Can't Stop Us Now

“I wish they’d let us out of this place once in a while. The beach is right there.”

“Ah, but if they let us out, we could spend time away from each other. Tensions would be at an all time low, and what good would that do for ratings.”

“Shit as it is, does sorta help a bit. Three outta eight is easier than three outta nine.” 

“Always happy to help make things easier. So, does that narrow anything down immediately?”

Ian poured Caige a drink. “Here you go.”

“Cheers, man.” Caige raised his glass to Ian before downing half its contents. “So, how are you feeling about a match with Tilly?”

Rory laughed weakly. “Yeah, uh– I’m… really sorry about that. I mean, I– yeah.”

Caige shrugged. “It’s not ideal, sure, but it could have been worse. Besides, there’s only one confirmed gay man in the house. There’s bound to be more misses than hits. Doesn’t sink my battleship, ya know?”

“I don’t even know if I have the energy to get wasted tonight.”

“But you’re not gonna make me drink alone, right? I don’t need the crushing realization that I’m an alcoholic.”

The more Adam got his rhythm the easier it became to swim, though it didn’t feel quite natural to him. “You’d be way behind if you hadn’t,” Adam tried to joke. 

“No, I’d still be winning, it’d just be more fair.”

“Who’s taking cheap shots now?” Adam laughed before diving in after him. While not the best swimmer, he fought to catch up with Caige, though mostly focusing on not doing the whole drowning thing on TV. 

Caige struggled to keep his lead, Adam not far off every time he glanced back. “Doesn’t really seem to matter does it? Clearly cheating gets me no where.”

“Hopefully that mind full of books doesn’t slow you down. Ready?”

“Oy, cheap shot. Okay, ready, set –”

“Race to the waterfall?”

“Oh, you are sooooo going down.”

“Okay. Uh, should we swim?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“And… you’re gay? I’m not gay.” 

“Yeah, I’m gay. Though you know there are other sexualities than gay and straight though, yeah? It’s not a black or white sort of thing. There are sexualities where you can be interested in guys, girls, both, neither, and everything in between.”

“I uh, well, I dunno if you can call it that. I’ve only ever dated girls.” 

“You know you can date girls and still be not straight, right? I mean I’ve dated girls before.”

“Helpful to the people who wrote them.” 

“Guess I can’t argue against that, but what were you going to do if I refused? We haven’t even talked before.”

“I think reading is probably more acceptable as fun than something that sounds like work.” 

“Can uh, can I ask why you picked me?” 

“More acceptable, maybe, but not nearly as cool. Or, you know, helpful to other people.”

“Nah, I teach others to defend themselves for fun. What about you?” 

“I feel like anything I say sort of pales in comparison to something like that.”

“Close, I uh, happen to live in Chicago. Wasn’t that far away, but it was a pretty good run.” 

“So you’re one of those people who run for fun then?”