Page 69 of Right Up His Alley

Maybe it’s better if he lets me go. Maybe it’s better if he never looks at me like that again. Maybe he needs to hate me as much as I hate myself for getting my hopes up.

“Can we talk? Please.” His voice is quiet, missing the vibrancy he normally possesses. It only serves to drive the dagger deeper.

I should say no. But I can’t do that to Truett. He deserves some sort of an explanation. I would have liked to do his sober, but here we are. “Alley,” I slur, feeling lightheaded.

Truett follows me out the door, and we walk in silence to Spare Time. The alley is closed today—another shitty decision on my part because I need the money, but I just don’t have the energy to keep it open today. The front door opens with a turn of my key, and I step inside, letting it close behind Truett.

“So?” he asks once we’re alone. “Care to tell me why I found my boyfriend drunk and getting tattooed in the middle of a work day?”

I ignore the word “boyfriend.” Not because I don’t like the title, but because I like it too much. Like him too much. But liking him jeopardizes everything. I was once foolish enough to think we could be something, despite the rules USBC laid out for us. But now? I can’t screw up yet another thing, especially when I no longer have a safety net to fall back on.

Instinctively, I fold my arms across my chest, a barrier between us that says more than words ever could. Truett notices. His mouth tightens, and after a beat of painful silence, he steps back, giving me the space I silently demand.

Fuck, I’m an asshole. The biggest fucking jerk for breaking his heart.

“Ezzie, baby, what’s going on? Your mother and I are worried about you.” The pain in his voice cuts deeper than before. His anger, I can handle and match with my own. But this? This fucking sucks. Seeing the man who is starting to mean more to me than anything in this world in so much pain because of me is the worst kind of punishment.

Truett deserves better than this.

I should have never let it go so far.

But he deserves the truth. An explanation. It won’t change anything, but maybe he’ll understand why I have to break our hearts.

“I can’t do this anymore, True,” I whisper, and like a weak man, I can’t meet his gaze. I don’t want to see the pain and hurt I’m causing him. Feeling it is enough.

“What do you mean?” His voice is thick with emotion. It sounds like he knows exactly what I mean, but he’s going to make me say it.

Every part of me wants to go back to the bubble we lived in this weekend. Back when I thought I had a say in my life. Back when I could allow myself to fall in love with the one man who has done nothing but support me and Spare Time since the beginning. A man who will haunt all of my dreams.

“Today when I got back to the alley, there was a foreclosure notice on the door,” I finally say, looking up just in time to see Truett’s eyes widen. “It freaked me out. So, I called my mom and asked her about it. She admitted we are three months behind on the mortgage, and she didn’t want to tell me because she didn’t want me to worry. She also didn’t want me spending the money meant to renovate the alley on bills.”

“Okay, yeah, that’s pretty bad. But we can fix this. I just got⁠—”

“It’s already been paid, True.”

“But… how…” Truett’s voice trails off, but I see it—the moment the truth hits him.

His expression twists in slow-motion horror, eyes widening even more as the pieces fall into place.

“No.” He shakes his head, like he can undo it, like he can will the truth into being something else. “Please tell me you didn’t—” His voice cracks. There are tears in his eyes, which he furiously tries to blink away. “Tell me you didn’t use the tattoo money you’ve been saving for years to cover the delinquent payments.”

I don’t need to speak because he can see the answer all over my face.

His breath leaves him like I punched it out of his chest. And for a second, he just stands there, staring at me like I broke something sacred.

Because I did.

“I had no choice, Truett,” I break the silence. I couldn’t stand it any longer. “I can’t lose this alley.”

“You can’t lose out on your dream either, Ezzie!”

“What the fuck do you want me to do?” I snap, my anger bursting out of me. Anger at my mom for keeping this from me. Anger at my dad for fucking dying and leaving this shitty alley for me to run. And anger at myself for hurting him. For hurting everyone in my damn life because I can’t seem to get my shit together.

“This is the one thing my parents had. The one thing my father left for me. Losing it will devastate my mother. I can’t do that to her. I won’t do that to her. My focus has been elsewhere, and I should have been checking in on the finances more. This is my life, Truett. I don’t get to choose a different one.”

“But you can. It doesn’t have to be one thing or the other. You can have both things! I can help you, Ezra. Let me help pay,” Truett urges, but I don’t want to listen to him, and there’s no way in hell I’m taking a handout from him. I’m already destroying his heart; I don’t need to take more from him.

“I don’t want your money, Truett. You might have the opportunity to choose a different path, but I don’t. This is my family’s livelihood. What they built for me. My place is and will always be here.”