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The scent of bleach and old mop water clung to the air, thick and biting, as Ford adjusted his glasses and carefully laid out his homework across the dingy floor. The janitorial closet was small — the kind of cramped that made each breath feel heavy, the walls inching closer with every exhale. Shelves lined the space, crammed with rusting cans of floor wax, half-used bottles of ammonia, and an assortment of grimy rags clearly on their last leg. In the corner, a slow, rhythmic drip echoed, ticking away the minutes until their inevitable release.
Ford had expected to be here. This wasn’t his first time locked in the school’s basement closet. It wouldn’t be his last.
But Stanley?
Stan was a new variable.
Ford stole a glance at him—his twin, his mirror image, except where Ford was wiry, with sharp angles and slouched shoulders, Stan was solid. Strong. He was still jiggling the door handle, cursing under his breath, jaw set, hair mussed from the scuffle. His lip was split, his knuckles raw, and bruises already beginning to bloom on his cheekbone. Ford took a mental note to make sure he iced those later.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.
Stan was never around for it. His brother had boxing practice, which gave Ford the perfect excuse—if he got home late, he could claim he’d been at the library or with a study group. He’d perfected the lie, worn it in the way you do with an old sweater. But today, of all days, Stan had cut practice early. Just needed to hit the bathroom, he’d said. And that’s when he saw Ford being hauled toward the basement by a pack of meat-headed morons in letterman jackets, apparently holding a grudge against anyone who could spell “Pythagorean theorem” without stuttering.
And naturally, hero complex flaring, Stan dove in.
Five on one didn’t go well. Not even for Stan.
Ford flinched at the memory—Stan’s yell, the crack of a fist landing, the screech of sneakers on concrete. Then the door slammed shut behind them, and the silence settled, heavy as wet cement.
Now it was just them. Crammed together in barely enough room to breathe.
Ford drew a line through his equations. The only light came from a grimy, small window set high on the wall, barely enough to cast more than a few weak streaks of sunlight against the linoleum floor.
“Stanley, just leave it,” Ford sighed, adjusting his grip on his pencil. “We’re gonna be here a while.”
Stan twisted to glare at him, his face flushed from exertion, his knuckles already bruising from the fight.
“Ma and Pa are gonna kill us if we’re gone all night,” Stan muttered.
“Tony swings by around 5:30. Picks up the mop and whatever else he needs to pretend he’s cleaned the bathrooms. We’ll be out before dark.”
Stan squatted down in front of him, arms braced on his knees like he was at a campsite waiting for the fire to catch. His foot landed on one of Ford’s papers, and Ford made an irritated sound, yanking it out from under him before it could get smudged.
Without missing a beat, he poked Ford square in the forehead. “How d’ya know that?”
Ford froze.
Right.
Stan didn’t know.
Didn’t realize how many afternoons Ford spent counting mildew spots in this closet, silently waiting out his sentence.
“It’s just an assumption,” Ford lied quietly.
Stan snorted inelegantly. “You? Assumptions?”
Ford clamped his jaw shut. It might’ve been funny, if he didn’t feel caught red-handed. Instead, he looked away, heat creeping into his ears.
Stan studied his face. “This ain’t your first time in the ‘closet of the damned,’ huh?”
Ford said nothing.
“Multiple times…?”
Still, Ford didn’t answer.
Stan inhaled through his nose, exhaling slow and long. “Y’know what? Lucky for you, I’m too tired to chew you out for not tellin’ me.” He cracked his neck, rolling his shoulders. “But we’re not sittin’ here ‘til five.”
“The door only opens from the outside,” Ford reminded him, already mentally recalculating his algebra problem. “And I’d really prefer not to make things worse.”
“There’s always a way,” Stan shot back, determination setting in his face like stone.
Ford shook his head. “I can just tell Ma I was at the library—”
“Yeah? And what am I supposed to say?” Stan crossed his arms, stepping into the sliver of light and casting a shadow that loomed over the room. “I get home before you. You think they’re gonna believe I had nothing to do with it? They’ll blame me for the whole thing.”
Ford pursed his lips, but Stan wasn’t finished.
“And you think it’s fair?” Stan jabbed a finger at him. “You get to sit here in your own personal study hall—”
“This is hardly an adequate space to do homework,” Ford interjected, adjusting his glasses. “It’s just convenient. ”
“—And I get stuck listening to Ma and Aunt Irina bitchin’ about God knows what all evenin’?”
Ford chuckled at that. “You really think Ma’s gossip is worse than being locked in here?”
“Yes!” Stan threw his arms up. “You don’t know what it’s like! You left me in the trenches, Ford! Irina’s a freakin’ yenta, man! She started reading horoscopes to my knuckles last week!”
“You can’t call her that.”
“I just did.”
Ford shoved him. “You’re insufferable.”
Stan shoved back, grin stretching wider. “And you’re a nerd. Now help me move this mop bucket.”
Ford blinked. “What?”
Stan stood up, stretching, his arms reaching above his head, his muscles shifting beneath his thin, sweat-damp shirt. Ford’s eyes followed without meaning to, tracking the movement, the subtle roll of his shoulders.
"We can probably get out through the window," Stan muttered, mostly to himself. Then he started pushing things aside—shifting a couple of shelves, hefting a stack of dustpans as if it weighed nothing.
Ford stared. “You’re joking.”
Stan turned, cocking an eyebrow at him. “Do I look like I’m jokin’?”
“Yes.”
Stan rolled his eyes. “Get your bony ass up, Sixer. We’re building an escape ladder.”
Ford sighed, collecting his papers with quick, meticulous hands. “I can’t believe this is my life.”
“Better than bein’ stuck listenin’ to Irina’s third retelling of that time she got thrown outta Macy’s.”
Ford groaned as he stood. “Point taken.”
“That’s what I thought. Now help me lift this.”
Ford will not admit that Stan was right.
He absolutely, categorically, in no uncertain terms, will not admit it.
That would mean admitting that their ridiculous makeshift staircase—haphazardly constructed from precariously stacked paint cans, overturned buckets, and a few wooden crates—actually worked. That it reached the window with just enough height for them both to crawl through. That, hypothetically, they could squeeze out and land on solid ground in one piece.
Moving around, however, was another ordeal entirely. The closet wasn’t made for two teenage boys, let alone two teenage boys maneuvering around each other. It meant bumping elbows, brushing against shoulders, and being uncomfortably aware of the way Stan smelled—sweat and cigarettes, the sharp musk of exertion, but also something lighter, something floral and lingering.
Carla’s perfume. God, that perfume.
It had been giving him a headache for weeks, ever since Stan had started seeing her. Or—more accurately—ever since Ford had started noticing why it bothered him so much.
Being locked in a closet with Stan was one thing. Being locked in a closet with Stan while Ford was knee-deep in questioning the nature of their relationship was an entirely different kind of torture.
He would not think about it now.
Instead, he latched onto the only thing keeping his brain from spiraling: the efficiency. The teamwork. The problem-solving. Yes. Good things.
They were working well together, moving with an almost practiced rhythm. Stan was standing back now, hands on his hips, chest puffed out as he admired their work. He flashed Ford a grin, raising both arms with a triumphant, "Ta-da!"
Ford crossed his arms, eyeing the unstable structure with suspicion. “It hardly seems… stable .” He pressed his fingers against the top paint can, which wobbled slightly, tilting downward at an unsettling angle.
Stan blew a raspberry. “It’s perfect. You’re just mad my big dumb caveman brain thought of it first.”
Ford rolled his eyes. “That is not what I said.”
Stan snickered and stepped onto the lowest shelf, testing his weight before climbing higher. He reached the window ledge, fingers fumbling against the frame, and Ford could see at least a million and one ways this was going to go horribly wrong.
Stan could lose his footing, come crashing down onto the paint cans, split his skull open …..
But then, a soft click—a creak—and a gust of icy winter air swept into the closet.
A gust of frigid air swept through the cramped closet, sharp and biting against Ford’s exposed skin. Stan exhaled triumphantly. “Woulda been frozen shut if we waited any longer,” he muttered. Then, with an awkward shimmy, he hoisted himself up, sticking his head out through the opening.
He turned, hair wind-mussed, looking down at Ford. “You just gonna sit there, genius?”
Ford sighed, shoved their bags up first, and squared his shoulders. Stan extended his arm, and Ford hesitated—only for a second—before gripping his brother’s hand.
The muscles in Stan’s forearm flexed; tight, strong, warm under Ford’s fingers, and suddenly he was being hauled up, breath catching as the world tilted.
But what he hadn’t accounted for…
Was the ice.
Or the fact that Stan had pulled just a little too hard.
Or the undeniable, inarguable momentum of it all.
His sneakers skidded the second they hit the frozen ground. The momentum of Stan pulling him out was just strong enough that instead of landing cleanly, he crashed right into his brother.
For a second, he didn’t understand. His brain blanked, skipping in place, stuttering over the scene in front of him.
Then he looked down.
Oh.
He landed atop him.
Straddling. Hands braced on either side of Stan’s head, knees locked at his hips, pressed flush, too close, not nearly far enough. Their bodies slotted together, awkward and seamless all at once.
Ford could feel the heat pooling in his stomach. This was doing terrible things to his brain. His logical, analytical, very intelligent brain, which had—at this precise moment—decided to betray him entirely by etching this position into memory. Branding it there with a clarity that felt criminal.
They were staring at each other.
Neither of them moved. Neither of them spoke.
Stan coughed.
The sound was rough, a little strained. His voice came next, also rough, and Ford could swear he was struggling to get the words out.
“Uh. You… gonna get off, or what?”
"Right. Yes!" Ford scrambled so fast to untangle himself that he nearly slipped again. His knee knocked into Stan’s pelvis as he jerked back, and Stan sucked in a sharp breath.
No. No.
Stan wasn’t—he wasn’t, right?
Ford did not have time to think about it.
Not when Stan abruptly reached for his duffle bag, very deliberately positioning it over his lap. Not when his cheeks were still pink, and his eyes were darting anywhere but at Ford. Not when, after a beat of tense silence, Stan suddenly fished something out of his bag and chucked it at Ford’s head.
A scarf.
Ford barely caught it in time, his fingers clenching around the soft wool. “Oh,” he blurted. His voice came out high, too high, and he had to clear his throat before managing a stiff, “Uh. Thanks.”
Stan nodded. Nodded.
Didn’t say anything.
Just adjusted his sweater. Lowered it slightly.
Then, finally, mercifully, changed the subject.
“Let’s get home before Ma goes out lookin’ for us. You know she’s got night vision.”
Ford didn’t laugh.
He couldn’t.
Not with the heat still blooming in his chest, not with the weight of that moment pressing on his spine like a second of gravity.
The walk home felt easy.
Suspiciously so.
Snow slushed underfoot, their boots making wet, heavy sounds that echoed in the quiet between them. Cold bit at their cheeks, their breath turning to fog that disappeared too fast in the dying light, and neither of them said a goddamn word. Not about the closet. Not about how Ford had landed. Not about the straddle. The weight. The way Ford’s hands had pressed into the floor, braced just shy of cupping Stan’s jaw.
His scarf sat too high on his throat, tugged tight enough to burn. He yanked it tighter anyway. A noose was easier than a memory.
By the time the front porch came into view, his pulse had steadied, just barely. He’d buried the moment—mostly. Smothered it under layers of silence and willpower and the icy numbness crawling up his legs.
Inside, the house was chaos, same as ever. Irina’s shrieking cut through the kitchen, a full-blown banshee routine as she worked herself into a froth over Eugene again—this time, something about a divorced woman with fake nails and a name straight out of a perfume ad. Their mother moved with the precision of a war general: stirring sauce with one hand, cigarette trailing smoke, phone receiver wedged between shoulder and cheek, nodding along with the stamina of a seasoned veteran.
Stan, meanwhile, had made a beeline for the fruit basket.
He sank his teeth into an apple as if it owed him money and locked eyes with Ford across the kitchen. Mouthed Yenta at him.
Ford snorted, biting back a laugh.
This felt normal.
Except they weren’t.
Later, Ford sat at the dinner table, a hollowed-out mannequin, fork loose in his hand, staring down a pile of potatoes gone stiff with cold. The radio murmured behind them—soft jazz and static. Their father rustled the newspaper, glasses slipping down his nose. Their mother hummed along through the commercial breaks.
And Ford?
Ford was still on Stan.
Still in the snow.
Still feeling the press of their bodies, the uncanny fit of hips and thighs, and breath that didn’t belong in a sibling story. He’d memorized the way Stan’s chest rose against him. The flush on his face. The stiffness in his voice. The shape of the silence that followed.
He shifted in his seat, something raw curling low in his stomach.
He didn’t want to think about what it might’ve felt like if Stan had landed on him.
It gnawed at the edges of him, followed him through chores, through brushing his teeth, through the steady creak of the house settling into night. It followed him all the way to their shared room, where he dropped into his desk chair and tried not to look up when he heard the bathroom door opened.
Stan stepped out, fresh from the shower, towel slung low on his hips, chest flushed from the heat, hair dripping in wild spikes. No cologne. No cigarettes. No Carla.
Just warm skin and soap. Steam and muscle.
Ford’s grip on his pencil tightened. His throat clicked. He forced his eyes back to the page, pretending the image in the doorway hadn’t already burned itself onto the backs of his eyelids.
Stan wasn’t even doing anything. He wasn’t being loud, wasn’t teasing. Just existing.
God, he was so good at existing. He sat cross-legged on the bottom bunk, sketchpad in hand, pencil twirling between his fingers. Ford watched him through the reflection in the pencil sharpener, caught the way the lamplight softened the shadows across Stan’s bruised cheek. Still purple. Still tender.
Ford blinked once, then again. He stood—barefoot, quiet—and slipped down the hall to the kitchen, moving with the caution of a thief. The freezer creaked open. Behind the frozen peas and a graveyard of unmarked Tupperware.
Two Italian ices. Lemon. Cherry.
He was fairly certain they’d been in there since two summers ago, but they’d serve their purpose.
He snagged them and padded back, cold biting into his fingers through the thin paper. Tossed one at Stan without a word. It thunked softly against his chest, and he caught it one-handed, eyes raising.
“For your face,” Ford muttered, dropping into his chair and peeling off the lid of his own.
Stan grinned. Pressed the treat against his cheek with a hiss. “No frozen peas this time?”
“Would you prefer the bag of peas?”
“Nah. This one tastes like victory.”
The silence stretched between them, light and easy. They scraped their spoons into the ice— skrrk, skrrk —the sound cutting through the stillness like a metronome.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Stan’s voice was quiet, flat.
Ford didn’t look up. He focused on the red swirl in his cup. “Tell you what?”
Stan gave him a look.
Ford swallowed. “Didn’t need you worrying.”
“Bullshit.”
Ford clenched his jaw.
“Being shoved around is one thing, ” Stan continued, voice low. “ But getting left there?” He shook his head. “That ain’t right.”
“That isn’t right.”
Stan shot him a sharp, unimpressed glare.
“God, you’re impossible. ”
“I’m accurate.”
“You’re an asshole,” Stan muttered, but there was no heat behind it. Just something else. Something tired.
“There wouldn’t have been any way to tell you, anyway,” Ford continued. “You have practice. You’re always…. busy."
Stan raised an eyebrow. “Busy with what, exactly?”
Ford’s spoon scraped his ice just a bit harder. “I don’t know,” he muttered. “Maybe Carla or something.”
“Sure,” Stan said, drawing lazy circles against the plastic cup with his thumb. “But you know you’re my priority, right?”
Ford nearly dropped his ice.
His whole body locked up for a fraction of a second, his fingers stiff around the frozen plastic. He forced himself not to react. Not to think about what that meant. Not to want it to mean something it didn’t.
Stan stretched, slow and oblivious, shirt rising to reveal a line of skin above his waistband. Warm, tanned, still damp.
Ford looked away so hard he nearly strained a muscle.
“Not like I even see Carla that much anyway. She’s got French lessons,” Stan muttered, still watching his ice melt. “Clarinet crap. Schedules don’t match. Whatever.”
Ford bristled before he could stop himself. His grip tightened around his spoon, but he forced himself to keep his tone even. “Relationships take effort.”
Stan huffed. “Tell me about it. She’s been on my case lately.”
“She’s probably just… invested.”
“Too invested.”
God, what else was he supposed to say? What was he supposed to think?
Carla wasn’t even—she wasn’t a bad person.
She was smart. She was capable.
If Ford had any sense, he’d be interested in someone like her.
But the thought of her expecting something from Stan, of wanting something from him that Ford couldn’t even acknowledge wanting —
He hadn’t even realized Stan was looking at him until he turned his head slightly, catching the faintest trace of something unreadable in his brother’s eyes.
Stan searched his face for a second. Long enough that Ford felt like he was waiting for something, some kind of reaction, some kind of tell —but whatever he was looking for, he must not have found it.
Because after a second, he just shrugged.
“But yeah,” he muttered, dropping his gaze back to his sketchpad. “She’s pretty okay, I guess.”
The house had shrunk down to bones. Cooling wood groaned, remembering storms. Pipes rattled beneath the walls, restless and caged. The TV buzzed low from the living room, his mother’s soap operas hiccuping into reruns no one was awake to finish. The radiator hissed, as if it had something to say but couldn't quite find the words.
Ford lay on his back, staring up at sin.
A real masterpiece of tacky, it was. Provocative, borderline obscene, some model with barely any clothing, her legs spread just enough to toe the line of decency. Clearly designed to be enticing. And it was, in a sense.
But not to Ford.
To Ford, it was just an obnoxious reminder.
Stan had put it there as a joke. “So you don’t get too lonely up here,” he’d snickered, waggling his eyebrows. Ford had rolled his eyes and ignored him, because acknowledging it only meant encouraging him. But now?
Now it was mocking him.
You’re thinking about him, aren’t you?
Ford twisted, jammed his face into the pillow. The stuffing inside was lumpy, smelled like laundry that didn’t dry right. Didn’t matter. He needed anything but that ceiling. Anything but that girl. That smile. That joke. That closeness.
Stan and Carla.
Stan and Carla.
Stan and "she's pretty okay."
What does that even mean?
Not great. Not fantastic. Not my girl. Just… pretty okay.
Ford frowned up at the darkness. And what was Carla hounding him about?
What did Carla even want from him? What could she possibly complain about? Maybe he needed a push to actually try in his classes, but he wasn’t failing. He was coasting. Which, given how much he slacked off, was basically an achievement. Stan wasn’t bad at relationships. He was too good. Loyal, stupidly loyal, always showing up for people who didn’t deserve it. Always giving too much. Always giving Ford...
He sat up halfway before catching himself. Swallowed the rising bile.
He didn’t want to picture her hands on Stan. Didn’t want to think about her head on his shoulder, perfume clinging to his skin as if it were poison. Didn’t want to think about her lips where…
Nope.
Ford rolled onto his back and exhaled through his nose, sharp and trembling. The ceiling felt closer now. Oppressive. As if it might lean in and murmur the truth if he stayed still for too long.
The closet. The fall. The position.
The way Stan’s body had broken his fall. The way Ford had crashed into him—legs tangled, hands braced, their chests brushing. The breath. The look. The silence.
He hadn’t been cold. Not for a second.
Ford blinked into the dark, eyes aching.
And then the bunk below creaked.
At first, he ignored it, chalked it up to Stan shifting in his sleep. He was a fidgety sleeper, always had been. Constant tossing and turning, arms and legs everywhere, half-kicking his sheets off the bed.
Except—this was different.
Ford stiffened. The sheets rustled again, a slow, deliberate movement, not the careless toss-and-turn of someone getting comfortable.
Yes, this was something prominent in their age group. It was normal, natural, a biological inevitability, really.
But not here.
Not while Ford was right above him.
Not when they’d both agreed —
Because the first time Ford had accidentally walked in on Stan, Stan had screamed like a girl.
Ford hadn’t even meant to walk in on him. He’d just gotten home early, opened the door, and there Stan had been—well, hands under his waistband mid-stroke, eyes going wide in horror before he scrambled off the bed like he was about to be executed on sight.
It shouldn’t have been funny.
Ford had laughed so hard he almost cried. Stan, red-faced and furious, had shoved him out of the room and disappeared into the bathroom to finish his business (which, seemed counter-intuitive, but Ford wasn’t going to argue about that). After the sheer horror of that situation, they had come to a firm, mutual agreement: No funny business while the other was in the room.
It was a simple rule.
It was a good rule.
It was a rule that Stan was currently breaking.
Ford’s body flushed hot, cold, then hot again. He stared hard at the ceiling, breathing shallowly, trying to pretend he didn’t hear what he heard. The soft slide of movement. The way the sheets whispered. The subtle, unmistakable cadence.
A normal , rational, functional human being would roll over, close their eyes, and wait for it to be over. Ford was not a normal, rational, or functional human being.
"Stanley?"
A mistake. A colossal, unforgivable mistake.
Because he heard it. Heard Stan freeze, his breath catching, the soft, rhythmic motion halting for the briefest of moments. And that sound won’t be leaving his memory any time soon.
Then a hoarse, thick “What’s up?”
You liar.
Stan’s voice came thick. Slurred. Too low. As if he’d been caught in the middle of something and was trying to sound innocent through a throat full of gravel.
Ford hesitated, every nerve in his body screaming at him to drop it, drop it, drop it, drop it, but his mouth betrayed him. “What are you—”
The words crumbled on his tongue. And the silence that followed wasn’t even silence—it was filled with noise. With awareness. Ford heard the blankets shift again, but quieter this time. Controlled. Stealthy. As though Stan figured if he just smoothed the rhythm, no one would notice.
But to Ford, the sound might as well have been dialed up to a hundred, every rustle of fabric, every faint, repeating movement, echoing straight through his skull. A deafening, shattering truth. He swallowed hard.
And then, like the absolute masochist that he was, he thought—
To what?
His mind betrayed him in an instant, spinning through the possible answers, choking on them before he could stop it.
Would it be Carla?
Of course, it had to be. It was the logical answer.
But some deep, twisted, horrible part of Ford had thought—the part he tried so desperately to suppress, the part that had sent his stomach plummeting when he landed on Stan in the snow, the part that had made his whole body burn —
What if it wasn’t?
What if it was him?
His thighs twitched. A sick pulse beat low in his belly.
What if Stan wasn’t thinking about Carla’s perfume or her voice or her mouth—but about Ford. About how Ford looked above him, flustered and breathless. About the weight of him, the burn of it, the flush in both their cheeks.
God. Ford clamped a hand over his face. He was sick. Sick for hoping. For even entertaining the idea.
And still—the sound hadn’t stopped.
Stan wasn’t stopping.
Why wasn’t he stopping?
He knew Ford was awake. Had to. They’d spoken. And still he kept going, slow and steady under the covers like Ford’s presence didn’t matter.
Or like it did.
His own body betrayed him in real-time, burning with the thought of Stan’s hand wrapped around himself and the possibility that he wanted Ford. That maybe—maybe—he was getting off to it.
Ford’s breath hitched. His skin burned.
Then: a shaky exhale from below. “...‘s cold,” Stan mumbled, voice thick and raw and utterly full of shit. “Go to sleep.”
Ford rolled over violently, pulled the blanket over his head, curled into himself as tight as he could without breaking. Every inch of him was on fire. His erection pressed against the seam of his boxers like a threat, his breath ragged and caught between a groan and a whimper.
He bit the inside of his cheek hard enough to sting. But the ache was there. The wanting was there. And the sick, shameful hope— the maybe —would not die.
Days slipped by like water over glass. And, Ford almost forgot.
(No, that was a lie. He couldn’t forget, not with the memory stitched under his skin like thread soaked in fire.)
But he was good at pretending. He'd had years of practice, sculpting his face into the expressionless mask of a boy who didn't burn alive every time his brother laughed, stretched, breathed. And Stan, the bastard, was apparently just as good. Stan still ruffled his hair in the hallways, stole the last of the orange juice in the mornings, and whined about history homework while Ford ignored him with practiced ease. It was fine. They were fine.
They were fine.
Until today.
It was late. Way past when Stan should've been home, let alone still hanging around school. Ford had stayed behind to talk to his biology teacher, lost in an engaging (and thoroughly unimportant to anyone but him) debate about gene expression. He was stuffing the last of his books into his bag when he shut his locker door and nearly jumped out of his skin.
Stan was there. Leaning against the next locker, arms folded, face a picture of smug satisfaction.
“Moses,” Ford hissed, pushing his glasses up. “Stanley.”
“Gotta work on your situational awareness, Sixer,” Stan said, his grin widening. “If I were a predator, you’d be toast.”
“You’re not supposed to be here.” Ford's voice cracked somewhere between exasperation and suspicion. “Practice ended two hours ago.”
Stan shrugged, pushing himself off the locker, his hands sliding into his pockets. “Told Marc to switch me to mornins’.”
Ford rifled through his bag, making sure he had everything—notebook, pens, physics textbook, calculator —before pausing to process what Stan had just said.
“… You hate mornings. ”
That was an objective fact. He gave Stan four to five minutes before leaving for school every morning, knowing that his twin needed every second to drag himself out of bed and come barreling down the stairs, half-dressed, shoes barely tied, wild-eyed and desperate, pleading Please don’t leave me, don’t leave me, Sixer I’m comin’, I swear—!
“I’m evolving. Getting sophisticated. Grown-up stuff.”
Ford rolled his eyes, rummaging through his bag. “Uh-huh. Right. And maybe I’m the Queen of England.”
“You got the stuff for it,” Stan said, voice mock-serious. “All regal. Delicate hands. A little tiara’d suit you.”
“Shut up.”
Stan leaned in, smirking. “Can’t. Too busy protectin’ your royal highness.”
Ford zipped his bag, staring at him. “…You didn’t have to shift your entire schedule just to babysit me.”
“Not babysitting. Just… operating in your general vicinity.”
Ford gave him a flat look.
Stan sighed dramatically, stretching his arms again, rolling his shoulders like he was warming up for a fight. “Look, if I see those losers,” he said, reaching out and ruffling Ford’s hair —which, damn it, was completely uncalled for—“they got karma comin’ for ‘em.”
Ford muttered under his breath, trying and failing to fix his hair. “It was barely an hour.”
Stan just held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor, Poindexter. Don’t worry about it.”
Ford shot him a flat look. “You were never a Scout.”
Stan dropped one finger. “Not with that attitude.”
Ford clenched his jaw so hard he could feel the pressure behind his ears. And then Stan’s tone shifted—softer, coaxing. The kind of tone he used when convincing Ma to let him borrow the car. The one that always worked.
“Just give me a week,” he said, head tilting, his smile turning crooked. “C’mon, I’m mixin’ it up. Feelin’ spontaneous.”
Ford should’ve walked away. Should’ve said no.
But that look. Boyish, eyes wide and imploring, practically radiating I’m your twin, you love me, you can’t say no. As if Ford were the only thing in the room that mattered.
“…Fine,” he muttered, the word dragged out of him, a reluctant confession.
Stan’s grin could’ve powered a city block.
They walked side-by-side, footsteps echoing loud in the empty halls. The kind of after-hours hush that made your own breath feel intrusive. Lockers hummed. Fluorescents buzzed. Somewhere, a janitor whistled off-key.
They passed the music room. A slow clarinet solo drifted into the hallway—Carla. She was probably mid-rehearsal, eyes closed, lost in some delicate, earnest melody. Stan gave a quick wave toward the glass-paneled door.
Ford’s steps faltered.
That was… not right.
If this had been any other day, Stan wouldn’t have just waved.
He would’ve burst into the room, loud and unapologetic, with zero regard for the delicate sanctity of a practicing musician. The teacher would’ve scolded him, sure, but somehow— somehow —Stan would’ve made them laugh. He would’ve lit up the entire space just by existing in it.
Hell, he probably would’ve spun Carla around, dipped her in one of those dramatic, showy twirls Ford had caught glimpses of during study hall. Then, inevitably, he would’ve kissed her, right in front of the entire class, just to make them all groan and roll their eyes.
Which had always made him want to vomit.
Though—if Stan did that with him, however….
The point was: This? This was different.
Ford tilted his head. “We’re not going in?”
“She’s in the zone,” Stan said breezily.
“Uh-huh.” Ford slowed a bit.
He didn’t buy that for a second.
This wasn’t Stan.
This was a simulacrum. Soviet experiment? Possibly replaced during wrestling drills?
Or….a lizard person?
If he could prove it, imagine the renown! The prestige! To uncover a real-life case of infiltration before he even got to college…
Stan flicked him between the eyes.
“Hey! Ow! ” Ford recoiled, rubbing his forehead.
“Don’t even start.” Stan gave him a knowing look, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I know what’s goin’ on in that nerd brain of yours.”
Ford rubbed at his forehead, scowling. “You don’t know what I was thinking.”
“You were thinkin’ I’m some kinda alien or clone or—”
Ford’s lips pressed into a thin line.
“Putz.” He shoved Ford lightly. “I’m me, alright? Just givin’ her space, that’s all.”
“She asked for space?”
Stan was already ahead, two steps at a time down the stairwell. “Maybe I’m takin’ some for myself.”
Ford followed, slower. “Why?”
Stan hesitated—just a blink, barely noticeable.
Then, feigning a yawn so fake Ford could smell the bullshit, he mumbled, “I told ya. She’s been on my ass.”
The silence hung weird. Off-center. Stan was normally quick with excuses—jokes, grins, dumb voices—but this wasn’t that. It was stilted, quiet, the kind of quiet where the unsaid things echoed louder than what actually made it out. That wasn’t him. But maybe Stan just didn’t want Ford poking around. Maybe it had nothing to do with him.
So Ford let it drop.
“…Okay.”
Immediately, Stan snapped back, shifting gears as if nothing had happened. “How was your last class?”
Ford blinked, caught off guard. “Biology?”
Stan nodded like he was going to follow that up. He didn’t.
Ford narrowed his eyes but went on, because his mouth had always been easier to manage than his brain. “We were covering gene sequencing. It’s these DNA segments that jump around—transposable elements—they disrupt or regulate gene expression depending on where they land—”
Stan didn’t groan. No eye roll. No dramatic collapse into the lockers or sarcastic retching. He wasn’t even gearing up to crack a joke. He just watched Ford. Tracking every word. Ford’s steps slowed. “Why are you asking?”
Stan gave the world’s most suspicious sigh. Loud. Theatrical. “No reason. Just curious.”
Ford raised a brow. “You hate this stuff.”
“I don’t—” Stan paused, then grinned, wide and full of shit. “I just thought I’d catch up on my studies. Make you proud. Y’know. Education. The foundation of our future.”
Ford stopped walking. Turned, and stared at him hard. “You once told Mrs. Trenner you couldn’t write your essay because you had a—what was it? A rare pencil allergy?”
“Pencil Trauma.” Stan corrected solemnly. “Tragic condition. They still haven’t found a cure.”
Stan wasn’t visiting Carla. He’d changed his practice time. He was talking about Ford’s class like he was trying to memorize something that mattered.
Stan slid an arm across Ford’s shoulders, leaned in like they were sharing the same thought, the same air.
“Now tell me more about these jumpy little bastards.”
Ford sighed. “They’re not jumpy. They’re sequences.”
“Yeah, yeah. Mobile jean things.”
And even though he shouldn’t have, even though it made his chest go tight and wrong, Ford let himself talk again.
Because Stan was listening.
Or acting like he was.
And Ford didn’t know which was worse.
Weeks.
Plural.
Stan kept it up for weeks.
Ford had braced for the collapse. Assumed his brother’s newfound diligence was just a fluke, a sugar rush of protectiveness that would fade the second something shinier came along. Boxing, girls, a limited-edition pack of baseball cards. God knew Stan’s attention span was shorter than a fruit fly’s lifespan.
But no.
Morning after morning, he dragged himself out of bed at unholy hours—a grumbling, half-conscious heap of elbows and tangled hair, muttering curses at the radiator and gravity as he stumbled through the hallway, raccoon-eyed and unsteady. And every time, without fail, Ford would be tying his shoes, already pressed and neat, watching Stan with the kind of quiet, suspicious awe usually reserved for lunar anomalies.
“You’re really doing this,” he said one morning, voice flat with disbelief as Stan jammed his foot into a sneaker as if it had personally offended him.
Stan yawned so hard his jaw popped. “Yeah, well. Maybe I enjoy gettin’ up early now.”
Ford raised an eyebrow.
“Okay, no. But maybe I enjoy not picturin’ your face all bruised up ‘cause some meathead jock decided your existence was a crime.”
Ford paused, hand still on his laces. “You’re protecting my face?”
“Your stupid, nerdy face,” Stan said solemnly, standing and swaying under the weight of too little sleep and too much effort.
And all Ford could do was stare. Every morning. Every damn morning, because Stan was there—bleary-eyed, sleep-deprived, snarling at cereal boxes and snapping the clasp on his duffel bag with the fury of a man personally wronged by the universe. And Ford had to admit… it worked. The morning walks. The early arrival. It meant he didn’t have to stay behind after school, reeking of mothballs and drowning in lies about study groups or library trips. He could ask questions when the teachers still had patience, when their eyes hadn’t yet dulled from a day of teenage chaos.
And it wasn’t just mornings.
Stan wasn’t seeing Carla. Not really. She was the one chasing him now—stopping him in hallways, cornering him between classes with arms folded and eyebrows sharp enough to carve roast beef. Ford watched it all from the sidelines, pretending not to.
Except he was. Watching. Attentively. Obsessively. Like someone who had rewired his entire nervous system to zero in on Stan’s every breath.
A month ago, Stan would’ve been all over her. Spinning her around, hands low on her hips, whispering something into her ear that made her laugh.
It was Ford’s job to track patterns. Patterns mattered.
So he jotted it down. In his journal.
His very, very private, not-a-diary, absolutely-not-meant-to-be-seen-by-anyone journal. The one kept under his mattress, between an old Latin textbook and a warped issue of Popular Mechanics. The one with entries like:
November 30 –
Stan wore that grey Henley again. The one that stretches across his shoulders like God made it to personally test my limits. His knee touched mine under the table. Again. He didn’t move it.
I didn’t either.
Ford hated that he wrote it. But writing it down was better than combusting.
Because Stan was touchy. More than ever.
They’d always lived in each other’s airspace—one bathroom, one bedroom, two twin beds crammed so close Ford could reach out in the night and touch Stan’s wrist if he wanted to. Not that he ever had.
(Not that he hadn’t wanted to.)
But this was different. This was planned.
Stan would lean in close to look at Ford’s homework and not move. Breath warm on his neck. Chin practically on his shoulder.
“Wow,” he’d say, squinting at Ford’s physics notes. “You write like a serial killer.”
“I’m sorry, did you say ‘serial intellect’? ”
“No. Definitely ‘killer.’ Like if I get murdered, the cops’ll find this notebook and go, ‘Yup. This is the guy.’”
Another entry:
December 5 –
He looked at me in history class like he was trying to memorize something.
Not my notes. Not the board.
Just…me.
I asked if I had something on my face.
He said: “Yeah. Your whole face.”
I think I’m obsessed with an idiot.
Then there were the bumps. The nudges. The Godforsaken knee thing.
Ford could count on it now. The exact moment, during dinner, when Stan’s knee would find his under the table. It wasn’t an accident. Ford had tested that theory. Scooted away. Shifted sideways. Stan just followed.
“I swear to God, Stanley, if you do that one more time—”
Stan didn’t look up from his mashed potatoes. “What? Bein’ affectionate?”
Ford choked on his water.
“You’re not affectionate,” he wheezed.
“Sure I am. Real tactile guy. My love language is… uh…” Stan tapped his fork to his temple. “Elbowing.”
“I’m going to kill you.”
“And I’ll die in your warm embrace.”
Ford looked to their mother for salvation, but she was too busy twirling the cord of their house phone, arguing with Irina about whether or not Khrushchev was secretly bald under that hat.
Another entry:
December 15 –
He trailed a finger down my spine when I was reading. Said he was “checking my posture.”
He has never once cared about posture.
The worst part was—Ford couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t push him away.
Couldn’t say no. And the idiot? The idiot just kept looking at him, eyes full of something that said he knew every goddamn word Ford couldn’t speak.
Kept reaching. Kept touching. Kept wearing that smug, crooked grin, already convinced he’d won.
Every day was another tally mark. Another scribble. Another long, aching pause between breaths when Stan’s fingers drifted too low on his back, or lingered too long on his shoulder, or settled on his knee for an extra beat—casual, effortless, as if it meant nothing at all.
The weekend came disguised as a reprieve.
Their mother vanished early with a purse full of coupons and a face full of feigned purpose, muttering about errands, but Ford knew better. “Errands” meant Irina’s kitchen table, a chipped teacup of instant coffee, and three straight hours of weaponized gossip—on schedule. Their father had retreated into the den for his traditional post-lunch, pre-dinner, possibly eternal nap, his snores rattling the paneling every few minutes, low and steady as distant thunder. That left the house adrift in a rare kind of stillness.
Ford had claimed the quiet. Settled in at the desk with a book cracked half-open and a pencil in his teeth, pretending to read while mostly dissecting the way Stan had looked at him over breakfast—some strange, unreadable grin that made the juice glass sweat in his hand even though the radiator wasn’t even on. He was halfway through rereading the same paragraph for the fourth time when a snap—a sharp flick of fingers by his temple—jerked him out of it.
“There he is,” Stan drawled, arms folded, eyes gleaming with mischief. “I could smell the brain cells overheating from the hall.”
Ford let out a breath through his nose. “No, that’s your sock pile fermenting by the vent. Congratulations. You’ve invented mustard gas.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Stan muttered, flopping against the desk as if gravity had a personal vendetta against him. “You’re lucky I don’t chuck you into the Atlantic. The salt’ll scrub off whatever this attitude is.”
Ford narrowed his eyes. “Do you actually need something, or did you just come in here to insult me?”
“Little of column A, little of column B,” Stan grinned, drumming his fingers on the desk surface. “I need the desk. Finally gonna build that damn ship.”
Stan had been threatening to finish it for months now. Somehow it always got back-burnered under “stuff came up.” Boxing. School. Carla. “You pick now ?”
“Look, Ma’s gone, Pa’s unconscious, and you’re stuck in one of your Victorian daydreams. It’s perfect.”
Honestly, a reasonable request.
Ford shrugged. “Fine. I’ll just—” He waved a hand toward the bunk bed. “Go up top. Read one of my overdue books.”
“Dork.”
“Philistine.”
Stan snorted, already unpacking the dry glue and toothpick masts while Ford scooped his books up into his arms.
And then—he saw it.
There.
The little leather-bound bastard. Pages full of raw nerves and worse metaphors. Crude outlines of moments he couldn’t forget, all inked in the kind of desperation he’d chew through his own wrist to keep private.
His fingers snapped around it.
Keeping his movements as casual as humanly possible, Ford snatched it up. “Yup. The table’s all yours,” he said, too quickly.
Stan blinked. Squinted. And tilted his head. Ford didn’t need telepathy to know exactly what that look meant.
“It’s nothing,” Ford said too fast.
Stan raised an eyebrow. “Doesn’t look like nothin’.”
“Homework,” Ford offered, throat dry. “Just notes. You know. Math. Numbers.”
“Numbers. Of course.” Stan said, nodding sagely.
“Stan.”
“Fordley. ”
“Don’t.”
“Oh, I’m gonna.”
And then it was chaos.
Ford yelped and bolted, the notebook clutched to his chest as Stan lunged, laughter tearing from his chest. They scrambled down the hall, skidding around corners, knocking over a laundry basket. Ford ducked, spun, cut left around the kitchen table—Stan was right behind him, socked feet slipping on the linoleum.
“Ford! C’mon, what is it?”
“No!”
“What—a list of girls you like?”
“No!”
“Conspiracy theories?”
Ford huffed, leaping over the couch. “You already know my conspiracy theories!”
Stan gasped, hand over his heart. “A love poem to the physics teacher?”
Ford spun on him, horrified. “Are you serious ?!”
This was inevitable, wasn’t it? Ford cursed his own short-sightedness. He should’ve known better. The second Stan smelled blood in the water, he wasn’t letting go. He was nosy, persistent, and worst of all, fast.
Ford barely ducked around him, made a break for their room— If he could just get to the door, get it shut ….
Stan grabbed the back of his shirt and yanked. Ford stumbled forward with a panicked squawk. They toppled in a tangle, the world pitching sideways—then slamming to a halt. And somehow, Stan had ended up on top.
Ford’s stomach flipped. His skin felt three sizes too small.
Maybe—just maybe—he should’ve listened more closely to whatever religious warnings his mother used to preach. Maybe then he wouldn’t have offended the god currently punishing him.
Stan shifted, looking way too pleased with himself.
“Jesus,” he muttered, swiping a forearm across his brow. “You hit the ground hard.”
The air felt thick. Too much heat. Too much contact. Stan’s weight pressed down on him, anchoring him in a way he couldn’t shake. Elbows planted on either side of his shoulders. Thighs boxing in his hips. Their chests nearly brushing.
Ford tried to push him off, but Stan leaned in closer, clicking his tongue the way a schoolteacher might. “Ah-ah. You’re not going anywhere ‘til you fess up, Sixer.”
“Stanley,” Ford hissed, but the sound came out thin and wrong.
“C’mon. Just a hint. One word. Is it romantic?”
Heat bloomed across Ford’s face. “It’s mine. ”
“Yeah, well. I got a right to know what my emotionally stunted brother’s scribbling in his diary.”
Ford bucked, squirmed. Nothing. Curse Stan’s boxing training, because the way he had him pinned was too clean, too methodical. Ford should have been proud—technically, this meant Stan was actually retaining his training—but all he could focus on was the creeping heat licking up his spine, the shortening of his breath, the way his hands—trapped at his sides—had curled into fists.
This was stupid. So, so stupid.
“You’re not struggling hard enough,” Stan said with mock concern. “You’ve gone soft, Poindexter. Tragic.”
“I’m trying not to break your nose.”
“Aw, you’d never hurt me.” Stan’s voice dropped slightly, softer, teasing. He propped himself up on one elbow as if this was the most casual thing in the world. “Not that fun bein’ pinned, huh?”
“Oh, please.” Ford forced his voice into something unimpressed, unshaken. “You do this voluntarily. For sport. ”
“Yeah, but I’m usually not this comfortable.” Stan rocked his weight side to side like he was testing the give of a mattress, and Ford felt it—all of it. The shift of muscle, the pressure of thigh on thigh, the unspoken shape of his brother pressing into him in ways Ford’s brain wasn’t equipped to rationalize. “This is a premium Sixer mattress. Good bounce. Nice give. Eight outta ten.”
Ford’s stomach clenched. His heart—God, it wasn’t just beating, it was pounding, trying to signal SOS through the bones of his ribs. Stan was joking, of course he was, that was his default setting. But his weight hadn’t shifted off. He wasn’t pulling back. He wasn’t even moving.
And Ford couldn’t stop noticing everything.
The crease in Stan’s shirt where it had bunched up just above his waist. The faint smell of soap and sweat and boy curled off him in waves.
“Get. Off.”
“Keep shiftin’ around and I’m gonna start wonderin’ if you want me here.”
What.
Ford’s brain white-screened.
The world ceased to exist beyond the sound of blood rushing in his ears and the burning throb at the base of his spine. The words replayed—line by filthy, unraveling line—as if his entire nervous system had been rewired to do nothing but loop them in stereo.
He stared up at Stan, wide-eyed, mouth slightly parted, chest frozen in a breath that never finished. “What?” he choked. Not even a real question. Just a sound. Shock given shape.
Stan’s smirk twitched—cracked, even. Barely. A flicker of realization playing out second by second as if he were just registering what he’d said. His hands twitched against the floor.
Then, with the sharpness of a marionette jerked upright. “Right! Uh—yeah, no—enough horseplay,” he coughed, voice cracking halfway through the word. “Game over, Sixer. Gotta—gotta get back to shipbuilding. Prime wood-gluing hour.”
And just like that, he was off.
Too fast. Too sloppy.
“…Stan.”
Stan pretended not to hear.
He was rummaging through the closet.
The closet.
The closet where the ship was not.
Because the ship was on the desk.
Their mother returned just after sunset, trailing cold and chaos in equal measure. Her coat was flung over a chair before the front door had even shut behind her, paper bag of groceries thunked unceremoniously on the counter. Her voice launched into motion like it had never stopped.
“…And Irina, you know how she gets. Always some disaster. Swears up and down she saw Sal Romano sneaking around with that redhead from the butcher’s.” She laughed, sharp and full of satisfaction. “I told her, ‘Irina, if ya spent half as much time mindin’ your own business as youse do everyone else’s, you’d be a saint.’”
Ford moved through it all like sleepwalking. Set the table. Knife to the right, fork to the left, cup up top, napkin square. His hands knew the rhythm. His brain didn’t need to be present.
“Can you believe gas is fifty-four cents a gallon?” his mother barked across the kitchen, half to him, half to the ghost of the nation’s economic stability. “Fifty-four! I told the boy behind the counter, I said, ‘For that price you better pump the gas and bless the car, sweetheart. Oh, and you remember the grocer on Melrose? The good one, with the little smile lines? Discounted basil. Swear to God I would’ve paid three whole dollars—”
Across from him, Stan hummed noncommittally. Eyes half-lidded. Fork shoveling food like it was his full-time job. Just enough noise to avoid being accused of tuning her out.
“Ma, I don’t even know who you’re talkin’ about.”
A playful slap to his arm. “Don’t talk with your mouth full.”
Dinner passed in layers. Forks clinked. The radio buzzed from the living room, some fuzzy jazz station no one was really listening to. Their mother smoked half a cigarette she’d later deny ever lighting. The sky outside bled from orange to black.
Then, finally, the house thinned out.
Dishes done. Leftovers sealed in wax paper. Their mother vanished down the hall with a book and her smoldering ashtray. Their father hadn’t stirred since six.
Ford found himself back at the desk.
The chair creaked under him, the weight of the day pressing into his spine as if it were scolding him for his posture. He opened his trig notebook, stared at a problem he could solve backwards in his sleep. His hands moved. His brain didn’t. He just needed motion. Something to drown out the heat still lingering in his skin from earlier. From the floor. From the look.
Behind him, there was motion. Barefoot shuffle. Wood creaking under weight.
The edge of the pencil sharpener caught the reflection.
Stan.
His hair stuck up in erratic angles, still damp, as if he’d towel-dried it with a lightning strike. Skin flushed from the shower, faint steam rising in the cooler air. He moved slowly. Opened a drawer, dug around for a shirt, unhurried, as if time had stopped.
Ford felt it before he saw it. That lingering. That stupid, tell-tale stillness.
He turned his head slightly, voice too casual. “Different notebook.”
Stan straightened like he’d touched a live wire.
“Wasn’t lookin’,” he muttered, already yanking his shirt down, turning away too fast.
Ford bit the inside of his cheek to kill the grin. “Mm-hm.”
Silence settled again.
Stan pulled on his shirt and flopped onto the bottom bunk, idly picking at a poster taped to the wall. The air between them felt thick, weighted by something unspoken, something Ford could feel crawling under his skin, tightening in his chest.
“…About earlier.”
Ford’s fingers stilled around his pen. He didn’t look over. Just waited.
Ford inhaled slowly. “What about it?”
Stan shifted. The mattress creaked. He sounded small. Uncertain.
“I… y’know. Sorry. For trying to snoop.”
Ford nodded. “It’s fine.”
It wasn’t, not really. But it also wasn’t unexpected. He’d practically waved a red flag in front of a bull. Of course, Stan chased it. Ford had practically invited disaster upon himself.
Stan inhaled slowly. The kind of breath you only took when you were about to say something stupid. Or dangerous. Or both.
“…You ever think about shit you shouldn’t be thinkin’ about?” he asked.
Ford’s whole body went still.
Stan rolled onto his side, facing the wall like he couldn’t bear to look at what he’d unleashed. “Like—stuff that’d get you clocked. If you said it out loud.”
Ford wet his lips. “…Sometimes.”
Stan exhaled through his nose.
“Yeah,” he murmured. “Thought so.”
Ford’s fingers twitched against the desk. Tapped once. Twice. Then stopped.
“Stan.”
No reply.
“What is it that you’re thinking about?”
The silence stretched until it hurt.
“…Stuff,” Stan said finally, and Ford could hear the grimace in it.
“ Stuff.”
Stan nodded.
Ford stared at him, trying to divine meaning from the back of his brother’s skull. He reached up and dragged his fingers through his hair, slow.
This room had always been too small.
The walls used to breathe with them, shift around them. Now they just pressed in. A box. A trap. If Ford said the wrong word, it might all collapse, burying them both.
“Alright,” he said finally.
Stan twisted around, brow furrowed. “Alright?”
“If you’re gonna dangle some half-thought at me, you don’t get to escape with a one-word answer. Be specific.”
Stan laughed once—short and sharp—and covered his face with his hand. “God, Sixer.”
“You started it.”
Stan groaned, flopping fully onto his back, staring up at the ceiling.
He looked miserable.
Good. Ford was miserable too.
He wanted to split open Stan’s head and read it like a manual. Wanted to know exactly what was happening in there. Instead he was stuck on some terrible carousel, dizzy with implication. If he even hinted at something and it exploded in his face—
He’d have to change his name.
Move across the country.
Maybe study moths.
Something small.
Well, actually…no, moths weren’t that small. They were incredibly vital to the environment. Some research even suggested they were more efficient pollinators than bees—
No, no—stop. Focus.
Marine science?
No. That would remind him of Stan. Stan, who always talked about it like he belonged to it, like the ocean would swallow him whole one day and he’d go happily. Maybe he’d end up a dockmaster, if not in Jersey, then somewhere warm, somewhere together if he could just stop feeling this way—
Astrophysics?
Easy enough. Head in the stars, far away from—
“Forget it.”
Ford’s spiraling thoughts slammed to a halt.
Stan ran a hand through his damp hair, voice too casual. “ Was just runnin’ my mouth.”
He sounded like he wanted to mean it.
Ford didn’t believe him for a second.
He stood slowly. Moved to the bunk, sitting beside him, feet tucked under, elbows on his knees. For a while, he didn’t say anything. Then, soft, almost too soft: “What if I don’t want to forget it?”
Stan turned his head. Looked up at him.
And for a second—just one—something flickered.
“…You don’t wanna?” he asked, half-teasing, half-defensive. A lifeline, if Ford chose to laugh it off.
Ford didn’t.
Stan leaned back, sliding down until he was half-lying against the wall. His breath caught. The lamplight hit him at an angle—amber and soft, catching the slope of his cheek, the hollow of his neck.
“I’ve been pushin’ thoughts away,” he said, voice rough, the words scraping their way out. “For a while now.”
His eyes stayed fixed ahead. “The kind of thoughts you dig a hole for. Real deep. Backyard, middle of the night, don’t-look-back deep.”
Ford’s fingers twitched where they rested on the blanket.
Stan laughed, but it came out dry, cracked. “And then it’s us. Out there. In the snow. And you’re just—on me. Warm and weird and all pressed up close. And I couldn’t not think about it.”
He shook his head, dragging a hand through his hair as if he could claw the memory out. “Everything I’d shoved down came clawing back up. I was freezing and burning at the same time, and your eyes were right there, watching me like you saw everything, and I couldn’t stop thinking how easy it’d be to just…”
Ford’s heart was loud in his ears. Every beat an ache.
Stan made a face, teeth flashing in a failed attempt to laugh it off. “It’s stupid,” he muttered, flinging one arm out, tossing the words away. “You’d probably call it somethin’ scientific. Somethin’ with hormones. Being wired weird. Or—hell, I dunno. Mutant bacteria .”
He lifted both hands in mock surrender. “Whatever bullshit you’d come up with to make me feel less of a freak.”
He opened his mouth—to say something, to correct that, to tell Stan he wasn’t a—
“And don’t” Stan cut in sharply. “Start explainin’ it to make me feel better, Poindexter, I swear to God.”
Ford shut his mouth.
Stan nodded once. That was all he needed. A little control. Enough space to say what he didn’t know how to put into words.
“Truth is…” He shifted, kneading his knuckles into his thighs like they itched from the inside out. “It wasn’t just snow day. Or last week. Or this month. I dunno when it started. Maybe it’s always been there and I just didn’t have the guts to look straight at it. But lately, I can’t help it.”
Ford was burning up. Because Stan—Stan was saying what he thought he was saying, right? This wasn’t some twisted misunderstanding?
“You. You’re always there. You’re the first thing I see when I wake up and the last thing I think about before I fall asleep, and half the time I’m dreamin’ about you anyway. And not just normal brother stuff. Not just ‘remember when we stole the keys to Dad’s car’ kinda stuff. Feels like you’ve been livin’ in my damn skin.”
Stan looked uneasy, scared of what Ford might say. Bracing for it. Expecting him to be disgusted.
(And wasn’t that the worst thing? That Stan actually thought Ford would look at him and see anything other than—)
“I—shit, even Carla gave me grief,” Stan said suddenly, rubbing his neck. “About you.”
Ford blinked, dragged back by the curveball. “Me ?”
Stan shook his head, scoffing. “All I ever did was bring ya up in conversation. She’d get all huffy—said I oughta just go and marry you already if I was gonna keep talkin’ about you that way.”
Take that, Carla.
“She was jokin’. I think? But it stuck. Like—like a burr in my head. So I started testin’ things,” Stan said, voice flat. “Pushin’. Little things. Shoulder here, knee there. Seein’ if you’d flinch. If you’d shove me. If you’d finally say knock it off, Stan, or quit bein’ a creep. But you didn’t.”
Ford felt heat flood his face. Neck to hairline.
“Not once.”
Because, no. Ford hadn’t stopped him.
Not when he lingered too close. Not when his hands found their way onto Ford’s shoulders—casual, familiar, too much. Not when his knee pressed against Ford’s under the dinner table. Not when he had him pinned to the floor, looking down at him as if—
Ford’s face went hot, a flood of heat from scalp to stomach.
Stan shifted, eyes locked on him as though he had his answer now, seeing it clear as day on Ford’s face, in the way his fingers curled, in the way his breath hitched.
“…Fuck it.”
Ford barely registered the words before Stan moved.
Stan grabbed him. Not a hesitant touch, not careful— greedy , decisive . His fingers curled into the fabric of Ford’s sweater, fisting it near the collar, yanking him forward like this was something owed .
Stan kissed him.
The world stopped.
Or maybe it didn’t. Maybe it just tilted, the ground shifting beneath Ford’s feet, leaving him weightless and off-balance.
Either way, his brain emptied—no analysis, no overthinking, no search for meaning. Just lips. Tongue. Pressure. Stan’s hands gripping him, holding tight as if Ford might vanish.
Ford kissed back.
God help him, he kissed back.
His hands fumbled against Stan’s shirt—clinging, grasping, pulling. He didn’t know what he was doing, didn’t know how, but it didn’t matter. Stan didn’t seem to care. He kissed with a kind of hunger, as if Ford were air and he couldn’t get enough before the world snapped back to stop them.
Ford’s breath hitched as Stan shifted, pushing into him, chest to chest, heat rolling off him in waves. One hand slid down Ford’s side, fingers skating under the hem of his sweater—bare skin, contact so electric Ford shuddered, body curling into it without permission.
Stan groaned against his mouth, and Ford swore it rewired his brain.
He would do anything for that sound. Anything to hear it again.
A door creaked.
They broke apart, panting, the spell undone.
Their mother’s voice floated down the hall, muffled. “You boys still up?”
Stan, still inches from his face, grinned.
His eyes flashed with something mischievous, something that sent a bolt of pure dread through Ford’s spine.
Ford knew that look.
Stan was about to be a little shit.
Ford hissed, “Don’t you dare—”
“Yeah, Ma!” Stan called out, voice way too chipper. “We’re just wrestlin’!”
Ford nearly blacked out from horror.
“Don’t break anything,” she called back.
Stan waited. Waited until the hallway was dead quiet again. Then turned. Slowly. Still smug.
Ford looked like he wanted to throttle him. “You are—unbelievable.”
“Smart, you mean,” Stan said. “Quick on my feet.”
“You’re a menace.”
Stan winked. “ Your menace”
Ford opened his mouth to yell something unholy—and then Stan kissed him again.
Quick. Soft. A press. Then another. And another.
Not deep. Not messy. Just there. Punctuation marks. Like Stan was proving something.
He kissed Ford’s cheek. His jaw. The corner of his mouth.
Ford’s breath caught.
“You’re not stopping me,” Stan whispered.
And Ford knew, knew in his marrow, in the pit of his stomach, in the throb in his throat, that he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. Not tonight. Probably not ever. And for one suspended second—he forgot to be flustered.
Almost.
Because thinking about something and doing it? Worlds apart. Entire galaxies apart. And Ford had thought about this. God, had he thought about this. He’d built entire hypotheticals in the dark, tucked away in the margins of his notebooks, an equation he’d never dare balance. Safely contained in private corners of his skull and a few shame-stained pages in his not-diary.
But none of those thoughts or nights spent biting his fist and sweating in silence—came close to this.
Stan’s breath, was warm and wet, ghosting just under his ear. The faintest tremble in his voice. The weight of him—solid, anchoring—straddling Ford’s thighs as if it was normal. Like they did this every night.
They didn’t. They hadn’t. And now it wasn’t some fuzzy fantasy. It was heat and pressure and sweat already starting to form between their skin.
It was real.
And real had rules. Consequences. Definitions. What….what were they? Was Stan done with Carla? Was this a mistake? Was this a joke he hadn’t figured out the punchline to yet?
Stan’s hands—broad, callused, stupidly gentle—had slipped lower without Ford noticing, fingers curving around his waist, thumbs dragging slow, lazy circles along the dip of his hips. Just above the elastic of his pajama shorts.
He should say something.
But all he could do was feel. And God, he felt everything. Every point of contact. Every beat of Stan’s pulse through his hands. Every breath that ghosted hot across his face.
They needed to talk. They needed to understand this. Name it.
But Ford couldn’t remember how language worked.
His back arched, almost involuntarily, when Stan’s hands slid higher under his shirt, knuckles grazing his ribs with hesitant care, as if afraid they’d break. And just as Ford began to lose himself in the sensation, his mind betrayed him—logic spiraling, a kicked beehive of thought.
They were in their shared bedroom.
The walls were paper-thin.
Their mother and father were twenty feet away.
The door didn’t lock.
If she opened the door—
He could already hear it.
“This is a shanda for the whole block! You hear me, the whole synagogue! You think Mrs. Wasserman won’t know by sunrise? You think Rabbi Klein won’t have my number by breakfast?! Mishegas in my own home, Irina’ll throw a goddamn parade!”
Ford clenched his eyes shut, hard. His brain skidded straight into disaster territory:
Taboo number one: boys.
Taboo number two: his brother.
Ford would be lucky to survive this with both kneecaps.
Stan must’ve felt it—of course he did, the bastard was practically glued to him—because his hands stilled. They flattened out, pressing a light, grounding touch beneath Ford’s ribs, soft and slow, almost reverent.
“Hey.” Stan’s voice was low, warm enough to crawl under Ford’s skin. “Don’t go gettin’ all thinky on me.”
Ford swallowed hard. His mouth opened, and because he was an idiot, he said, “Your hands are low.”
Stan’s smile was all teeth. “Could be lower.”
Ford glared. Or tried to. It came out watery and pathetic.
Still, he didn’t pull away.
“Ain’t gonna do nothin’ you don’t want,” Stan murmured.
Ford scoffed, weak. “I’m not going to do anything.”
Stan rolled his eyes. “Listen to you. Grammar in the middle of sin. Real sexy, Sixer.”
“Some of us have standards.”
Stan’s grin dipped, not quite disappearing—just softening. “Some of us… don’t got a clue what we’re doin’. But I’m tryin’, I swear.”
Ford looked at him. Really looked.
That stupid messy hair, still damp from his shower. The freckle near his left eye. That old scar on his collarbone from climbing the fence near the old cemetery when they were eight. Everything familiar. Everything Ford had never been allowed to want.
And maybe it was selfish—maybe it was the worst, most dangerous part of him—but Ford knew he wasn’t going to stop Stan. How could he? When this was the one thing he’d never thought he’d get, not in a thousand lifetimes. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ruin himself, and he was already halfway to the gallows.
Instead of answering, Ford slid his hands up under Stan’s shirt, fisting the hem, tugging until they were nose-to-nose, breath mingling. Foreheads touching.
“You’re heavy,” Ford muttered.
Stan huffed a laugh, nose brushing Ford’s cheek, grinning against his skin. “Hey, I’m all muscle. Ma says so.”
“Sure you are,” Ford whispered. And tugged him closer. “I like it.”
That made Stan freeze, just for a beat. And then Stan kissed him again, harder, more certain.
Ford let his head fall back against the pillow, let the kiss devour the part of him still trying to think, to rationalize. Stan’s mouth was hot, persistent, and when he shifted, hips rolling experimentally, Ford’s body arched without permission.
The drag of fabric between them—pajama pants, thin and useless—felt unbearable. The friction maddening. Ford’s hands scrabbled against Stan’s back, nails dragging, trying to get closer.
It still wasn’t enough.
“Off,” Ford mumbled, tugging at Stan’s waistband, fingers clumsy and shaking. “These off.”
Stan stilled, pulling back just enough to search Ford’s face.
One heartbeat. Two.
“Yeah,” Stan breathed, voice cracking at the edges. “Okay.”
And the look on his face, like Ford had just handed him the moon.
Stan’s pupils were blown wide, lips swollen, fingers trembling where they gripped the hem of Ford’s shirt—as if it were the only thing keeping him steady. As if it had always mattered, and Ford was just now realizing it.
His pants were gone before he registered it, flung into the gap between the bed and the wall. The boxers followed. Stan’s were already halfway down, the elastic catching on his hipbone, reluctant to let go. He cursed under his breath, yanking them off one-handed and nearly elbowing Ford in the ribs.
“Graceful,” Ford muttered, breathless, grinning despite himself.
“Shut up,” Stan growled—but his voice broke halfway through, raw and unsteady, and Ford’s grin faded into something gentler. He watched Stan lower himself again, their skin brushing, flushed and bare, chests pressed close, hips meeting with the inevitability of magnets sliding across glass.
The first slow, inevitable grind made Ford choke on his own breath.
Stan exhaled, heavy head thunking to Ford’s shoulder. “Fuck,” he whispered, reverent. “You feel… ”
“Shh—fuck —Stan—” Ford hissed, ears burning, hips moving anyway because he was the worst kind of hypocrite.
“You shush me when I’m barin’ my soul?” Stan whispered, mock-wounded.
“Stanley. ”
Stan grinned against his throat. Ford’s hips rocked up to meet Stan’s drag, the friction catching him off guard. Bare skin to bare skin, cocks pressed together, slippery and perfect and wrong in every way he’d never stop craving. The rhythm was clumsy at first. Too much thigh, too much sweat, knees knocking as they tried to find a pattern. But then Stan shifted, hips angling just right, and—
The bed gave a telltale groan.
Ford went rigid, eyes darting to the door. “Quiet—Jesus—”
“I am being quiet,” Stan said, a little too loud.
Ford slapped a hand over his mouth.
Stan laughed into it, muffled and wicked, tongue flicking against Ford’s palm just to be a menace. Ford’s spine bowed a full-body twitch. “God, you’re disgusting.”
“Yeah?” Stan breathed against his skin, dragging their hips together again, harder. “Then why’re you shakin’ like that, huh?”
Ford nearly choked. “Would you shut up— ”
Stan ground down again, harder this time, slick heat catching perfectly. Ford’s fingers clawed at his arms, grounding himself, breath punched out with every thrust, quiet curses whispered against Stan’s collarbone. The rhythm was frantic now—no finesse, just raw need, hips chasing friction, sweat dripping, the bed whining beneath them like it wanted to give up and collapse under the pressure of what they were doing.
And Ford was unraveling. Fast. “Fuck, I can’t—” Ford gasped, every muscle pulled tight, hands scrambling up Stan’s back, anchoring, clawing.
Stan leaned in again, lips brushing the shell of his ear like he was drunk on the moment. “You remember that night?”
Ford blinked, dazed. “Wha—?”
Stan groaned, hips stuttering against his. “When you caught me jerkin’ off.”
Ford stiffened.
“Yeah. That one,” Stan grinned, nipping at his jaw. “You said my name. Real soft. Like you didn’t mean to. And you made a sound…”
“Shut up— ”
“You know what I was thinkin’ about?” Stan’s voice cracked.
“Stan— ”
“You. Just like this. Under me. Lookin’ up at me like you’re about to break. ”
Ford did break. He came with a whimper, shaking. Stan bit down hard on his shoulder, breath hitching, and then followed, hips jerking, cock twitching against Ford’s belly as he groaned into the crook of his neck.
The silence afterward was deafening. Just the hum of the radiator and the sound of two idiot boys trying not to sob from overstimulation.
Stan’s body collapsed on top of him, heavy and solid, breath gusting hot against his throat.
Ford didn’t want him to move. Not an inch.
His legs still felt numb.
Minutes passed.
Maybe hours.
Eventually, Stan peeled himself off and rolled onto his back, hair soaked, limbs limp as if he’d just finished a championship match. They both stared at the ceiling slats of the bunk above, half-expecting divine commentary.
Their hands found each other under the covers.
Ford looked over.
Stan was already looking with a smile. Soft and crooked, carrying a kind of honesty it couldn’t shake—ruined him.
He hesitated, then asked it anyway. “Carla?”
Stan’s smile twitched but didn’t fall. “Didn’t even get this far,” he said. “Not even close.”
Ford blinked. “Really?”
“Didn’t want to.”
Silence again.
Then Stan shifted closer, his hand sliding beneath the blanket, fingers threading into Ford’s as if they’d always belonged there.
Ford swallowed hard, eyes stinging. His throat tightened when he whispered, “Why me?”
Stan kissed his knuckles, lips barely touching. “Because it’s always been you.”
“…We’ll figure it out,” Stan murmured, his voice quiet now. Real.
Ford’s fingers squeezed his.
Yeah.
They’d figure it out.