Chapter Text
By some stroke of luck, it’s a peaceful practice session on the volleyball court.
The team is getting warmed up, stretching their arms and legs, lazily tossing the volleyball to each other. For one hopeful moment, Daeyeol thinks that, maybe for once, the peace will last and today will be a practice session free of conflict.
“That’s my bottle you’re drinking from, Joochan.”
“Fuck off, Choi. It’s mine.”
Spoke too soon.
From some part of his mind that isn’t despairing by the sounds of those voices, Daeyeol wonders what he had done in his past life to deserve this. He wants to weep. All he had hoped for when he had become captain of the boy’s volleyball team was to have some fun, play some games, make some friends. Not—Not suffer every day, stuck dealing with this.
This is the two boys that are stomping into the gymnasium now, shooting nasty remarks at each other like they always are. Specifically, Choi Sungyoon and Hong Joochan.
Daeyeol hadn’t known it had been possible to simultaneously love and despise two people the way he does until he had met the two.
They’re still arguing. Compared to Joochan, who’s prattling off insults at an alarmingly-quick rate, Sungyoon is rather calm, posture relaxed and eyebrow cocked. The unbothered front doesn’t fool Daeyeol; even from where he's sitting in the stands, he can clearly sense the irritation radiating off of Sungyoon.
“I’m telling you, it’s mine-”
“Well, I don’t see your name on it,” Joochan quips back and Sungyoon loses it just a little, groaning in the same way Daeyeol wants to right now.
“If you bothered to use your eyes, you’d see my name is written right there-” Joochan stops mid-chug to twist the bottle around and gape at where, indeed, Choi Sungyoon is scrawled out in flourishing letters.
From the corner of his eye, Daeyeol spots Jibeom edging into their conversation. A sinking feeling seizes him. Whenever Jibeom offers any input into a matter, especially when said matter is one of Sungyoon and Joochan’s spats, it never bodes well for any of them.
Jibeom opens his mouth and Daeyeol braces himself.
“Doesn’t this mean you just indirectly kissed Sungyoon?”
Daeyeol would really like to take a seat and weep, especially as Joochan screeches and flings the water bottle. And now there’s a puddle of water on the floor.
What have I done to deserve this?
By the third fight Joochan picks with Sungyoon, the older responding just as aggressively, Daeyeol is done. He swears, if he hears one more word from either of their mouths-
“I know you hit me on purpose!”
“You’re fucking imagining things, Joochan. Maybe you need to go to the nurse to see if you got hit harder than you thought.”
“Oh, so you’re calling me insane now, are you?”
“Maybe I am, because clearly, even that hit wasn’t enough for you to recover from the drop you took as a baby-” Joochan emits an affronted screech.
“You-”
With every pitch their voices climb, Daeyeol’s patience only thins, the throbbing in his head growing worse. And finally, after a particularly loud shout from Joochan, it shatters.
“That’s it,” he hisses, getting to his feet, and it’s as if the temperature in the room has dropped to the negatives as everyone stops in their tracks, wide eyes staring in his direction. A few stray volleyballs fall from limp hands, bouncing away. Joochan freezes from where he has his hand fisted in Sungyoon’s collar.
Daeyeol steps forward, footsteps quick and purposeful until he reaches the subjects of his rage. “You two-” He points an accusing finger at the two, Joochan immediately dropping his hand and moving away. “Are going to learn how to get along.”
Joochan and Sungyoon blink at him owlishly. “But-”
“No buts. If you two don’t learn how to at the very least tolerate and respect each other, we’re doomed this season. So,” he uncrosses his arms from where he had folded them over his chest. “I will be resorting to drastic measures.”
“Drastic… measures?” Joochan echoes, clearly confused. Sungyoon is in a similar state, face pinched and brow creased.
Daeyeol grins. There’s a saying which states to avoid ever getting kind people angry because the results can be brutal. Sungyoon thinks he’s beginning to understand it now as Daeyeol seems to suddenly tower over them, eyes glinting as he takes them by the arms and leads them to-
The closet?
Sungyoon glances back at Daeyeol. “What-”
It happens quicker than he can process: suddenly Youngtaek and Seungmin are yanking open the doors and hands are shoving at their backs—Jangjun and Seungmin—sending them tumbling onto their asses and into the darkness of the closet. Daeyeol’s nodding over them with a satisfied smile, scarily sweet. “Until you learn how to be in each other’s companies without constantly being at each other’s throats, you can stay locked up in here.” Sungyoon’s head snaps towards Joochan, who’s sporting the same wide-eyed, fearful look as him. Daeyeol’s grin widens. “Don’t even try to get out.” With that, the doors slam shut, and there’s only darkness. They sit in stunned silence.
And then all hell breaks loose.
Well, Joochan throws himself against the door and begins thundering his fists against the door, jiggling the handle furiously.
“Daeyeol! Daeyeol! Let me out! Let me out! You can’t leave me here! Not with him! Take my phone! Or make me stay for clean-up the entire month! Anything but this! Please!”
“Gee, nice to know you love the thought of spending time with me so much,” Sungyoon mutters darkly. Joochan ignores him, continuing to plead.
“Daeyeol, please! I’m sorry! I won’t fight anymore! Even though Choi’s stupid and needs someone to tell him that-”
“I’m right here.”
Joochan’s voice continues to grow more desperate along with his fists. “I’ll do anything! Extra training! Make your bed every morning! I’ll stop using your money for chicken-” It’s no surprise when his pleas fall on deaf ears.
“No one’s going to listen to you,” Sungyoon tries, but quickly gives up when it becomes clear that Joochan has no intention of listening to him. He sighs. Whatever. It’s not like he cares if the other shouts himself hoarse.
Which he does, screaming and banging his fist against the door until his palms must surely be stinging and his voice begins cracking from the strain. Sungyoon watches him, slightly impressed by his vocal capacity but also almost insulted. Surely, he’s not that terrible to be around, right?
Then again, this is Hong Joochan, and Hong Joochan finds everything about Sungyoon irritating.
Thinking over it, when had their strained relationship began? How had it escalated to this point, where they couldn’t bear to be in the other’s presence, and if they were, it was impossible to not let a snide comment slip? Sungyoon doesn’t know.
Maybe it had been because of how they had started off on the wrong foot.
In all honesty, Sungyoon doesn’t remember much about their first meeting. He vaguely remembers that one moment he had been walking down the sidewalk and crossing the road, humming to the song blaring into his ears through his AirPods, and then the next Joochan was running up to him, fidgeting with his shirt and eyes bright. Sungyoon had stared at him in confusion as he’d asked something, making a move to reach up for his AirPods to pull them out, but then to his confusion, Joochan had paled and turned tail and ran. There had been no chance for Sungyoon to pause his music and ask him to repeat himself. He’d brushed it off as Joochan asking for directions or something along those lines, and forgotten about it.
Forgotten all about it until the next day, when he’d entered the court to Daeyeol introducing a boy with sweetly-curved fox eyes as their new teammate, and Sungyoon had thought for a fleeting moment that the other was rather cute. Until that is, Joochan had caught sight of him and outright shrieked.
He had pointed a shaking finger at Sungyoon, the corners of his lips twitching angrily. “You-” He’d spat out, with enough contempt it had Sungyoon questioning whether he’d accidentally killed Joochan’s dog. “You’re terrible! ” With that, he’d fled the court, leaving the rest of them blinking in his wake.
“Damn, what’d you do to him?” Jangjun had asked, nudging him, and Sungyoon had only been able to shake his head in confusion.
He’d tried to approach Joochan a handful of times after that, all with varying success rates. Mostly failures. It was as if whenever Sungyoon would try to strike up a casual conversation with Joochan, suddenly he’d have something to attend to and he’d slip away before Sungyoon could get a word out.
Joochan’s choice of scornful words whenever Sungyoon was anywhere within a few feet of him didn’t fall on dead ears either, and they weren’t supposed to. Eventually, the irritation and resentment over Joochan and the “grudge” he held against Sungyoon grew and grew, and here they are now, locked in a dark closet.
By now, Joochan has given up on yelling and banging, instead opting for quietly sitting opposite him. The closet is cramped enough that their knees brush with even the slightest shift, Sungyoon doing his very best to stay tense and not move, lest he touches more of Joochan.
While the closet is dark, his eyes have adjusted enough by now that he can make out how Joochan is sitting crisscrossed, an arm thrown over his eyes. He opens his mouth, thinks better of it, and closes it again. And then opens it again.
“Can we just get along? We’re stuck here together, after all.” Joochan offers no response. Sungyoon sighs. It had been worth a try. “...or you can just stay silent. That works too.”
The silence is somehow louder than any of their dumb quarrels. Sungyoon tries to distract himself, thinking of what he needs to improve in volleyball and reminding himself to warm his voice up properly before his vocal lessons today and what he’s going to eat for dinner today. They work, but only for a few minutes before his attention is being dragged back to the boy in front of him.
It occurs to him then, that he had never been able to find out why exactly Joochan seems to despise him so because there’s no way that Joochan can hate him so much simply because he hadn’t been able to hear the other over his music.
And… he glances in Joochan’s direction once more. Right now, it’s the perfect time to ask, locked in the closet. There’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
“Why do you hate me?” The question blurts itself from his mouth before he can think over it more, and he almost regrets it as Joochan immediately tenses. Still, he continues. “I can’t think of a single thing I’ve done to you to make you hate me so much, but still you act like I’ve killed your firstborn-” He stops in his tracks as Joochan lowers the arm that had been covering his face and now Sungyoon can see it, the cold shine of his eyes.
“Why do I hate you?” It’s as if his words have flipped a switch in Joochan because, in contrast to just hardly a minute ago, when he’d been dead silent, he’s roaring with life now, eyes blazing. “Do I even need a reason? Don’t you see yourself? But if you really want to know, I’ll tell you. I hate how you seem to think you’re above everyone else, above me. I hate how you’ve never had to put in an ounce of work to get what you want, always parading around with your pretty face and having people kneeling to you without a word. I hate how you have the audacity to ignore people as you please and act like the world revolves around whatever you want it to, I hate how even after it all, you can’t even be bothered to apologize. I hate how-”
It’s never-ending, the list spilling from Joochan’s lips like a flowing waterfall, filthy and appalling and most importantly, untrue.
With every new reason that Joochan tacks on, Sungyoon’s fists tighten even further, knuckles turning white. Is this what Joochan really thinks of him? That he’s an asshole who takes pleasure in the misfortunes of others and regards everyone else as inferior?
Joochan’s still talking, but Sungyoon can’t really hear him, not with the disbelief clouding his thoughts and the ringing of his ears. A laugh bubbles up his throat, threatening to escape his mouth. It’s not that anything about this is funny, rather the fact that it is so unfunny is what makes the situation laughable.
White-hot anger blinds him for a moment. Joochan can’t be farther from the truth. If anything, he’s the arrogant one here, having the audacity to create such far-fetched assumptions about Sungyoon and not even give him a chance to prove him wrong-
“This is so stupid,” Sungyoon seethes, words dripping in contempt. Joochan hisses back.
“You’re stupid,” he spits out, and for some reason, that’s the last straw.
Something snaps in Sungyoon, something that had been growing weak and brittle with every dirty look and muttered word from Joochan and he’s grabbing Joochan’s shoulders, nails digging into skin, deep enough to break skin. A hiss of pain leaves Joochan’s lips but it goes ignored as Sungyoon yanks him forward, and he can hear the audible noise of Joochan’s breath hitching in the back of his throat and-
And then he’s crushing his mouth against Joochan’s, feverish and hungry and brimming with rage and anger built up from weeks and weeks on end. Joochan’s frozen against him, hands motionless in the air from where he had been gesturing wildly but then he’s melting into the kiss with a quiet sound, pressing against Sungyoon.
For someone who talks a load of bullshit, Joochan is surprisingly responsive, shuddering and clinging closer with every shift from Sungyoon, every nip of his lower lip, from every touch of Sungyoon’s fingers against his neck. Hazily, Sungyoon wonders why he hadn’t done this long before, especially as he parts Joochan’s lips with a languid flick of his tongue, drawing a soft groan from him.
Hands grapple at his back, fisting into his shirt, and all at once, Sungyoon gains his bearings.
He’s kissing. Hong Joochan. In a cramped closet. Hong Joochan, who he hates. Hong Joochan, who is a warm weight against him, chest pressed flush to Sungyoon’s, his lips and tongue sweet and dangerous and every little sound that leaves his mouth sending a euphoric rush through Sungyoon-
He’s kissing Hong Joochan.
A strangled noise escapes his throat and then he’s jolting backward, mind scrambling with the realization of what he’s just done. Impulsively, his hands shoot out, shoving Joochan away and he’s out of it enough that there’s no time for him to avoid or brace himself for the impact and he’s sent crashing to the floor.
Fuckfuckfuckfuck-
Joochan moans from where he’s splayed out on the ground, low and painful, slowly pushing himself up. He’s clutching the side of his head and—ouch. That will most likely—no, definitely bruise.
But what has his attention more isn’t the purple bruise flowering on Joochan’s cheek is, but instead the state that Joochan has been reduced to, hair rumpled and panting, lips bruised red and swollen from kisses. His kisses.
He’s done this, Sungyoon realizes with dawning horror. Made Joochan’s eyes cloudy and unfocused as he catches his breath, as he tries to focus on Sungyoon. And the other hadn’t pushed him away, instead pulled him closer, if the stinging of his back from where Joochan’s nails had dug in is any indicator.
And that can only mean-
Joochan’s pupils-blown eyes finally focus on Sungyoon’s own wide ones. For once, he doesn’t look enraged, indignant, or even disgusted. “You like me?”
Sungyoon nearly chokes. “No!” He shouts out in a panic, because he doesn’t. Him? Like Hong Joochan? Impossible. “Do you like me?”
“What?” Disbelief lace Joochan’s words and he’s finally recovered enough to scowl at Sungyoon. “Of course not!” Sungyoon doesn’t know why his stomach swoops unpleasantly as it does. “Why would I-”
“You kissed me back!”
“Because you kissed me!”
They stop in their shouting, heaving for breath as they glare at each other. Joochan’s cheeks are flushed pink; from anger, passion, or even embarrassment, he doesn’t know. Sungyoon has an inkling he’s in a similar state as well.
Joochan’s scrutinizing him fiercely like he’s trying to make sense of him. Sungyoon himself is trying to make sense of himself. “So you hate me?” Sungyoon groans, raking a hand through his hair.
The answer should be yes. It’s the only answer that remotely makes sense because Sungyoon hates Joochan.
Or had hated him, up until a moment ago.
“Not that either,” he finally answers. The gusty breath Joochan exhales tells him that the other isn’t impressed.
“Then what is it?”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”
Sungyoon feels a little like he’s missed a step on a staircase as he stares at Joochan, or maybe put his foot down where he expected it to be, only to find air.
None of it makes sense. Sungyoon thinks he can feel a faint headache throbbing behind his temple. He’s spent the last few months cursing Joochan’s name whenever he would have even a minor inconvenience, wishing to hurl a volleyball at the idiot’s head whenever his back was turned, fighting off irritation whenever he’d see Joochan smile, ignoring the fluttering of his stomach whenever their fingers brushed during practice, resisting the urge to grab the other by the shoulders and kiss the ugly words out of that pretty mouth…
The fingers smoothing at his temple still.
...What’s that?
Stomach fluttering? Being irritated at Joochan’s smile?
...Wanting to kiss him?
He lowers his hand, slowly. A horrifying realization is creeping up on him, bit by bit. He can see it, where this is leading to, and even if he tries to act like he doesn’t, it’s clear as day to him now.
He-
“I don’t… not like you.” It’s hardly more than a thoughtless mumble but it has his head jerking up all the same. Joochan’s gaze is fixed to the left of Sungyoon’s head, his forehead creased like it’s an effort to get the words out. Sungyoon stares.
And stares.
And stares a little bit more, until Joochan’s gaze snaps back to his, mouth twisted angrily but really, it’s more of a sulky pout. “Stop staring.”
A brow shoots up. Stop staring? When Joochan had just dropped the bomb of the century on him? “Then why-”
The color is back in Joochan’s cheeks and he’s dropped his gaze again, fiddling with the bandages on his fingers. “I don’t take back what I said earlier,” he mutters, but there’s significantly less anger behind the words. “You’re still an asshole who thinks you’re better than everyone and can’t even nicely reject the person trying to ask you out-”
Sungyoon frowns, wondering if he’s heard Joochan correctly. “What?” Joochan stops mid-sentence, glancing back at him.
“You’re still an asshole.” He resists the urge to thwack the other.
“No, after that.”
“Think you’re better than everyone-”
“No!” His fingers have made their way back to his temple, massaging the skin there in an effort to delay the headache that is surely on its way. “Reject the person trying to ask you out… What do you mean?”
Joochan scoffs, crossing his arms over his chest. “You don’t remember.” He sounds almost disappointed. “Of course, you don’t. I don’t know why I expected you to, since you get asked out left and right-”
With every word that Joochan says, Sungyoon’s brows knit together more and more closely. Something tells him he’s missed something incredibly important, lost the final piece to a puzzle. Because what Joochan is talking about, alluding to, can only be one thing, but…. but… there’s no way.
“You asked me out?” It sounds even more bizarre coming out of his mouth than it already had in his head, and he prepares himself for the flurry of punches Joochan is surely going to rain upon him any minute now, or at least a storm of cuss words for even trying to imply such a thing.
Joochan does neither.
Instead, the color dusting his cheeks spreads impossibly further, staining his neck, his ears, in red, creeping under his jersey and Joochan buries his face in his hands. Sungyoon suddenly feels as if he’s floating, stuck in an extremely strange dream. “Finally remembered, huh?”
What.
So then… What Sungyoon had assumed to be Joochan trying to ask him for directions…
Had been him trying to ask Sungyoon out?
All the pieces of the puzzle are fitting together now. Joochan nervously approaching him on the sidewalk. The paling of his face when Sungyoon hadn’t answered and only blinked at him. His quick and hasty exit before Sungyoon could pause his music. He must have felt humiliated and crushed at what seemed to be, from his perspective, not only a rejection, but also Sungyoon not considering him important enough to even acknowledge. And then Sungyoon seemingly forgetting about “rejecting” him the very next day must have hit a sore spot, and now, here they are in the culmination of their mess, all because Joochan hadn’t realized Sungyoon had been wearing earphones.
“I was wearing AirPods,” Sungyoon starts, slowly. Joochan’s head jerks up. “I didn’t hear what you said and before I could ask you again, you left.”
Joochan squints at him like he’s trying to solve a complicated math problem. “So you-”
“Didn’t reject you.”
There’s a pregnant pause as Joochan digests his words and Sungyoon waits patiently before he lets out what can translate as a sad wheeze, burying his face back into his hands. “This is so stupid,” he says, echoing Sungyoon’s words from earlier.
“Yeah.”
The awkward silence that has descended over them now is worse than any of the tension before. The brush of his knees against Joochan’s suddenly feels much more scandalous than it had just minutes before, and even looking at him has his cheeks feeling hot.
Especially with how every shift from the other and slight press against him reminds of how soft Joochan’s lips against his own had been, how the gasp he’d pulled out of Joochan had been like music to his ears…
He shivers, pulling his arms around himself. The sensation of Joochan’s nails digging into his back, his hand cupping the back of Joochan’s neck, isn’t one he’s going to forget so easily.
Goddammit, Choi Sungyoon.
He’s not sure whether it’s a blessing or a curse when Joochan’s stomach growls, slicing through the quiet, followed by a sigh of despair from Joochan. Sungyoon holds back the laugh fizzing in his stomach when Joochan’s head whips in his direction, slitted eyes daring him to speak.
He can’t blame Joochan either; Sungyoon is hungry himself, what with how he had skipped lunch in favor of knocking out on his deck. A poor move on his part. If he had known he’d been rudely thrown into a closet by his teammates he would have stuffed himself full.
Joochan shuffling around catches his attention; the other seems to be searching for something, hands digging around in his jersey and then he produces-
A lollipop?
He can’t hold back his snort this time as Joochan pulls out what is indeed a lollipop, unwrapping it as if it’s the most normal thing to do.
“You keep lollipops in your jersey?” Joochan scowls.
“Shut up.” Sungyoon holds his hands up in defense.
“I’m not saying anything.” Joochan gives him a look that tells him he doesn’t believe him, before grunting and turning his attention back to the candy in his hand, popping it into his mouth before leaning back with a satisfied sigh. The other sufficiently distracted, Sungyoon takes the moment to actually look at the other without the danger of meeting eyes.
He’s already known this for long, but Joochan is… Joochan is pretty. He’s prettier when he isn’t frothing at the mouth, and he’s especially pretty when he’s smiling, all teeth and creased eyes and round cheeks before he’d take notice of Sungyoon and immediately go back to scowling with a barked “what’re you looking at?”
Sungyoon wonders how he would have reacted if he’d answered “you.”
Joochan’s fingers wrap around the lollipop stick, pulling it from his mouth. Sungyoon’s focus zeroes in on his hands. They’re… nice, he supposes, crooked at the fingers and bandaged in white, and he knows under them the pads of Joochan’s fingers are calloused from years of playing a number of instruments. A tidbit of information he’s picked up from Jangjun.
Joochan sings too, and he knows this because he’d seen it himself, when he’d passed the music room one day only to back up at the sound of a voice softly singing through the door. He’d stopped in his tracks and peeked into the room because the voice was too beautiful to not know who it belonged to -
And as if like a dream, it had been Joochan standing there, back turned to the door as he piled music sheets and pushed tables to where they were supposed to be. Sungyoon had been transfixed, rooted to where he had been standing as Joochan’s voice swelled and crashed like the ocean waves, unable to look away.
He’d stepped forward to hear better a little too loudly, shoes squeaking against the floor, and Joochan had wheeled around in surprise. By then, Sungyoon had already ducked and sped away, wondering why his chest felt so tight and why his heart was thundering the way it was.
It occurs to Sungyoon that he spends a little too much of his time thinking about Hong Joochan.
Before he can think about what that exactly means for him, Joochan’s clearing his throat. Sungyoon glances at him. The other is looking back and forth between him and his hands, brow furrowed. Sungyoon eyes him.
“Is there-” He doesn’t get past the first two words because Joochan is jerkily holding out his hand, something in his palm, grumbling all the while. Sungyoon blinks down at it. It’s a lollipop. A slightly squashed lollipop which looks as if it’s been going through it, but a lollipop nonetheless. He looks back up, to where Joochan is definitely blushing. “What’s this?”
Joochan huffs. “A peace offering.”
Sungyoon blinks again. He wants to refuse because he’d rather not eat a lollipop that Joochan had stowed in his pocket for God knows how long and is, more importantly, grape-flavored. He makes a move to refuse until he catches the look on his face.
Past the heavy scowl and red of his cheeks, Joochan looks almost… hopeful, eyes following the movements of Sungyoon’s hands. Combined with his general twitchiness and how the fingers of his free hand are clenched tightly into a fist…
Oh.
This is more than just Joochan feeling bad for Sungyoon and grudgingly handing over his clearly-precious stock of candy. No, this is Joochan’s way of starting over, of giving their friendship another chance. His lips twitch up into a smile.
He accepts it, plucking the candy out of the other’s hand, and it’s clear his suspicion had been right when Joochan exhales quietly, as if relieved. Their fingers graze and they both jolt away as if they’ve been burned.
“...Thanks,” Sungyoon says, even with how they’re avoiding each other’s gazes. Joochan nods stiffly.
The taste of medicine and grape isn’t as bad as it usually seems to be, as every brush of their knees, every sneaked look that ends in them realizing the other is looking right back, sends a thrill prickling under Sungyoon’s skin.
When Daeyeol opens the closet an hour later, it’s to the pleasant surprise of finding Sungyoon and Joochan in one piece, sitting quietly. He glances at the candy wrappers crinkled on the floor. He could have sworn those hadn’t been in there before.
“Good… job,” he says slowly, watching closely as they pick themselves up off the floor and dust their jerseys. He can’t put his finger on what it exactly is, but something’s different.
Something’s changed.
Is it the way Joochan flinches when Sungyoon steps just a bit closer? Or how they seem to be refusing to meet the other’s eyes? And when they do, immediately looking away, he can swear their faces are pinker than they had been a moment ago?
Daeyeol’s eyes narrow. No, it can’t be. He must be imagining things.
Joochan nods at Daeyeol stiffly, swinging his bag over his shoulder. His eyes flicker to Sungyoon once as he bids his goodbye and then he’s running off, backpack bouncing on his back with every step. Daeyeol turns to Sungyoon, full of questions, and does a double-take.
Sungyoon’s watching as Joochan goes with his lips curved up into a smile.
What happened in there? Daeyeol wonders, because whatever this development is, while welcome, is unexpected.
“Well,” he starts again, “I don’t know what happened in there, but at least you two are getting along?” It’s phrased more as a question than a statement.
Sungyoon’s smile widens, but other than that, he gives nothing away. His fingers come up to lightly touch his lips.
“Yeah,” he echoes. “I think we’re getting along.”