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He sighed and ran a hand over his head. “I know. Simon is watching me like a hawk. It’s just difficult when you’re not hungry. Then I workout and nothing is hanging on.”
I nodded and looked at our hands.
“The concert was really good. When did Adam start singing his song?”
“San Francisco. What made you come to Phoenix?”
One side of his face lifted into a smile. “I wanted to see how things were going. I miss being on tour with you.”
“I miss it too. I look for you off stage every time.”
“I don’t understand why we’re doing this if we want to be together.”
Letting go of his hand, I stood up and moved to the window. “You know why, Patrick.”
I was so angry at him for doing this to us.
“The whole reason we moved to Portland was so we could come out. Don’t you remember that? We weren’t going to have to hide anymore.”
“I know.”
I turned and looked at him. “Then why the fuck are you still in the closet? There’s no fucking good reason for it! You have openly queer teammates, for god’s sake. Why do you have to do this to us?”
He stood and ran his hands through his hair, leaving it a disheveled mess. His handsome face was marred with pain. Right then, I knew I was no closer to going home than we were a month ago, but I wasn’t expecting his anger.
“Why can’t you just accept our life the way it was? It was so good. We have friends we could be together around, but you insist on making me choose between you and outing myself.”
I ran my hands through my hair. “You mean the friends I watch show their partner how much they love them after games? Who can hold hands and be a couple outside the confines of their home? We’ve been together longer than all of them, Patrick. And we’re still hiding!”
“I can’t do it right now, Cole! Why can’t you just accept that?”
I looked at him as tears filled my eyes. He was going to make me break our hearts. “Then I guess this is it for us, Patrick.”
He threw up his hands in obvious irritation with me. “You’re going to end this after being together for almost sixteen years? If that’s what you want to do, then I guess that’s what we’ll do. I get no say in any of this. You decided you can’t be a rockstar without telling the world our fucking business. But you go ahead, Cole. You’ve got it all figured out.”
Patrick turned and grabbed his wallet and keycard.
“Where are you going?” The desperation in my voice was a shock to me.
He looked at me over his shoulder. “Doesn’t really matter now, does it?”
With that, he turned and walked out the door, leaving me in his room.
I was stunned. I didn’t know what to do. He’d never walked away from me before, and I didn’t know how to handle it.
Patting my pockets, I found my phone and key card. I walked toward the door, but stopped when I saw his Fallen Angel t-shirt on the chair. Picking it up, I brought it to my nose. It smelled like him and threatened to take me to my knees.
I wanted to take it with me, just to have some part of Patrick during the last eight weeks of the tour. But I put it down and wiped my eyes on the hem of my shirt in case I ran into anyone in the hallway.
Walking to the door, I looked back, already missing him so goddamn much.
I didn’t hear from Patrick again until we got to Seattle, eight weeks later.
CHAPTER 4
PATRICK
When I returned to my room after I’d calmed down, Cole wasn’t there. I knew I’d fucked up. But the weight of everything that had happened between us came crashing down on me and I couldn’t hold it back any longer. The pain of missing him. The guilt knowing it was all my fault for causing all the chaos in our lives spilled out of me uncontrollably. I regretted every word that had come out of my mouth. Breaking up with him was the last thing I wanted to do.
