A New Life - 19. Chapter 19: Sunscreen

On at least some level, Blake had always been aware that he was an unusually anxious person, beset with fears and worries well beyond those of other people, other normal people anyway. ‘Neurotic’ his mother had called him, even as a small child, although she could hardly point the finger herself.

It hadn’t taken years of therapy or some ‘breakthrough’ for Blake to figure this out about himself. He had confidently identified the problem to his psych at their first session, having prepared meticulous notes documenting examples from his life, which in turn, were drawn from the background research he had undertaken in preparation.

He remembered the slightly off-putting curl that had appeared at the corner of his psych’s mouth mid-way through showing him these notes. It was an expression he would later grow to know only too well. At the time though, he thought that his psych was laughing at him, which in part was true, but not in the way he’d imagined. Not in a bad way.

The man was not dismissing the effort that went into Blake’s preparation for their session nor the conclusions reached through this armature self-analysis. In fact, he whole-heartedly agreed with Blake. What amused him was the behaviour itself.

“It’s the anxiety patients that tend to show up with notes,” he had explained, before somehow managing to smile with such warmth and compassion that any sting from comment was neutralised.

Blake had liked Dr ‘Z’ from that first session and thereafter he’d spent quite some time with the man, learning all about the different dimensions to his anxiety problem. He would gradually come to understand just how much of his life revolved around anxiety and the various ‘issues’ that went hand-in-hand. From control, obsessiveness and compulsion, to all the internalising, the depression, guilt and self-loathing, just to mention a few.

These words would gradually make their way onto a list Blake had once kept. A list of things he wanted his psych to ‘remove’, not that they really did that he was later disappointed to discover. Blake had always imagined psychology involving some sort of ‘emotional lobotomy’. The surgical carving out of some derelict part of the mind, tossing it away to leave only the healthy bits behind.

Unfortunately, as Dr Z would later explain, that would be like trying to heal a broken leg by amputating it. Except, even that analogy wasn’t appropriate, because it was at least medically possible to remove a leg. Anxiety, on the other hand, was a natural part of being alive and was hardwired in at the most basic level of human physiology. Getting rid of it like that just wasn’t possible.

No.

The actual stuff of psychological treatment, involved time consuming, difficult and often unpleasant hard work.

The first step of any treatment seemed invariably to involve identifying the problematic behaviour to begin with, catching oneself in the act of doing ‘it’. This did go a long way towards making things better, Blake had been surprised to discover, but unfortunately, all too often it was simply not enough.

That Wednesday morning, the day after the diving ‘incident’, Blake had awoken to a generalised anxious feeling. He had identified the problem almost immediately, but that hadn’t stopped him from spending most of the morning ‘catastrophising’, as his psych used to call it. A process of spiralling negative self-talk that inflated and exaggerated worries leading to the predication of ever worse things to come.

On this occasion, as was often the case, there was an entirely legitimate basis for some level of worry. Haze had been acting rather strange on the walk back to the ute the night before and also during the short trip to Blake’s home. Withdrawn and silent, he had barely mumbling a word beyond ‘see ya tomorrow’ as Blake had left the car. This, coming after such an intensely intimate evening, naturally worried Blake, but from that reasonable starting point the spiralling thoughts progressed and grew out of control.

The memory of Haze being quiet and withdrawn had led to thoughts and worries about why that might be so. Perhaps Haze didn’t feel like talking? Or perhaps he just didn’t feel like talking to Blake? Perhaps he was embarrassed or uncomfortable about what they had shared? Perhaps he was regretting having ever said anything? Maybe he was freaked out by the emotional intimacy or the touching? Maybe he now thought that Blake was even more of a crazy, after the stuff he’d heard? Maybe he’d figured out Blake was gay and was disgusted by the hug which he mistook for sexual advances? Maybe he wanted to get away as fast as possible so he could wash himself clean of the crazy’s disgusting gay-germs and then laugh with the others about what a loser, freak, weirdo...

And so on.

Then, the future predicting. The prophesies of doom to come.

Haze wasn’t going to be at work today. He just wouldn’t show up at all. Blake would then have to spend all day worrying about what the other boy was thinking after last night. He would have to spend the whole day endlessly anxious without any promise of relief. It was going to be a horrible day. Or perhaps Haze was going to be at work today, but he would just ignore him all day instead? Maybe even give him glares or disgusted looks? Shout at him to ‘go away’? He would never want to be alone with a crazy, gay freak like Blake. Never again, not after what he had heard last night. Haze would hate him from now on. Maybe he would even huddle with the others and laugh and point and...

And round and round it went.

It didn’t take too long for Blake to realise that he was doing it again, this catastrophising. However, it was one thing to spot the problem and another entirely to do something about it. He was just too busy showering and eating breakfast and doing other things, to tackle the problem. So the thoughts just kept coming and coming, reinforcing each other and making the feelings worse and worse.

Eventually though, Blake started to notice the tell tale signs of runaway anxiety and knew he would have to do something or else he would end up having another panic attack.

He sat down on the couch and forced himself to go through some of his exercises, to audit the troubling train of thoughts and try to put them to rest. This involved a number of steps.

First step, he recalled, was to gather factual evidence.

Haze had appeared quiet and withdrawn after they’d left the beach, perhaps even embarrassed or uncomfortable. Blake was sure this much was true and factual. However, had the other boy ‘freaked out’? No. Had he treated him with disgust or distaste? No. Was there any evidence that he was thinking negatively towards him at all? Not really, Haze had just behaved a little awkwardly, that’s all. There was no evidence of all the other things.

Second step, think of counter arguments.

Why else might Haze be acting quiet, withdrawn and uncomfortable? Well, for one thing, the boy had just shared some really intimate secrets about himself. That would explain being uncomfortable, if not the quiet and withdrawn bits as well. Especially, since Haze was such a guarded individual. Maybe he had just been thinking things through, wondering what to do next? Maybe he was just being his usual quiet and withdrawn self? Maybe he didn’t know Blake was gay, and even if he did, maybe he wouldn’t care?

Third step, think back on previous occasions and compare.

Haze was often quiet and withdrawn to be around. Sometimes this had been because of something Blake had done, but most of the time it had nothing to do with him. And how many times had Haze revealed to the others Blake’s secrets? Zero. How many times had he reacted to Blake with disgust or hate? Never. How many times had he laughed or made fun of his anxiety problems? Not once.

Going through these mental exercises helped to contain the thoughts a little, but Blake knew that he really needed to write it all out on paper for the messages to sink in properly and he just didn’t have time for that now. He had to be at work soon. So, he quickly went about the rest of his morning routine and by the time he was leaving the house, the worrying was back, full-force.

This time about ‘the kiss’.

There was just no way Blake could rationalise or come to some understanding within his head about what had happened. The event had been too intense, it was just so difficult to remember the specifics now. He could recall the two of them arguing, then some pushing and then...

“Argh!” he involuntarily cursed out loud, slapping his forehead with his hand. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!”

What had he been thinking? What on earth had possessed him to even contemplate kissing a straight guy? Haze, no less. The best looking boy on the planet. Someone who was well out of his league. Who also, incidentally, wasn’t even in his league to begin with because he was straight! Having broken up with a lifelong girlfriend, not 24 hours ago!

Just thinking about the kiss now brought overwhelming feelings of humiliation and shame, enough to make him cringe and squint his eyes closed and even gasp out loud. He couldn’t even recall what it had felt like at the time, all he knew was that thinking back on it now made him feel bad things. So much so, that he was becoming phobic of the memory itself. He was recoiling from it, even though he couldn’t remember what had happened. Just thinking about remembering it was enough. He was running away from even thinking about the memory of ... the kiss.

And what had Haze made of it? What was he thinking now? Surely, he must have noticed? Surely, he had to at least suspect now that Blake was gay? What else would he be thinking?

Try as he might Blake couldn’t properly recall Haze’s reaction. He did seem to remember Haze yelling at him at some stage, ordering him to leave the cabin. However, he also seemed to recall conflicting pieces of the story. For example, he remembered clearly the feel of the cold metal wall against his naked back. Why did Haze have him pressed up against the wall? It didn’t make much sense.

He slowed the brisk pace of his walk along the dusty street as he noticed he was nearing the mall. He made a conscious effort to maintain control now, to stop muttering to himself and slapping his head like a crazy person. He really didn’t need to be caught in the act of doing something weird right now.

Unfortunately, the damage had been done and by the time he was walking through the front door, his anxieties had reached an almost feverish pitch. He was a hair’s breadth away from a full-blown panic attack. All it would take was something to push him over the edge, something bad. Like a nasty run in with Haze. That would do it.

This was concerning too, because Blake felt certain that in all probability, seeing Haze was going to be bad this morning. The boy would’ve spent last night regretting everything that had happened between them and he would come in this morning and he would hate...

But Blake stopped then, mid-thought, as the object of these obsessive musings suddenly appeared from the back room.

Haze was speaking to Jill as he stalked over to the shop’s counter, but then he seemed to cast his eyes across the room and for the briefest moment they landed on Blake. There was an almost imperceptible widening, as if in recognition, before those beautiful blue orbs dropped to floor, evasively, awkwardly.

‘You see!’ crowed the inner critic inside Blake’s head. ‘He hates you! He hates you! I told you!’

And within that fraction of a second Blake felt his insides twist and contract with pain and shame and self-loathing and...

But then Haze had lifted his head again, not two seconds later, and this time his eyes held steady. This time there was the slightest twinge at the side of his mouth, shy and hesitant, but genuine and unguarded. It was a small smile. Real Haze, just for the briefest, fleeting second, before the mask had returned and he’d resumed talking to Jill.

It wasn’t really much to go on, but for Blake it made all the difference in the world.

Suddenly, the swirling clouds of dark thoughts and obsessive worries were gone, blown away by a blast of light fresh air. The rapid change of mood brought a goofy shy grin to Blake’s face and he felt his whole body lift and stand taller, as if it were freed from some burdensome weight.

“You’re looking chirpy this morning,” came a voice from right next to him.

Blake jumped a little, before quickly recovering, managing to smother the silly grin on his face and drag his eyes away from Haze.

“H-Hey Vicky,” he stammered. “I-I’m okay, how are you?”

He ‘sort of’ chatted with her for a short while before she wandered off to talk to Jill, having apparently lost interest in the conversation. This probably had something to do with the fact that he’d kept missing what she was saying and gave only one word answers to most of her questions. He didn’t really pause to consider this in any depth though, as his mind was preoccupied with cool blue eyes and the crazy pleasurable feelings that coursed through his body whenever he pictured that tiny smile.

Blake’s eyes never strayed far from Haze that morning. They seemed to drift over towards the boy at every opportunity, as if with a mind of their own. Whether Haze was loading gear onto the trailer, helping tourists to get fitted or just fiddling with equipment, Blake just couldn’t seem to get enough of him.

However, he quickly began to notice that Haze wasn’t looking back. In fact, they hadn’t made eye contact since he’d first arrived that morning and they were now nearly ready to leave for the boat.

Gnawing doubts and anxieties began to creep their way back into Blake’s mind. Haze was intentionally avoiding him, he could feel it, he was sure. Perhaps he had misread Haze’s body language before? Maybe the blue-eyed boy hadn’t really smiled at all? Or maybe the smile meant something else? Something more sinister? Maybe it was a scornful smile, a cruel smile a teasing smile?

At about that time, Jill called the crew together for her usual daily briefing and Blake made his way over to join the congregation, watching Haze carefully all the while. The other boy did not look his way once, not even when he was right in front of him. Haze was intentionally avoiding him, Blake could feel it, he knew it to be true. But why? What did it mean?

“Which just leaves you Blake.”

“Eh?”

“Well I don’t want ya diving,” Jill explained, apparently mistaking his confused grunt for some sort of protest. “You and Haze are outta the water for a while, just in case.”

“Oh ... yeah ... sure,” Blake fumbled, catching up with the conversation at last.

“Guess ya can stay here with me. I gotta do the books today so I was gonna man the shop myself, but I guess I can get ya to do some stock takin’ or somethin’ or maybe ...”

“I can teach him to skipper?”

Blake’s head whipped around to check that his ears had heard right. However, even now the blue-eyed boy refused to look his way. His face was bland, expression neutral. He gave no indication that he had spoken up at all, his eyes remained fixed on Jill.

She looked skyward, thoughtfully, as if to mull this over for a bit, before responding.

“Yeah alright, I ain’t really got much to do ‘round here anyway,” she relented. “Blake ya can stick with Haze today. It’d be good if ya could eventually skipper too, so it’s not all Matt and Haze.”

With that settled, Jill continued to run through her outline of the day’s activities, but Blake had completely stopped listening. Studying the floor at his feet, he did his best to smother the blush he could feel spreading across his face, trying to hide the pleasurable, giddying feelings from showing.

After having spent all morning watching Haze, he now suddenly found himself unable to look up at all, too shy and overwhelmed. Part of his mind was warning him not to be so silly, not to leap to conclusions. After all, Haze had done nothing more than suggest a work-related activity for Blake to help with, since neither of them could dive. That might be the end of it.

However, a larger part of Blake’s mind wanted to take this as a sign, to read into the gesture something more. Surely, Haze must want him around? Or at least he must be okay with his company? He wouldn’t have offered otherwise.

The thought of this, together with the notion of them spending all day together brought about an anxious, but excited feeling within Blake. He just couldn’t seem to stop smiling, so he kept staring at his feet, hiding his face from the others, until Jill had finished.

After that, the tourists were gathered together and lead out to the minibus. While this happened Haze remained in his introverted state. He didn’t say a word to Blake or even look his way during the trip to the jetty or while loading the gear onto the boat.

However, nothing could dampen Blake’s sprits now. He was going to spend the whole day with Haze. He was really nervous about that of course, but it was in a different kind of way. A good kind of way.

It wasn’t until after they had cast off and Haze had finished his boat safety speech to the tourists that he finally made a motioned towards Blake.

“Come on,” he said in a flat, serious, ‘work-like’ tone of voice. “Time to get going.”

He started to climb the metal ladder to the bridge and so Blake rushed to follow him, his eyes drawing level with the discoloured leather bracelets wrapped around Haze’s ankle.

Blake took note of Haze’s bare feet, musing that the boy never seemed to be wearing shoes, but then he felt his eyes drift further upwards. He felt compelled to follow the athletic contours of those tanned legs ever higher, until the pale blond hairs and sun-browned skin disappeared beneath board shorts. Then he angled his head a little, his breath hitching slightly as he caught a glimpse of Haze’s baby-blue swimmers up the leg of his shorts.

Haze was wearing those AussieBums again, Blake noted, the ones in that semi boxer-brief style. Blake had seen him wearing them before and recalled how unbelievably good they had looked, fitted snugly to Haze’s well-shaped backside.

Unfortunately, Blake was shook from his revere just then, as Haze abruptly climbed onto the deck of the bridge, depriving him of the view. The other boy then popped his head over the edge to look back down the ladder at Blake, making him jump.

“Come on,” he said, before his head disappeared again.

Blake quickly averted his eyes, embarrassed at how shamelessly he had just been perving on his friend. Luckily, Haze did not appear to have noticed though, so with a shake of his head, Blake cleared his mind of lewd thoughts and images, and follow after him.

He hauled himself up the ladder and onto the bridge in time to see Haze climb onto the cracked and faded plastic chair behind the steering wheel of the boat. As he approached, Haze rotated the chair about to face him.

“To be honest, mate, their ain’t much to it,” he confessed, in a markedly different tone of voice, buoyant and playful all of a sudden.

Blake was immediately struck by the change in the boy’s demeanour. Once again the neutral, expressionless mask was gone and Haze had morphed into someone else, someone completely different. There was a twinkle to his eye and a kind of relaxed manner about him that had just not been there a moment before. This was real Haze, wearing a small, but distinctly cheeky grin.

Blake was momentarily dazzled, suddenly too shy and tongue-tied to say anything. Haze had been making him nervous before, but now Blake could feel he was almost shaking with anxiety.

And yet he couldn’t seem to stop smiling.

“I figured ya didn’t wanna spend all day with Jill makin’ up stuff to do, just to keep ya busy, hey?”

Blake shook his head, peeking up through his lashes briefly, but unable to meet Haze’s brilliant smile for very long.

“Y-Yeah ... I-I’d much rather be with y-you,” he fumbled awkwardly, before the words caught up with his brain and sent him into a flurry of rapid backtracking. “I mean ... not with you! I mean ... no ... I mean not, not with you either... I don’t not want to be with you ... I mean around you ... here ... I am glad to be here ... I just don’t ...”

Haze snorted and cut him off. “Relax dude,” he chuckled warmly. “I get it.”

Blake vigorously nodded his head in agreement, seizing upon the out Haze had given him. But then he stopped and wondered to himself what on earth the other boy actually meant by that? What did he ‘get’ exactly?

“Okay, well, come over here,” Haze said, waving Blake over and in the process preventing him from dwelling over the exchange further.

Blake took a tiny step forward, but then as Haze turned around to face the steering wheel again he realised that he wasn’t close enough to see what his friend was doing from here, so he took a few more hesitant steps forward.

“Come on,” Haze said again, waving over his shoulder.

Blake swallowed nervously and moved as close as he could without touching, standing just a few inches behind the chair Haze was sitting on. He was dithering there for a moment, worrying about whether he was close enough now, when Haze abruptly looked up, causing him to jump again.

“Sit there!” he ordered, pointing to the middle rung of the metal railing besides the chair, where he usually rested his feet.

Blake scootered up closer, trying not to notice the way that his hip brushed up against Haze’s shoulder as he tried to squeeze past. Then he sat down, perched uncomfortably on the metal bar, his knees resting against the seat of Haze’s chair. The position had him facing Haze more than the steering wheel, but he pointedly turned his head and focused on the controls Haze was indicating.

“First, release the bilge pump,” his friend explained, pressing a button. “Gets rid of the fumes.”

Blake nodded. He was doing his best to pay attention, but finding it difficult given how close they were now sitting. Was it just his imagination? Or was that tense feeling back again? That invisible barrier of tension that had felt so strong the day before? Could Haze feel it too?

“Next, disengage the propellers by holdin’ down this button.”

“Uh-huh,” Blake muttered, unable to resist the odd sideways glance at Haze now and then.

“The ignition button is here and you have to turn the key while holding it down.”

“Okay.”

“But before that you need to ...”

Blake was trying hard to listen and to commit the instructions to memory, but being so close to Haze, his mind kept wandering. At some point he became distracted, as Haze paused to tuck a shaggy, blond-brown lock behind his ear.

The hand had soon retracted and the lesson continued, but Blake found his attention lingering there. He suddenly noticed that Haze’s ear was slightly undersized for his head. It was as tanned as the rest of him and sort of freckly at the tips.

“... dial is for the fuel ...” “... releases the throttle ...”

Haze’s words washed over him as he stared at that ear, in an almost trance-like state, before his eyes started to trace downwards. He studied the skin where the lobe attached to the jaw line, noting the lightly coloured stubble, then lower, down Haze’s neck, pausing again at the jugular vein.

“... dial is for the revs ... gotta make sure ...”

The vein protruded slightly against the tanned skin, which was smooth and dusted with tiny, almost invisible blond hairs. Beyond that, the shape of the trapezius muscle and collar bone were just visible above the collar of Haze’s shirt.

Blake’s gaze trailed lower again, but then he caught a movement out of the corner of his eye, which made him look up again. When he did this, he was startled to find that he was no longer looking at Haze’s ear. He was looking directly into those cool blue eyes.

He froze like that, transfixed by those eyes, by that face. He had no idea when Haze had stopped talking nor for how long he had been watching him like that, but none of these things seemed important. The world around them had dissolved and all that was left was Haze’s face, only a short distance apart from his own.

Blake could sense that something was different with Haze. The playful smile was gone. He seemed to have changed moods again, his expression turning deadly serious and tense. However, it wasn’t neutral, the mask wasn’t back. It was something else.

Haze was staring at him, as if to study his face and then all of a sudden there was that tension again. Blake could feel it stronger than ever. An overwhelming pressure was building between them, more and more, stronger and stronger. Then he felt a sick kind of anxiousness overcome him as he watched Haze part his lips ever so slightly.

It was too much, the pressure was too much and he felt the sudden need to do something, to break out of this tension, immediately.

“Sorry ...” he mumbled, bowing his head, ripping his eyes away from Haze’s.

He paused there for a moment, studying his knees and releasing a breath he hadn’t even realised he was holding. When he next glanced up, he was relieved to discover that the spell between them had been broken. The world appeared to have resumed its normal goings-on and the tension in the air was finally dissipating.

Haze had changed again too. The sad sort of look on his face disappeared as his expression abruptly brightened.

“Spacin’ out again huh?” he asked, in a light-hearted tone.

“Y-Yeah,” Blake croaked, nervous and tongue-tied despite the lessening of the tension between them.

“Always spacin’ out aren’t ya? Always in ya head. Thinkin’ too much.”

His mischievous smile had reappeared and Blake found this greatly reassuring.

“That’s me,” he admitted, unable to suppress a shy smile from spreading across his face.

Haze winked at him and laughed, but then he grew more thoughtful after a moment.

“So ... what were ya thinkin’ about?” he asked, cocking his head, his tone a little more serious than before.

“Nothing!” Blake responded in alarm. “P-Please ... w-what were you s-saying?”

Haze narrowed his eyes slightly, as if to scrutinize for a few seconds, but then he turned back to the controls as if nothing at all had happened.

“Okay so ... now the engine is primed, all ya gotta do to start it is to hold that button down and turn the key,” he said pointing to the controls. “Here you do it.”

“Oh ... no that’s okay, you do it.”

“Come on, sit down,” Haze said, getting up from the chair and forcing Blake to stand up too, given the lack of space between them.

“I-I really can’t ... I wasn’t listening properly,” Blake protested, trying to ignore the fact that they were practically standing on each other’s toes now, their bodies touching in several places.

“It’s easy, I’ll show ya!” Haze tried to navigate around them, shuffling his feet and resting his hand on Blake’s waist for balance.

“Okay, Okay!” Blake hastily agreed, if only to escape from the uncomfortable tangle of limbs. He was intensely aware of the tingles of electricity radiating through his body, the disconcerting sensations Haze’s touch was causing him.

He edged around Haze as best as he could and then sat down on the chair, scooting over so as to put a safe distance between them.

“Okay, now press that and turn the key,” Haze instructed, kneeling on the edge of the chair, where Blake had inadvertently made space. He appeared completely unaware that he was crossing into Blake’s personal space, oblivious to the emotional chaos he was causing.

Or else he was pretending not to notice? Blake could not be sure.

“Come on, we gotta go!”

Blake did as he was told and the quiet stillness of the boat was abruptly shattered by the choke and rumble of the engines.

“Now push the throttle forward!” Haze said, much louder now.

Again Blake did as he was told and then he saw rather than felt the boat moving forward slowly, the jetty to his left passing by at a snail’s pace. He looked back at his friend for guidance, but Haze just smiled at him. After a minute or so like that he then reached over and pressed some other buttons, his elbow in Blake’s face.

“Okay, now push the lever forward more,” he instructed, pulling back to let Blake do it.

As Blake did this, the engines kicked up a notch and then the boat really started to get moving. The wind seemed to pick up and the rocking sensations began, waves splashing against the bow of the boat, as it cut through the water.

Blake started to relax a little and enjoy the experience. He was surprised to discover that after all the initial fiddling, there wasn’t really all that much to do now. It wasn’t like driving a car, where you had to be watching the road all the time. There were no other boats on the water as far as the eye could see and so far as navigating was concerned, not much steering was required.

Haze told him to keep between the buoys, the green buoys on his right and the red ones on his left. They marked out the deeper channels from the shallower reefs, but on a day like today they seemed hardly necessary. The water was so clear it was easy to see the dark blue ‘road’ which snaked its way through the lighter coloured sand bars and rocky outcrops of the reef.

With the noise from the engines and the wind on their faces it was harder to talk now, but Haze still gave little instructions or explanations here and there, shouting something or leaning over to speak in Blake’s ear.

The proximity between them was nerve wracking so far as Blake was concerned and he could feel that tension building between them again, but to a much lesser degree. There was something about the noise and the movement of the boat which made the situation far less intimate somehow, despite the way Haze would continue to lean in close now and then.

Still, over the course of the next hour or so of weaving their way through the reef there were plenty of tense and awkward moments.

Blake seemed to be able to sense when Haze was watching him and sometimes he would be unable to resist a glance himself. On more than a few occasions they would make fleeting eye contact, which one of them would quickly break with an awkward looking smile. It was confusing and unsettling, but not entirely unpleasant. That ‘good’ kind of nervousness Blake had been feeling before.

Eventually Haze reached over once again and pulled the throttle back, lowering the din from the engines and slowing the boat.

“Shove over, I’ll take it from here,” he said, moving as if to sit on Blake’s lap.

Blake scrambled to his feet and slithered out of the chair quick smart, deciding to stand behind Haze rather than squeeze in next to him as the other boy had been doing.

Haze took control and skilfully navigated the boat through the shallows of the reef towards the anchor buoy that marked out the dive site.

From up on the bridge, Blake could see Vicky make her way to the front of the boat, carrying a long aluminium pole. The noise from the engines began to fluctuate then, up and down, as Haze revved the throttle to keep the boat as still as possible. Once they were close enough and steady enough, Vicky used the pole to grab the buoy, fixing the rope to the front of the boat.

She then turned to wave at them and Haze switched off the engines, abruptly plunging them into relative silence. All that could be heard now was the sounds of the waves lapping against the hull and the occasional metallic clunk of something knocking about on the gently rocking deck.

“Well whatcha think?” Haze asked, turning in his chair, grinning ear to ear.

“Beats riding the ATVs that’s for sure,” Blake quipped, finding it difficult to meet the other boy’s dazzling smile.

Haze laughed then, his whole face lighting up even more as he did so.

“Ya really didn’t like ridin’ the bikes hey?”

“No I did ...” Blake protested, not wanting to detract from that day, which was, after all, still probably the highlight of his time here at Kulibari Bay. “It’s just that the boat’s a lot ... more relaxing.”

Haze nodded and then smiled knowingly.

Blake found the look infectious and soon he too was smiling, leading to another awkward moment between them as they smiled at each other like that.

The tension was back again. Blake could feel it slowly building once more. The same nervous energy as before, which seemed to both draw him forward, towards Haze and yet at the same time repel him backwards, away from the boy.

However, before the tension could gain momentum, they were disturbed by Vicky, whose head appeared at the top of the ladder.

“A little help guys!” she shouted at them, before bobbing back down again.

Her appearance had momentarily distracted them and when Blake turned back around, he was yet again confronted with a strikingly different version of Haze. The smile was still there, but it was different now, muted and somehow faking looking. There was a distant and detached air about him as well. He had withdrawn again.

“Comin’!” Haze shouted as he moved towards the ladder, passing by Blake without saying another word to him.

The two of them climbed down to the main deck and set about helping the tourists to get ready for their dives. Blake found it strange to be only helping today, instead of getting ready to dive as well, but he wasn’t too disappointed. Jill had preselected shallow, easy dives for the rest of the week, having placed a temporary ban on advanced, deeper dives, so Blake didn’t feel he was missing out on very much.

After helping the last of the tourists climb down the ladder and into the water, he leaned against the railing to take a rest and to watch as they disappeared from the surface.

“So, watcha wanna do?” asked Haze, his voice suddenly appearing from close behind.

Blake flinched a little and as he turned to face the other boy he grew acutely aware of just how quiet and empty the boat had become. With everyone else underwater, it was just the two of them now. Him and Haze, alone at sea.

“I-I ... um ... I dunno,” Blake stuttered, growing anxious at the unexpected intimacy of the situation. “Wh-what do you normally do?”

Haze raised his eyes skyward for a moment.

“Usually?” he asked, the playful smile returning to his face. “Nothin’ ... just chill I guess.”

Blake nodded in response, unable to come up with anything else to suggest.

“Well, we got half an hour to kill, so let’s catch some sun hey?” Haze proposed after a pause.

Blake gulped nervously, doing his best to suppress the involuntary shiver of dread that ran through his body. He could not imagine anything worse than having to deal with Haze half-naked right now, especially if the boy expected him to join in on the sun tanning as well.

“O-oh ... s-sure ...” he fumbled, his mind already racing to come up with ways to get out of having to take his shirt off.

“Great! Come on then.”

Haze bounded about on the deck, grabbing a towel from a rack along the underside of the roof before swinging up to the narrow walkway that ran along the side of the boat. Once again Blake marvelled at how agile and light footed he was, despite the rocking of the boat and the litter of equipment in his path.

Blake did his best to follow suit, grabbing a towel himself and climbing unsteadily onto the walkway, gripping the grab-rails fiercely as he made his way around. When he reached the front of the boat, there was Haze, standing on the railing at the bow, leaning over the water at an alarming angle.

He turned around as Blake made his way onto the foredeck and jumped back down.

“Perfect day hey,” he said, smiling that unusually cheerful smile again. A real Haze smile.

“Y-Yeah,” Blake stuttered, taking a moment to look around them.

He was right. Once again the weather was brilliantly sunny and bright, the sun sparkling off the crystal clear water almost blindingly.

“Perfect for workin’ on ya tan!” Haze declared, shaking out his towel and laying it down on the deck, making sure to leave enough room for Blake to lie down next to him.

Blake reluctantly did the same with his own towel and while he was halfway through doing this, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and turned to see Haze lifting his shirt up and over his head.

Blake felt a rush of anxiety and that unbearable tension again, so he looked away, focusing instead on flattening out the corners of his towel until they were perfectly symmetrical and flat. He did his best to avoid looking Haze’s way, but averting his eyes did nothing to wipe the images from his mind. The sight of his friend’s tanned smooth skin as that shirt was riding up lingered in his brain whether he wanted it to or not.

“Watcha doin?” Haze asked after a moment and Blake felt himself involuntarily look over to respond.

He caught sight of Haze who was lying on his stomach, his head sideways, facing Blake’s way. Muscular shapes were visible beneath the tanned and slightly freckled skin of Haze’s back and shoulders. The sight did nothing to alleviate Blake’s rising anxiety.

“Er ... n-nothing ... just laying out my towel,” Blake explained, straightening the corners for the tenth time, and then sitting down, his arms wrapped around his knees, his eyes looking anywhere but to his left.

“Ya not gonna get a tan that way man,” Haze pointed out.

Blake began to panic internally as his anxious mind raced to come up with some excuse.

“I-I ... err ... don’t wanna get too much ... still building up a tan.”

“Put cream on then.”

“I didn’t bring any.”

Haze groaned, bringing his arms to his side and then pushing himself up again.

“I’ll go get some,” he announced.

“N-no that’s okay,” Blake protested, but it was too late, Haze was already climbing around the side of the boat once again.

Blake cursed and looked about for some form of rescue, but then he spied the pile of clothes on the towel next to him and his eyes widen. Haze’s board shorts were with his shirt, which meant that he must be wearing only his swimmers now.

Blake blushed as images of Haze in those skimpy swimmers came to mind. He began to worry that Haze would catch him perving, so he made a conscious effort to face towards the other side of the boat. However, his plan was thwarted when Haze appeared from that side, climbing around the edge with a faded yellow bottle in his hand.

Feeling caught out, Blake scrambled to his feet for some reason, not knowing which way to look as Haze approached him.

“Here ya go.”

Blake was forced to look at Haze then as he passed him the sunscreen and despite his best efforts his eyes quickly swept over the other boy’s body. The enticing trail of hair down Haze’s front and around the navel drew Blake’s attention to the athletic shape of his chest, the ridges of his stomach muscles.

He tore his gaze away and forced himself to look Haze in the eye instead, but what he saw there was even more unsettling.

Haze seemed to be uncomfortable all of a sudden, behaving as though he too did not know where to look. The boy seemed self-conscious almost and this puzzled Blake because Haze had never been self-conscious of his semi-nakedness before. Had he noticed Blake ogling him?

“T-thanks,” Blake muttered, moving away to put some distance between them. The last thing he needed to do right now was to fuck up everything by being caught perving on his straight friend.

He sat down on his towel and leaned his back against the metal bench behind them. Not knowing what else to do, he decided to put sunscreen on his face first, to buy himself some time to think, to plan. He studiously stared at his lap as he did this, but once he had finished he quickly lifted his head to see where Haze was before he took off his shirt.

Haze was looking out over the ocean and with his back turned, Blake found it impossible to stop his eyes as they trailed down that v-line body, pausing to ogle at the boy’s backside in those baby-blue swimmers. He quickly shook his head though, cursing at his monetary lapse in judgement. This was not the time to be gaping at Haze. He needed to change while Haze wasn’t looking.

Blake quickly shucked off his shirt and then slathered the lotion across his chest and along his arms. In his haste he knew that he was using too much sunscreen, but he was desperate to finish and to be lying on his towel before Haze turned around again.

He tried to reach his back as best he could, but when he next looked up he found that he was too late. Haze was already watching him, an unreadable expression on his face. He quickly looked the other way though, but then he turned back again and this time he was speaking.

“Err ... I can do that for ya,” he said in a small and strangely uncertain sounding voice.

Blake could feel it again then, the renewed tension between them, as yet another change seemed to come over Haze. The boy’s expression grew serious and his eyes intense. As he approached the nervous energy Blake was feeling grew stronger than ever before and he was forced to lower his eyes.

He didn’t dare open his mouth or raise his head again, but when Haze’s outstretched hand appeared in his field of vision, he handed over the sunscreen without protest. He could feel Haze’s presence as the boy moved to sit down on the metal bench behind him, so he scootered forward a bit, to make room.

Then there was a pause, which seemed to last for an eternity. Blake waited like that with increasing anticipation, wondering and fearing what was to come. He listened for sounds of movement behind him, but then he caught sight of Haze’s feet as they appeared on either side of his waist. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end and his whole body became rigid with nervous apprehension.

Finally, a cool dribble of sunscreen landed on his shoulders, making him flinch a little and then shiver as it trickled down his back. The sensations were powerful, but nothing compared to what was to come next.

Haze’s hands, running firmly over the back of his shoulders, fingers spreading lotion across his body, down his back and then up to his neck.

Blake bit down on his tongue to stifle a moan, as the sensations grew ever more exquisite and unbearably sensual. He tried every trick he could think of to control his reactions, to stop himself from revealing the extent to which Haze’s touch was affecting him, but his mutinous body refused to obey. He could feel the arousal and the anxiety war within him for dominance and despite his best efforts he couldn’t help the stirring sensations in his shorts, the slight trembling of his body.

The sensations and feelings within him grew and grew under the wonderful administrations of Haze’s hands. The boy wasn’t just slapping it on, he was massaging it into the skin in a way Blake found unbelievably pleasurable.

Then all at once he seemed to stop, one hand remaining where it was on Blake’s shoulder and the other disappearing.

“Blake?” Haze whispered, his voice suddenly appearing close by.

Blake couldn’t help the slight shiver that ran through his body just then as Haze’s breath tickled his ear. The proximity between them, the tone of Haze’s voice and the sound of his name on the other boy’s lips added to the already excruciating physical sensuality to create an intoxicating mix of desire and longing.

“Yeah,” he whispered back, turning his head around a little, looking at Haze out of the corner of his eye.

“Nervous thing again?” he asked, softly, just barely above a whisper.

“N-no ...” Blake squeaked, his heart racing, his breath becoming rapid and ragged.

Haze leaned his head over and around Blake’s shoulder a little further so that they were now almost facing each other, only inches apart.

“I can feel ya shaking and ...” Haze started to say, but then he stopped, as that strangely serious look came over him again.

They froze like that and for second after second neither of them spoke a word nor dared to blink an eyelid.

Blake’s mind had completely fused and the whole world seemed to dissolved around him. His senses were alive, his neck and shoulders tingling from where Haze’s hand was resting. He could feel the other boy’s sweet breath on his face and despite the unbearable tension, he found that he couldn’t do anything to escape this time. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to, but he couldn’t keep looking into those deep blue orbs either, so he gently fluttered his eyelids closed and leaned backwards a little, towards the other boy.

Then he felt the hand on his other shoulder travel upwards, along the side of his neck to his ear, kneading his flesh, rubbing cream into his hair and all over the shell of that ear. Blake couldn’t help but move his head that way, instinctively nuzzling the hand that was touching him, too lost in the moment to feel embarrassed by the gesture.

But then Haze’s free hand had appeared at his chin, steering his head back to the other side, towards Haze’s face again. When it finally got there, Blake could tell, even without opening his eyes, that the other boy was even closer than before. He could feel Haze’s breath on his lips now and the gentle tug on his chin, lifting his jaw higher.

They kissed then. Briefly, hesitantly, the distance between them vanishing as their lips pressed together, Haze’s chest brushing up against Blake’s shoulder as they leaned in close.

Then Blake could feel Haze pulling back and his eyes fluttered open as the other boy’s hand dropped from his chin. Haze opened his eyes too and then they stared at each other like that, panting breaths, heartbeats racing.

Blake’s paralysed mind could not even form the most basic thought or instruction. All he could do was watch as the strange combination of fear and desire he was feeling played out across Haze’s face, their identical expressions a mirror of the other’s.

Then Haze began to move towards him again and this time Blake turned his whole torso around to accommodate him. They kissed again, briefly, Haze dragging Blake’s lip between his own as he backed away for a second time. However, before they could part again, Blake had snatched his hand out to pull Haze’s head back down, continuing the kiss, parting his lips a little as he groaned at the sensations.

The kiss broke once again as each of them gasped for breath, but Blake would not let go and so their foreheads remained touching as they panted. Haze lifted his chin briefly, up and down, bringing their lips together and then apart again, over and over until Blake growled with desire and pulled the other boy forward more forcibly.

Haze slipped from his perch on the bench, coming to rest on his knees, one hand firmly at the nape of Blake’s neck, the other on the deck, keeping balance. Blake turned some more in response and his other hand now reached out to grab at Haze’s waist, pulling him closer still.

The kissing continued in earnest, changing from soft and hesitant to firm and hungry as Haze’s free hand now appeared between them, reaching out to trace across Blake’s bare chest. The sensations elicited another gasp from Blake, who parted his lips, inviting Haze’s tongue to explore deeper as he opened his mouth.

Lip locked like that, their tongues dancing together, hands grew more demanding as fingers moved feverishly across flesh and skin. Sunscreen lotion was everywhere, causing slick hands to slide across the other’s body with ease, feeding the sensual feelings, the desire to explore, to touch, to caress and to hold.

When next they pulled apart, Blake noticed the almost wild look to Haze’s eyes and impossibly he became even more aroused. Fed up with the awkward position they were in, he swung his legs around and leaned back, pulling Haze with him as he lay back on the towel.

Haze followed eagerly and now they were kissing once again, this time with Blake lying down and Haze leaning over, propping up by hands resting on the deck on either side of Blake’s head. The kiss became even more intense, even more ravenous, as Haze lowered himself until their chests where touching, sliding against each other, slippery with sweat and sunscreen.

Blake reached up and snaked one hand behind Haze’s head, as the other traced down the boy’s back until it reached firm buttocks. Blake then grabbed a fistful of that arse through the skin-tight Lycra of swimmers and squeezed until Haze broke their kiss to gasp.

At that moment the boat rocked to one side and Haze slid off Blake’s chest and onto the towel besides them. Blake refused to let go though, using the momentum to propel himself over and on top of the other boy. He didn’t bother propping his body up as Haze had done. Instead, he pressed down, instinctively, squashing Haze’s muscular frame into the deck, squeezing every inch of their bodies together.

Blake’s hand was trapped beneath the other boy, but it never released its grip on that arse. Instead, he pulled Haze towards him, up off the towel and deeper into his embrace, their groins mashing together now. Blake could feel his throbbing hard-on pressing up against Haze and when he felt a twitch between them, he grew even more aroused, the passion between them reaching a feverish pitch.

Haze seemed to respond in kind and now their limbs became a tangled blur of intense passion, kissing, groping, squeezing with increasing force until they were almost fighting, wrestling for positions, every inch of their skin slick with sunscreen and sweat.

“Oi!”

The sound of someone calling out sent them both flying apart from one another, the passion extinguished as if a bucket of cold water had just been dumped on them.

For a moment neither moved as they stared at each other, panting, wheezing, identical looks of shock and fear on their faces. Haze had a wild, almost panicky look about him and his unruly curls were sticking out in all directions, matted with sunscreen.

Despite the circumstances, Blake was overcome by a strange compulsion to fix the other boy’s hair, to straighten out his messy locks and to brush away the hand prints of white cream that were all over his face and body.

However, when he reached out towards him, Haze recoiled violently, as if Blake had drawn back his fist to strike. He propelled his body backwards and then he froze again like that, sitting on the deck with that look of shock and horror on his face.

For another few seconds neither of them moved, but then another shout could be heard and they both scrambled to their feet, frantically grabbing at clothes and pulling them on as hastily as could be managed.

Blake grabbed his towel from underneath him, but without it, his feet kept slipping on the polished deck and so it was Haze who finished dressing first. He paused only to wipe his face and arms with his towel before dashing to the walkway along the side of the boat, swinging himself around the edge and disappeared from sight without so much as a backwards glance.

Alone on the foredeck now, Blake took a moment longer to wipe the cream from his body and also from the deck, where it had somehow managed to spread. Then he slipped on his shirt and again wiped his face and arms with the towel one more time, before following after Haze.

At any one point in time, Blake ordinarily had at least one, if not multiple voices in his head. Worrying voices, criticising voices, voices that obsessed over something or, in Haze’s case, someone.

However, right at that moment his mind was a total blank, completely devoid of thoughts, his body moving on its own, as if by some kind of autopilot.

He navigated his way along the narrow walkway to the back of the boat where he saw Haze offering his hand to one of the tourist, pulling her up and ladder and onto deck.

There was a lot of noise and commotion as the tourists gathered on the deck to take off their gear and chat excitedly amongst themselves about their dives. However, none of that was enough to break Blake out of his trance-like state. Nothing could.

Not until Vicky suddenly appeared in front of him.

“You’ve got stuff in your hair mate,” she laughed, tussling his fringe with her hand. “Come help me with lunch, while the guys fix the tourists.”

She didn’t appear to notice the panicked look on his face, so he quickly pulled himself together and followed her into the cabin.

They set about unpacking the food there, opening tins and jars, laying out cold meats and salads and buttering bread. Vicky chatted idly to him as they worked, about the dive mostly, although Blake couldn’t be sure since he found it impossible to take anything in.

His brain had slowly begun to unfreeze itself, but so far it was only capable of thinking about one thing. That moment, not ten minutes ago, which somehow seemed to belong to alternative universe now.

What had happened? Was it even real?

Blake searched his memories, but the images that sprang to mind were too surreal to be true. Such things happened only in his fantasies, not in real life. However, the tingles on his skin felt fresh and were undeniably real. Something had happened between him and Haze. There was nothing imaginary about that, he was sure of it.

Neither had it been merely a one sided affair. Haze had definitely participated. In fact, Blake was sure that the other boy had started it. Not even the most paranoid and self-critical parts of his mind could come up with a different version of events. Haze had been a willing player in ... whatever it was that had just happened.

And what would happen now? What did it all mean? What would Haze do next? What would he say?

Vicky carried the large trays of food out to the table on the main deck and Blake followed carrying two jugs of orange juice. His eyes automatically searched out Haze, but when they finally found him, he was dismayed to see that Haze was studiously ignoring him.

They’d come full circle, Blake realised unhappily. From awkward glances and nervous tension to a moment of incredible, almost unbelievable passion and intimacy and now back to this again. Blake just couldn’t comprehend what was happening. What did all of this mean?

After allowing the tourists to eat their fill, the crew hung around the table to chat and eat some lunch themselves, but the conversation was sustained entirely by Vicky and Matt. Haze was withdrawn and for the most part silent and Blake didn’t feel like talking either.

Haze did glance up now and then and occasionally he even made eye contact, but he would always look away immediately, his expression one of fear and worry. Blake could tell then, that he wasn’t really withdrawn at all. He was trying for his introverted state, but despite obvious effort he seemed unable to hold his mask in its place.

With lunch finished and tidied away, Blake helped the tourists change their tanks over and get ready for their second dive. As he did so, he began to worry about what would happen when he was alone with Haze again. The blue-eyed boy seemed more determined than ever to pretend that he didn’t exist.

Blake decided then that he was going to do something about this. It wasn’t so much a courageous decision as it was a case of picking the lesser of two evils. Either he could force a confrontation with Haze, demand that they talk about what had happened, or he could say nothing and then spend a sleepless night worrying about it. He simply could not bear another night’s anxious worrying, so confrontation was the plan.

He hung back around the cabin, making a show of doing the washing up, while Haze took care of helping the last of the tourists down the ladder and into the water. When everyone was gone and only the two of them remained, he dropped the plastic plates he had been holding into the soapy water and made his way over to the boy.

Haze was watching him approach with a disconcerting expression on his face, defensive, serious, almost aggressive.

Blake could feel himself buckle under the intensity of that look, but he marched right over in any event. He was determined not to back away, despite the tension between them, despite his racing heartbeat and despite the slight nervous trembling of his hands.

He was going to have a word with Haze and it was going to be right now.

But then, in flash, Haze sprang into action too, moving to close the gap between them with long determined strides of his own. His expression remained serious, his eyes wild, but the fight was gone. There was something else now. A hungry look, in place of that defensiveness.

Blake wasn’t sure what to make of this, but as they finally reached each other he didn’t lift a finger to stop Haze from reaching out to him. He could feel the other boy’s hands as they landed on either side of his head and then he could feel Haze pulling his face closer, forcefully, until once more their lips were touching.

The thinking part of Blake’s brain seemed to vanish again, as his hands instinctively fell to the other boy’s waist. Once more, his senses ran wild with pleasure and desire, as the space between them was squeezed into nothingness.

It was as if the last hour or so hadn’t happened and they had somehow mutually agreed to pick up from where they’d last left off. These were not soft, hesitant, exploring kisses. They had skipped all of that this time and were already kissing with hunger and with passion, their hands clutching at each other, full of desire and need.

Lost in the moment, Blake forgot all about his plans, his worries, his self-conscious fears and doubts and, instead, he simply acted on instinct, doing what his body was telling him to do.

When Haze’s hands ran up under his shirt and across his chest, thumbs brushing over sensitive nipples, Blake allowed this, his eyes rolling back with pleasure. He let his hands drift lower again, grabbing at Haze’s backside through board shorts, pulling him closer and upwards.

When Haze gasped and broke the kiss, his facing reaching skywards to breathe, Blake kissed down his chin and across his jaw line, taking the lobe of the other boy’s ear into his mouth before sucking on it, biting it gently, relishing the taste of salt, sweat and just a hint of sunscreen.

Haze growled throatily and then he ducked his head and licked and kissed along Blake’s collar bone, one hand tearing at the neckline of his shirt, as if desperate to find more for his mouth to taste. He seemed to grow frustrated with that, pushing away to get some distance between them, before grabbing at the hem of Blake’s shirt.

Despite being lost in the moment so far, Blake’s feelings about his body were deeply ingrained. The moment he felt his shirt lifting up, parts of his brain began returning and he instinctively clamped his arms against the sides of his body, elbows to the ribs.

“Come on,” Haze urged through wheezing breaths, apparently aggravated by this obstruction.

It was the first words he’d spoken to Blake since offering to help him with putting sunscreen on his back and the words were enough to bring more of Blake’s brain to the forefront.

“No ...” he muttered softly. “Wait ... what ... what are we ...”

“Shhh,” Haze hushed, silencing his protests.

He then reached behind and slid his hands down the back of Blake’s board shorts, grabbing at his bare flesh and mashing their groins together.

Blake gasped at the sensations and was only dimly aware of Haze’s fiddling this time, barely noticing his shirt riding up until he felt the skin of the other boy’s naked chest pressed against his own bare flesh. He gasped and let out a high pitch whimper too, as throbbing pleasure threatened to overwhelm his senses.

They continued like this for a time, until Haze finally pulled back.

“Cabin,” he ordered, in a loud and authoritative whisper, pushing Blake backwards.

“But ...”

“Others might come back soon.”

“But ...”

Blake didn’t get to say anything, not that he could think of what he wanted to say properly in any event, but he could have come up with something if only Haze would stop doing amazing things with his hands, with those lips.

“Shhh,” Haze whispered again, as he directed them into the cabin, pulling away only for the briefest second to drag the door shut behind them.

No lights were on and although the cabin wasn’t all that dark, Blake was blinded having had no time to adjust from the brilliant sun outside. But it didn’t matter for his eyes fluttered close anyway as he felt the pressure of Haze’s lips on his own. Once again they were kissing.

In the darkness he felt somehow safer and his touching became bolder. If he had been able to think, he might have wondered whether Haze had done this on purpose, but as it was, his body took charge and it wanted one thing: more of Haze.

Blake allowed his hand to trace a path from the back of Haze’s head, down the front of his chest and along the firm ridges of his stomach. However, strangely unsated, he then curled the hairs below the boy’s navel between his fingers, feeling lower and lower until now he traced the waistline of Haze’s board shorts. His fingertips then inched between material and skin, reaching lower until they brushed against the tip of something warm and hard.

But once more the moment was ruined when thumps and crashes could be heard from the deck. Once more they both flew apart and paused for a moment, before Haze set about putting his shirt back on, tossing Blake his too.

Blake didn’t remember the boy collecting their shirts, although he didn’t really remember how any of this had happened. Not once, but twice now.

He couldn’t believe half-an-hour had already passed! Where had the time gone? He couldn’t believe that he hadn’t managed to speak a full sentence to Haze in all that time either! What happened to forcing the boy into a discussion about what was going on between them?

“Come on,” Haze prompted, his hand resting on the handle to the cabin door, waiting impatiently.

Blake quickly shrugged on his shirt and without another word, Haze ripped open the door and vanished into the blinding sun.

Once again there was a flurry of activity as the tourists climbed on board, talking excitedly amongst themselves and struggling out of their diving gear. Once again, Haze went about his job, helping the others in a professional manner, while hiding behind his mask and completely ignoring Blake’s existence.

There wasn’t a chance to speak after that. Vicky and Matt had decided to hang out on the bridge with them on the way home, so Haze had remained introverted. He’d occasionally said a few words, but only to do with the workings of the boat. His lessons had become cold and functional, the mischievous smile nowhere to be seen. He no longer seemed to reach over or otherwise get too close either, instead keeping a distance between them.

Blake didn’t really expect him to want to talk about things with the others there, but it didn’t make being ignored any easier. Dark thoughts were circling around in his head again, driving him mad with indecision and doubts. He wanted to grab the other boy and to shout at him: ‘What the fuck!’

But he never got the chance. When they got back to the shop, Haze gave him the slip, disappearing amidst the confusion and noise of the returning tourists.

Had he done it on purpose?

Was Haze avoiding him?

What did it mean?!