His hands fall as he tilts his head in confusion. “Huh?”
“There’s only one referee in a game, the one in the white hat who calls the penalties. The rest are judges or the replay official or the umpire.”
“. . . Do they all wear the black-and-white-striped shirts?”
“Yeah.”
He stares at me, not blinking for a long time. When he does move, it’s to grab a couch pillow, which he uses to whack me with repeatedly. “Hendrix Rosetta Avery!”
“Ow! Not my middle name!”
“To us plebeians, they are all refs! Every. Single. One.” He hits me with each staccato word. “You knew what I meant.”
“Okay. Okay. Micah, seriously. I’m still sore from the game last night.”
“How? You were benched,” he hisses like a little gremlin.
I point my finger in his face, tone serious. “Hey.”
He deflates. “Sorry.”
Back to the matter at hand . . . “Isn’t Larson, like, hella old?”
“He’s forty-three.”
I shoot him a look that asks, “Why the fuck do you know that?”
“I googled him. He’s attractive, not gonna lie. The salt-and-pepper look fits him well.”
“But Kit is . . .”
“Twenty-two,” he supplies when I can’t recall. “I googled him, too. He’s a running back.”
I roll my lips between my teeth, nodding in what I hope comes across as supportive. “Yes, Mike. Good job.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “Don’t patronize me.”
Raising my hands in surrender, I steer him back to the gossip. “So, a twenty-one—”
“A twenty-one-year age difference! Can you believe it?”
“It’s . . . something,” I acknowledge.
“And that has to be a conflict of interest, no?”
“Home field advantage?”
Micah gasps and swats my shoulder. “No.”
Laughter bubbles out of my chest, surprising me, but I let it burst free. I’m not sure when the last time I laughed in front of Micah was, though his face says it has been a long fucking time. It doesn’t seem that long to me. Perhaps because I laugh so often with Tahegin, it’s becoming a normal thing. I guess I haven’t been spending as much time with Micah as I should, if this is the first.
“The NFL has been good for you,” he notes.
“Tahegin has been good for me,” I correct without thinking.
Hiding a grin, Micah falls back against the couch and tips his head to stare at the ceiling. We’re quiet for a moment, him watching nothing and me watching him. Eventually, he gives a thoughtful hum. “I always wondered why they call Kit ‘Baby Boy.’”
“Why?”
“Doesn’t it make sense?” He rolls his head to look at me. “We call him baby boy, and he’s dating a significantly older man—a daddy, if you will.”
I feel my eyes widen in shock at the implication. “Micah!”
“I’m just saying!”
“Well, don’t. It isn’t any of our business.”
The doorbell rings, most likely our takeout arriving, so Micah excuses himself to go handle it. He returns with his arms full of the vegan Chinese cuisine that Tahegin introduced me to. Micah isn’t thrilled about it, but it’s nice of him to try. I had told him we could order pizza or something, and he’d shot me down in favor of this place—he said I’ve been mooning over it since the first time I tasted it.
We eat in silence, save for the TV softly playing in the background, until Micah looks at me, the gears in his head turning loud enough to catch my attention. I pause with a bite of eggplant stir-fry almost to my mouth and quirk a questioning eyebrow.
“Will you tell me—about your parents? It’s just, you told Tahegin, even though you haven’t known him nearly as long as we’ve known each other.”
Setting my food on the table, I take in his sincere expression and the nervous fumbling of his chopsticks. “I wasn’t aware you wanted to know. I mean, you haven’t asked . . .” Except that one time shortly after we were paired as roommates in college, and I had—
“You kind of snapped my head off the one time I did ask, so I never mentioned it again. I thought you would tell me when you were ready.”
“You’re right,” I agree. “I should have told you before now. If you want to listen, I’m ready to talk.”