November 26, 2020—Tel-Aviv, Israel—The Next Day #2
The early evening sky was painted in hues of deep blue and gold as Logan parked his rented Maserati in front of Adrian’s house.
The engine purred to a stop, and Logan stepped out, brushing his hands over his jeans as he admired the sleek car for a moment.
The decision to rent it had been impulsive, but he’d needed something to counter the frustration of cab rides, and besides, tonight was special.
He wasn’t going to let anything, not even a car, stand in the way of this moment with Adrian.
He made his way to the door, letting himself in as Adrian had instructed in his text. The house was quiet except for the faint sounds of movement coming from Adrian’s room. Logan headed straight there, his heart skipping a beat as he reached the doorway and caught sight of him.
“Wow,” Logan breathed, his eyes trailing over Adrian, who was buttoning up a sleek black shirt.
His long hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail, and the navy jeans hugged his hips in a way that made Logan forget how to form words for a moment.
Adrian looked like a vision, like something Logan might have dreamed up during one of his sleepless nights.
Adrian glanced up, a knowing smirk playing at his lips. “Not too bad yourself,” he said, his eyes flicking over Logan before he winked and returned to his buttons.
Logan closed the distance between them, his hands sliding up to cradle Adrian’s neck. “How are you feeling?” he asked softly, his gaze searching Adrian’s for any trace of fatigue or discomfort.
Adrian smiled, leaning into Logan’s touch. “Okay,” he murmured before pulling Logan into a kiss. It was soft, slow, and grounding, and Logan’s heart seized in the sweetest anticipation.
God, they were playing house. They were pulling off the whole boyfriend thing—kissing in doorways, teasing about dinner reservations—and Logan was completely in love with it. With Adrian. With every bit of this ridiculous domesticity.
“Let’s go,” Logan said after they broke apart, his voice filled with a barely contained excitement.
“I made reservations, we still have some time but we can maybe look around before.” Technically, Dean had suggested the restaurant when Logan called him in a mild panic, but Logan had made the call himself.
“And I even scoped out a party we can hit afterward.”
Adrian cocked an eyebrow, amused. “A party?”
Logan threw his hands up in mock defensiveness as they walked toward the living room. “Come on, I’m allowed to want to go to a party once in a while. Let me have this.”
Before Adrian could reply, Dean’s voice cut through the house like a fire alarm. “Adrian! Holy fuck, there’s a Maserati outside our house!” Dean’s footsteps thundered as he rushed into the room, his eyes wide with disbelief. “There’s a Maserati parked outside! Our house!”
Logan smiled smugly as he dug into his pocket. Adrian’s eyes sparkled with recognition just before Logan retrieved the keys and dangled them playfully.
“No fucking way, princess,” Dean muttered, collapsing onto the couch as Logan dangled the keys in his hand.
“Yes way,” Logan called back with a grin. “And you, you son of a bitch, you gave me a phone of a cleaning service twice when I called you for a recommendation about a restaurant!”
Dean’s laughter echoed through the room, unabashed. “That was a good one,” he said, clearly proud of his petty triumph.
Logan turned to Adrian, his grin softening into something more sincere. “It’s rented,” he admitted with a shrug. “I couldn’t help myself.” Then, with a flick of his wrist, he tossed the keys toward Adrian. “You’re driving.”
Adrian caught the keys, his expression a mix of surprise and amusement. Dean, on the other hand, groaned dramatically. “Damn it. I want a rich boyfriend.”
Adrian snorted, his smirk taking on a mischievous edge. “I think you could definitely find yourself a sugar daddy,” he teased, nudging Dean’s foot with his own.
Logan, ever the troublemaker, chimed in without missing a beat. “I don’t know… I don’t think he’s hot enough for that. And honestly, he’s way too gruff—and let’s face it, a bit too old—for the sugar baby role.”
Dean’s face twisted into a mix of offense and awkward indignation, and Logan nearly doubled over laughing at the expression. Adrian rolled his eyes, grabbing Logan’s arm and tugging him toward the door.
“You’re going to start a war,” Adrian muttered, but he was smiling as they left, the keys jangling in his hand.
Logan looked over at him as they reached the car, his heart full as he watched Adrian slip into the driver’s seat.
“Ugh, I forgot my jacket,” Adrian grumbled, feeling unsure as he had been getting cold more easily lately. “I’ll run back to grab it,” he added, already half out of his seat.
“No,” Logan said gently, resting his hand on Adrian’s shoulder. “Tell me where it is, and I’ll grab it. You can start the car.”
“It’s on the left side of my closet, on the hanging rack. It’s the black one.”
Logan leaned in and brushed a quick kiss across Adrian’s lips, a gentle, almost shy press of warmth. “I’ll be back in a sec,” he murmured, slipping out of the car and heading back to the house.
Dean’s door was closed, and through the wood, Logan could hear faint murmurs in Hebrew, a soft, awkward laugh following. He shook his head, a small, knowing smile tugging at his lips as he imagined Dean talking on the phone with the girl from last night. “Couldn’t even wait a second…”
In Adrian’s room, the air felt cool, and Logan could faintly hear the waves crashing on the shore.
He opened the closet, instantly spotting the black jacket next to a heavy gray wool coat and a denim jacket.
Adrian’s wardrobe was a study in simplicity, comprising a handful of items. It made Logan smile—Adrian had always been like that, valuing meaning over excess.
He reached for the jacket, and as he pulled it out, an unexpected motion jostled something free.
A well-worn duffel bag tumbled from the dark recesses of the closet, its zipper gaping half-open, and its contents cascaded out in a sudden rush.
Papers fluttered like startled birds, scattered across the floor, while cherished photographs slid and skittered in chaotic disarray.
A thick book and a well-used notebook tumbled from the bag, landing half-open, revealing dog-eared pages, accompanied by a few mismatched items strewn across the floor.
“Shit,” he breathed, the word barely breaking the stillness. He set the jacket on the bed and knelt down, his hands moving carefully as he began to collect the fallen items.
The papers were mostly in Hebrew, the text a river of dark ink that he couldn’t navigate.
He stacked them neatly, his fingers brushing over a folded envelope with his name on it, written in English in Adrian’s handwriting.
The ink was faded, the edges of the paper worn and soft, as if it had been opened and closed too many times, or perhaps never opened at all.
A quiet unease settled over him, a tightness coiling beneath his ribs. He didn’t open the letter, couldn’t bring himself to do it. Instead, he set it gently on top of the pile, his touch lingering as if the paper might speak if he waited long enough.
A notebook lay open, half in Hebrew, half in English, in Adrian’s messy handwriting.
His gaze caught a fragment of a sentence, a word hanging like a question in the space between languages before he snapped it shut, the sharp sound startling against the quiet.
Adrian’s privacy was a line he would not cross, not even now, not even with the ache of curiosity gnawing at him.
He continued gathering the scattered items, his hands brushing over a worn copy of Adrian’s favorite book.
The same one he had carried with him two years ago when they traveled together.
The pages were bent, the spine cracked, a story that had been lived in, loved in.
Logan swallowed hard, the weight of memory thick on his tongue.
Logan remembered the way Adrian’s lips would move as he read, the way he’d underline passages with a quiet, thoughtful smile.
He reached for the duffel bag, his intention to put everything back in order.
But as he unzipped it fully, a piece of black fabric caught his eye.
His breath stilled in his chest. He pulled out the hoodie—the one that had been his but had long since become Adrian’s.
The fabric was soft, worn down from years of being held onto too tightly.
Logan’s fingers curled into the material, the scent of Adrian wrapped around it, a ghost of warmth and comfort.
More items slipped from the bag, a pair of dog tags, the metal cool in his palm. One bore Adrian’s name in Hebrew, a familiar shape of letters that Logan had learned to recognize.
His hand trembled as he picked up a framed photograph. Adrian as a small child, no older than four, his eyes a warm whiskey brown, his hair tousled by the sun. Beside him stood a woman with the same eyes, her smile wide and soft.
Another photograph lay beneath it, and this one pulled at Logan’s breath.
It was them, tangled together on the beach, their skin golden with sunlight, their mouths pressed together in a kiss that seemed to hold the whole world still, a love captured in the pixels, frozen in time along with the elements surrounding them.
He remembered that day—the heat of the sand, the taste of salt, the feeling of Adrian’s arms wrapped around him like an anchor.
Tears blurred his vision, the room slipping into soft focus. Each item he touched felt like a thread, pulling him deeper into the life Adrian had been building quietly, the plans he had been making for a future already foreclosed.