matchbox

"Alright," Nursey says, still a little bewildered. He looks down at the box in his lap. It's maybe half as long and wide as a laptop and fairly shallow, wrapped cleanly and concisely in pink wrapping paper with red hearts on it. Nursey carefully glides his finger through the taped flap on the side of the box and pulls the paper off cautiously.

The plain cardboard box underneath is thankfully easy to open, tape peeling off in one clean tear. Inside the box is a rectangular something wrapped a few times over in bubble wrap. "Did you bubble wrap this just so you could throw it at me?" Nursey asks, looking away from the package at Dex where he's watching Nursey.

Dex shrugs, but he's got half of that dorky grin that he gets when he's proud of one of his lame jokes. Nursey scoffs and rolls his eyes, but he's smiling too.

He starts unwrapping the bubble wrap to reveal a small, thin black journal, maybe 8 inches in length. Nursey appreciates it, he always needs more notebooks, but he doesn't understand why Dex would go out of his way to get Nursey one. "Thanks, dude."

Dex's brows pinch together. "No, open it," he says, gesturing at Nursey.

Nursey is still confused, but he obliges, flipping open the cover to the journal. One of his favorite Pablo Neruda poems, Love Sonnet XVII, is handwritten on the first page in both the English translation and Spanish.

All of the following pages are filled with Nursey's favorite poems: all ones he's bookmarked or highlighted or annotated in his collection, all in Dex's blocky capitalized handwriting.

The last page of the book is blank, save for a line at the bottom that reads: A blank space for yours.

The inside of the back cover reads Sorry for my pedestrian takes on Emily Dickinson. Happy birthday & Happy Valentine's, dated 2016. The final line reads Love, Dex.

Nursey looks up at him again where he's fidgeting in place uncomfortably. "Dex." Nursey's voice comes out urgent and breathless. He finds himself without the words to describe the vines squeezing his heart and the flowers that bloom off them.

Nursey can just barely see the way Dex squeezes his arms with his fingertips where they're crossed. Nursey doesn't think he could miss a thing right now. He can't look away. "Is it too much?" Dex asks, uncharacteristically bashful. "If it's too much, you don't have to keep it, I can—"

"No," Nursey interrupts. Dex would have to pry this book from his cold dead hands, and even then, he doesn't think Dex would have much luck. "No, I love it."

"Okay, um, I'm going to…" Dex trails off, gesturing bodily to the door.

"No, dude, wait," Nursey says, dismounting the top bunk with the book in hand. He kind of wishes now that he'd taken Dex's advice and kept the bottom bunk after Dex moved to the basement because then he'd be over to Dex faster.

Nursey sets the journal on his desk gently, crossing the room as fast as he can without looking like an idiot or scaring Dex off or both. Nursey steadies his hands on Dex's arms. He wishes Dex would let him touch more often. Nursey stares into Dex's eyes, searching his face. "I love it." He doesn't know how else to tell Dex. He doesn't know if it's too soon to say I love you instead. Technically, Dex said it first, right? Love, Dex. That counts. And if that doesn't count, surely the journal itself must, because you don't give things like that to people you're not dating if you don't mean I love you. Hell, you don't give that to people you are dating if you don't mean I love you. Nursey's seen worse marriage proposals.

Nursey pulls him in for a hug, because if he doesn't, he'll kiss Dex, and Dex is still acting like he's being held hostage. Dex slithers his arms out from where they're pressed between them and hugs him lightly. "I love it," Nursey says again, mumbling into his ear. Dex holds him a little tighter.

Nursey makes himself pull away. "If I didn't know any better," and he really does, actually, but he has to joke, has to lead into this somehow because Dex isn't giving him anything, "I'd think you were trying to wife me up, Poindexter." Dex smiles at him and ducks his head a little and shoves his hands in his pockets, cheeks coloring. "Are you? You totally are," Nursey says. The early evening sunrise peeks through the blinds of the window and cuts orange stripes over Dex's face, lighting his freckles like tiny glowing stars and pooling in the wells of his irises. Nursey wants so badly to kiss him.

And Dex looks back up at him, seemingly summoning confidence. "I am, yeah," he says, and the light catches his lips. So Nursey does kiss him.

It's like fireworks, it's like the crackling of a campfire, it's like a really good book, it's like every goal he's scored in his life all at once. But mostly, it's like Dex. A little rough, a little rash, a lot sweet and gentle at its core.

"I love you," Nursey says finally, pulling away. "You romantic piece of shit."

"I love you too."