nothing like experiencing a documentary with someone who was just as engaged with it the entire time. Nathan even found himself glancing at Miles to see his reactions, such as the wide-eyed look he got when Jane made first contact with a chimpanzee. Nathan felt even more validated for the sting in his eyes when Miles searched for a tissue in his pocket at a particularly heartbreaking scene and then silently offered one to Nathan too.

Afterward, neither of them mentioned their shared sob over chimpanzees.

“I don’t know about you,” Nathan started the moment they emerged from the theater, hands shoved in his pockets, “but that took me on an emotional roller coaster that only food can bring me back from.”

Miles agreed without any coaxing, leading Nathan to a restaurant he swore made the best noodles Nathan would ever have in his life. And Nathan—as a college student and, therefore, as a rite of passage—had already consumed a lot of noodles in his time, so of course he had his doubts.

“Holy shit,” Nathan managed on the first bite. “This is amazing.”

“Right?” Miles replied with an all-knowing grin, rolling his chopsticks between his hands before digging in himself. (Nathan stuck to using a fork.) “This is one of my favorite places.” Miles took a dainty mouthful. “A lot of happy associations here.”

“Oh yeah?” Nathan asked with a not-so-dainty mouthful.

“Yeah,” Miles said and hummed, glancing down to his bowl. “I had my welcome-to-the-family dinner here.”

Nathan furrowed his brows, trying to understand what he meant. And then he recalled the whole adopted thing.

“What age were you adopted?” Nathan asked before he could stop himself. Was that an insensitive thing to ask? Too late, it was already out in the open. No going back.

“Fifteen,” Miles answered, and Nathan was relieved he didn’t sound offended or affronted in any way. Although, Nathan’s brows hiking higher might have changed that.

“That’s…”

“Old, I know,” Miles finished, saving Nathan from sticking his foot in it again. Miles shrugged, stirring his noodles with the chopsticks, considering. “I was in Jordie’s class in high school. And she mentioned to Mom and Dad that I was in and out of foster care…” Miles trailed off with a smile. “The moment they found out, they applied to be foster parents, and then a year later, they signed the adoption papers.”

Nathan was silent for a few moments, digesting both his words and the noodles.

“They sound like great people,” he managed. What could you say when someone told you something so personal like that?

“Yeah.” Miles nodded, bowl in hand, and finally looked back up to Nathan. “The greatest. I’m very lucky.”

Nathan smiled at how fondly Miles clearly regarded the family who had welcomed him as their own.

“And they have great taste in noodles, so I like the sound of them already,” Nathan added in an attempt to lighten the mood that had suddenly gotten so serious.

Conversation flowed freely after that, with Miles chatting more openly than he had on the hike, smiling more, even laughing at some of the things Nathan said. Not once did Nathan mention Lorcan. At least, in terms of showing him off.

Nathan name-dropped him once or twice, sure. But not with the purpose of selling him to Miles. Lorcan was such a big part of Nathan’s life that it was difficult not to mention him at least once, especially when it came to ridiculous shit Nathan may have gotten up to.

But mostly, they talked about their interests. Hobbies that Nathan had almost forgotten (like that phase of crocheting he had gone through in high school, Lorcan still wearing his patchy hat every winter) or weird and fascinating things Nathan had learned through his studies.

Miles lapped it all up, not once looking bored but instead asking questions, actually engaging with what Nathan had to say. Which was rare, considering most people switched off the moment Nathan really got into talking about the wide and wonderful world of anthropology.

“Fellas, we’re closing up,” a voice cut through, pulling Nathan out of his tangent about totem poles.

“Shit, really?” Nathan was genuinely surprised as he checked his phone for the time. He glanced up to Miles, who looked similarly dazed. “You should have told me to shut up at least an hour ago, dude.”

“But that would have meant missing out on otherkin theory,” Miles pointed out, as though that would be a great loss. Nathan was momentarily thrown by the fact that Miles had been paying attention enough to remember that part of the conversation.

They went Dutch, leaving a generous tip for staying so late, and hightailed it out of the restaurant.

“Still good for that ride home?” Nathan asked, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“I’ll happily be your Uber for the night,” Miles assured him, leading Nathan to his car.

The ride back was, surprisingly, just as chatty as dinner was. Surprisingly because Nathan had been convinced Miles didn’t talk that much. He usually didn’t, except for on a one-to-one basis.

Miles let Nathan rummage through his CD collection, which probably had more variety than most music stores Nathan had wandered around in. They even started a game where Nathan would pull out a random CD and Miles would try to list all of the songs on it. In order.

When Miles proved that to be too simple a challenge for him, Nathan quizzed him about the name of a specific track number.

Nathan refused to be impressed when he got at least 95 percent of them right. He completely refused.

Before long, Nathan directed Miles into his driveway, keeping an eye on Lorcan’s house in case he was awake and spied Miles’s car pulling up next door. But the house was cast in darkness, so Nathan figured he was in the clear.

“Thanks for the ride, really appreciate it,” Nathan told him, patting down his pockets to make sure he wasn’t leaving anything behind.

“Anytime,” Miles assured, and as Nathan placed his hand on the door handle to get out, Miles hurriedly added, “We should do this again.”

Looking back at him, Nathan raised his brow at the uncertain expression crossing Miles’s face. Nathan’d had a damn good time with him, and he’d actually gotten to talk about all the weird stuff he was into for the first time in…a really long time. The best thing? Miles didn’t seem to hate any of it.

Hanging out with Miles again? That was definitely something Nathan could see himself doing.

So, he grinned and nodded in confirmation.

“Definitely, yeah. I’d like that a lot.”

Miles let out a relieved breath, a light smile dancing over his lips as he placed both hands back on the steering wheel and bobbed his head in way of a nod. “Night, Nathan.”

“Night, Miles,” Nathan called back, closing the door behind him as a final good-bye before disappearing inside.