Chapter 25

Chapter Twenty-Five

Henry

I REALIZE I SCREWED up the moment the words pass my lips. I wasn't even sure I spoke aloud until I felt Alex go tense under me. Now I'm tense as well, bracing from the shock of my slip up.

Damn it. How could I be so stupid? And right when we were both feeling so incredible. Alex was … he was amazing. I was soaring from what we did, adrift in a warm, pleasant satiation that made my whole body light and loose … including my tongue, unfortunately.

I've thought those words before. I've thought several times that I wish this wasn't finite, I wish it didn't have a time limit on it, I wish I could count on seeing him again. But that's not realistic. Alex has a whole life in San Francisco, a good job, a nice apartment, friends, co-workers. And even if he didn't, he hates Tripp Lake. He got out of here as quickly as he could. He certainly wouldn't come back for his temporary gay experiment.

Because that's what I am, isn't it? Even if he wasn't leaving, none of this is real to him. It's just a whim he's indulging, an escape from the stress and pressure in his life. He could live next door and it wouldn't matter. There is no version of this where Alex is staying.

Which makes what I said damn near the worst thing that could have come out of my mouth.

"I-I'm sorry," I stammer. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say that. It doesn't mean anything."

"It's okay," Alex says, quiet and stilted, stiff.

I push myself off of him. Suddenly our warm cocoon of contentment is gone, and I remember that I'm lying in a sticky mess. I take my opportunity to jump out of bed and head to the bathroom attached to my room. Maybe Alex will be gone by the time I return. Maybe he'll literally run. How could I blame him after I suggested he do the one thing he absolutely will not do? I'm going to seem clingy now, obsessive, but I'm not trying to force him into anything. It was just a wish, just an idle desire spoken in an unguarded moment. I didn't mean it.

I kind of meant it.

I definitely meant it.

I want him to stay. Okay. Fine. Of course I want him to stay. This has been incredible and impossible. The first day I saw him in the cat café, I brushed aside my attraction, writing it off as a silly fantasy. But nothing I dreamed of compares to the reality of being with him. And it isn't purely the physical part. It's how he looks at me, how he says my name, how easy it is to be around him. I want to go hiking with him and return to a house where our cat is waiting to greet us. I want to do all those cute, ordinary things I've only gotten the barest taste of so far. They're so possible and so tangible that I can't help but dream of them.

I force myself to leave the bathroom, bracing to find my bed empty, but Alex is still here. He sits on the edge of the bed, his fist closed.

"I wasn't sure where to get rid of this," he says.

"Bathroom," I say. "There's also a cloth if you want it."

"Thanks."

He's stiff when he passes me to enter the bathroom. His eyes focus on the floor instead of me.

I take the place he vacated on the edge of the bed and sit with my hands clasped between my knees and my head bowed. I'm not sure what to expect when Alex comes out of that bathroom, but I steady myself to accept whatever he says. Maybe he'll want to leave. I'll have to let him do it, no matter how it hurts. Part of me (okay, most of me) imagined waking up next to him again. When he texted me, my brain went crazy conjuring up vivid images of riding him and then snuggling up to sleep on his broad, warm chest, of waking up to the wonderful knowledge that he's still here, of sleeping naked because we're tangled around each other sharing body heat.

All of that is likely gone now. I swallow down my disappointment. It's my own fault. I can't push him for things he doesn't want to give.

My head pops up when Alex re-enters the bedroom. To my surprise, he settles beside me on the bed, clasping his hands like I clasp mine.

For an interminable moment, he's quiet. When he finally speaks, it's barely loud enough to truly break the silence.

"I have to go back soon," he says.

"I know."

"My boss, my co-workers, our clients — they're getting impatient. I've been gone longer than any of us thought I would be. The work is piling up. I can only keep up with so much of it from here."

"I know."

"They have this new account that they want me working on. I can do some of the initial research and stuff from here, but this is a big client, a huge client. They're not going to be happy with me being out of the office forever."

"I know. Alex, I'm sorry. It was a slip in the moment. I wasn't serious. I know you have your life to get back to."

"It's just…" Alex pauses and glances over at me. "Henry." He turns his body toward me until our knees bump together and unclasps his hands so he can take mine. The contact settles me, even though I suspect whatever he has to say isn't good news for me. "I don't want you to feel like you're … like this isn't important to me or I'm using you or something. That's not my intention. It's just that my job…"

His eyes flicker down as a scowl twists his mouth. Whatever emotion that phrase elicited passes as quickly as it appears. Alex shakes his head at himself and huffs out a sigh.

"It doesn't matter," he says. "My job is my job, and if I want to keep it, I can't stay here too much longer, no matter what my parents may want."

There's decades of bitterness wound up in that one sentence, but this doesn't seem like the moment to unpack it. I don't know if his parents or his job are causing the reaction. Maybe both are equally guilty.

"I know that," I say. "I'm not trying to make you stay. I just want to be a place you can go when you need to get away from them, honestly."

"And you have been. And it's probably the only reason I'm sane at all." He chuckles wryly at himself.

I yearn to do more, to dig, to help. It's in my nature, but I'm terrified that any offer will only scare him more. I've already freaked him out enough for tonight.

"Do you want me to leave?" Alex says.

It's so soft and scared I could mistake it for my own voice. But that doesn't make sense. What does he have to be scared of? He's the one leaving, the one who's just experimenting. This should all be so easy for him.

"No," I say. "I don't. Unless you want to leave. It's okay if you do."

Alex surprises me by reaching up to tuck my unruly red-brown hair behind my ear.

"I don't want to leave," he says. "But I also don't want to stay if it's going to hurt you."

I almost laugh. As though this doesn't already hurt. I can't show him that, however. I don't want him to know how hard I've fallen for him when I'm supposed to have kept some distance between us. It should be purely physical. Revealing that I've let feelings creep in will mess up whatever precious time I have left with him.

"It's okay," I say. "I promise. I knew this was only physical. How could it not be, right?"

Something passes over Alex's face, but I can't read it before it's gone. "Right. Of course."

We shuffle under the sheets together. Alex positions himself behind me, hugging me against his chest. He's large enough to make me feel small when I'm swallowed up in his embrace. That usually brings me a comfort like nothing else, but tonight it's hard to relax into his warm, strong arms. They feel more insubstantial tonight, ghostly arms that could vanish at any moment and leave me cold.

Alex nuzzles his nose into my hair and breathes deeply, squeezing me tighter for a moment. A lump clogs my throat. It's so hard going back and forth like this with him. One moment, he's telling me how he has to leave soon; the next, he's holding me like this, making me feel so secure, so warm, so … loved .

My brain reels away from that word. That one is dangerous even to think.

I scoff at myself. Dangerous. As though keeping Alex here in my bed isn't dangerous. As though doing the things I'm doing with him isn't dangerous. As though clinging to him for as long as I can isn't dangerous. This whole situation is one enormous red flag, but I can't seem to stop myself, so I might as well feel good while I can.

Alex kisses my shoulder. "You feel tense." His words brush against my neck, sending a shiver down my spine.

"Sorry."

"You don't need to apologize," he says. "It's because of what I said, right? I was just trying to explain."

"You don't need to apologize or explain, Alex. I knew what this was. It's been great. Really. I never expected anything to happen between us. Even if we never did anything but go on a totally platonic hike together I would have had a great time with you."

He laughs softly. "I'd like to go on more hikes with you, platonic or otherwise."

Something trembles in my chest. An image flashes through my brain of the two of us hiking on the weekends like some sort of actual couple , and I really wish my stupid brain would stop showing me all these things I can't have while Mr. Unattainable is still naked and in my bed.

"I'd like to go on more hikes with you too," I say. "Maybe some day it will be possible. You can always come back to visit. I won't tell your family."

"Heh. I'd like that. Escaping to the woods every now and then. Not telling anyone where I am. Spending the weekend with you."

That trembling in my chest is only getting worse as Alex cruelly paints a picture of the long-distance clandestine relationship we could have. It's probably stupid for me to even entertain the idea, but it heals the part of me that's waiting to get hurt by his leaving. I should discard it, but I cling to it instead, bury it inside of me so I can pull it out later. When he leaves. When this hurts for real.

"That would be great," I say softly.

Maybe Alex is humoring me. I'm not sure. But both of us relax after that, letting the conversation drift into silence. Until this conversation, this was a perfect night, and I try to go back to that feeling of utter contentment that dragged those unfortunate words out of my mouth. Alex's arm goes heavy atop me, his breathing deepening as he relaxes as well.

We might have no future, but we do have the present. And I'm going to hold onto that for as long as I possibly can.