33. The Marriage

Logan

“It was nice to get out of the house for once, even if it was only for a few hours,” Logan said to his wife, Amber, as they pulled up in front of their modest, two-level Sacramento home. They had gotten a sitter for a few hours that night; the first time they’d left the house in over a year since baby Emma was born. Amber didn’t respond, staring blankly out the window. “What’s up with you? You haven’t said a word this whole car ride.”

“I thought we would always be honest with each other,” she said, with her arms crossed at her chest.

“What are you talking about?”

“The game we were playing.”

Fuck. While letting out a sigh, he slumped his shoulders forward.

“‘Have you ever had a sexual experience with a member of the same sex?’” she continued.

Logan swallowed hard, a visible gulp of nervousness. “So?”

“You said, ‘yes’!”

“And?”

“You never told me about that. Who was it with? What did you do?”

He took the key out of the ignition and gathered his items. “It’s a lot more complicated than that. Not sure I want to talk about it right now.”

“Why not? Was it a one-time thing or … ?” she asked, her voice trailing off.

Logan sighed and left the car with her in it.

They didn’t speak when they went inside and relieved the sitter. He regretted answering that question the way that he had. At the gathering, he had a couple of drinks and was, perhaps, too honest. He figured many people had homosexual experiences so what was the big deal? Four other people out of six answered ‘yes.’

He got in the shower and turned on the hot water. The truth was he missed Hunter. He’d often wonder how his life would have been if he had gone to New York to be with him. He loved his wife and his daughter, but he couldn’t help but wonder. He wanted desperately to feel the way he would in Hunter’s arms or with Hunter inside of him with his large hand pinning him down by his neck. The sex he had with Hunter was the most intense of his life. He came in the shower to the thought of it as he did often enough since the sex with Amber died down. He’d keep Hunter to himself, he decided. No one needed to know about their personal lives. It was special because it was theirs and theirs alone.

“It was Hunter, wasn’t it?” The words were like a knife to his throat as he entered their bedroom in a towel.

“Jesus, Amber, what are you talking about?”

“You. You being gay—with Hunter, apparently.”

“I swear, we were just friends. Close friends,” he said, rushing past her.

“Do you kiss all of your friends like this?” she asked, holding up a selfie of him and Hunter kissing in bed. It was their first New Year’s Eve together and the first one they’d decided to stay in instead of going out on the town. After Christmas with their families, they were desperate to get back to their place and sleep in the same bed again.

“You went through my phone?!”

“Logan! You’re gay!”

“I’m not—!” He sighed and lowered his voice. “I’m not gay.”

“Then what the fuck is this?”

Logan was worried, but mostly for Hunter. He didn’t care if people knew; his parents already knew. He wanted to keep Hunter’s secret—their secret. “That was a joke. Where did you even find that?”

“Hunter emailed it with an ‘I miss you’ a few weeks after you moved to L.A. What the fuck is this? What did you do together? Is this why he didn’t come to the wedding? Is that why I never met him?” she shouted, tearing up.

Logan sat at the edge of the bed and sighed, defeated. “Hunter and I had been best friends since elementary school. Sophomore year of college—our friendship changed, and we started living together up until we graduated. He went to New York, and I came here and met you. That’s it.”

“Logan, you were in a serious relationship with a man for two years and you’re not gay? And you never bothered to tell me? Did you tell anyone?”

“No. It was a private thing.”

“Did you love him? Two years living together, you must’ve loved him.”

“No, not the way I love you,” he said.

“Then, in what way?”

He got to his feet and dressed in a hurry. “I don’t know—I don’t know what you’re asking me.”

“Have you been with other men?”

“No. I already told you!”

“Are you bisexual? Are you secretly wanting to be with men?” she yelled, in tears.

“No, Amber, I’m not secretly pining for men. I’m not bisexual, either. It was—only him. Maybe that’s bisexual. I don’t know. We never labeled ourselves.”

“Because you loved him. You must’ve.”

“Whatever,” he said and left the bedroom. “I don’t ask you about your lesbian threesome in college because it’s in the past.”

She followed him out into the hallway. “Do you want to have a threesome? With a man, maybe?”

“What?! No. Jesus Christ! Are you not listening to me?”

“What is it about him then?”

“What is what? I haven’t spoken to him in years, Amber! We’ve had zero contact.”

Amber’s silence gave him a bit of relief. He desperately wanted the conversation to be over. He didn’t want to be reminded of what he lost.

She sighed before continuing, “What happened? How do you go from being best friends to not speaking? Something must’ve happened.”

“Do you still speak to your friends from third grade? We moved away. We grew apart.”

“You saw him—last year.” She remembered. “When you were in New York for that seminar, you said you were going to get in touch with an old friend to be in the wedding—was it Hunter?”

“That was two years ago, and yes, it was Hunter. I wanted him to be my best man.”

“You wanted your ex-boyfriend to be the best man in our wedding?” she screamed. The cries from the nursery down the hall reached their room.

It wasn’t easy for the two of them to navigate the revelation of Logan’s past relationship. It would take at least six more months of fighting about it and three months of therapy for it not to be mentioned in their household again.