Platonic by Kate Paddington Page A

pictures and stories. Only a few hours since he last thought about him, but that is because Mark is in New York and, for so long, this city was their dream together. Finally arriving had unavoidably stirred up the nostalgia.
    And now here he is in his natural habitat, having just gotten out of a cab, wearing a thin, immaculately tailored and pressed coat with sleeves that end tight at mid-forearm. It’s in the high eighties, but Daniel doesn’t look as if he’s sweating. He’s grown beautifully lean in sharp contrast to his teenage roundness, his waist tight and his shoulders broad. He carries an oversized folio and a shoulder bag, and his sunglasses are perched high on his head, his mouse-brown hair lightened to almost blond and cut shorter, falling around his ears and across his eyes in wisps of bangs. He’s on the phone and he’s smiling.
    “What?” Ben asks, staring in the right direction but not picking Daniel out of the bustling crowd of New Yorkers.
    Mark starts to answer but his voice cracks. He swallows and tries again. “That’s my ex.” His teeth clack. He’s not sure he’s ever called Daniel that. “I mean, from way, way back. High school.”
    Ben laughs and continues to scan the crowd for the man he’s supposed to be looking at. “You dated in high school?” Ben knows about Mark’s past relationships, for the most part. They’ve talked about his failed undergraduate loves and the friendship with Patrick. Mark hasn’t detailed every casual encounter, but he hasn’t hesitated to tell Ben that he’d had fun for a while, and really learned his body and how fun sex could be. He hadn’t mentioned high school, though, choosing to keep that story between him and Patrick. Ben had assumed Jason was Mark’s first real relationship.
    Looking harder across the intersection, Ben works out whom Mark is talking about and can’t stop himself from looking his boyfriend’s ex up and down.
    Mark thinks he must be a little intimidated; who wouldn’t be? Daniel looks fantastic. He retains all the charm of his youth—the roundness of his cheeks and the jut of his chin, his hair still falling across his eyes and down to the nape of his neck.
    Suddenly Ben is dragging Mark across the street, weaving in and out of traffic and jaywalking in a way that earns them honking horns and brings one car’s tires screeching to a halt.
    Daniel sees them before they get there, the horn of a taxi close by making him look up lazily from where he’s hung up his phone and now riffles through his bag. His eyes widen when he sees Mark being tugged toward him. They’re such a soft brown in the sunshine, Mark notices, exactly as they were when he and Daniel were young. Even if so much else has changed.
    Closer up, Mark notices that Daniel’s skin is darker by several shades. His hair is indeed borderline blond, with subtle highlights of honeyed and amber browns, and product to keep it ruffled in place. The jacket is stunning, as he expected, fine shimmering thread stitched into the collar and cuffs, and underneath Daniel wears his usual low-slung jeans and T-shirt. They fit him differently now, though, tight across the chest and thighs, loose everywhere else.
    Daniel keeps staring back at him, and for a split second, Mark thinks he looks terrified and lost and as young as when they knew each other. And then he’s grinning and placing his folio and bag at his feet. His teeth flash white in the sun.
    There are a couple of missed beats, both of them just looking, both of them very, very aware that Ben is standing there looking back and forth between them and slowly realizing there is so much more here than hilarious anecdotes about teenaged Mark.
    “Mark Savoy,” Daniel eventually says, sounding pleasantly surprised. “Finally made it to New York City.”
    Mark laughs, awkwardly, blushing even though he doesn’t know why. Ben is watching. “Daniel O’Shea,” he returns. “Exactly where I left you.”
    He regrets it the