-Bennett-

"My laptop? Yeah, it's in my car... why?" Jonah asked while shifting over to open the break room door, peering inside before signaling for me to head in. He'd thrown my arm over his shoulder and dragged me to the back of the gym the moment Mason left, insisting that we go settle down somewhere quiet.

Which had led us here.

I pursed my lips while settling the paper bag down on the coffee table, not really eager to share more than I needed to. "I—"

"Did you forget yours at home?" he supplied while coaxing me towards one of the worn-out, obnoxiously bright red couches, likely remembering the number of times he'd found me settled down in here after my shift, working on assignments until the last bus of the night was set to pass by. "Do you need to borrow mine?"

My eyes widened. "Yeah! I—I left it on my desk."

Jonah nodded his head, finally pulling away now that we were in the safety of the break room. It was more or less just a glorified storage room with a few timeworn couches, a fridge that didn't quite freeze, and a dirty microwave that sort of heated food up... but it was also far away from most of the noise outside. I liked it in here, even if it did have this odd, persistent odor that reminded me of damp clothes.

At least there was a surprisingly expensive coffee maker, which felt so out of place atop one of the grey counters in the far back. Still, it mostly collected dust. One of our former co-workers, Kira, had more or less maintained it and refilled the pot whenever necessary. But no one else had bothered with its upkeep ever since she quit a few months back.

"I'll go fetch mine, then," Jonah replied, already turning back towards the door when I nervously cleared my throat.

"... are you sure?"

Jonah snorted, earnestly nodding his head in agreement. "I wouldn't have suggested it otherwise, Benny. Besides, you probably have an assignment you need to work on, huh?"

I hesitantly nodded my head, a bit unsure of how to shake off the guilt of asking Jonah for a favor so soon after getting into a disagreement with him. "I'm sorry for yesterday," I blurted out, hoping that clearing the air would help... at least somewhat.

Jonah's eyes widened in surprise. "Huh? You're sorry?"

"I—I mean, yeah!" I insisted. "There was no reason to—"

"I should be the one apologizing!" Jonah suddenly exclaimed, releasing an awkward chuckle. "And I am sorry. But you're not even mad at me, are you?"

I curiously peered up at Jonah, who was apprehensively shifting from one foot to the other, just warily pacing in place. "What? I thought you'd be mad," I retorted. Yet, when I glanced up to frown at him, there wasn't even a hint of irritation in his eyes.

"I'm the one who pissed you off yesterday!" Jonah explained, glancing over at the door before opting to settle down on the couch beside me. He was probably meant to be doing something else, but I didn't question it.

"But I'm the one who—still. I'm sorry; I shouldn't have been so defensive," I reiterated, feeling somewhat flustered by his unwillingness to place the blame on me. It wasn't like I'd intended to get into an argument with him at all, though. I'd just been... overwhelmed.

In hindsight, I should've known I could trust them to remain my friends; however, that hadn't made it any less intimidating to have him suddenly questioning my sexuality. I'd been so consumed by my own fears, that there had been no time to consider anything else.

"Don't worry about it, alright? If anything, I shouldn't have been making assumptions about you, buddy," Jonah replied, patting my shoulder. "It wasn't cool of me."

I sighed. Perhaps that was true. And yet...

"Is it that obvious?" I asked, wincing when Jonah's eyes widened with curiosity. He searched my face, looking for some hint that he could actually carry on with the conversation before just shrugging in response.

"I wouldn't say it's obvious, per se," Jonah replied, nervously scratching at the bridge of his nose. "Although, I can't deny that I have caught you checking other guys out a few times. At first, I thought maybe you were just keeping an eye out in case anyone was misusing the equipment, but... y'know. You'd also look all flustered and stuff— aw, c'mon, it's not a big deal! Really!"

A furious blush had likely crept up along my neck and spread across my face as I rested my elbows against my knees. I shielded my face with shaky hands, suddenly unwilling to make eye contact. "Oh," I breathed out against my palms, internally cursing myself for being so damn oblivious.

Oh god, had he ever caught me checking him out? Because I had... I definitely had. Even if I didn't necessarily like him in that way, it was kind of hard to ignore how hot he was.

I only looked up when Jonah started softly rubbing my back, chuckling under his breath like none of this was absolutely mortifying. Which, yeah, he wasn't the one being exposed! "I'm serious, it's not a big deal! I check people out too! All the time!"

It made sense, but that didn't make it any less embarrassing. "Why didn't you say anything before?" I muttered, genuinely conflicted on whether I even wanted to know the answer.

Jonah's hand halted its circular motions, a hesitant sigh escaping past my friend's lips before he continued. "I don't know. I mean, I guess it just never occurred to me that it wasn't normal? I grew up around my moms, so it's not like I've ever... y'know." He sighed under his breath, unable to find the words to express himself. We were similar in that way. "I hope you know I would never judge you because of your sexuality."

I nodded my head firmly. I believed him, really. Now that I thought about it, I couldn't think of a single time when he'd ever said anything homophobic. Or even remotely concerning, really. So, why? Why had I been so terrified of him knowing?

"I'm sorry I didn't ask you about it beforehand, though," Jonah elaborated. "I shouldn't have just blurted that out of nowhere."

"No, it's—it's fine," I assured him. And it did feel that way now, at least a little bit. There was still that inkling of worry fermenting in the back of my head, but that was unlikely to go away no matter how hard I willed it to. "We're cool, right?"

Jonah perked up at that, flashing a wide smile before nodding his head. I put up with the way he roughly tousled my hair. But I did roll my eyes when he signaled towards the paper bag Mason had given me, which was resting in the center of the coffee table.

"You should eat, Benny."

"In a bit," I assured him, still somewhat stirred up from having to confront so many people back-to-back. There was also that bout of nausea that I was struggling to ignore, but the incessant growling that had settled in the pit of my stomach earlier in my shift was mostly gone as well.

"You didn't take your lunch break today," Jonah murmured knowingly in response, rolling his eyes when I grumbled under my breath. "C'mon. I'll go fetch something to eat and we can make it a lunch date, alright? I still haven't gone on my break either."

I would've felt embarrassed, but he sounded so nonchalant whilst suggesting it. I glanced up at him, a bit dumbfounded. He was probably just messing around, per usual. "Can I still borrow your laptop?" I asked instead, choosing to ignore his incessant teasing.

Jonah grinned down at me while heading towards the door. "Yeah, I'll go grab it from my car as well!"

---

I took another bite of the chicken sandwich before glaring at Jonah's laptop screen, a bit unsure of how to further connect this new source to my thesis. I'd been forced to scrounge for some new pieces of evidence; a lot of my notes and research was unfortunately locked away on my own laptop.

"No luck?" Riley asked while stealing another nigiri from Jonah's sushi platter before he shifted it away, humming relaxedly as she lay sprawled across the other couch, her head on Jonah's lap. She had found Jonah heading to the back with food and had promptly used her break time, trailing after him even as he threatened not to share any.

And here they were, lazily sprawled across the other couch. I was a bit jealous of their time-management skills, quite honestly, considering I'd never seen either of them struggling to complete any assignments in time. There had been that one time Riley had to cancel a shift to finish a project, but that was as rare as Jonah being productive during any of his shifts.

"I hate writing essays," I pointed out under my breath, wondering if the professor would call me out for including a non-argumentative quote. He'd warned me about including any quotes that merely summarize, but there was nothing present within the article that could really add anything of substance to my paper. Hell, the article's theme hardly agreed with my own. Perhaps I could use it as a counter-point and refute it, but it didn't quite oppose my own opinion either. Sigh.

"Hm, I'm not a big fan of them either, to be honest," Jonah replied, huffing under his breath. "So much effort, ya know?"

I snorted under my breath, unable to suppress a smile at the implications. "Aren't you an English major, though?" Riley mentioned off-handedly, scoffing when Jonah kept her from taking another piece from his platter.

Jonah had the nerve to roll his eyes. "Yeah... and your point?"

"Nothing, nothing," she murmured before flashing him a wide smile. "Food, please?"

Jonah fussed yet lowered the platter back onto his knee, back within her reach. And so, she grabbed another nigiri.

I leaned back, releasing a yawn into my hand whilst melting back against the comforting embrace of the droopy backrest. It'd been a few days since I'd started this tedious paper, but I was still not quite close to finishing it. Luckily, I'd managed to finish and submit my other small assignments in time, so this was all I had left for now. I'd been working on the other assignments on the class site, so most of the progress had been auto-saved anyways. And my essay had been auto-saving to the cloud as well, so I'd only been forced to re-write the second to last paragraph.

"I do enjoy writing, for the most part," Jonah added as I glared at the incomplete conclusion. Damn it, it could use a few more sentences elaborating on the findings. "Anyways, do you want me to proofread what you have right now, Benny?"

"Would you mind?" I asked, immediately sitting up.

Jonah chuckled softly before gently nudging Riley off his lap. She sighed, yet sat up, tiredly scratching the back of her neck before leaning against the couch. Then, he reached forward, signaling for me to pass him the laptop. "I'll get through as much as I can. Although, I do need to head back soon, I think."

I nodded my head, contemplating what to do. I technically had a few more days to finish the essay, but part of me wanted to get as much of it done since I didn't quite know when I'd have access to a laptop again. "Thank you, Jonah," I replied quietly, watching as he ate another bite of his sushi, and then passed the platter off to Riley, before dramatically rubbing his hands together.

"Alright, time to shred your paper to pieces!"

"Ugh, please don't?" I asked, flashing a weak smile. "Or maybe it's fine? It'll hurt my ego, but I could use the feedback. Please be nice, though."

Riley flicked his ear just as he let out a theatrically evil laugh, effectively cutting it short. "Oh, he'll be nice, if he knows what's good for him! Right, Jonah?"

Jonah burst out laughing, even as he rubbed at his ear. "Don't worry! I will, I will!"

"And you!" Riley said before signaling towards the sandwich I'd left resting on the coffee table. I rolled my eyes but took another bite.

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A/N: Thank you for reading. Please consider voting and commenting; I appreciate it immensely!