“Soooo much. Hey, remember when we switched Mom’s yogurt with mayo?”

“I do. It was genius—your idea, of course.”

“And Mom puked.”

“She was pissed. Come on, let’s go to bed.”

“I got grounded for a day. But you got grounded for two weeks, because she kind of hates you.”

“Worth it.” Jack smiles, like he doesn’t mind being told that his mom hates him. Greg tries to embrace him, and Jack stops him. “Bud, I’ll get non-nipple milk all over you.”

“Why don’t I get him into bed?” I take Greg’s arm, pulling him with me. “Go find something clean.”

The bedroom is just a tad messier than the rest of the place, the bed still unmade from Greg’s last night in Boston. He’s narrating a documentary on the environmental toll of almond production, which makes cajoling him into lying down marginally easier. I don’t turn on the lights, and he falls quiet while I’m untying his shoe.

Thank God he’s asleep. I’ll be out of here in a minute and—

“I like you, Elsie.”

I look up from Greg’s boot. His eyes are closed. “I like you, too, Greg.”

“Remember how you said we could be friends?”

“Yeah.”

“I want to be friends.”

My heart breaks a little. Not when you snap out of it and check your email, you won’t. “Awesome. Let’s be friends.”

“Good. Because I like you. Did I mention it?”

“Yup.”

“Not like like you. I don’t know if I can like like people.”

“I know,” I say softly. I pull the boot off and get started on the other.

“But you’re cool. Like . . . a Barbie.”

“A Barbie?”

“You’re not blond. But there’s one of you for every occasion.”

Something catches the corner of my eye and I turn. Jack. Standing in the doorframe. Listening to us. His expression is dark, his brow is furrowed, and his chest is . . .

Bare.

He’s taken off his soiled shirt, and for some reason I am physically unable to look anywhere but at his body. Which has me realizing that I was totally wrong about him.

He is . . . well, he is big. And well muscled, very well muscled. And I can see all the . . . all that stuff that people always talk about—the bulk, the mass, the abs, the biceps and the triceps stretching under the ink. But he’s not made the way I thought he’d be. I expected a gym rat body with 0.3 percent body fat and bulging veins, but he’s a little different. He’s real. Imperfectly, usefully strong. There’s something unrefined about him, as though he stumbled upon all this mass by chance. As though he’s never even thought about taking a mirror selfie in his life.

Something warm and liquid twists behind my navel, and the feeling is so rare for me, so unfamiliar, for a moment I barely recognize it. Then I do, and I flush hotly.

What is wrong with me? Why do I find the idea of someone not going to the gym attractive? Why can’t I stop staring at him, and why is he staring back?

Jack clears his throat. He turns to reach for something to wear in Greg’s dresser, and whatever’s happening between his shoulder blades looks like a religious experience.

“Elsie,” Greg mumbles from the bed. I’m grateful for the reminder to look away. “Is soy milk from a nipple?”

“Oh, um . . . no.” My voice is hoarse. Breathing’s hard, but marginally easier once Jack walks out of the room. “Soy’s a bean.”

“You’re so wise. And full of layers. Like . . .”

“An onion?”

“Like a yogurt with the fruit on the bottom.”

I smile and drag a quilt over him. “Let’s play a game. I’ll go in the living room, and we’re both going to count however high we can. Whoever counts highest wins.” I have vague memories of Mom making Lucas and Lance do this. Of course, like everything with Lucas and Lance, it always devolved into them fighting over who could count the highest and waking up the entire house.

“What a shitty game.” Greg yawns. “I’ll kick your ass.”

“I bet.” I close the door between thirteen and fourteen. Jack’s waiting on the green Lawson couch, wearing a too-tight hoodie that’s probably tentlike on Greg. The mysteries of genetics.

He doesn’t look up. He sits motionless, elbows on his knees, staring at one of Greg’s colorful, artsy wall prints with a half-vacant, all-tense expression.

My stomach sinks.

He’s pissed. Really pissed. I’ve seen him amused, curious, annoyed, even angry last night with Austin, but this . . . He’s furious. Because I’m here. Because he thinks I extorted his brother. Because I overfilled the milk jar. There’s going to be a whole messy confrontation, and after the last three days, I’m not even sure I want to avoid it.

“Listen.” I take two steps toward him, one back, two forward. If we have to argue, we might as well be close. Keep the volume down to avoid waking Greg. I run my sweaty palms over the back of my leggings. “I know I haven’t been exactly . . . truthful. And I assume you’re figuring out what’s going on between Greg and me. But this entire shit show is reaching a quantum-entanglement, spontaneous-parametric-down-conversion, decoherent stage. And I’m asking you to wait till Greg feels better to have a frank conversation with him.”

Jack opens his mouth, no doubt to unleash his wrath, and then . . .

He doesn’t.

Instead he closes it, shakes his head, and covers his eyes with his hands.

Oh, fuck. What is this?

“Jack?” No answer. “Jack, I . . .”

I debate what to do for a moment, then go sit next to him. If he starts yelling now . . . well. R.I.P. my eardrum.

“It’s okay,” I say. “Greg’s not sick or anything, I promise. Nothing bad is—”

“He told me.” Jack straightens his back, eyes once again on the print. “I should have known.”

“Known what?”

“When he was . . . I’m not sure. Fifteen? He was still in high school. I came back from college during break.” His throat works. “He took me aside and said that he was worried. That he couldn’t imagine ever wanting to be in a romantic relationship. And I told him he shouldn’t worry. That it was still early and he’d find someone. That it was normal to be nervous before becoming sexually active. That he should just keep an open mind. And then I . . .” Something jumps in Jack’s jaw. He closes his eyes. “And then I asked to watch Battlestar Galactica together. Like a total fucking asshole.”

I never came out to anyone in my family, Greg once told me. I think I tried, once. Kind of. But then I chickened out and . . . I don’t know. It’s better this way.

“Have you ever heard of the ace/aro spectrum?” I ask gently. I’m being gentle to Jack, apparently.

He shakes his head, eyes still closed.

“It’s . . . well, some of it is what Greg told you. But there’s more. Lots of complexities. There are good resources online that you might want to look up before you guys have another talk. And he . . . I think he’s still trying to figure himself out.” Many of us are, I nearly add. But it’s more of myself than I’d rather show.

“Fuck.” Jack turns to me. His expression is . . . Devastated is the only word that comes to mind. If he started slapping himself, I wouldn’t be surprised. “He should have punched me in the face.”

I open my mouth. Close it. Then think, What the hell. “Would it make you feel better if I punched you in the face?”

His eyebrow lifts. “Would it make you feel better?”

“Oh, a lot.”

He lets out a silent, wistful laugh, and my heart squeezes for both Smith brothers. “Jack, you were a kid. And ignorant. And an asshole. And . . . okay, you’re still two of these things.” I lift my hand. It hovers for a few seconds by his shoulders while I contemplate the insanity of me voluntarily offering physical and emotional comfort to Dr. Jonathan Smith-Turner. Endothermic hell must be supercooling. “Your apology isn’t mine to accept, but I know Greg cares about you as much as you care about him.” His shoulder is tight and warm under my palm. Solid.