Page 85 of Gym Bros
“Look, I don’t expect you to sit on my lap or call me baby, but you’re still allowed to touch me if I could be doing something better.”
He flushes. “I didn’t realize I wasn’t.”
“Okay,” I say with narrowed eyes.
“I mean, I asked how your day went.”
“Yeah. You did.” I’ll give him that. “How was your run with Ryan?”
“Hard. He runs forever.”
“You guys close?”
“I mean…we’re like—gym friends. I met him here.”
“You ever go out?” I ask.
“He has a boyfriend. Is that what you mean? Because yeah, sometimes I hang out with him—them. But he’s in a relationship.”
“So you never…hooked up with him?”
Calyx’s eyes widen. “No—I mean—is that your business?”
I shrug. “I’m just asking.”
“Okay.”
“But while we’re on the topic, have you been in a relationship recently?” I ask.
All the color drains from his face as fast as it rushed into it. “Why?”
“I’m sorry—are these not perfectly normal questions? I wasn’t asking if you have any weird fetishes or what your relationship with your mom is like—I’m just asking the guy I fucked yesterday if he’s recently been in a relationship.”
His lips part and he stares at me a moment. “Um. Okay. I uh…was dating a man named Isaac for a few months in the spring, but no one serious since.”
“He was a serious thing?”
“I mean, no…not really. It was mostly physical I guess.”
There goes my chest clenching up again. “You still talk to him?”
Calyx shakes his head. “No. I haven’t seen him since before summer.”
I nod.
“You?” he asks.
“Oh, no. I only have the one friend here, and there hasn’t been anybody. Ever really.”
“Okay.”
“I mean—if we’re being honest, my friend here did give mehead one time a few weeks ago, but he says it was platonic head.”
“He?”
I nod.
“Platonic head?”
