“Okay. Sure. Stuff. Why not?” I closed my locker and sighed loudly. “Lead me to wherever is private.”
“Thanks, Quinn. I promise, it’ll only take a bit.” He walked down the hallways, peering down each of them to survey the number of students in each, and I followed, my eyes half-closed, feeling more and more cynical about high school with each passing second.
After about a minute, Milo audibly went, “Aah!” and led us down a hallway with an elevator at the end, reserved for the one or two students at the school who were wheelchair-bound. If the elevator were open to anyone, no doubt students would use it all the time, but it needed a key, so the elevator was rarely used and as a result, the little hallway connecting the elevator to the main hallway was also rarely used.
I walked in and folded my arms. “Okay, so, what would you like to talk to me about?” I asked.
Milo exhaled in nervousness, walking to the end of our little hallway to peer out before walking back in. “Okay, so, I’m not asking this because of any, like, anything related to you. I just know some stuff and wanted to see if you were caught up in it. But, in exchange, I want a promise.”
I was doing a lot of promising lately. “What is it?”
“If none of this applies to you, I really need you to forget I ever asked. Seriously. The question is kind of… provocative, and I know we like to be curious and nosy. But I really can’t tell you anything you don’t already know. And, I can tell, you seem to really roll your eyes at teen drama-” Again my mouth opened in protest, and again he held up a finger, “-and I get that. Honestly, I do. I agree a lot of the time, it sucks. So, if this doesn’t apply to you, not asking me anything afterwards will really minimize any drama or fallout or anything like that. Okay?”
I nodded. “I understand what you’re saying. I just don’t know how I’m supposed to react or how I will react or whatever until you ask me.”
Milo sighed. “Yeah, fair enough. That’s totally fair enough.” He looked around one last time and lowered his voice. “Okay, here we go. Are you currently having sex with Taylor?”
I made a committed effort to keep my face frozen in place, not giving away anything in either direction. I thought about my answer in my mind, and rehearsed it internally a few times. “Did I give the impress-”
“That’s not what I’m asking.” Milo clarified, interrupting me. “Again, try to believe me, as best as you can. This isn’t about you, or anything you did.”
“How can you ask me that and tell me with a straight face it has nothing to do with me or anything I did?!” I asked incredulously. In answer, Milo cocked his head slightly, but his expression remained unchanged. He was good at this.
I ran my tongue over my teeth in thought. Something was definitely up. This was time for my overthinking brain to activate and play some 4D chess. Was Milo asking on behalf of Taylor, to test my trust? Was he an agent of Morgan, trying to see if the rumors were true? Or, according to Morgan, becoming true? Was he his own little independent agent? If so, what was his end goal? Was he snooping? Did he know something important to me? Did he know something important to Taylor? Was he protecting her from me, or me from her? Or us from a third party?
Bwaah, too many possibilities. “Hùnzhàng,” I muttered aloud, to no one in particular. I knew he was expecting an answer, but I also knew that Taylor was expecting me to be loyal to her, and loyalty meant secrecy. “I don’t know what you think is going on, but we’re literally just studying,” I told Milo in a low voice, trying to sound like a mixture between angry and weirded out. “If you’ve heard some rumors, let me save you some time: they’re not true. Taylor is Taylor, and I’m me. Of course we’re not having sex.”
Milo stared at me for a bit. “Okay,” he finally told me, coldly, his expression not changing. “Thanks for the info. Have a good day, Quinn.” With an ominous calmness, he walked right out of the hallway, and that was the end of that.
I honestly thought I was going to feel regret or guilt for lying, but honestly, I only felt proud. I stuck up for myself, and I knew Taylor would be happy with what I did. Part of me was wondering if maybe I should report to Taylor that I was being asked this by Milo.
I started walking back to my locker, thinking to myself. No, I really should just keep my mouth shut. Adopt the Morgan approach. I saw no one, and no one asked me anything.
But Milo did ask me something. He asked me if I was having sex with Taylor, hitting the bullseye. And… it ‘had nothing to do with me.’ How was that possible? Sex takes place between two people. Without it, it’s just… masturbation. Granted, Taylor and I weren’t having full-on sex, but…
…but we were having some form of it. And Milo was asking me, without me having to do with it. So… it wasn’t getting out that I was the one having sex with her? What could that mean? There was a rumor going around that Taylor was having sex with someone, and people wanted to find out who?
No, that was dumb. If someone was spying on her, they’d see both of us, not just her. And if she was leaking it herself, she wouldn’t need me to shut up about it.
But then… what? If it genuinely had nothing to do with me… then why would Milo even ask me? He seemed like the least drama-hungry of the group. Or power-hungry. He had nothing to gain. And he was… trying to get me to admit to sleeping with Taylor? Or, wait, if it had nothing to do with me, he was trying to find out who was having sex with her.
But why? What does it mean when the only missing puzzle piece was who someone was sleeping with?
I don’t know how it started. Maybe it started with the bad feeling in my stomach. Maybe my legs made up their mind before my mind did. All I knew was, in a matter of a minute or so, I was walking — nay, running — after Milo.
I barely caught him before he disappeared inside what must have been his first period classroom. At the risk of making a scene, I called out — “Milo!” — to him.
He turned around, his expression still unchanged. He just stared at me as I jogged the last few steps up to him. Neither of us said anything for the longest time. Eventually, I just started nodding at him.
“Yes?” he asked.
“Yes. The answer to your question is yes. Is there something I need to know here?” I asked, out of breath.
“I thought it might be,” he muttered. “Yeah, there is.”