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  I must admit I brace for it too, expecting my stomach to lurch unpleasantly at Nate’s proximity under nonsexual circumstances—circumstances that resemble our old intimacy entirely too much to be good. My body aches all over, though, and I find myself too exhausted to put up a fight, even when Nate’s legs shift to bracket my hips on either side and he encourages me to lie back against him and into the ice wedged between our bodies. Part of me admires him for putting up with my snippiness with such saintly patience—astounding enough for someone with a quick temper—and recognizing I’m on edge with discomfort that extends to the mental as well as physical. At one point I opened my mouth to tell him to fuck off and play nursemaid to someone else, but Nate cut me off at the pass with a gentle “Please.”

  Apparently there are some things even I can’t fight against, but for the first time in a couple of weeks, I find myself wishing for a Xanax to wash the rest of my uncertainties away and numb me the hell out.

  “What was all that back at the beach, at Max’s shop?” Nate finally asks. I’m impressed by his restraint for not having asked about it until now. “You thinkin’ of buyin’ into the business or something?”

  Or something; my own thoughts on the matter are still far from clear, just a jumble of ideas and inspiration I haven’t felt for a while. But there’s definitely a spark of interest I can’t deny, smacks of the same drive that had me off investing in property and obscure stock options from a young age—the very things that have more or less kept me afloat since being cut off from my family. It might not be much compared to what I was once promised, the decimal point having moved some, but selling off my real estate in Ohio and Chicago, not to mention some of my shares, has padded my bank account nicely enough. I’ll never have to work again, if I play my cards right. Deep down, I know one of those cards is Hugh’s offer to move in, the sheer generosity of the suggestion appealing to my good sense as well as my affection for my friend. Without quite meaning to, I’ve started looking at his home a bit differently, weighing the ways in which it’s already felt like my own for months.

  Where Nate fits into the picture, I don’t know. I remind myself he’s probably headed back to Ohio in good time.

  I’m silent for a little while, considering Nate’s question and how much I want to answer. To my surprise, it comes much easier than I expect. “Something about that shop appealed to me,” I tell him quietly. “It just felt so home-grown and authentic in there, you know? And I was really impressed by how highly regarded they are around here; I’m sure if I asked around some more, most of the locals would say the same thing. Obviously Logan and Max do quality work.”

  I feel Nate nod. I also feel what could be fingertips skimming my bare shoulder, and I shrug it off as imagination, knowing Nate is too smart to start getting overly familiar when I’m in a snit.

  “The whole thing is probably crazy, but I saw that place and thought, ‘Hey, maybe this is something I could invest in.’”

  Hesitating more now, I add, “It’s pretty stupid. I haven’t even gotten myself back on my feet yet, and I’m already starting to think about what it’d be like to set up shop here for good and just… rebuild. Start over. I do like California, and surfing feels so… me.”

  “That doesn’t sound stupid,” Nate answers, voice low. “You’ve got a good head for business, better than almost anyone. I’ve seen that brain of yours in action, man; almost puts Hugh’s massive gray matter to shame.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” I answer sarcastically. “Good thing I’ve got some good business sense, since I obviously don’t have much for anything else.”

  Nate shoves at me lightly. “Don’t be retarded, Phel. You make good choices.”

  Christ, when was the last time he said that to me? I wish I could say I didn’t remember, but that’d be a lie. It was at a baseball game we went to with Liam late last spring, the Rangers against the White Sox. Such a big deal on multiple counts—not the first time I’d met Nate’s son, not by then, but certainly the first trip the three of us took together, a special treat courtesy of my company’s box seats in Chicago.

  I’d never seen a little kid so happy in my whole life, his face split in half by a grin that didn’t budge from the second I greeted them at the airport. His father was practically over the moon too. I wasn’t doing so bad that weekend either, considering the rare treat of having Nate in Chicago and the son who was gradually becoming a part of my life. Although I’d never been one for kids, I had to admit I was crazy about Liam, who was, like Nate, as smart and cocky and funny and generous as anyone I’d ever met. Weirder still, he seemed to like me, even if it sometimes meant I had to withstand being teased about the stick up my ass by father and son at the same time. I didn’t mind in the least, and I… I admit I started to dream big.

  As far as I can tell, the misunderstanding started when Nate took my hand during the game, right there with Liam between us, snacking on popcorn and having the time of his life as he cheered on his team. Granted, our entwined fingers stayed hidden behind Liam’s back where he couldn’t see, but I think I somehow assumed it meant everything was okay, that Liam’s being here and his father’s openness with me were signs that he knew. Obviously that wasn’t the case, as I quickly learned when Liam went to call the score in to his mother between innings, and I leaned over to give Nate a kiss.

  He jerked away like I’d spat in his face. “What the hell are you doing?” he hissed, putting so much space between us so quickly that I was surprised he didn’t jump out of our private box altogether. “Liam’s right there!”

  Something lodged painfully in my throat. It took a few moments for me to answer. “I’m sorry,” I stammered, and backed away with my hands up. “I thought… I thought you’d told him. About us.”

  Nate was watching his son with alarm written clear as day across his features, staring so hard he might have willed the kid to turn around and start hurling accusations our way. With his back to us, on the phone, Liam was completely oblivious to our exchange and to the fact that I’d tried to kiss Nate, but Nate seemed equally oblivious to Liam's ignorance. “Jesus Christ, Phel,” he said, voice like gravel. “Of course he doesn’t know. He’s nine fucking years old. Don’t be retarded.”

  I think Nate knew the gravity of what he said the moment the words left his mouth; he started backpedaling immediately, apologizing so many times I eventually had to ask him to stop. “I think I’m done with this conversation,” I told him quietly. “Let’s just finish watching the game.”

  “We can talk about this after Liam’s gone to sleep,” Nate suggested raggedly, whispering. “I’m sorry, baby, you know I didn’t mean that. You just—I freaked out, okay.”

  “Shut up about it,” I snapped, then sat back down in my seat to indicate my refusal to listen to any more. “And don’t call me ‘baby’ like it changes anything. You made your point.”

  The fight that ensued didn’t actually happen until several days later—Liam’s presence prevented it, and when the weekend was over and we flew back to Ohio, Nate took him home after giving me a hug and a promise to call that I didn’t acknowledge or return. He made a special trip back out to Columbus to see me the next day, though, and that I knew he was sorry didn’t make me feel much better about anything. Nor did it change the few harsh realizations I’d made since seeing Nate and Liam off.

  I tried not to be too hard on myself about it, or so I kept telling myself—my space, after all, had become shared space with Nate, as he’d been staying with me in Columbus for so long that his presence was visible everywhere in the apartment. His clothes were in my dressers, his beer in my fridge, his life my life. Little things that made me happy every time I was reminded of Nate’s place in my world, his place in my heart. Corny, I know, but I was at the point I’d started considering making a space for Liam, an adjustment I’d never anticipated but was willing to make for Nate.

  When Nate came to visit after the Chicago trip, I told him as much. Not because I wanted to make hi
m feel guiltier, but because I thought it necessary for him to know. “I put my place up for sale in Chicago,” I told him once the silence across the dinner table that night became too much to bear. “I’m never there anymore, and I have three bedrooms here: I was going to start living here permanently. Maybe even buy a house.”

  “But you fucking love Chicago,” Nate said, puzzled. “Why move?”

  “Because I fucking love you more,” I snapped. We both fell silent for a moment. After taking a deep breath to collect myself, I continued, “I wanted—want—you to move in with me. And Liam. I was going to ask you to move in.” The expression that crumbled over Nate’s face almost shattered my own resolve not to cry. Aside from a slight quiver of my lip, I think I managed.

  “You were going to ask me,” he repeated.

  Without meaning to, I barked a laugh that sounded twisted even to my ears. “Obviously the answer’s no, isn’t it?”

  Nate made a face. “The answer isn’t no, Phel,” he forced out. “Jesus Christ—it’s ‘I can’t.’” Apparently feeling useless unless he was touching me, Nate pushed back his chair with a loud screech across the tile and came around to my side of the table. He dropped to one knee in front of me, taking my hands. Pleading with me with his whole body and the scared set of his eyes. Perversely, it looked like he was about to propose marriage. “Liam doesn’t know about all this—and even if he did, I wouldn’t be able to disrupt his whole life and move him somewhere else, move him away from his mom. No way is he ready for that, and neither am I. But it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t, in a heartbeat, if things were different. You know that, right?”

  I wrenched my hands away. “Yeah, Nate, I know.” Unable to look at his face any longer, I pushed myself up from my own chair and grabbed my plate, still bearing the dinner I’d hardly touched. “But let me ask you something,” I began, going over to the kitchen island to clatter my dishes down into the sink. “We’ve been together for a year. I would marry you tomorrow if I could, and yet you won’t even tell your son what I am to you. You won’t come out to your family, and you won’t move in with me. So when the fuck are things ever going to be different? If not now, when? You gonna tell Liam the truth and sign a joint lease with me from your goddamn deathbed in sixty years?”

  Nate’s arms folded across his chest, a sure sign all hope for a civil discussion had just flown out the window. But I didn’t care. I didn’t think “civil” was a word I even knew right then. “Don’t give me the guilt trip bullshit, Phel,” he growled. “I’m here, and I’m with you. I’m sorry things aren’t moving along according to your personal schedule, but I got a son I have to think about too.”

  “Oh, are things actually going somewhere?” I asked with incredulity. I hated to voice that fear out loud, but the thought had stuck in my head sometime over the weekend, and I hadn’t been able to unstick it. “From where I’m standing, it doesn’t look like this fucking relationship is moving anywhere at the moment. We’re in almost the exact same spot we were that first night we came back here to fuck, except then I still thought I’d have my common sense left in the morning—not some terrified asshole who’s afraid to be seen with his faggot boyfriend within fifty yards of his ‘real’ family.” I gave another sharp laugh, watching Nate’s face darken with each word that left my mouth. Fuck him. “What’s the problem, Nate? Are you still in love with that ex-wife of yours? Scared I might ruin your chances if she sees us together?”

  I think I expected Nate to pick up the nearest plate and smash it, or maybe throw a punch at my head. That’s not what happened. Instead he left the room and came back carrying his jacket, motorcycle keys in hand. I stared at them mutely and then up at his face, unsure what to say because I knew it would sound like a challenge for him to leave. But I also couldn’t say I didn’t want him to, the words catching on my tongue like lead.

  In the end, my silence probably pushed him halfway out the door as much as another cruel taunt would have. Nate walked to the exit and wouldn’t look at me at first. He fiddled with his keys, twisting them over and over in his hands. “Tell you what, Phel,” he said, and I knew from the tears in his voice this was going to hurt. “I’ll come out to my kid when you come out to your father, okay? You criticize my priorities, but from where I’m standing? The only reason you haven’t done it already is because you’re more attached to your trust fund than anything else. Whatever you say, you’d rather he give you a pat on the head for a lie than be true to yourself, when that’s something I wish for every day.”

  From his key ring came the key to my home, which he flung at me across the floor. His eyes flickered up to meet mine for a second, and then he was gone. The door slammed after him.

  Once I’d roused myself enough to throw the deadbolt behind him, I picked up Nate’s key from the tile, I thought it was the last time I’d ever see him. I maybe even prayed for it a little.

  But here we are, nearly two years after we first met. Nate telling me I make good choices when his very presence is irrefutable proof I absolutely don’t. He makes me, to use his word, retarded, a fact over which I always end up hating myself, no matter my best intentions. Right now I can’t seem to decide whether I feel more wretched for being able to look at him at all, or that I for a moment chose to share with him something of my private hopes for my future. Stupid Phelan. That future doesn’t exist, not with Nate in it. Can’t stay with him here, can’t ask him to go—Hugh will never give him up for you.

  This conversation is over, and he doesn’t even know it yet. It shocks me, really, how easily the words to push him away come to me.

  “I’ve been wondering about something lately,” I begin, and I lean back a little into Nate’s loose embrace, the one he’s trying to pretend isn’t happening on purpose.

  Predictably, he rests a hand against my forearm to indicate he’s listening, gives a gentle squeeze. “Yeah?” I can actually hear the hope in his voice, the tightening of his groin against my lower back as he responds to the tenor of my voice like an invitation.

  “Is this what it was like for you the first time around?” I ask. “It’s kind of like we’re carrying on an illicit affair all over again, doesn’t it? There’s risk, excitement.… We could get caught at any time. Did cheating on Emilia and sneaking around fill you with the same sense of exhilaration as throwing yourself at me now?”

  Nate stiffens against me in an entirely different way, muscles rigid, and on my lips there’s a smile that won’t come, no matter how hard I try. Silence crawls over us in what feels like an endless haze, cloying, but then Nate shifts backwards into the cushions, trying to put space between us without shoving me out of his lap altogether.

  “Well?”

  He clears his throat. When he speaks, I can barely hear him even from a few inches away. “Lemme make something clear,” he murmurs, but we both know I’m listening. I asked, after all. “Every time I cheated on Emilia was the saddest I’d ever been in my life. Much as I wanted to lose myself in how happy it made me to be around you, I never forgot what I was doing to my family without them knowing. Not a day went by that I didn’t dream about coming clean to Em and ending the whole charade, but I was fucking weak.”

  To my horror, I try to speak, but nothing comes out; something grips my throat so hard I have to stop and wonder if it’s a panic attack, here out of the blue, but I know it’s not. No, this is something else, and I fight against it until I find my voice again and ruthlessly suppress Willa’s words surfacing in my head. Still, it penetrates that I do not, in this moment, feel proud. “We agree on that much, at least,” I force out.

  “Phel.” However reluctantly, I turn to look at Nate, then immediately away when I see tracks of moisture on his cheeks, wiped hastily away. “I wasn’t sure whether or not I should say anything to you about it, but I’m thinking of coming clean to Hugh.”

  The non sequitur makes my body go cold, and I pull myself up off the couch to face him. “That’s kind of petty given the circumstances, isn’t it? You mi
ght think you’re upset at me, but telling your brother we’ve been fucking on his good leather sofa isn’t the right way to express your anger.”

  Nate shrugs, hands curling around his ankles as he pulls his knees in to his chest. His eyes glitter in the low light of the room, and I realize, too late, that the look on his face isn’t the same need for blood I’ve found in my own reflection of late. He looks tired, which is perhaps most frightening of all. “Tired” often means “done.” But the flash disappears quickly, shoved beneath the surface as Nate’s mouth quirks in a sad smile that’s just for me.

  “I wasn’t gonna tell him about us,” he explains. “Just that I’m gay. It’s time, and the way I figure, only fair. Liam knows, and Emilia knows—Hugh should know too. But I can see how you’d be worried it might give the rest away.” He pauses. Then he suggests, “You could just tell him yourself.”

  “No.” It would break Hugh’s heart; I know this. Nate knows it. He loves his brother, but he’s not volunteering to be the bearer of that information either. But it does, for the briefest of seconds, make me wonder why it would be so bad if Hugh knew, before I remember how much I actually care. The thought of Hugh ending our friendship makes my stomach twist, but that isn’t what terrifies me so much.