6. Chapter 6

If I thought being off skates with a minor shoulder injury from yonks ago would equate to a few lazy weeks hanging around with Kitty, I was sorely mistaken.

Sorely being the operative word.

Dr Sullivan's recovery regime was, not to put too fine a point on it, fucking brutal. It involved stretching, lifting, stretching, cardio, stretching, massage, and, to nobody's surprise, more bloody stretching.

Not just normal stretching, oh no. The stretches Jamie had me doing were uncivilised at best, and at worse, probably illegal in several states.

And not only my shoulder. Jamie had me FLEX-ing and EXTEND-ing muscles and joints that were about as far from my shoulder as they could get. Shouting commands at me as though he was my drill sergeant and determined I wouldn't miss out on the actual agony of training camp.

"It's about whole body conditioning," he would say. And then proceed to spend the next two hours demanding I put on a one-man squats, leg press, and hamstring stretching show for him. "Give me ten more. Another ten. Just ten more, and you can rest."

He would watch the entire thing, brow furrowed in Super Concentration?. Occasionally, he would come over and correct my techniques, which meant sometimes he'd touch my butt … If I timed it right and moved it into his touch, but still.

"Oh, so sorry. Did you accidentally touch my arse again? I'm probably not doing it right."

I quickly learned to weaponise my incompetence.

"Kitty, I'm not sure about my posture while doing this stretch. Can you check it for me?"

The cat cow stretch. Where you get on all fours and alternate between bending your back in an arc upwards (the cow) and then reversing that arc and popping your butt out (the cat). Which is what I was doing on the mat in the weights room.

"Your posture's fine. You know it's fine. You ask me every time. It's been fine every time," Jamie said. One hand on his hip, the other on his forehead like he was either a Regency woman swooning, or he was trying to iron out the wrinkles with his fingers. He'd been pacing the gym.

He was always pacing. His brows furrowed, lots of wrist watch checking and unnecessary sighing and calling upon our lord's son. He looked like a 1950's father waiting for the birth of his first child.

"Are you sure my spine's not bent in the wrong way?" I asked, rolling from cow to cat, and really, really sticking my ass out. "Can you get behind me and check how straight it is?"

He did, because, by now, he'd realised it was quicker not to argue with me. Simpler to get it over and done with and shut Bowie up.

"It's fine. Not ben—Stop looking at me over your shoulder like that."

I rolled back into cow, and groaned, and Jamie immediately moved to my side as though staring right at my ass was just too much. "This stretch feels great. It's really opening up my—"

"Don't."

"I was going to say chakras, you pervert. What did you think I was going to say?"

I chanced a peek at Jamie, who, despite himself, was smiling. Damn, that smile was everything.

Back into cat, and Jamie didn't move. He simply stared at me, drifting off into his own thoughts, perhaps. His eyes took on an unfocused glaze, like he was looking, but not seeing. Like his brain was banking up images of me, but his eyes were inactive participants. I let him get his fill.

Until I got bored.

"What're you thinking about?" I said it in my most bedroom voice because I would have put money on that being the thing he'd been thinking about.

Jamie stumbled, almost tripping over his own feet, practically confirming my suspicions. "That, uh, you should switch stretches. Ten reps of cat cow is enough. You've done at least triple that."

"Good. I need to do my hammies now." I flipped onto my back, and Jamie passed me a yoga strap, then knelt beside me. "Do you know what's weird?"

"What?" he groaned, with all the patience of someone waiting for the punchline to a Christmas cracker joke.

"You're in a gym, and you're wearing a button-down."

"So?"

"You're in a gym, and you're wearing a button-down," I repeated, louder.

"I have appointments today in my therapy room. You're not my only patient, you know?"

"But you could change?" And he would. I'd seen his little collection of dry-cleaner bags in his office. But changing from one button-down to another was … odd. Even for Dr Perfect … "Oh, I get it now."

Jamie paused, like he wasn't sure whether he wanted to ask. He did eventually. "Get what?"

This whole look of his. His one-thousand-times pressed shirts, his ultra manicured five o'clock shadow, his Hollywood smile, that cologne. Total professionalism. No tattoos on show, not a hair out of place—I bet he even combed his pubes—was all a front. A mask to hide behind. He'd built a fortress. A big super-doctor stronghold.

There was Jamie, and there was Dr James Sullivan, PT, DPT. We had more in common than I realised. Archie and Jamie. Both of us with our secret selves.

Like the brief glimpses of Archie I'd let through, Jamie had occasionally given me insights into the real him. Like at the lake. Those tattoos.

There were animals, from what I could make out. Bears, and snarling predator types, a big bird and skull on his chest, a few people-ish ones, and some scrolling text I couldn't read because he wouldn't let me look at him long enough.

I decided not to answer his question. "What do your tattoos mean?"

Jamie opened his mouth to speak, closed it again. "You're doing the stretch wrong," he said.

"Well, come here and help me with it, then." Okay, he wasn't ready to talk about the tattoos.

Jamie obliged, affecting a little eye-roll like, Oh, this kid. He moved between my thighs (hot) and dropped to his knees (super fucking hot). I stuck my leg up straight into the air at a forty-five degree angle.

His warm hands closed around my ankle and supported my knee, and he pushed the leg towards me. "How's this?"

I groaned, because I was mature like that.

Jamie shook his head infinitesimally, but I didn't miss the gesture. "Tell me about England. What's it like? I've only been once, a long time ago."

"Did you go anywhere besides London?"

"No," he admitted. "I had a g—a thing in London. We didn't get much time to explore. What's Burton Willesberry like?"

"Bru-ton Wills-bree," I corrected. "Well, there are a lot of farms, and it rains ninety-percent of the time. We get two weeks of summer, usually in May or September, then it's cold for the rest of the year. My neighbours—my folks' neighbours are having a decade long feud about which bins go out on which days.

"The main pub is called The White Hart. The landlady is Chris. She's one of those people who's just, like, always there when you need her to be. You could knock on her pub doors at five A.M. and ask for a jacket potato with cheesy beans and she'd invite you in and get the fire on and the kettle and … On Thursdays they do a pub quiz. I won it once. Chris rigged it, though. She made the picture round NHL logos. My brothers were fuming." I laughed, remembering how irritated Harry had been, furiously Googling them under the table, until Chris caught him and confiscated his phone.

"What are your brothers like?" Jamie asked in a quiet voice. He laid my leg flat on the ground and motioned for me to lift the other. "Do they live at home?"

"No. Well, Theo's just moved back from uni, so I guess he does for now, and Finley's still studying. But he only went to Bristol. Mostly so he can come home on the weekends and get Mum to do his washing. My older brothers Olly and Harry live in the village, but in their own houses."

I laughed again. "I'm the smallest, out of all my brothers, right? Olly's like six-nine, and he lives in this three-hundred-year-old cottage. Like, why? The ceilings are literally about six-feet tall. Even I have to bend down to get through the doors in the old part of his house. On Sundays we all go to Mum and Dad's for a roast. Sometimes Chris will come round with her girlfriend, or my mum's friend Lyn, or my aunt and cousins. It's always a very busy and noisy house."

I stopped talking and looked at Jamie, properly looked at him. He was smiling. A sort of soft, dreamlike smile.

"It sounds incredible," he said, in a voice that matched his expression.

I suddenly remembered where we were. What we were doing. Me, flat on my back, my entire leg in Jamie's grip. I didn't want to ruin the moment, but …

"Harder, Kitty," I whispered, gazing into his eyes. He frowned at me. "Stretch me harder."

To his credit, Jamie was a pro at maintaining his cool, even when I deliberately took things to a weird, and one-hundred percent inappropriate, place.

"Kitty, harder. Come on, I can barely feel that."

Jamie pressed his chest against my calf and pushed forward. "Do you go home for the holidays much? Do you stay in your old room, or do you get a hotel?"

"Trying to get a good mental image of me in bed, ay? No, I don't stay in my old room. I used to share it with Theo and Finley. It's only a three-bed house. So when Harry moved out, Finley stole that room. I could stay with my parents, but I'd have to bunk with one of my younger brothers. Finley has this girlfriend he's always on the phone with, and I don't fancy hearing their phone sex, and Theo's a gamer. He has headphones, but when it's like three o'clock in the morning and he's screaming ‘Bot!' and ‘He's behind the barrels!' it's not much fun."

"Three bedrooms for …" Jamie did a quick mental calculation. "Seven people?" He leaned heavier on my leg.

"You're forgetting everything is smaller in Britain. Also, lol, there are no hotels in Bruton Willesbury. You can stay at the pub. It's a BB, but I usually stay with Olly."

"In his low-ceilinged, chocolate-box cottage?"

"Right."

I smiled. This overlap between my two lives, my two personalities, between Archie and Bowie, felt strange, and … right. Like Jamie was letting me be me. Like he wanted to see the guy behind the unfaltering self-assuredness.

"Give it some welly. I'm bendier than you think," I said, keeping the same softness in my voice to let him know I was enjoying the conversation. I wanted him to ask me more. I wanted to know what Jamie thought of Archie.

Just the teeniest eye-roll. He pushed further still. The muscle began singing. That point where the stretch felt so fucking good. Riding the fine line between pleasurable and why, God, why?

"Does Olly have a family, or is he single?"

"Why? You in the market? Yes, he's single. Gay, too. So's Harry."

"That's great your folks are cool with that."

"Honestly, I think as long as we're happy and we like rugby, they wouldn't care what we did or who we fucked. Harder, Kitty."

He blinked at me, then leaned in further. My foot stuck up over his shoulder. I decided I enjoyed seeing my feet there.

"Is Harry single as well?"

I raised my eyebrow, even though I was sure my face was turning beetroot red by this point. "Wow, you certainly have a thing for the Bowman boys, don't you?" I teased. "To be honest, nobody is ever sure with Harry. He doesn't talk much about himself. He'll disappear for weeks, no calls or texts, and then one day, he'll just rock up at Mum and Dad's for Sunday lunch with, like, a ski-goggles tan line, or a buzz cut. One time he came wearing a tuxedo and sliders and gave literally no explanation."

Jamie laughed. "It sounds like your mom had her work cut out for her."

"Kitty," I said, taking on a serious tone. He pulled his gaze to my face. "Harder."

"I can't go harder. I'll break you."

"I can take it."

He shook his head.

"Please."

He shook his head again and gave me a look, somewhere between an apology and fear, and he pushed harder. His fingertips touched the mat on either side of my waist.

"Harder."

"Bowie." He was pleading now, his own face turning red.

"Harder."

His palms were flat against the mat, his elbows bending more and more. I groaned. Cried out. He copied me.

And still he kept pushing.

It was too much.

But so fucking good.

I'd probably pass out.

Jamie could carry me to his office in his massive arms and nurture me back to health.

His mouth was open. Mirroring mine.

Further still.

His huge, solid body loomed over mine.

I was yelling.

He was yelling.

So much yelling—

"Get a room, guys!" Rowan said, barrelling into the gym, dragging Aaron and Zac behind him.

The room swam back to me with dizzying clarity. Jamie was on top of me, red faced, ordinarily flawless hair sticking out at wayward angles. He pounced to his feet and smoothed down his shirt, looking around the mat like he'd lost his keys.

If it weren't for the fact we were both fully dressed, it would have looked unimaginably compromising. Exactly how it felt.

I gave the guys a smile and a wave. "Alright, lads," I said, still flat on my back. I brought my knees up to hide certain involuntary bodily reactions that seemed to have developed during our little sesh.

Jamie scratched his temple, not quite meeting the eyes of the newcomers. God, I loved seeing him flustered.

He looked at me. "Get up," he mouthed, his cheeks delightfully pink.

"Can't stand up right now," I said, loud enough for everyone to hear. I dropped my knees to the mat. "I've got a bit of a sitch going on."

Rowan snorted. The three guys watched Jamie, waiting for his reaction.

"Jesus, well," was all Jamie could manage. He looked around the gym floor again as though he'd forgotten something, pointed to me with both hands, shook his head, and headed for the gym's double doors, knocking his thigh against the dumbbell rack as he went.

He paused at the door. Ran a hand through his hair. "Uh, Cap, I've got you down for a two o'clock. Still good with you? How's your elbow?"

"Can we make it any earlier?" Aaron said. His face would have been deadpan if it weren't for the tiny twist to the corners of his lips. "The others are getting here at two for a scrimmage."

Jamie nodded, straightened his shirt once again, and left.

"Oh, my God," said Zac, shooting Aaron a look that could only have one meaning: What did I tell you?

Eventually, I sat up and pulled myself onto a nearby bench.

"How's the shoulder?" Aaron called out from across the mat. "You scrimmaging later, or still no ice time?"

I shook my head. "Not sure Sir Yes Sir will let me, but I'll stick around and watch."

Aaron flashed me a thumbs up, then immediately turned to the other half of his duo, and began—or continued—a conversation so low they might as well have been whispering sweet nothings into each other's ears.

Rowan dropped onto the bench next to me. "So, what's happening with you and the doc?"

Well, that was the question of the century, wasn't it? And the truth was, I had no idea.

I liked Jamie. Like, really liked Jamie. Like, starting to think maybe I wanted something more than a quick fuck against his physio's table. Like maybe I wanted, I didn't know … a date?

I couldn't stop thinking about him. About that body of his, and those tattoos, which he'd been hiding all this time. Well, I sort of guessed about the body. From the way his work shirts pulled deliciously over his chest. And those thick as fuck forearms he used to torture and taunt me in equal measures. But those tattoos. I could go off all Shakespearean about those tattoos if given half a minute. I would find out what they meant. At some point.

I couldn't stop thinking about our hike, either, and our swim. How incredible his body looked in the lake, streaming with run-off, his marl-grey boxer-briefs rung through with water, clinging to everything, leaving very little to the imagination.

Okay, in all fairness, it was icy cold water. Even so, what I could make out was pretty damn impressive. I had not fared so well in those conditions. Once submerged, Little Bowie took his own hike, seeking warmer climes, into my body. My pasty British skin quickly adopted a Leo-after-Kate-let-go bluish hue.

But Jamie had climbed out of that water like an inked up Daniel Craig, laughing and splashing me and doing that sexy pond-man thing like that one really hot Bridgerton brother. Or like he'd finally left the fusty pencil pusher at Bobcats HQ and had concluded fun wasn't all that bad.

But as much as I wanted something to happen between us, I knew it never would. He'd never let it.

And yet I didn't understand why. He was open for hookups. That much I knew when I found his TopTier profile. He still hadn't replied to my messages. Those two little ticks still remained grey. Unread. So either he didn't want to hook up with me, or he was already getting it from someone else.

Though, the way he acted around me gave the distinct impression he was, in fact, not hooking up with anyone besides his right hand. He bumbled his words. He gaped at me as if he, a physiotherapist, had forgotten what the male anatomy was supposed to look like, and I was providing his deprived brain with the revision it so desperately needed. And I was pretty sure that all the stuff he let me get away with doing—calling him Kitty, saying the most ludicrously suggestive things, making him touch my ass—was actually, probably, lawsuit material.

So, he liked me? Or he didn't like me? Which was it?

Because I was going out of my mind trying to figure it out.

I was a cocky asshole. Had to be. What with being the middle child of a five-son-household. I was only the youngest for two years, barely time to milk it. Not that I remembered it, anyway.

So, I had to find another way to get attention. By stepping over everyone who stood in my way. By being the person who pushed other people out of my limelight by their faces. By seizing what I wanted by the bollocks and not letting go until it was mine.

That hadn't worked with Jamie. It wouldn't work. And I knew it wouldn't work, but I still fucking tried.

He wasn't into the whole cocky-asshole thing. Fair. Neither was I. But I couldn't seem to switch it off.

Was … too afraid to.

Would anyone be as into Archie as they were Bowie? Would anyone have the time of day for me? For the injured boy with the weird accent and cultural deficits? Jamie had at least seemed interested in finding out more about me … but I was still worried it wasn't enough. He had said my talent would keep them from benching me, and I half believed it, but somebody forgot to let Archie know.

So, I would keep up with Jamie's militant regime. Because that was what Bowie would do. Get myself back on skates. Back on the ice. I would keep on being an arrogant tosser, because that was what Bowie would do. And I would keep edging myself to madness over Jamie fucking Sullivan, because I just couldn't seem to stop.

And if he didn't like it, well, he should stop throwing me such mixed signals.

"Honestly, nothing. Nothing has happened with me and the doc," I said to Rowan, acutely aware that we'd been sitting in relative silence while my brain took a brief holiday to Reflection Town.

He seemed to read between the lines. "You know, the doc and I started the same year with the Bobcats." He blew out a breath. "What, six years ago now, maybe seven. He's a stickler for the rules. Always has been. Well, not always, but definitely since … you know. If you want him to take a chance on you, you're gonna need to figure out how to get him to break his own rules."

Watching the lads skate while I sat on the benches should have been one of those things that caused the monster inside Bowie to growl with jealousy.

It didn't, though, and I couldn't explain why. Perhaps it was that now and then, Zac would yell, "This one's for you, Bowie," and smash the puck towards the net. Or perhaps it was when Rowan shouted, in such a baffoonish British accent it made me wince, "Come on, lads, get your bloody shit together," and the rink echoed with the deep laughter of my teammates.

Or maybe it was the mountain of heat occupying the plastic seat beside me. Occasionally throwing me glances, but looking away as soon as I returned them.

"It's Saturday tomorrow," Jamie said, eyes on the boys. "You can take the weekend off. Sort of."

"So kind of you, Kitty. But I do believe we have plans."

At that, he permitted himself a single look. Arching a brow, and holding out a palm, in an Explain yourself, Bowie manner.

"Well, you got to choose the location of our last date—"

"Not a date, Bowman. We just went for a hike, and … a swim." Jamie discretely adjusted the collar of his shirt.

"Yes, and thank you for all those new bank images." I shot him a wink, which he tsked at. "But I think it's only fair I get to pick our next date."

"Nope, no. We are not going on another—I mean … a date. We are not going on a date. We … no." He shook a finger between us. I seized it midair. Wrapped my fingers around it. Jamie sucked in a breath.

I resisted the urge to hiss my victory. "Only, I'm still new in town. And I don't really know anywhere. So you might have to help me."

He shook his head, turned his attention back to the scrimmage. "Nope, not playing this game."

"Dinner? Big guy like you must need feeding often."

Jamie ignored me.

"Dancing? There's a place near me—actually there are a few places near me—but there's this one. Plays nineties and early noughties cheese-pop?" I elbowed him in the ribs. "Macarena?"

Still, he ignored me.

"Goddammit, Jesse, take the body when he tries that dangling shit," he muttered towards the ice in a clear demonstration of exactly how much he was ignoring me.

He … was kind of right, though. Impressive. Doc knew him some hockey, I guessed.

"Alright, what about some culture? Got to be museums or some shit around here."

"No, there's nothing. No museums, no culture. Bringham's a cultural wasteland. So you can just stop that now."

"Is that so?"

I pulled out my phone. Out of habit, I checked the TopTier icon for a new DM notification. Nothing. I brushed off the slight pang of disappointment since I should've been used to it by now, and began typing.

"Says there are over thirty-five museums in, or near, Bringham, Maine."

Jamie rolled his eyes. A gesture I was so familiar with now, I could have painted it blindfolded. If I knew how to paint. "That's wrong. Must be out of date."

I began listing off museums as I read them. "Bringham Natural History Museum. Hmm, could be fun. You like dinosaurs, Kitty? Or … International Museum of Calligraphy. Yeah, I'm gonna veto that one. The National Collection of Ventriloquists Dummies. Yeesh, yeah, maybe you were right. Oh, my God!"

"What is it?" Jamie asked, his attention snapping to me as though I was in danger.

But I couldn't answer him because I was laughing too hard. Tears sprung from my eyes, and I folded over in my seat, pushing my face between my knees like I was having a panic attack.

"Are you choking or—" His warm hand found my back, between my shoulder blades, but in that moment he must have realised what was happening. "Are you laughing? What the fuck is so funny?" He swiped my phone from my hand. "Bringham Trolley Museum? … A. Trolley. Museum? What's so funny about that?"

"A trolley museum. A trolley museum! Why would anyone ever make a museum dedicated to trolleys?" I straightened up and wiped my face with the back of my fist.

"I don't know. Maybe they like them. Maybe they have cultural or local significance?" he said, his brows knotted together in the middle. He handed my phone back.

"Trolleys?! Trolleys though?!" I said, louder this time in case he hadn't heard me over that deadpan expression of his. Why didn't he think this was funny? Or at the very least, extremely weird. "Trolleys. Like what you push around the supermarket and put your tomatoes and bran flakes and detergent in?"

"Shopping cart?" Comprehension dawned on both of us at the same time. "Oh, my God, you guys call them trolleys?"

"Yeah. What do you call them, dum dum?" I said, smiling, even though the embarrassment was already creeping up my cheeks and burning my ears.

"Carts. Dum dum. Or carriages." He swatted my bicep with his hand, but it was too gentle to be anything other than affectionate. "I can't believe you thought there was a museum of shopping carts."

"Oh, haha, let's all laugh at the adorable foreigner," I said. And because I was a sucker for punishment, I added, "I'll book us tickets. Pick me up tomorrow at, like, midday?"

Jamie shook his head again and pursed his lips together. "No, Bowman. Not happening." But I knew, deep in the cavities of my soul, if I were to walk out my apartment's front doors tomorrow at noon, he'd be waiting for me in his big, white not-quite-a-monster-truck.

"So, what are trolleys, then?" I asked, because I should at least have some base knowledge before we turned up at a museum dedicated to them.

Jamie hefted a huge shoulder. "Maybe train carriages or something."

Jamie picked me up at precisely twelve o'clock, and drove us forty-five minutes out of Bringham into the middle of hell, probably. Dusty, browning, summer-parched lawns and cracked, weed-infested concrete seemed to disappear into the horizon on every side.

"Ahh," he said as he pulled up into the car park.

Our first—or seventh—clue should have been the dearth of other vehicles in the lot.

I jumped out of Jaime's truck, and before us, a little worse for wear, sat an enormous shopping centre. It would not have looked out of place on the set of a zombie movie.

I wondered if Jamie had taken us to the wrong place. Typed the wrong zip code into the sat nav. But there was no mistaking it. This was the correct address. Because outside of the building, in every available square metre, literally hanging from the walls, on posters and signage, and in big blinking neons above our heads, were shopping trolleys/carts/carriages/whatever you wanted to call them. The type that aided your weekly grocery shop. Definitely not the type that were on trains.

"Ha ha ha, in your face! It is a museum of shopping carts. I win!" I yelled, triumphantly punching the air.

But my victory was short-lived. Very short-lived. Given that once you'd seen one shopping cart, you'd pretty much seen them all. And given that this museum was spread out over a once-abandoned megamart (nothing like British supermarkets) with its ramshackle repairs and displays. And given that the owner of the museum, and our personal and super diligent tour guide, was stark raving bonkers.

"This beautiful specimen," our tour guide went on, "was used on the set of Supermarket Sweep Brazil. Note the dodgy front wheel that controversially cost the reigning champions their win. Couldn't reach the dairy aisle in time. Another pair snatched the victory right from under their noses."

"Fascinating," I said, while Jamie hid behind his palm. His shoulders shook with silent mirth.

"And this one here, well—You boys seen the movie E.T.?"

"Yes, was it used in the film?" I said, trying to convey at least a modicum of enthusiasm while Jamie fully checked out.

"No. It's from the Walgreens opposite the Universal lot they filmed E.T. in."

At this, Jamie bent double, raking in his breaths, sounding as though he'd swallowed a harmonica.

Our host was a Brit, because of course he was. Went by the name of Phineas Robertson. And like every old, eccentric Brit, he had long, grey wizard hair, a handlebar moustache, a dusty, moth-eaten tailcoat, a technicolour waistcoat, pinstriped brown trousers, and Air Jordans.

Red Air Jordans. As though black ones would have thrown him firmly into the too-basic camp.

He'd welcomed us fondly. In hindsight, perhaps too fondly.

But the look on Jamie's face had me ignoring all the red flags. His eyes were like saucers, his brows pulled up into his hairline, his arms outstretched, asking the silent question we were both thinking.

What the actual fuck?

Phineas had taken Jamie and me through the main part of the market/museum, and had given us a not-at-all-brief introduction to the history of the shopping trolley, despite his earlier assurances that it would be very brief indeed.

I listened to everything he'd said. Guided by my innate British manners and a deep-seated instinct for social cohesion. And frankly, it would have been rude not to.

Unlike my companion, who spent the entire introduction elbowing me in the ribs, muttering, "What the hell is this place?" and "Good lord, this stopped being ironically funny thirty minutes ago."

"It's almost as though you don't respect Sylvan Goldman's legacy, the inventor of the first ever shopping cart," I said, nudging him back, but really using any old excuse to touch him.

"I'd suggest making a run for it, but he's watching us like a beady-eyed hawk."

It was when Phineas guided us to an area earmarked for "famous" shopping carts, deceptively named Hollywood Wheels, that Jamie totally lost his shit.

"He's playing it fast and loose with the term famous, don't you think?" he asked, as Phineas took us down an aisle displaying trolleys allegedly used by Channel 6 News stars while filming a piece on the ever increasing cost of groceries.

"He's just passionate," I countered. "Everyone has to have that one thing they crave more than anything. That thing that consumes your every waking thought. That thing that, if you didn't get, or get to do, you'd spiral into a deep, bottomless pit of despair. For example, for me, that's hockey. And for you, that's sucking all the joy out of any situation."

Jamie laughed. And I figured perhaps the trolley museum wasn't such a bad idea after all. Any time I got to hear that elusive Dr James Sullivan laugh was worth it. Even if it did feel like we were trapped on the set of Dawn of the Dead.

As we walked down the narrow faux supermarket aisles, Jamie's knuckles would occasionally brush mine, sending perfect little sparks of electricity up my arm.

Jamie paused. "He's … wait, what was that phrase again? You know, the one I used when I was trying to say how drunk you were before?"

"Don't say it," I said. "I kind of feel bad for him."

But that was before the fifteen minute Ted Talk on how baskets were an infinitely inferior vessel for transporting groceries, and the twenty-eight minute grilling on the trolleys I was accustomed to at my local Bruton Willesbury shopping centres.

"Well, there's a Co-op, for milk and bread and whatnot," I offered. "But if you want to do a big shop, everyone uses the Waitrose in Upper Willesbury Highstreet."

"Mmhmm," Phineas said, gripping the handlebar of a nearby cart so hard his knuckles turned white. "And describe the trolleys for me. Plastic or metal. What special features do they have?"

"Metal …" I side-eyed Jamie, whose face had gone red trying to hold back his laughter. "Um … they have these little metal rings where you can put your baguettes in …"

"Jesus H. Christ, you're gonna make him come," Jamie whispered.

After a few moments of veeeeerrrry awkward silence, Phineas perked up. "That about wraps up the famous trolleys part of the tour. After this, we have shopping trolleys of the world, arranged alphabetically by country and chronologically within those groups. Including a very interesting take on how trolleys were used to aid Britain's efforts during the second world war. Then we move onto my favourite display, an interactive look at the science and technologies of trolleys. Followed by a brief"—there was that word again—"but delightful, 4D movie exploring the future of shopping trolleys."

Any trace of Jamie's mirth had long since vanished. In its place, those pleading puppy dog eyes of his.

"If either of you fellas need the W.C., there's one just there on the left. I recommend trying to go, even if you don't have the urge. This'll be your last opportunity for the next three to five hours."

"Oh, my God," whimpered Jamie.

"Yeah, I'm dying for a piss," I said, pulling Jamie with me, across the mouldy carpet and into the tiny, one-stalled bathroom. I shut the door behind me.

"Oh, my God!" he said again.

"I've fucked up. We have to get out of here." I looked around the chilly, dank room. At the thirty centimetre by thirty centimetre window. Even if we popped the thing out of its frame, there was no way Dr Sullivan was squeezing his line-backer shoulders through that. "We're gonna have to go out the way we came. And run for it. Okay?"

Jamie absentmindedly squeezed the top of his knee, as though preparing his muscles. "Which way do we go? This place is a fucking labyrinth."

"I'm great at directions," I said. I, in fact, was not. "Just follow me. It's just a left before Alt History of Trolleys, straight through Trolleys of the Great Depression, and another left after Watery Grave: An Abstract Photographic Exhibition of the Abandoned Cart."

"Jesus, okay. Wait, now can I say it?" Jamie wrapped his hands around both my triceps, and I near enough forgot why we were stuffed into a miniscule, mushroom-factory of a bathroom.

"Yes, you can say it now."

"He's … wait for it … off his trolley." My God, he was cute.

"Very good, Kitty. You ready?" I eked the door open a fraction. Peered out.

"Can you see him?" Jamie asked, hovering over my shoulder. Heat leapt from his body onto mine.

"No, no … There he is! Other side of the Hollywood Wheels. Now's our chance! Go go go!" I hissed, throwing the bathroom door wide and legging it down the aisles of the museum. Jamie right behind me.

Phineas whipped his head up in our direction like a kitchen-variety velociraptor. But too late. We were too speedy. Sprinting down another aisle. Too fast to notice what part of the museum we were in. My eyes scanned overhead for some form of glowing exit sign, but of course we were in a hell-pit death-trap of a building.

"Quick, here," Jamie said, seizing my arm and pulling me off to the side, into a tiny alcove between displays, just as Phineas's willowy frame rounded the corner.

A snort burst free from Jamie's mouth. I slapped a palm over it, and tried to catch my breath. Just as I realised how cosy the alcove space was. My back was pressed against one wall, Jamie's back against another, our chests, and the entire fronts of our bodies, moulded together. Panting, heaving breaths. My thigh trapped between both of his. His hips pressed into my stomach. His face, still covered by my hand, was inches from mine.

I could see nothing but him, feel nothing but him, smell nothing but his cologne, hear nothing but our mingling breaths.

His half-terrified, half-hysterical expression melted into something that was both softer and harder. His pupils dilated and fixed on my face, flicking between my eyes and mouth, like he couldn't decide which was more worthy of his attention.

I dropped my hand, and let it come to rest on his shoulder. And my gaze fell to his lips. His tongue dipped out to wet them. My cock twitched, which he no doubt felt against his own leg.

And we simply stared at each other. For a whole minute, or for a few seconds. It was impossible to tell.

"Kitty …" The word came out like I was begging.

I was.

But Jamie continued to bounce his sight between my lips and eyes, like there was some inner war waging inside his mind.

He wanted to kiss me, as much as I wanted him to kiss me. I was sure. I moved my hand from his shoulder and curled it around his nape, noting the way the super-soft shaved hairs at the back of his head caressed my palm.

He wanted to kiss me, but I knew he wouldn't. Not of his own accord. His own self-imposed rules were standing in the way. I would have to make the first move. I narrowed the gap between our lips.

"Bowie," he said, in an impossibly quiet voice. Almost as though the word had become stuck in his throat.

I drew closer still. My heart trying to escape through my ribcage and take up residence in his. The headiness of his cologne and our mixed breaths was making me feel deliciously drunk.

Our noses brushed together.

"Jamie," I whispered, using his actual name. Now or never. "Will you kiss me?"

I felt his initial reaction twitch against my hip, but his eyes took on that pained, inner-war look again. He closed them. Whether to buy himself more time, or in readiness, I wasn't sure.

"Fellas!" called Phineas from somewhere nearby, obliterating the moment. "Have you boys got lost?"

Jamie pushed a gap between our heads and whipped his round to Phineas's approximate location. "There's a running-man sign. Come-on." He grabbed me by the arm again, and pulled me along with him, giving me no time to adjust the manic rhythm of my heart or catch my breath. "Now!"

And we barrelled through the fire-exit door, bursting into the blinding September sunshine. The dusty, weed-cracked lot unfurled all around us, like an oasis.

Our salvation.

And like a pocket full of stones weighing me down while I tried to run.

I would have killed for one more minute in that godforsaken museum cubby.

We got back into Jaime's truck. Jamie started the engine, put on his sexy aviators, and pulled out of the car park onto the highway.

Neither of us mentioned the almost-kiss for the entire forty-five-minute ride home.