7. Seth
SETH
The pile of clothes that covered my living room looked perfectly normal, which was probably the problem. There wasn’t anything actually wrong with them.
The shirts fit, the pants fit, and the jacket draped over the back of my chair was probably the right size too.
Yet every time I looked in the mirror, I had the uncomfortable feeling that I was trying on somebody else's life instead of my own.
I tugged at the sleeves of a pale blue button-down and studied my reflection for another second before letting out a small sigh.
A knock came at the door just as I was considering looking at another linen suit.
“Come in.”
Dane stepped inside my apartment, pausing just long enough to take in the scene.
His gaze landed on me, moved over my outfit, then the sofa piled with clothes, and settled back on me again.
“I don’t like it,” he said simply.
I frowned. “What?”
“What you’re wearing.”
I let out a short breath and gestured at the pile on the sofa.
“Right. Then help me with these,” I said.
I picked up the first shirt and held it out.
Dane didn’t hesitate. “No.”
I tried another.
“No.”
I dropped it back onto the sofa, already losing patience. “You haven’t liked a single thing.”
“Because I don’t.” His attention drifted over the pile again. “Where did these even come from?”
“Glen.”
That got a small pause out of him. His gaze stayed on the clothes a moment longer, like that alone explained more than it should have.
“They smell like him,” he said finally.
For a second, my brain refused to catch up with what he meant.
“The clothes,” he added, like that clarified anything.
A laugh slipped out before I could stop it. “You can actually tell?”
He tapped the side of his nose once. “Wolf.”
I stared at him, trying to decide if he was serious or just committed to the bit, then shook my head.
I exhaled. “Well, they fit me at least.”
“They fit,” he agreed. “That doesn’t mean they’re right.”
I waited for him to elaborate. He didn’t. Just looked at me like the answer should have been obvious all along.
“I’m going as your boyfriend at a wedding.”
Boyfriend.
We’d said it before, joked about it, rehearsed it in different ways. Casual touches that were meant to look natural. All of it carefully constructed and safely contained.
But hearing it like that, simple and matter-of-fact, made it feel different in a way I didn’t immediately want to sit with.
When I looked back up, Dane was watching me, as if he’d noticed something shift but wasn’t forcing it into shape yet.
I opened my mouth to say something normal, something that would reset whatever this moment was becoming.
But thankfully, he moved first. “Come on.”
I frowned. “Where?”
“We’re getting you actual clothes.”
“What’s wrong with these?” I glanced back at the sofa, at the mess I’d been fighting with for the past hour.
Dane didn’t hesitate. “Everything.”
The moment we stepped inside the rental shop, it became painfully obvious why Dane had insisted on coming. The space was orderly in a way that felt almost intimidating.
Rows of suits lined neatly along one wall, crisp dress shirts arranged by shade on another, and mannequins positioned throughout the floor wearing combinations I never would have thought to put together on my own.
Soft music played overhead, something slow and instrumental that made even the air feel more expensive than necessary.
“Okay,” I said after a moment. “Glen said beachy nautical.”
I started pulling a couple of shirts from different racks. When I looked up, I caught Dane watching me with a raised brow.
“Why do you need all those?” he asked.
“We’re there for a whole weekend,” I said, shifting the shirts in my arms. “We’ll need more than one outfit.”
He looked at me for a moment before stepping in closer without saying anything.
Close enough that I caught the faint scent of him, something clean and slightly woody, like soap with something sharper underneath it I couldn’t quite place.
For a ridiculous second, my brain short-circuited and the thought that followed wasn’t remotely helpful.
He’s going to kiss me.
Except he didn’t. Instead, he reached past me for a shirt on the rack beside my shoulder.
His arm brushed mine as he moved, brief but deliberate in a way that didn’t feel entirely accidental. My pulse did something annoying.
“We should get a few matching pieces,” he said.
“Matching pieces?” I repeated.
“It would make sense,” he added simply.
“Right,” I said, a little too quickly. It came out flatter than I meant it to, like my brain was still a step behind the rest of me.
“Trust me,” he said, handing me the shirt.
I huffed a small laugh. “Should I?”
“Absolutely not.”
That earned him a sharper laugh from me, and the tension that had crept in without me noticing loosened as we moved deeper into the shop.
After that, it stopped feeling like shopping and started feeling like being guided through something I didn’t fully understand but didn’t entirely hate either.
Dane didn’t just pick things at random.
He looked at fabrics, commented on cuts, adjusted collars without asking, and moved through it with an ease that suggested he’d done this far too many times before.
Linen, light wool blends, muted tones that apparently photographed better in sunlight. Eventually, I stopped questioning him and just followed.
“You speak wedding,” I said at one point, watching him inspect another jacket.
“My brothers keep getting married,” he said simply. “I’ve been a groomsman more times than I can count.”
“That’s where you learned all this?”
“When you’ve got enough brothers,” he said, “you end up dragged into enough weddings to learn it all eventually.”
I shook my head slowly, looking around the shop again like it might suddenly make more sense if I stared at it long enough. “That’s terrifying.”
Dane’s mouth quirked. “You’re welcome.”
The staff eventually led me toward the fitting rooms at the back of the shop.
I grabbed the first few options Dane had approved, or at least not rejected outright, before slipping inside one of the cubicles. The dark navy jacket sat cleanly across my shoulders.
It was tailored in a way that made everything feel a little sharper, a little more put together than anything I’d tried on at home from Glen’s borrowed collection.
The shirt underneath was lighter, softer at the edges.
It had the kind of fabric that looked like it belonged somewhere with sunlight and open air instead of my apartment mirror and questionable lighting.
I stepped out. “Well?” I asked.
Dane looked up and went still, his gaze settling on me in a way that didn’t quite feel like the way he usually looked at me, as if he was taking in more than he meant to.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Yeah what?” I prompted when he didn’t continue.
“That one’s good.” There was no teasing, no easy grin to break the moment apart.
Something warm shifted in my chest, unfamiliar enough that I looked away first.
Dane moved then, adjusting the collar of the jacket near my shoulder. It was just a small touch, straightening something that didn’t really need fixing.
A few seconds passed before he spoke again. “Can I ask you something?”
I glanced at him, already cautious for reasons I couldn’t fully name.
“What happened?” he asked after a beat.
I knew what he meant immediately.
My gaze dropped to my hands before I could stop it, thumbs pressing lightly together as if that could anchor me somewhere other than the question he’d just asked.
I considered giving him the easy version, the kind I could say without opening anything I’d already learned how to keep folded away.
Instead, I exhaled.
“Nothing dramatic,” I said, because that part was still true.
Dane didn’t push. He just waited, steady and patient in a way that made it harder to stay on the surface. So I kept going.
“Darryl got a job after graduation, working for his father’s company. We did long distance for a while.”
“Was it hard?” Dane asked quietly.
“Sometimes,” I admitted, with a small shrug. “Not impossible.”
At least, that was what I had told myself at the time. Back then, I thought that we were fine in the way people meant it when nothing was obviously wrong yet.
We called, texted, we visited when we could.
Life kept moving in a way that felt steady enough that I didn’t question whether steady could slowly turn into something else while everything still looked the same from the outside.
“I thought we were okay,” I said after a moment. “Then one day we just… weren’t, and he ended things.”
Dane’s expression shifted slightly at that.
“Then he met Elliot.” A small smile tugged at my mouth without permission. I added, “Elliot’s actually a good guy.”
“He is?” Dane asked, a slight lift to his brows, as if that detail wasn’t what he’d expected.
The smile stayed, but it didn’t sit comfortably anymore.
The truth of it wasn’t really about Darryl in the end, or even about the breakup itself. It was everything that had come with it.
My friends. The life I had. The people I used to see without having to plan for it.
Holidays that already had a place for me. Family gatherings where I never had to think about where I stood, because I’d already been folded into something that felt certain.
Nobody did anything wrong. There was nothing to hate. Just absence and inevitable change. My throat tightened.
A small, nervous laugh slipped out before I could stop it. “Things were just easier before, I guess.”
I lifted my gaze without fully meaning to. Dane’s eyes met mine.
He was closer than before, or maybe I just hadn’t noticed how close he’d gotten until now.
He reached up and tucked a loose curl behind my ear, his fingers lingering for a fraction of a second against my skin.
The touch was careful, almost hesitant, like he was still deciding how far he was allowed to go.
His thumb traced just under my eye, slow and feather-light. It made my breath catch for reasons I didn’t want to name.
He didn’t rush it. He stayed close, near enough that it was hard to think around him. For a second, I thought he might finally lean in.
Instead, he stopped right at the edge of it, waiting, like the choice had been left entirely to me. I could have stepped back. I knew that.
I closed the distance first.
Dane reacted immediately, a flicker of surprise crossing his face before it disappeared into something quieter. Then he met me halfway.
The kiss was soft. Careful in the same way everything about him had been just seconds ago, like he was still half-expecting it to fall apart.
His hand slid from my cheek to the back of his neck, pulling me in more firmly, and the carefulness I'd felt a moment ago gave way to something surer.
A moan slipped out of me as he tightened his grip at my waist.
Dane dragged me closer until there was nothing left between us except the steady press of him and the way my body answered before I could think to stop it.
There was nothing neat about it anymore.
There was only tongue and teeth, the heat of him, and the way everything shifted as he stopped holding back.
Dane kissed me like he wasn't planning to let us pull away, and I realized I didn't want to either.