Chapter 25 Liam #2
Noah was at his desk. Laptop open. Coffee in hand. Debate notes spread out in that organized chaos that somehow made sense to his brain.
He looked up when I walked in.
His eyes tracked down my body. Last night's jeans. Last night's hoodie. My hair, which was definitely wrecked.
His eyebrows rose slowly.
"Don't."
"I didn't say anything."
"You were about to."
"I was just going to observe that you're wearing the same clothes you left in… and you didn't sleep here last night."
"Shut up, Noah."
He grinned into his coffee.
I closed the door. Leaned against it. Took a breath.
"I need to talk to you about Emily," I said.
The grin faded. He set his coffee down. Closed his laptop. Turned his chair to face me.
"Okay," he said. "Yeah. We should talk about Emily."
I crossed the room and sat on the edge of my bed.
"She knows everything," I said.
"I know."
"She asked if I was in love with him. I couldn't answer. Which was an answer."
"Yeah, it was. But there's nothing you can do now."
"I just feel bad," I said.
"Well, Liam, Not to be a dick. But you didn't handle it well."
I looked up at Noah. I wanted to be mad, but he was completely right.
"I know it hasn't been easy but Emily is good people… and you hurt her," he said.
"I fucked up." I shook my head. "I'm just worried she's going to tell someone."
Noah was quiet for a moment. Thinking.
"She's not going to out you," he said. "I know Emily. She's hurt—she has every right to be—but she's not cruel. She's not going to blow up your life because you broke her heart."
"I wouldn't blame her if she did."
"Maybe not. But she won't." His voice was certain. "Give her space. No more texts. No more calls. Let her process. If she's ready to talk, she'll reach out."
"And if she doesn't?"
"Then you live with it. You hurt someone. That has consequences. Not all of them are fixable."
Hard truth.
"I owe her a real apology," I said. "Not the panicked bullshit in the parking lot."
"You do. But not yet. Right now an apology would be for you, not for her."
He was right. I hated that he was right.
I lay back on my bed. Stared at the ceiling. The water stain. The buzzing fluorescent light. My ceiling. My world.
"She said something that night," I said quietly. "Before she got in the car. She said she hoped he was worth it. Hoped Alex was worth throwing everything away for."
Noah was quiet for a beat. "Was he?"
I thought about this morning. Alex's face in the grey light. The pillow crease on his cheek. The way he'd said It's nice. Waking up with you. The British meditation lady. The magazine under my hip. The way he'd grinned when I stole his hoodie.
"Yeah," I said. "He is."
Noah nodded. Something in his expression softened—relief, maybe. Like he'd been waiting a long time for me to be able to say that.
"Good," he said. "Then figure the rest out."
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
Then again. And again. The staccato burst of the team group chat going off.
I reached over. Grabbed the phone. Scrolled past the noise—Tyler's all-caps reactions, Derek's play-by-play, Remy's single thumbs-up emoji that somehow said more than anyone else's paragraphs.
Then I saw it. Pinned at the top. From Coach Hale, sent twenty minutes ago.
Coach Hale — RSU Men's Crew
Team — following yesterday's invitational results, the coaching staff from both programs have made a decision.
We're entering a several Kingswell-Riverside boats in the Head of the Charles on October 29th.
Namely, our double with Moore and Harrington.
Intensive training begins tomorrow, 5:30 AM, Kingswell boathouse.
Three weeks out from race day. This is the biggest stage we've been offered as a program. Details to follow.
I read it twice.
The Head of the Charles. Three miles on the Charles River in Boston. Biggest head race in the country. Thousands of spectators on the bridges and the banks. National media. D1 scouts, U23 scouts, Olympic development scouts.
Me and Alex. In a double. Three weeks of intensive training.
Starting tomorrow morning.
"What?" Noah asked. He'd seen my face.
I turned the phone around and showed him.
He read it. His eyebrows climbed. Then he looked at me with that expression—the one that was half sympathy, half the look of someone who couldn't believe the universe had this kind of timing.
"Head of the Charles," he said.
"Yeah."
"You and Alex. Three weeks."
"Yeah."
"Every morning in a boat together."
"Yeah."
"After spending last night in his bed."
"I'm aware, Noah."
"Are you guys dating?"
"Noah."
He held up his hands. But he was smiling. "I'm just saying. The universe has a sense of humor."
Two hours ago, in Alex's bed, we'd made a deal. Secret. Careful. One day at a time.
And they'd just made us the most visible double in the Northeast.
Every practice filmed. Every race broadcast. Every glance across a boathouse visible to anyone with a camera and an internet connection. Three weeks of arriving together, leaving together, our bodies moving in sync while the whole rowing world watched and wondered what made us so good.
I knew the answer.
And so would everyone else, if we weren't careful.
The problem was—in that boat, with him behind me, with the water underneath us and the rhythm pulling the truth out of my body stroke by stroke—I'd never once been careful.
Tomorrow. 5:30 AM.
The biggest stage of our lives.
And a secret that was getting harder to keep with every stroke.