Trevor did not lose his frown. “Do you?”
“Oh, more than you realize.” Sky was close to stroking a villain’s fluffy cat as well. Or maybe Sky was the cat, already purring. “Say it again, please.”
“I love you?” Trevor could say it many times, but maybe Sky wanted something else. “Or that I want you to be mine?”
The movie villain dropped his phone, then recovered it. “God, you make things difficult,” Sky hissed, but fondly. Only Sky could hiss fondly. “Okay.” He said it once, then again as if steadying himself. “Okay. I need you to hold onto that thought for a while longer. Please? Just for another hour? Maybe an hour and a half? Before I can speak to you again?”
Trevor gripped his phone so hard it should have cracked. But he already knew he was going to respond the way he always did. “I’ll give you anything you ask for, you know that.”
Sky pulled the phone away from his mouth but a muffled scream was audible. He came back to say, “Then don’t go to bed. Wait for me.”
He hung up before Trevor could answer.
Mere seconds after that, Trevor’s phone lit up with a message.You made me forget to say it back. I love you too.
Trevor smiled at his phone with giddy relief.Oh good.
And I’m yours. Don’t go to bed,Sky replied, then sent him every kind of heart emoji every few minutes for the next half hour before he must have gotten pulled into his work.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jittery despite Sky’s texted assurances, Trevor sat in the dark of the backyard for a while, trying to make himself think of where he and his grandma could place solar lights. He looked over the fence to peek at the light in G.G.’s living room. He thought about messaging G.G. since he had G.G.’s number now, but didn’t want to disturb G.G.’s evening or accidentally leave him wanting like he had the night before.
He played with Ellie to wear her out because she was picking up on his nervous energy. Then he went in to take a shower and get ready for bed with no intention of sleeping any time soon.
Mr. Tammy trotted after him as Trevor came back down the hall, apparently convinced Trevor was going to give him a treat for some reason—which Trevor did, and then had to get one for Ellie as well to avoid jealous pouts. He had just dried his hands after washing up from that when a knock on the door stopped him.
Only the vaguest of shapes were visible out the kitchen window: someone moving around on the porch, the taillights of a car out on the street.
Ellie went on alert, tail wagging pertly as Trevor went to the front door to flick on the porch light and peer through the peephole.
He saw a pouf of blue hair and someone pulling off a Venom face mask, and then he was tearing the door open to get Sky in his arms. A word, a nervous greeting, fell from Sky in the half second before Trevor was on him, anoofsound as Trevor squeezed him and pulled him off his sneakered feet.Too tight, Trevor’s mind screamed at him,you’re holding Sky too tight. Then Sky’s arms were around him and his glasses nudged into Trevor’s cheek and jaw before Sky turned his head to try to bury his face in Trevor’s neck.
The car left the street. Ellie, grasping that something was different and emotions were high, was on the porch with them, although she was a good, if excited, girl and didn’t go farther than that. She circled them both, yipping softly until Trevor muttered, “Shush, Ellie girl,” while inhaling Sky’s shampoo and aftershave. Sky hadn’t changed brands. Trevor was weirdly happy to know that.
Sky ended Trevor’s moment of dazed observation by abruptly jerking his head back and wiggling his feet to the ground to gaze up at Trevor. He looked from Trevor’s bald head and buzzed hair to Trevor’s eyebrows and his eyes, and then to his nose and mouth before he met Trevor’s eyes again. Sky stared without a word, curling his hands into Trevor’s t-shirt as if he had no intention of ever letting go.
You’re holding him too tight, Trevor’s brain told him again. Trevor even agreed. It took strength he didn’t know he had to relax, although he couldn’t entirely release him.
“Hey,” Trevor said at last, smiling.
Sky was in at least three layers, a tee, flannel, and a sweatshirt. He had on jeans and he’d styled his hair. His glasses were smudged on one side, probably from Trevor’s cheek.
He smiled back, showing the slight gap in his teeth. “Hey.”
Ellie tried to stick her nose between them and was big enough to make herself impossible to ignore. Trevor scowled, but Sky glanced to her, so Trevor surrendered to the inevitable and stepped back enough that Sky could bend down.
Sky put himself face-to-face with Ellie, who wagged her tail hopefully.
“Ellie,” Trevor introduced them in a whisper, “this is Sky.”
Sky let Ellie sniff his hand, then reached out ever so carefully to smooth his fingertips over her face from her snout to her ears. He scratched behind those, making Ellie loll her tongue.
“My replacement is softer than I expected,” Sky observed.
“I don’t like that joke.” Trevor was quiet but clear. “It’s not you saying you’re a pet. It’s you thinking I could replace you.”
Sky stayed with Ellie for another moment, then straightened. He looked at Trevor with his head down, his gaze only a teasing hint above his glasses. “Sorry, Sir.”
