out over it yesterday, and a better friend would’ve been thinking about his, too. His fear of rejection, his fear that one day his life would change dramatically and he couldn’t do anything about it.
“We’ll always be Kit and Andy,” I promised. “Like I said yesterday, you’re not getting rid of me that easy. Even if I have to like... book an audience to see you sometime.”
“I’ll always keep room in my schedule for you. I have promised you pizza every Friday night for the rest of our lives, and I mean to keep that promise.”
“That’s okay, then,” I said, rolling out of bed. “Time to go scandalize your mom some more.”
10
Kit
“Do you boys have anything planned for today?” Father asked, pouring tea for Andy like the world’s most affable host, a role he almost never took on.
Andy accepted the cup, yawned, and let his head fall against my shoulder.
Mother looked determinedly out the window behind us, on the other side of the table.
“Nothing in particular,” I said. “Andy?”
“Hmm?” he hummed through a mouthful of tea. I got the feeling he was developing a taste for it.
“You mustn’t forget that invitation to Will’s little get together tonight,” Mother said, buttering toast as though it was a delicate task on par with splitting the atom. “He would be so disappointed to miss you.”
Damn. I’d forgotten all about it until now.
“The guy you were talking to yesterday?” Andy asked.
“Oh yes,” Mother said, still without looking at him. “They’re very old friends. Joined at the hip when they were boys.”
That was a lie, but I hesitated to start an argument over the breakfast table. Mother’s fantasy had always been that we’d be the best of friends, but that wasn’t how it’d really gone.
“Is she talking about sex?” Andy stage-whispered beside me.
Father snorted, Mother glared at him, and it took all my willpower not to smirk.
“Really,” Mother said after a moment, still refusing to so much as look at Andy.
“Well,” Father spoke up. “The dogs are at your disposal, or you’re quite welcome to come into town with me today. I have some business to attend to.”
“No,” Mother said. “You’ll make them late for the party.”
Father gave me a look that said I tried loud and clear.
I appreciated the attempt.
“I like Christmas parties,” Andy spoke up.
The look on Mother’s face was priceless, and if I thought Andy would appreciate it at all I could’ve kissed him.
... I shouldn’t have been thinking about kissing Andy.
Or about the sheer joy of waking up in the middle of the night with Andy snuggled up against my side, cuddling me like a favorite stuffed toy.
The embarrassment of this morning was a small price to pay for that memory. Even now it made my heart ache with tenderness at the thought of the tiny smile on his face, the way his fingers curled gently into my t-shirt.
I knew better than to think any of that was because of me, specifically. I’d just been a warm body.
But I liked the way being a warm body for Andy felt.
“Well, there you have it,” Father said, smiling down at his eggs. “Andy coming to your defense, dear.”
There was nothing Andy could have done that would’ve upset mother more.
“Perhaps there’s hope for him.” Mother sniffed. “Robert plans to arrive tomorrow,” she added.
“Oh good,” Father said, by which he clearly meant he would have preferred to put his hand in the blender.
Or Robert’s, for that matter.
Robert—my uncle, my mother’s oldest brother and the Duke of Hartsworth—shared a place in both mine and my father’s hearts as least favorite relative.
“Must you take that tone in front of a guest?” Mother asked, making it clear that when she said guest, she meant outsider.
I took Andy’s hand, linking our fingers together between our place settings.
“I thought he wasn’t a guest,” Father said. “I since he wasn’t welcome in the front parlor.”
Mother glared at him.
Father took another slice of toast and the jar of marmalade from the middle of the table. “Can I offer you some of this marmalade, Andy?” he asked. “Kit never developed a taste for it, but I suspect your palate to be somewhat more adventurous.”
Andy shrugged. “Guess I’ll try anything once.”
Father smiled to himself as he spread the slice of toast liberally with marmalade, cutting it in half and passing it across the table to Andy, making Mother roll her eyes again.
Andy took a curious bite, hummed, and ate the rest of the half slice without a pause, licking his sticky fingers clean when