Chapter 48

Asher

Reece is quiet most of Sunday. We make lunch and then dinner, and in the evening, we watch a movie, the three of us. We kiss and share each other on the couch, but there's no sex. Reece is tired and Sawyer is distracted, and I'm worried about Deliah's gossip.

They spend the late evening outside on the back porch carving out new figurines. It's quiet, and I don't like that. I'm caught between addressing the shift in the air between us and letting it ride out. Things can't always be perfect. We are all human, after all, and we need our space, even if that space is inside our heads, so I leave it alone.

"Let me see," I say, sitting down next to Reece. Sawyer glances up from across the table, where he's carving out a figure of an insect. He's only just started so, apart from the one side of a wing, it's hard to tell what kind of insect it will be. It's also smaller than other figures he's carved in the past.

His eyes meet mine. I know my husband. I know every tick of his mouth and every glance of his eyes and even the things he can't show me, I see. Something is wrong.

Reece holds out the piece of wood he's been working on. "It's supposed to be a cat," he says.

I take it from him, inspecting it because it looks nothing like a cat. "Are you sure?" I ask with a smile.

He laughs. "No."

"Whatever it is, we'll put it up on the mantle with the others."

***

The first day of school is like waking up from a wonderful dream and finding the world has fallen into apocalyptic chaos.

The football team finds me on the field at the end of the day, screaming like the championships are tomorrow and not three months away. I almost hide among the group hugs when I spot Gerald making his way swiftly across the field, but it doesn't help. Sam and the guys disperse, getting ready for their first day of practice for the new school year, and Gerald finds me.

"Hey, Gerald," I say, after the bodily attack from the team. "Good summer?"

"It was alright. Alright, I guess." He stares at me too long and that means he's got something juicy to tell me.

"Everything alright with you and your partner?"

Well, I guess nothing has changed since the summer. Gerald is still low-key homophobic. I hate how he insists that he loves ‘the gays' but refuses to speak the language we speak. Every time Gerald has referred to Sawyer as my ‘partner' in the past, I've politely corrected him, asking him to refer to Sawyer as my ‘husband'. I know it's petty, but it grates me when they want to be friends but won't deal with their discomfort over these small things. Is it so hard to refer to a man's male spouse as husband ? ‘Partner' is fine until it's a cop-out.

"My husband, Sawyer, you mean?" I ask.

He grins. "Yeah, yeah."

I don't answer him because he has no filter or boundaries and doesn't even realize how inappropriate that question is. I'm not going to make it easy for him.

Gerald also can't read the room and has zero ability to pick up social cues. "Yeah," he continues, "You know. Just . . . you guys still going strong, eh?"

And when I give him a blank look, he says, "Bumped into Deliah yesterday at the town debate."

It takes everything in my soul to keep from groaning out loud. I'm so sick of Deliah.

I play it cool. "Yeah? Is she good?"

"Well, I don't know. I didn't ask. But the debate was pretty crazy. People better vote red if they want this country to take back its dignity."

I ignore his fishing for a political debate. "I heard she's not doing too well. Health-wise." I'm totally making it up, but let's see how long it takes for Gerald to break and ask me about ‘Sawyer's friend'.

"Shit. That's bad. Cancer or something?"

I shrug. "She had a small sniffle, she said, when I went in for milk two days ago."

"Must be cancer. Her mother had cancer, you know."

Deliah's mother didn't have cancer. It was Deliah's husband's mother who had cancer. I shake my head and work hard to keep my eyes from rolling. This guy is something else.

"Anyway, she looked fine to me. She's probably even lying about it to get some attention. You know how women are."

Gerald thinks since I'm not attracted to women, I must hate them too, like him. "No, Gerald, I don't know about that, actually."

My words fly right out over his head.

"Yeah. She said she saw Sawyer at the store with another man just before the summer. You know about that?"

I maintain the lie I started with Principal Watson. "Yes. Old friend of ours, working at the woodlot with Sawyer now."

Gerald looks disappointed. "Working with Sawyer?"

"Yeah."

He frowns now, confused that there's nothing sensational for me to add to his gossip. Well, there is, but I'll die before I ever let Gerald, of all people, find out.

"Deliah said he was a new face."

"Hmm."

"From where?"

"Desert Lands."

"Desert Lands? You gotta be more specific, Cameron. Nevada? Texas?"

"Hmm."

"God, you're such a wet blanket sometimes. It wouldn't kill you to just tell me, you know. Anyway, I told Principal Watson. He said he talked to you about it. Friend or coworker or something, he said."

I raise an eyebrow. "So, you already knew before you came over here?"

He shrugs. "Needed it from the horse's mouth."

" Needed it? Needed what, Gerald?" I'm a little pissed. I hate this kind of entitlement. It reminds me of Reece's father, thinking they have a right into people's lives without any reason for them to be there.

"This is a small town, Asher. Rumors aren't good. A simple thing like your partner buying lunch or whatever with a coworker can cause unnecessary damage. Nice to clear things up. Now, if anyone asks me, I can tell them I got it straight from you that there's no funny business going on."

I turn back to the field. Fuck this guy.

Gerald laughs and pats me on my back. "I'd still keep an eye on Sawyer if I were you. Deliah said that new guy is real pretty."

"Thanks. We're fine," I mutter. Because if I tell him all the ways I've fucked that real pretty new guy in recent months, Gerald might faint and die.