Page 95 of Zero Confusion

Instead of Miles’s truck, a sedan idled in their driveway. As he waved at it, Mara stuck her head out of the driver’s-side window. “Morning, Zach!”

“Hi, Mara. Didn’t expect to see you.” He slapped on a fake smile and trudged to the car, disappointment turning to confusion when he found the passenger seat occupied.

By Miles.

She snorted with amusement. “Try not to sound so thrilled. Sorry to ruin your special time, but someone’s gotta drive the car back.”

“Hey, can we talk a sec?” Miles swung the door open and hopped out.

Something in his voice gave Zach pause. Miles seemed…nervous. Zach dropped his bag on the ground and followed Miles a few feet away.

“What’s up?”

Miles laced their fingers together and pressed a quick kiss to Zach’s knuckles. “I need to tell you something.”

Zach was instantly awake, a strange energy buzzing under his skin.

“What is it?”

“I should have told you earlier, but…” Miles gave him a sheepish look. “Don’t be mad.”

Zach sighed heavily. “Miles, are you breaking up with me?” He knew Miles wasn’t—not with the way he touched him so gently, as if he were the most important thing in the world—but he needed to jolt him out of his guilt spiral and get him to start talking. No matter how bad it was, they’d make it work.

He almost laughed at how quickly Miles’s expression changed from concerned to confused, then horrified.

“What? No! What?”

“Then I probably won’t be mad at you.”

Miles yanked Zach’s hand to his chest, causing him to stumble forward.

“I’m bad at this,” he said. “I can’t manage to string my words together around you.”

Zach closed the rest of the distance between them and touched their foreheads together.

“Tell me.”

Miles cupped Zach’s face, letting the quiet affection between them fill the silence. The faint dawn light gleamed in Miles’s eyes, making him look otherworldly, like a beautiful paranormal being. An elf, maybe, if beefy elves were a thing.

“I don’t want to do long distance, Zee. I don’t want to spend a year surviving on nothing but video chats. I wanna wake up next to you every morning and go to sleep together every night. I wanna be able to touch you and hug you and kiss you every day.”

Hope unfurled somewhere deep inside Zach, and he tried to stuff it down, but it bloomed more and more as Miles spoke.

“I didn’t want to say anything until it was real,” Miles continued, running a thumb across Zach’s cheek, “but I figured out a way to finish my degree remotely. It took, like, a billion emails and even more forms, but it’s done.”

Zach’s breath hitched.

“And I talked to one of my professors, who put me in touch with this guest speaker, who… Long story. Bottom line, I have a paid internship next spring.” Miles’s lips curled in a nervous smile. “Until then, I’ll get a job. Grocery store, coffee shop, whatever.”

He bit the inside of his cheek, his worried gaze fixed on Zach.

What could he possibly be worried about? This was the best possible news.

Zach jumped up and wrapped his legs around Miles, crushing him in a joyous hug. His sore muscles twinged, but he was too happy to care.

Mara interrupted the moment with a loud whistle. “You’re gonna be late!” she yelled out of the window. “You can make out while I drive.”

Miles rolled his eyes and carried Zach to the car.