Chapter 21

Dell was finishinghis second bookshelf of the week when Luca finally texted him back.

His stomach sank when he saw the reply to Dell's request to talk, sent only a few hours after Mae had left his bed, four days earlier.

Okay

Luca had never been the most garrulous guy, but even for him, a single okay didn't portend enthusiasm. Dell supposed he should be grateful that he at least included the ay. Dell supposed he should be grateful Luca responded at all.

Is it okay if I come over later? he typed back immediately, not even concerned about how thirsty it appeared, texting back within thirty seconds. He wished he could express it somehow over text, that he wasn't coming over to say goodbye. But he didn't know how to say any of this, really.

At least Luca didn't leave him hanging now.

sure

Which was how, three hours later, Dell once again found himself in front of Luca Yaeger's door.

He sucked in a small breath when Luca opened it. Luca's hair was starting to get curly again, and it looked like he hadn't shaved in a few days, making him appear rather scruffy, all over.

Dell was into it.

Dell had always been into all of it.

"Hey." Luca stepped back. "Want a beer?"

"Yeah." Dell closed the door behind him. "A beer sounds great."

Luca cracked open a can, a bit of foam running over his thumb. He sucked it off after he handed it over, before he opened his own. Dell felt hyper aware of every move Luca made. Hyper aware of every hop running down his throat. Hyper aware that Luca hadn't made eye contact since he'd opened the door.

"So." Luca leaned his forearms on the counter, looked over at the view of the surf from the kitchen window. "I feel like you should just get to it. Whatever you wanted to come here to say."

He was right. There wasn't need for small talk. Dell had to use his words; Luca deserved that.

Dell stuck his hands in his back pockets after taking another sip for bravery.

"The person who's opening the bookshop. Mae. Who I told you about last time. We've gotten a little…closer. I told them more about you."

Luca remained still, eyes still focused on the outside world.

"And they…" Dell swallowed. "They suggested…if we wanted to…that you and I could keep up our deal. While I start seeing Mae, too. Sort of an…" He waved a hand. "Open relationship deal. So we wouldn't have to stop this. If you didn't want to. Because I don't want to stop, Luca."

The truth was, while Dell had been skeptical when Mae first suggested it, he'd been doing a shit ton of reading over the last few days. And a shit ton of wondering if his initial discomfort had only been due to the societal pressures that prioritized monogamy, a culture he'd been immersed in his whole life. Maybe he didn't have to feel shame about harboring feelings for two people at once. Maybe it was okay to want to hold onto all of this.

Finally, Luca looked up at him, an eyebrow arched.

"So you came here to ask me if you can keep fucking me, while you start fucking them?"

Dell blushed, looking down at the counter.

"It, uh, does make me sound like selfish, when you put it that way. But…yes." It sounded cruder, the way Luca had just put it, than everything Dell had been reading about openness and communication and boundaries and trust. But—"That's about it."

Luca made a noise Dell couldn't interpret before grabbing his beer and walking to a chair in the living room. After a moment, Dell sat in the opposite chair, joining him in his stare out a different window.

"So you're into open relationships," Luca summarized after a silence, tapping his fingers against the side of his can. "This wasn't exactly what I was expecting."

"I know," Dell rushed to say. "It wasn't what I was expecting either. But I've thought about it a lot, been reading about non-monogamy. I've never actually tried it before, but caring for Mae doesn't mean I suddenly don't care about you. I think…we work well together, you know? Or else we wouldn't have kept this up so long."

Luca nodded slowly. "You don't want things to change."

"Not really, no." And then, unable to help himself, he blurted, "Do you?"

Luca only stared straight ahead before he said, "I have a feeling that what I want isn't the most important factor here."

"No, it is." Dell pushed to the edge of his seat, turned his knees toward Luca's. "That's why I'm here, talking this out with you. I want to know what you're thinking. What you want. It should be about what all of us are comfortable with."

Luca closed his eyes.

Dell had known this might be an awkward conversation to have, but his gut told him, even by his low expectation standards, it wasn't going well.

"I haven't kissed them or…anything," Dell stuttered out, face flushing as Luca's silence stretched, as the shame he'd been training himself not to feel came creeping back. Wondering, after the words came out of his mouth, if that statement was even true. If the looks, the nearness he and Mae had shared in that karaoke bar, if spending a night in the other's bed counted as anything. "We promised we wouldn't, until I talked to you."

Luca continued to be quiet for a long time. At least, it seemed like a long time. It might have only been an awkwardly prolonged pause before he spoke again, but maybe it was also an eternity.

"You could've kissed them if you wanted to," he said, rubbing a hand over his face, like the conversation was making him tired. "You're not…obligated to me, Dell. I thought we were clear about that."

"Yeah." Dell cleared his throat. "I guess I just…want to be obligated, a little. To you."

Luca leaned forward in his seat, resting his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands.

"Did you really think I was seeing other people, while we've been…doing this?" Dell asked after a moment, genuinely curious.

Luca sighed, dropping his hands.

"I guess not. I mean, it's a small town. I figured if I heard about you being with anyone else, and you were still coming around, I'd ask you about it. Or…" He raised a shoulder, a small smirk on his lips. Dell breathed in relief at the hint of amusement on those lips, no matter how faint. "Shit, maybe I wouldn't have asked you, and just kept having you while I could. I don't know."

Dell's brow furrowed.

"But isn't that…what I'm proposing?"

Luca was quiet again. Before he leaned back and looked directly at Dell, fist propped just below his mouth.

"Mae would be your primary. Right?"

Dell's mouth gaped open and closed at the terminology coming out of Luca's mouth so casually. But eventually, he nodded.

"So it feels, to me, like what you're proposing is that you and Mae get to fall in love, while I get to be your open relationship side hustle experiment."

Dell couldn't hold his gaze. He blinked away, eyes suddenly stinging.

"I'm sorry, Luca. I didn't mean…"

The rest of the words caught in his throat, but they felt obvious. To hurt you. Luca's tone was even, almost clinical. But it was impossible to not hear anger in the actual words.

Except…wait. What was happening here? Why was Luca getting to act offended? They had met once a month for exactly one thing for a long time now. Luca had never offered anything more than that. Had never even seemed to want to. He had iced Dell out just as much as Dell had iced him out. So yeah, maybe Dell didn't actually understand how he was the bad guy here.

"If you want more than this, Luca…listen, I'm not opposed. I…" Dell stopped himself to gather the right words. Honesty, that was what he'd read over and over this week. This kind of shit only worked when everyone was honest. "I haven't been opposed to that for a while."

Luca took a long, audible breath. His knee bounced, until Dell could see him make himself stop.

"I think…that might be what freaks me out," he eventually said. Dell turned to him, a lick of…something stirring in his chest. "If we were all just fucking each other—fucking you, I guess—it'd be one thing. But something about…approaching it this way, all open and honest…" Luca laughed a little. "Maybe I'm just not equipped for that level of maturity, or something, but it's hard not to see it all leading to deeper feelings, and…"

Luca's mouth opened and closed a few times, before he finally met Dell's gaze.

"You already have those deeper feelings with Mae, right?"

Dell swallowed. "I think so."

Luca looked away again.

"I think it'd be best for everyone if you just let yourself have those feelings, Dell. I fear I would just…muck everything up. You deserve a good thing."

"You deserve a good thing, too, Luca," Dell said, voice quiet.

Luca raised a noncommittal shoulder, let it fall.

"I'm sorry I can't let it be this."

"Yeah." Dell cleared his throat, interlocked his fingers over his stomach. Finally accepting Luca's answer. "I get it. Sorry. I just…got excited about the possibility, I guess."

"I mean." Luca adopted a similar position, crossing his arms over his chest. He settled deeper into the chair, a smile lifting his mouth. "I get it, too, Dell. Getting to fuck two people you like? I'm just sorry I can't give that to you."

"Oh god." Dell covered his face with his hands, chest suddenly full of laughter. "Do you think I'm an asshole? Have I just…made this the worst breakup of all time, or something?"

"Nah." Luca's grin turned bittersweet. "I didn't give you much to break up with, Dell. I know that, too."

For the first time in what felt like a while, Dell picked up his beer again.

"I didn't, either," he said.

Except…part of him wanted to keep pushing. This conversation was never going to be easy, but this conclusion they'd somehow come to didn't feel exactly right. Mae: feelings. Luca: sex. Like Luca was trying to fit them into little boxes so this split would make more sense.

But no relationship ever fit into little boxes. The truth was, Luca and Dell had shared something. Even if it was mostly physical, it had come with a sense of trust, of safety, that wasn't exactly easy for a person like Dell to find. It had lasted almost as long as Dell's longest relationship.

Maybe they had iced each other out at times; maybe they didn't share all the details of their lives. But they had spent a lot of hours in this place, even when they weren't actively fucking, in quiet acceptance, skin to skin. It meant something to sleep next to another person, close enough to feel their heat, to wake up next to them. To learn the shape of another person's body, the secret spots that made them shiver. It was fucking vulnerable. They did know each other, Dell thought, in a way that had been singular, unique to them. Dell imagined Luca would find a man, eventually, that he'd be able to open his whole self up to. Who he'd share all the secrets hiding behind those mysterious, brooding eyes with, in addition to all the private pleasures of his body. Dell's chest ached with jealousy at the thought.

But still, that man wouldn't know Luca in the exact same way Dell had known him, these last two years. Just like Mae wouldn't know the Dell who had existed in this cabin exactly like Luca did. None of it lessened anything else; no amount of care minimized other care. It was still all care. It all carried weight.

But Dell knew he'd likely already pushed Luca too far. He'd already put enough of his thoughts out there, and they weren't Luca's burden to bear if he wasn't interested in hearing them.

So he kept his mouth shut, and Luca took another long sip of beer before he said, "It was what we agreed to. Sorry if I reacted badly to this. I had just thought that we'd already said goodbye, so…I don't know. This caught me off guard."

"Wait. You thought we'd said goodbye?"

Luca cut his eyes toward Dell's.

"Yeah, Dell," he said, quiet but not unkind. "We did."

Dell looked away, back toward the Pacific, feeling suddenly childish.

Another long silence passed, but this one felt off-balance. Like Luca had finally relaxed, and Dell was glad for that, but Dell was, himself, increasingly lost.

"So we can't…" And Jesus, maybe Dell really was a crude ass, but apparently he was going to ask anyway. "Go one more time?"

Luca slowly shook his head.

"I mean." He gestured vaguely toward Dell with his beer, even as his eyes remained focused on the window. "My body has a Pavlovian response to you at this point; I'm pretty much crawling out of my skin to touch you." Luca cleared his throat. "But if we went one more time, I think it'd just make me sad. And sad sex isn't up my alley."

Dell's throat went tight.

Luca had described it perfectly. Crawling out of my skin to touch you. He knew Luca was right; following every instinct in his body right now likely wouldn't be a good idea.

Part of him was bitter, though, that Luca had known the last time had been the last, and he hadn't.

But maybe…a tiny part of him had.

Either way, the fact that he and Luca would never have another time, that he would never have this again, a moment alone in Luca's cabin, made the hyper awareness of Dell's skin shift from arousal to something painful. Like it wanted to rip right off of his bones.

Even if he was the one doing the ripping.

"Well." Dell stood abruptly, placing his can on the table. "Probably shouldn't drink too much more of that."

Because maybe he could have stayed to shoot the shit with Luca until the beer ran dry, but something about that felt even more painful than sad sex. Even more of a misdirection than whatever Dell had already done here today.

"Yeah." Luca joined him, placing his own can next to Dell's. "Sorry. Probably shouldn't have given you one at all; it was just…"

"Routine." Dell smiled sadly. "Yeah, I know. But I should go."

"Yeah." Luca attempted to give him a smile back. "You probably should."

Dell paused at the door, glancing behind his shoulder.

"It won't be weird between us, if we run into each other at the IGA or something? I don't want it to be weird between us."

Luca's smile didn't fade, but he said, "I can't guarantee that, Dell. At least not for a while."

Dell looked back at the door.

"I'm sorry, Luca."

A moment passed. He felt, more than saw, Luca's shrug.

"I'm not. I mean, I'm sorry as hell right now, but…it had to end at some point. Right? And you deserve to be happy." And then, a true kindness: "It's okay, Dell." Another shrug, small this time. "We're okay."

And even if Dell had had any more words, he wouldn't have been able to say them.

With a nod and one last glance, he shut the door behind him.