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He stares at his watch, weighing the options. “I’d like to cook. It settles me.”
I nod, but he isn’t looking at me. He’s refusing to look at me. His eyes focus intently on the greens in the fridge, but I know his mind is elsewhere.
“You’re going to cook me dinner… and leave?” There is way more bite to my tone than intended, but panic is creeping in. I don’t want him to cook me a goddamn dinner and leave. I want him to stay…. forever.
He finally looks directly at me. His eyes remain red and raw and tired. “You left me.”
His tone is flat, devoid of all life.
“I came back,” I plead.
“And you left again!” He shouts this time. “You fucking went to work. That told me everything I needed to know about how important this is to you.” He exhales, slams the fridge door shut and faces me. “You left,” he snaps again. “You came back and you left.”
I open my mouth to protest, but nothing comes out. I went to work. I don’t have a reason that will make sense to him as to why I needed to do that for a few hours.
He just shrugs his shoulders, interpreting my silence as validation to everything he thinks. “D, I don’t want to be a constant reminder of him. I don’t want to be the reason you can’t move on; you need to do that… you need to—”
“I need you.”
We stand. Those words hanging in the air. Carter stares at me blankly, like they haven’t registered yet, so I repeat them.
“I need you.”
“But…” he stammers, looks across the room, then back at me.
“Carter, you are the reason I can move on. You are the reason I want to move on, want to live in the now. You have been so right about all of it…”
“Wait, can you, uh, say that again?”
I laugh and step to him. “Carter, you were right about me not having dealt with it, about the fact that I was holding onto the past. But you’re wrong about one thing. I wasn’t holding onto Luke. I was holding onto what happened. I’ve spent so many years holding onto that, I’d actually forgotten about Luke. I thought I was honoring him by…” I rake my hands through my now shorter hair. Carter’s eyes watch my hands and then return to mine. “I’ve been living a lie. A huge lie, denying myself everything. This isn’t just about hiding being gay. It’s about all of it. My guilt, my anger, my confusion. That I shouldn’t be allowed to live and be happy if he couldn’t and my inability to stand up for him, or myself…
“Hell, I’ve spent so much time in denial and being the opposite of who I wanted to be… I don’t even know who I am anymore, but you do. You know me.”
Carter nods and smiles at me.
“I have a long way to go,” I add. “But I don’t want to do this alone. I can’t do this alone.”
Silence. He greets my proclamation with silence.
“I don’t want to be competing with a ghost,” he says after a long pause.
I shake my head. “You aren’t doing that at all. You never were. The reason I went back to Minnesota was to say goodbye to Luke, to remember him, to say I’m sorry, because I never did. Now I can begin the work to let go of all the other crap that took over my life.”
“No, we, begin that work.”
Chapter thirty-one
Three leather bracelets wrap around Davey’s right wrist. He used to wear a black beaded one, but it’s been missing since he came back from Minnesota. I’ve treaded lightly and not asked much about the trip, accepting what he has offered. What he has offered has been enough. More than enough. He’s offered me us, the chance to get through this together.
Davey casually weaves Madison’s silky ears through his fingers as he reads the paper. She snores softly, wedged in between us in the bed. Madison. It was the last street sign I recall seeing while out running when I came across her bloody body on the side of the road. My ego tells me she wedges between us to be snuggled in with each of us. But really, Madison is Davey’s. I smile at his hand as it comes to rest on her shoulder. I let my hand drift across to his and stroke along his wrist. He doesn’t look away from the newspaper, but moves his hand to allow me better access.
This is so nice. These simple moments we’re having more and more of. Simple moments I’ve never had before. Never allowed myself to have before.
“There’s one missing,” I say, running my fingers along the smooth leather straps and into the soft golden hairs on his arm.
He nods and shifts his focus to my fingers as they trail along his arm.
“I left it at Luke’s grave.”
