Chapter 33

33

DES

" I should go and visit my family this weekend," Alex says on Friday morning three weeks into our idyllic living-together experiment. Shoveling another spoonful of yoghurt into my mouth, I eye his damp hair over my bowl.

We go to the gym at 6:30 a.m. every day now, and it's become my new favorite regime because seeing Alex sweaty and spent after a hard workout makes me want to drag him back to bed and wear him out in another way. Before Alex, I did my exercise in the evenings to decompress after work, but his forcing me out of the apartment each morning has made me calmer and more motivated.

Over the last few weeks, he's had some difficult conversations with his sisters about what's been going on at home, but he hasn't mentioned talking to his dad again. I'd bet my life that someone forced his dad to come around and apologize. There was no remorse when he came to visit, and he's been suspiciously quiet ever since.

"Any news on your dad?"

"Apparently, they're praying."

" What? "

"For God to deliver my soul."

"Who told you that?"

"Becs."

"The accountant with the secret craft business, right?"

He nods.

"It's great you're speaking to your sisters."

He shakes his head. "I'm surprised after what happened with Tom. Hannah and Becs ignored me for two weeks. Hannah said afterward that I'd humiliated the whole family. No doubt parroting what my mom and dad were saying. Rachel intervened to sweep it all under the rug. She said a lot of things to my parents like how it didn't mean anything, that it was normal to experiment, although I think she knew."

"Hannah and Becs … are they more conformist?"

"Yeah, they are."

"And did you ask Rachel to intervene?"

"No, she just stepped into that role. Because I'm the youngest, she and Cara have always looked out for me."

I nod. I'm the stepping-in elder sister in this scenario. It still feels weird that I haven't met any of them.

"I shouldn't have gone along with it. I wish I'd been braver. Fuck, Des, I feel terrible about Tom. If I'd stood by his side, would he have been okay? Would his parents still have disinherited him?"

"You can't think like that, Alex. You did what you needed to do at the time. It was your family, your home. What would you have done if they'd cut you out of their lives?"

He drags his fingers through his hair and blows out a long breath. "To be honest, I'm not sure. I could have found somewhere to live, but not seeing them again … I could have gone to Nana, but explaining it to her would have been difficult. Ugh, I was a coward."

"How did it all go down?"

"In what way?"

"With Tom?"

"My parents called a conference with his."

I stare at him. "Seriously? Were you both there?"

Alex shakes his head. "No. They decided what the next steps should be between them. They agreed to hush it up."

"Without either of you involved?" Wow, that's crazy. "How did they find out about you two?"

"I wrote Tom a note, telling him how much I was enjoying what we were doing. He didn't hide it very well. I mean, he didn't hide it at all. His mom found it in his pocket when she was doing laundry."

"God, that's awful! Was it graphic? "

Alex waves his hand. "Oh, not at all! We didn't do anything except kiss and make out. I'd kissed guys before, but it was the first time I'd ever had something ongoing with a guy. It was more of an emotional thing."

My mouth turns down, and I lean into him against the counter. "You can get emotional with me any time you like."

He laughs. "Yeah anyway, it's dreadful at home, Becs says. Scary. I want to reach out somehow to my parents, try and make things right."

"You think visiting is the best way to do that?"

"I'm not sure, but it's the only idea I've got."

"Do you want me to come with you?"

"No. I think I should go on my own, check out the lay of the land. It sounds like my sisters are in a much worse position than when I was there."

"Your father being the one creating all this." I don't like the sound of this. He'll be on enemy territory on his own. And his dad is the enemy right now. But it must be taking a lot of courage to face up to this.

He must see something in my face because he says, "It'll be okay, Des."

I nod at this. "Allow me to worry a little, though—yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Are you scared?" I ask.

He nods and blows out a long breath, and I pull him into a hug.

And later, on my way into work I play loud shouty music instead of my normal dance tracks to try and take the edge off my worry.