Page 189 of In at the Deep End

Dad nodded. “You spent a lot of time there.”

“I know.” Matt chuckled. “It was supposed to be a summer job.”

“Which it was.”

“Yeah.” He stared at the folded tea towel. “It just became more than that.”

“Sounds like it.”

Matt glanced up to see Dad’s affectionate expression, and for one brief moment, he thought about telling him everything. About how he’d thought, for a little while, that maybe he’d finally found something worth holding on to.

Instead, he looked away. “I suppose it was always going to end.”

Dad was quiet. “Jobs do.”

“Exactly.” He put the tea towel down. “When I get back from Edinburgh, I’d better start looking for a real job.”

Dad nodded. “That sounds like a good plan.”

Matt nodded too.

It was sensible. Practical. The sort of plan he’d have made before Owen had somehow become part of the shape of his summer, before he’d started allowing himself to imagine that when the dissertation was finished and the garden was done, there might still be a reason to go back.

Before he’d caught himself thinking about next summer.

He pushed the thought down before it could take hold.

The summer was almost over.

Perhaps it was time to start acting like it.

The housewarming party was only two days away, and Matt had stopped searching for excuses to go to Owen’s.

The garden was finished, and they both knew it.

Owen had thanked him more than once, and when Matt had joked that he was sure there was still plenty of work left, Owen had laughed and told him he was going to have to find another excuse to spend his afternoons drinking coffee.

It had been said in a light tone. Matt had laughed too.

He hated the way their conversations had become a little more careful, as though Owen had started measuring every word before he allowed it out.

And as for the kisses…

That was the hardest part. The kisses had changed.

They were brief now, a kiss against his cheek before Owen turned away, or a brush of lips against his temple when Matt was leaving. Once, a soft kiss to the top of his head that might have been nothing more than affection between two people who had grown close.

Never his mouth.

Never the lingering kisses that had once left Matt breathless and wanting more.

And that hurt more than if Owen had simply stopped touching him altogether.

Owen wasn’t rejecting him, not really. He was still giving Matt affection, still letting him know he mattered, just not in the way Matt wanted him to.

Matt had stopped trying to work out when it had changed. He only knew Owen had drawn a line between them.

And he was beginning to understand he was standing on the wrong side of it.