We were still sitting at the table, and I had one knee pulled up to my chest, which was getting more uncomfortable the more I ate. I had already cleaned one plate and had started on a second, but my eyes were larger than my stomach.
“I’ve kind of looked into it.” He shrugged modestly, and he didn’t have a clue what an amazing cook he was. Milo never believed he was good at anything, no matter what I told him. “I don’t know.”
“Well, you still have a few years to think about it, but you’re too good to keep this hidden from the world.” I took another bite, but my stomach screamed in protest. I forced myself to push my plate away, knowing that I would explode if I continued eating.
“What about you? You’re graduating before I am. What did you have in mind?” Milo turned the tables on me, and I squirmed a little. He knew my grades at school, and he was constantly trying to talk to me about my future, but I avoided it as much as possible.
“I don’t know.” Lately, with everything that had been going on with Jack, I had a new found appreciation for paranormal studies and biology. “Maybe I’ll go to med school.” I had meant it as a joke, but Milo just nodded, like it would make sense.
“I could see you as a psychiatrist,” Milo said. “I mean, not anything that had to do with blood or surgery.”
“No, that would definitely be out,” I agreed readily. When I saw all the blood on Jack’s nonexistent wound, I had to fight the urge to vomit. “But I can’t imagine me being a psychiatrist.”
“Really?” He raised an eyebrow, as if it seemed like an obvious choice to him. “You’re a pretty good listener, and you love figuring people out. Everyone is like a puzzle to you, and you’re trying to put all the pieces together.”
“I guess that is true.” Essentially, that’s all I’d been doing for the last few weeks, but until Milo had said it like that, I didn’t realize that’s what I did.
“I mean, you figured out that I was gay.” Milo spoke quietly and kept his eyes down, so I knew it was still something that was uncomfortable for him to talk about.
“When did you know?” I pulled my plate back over to me, but I just pushed the food around. I was too full to eat, but when I felt awkward, I wanted to keep my hands busy with something, and this was better than biting my nails.
“I don’t know.” He sighed a little, and I wondered if I should change the subject, but then he went on. “I suspected for… ever, I guess. I mean, as soon as I learned what gay was, I thought, ‘maybe.’ But really, it was when I met Jack.” He blushed deeply, keeping his eyes fixed on the floor. “I’d just never been so attracted to anyone like that before.”
“Yeah, Jack does that.” I had meant to comfort him with that statement, but I ended up sounding exasperated.
“But you’re not attracted to him.” Milo looked up at me, looking both confused and disbelieving. “How is that even possible?”
“I’m attracted to him, definitely,” I explained the best I could. “I just don’t want to have sex with him.” Then I remembered what he looked like last night, sliding shirtless into the hot tub.
“But…” Milo shifted uncomfortably, and he sounded unsure of himself. “I don’t mean to sound gross, but that was all I could think about.”
“That’s not gross,” I replied quickly, but then recanted. “Okay. It’s a little gross, but only cause you’re my little brother. Not cause of the whole gay thing.”
“Even Jane went crazy about him, and she’s never crazy about anyone, except for herself.” He was waiting for an explanation, but I didn’t have one.
“I don’t get it either,” I told him finally. “I don’t see what you guys see in him, even. I mean, he’s attractive and funny and everything…” I trailed off, realizing that maybe I did feel the way they did about Jack, then suddenly, I remembered Peter. “I met his brother last night.”
“And?” Milo leaned in closer to me, his eyes shining brightly.
“And nothing. He’s gorgeous, like unbelievably so, but he hates me.” I shrugged, trying to make it look like it didn’t bother me as much as it did, and went back to picking at my plate of food.
“He hates you? Why?” At least he was incredulous at the idea of anyone hating me. Maybe I was more likable than I gave myself credit for.
“I honestly couldn’t tell you.” It physically hurt just thinking about the way that Peter had glared at me when I was by the hot tub. I would gladly throw myself under a bus than endure another look like that. “I don’t think I even spoke to him.”
“Then how do you know he hates you?”
“If you had seen the way he looked at me…” I shuddered at the thought of it and decided that that was enough of talking about Peter and Jack. I stood up and started to clear off the table.
“I don’t get you, Alice,” Milo muttered when I took his plate.
“There’s nothing to get,” I replied glibly.
Since he had cooked, that usually meant that I would do the dishes, but he helped me out tonight. He had just started doing his homework when I decided that a nice long, hot shower was in order. But when I went into the bathroom, the hamper was overflowing, and we were completely out of clean towels.
Milo had tons of homework, and he actually planned to do it, so I offered to go to the laundromat. I loaded up as much clothes as I could into three massive laundry bags, and then made the excruciating trek the block and a half down to the laundromat. The superintendent kept promising he’d put one in the basement of the building, but he’d yet to follow through.
I filled four washers with clothes (the maximum amount allotted to one person), then settled back in the hard plastic chairs to watch clothes spin around for an hour. I had just started doing a quiz in Cosmo (“Are You Pleasing Your Man in Bed?” – the perfect quiz for a single virgin) when my pocket started to ring.
What are you doing? Jack text messaged me.
Laundry.
Wanna do something? Jack replied.
I wore a pair of drawstring sweats, a faded Darkwing Duck tee shirt with an unzipped navy blue hoodie, my makeup had completely worn off, and my hair was pulled back in a pony tail. Of course he’d want to see me when I looked like that.