He glances at Lance, who’s leaning against the dresser and pulling on socks, his back bowed. The towel slips off of him and hits the floor with a soft sound, and he doesn’t bother picking it up again as he changes feet. Robbie can see the knobs of his spine, the exact shape of his hard, tight ass in the fraying boxers, and the cords of muscle in the backs of his long, long thighs.

Robbie steps closer to the woodstove until the heat is almost too much, a welcome discomfort.

Lance turns and gets under the covers. He’s still shivering, though. He rolls onto his side and catches Robbie looking at him, then goes very still. “I’m still cold,” he says, so quietly.

“I’ll get another blanket,” Robbie says roughly. There’s a faded quilt in one of the plastic storage containers. He brings it back, shaking it out and grimacing at the musty smell, but then spreads it over Lance’s body anyway, careful not to touch any of the angles and curves he’s formed beneath the covers.

When he looks down, Lance is looking up.

“Still cold,” Lance says. He holds up the covers in silent invitation, his eyes unflinching.

Take care of him, Robbie thinks, and gets into the bed.

Chapter Thirteen

Lance

Nine years ago.

Johnny takes them to school in the Chevy, which he’s been allowed to drive in good weather since his sixteenth birthday. As usual, Lance is crowded into the bucket seat between Danny and Johnny. His legs are tucked into Danny’s side of the gear shift, and Danny and Johnny are battling across him for control of the radio dial. Johnny is laughing and Danny is growling.

The school day is uneventful until Danny and Lance go out to the parking lot after their last class. They’re among the first kids to spill out the back doors into the student parking lot, which is about ten times the size it needs to be for the number of kids who drive. It’s a warm afternoon, the sun high and the pavement hot through the thin rubber of Lance’s sneakers.

“Where’d you leave off? Issue thirteen, right?” Danny asks, continuing the conversation they’ve been having in various forms all day. A new issue of The Team is about to drop next week, so they’ve been rereading every issue from Danny’s collection.

“Twelve,” Lance says, and then stumbles on the first step when he hears a girl’s shout ring out from the parking lot.

“Did someone call a teacher?”

Lance and Danny look at one another for a split second, then in the direction of the voice. There are a handful of cars parked in the first few rows, and from there the vehicles are more scattered. But there’s a congregation of kids growing in the row where they left the Chases’ Chevy that morning.

From the top of the steps, Lance can see over the crowd’s heads and spot Johnny, his head of golden waves unmistakable even from a distance. For a moment, Lance thinks he’s kneeling on the ground—like maybe he dropped something, and has knelt to pick it up—but then he sees his arm arch behind his head, then fall.