Out loud, the words sounded foul. Worse than foul, cruel. And he couldn’t suddenly say, Just joking! I didn’t write that! A breath jerked up in his throat, but what croaked out was, “Why are you attacking me?”

“I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt.”

Asher leaned his head against the wall. The cool of the plaster spread through him. He couldn’t connect to the solidity of his building, couldn’t assure himself it would still be here when Ivan left, which he was surely about to do. “You forced me to show you that picture,” he said. So Asher had been bad, awful. But so had Ivan—at least a little.

Ivan’s eyes rolled up, as though searching for what Asher meant. Then his face sharpened. “I asked your permission about that. You were eager enough to share.”

Asher crossed his arms over his chest. “I felt gross.”

“Asher. Come on.”

Asher was in the wrong. He should back down. But his throat thickened. “I’m weird about my body. You’re so interested in my transition, you should know that.” This wasn’t fair. He understood being treated badly by the world. He’d changed his whole gender, after all.

“I’m sorry.” Ivan’s face went gray. “But that’s not what we’re talking about.”

Asher leaped to his feet. His muscles vibrated—he had to defend himself, what could he say? But every rebuttal he marshaled would only make him sound fragile. Ivan stood too, and they hovered side-by-side in the center of the room. Asher had never realized before that he was taller than Ivan—barely, but he was. They’d always been sitting down or too far apart in the kitchen preparing food. The springy whorl on top of Ivan’s head was childish, a cheeky rude cowlick.

Without moving, they were somehow closer. Ivan touched Asher’s hip, leaving an electric handprint. Asher’s eyes slid closed as he waited for the kiss. Because, of course, a kiss was the only way to erase the conversation. The feeling was of such inevitability that he wasn’t even excited. Of course a kiss was next.