Chapter 10
AARON
“What are you doing tonight?” Barrett asks me.
He’s fishing, though I’m not sure exactly what for.
A running partner? A drinking buddy? Gossip?
With him, any of those is possible. The first two I can’t give him.
Lastly, I don’t want to. My personal business is exactly that, and I try not to let it influence anything at work. So far, I’ve been very successful.
“I’m hanging out with a friend tonight.” Technically true.
“Oh, anything good?” I swear he perks up, like he’s caught a whiff of something interesting. He knows I hang out with my college friends on Thursdays, without fail, and that today is not Thursday. Not that I only see them on Thursdays, but I usually discuss them by name.
“Nope, just dinner and television.” Also, not technically a lie. More of an omission. Oliver and I are having dinner and watching TV, but after we run. There’s also my crochet project. Both the running and the crocheting are going well. After a month of meeting up, we’ve both come a long way.
Oliver no longer thinks he’s going to die, but he’s unwilling to admit that it’s not pure torture.
He hasn’t missed a single run, though. Even when he’s on his own twice a week, he does them without fail.
I know because he’s given me access to the data on his app.
I told him it’s so I can analyze his runs and help him get faster.
What I really like is getting notifications on my phone that let me know he’s logged a workout.
Not that I necessarily need it. He sends me before-and-after selfies every time.
I wouldn’t call them thirst traps, considering he’s still wearing his oversized sweatshirt and sweatpants every time he goes out. Still, he’s absolutely adorable, his face giving away every ounce of emotion he feels. Without checking the data, I can tell whether or not he had a good run.
I even caved and sent him one after my sixteen-mile-long run this past weekend, something I’ve never done before.
“Sounds like fun. Is that with Matthias?” Barrett officially knows way too much about my life.
“No, a new friend.”
“Oooo…” I swear, he sounds more like a fifteen-year-old girl than a thirty-year-old professional at the moment.
“It’s not like that.” This is not a conversation I want to have with anyone, let alone a colleague. Oliver is a friend. I remind myself of that before I go over every week. A friend I’m helping get into shape, and who’s helping me make an afghan—one that’s a bit wonky but coming along nicely.
“But it could be?”
“Don’t you have work to do? Isn’t there an issue with one of the departure boards?”
Barrett puts his hand up, as though he’s surrendering. “Noted. A friend.” I don’t like the emphasis he puts on the word friend, but it’s not worth arguing with him. Besides, if I push back, it’ll just make him more interested.
I spend the rest of the day pissed off for no good reason.
My friendship with Oliver has been my dirty little secret for almost two months.
What I’ve said to Barrett is what everyone knows.
Not telling my best friends more about him physically hurts me.
I’m not even sure why I’m holding back at this point.
They obviously know we’ve been talking. I might not have said the words out loud, but inviting him to the Farmer’s Market and then to Matthias’s house sends a clear signal.
There’s nothing to hide. We text daily, but most of those are either about running or crocheting. I see him weekly for our usual night, though the day changes. So what am I worried about? It’s not like I have to tell them that we had sex. That was a one-time thing in the past.
I’ve almost convinced myself of that when I get to his apartment building.
He opens his front door wearing a pair of running shorts—which I finally convinced him to buy—and a single sock.
Nothing else. I do my best not to stare at his hairy chest, which is on full display.
I haven’t forgotten how it felt to lay my head against his chest and snuggle him close.
“Um… hi. I need like two minutes.” Oliver looks down at his feet, then back at me. “Make that five.”
I wave him off. There’s no real hurry to get out.
I’m more interested in whatever happened to him that led him to end up late this week.
Usually, he’s dressed and ready when I arrive.
It’s often me who needs a second to change, depending on how much time I have between finishing work and meeting him. “Everything okay.”
“No. I mean, yes, it’s fine. Just…” He waves his hand around in the air as though that explains everything.
Maybe it does. His place is a disaster zone.
Since the first time I came over, Oliver’s place has been considerably tidier.
I haven’t ventured beyond the living room and bathroom, so it’s possible he shoves everything in the bedroom until I leave.
It’s enough that I’d started to think maybe that first night was a fluke.
Right now, I’m tempted to double-check the weather to make sure a tornado didn’t blow through the living room at some point today.
Clothes and papers are mixed, strewn around the room as someone threw them in the air to see where they would land.
That’s combined with the thirteen cups I can see without turning my head.
Oliver’s gone for more than five minutes, loud crashes and the occasional curse coming from the bedroom.
Do I check on him?
“Fuck, sorry.” He reappears, wearing a second sock and a shirt. I’m calling that progress. “It’s been a day.”
Judging by the state of things, it looks like it’s been a week.
Oliver mentioned that things have been rough over the last few days.
I’d thought it was a usual amount of stuff with work, but apparently, I greatly underestimated things.
“Is there anything I can help you with?” Something tells me that an offer to clean up his space would not be welcome.
“No. I just…” He trails off as he looks around the room, his face falling as he examines the space. “I’m sorry. It’s a disaster in here. Fuck.”
“It’s not a big deal.” Yes, it’s a complete disaster. I’m not disagreeing with him on that one, but it’s also not an issue. Yes, my place is usually clean, but that’s partly because I don’t have anything to clutter it up. “You’ll feel better after a run.”
A month ago, he would’ve argued with me, told me that after a run, he’d only feel worse.
Exhausted, nauseous, and anything other than good.
Today, he looks me in the eye and says, “Okay.” If that’s not progress, I don’t know what is.
The rest of it—pace, distance, races—don’t matter.
Not really. Yes, it’s nice to be fast and run far, but if that’s all I got out of it, I would’ve quit years ago.
It’s the ability to get out of my head and do something productive.
Sometimes, twenty minutes or two hours later, the world is a little bit less chaotic.
“Come on,” I pull him in for a quick hug.
At least, that’s what I intend for it to be.
But when Oliver puts his head on my shoulder and lets out a broken sigh, I can’t help but pull him extra close and hold on for a little bit longer.
I half expect him to start crying, but he takes a few deep breaths.
Then Oliver pulls away.
I’ve hugged him every time I’ve seen him. Often twice—once when I arrive and once when I leave. I’m always the one to pull away first, ensuring things stay strictly in the bro-hug category and don’t venture over into anything that could be misinterpreted as anything other than friendship.
“Let’s go,” he says, reaching down to pull on his running shoes.
OLIVER
“I’m sorry, our connection must be bad. I thought you said you were out for a run.”
“Stop.” I give Jane my best stern look through my webcam.
“It’s new.” Well, newish. I’ve managed to work up to running a whole mile.
Not impressive by any stretch of the imagination, but I’m proud of it.
Which is why I’m rewarding myself with half a pint of my favorite chocolate caramel swirl ice cream.
Fine, I’ll probably eat the whole pint tonight. It’ll be served in two portions, though, so it doesn’t count. “I’m trying to be healthier.”
“You know I can see you, right? You’re eating ice cream for dinner.”
“It’s called balance. You should get some.” Maybe then she’d be so busy after this call that she wouldn’t tell our sibling group chat about my new hobby. “Then you could leave me alone.”
“You called me, baby brother.”
“I’m not a baby,” I remind her for the zillionth time. I already know what she’s going to say next.
“You’ll always be a baby to me,” we say at the same time.
“Is this why you missed our chat on Wednesday? The girls missed getting to talk to you.”
Wow. Straight to the guilt trip, then. “I’ll make it up to them this weekend with an extended video chat.”
“Or you could come stay with us. They’d love to see their favorite uncle.”
“Oh, is Daniel going to be at your house?” He’s the second youngest and the other physician in the family.
He always comes carrying big bags of candy from his trips overseas.
It’s hard to compete against an assortment of global goodies.
The best I can do is crocheted animals. I do have a set of dragons that I recently finished that I’m going to gift to them.
I finished the last one on Wednesday while Aaron worked on his afghan.
He’s made slow but steady progress. The strawberries are starting to appear in the pattern enough that it’s clear what it’s going to be when he finishes.
I’d say if, but Aaron’s proven to me that if he starts something, he’s definitely going to finish it, even if I make him take out four complete rows of work because he missed a repeat in the pattern.
That was a fun day. I thought he might chuck the whole project out my window. I wouldn’t blame him either. I’ve had that urge many times in my life. A few of my old pieces might be buried somewhere in my parents’ backyard.
They know what they did.
“Don’t be ridiculous. The twins adore you. Come and stay with us. I’m worried about you.”
“Why?” I ask, as though the answer isn’t obvious.
Jane’s been on the receiving end of increasingly frantic text messages over the last week and a half.
It’s not that anything’s wrong, more that I’m struggling.
It’s not new, but it tends to happen when I’m preoccupied with something.
Or, in this case, someone. Aaron consumes my thoughts, even when he’s not here.
When I agreed to be friends with him, I thought having some of Aaron would be better than having none of him at all.
I’m not taking that back, but only having a portion of him leaves me feeling a bit… empty.
“Oliver, I can see your apartment through the camera. It’s a disaster. My guess is your work is the same way. You’re behind. Let me help you.”
This is why I left my hometown. As much as I loved it there, my siblings were always in my business.
Yes, I’m struggling right now. Would I love to have someone step in and fix everything for me?
Of course. Who wouldn’t? I can do it, though.
I can get my shit together, catch up on work, and clean my apartment without one of my siblings staring over my shoulder.
“I appreciate it, Jane. Really. I just… I can do it on my own.” I’ve spent more than enough years in therapy learning all sorts of coping mechanisms. It’s time to put them all to good use. “I know you want to help, but this is something I want to handle myself.”
She sighs and shakes her head. I wonder if she does the same thing when her patients won’t listen to her? Her kids certainly see it enough. She means well, but she’s bailed me out so many times over the years. It’s not fair to her or her family to have me along for the ride.
“Please don’t tell Mom and Dad,” I add, which only adds to the feeling of me being the youngest sibling. “I’ve got a plan. This weekend I’ll get the whole thing put back together.” Or at least two-thirds of it.
“Does this have anything to do with that new friend of yours? The one you have a huge crush on?”
“Maybe.” I’ve never been a good liar, especially to Jane. She’s so much older than me, already off to medical school when I was born, that sometimes it’s like having a second mom. “We’re friends.”
“And I’m guessing he’s the reason for your sudden interest in physical fitness?”
I’m not answering that question.
“Well, at least he’s a good influence.” She turns her head to the side. “Girls, be ready to go in five minutes.” There’s a crash and some shrieking, but it doesn’t even faze my sister. “Just take care of yourself. If you need a break, the guest bedroom is always available to you.”
“Thanks.” I close my computer before she can say anything else. If she pushed, I’d probably cave and end up at her place this weekend, hiding out in the treehouse with her kids. Just because I’m not thrilled with the current state of my life is no reason to run away.
I can fix it. All of it.
Step one: clean the living room.
Step two: get Aaron out of my mind.