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“FINE!”
Dex’s voice rang through the Haus with the call for the dozenth time this weekend – and they weren’t even halfway through Saturday. Jack was visiting Bitty from Providence and, naturally, Ransom and Holster weren’t ones to shy away from the inherent fundraising opportunity as which Jack’s visits doubled. Because the money would, in their hands, inevitably used for a lifetime supply of beer and ping pong balls, Dex had volunteered for fine duty in exchange for managing the sin bin funds. The need for a new dryer outweighed the need for beer pong necessities (much to the dismay of Ransom and Holster, who took this as a personal affront), and so Dex took it upon himself to manage the fining in Ransom and Holster’s place.
Jack and Bitty, for their part, had just returned from a walk – Jack had insisted it should be a run, but Bitty’s “you’re no longer my captain” argument eventually won – and had slumped onto the couch in an inanimate pile of limbs and blankets. Dex waited patiently in the door frame, watching the couple to end all couples, until he witnessed the requisite kiss necessary for a two-dollar fine.
Upon hearing Dex’s voice – louder and deeper than you might expect – Jack’s hand reached into his back pocket, fished out two dollar bills, and placed them directly in the jar without removing his gaze from Bitty’s eyes. The way his mouth curved up at the edges betrayed the fact that he was happy to contribute to the “Dex Dryer Fund” in exchange for the ability to kiss Bitty wherever and whenever he pleased.
Dex, with a satisfied grin on his face, promptly turned around and left the two of them to their business. He may oversee fining, but he also couldn’t stand to be around them for too long. Their numerous public displays of affection left him feeling – not disgusted, that wasn’t it – but something Dex couldn’t quite put his finger on. Sad? Upset? With a sense of longing? Whatever it was, Dex couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Best not to think about it, then.
At that moment, Dex heard Nursey’s familiar footsteps walking through the front door. Oddly enough, that feeling returned. He and Nursey had grown close over the last year, but Dex still couldn’t account for whatever that feeling was. He didn’t feel it with any of his other friends – unless you considered Jack and Bitty to be one person, as he was prone to do lately – and couldn’t make heads or tails of what it meant. All he knew, or all he cared to understand, was that hanging out with Nursey made him happy. And so that was that.
“Hey Dex,” Nursey called out from the front door. Spotting the jar in Dex’s hands, Nursey raised his eyebrows and a light shone in his eyes that told Dex he was about to get chirped. “Working overtime? Can’t you give these guys a rest?”
“The dryer isn’t going to pay for itself, Derek. Besides, I was just on my way out.”
“Oh cool. Where to?”
“Annie’s. I’ve got a coding exam coming up and I haven’t had a chance to study, what with Jack the Fundraising Machine being here for the weekend.” Dex thought he could hear muffled giggles coming from Jack and Bitty’s general direction, and stamped down the queasy feeling that gave him in his stomach.
“Alright alright. Cool.” The light went out behind Nursey’s eyes, and Dex struggled to figure out why. Had he said something wrong? He figured Jack and Bitty were neutral chirping territory. They stood in the doorway for a moment, sharing an awkward silence, until both of them spoke at the same time.
“Wanna join me at Annie’s?”
“Did you want some company?”
The light returned to Nursey’s eyes, and Dex congratulated himself for having said something right – whatever it was. After returning the sin bin to its proper place (an alcove in the attic, deep within the recesses of an underused closet), Dex and Nursey made their way to Annie’s.
The two of them sat in comfortable silence for several hours, as was their routine whenever studying together. Dex would type diligently away at his laptop, often behaving as if Nursey wasn’t there for extended periods of time. Nursey would sit lazily back in his chair, his black poetry notebook open to a blank page in front of him, pen sitting untouched on the table. Nothing would ever get written in that notebook while he and Dex studied together, but he dragged it along for the pretense, if nothing else. These “study” sessions really just afforded Nursey the opportunity to run his gaze over Dex without it being weird or awkward. Sometimes Dex would look up from his laptop to check in with Nursey, and, catching Nursey’s gaze, blush from his cheeks to his neck and down under the collar of his t-shirt. Nursey, in these moments, found himself wishing he could follow the trail of blush to wherever it led.
Nursey was lost in thought when Dex looked up to find him gazing off into space.
“Working hard, huh?” Dex asked, a smirk across his face.
Nursey, paranoid that somehow Dex had discovered what he was daydreaming about, tried, and failed, to keep his cool.
“Uh – inspiration you know. Definitely needed for this –“ he reached down and patted his notebook, “but I’m fresh out.”
Dex nodded, already turning his gaze back to his laptop. Nursey, unwilling to let the conversation die, blurted out the first thing that came to his mind.
“So why didn’t you want to study back at the Haus, if Jack is going to be there all weekend?”
Something about the question made Dex shift awkwardly in his seat, and Nursey wished he hadn’t said anything at all.
“Well uh – I just don’t like – I find that – I can’t really be around Jack and Bitty too long when they’re together.
Nursey raised his eyebrows and opened his mouth, the look on his mouth implying a lecture was on its way.
“It’s not cause they’re two guys or anything,” Dex rushed, sensing what Nursey had misunderstood. “It’s just…” his voice trailed off, and his gaze lingered at a spot on the wall firmly above Nursey’s shoulder.
“What?” Nursey asked, gently, leaning back gently in his chair.
“Seeing them together makes me wish I had that in my life, too.”
Dex hadn’t realized what the feeling was that seeing Jack and Bitty left him with until that very moment, until Nursey asked him and he had to say it aloud.
It was envy.
Dex sat in stunned realization, unable to say anything else. Nursey sat back in his chair, his studied expression impossible to read.
“You mean, like, with a girl?”
Dex flushed.
“Well, uh, not, well – not exactly.”
Dex blushed more fiercely than Nursey had ever seen, and Nursey thought he might die in that very moment. His stomach was doing somersaults at Dex’s confession, and he felt himself hoping for the first time in a very, very long time.
“Hey man, it’s all good. You’ll have it one day. I know it seems like empty words coming from me, but I’m sure of it.” Nursey looked Dex up and down as he spoke, drinking in the side of Dex he had never seen before – nervous, vulnerable, authentic.
“It’s not… just that. I know I’ll find someone eventually – plenty of fish and all that – it’s just…” again, Dex’s voice trailed off, and he knew that whatever would come out next both he and Nursey would be learning for the first time.
“It’s that I want to have it with you.”
Nursey was thankful for the chair beneath him, as he was too stunned to hold himself up. He stared at Dex with that studied expression, a leftover from his Andover days, which was something Dex hated. Or loved to hate. He wasn’t sure which it was with Nursey, anymore.
They shared another moment of silence, but this one wasn’t awkward. It was careful, restrained, each unwilling to make the first move when they were already about thirty moves in.
It was Nursey who spoke first.
"You already do, babe.”
Dex rolled his eyes at the pet-name, and the anxious feeling in his stomach disappeared for good.