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The words hit him like a slap to the face and all the breath was pulled out of Harry’s body, as if a giant hand had grabbed his heart and squeezed.
Anger and embarrassment swirled through him, and he couldn’t hold back a shocked noise. Jack spun and stared, eyes wide and anxious.
Harry bolted.
He scrambled back up the stairs, as if distance could save him from further heartbreak. He stopped at the door to Jack’s room—their room. Except it wasn’t, was it? There wasn’t really a them at all, not if Jack wasn’t even prepared to admit that Harry existed. And okay, maybe Harry had been starry-eyed and naïve, but he’d thought—he’d thought that Jack would at least admit to dating someone. He didn’t have to name names. Harry would have been happy to be a just somebody, but not a nobody.
A burst of fury overtook him, and he angrily tugged on his jeans and a shirt, then dragged armload after armload of clothing out of the wardrobe, movements as rapid as his pulse. When Jack appeared at the door and opened his mouth, Harry cut him off without a second thought and retreated to his own room.
He hid in there, waiting—hoping—that Jack would come after him. Not that Harry wanted to talk to him, and he ignored it when Jack did call out, but that didn’t mean that a tiny, hopeful part of him didn’t want to hear a knock at his door, a further plea to come out, some indication that Jack cared.
But Jack never came.
Instead, Harry heard the roar of the ute engine bursting into life, telling him Jack had left. Harry threw himself onto his bed, flat on his back, blinking back tears. God, how pathetic was he? He was a grown man, yet here he was hiding in his bedroom like a love-sick teenager in some vampire movie.
“He’s nobody.”
The words continued to echo through his skull—taunting and cruel. Harry had to wonder—how long before he was good enough, important enough, for Jack to step up? Or was he meant to just wait while Jack twisted the truth time and again, making what they had into something less and expecting Harry to play along?
He just—Harry couldn’t do this. He wasn’t built like Jack or Tris or almost anyone he knew. Casual didn’t exist for him. Maybe this would be easier if it did, if he and Jack could just write this thing between them off as an experiment that didn’t work. But the thought of seeing Jack every day, of going back to being just roommates, made Harry’s stomach twist and his chest tighten.
He just wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do next.
His phone chimed in his pocket, and he scrambled for it. His heart leapt for a split second with the hope that it was Jack, saying he was on his way home, only to plummet again when it was just a text from one of his uni friends asking if he had the notes from last week’s class.
Fuck uni. He wasn’t going in today. He wasn’t staying here either, waiting for Jack to come home. He was better than that. He’d go and stay at Ambrose’s, and if and when Jack had anything to say for himself, he could damn well drag his arse across town and grovel.
He scrubbed the heel of his hand against damp eyes and sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. It made him feel slightly less pitiful. He took a deep breath and walked to his wardrobe, eyes flitting between a suitcase and a battered duffel that had been here when he moved in.
The suitcase seemed too depressingly final, so he grabbed the duffel. It smelt of stale weed when he unzipped it but was otherwise clean and serviceable. He grabbed clothes and underwear out of his drawers and stuffed them into the bag haphazardly, then added the items from his floordrobe that were still clean enough to be wearable.
He had to stop and take a breath when he went to the bathroom to pack his toiletries and saw his and Jack’s toothbrushes nestled up cosily together in a glass with their shared tube of toothpaste, but he pushed past it and grabbed what he needed.
He shoved his deodorant, toothbrush and body wash into the bag and zipped it. Then he pulled out his phone and fired off a text to Ambrose.
Okay if I crash at your place for a couple of days?
He pulled on his shoes and hitched the bag up on one shoulder while he waited for a reply. He was pretty certain it would be okay, the asking a formality, and sure enough, he got a text back within a minute.
Sure. What happened? Did you and Jack fight?
Harry wasn’t sure what to say to that. Because they hadn’t really fought, had they? Not exactly. They hadn’t even talked, because Jack had left before they could sort anything out, his job more important.
A tiny voice whispered that Harry was being unfair, that he was the one who’d said he didn’t want to talk, and Jack was just respecting his wishes, like he’d done this whole time. But a louder voice, the one that belonged to the part of Harry that was hurting, drowned it out, insisting that if his relationship with Harry really meant anything, surely Jack would have chucked a sickie. Obviously, he didn’t think Harry was worth doing that for.
He stared at his phone for a moment longer before replying.
I’ll tell you when I get there.
He trudged down the stairs to find Tris sprawled across the couch in his kimono. He nodded at the bag, his eyebrows raised in silent enquiry. “I’m going to Ambrose’s. No, I don’t want to talk about it,” Harry said curtly, and headed for the door.
“Harry, wait!”
Harry paused and turned. Tris held up a finger for him to stay there before running up the stairs, his footsteps light.
Harry wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but it wasn’t for Tristan to reappear a minute later and thrust Harry’s peacock suit at him. “Don’t you have that lawyer’s ball thing this weekend? You’ll need this.”
Harry blinked. Tris was right. Harry’s Bad Boyfriend date on Friday was a corporate event—some woman out to prove a point to her bosses about trying to police her personal life—and he’d been planning to debut the peacock suit. Just looking at it brought a lump to his throat as he remembered buying it with Jack, and how he’d first become aware of being attracted to someone else.
