Tuesday morning, Nick was bent over his maths homework all form. Charlie glanced at the page over his shoulder. "You know there's an easier way to do that, right?"

Nick frowned at him. "If I knew that, wouldn't I be doing it that way?"

Charlie smiled, taking the pen from him. "Here. Let me show you."

He demonstrated the problem and its solution, with Nick watching closely. "But, wait, how did you get from here to here?" He pointed.

"Like this." Charlie wrote rapidly.

Nick shook his head. "I don't think I ever learnt how to do it that way."

"It's not how they teach you. I just figured it out myself."

"It does look easier than the way I've been doing it. Hey. You want to come over after practise and show me how to do it this way? My mum would be happy to feed you dinner if it means getting my maths homework done quicker."

Charlie nodded. "Okay."

At Nick's house later that day, they sat side-by-side, heads bent over the paper, while Charlie showed Nick all the various tricks and shortcuts he'd learnt over the years.

"God, this is so much easier! Why don't they teach you this way in school?" Nick asked, leaning his head back with a sigh of relief.

"I don't know. Maybe their job wouldn't look so hard if we all knew how to do things the easy way?"

"Well, you're a genius, that's what I say. Absolute genius."

"Shut up," Charlie said, looking away.

Nick found himself staring, studying Charlie's profile. He wasn't sure why. Clearing his throat, he got to his feet. "You want a cup of tea?"

"Okay."

Charlie stayed at the table while Nick made the tea. He leaned over Charlie to put his cup down, resting one hand on Charlie's shoulder as he did so. It felt so natural, the casual touch, but what if Charlie read something into it? He hastily took his hand away.

That Friday, they took Nellie for a walk in the park to celebrate the end of the half-term. As they walked, Nick kept drifting toward Charlie, bumping his shoulder, apologising, moving away, and then slowly drifting again. He wasn't sure why that was happening, except that he liked hearing Charlie talk and kept wanting to move closer.

"Do you want to switch sides?" Charlie asked after the third time it happened.

"What? Oh. No. It must just be your magnetic personality." He smiled at Charlie, and Charlie smiled back. He had a really beautiful smile, so open. His eyes were beautiful, too. Nick found it hard to look away.

He made a joke about the science test he'd taken earlier that day, trying to distract himself from looking at Charlie, but he kept drifting for the rest of the walk, kept sneaking glances at Charlie's face. They were friends, he told himself. It was okay to feel like you liked looking at your friends, wasn't it?

It must be. Yeah. And he did his best to put it out of his mind.

They spent Saturday afternoon going through all of Nick's video games, finding that Charlie beat him easily at most of them.

Monday, Charlie came over to watch a movie. They ended up watching The Transporter, which they'd both seen but not for a while. Nick knew about cars, so he was able to fill Charlie in on some of the details of the car stunts.

Nellie stretched out between them, her nose on Charlie's leg and her back feet on Nick's. "You know, she doesn't usually like my friends that much," Nick said. "'Course, usually they come over in a big group and they're very loud. You're not like that; you're much more gentle with her." He looked up at Charlie, thinking how nice this was, just the two of them and Nellie. He smiled a little, glad to have Charlie Spring in his life, thinking that if he was Nellie, he'd probably put his head in Charlie's lap, too, and just ... rest.

Nellie stirred suddenly and Nick looked away, wondering where that thought had come from. Watching a movie together was one thing, but wanting to ... cuddle? That was a whole different thing.

Wednesday it rained, so they spent the afternoon in Nick's room, scrolling through their phones, showing each other old pictures they'd saved, updating their Instas. It was so nice and so comfortable, just hanging out together, not even talking sometimes. Nick had never had a friend like this before. The closest person he could think of that he felt this normal with was his mum, who was his favourite person.

When it came time to leave, Nick walked Charlie to the door. "Is it silly if I say I had a really good day? Like, we didn't even do anything."

"I know. But, same." Charlie smiled and reached for the doorknob. They were standing very close to each other in the hall, and Nick had a sudden urge to hug him.

Instead, he took a step back. "So, movie on Sunday? You can pick this time."

"Yeah. Sounds good. 'Night, Nick."

"'Night, Charlie." Nick stood in the doorway until Charlie had turned round the shrubs at his neighbor's house.

"You two are spending a lot of time together," his mum said when Nick finally closed the door and went inside.

"Yeah. He's a good friend."

She smiled. "I'm glad. I like him."

"Me, too." Nick couldn't help smiling, too.

Sunday's movie was the old Tim Burton Batman, which Nick had never seen. They sat closer together on the couch today, with Nellie tucked between them. All through the movie, they kept reaching to pet her at the same time, their hands brushing. Nick withdrew his hand quickly the first couple of times, but after that, their hands would touch for longer before he took his away.

Nick told himself he wasn't moving his hand because it was silly to worry about it—they were just petting the dog—but some part of him wasn't sure that was the whole reason.

When the credits rolled, Nellie got sleepily off the couch. Nick's mum took her out for her nightly walk, and Nick and Charlie stayed on the couch, facing each other. Almost, but not quite, close enough to touch.

In order to distract himself from that strange thought, Nick started thinking about other movies they could watch. "Oh, my God, you know what we have to do next," he said as the perfect idea came to him.

"What?"

"The MCU."

"The what?"

"The Marvel Cinematic Universe."

"Oh." Charlie frowned a little. Then the frown went away and he said, "Aren't there like thirty movies in that?"

Nick grinned. "Just about. Plus some TV shows."

"That's a lot of movies."

A sudden panic filled Nick. Had he read Charlie entirely wrong? Did Charlie not want to keep hanging out the way they had been? It had been so much fun spending most of this half-term with him, Nick didn't want to stop. "Well, if you'd rather not ..." he said, sitting up.

Hastily, Charlie said "No! No, it sounds ... it sounds good."

Nick smiled, pretending to have been joking, filled with probably more relief than he ought to feel, and leaned back against the sofa cushions again. "Good." Charlie's eyes were really beautiful, he thought suddenly. Such a deep, dark blue.

Neither of them moved. They stayed there, just looking at each other, heads resting against the sofa cushions, until the door banged closed behind Nick's mum when she came back with Nellie.

Both of them immediately jumped up and went to pet Nellie.

Nick walked Charlie to the door. "See you in form tomorrow."

"Yeah."

But that didn't feel like enough. And Charlie was on his way out the door. "Charlie!" Nick called out.

Stopping with the door half open, Charlie looked at him over his shoulder.

Nick kind of wanted to hug him. Would that be weird? That would be weird. He stuck his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching for him. "I had a really good week. Um ... thanks for hanging out so much." That was probably weird, too, that they'd spent most of the week together, but it had been so much fun.

Charlie's smile lit his whole face. Nick wanted to see him smile like that more. "Me, too. I'll ... I'll see you soon."

"Yeah." This time, Nick let Charlie leave.

He went up to bed, but he kept thinking about Charlie—the way he laughed when he was beating Nick at MarioKart, the softness in his face when he was petting Nellie, the way his eyes seemed to change colors depending on his mood.

Nick told himself to stop it, that he shouldn't be so invested in this friendship, that it was weird to think as much about a friend as he thought about Charlie ... but he couldn't help it. And he wasn't sure he wanted to.