Chapter 10

Eli returnedto the couch and tucked under Parker's outstretched arm. They put on a movie, but Eli didn't watch a second of it. His whole attention was on the man holding him.

He slid an arm around Parker's waist and let his head rest on Parker's firm chest. Parker ran his fingers through Eli's hair. Cuddling had never felt so good. Eli wanted to touch Parker everywhere. His heart pounded throughout the whole movie. That feeling of everything being new but so right hadn't gone anywhere.

They didn't kiss again, and Eli was fine with that. Snuggling was thrilling enough, but as the movie ended, his doubts set in. Did it mean anything that they hadn't kissed more? Had Parker changed his mind?

Eli should've offered to return the favor and gotten Parker off, but earlier, everything had felt so natural and perfect just how it was. It hadn't crossed his mind. He wasn't sure he was ready for more right this second.

Eli felt his inexperience acutely. He'd admitted that he'd never kissed a man and knew Parker wouldn't judge, but what if that fact made Eli less appealing in Parker's eyes. It seemed like Parker had guessed Eli's queerness and hadn't known Eli was walking around thinking he was straight. Maybe Parker assumed Eli had been with men before. What if hearing Eli had no idea what he was doing had given him pause?

Parker kissed the top of Eli's head. "This was fun. We should do it again sometime."

Eli tightened his arm around Parker. He shouldn't be worrying so much. It was just his insecurity talking. Parker sounded perfectly happy. Eli had to give the guy some credit. Parker didn't seem like the kind of person to get hung up on Eli's inexperience, and knowing Parker, he'd tell Eli if something bothered him.

"Yeah, I'd like that." Eli reluctantly extracted his arm from around Parker and pulled back. "I should head home."

Parker walked Eli to the front door. He grabbed his dirty clothes from the bathroom and pulled on his jacket. His cheeks were red as he said goodbye, nerves churning in his belly.

As distracted as he was, Eli didn't see the shade until it hissed at him. He stopped short. The beast hovered next to his car, its smirking, pointy teeth protruding past its lips. The way it was focusing on Eli had him worried it was about to pounce. He shoved his hand in his pocket, digging for his keys.

The shade drifted closer. Eli pulled out his shade-light and flicked it on. The shade dodged the beam but didn't retreat. Eli shone the light in its face, causing it to hiss again as it darted upward.

Eli quickly made his way to the car. The shade grabbed him from behind, yanking on his jacket. Eli whirled around, trying to point the light, but the shade didn't let go. Eli willed himself not to panic. The last thing he needed was to scream and have Parker come rushing out. He didn't want Parker to see him as someone who needed to be protected. He wanted to be on even footing more than ever, and needing rescuing wasn't going to help achieve that.

He yanked his jacket from the shade's grip and shone the light in its eyes. As the shade darted away, Eli followed it with the light beam, forcing it farther away. Then he quickly darted to his car and jumped in.

With a bang, the shade was at his window, hitting it with its fists. Eli gasped in surprise. Why was this one so aggressive? He started the car and pulled away, but the beast followed him all the way home.

Eli parked in the driveway of James's house. He had to shine his light out his window to push the shade back just to get out of the car.

He ran to the front door and threw it open. Once he was inside the wards, the shade couldn't get him. It hovered just beyond the threshold. Eli shone the light in its face one last time. It hissed and shot out of the way, retreating toward the car.

Eli closed the front door, suddenly exhausted. Shades were never this aggressive. Eli knew he wasn't just misremembering his childhood or too used to city living. This was weird, even for Moonlight Falls. But if something was going on, if the shades around here were changing their behavior, surely other people in town would have noticed.

Maybe the shade tonight was a fluke. Though Eli couldn't help feeling like he was being targeted. Almost like the shades, or one shade in particular, had been stalking him since that first night. But that wasn't how shades behaved. They didn't stick around. They usually just passed through Moonlight Falls before disappearing into the woods.

Eli couldn't shake the feeling that this shade was the same one that had grabbed him from under his car. No one would believe him if he voiced this fear. He'd only be told that all shades looked alike, and he was mistaken. And they did all look similar, like any other wild animal. You probably couldn't say if the two random deer you saw briefly running through the woods were actually the same.

Besides, Parker had banished that first shade back to Beyond. It wouldn't come back for him. That was ridiculous.

Eli pushed the thoughts away. He resolved to buy a more powerful light and went to bed.

The next night,James seemed tired when he got home from work, so Eli offered to make dinner. He hadn't been lying about not being a good cook, so he stuck with sandwiches, and James seemed happy enough.

"How's your research going?" James asked as they settled on the stools at the kitchen counter, plates in front of them.

"Good. I got my recording box back today." Eli was going to text Parker tomorrow about warding it and was pretending he wasn't nervous about it. Everything to do with Parker made his insides flutter.

James didn't dig into his sandwich right away. He seemed too focused on Eli. "Are you worried about your project?"

Eli put his sandwich down without taking a bite. "No." He paused, both wanting and not wanting to talk to James about what had really been on his mind.

"I'm sure everything else will go smoothly," James offered, clearly trying to soothe what he thought were Eli's worries about his research.

"Yeah." Eli tucked into his food. By the time he'd finished the first half of his sandwich, he'd convinced himself to go for it. "How did you know you were bi?"

James's eyebrows raised in surprise, but only briefly. "My first crush on a guy got me thinking, I guess."

"Right." Eli was disappointed by the simplicity of the answer, even though he tried not to be.

"I don't know," James went on with a shrug. "It wasn't just that. But I guess I had feelings for guys before I ever felt that way about girls, so I spent a decent amount of time trying to figure out if I was gay. But by the time I was in high school, I was pretty confident I liked people of any gender."

Eli nodded. Why had he ignored some of his crushes? James didn't seem to have ever had that problem. Maybe Eli shouldn't be looking for answers in James's experience—it wasn't the same as his—but he couldn't help it.

He wanted to tell James he thought he might be bi but wasn't sure how. It felt so awkward to blurt it out. He wished he didn't have to. He wished people wouldn't assume he was straight just because he'd only ever dated women. Yes, he'd made that same assumption himself, but how could he not have fallen into thinking like that when being surrounded by that assumption his whole life was a big part of what had made it hard to see himself clearly?

It was messy and frustrating, but maybe James didn't think Eli was straight. Parker hadn't.

Eli ate the rest of his sandwich. "I think I've only just figured it out," he said when his plate was empty.

James shifted in his seat to face Eli. "Figured what out?"

"That I'm queer, or bi, or something." Eli shrugged helplessly, letting his arms flop.

James smiled. "That's awesome." He got off his stool and hugged Eli.

Eli's chest pinched as he hugged his brother back. "Yeah." He smiled.

James released him. "Thank you for sharing with me."

Eli rolled his eyes, overcome with affection for his brother and needing to counter it. "Of course I'd tell you." He paused. "Did you know?"

"Know you were queer?" James considered. "No. I mean, I'm not totally surprised, but it's not like I'm sitting here thinking I've always known." Their grandmother had said something along those lines when James had come out.

"That's good." Eli rubbed the back of his neck for something to do with his hands. "I'm glad I wasn't the only one oblivious while everyone else knew."

James gave him a funny look. "Figuring yourself out now doesn't mean you were oblivious before."

"But I kind of think I was. All this stuff was there before now, and I didn't realize what it meant."

James squeezed his shoulder. "The important thing is you know yourself better now, and that's nothing but a good thing."

Some of Eli's conflicted feelings eased. James was right. He should cut himself some slack and not worry so much about his past or how long it'd taken him to sort out his feelings. He didn't have to feel bad about this happening now versus sooner. Eli knew people came out to themselves at any age, and really, he was still pretty young in the grand scheme of things.

He could wish he'd figured it out sooner or that he'd never bought into the assumptions that made him dismiss his own emotions, thinking what he'd experienced wasn't "queer enough," but he shouldn't beat himself up about it.

"I'm glad I told you." Eli smiled. "Now you can stop worrying about me being stressed. I was just freaking out about this, but I'll be fine."

James laughed. "I wasn't worrying."

Yeah, right. Eli patted his brother's shoulder. "Sure you weren't."

James gave him a sheepish look before collecting their plates. "I'm glad it's nothing else."

Eli thought of Parker, but there was no way in hell he was bringing that up.

Parker metEli in town the next afternoon to put a ward on his recording box.

Eli got butterflies as soon as he caught sight of Parker crossing the street toward him. "Hi."

"Hey, gorgeous." Parker grinned at what must have been a look of shock on Eli's face.

No one had ever called him gorgeous before. He really liked it.

Eli had no idea what was going on between them. Would they start dating? Did Parker want that, or did he just like flirting now that they'd acknowledged their mutual attraction? Either way, Eli couldn't mess this up. Parker would always be in his life via James. He couldn't let anything that happened between them ruin the friendship they had or make things awkward. If Eli was going to try and figure out something with Parker, he had to do it right. Eli had to figure out what he wanted and go in knowing what he was aiming for.

If Parker was up for something serious, a relationship, and not just a few kisses and flirty words, then Eli had to be prepared for what that meant: Moonlight Falls. Could he see a future here beyond the next six months? Admitting to liking the town wasn't the same as considering staying.

But looking around the town center, he didn't completely hate the idea.

"You should be good to go." Parker straightened, getting off the ground after completing the warding spell on the recording box.

Eli had set it up in the same spot as before. "I really appreciate it. Could you give me a copy of the spell? I need to put it in the methods section of my thesis."

"Yeah, no problem." Parker tucked his hands in his jacket pockets.

"Can I get you an ice cream as a thank you?" Eli's stomach flipped like he was asking Parker out on a date.

Parker grinned down at him. "Of course you can."

Eli got two scoops of the "spooky" ice cream and handed one to Parker.

Parker gestured to the cup in Eli's hand. "I see you've been converted."

Eli groaned. "Oh my god, you sound like Hazel."

"Sorry." Parker laughed.

They made their way across the street to the park just as a group exited the diner next door. Eli found himself face-to-face with Sam. His old friend stopped and stared like he'd been frozen.

"Hi." Eli waved.

Sam broke eye contact before looking reluctantly back at Eli. The other guys he was with stopped halfway down the block, waiting. "Hey, Eli. Surprised to see you back here."

"Yeah." Eli made an awkward motion with his arms, like a flailing shrug. "Look, Sam, I'm sorry about the way I was before I left."

The tension seemed to leak out of Sam. He ran a hand through his messy black hair. "That's okay. I get it. I mean, I didn't at the time, but I get now that you weren't mad at me. You were mad at this place and everything that happened here."

Eli cringed. "Yeah, I wasn't in a good place at the end of high school, but I didn't have to take it out on you. I was such an ass, acting like I was better than everyone for leaving." He hated thinking about how rude he'd been to Sam the last time he'd seen him, basically shitting on him for wanting to stay in Moonlight Falls.

"If I were you, I would have left too," Sam said with more understanding than Eli deserved.

"Well, now I'm back, so you can have the last laugh."

Sam smiled. "You're sticking around? I thought you were doing some project."

"I'm not sure. Maybe I'll stay," Eli admitted. Parker had drifted over to a bench in the park, away from the conversation. Eli felt it was fitting that Sam was the first person he told he might want to stay here. "I was wrong for hating this place so much."

"That right?" Sam shook his head. He glanced over at his friends. "I've got to run. We're only on our lunch break. But hey—if you want to join us for trivia the next time you're not working, let me know."

"Okay, thanks." Eli was dazed as he walked over to Parker. He was relieved he'd been able to talk to Sam. He'd felt guilty about the end of their friendship for years but had mainly tried to ignore it.

They might never be best friends again, but knowing Sam understood and didn't hate him was a relief Eli hadn't thought he'd get. It was just another thing about Moonlight Falls that was shifting before his eyes, another bad memory that had become more comfortable.

Being stuck here and confronting the past, rather than visiting for a few days only to run away, had been good for Eli. He only wished he'd done it sooner.