Ryan has always been a scientist at the core, and he notices patterns the way other people notice colours. It is how, after all, he has developed the ability to communicate with Alex at all, and it is a skill that is only fine-tuned around him—Ryan needs all the help he can get with Alex, sometimes, and his observation skills improve until they border on the frightening.
So he notices, perhaps faster than he should, when their…relationship (and he cringes at the word) is purely friendship, and when it dissolves into that murky area somewhere else.
Namely, in private.
In the weeks following the kiss in Nan’s garden, he notices that nothing of their contact would even hint at something more. Alex doesn’t touch him when there are other people to see, much less kiss him. On the odd occasion
