8. Quinn
CHAPTER 8
The house looked the same. His house. The one he split with his best friend. That fifties rambler style, split right down the middle and mirrored on both sides. It was modest, and some might call it ugly. But when he and Hunter had signed their mortgage together and sealed it with a pinky swear, he’d been emotional with how proud he was of both of them. Hunter especially.
And because he was back at his and Hunter’s house, Jonathan was also there. Putting up Christmas lights. In October.
Quinn parked his car in his tiny driveway behind his house and waved to Jonathan, who had already seen him. Jonathan waved back from on top of the ladder. He’d moved the deck furniture for ladder clearance and looked like he had a system going, even if he wasn’t far yet.
“You’re home,” Jonathan said, sounding happier to see him than Quinn probably deserved.
“Home.” Quinn nodded. The duplex didn’t feel like home yet. It was a reminder of how empty and broken he’d been at the beginning of the summer. When they had moved in, his side of the duplex became a storage place for him to go rot in.
He wanted it to feel like home, though.
“Are you already putting Christmas lights up?”
“They’re for Hunter. The beginning of the school year has been pretty rough, so I wanted to do something nice for him. He mentioned how he wanted to put lights up for Christmas this year, so I figured I would surprise him.”
“He’ll love that,” Quinn said. Hunter had been full-on nesting, a celebration of having a real home. A place to call his own. Quinn could already picture the spot in Hunter’s living room where he would put a Christmas tree. “Do you need help?”
Jonathan’s eyebrows shot up. “Yeah?”
“I think I need to rehabilitate my image over here.”
“Then yeah, man. I’d love some help.” Jonathan gave him instructions that basically amounted to “don’t let the strings of lights get tangled,” and they got to work. Jonathan was meticulous about everything. He looked at the world through eyes that were familiar to Quinn, who was used to adjusting designs pixel by pixel until they were perfect. Jonathan did the same, only in real life.
“This is nice of you,” Quinn said. “What’s going on at school?”
“He’s mostly just lacking administrative support. His favorite dean quit at the end of last year, and the new one isn’t making his life any easier.” Hearing Hunter’s school gripes secondhand was humbling. That was a complaint Quinn should have received straight from his best friend’s mouth.
“That is rough.” Carefully, he unwound another length of lights as Jonathan stood at the top of the ladder with a bag full of roof clips.
“And I can tell he’s missing you.”
“I miss him too,” Quinn said. “This is the weirdest time of my entire life. It feels weirder than my divorce.”
“You two aren’t getting divorced,” Jonathan dismissed. He was so quick to stop Quinn from going down that path that it gave him hope.
“I just mean…of course I loved Lee. And he was important to me.”
“But Hunt is your soulmate.” Jonathan didn’t sound jealous or catty. He sounded like he understood. Quinn burned with shame for jumping to conclusions and reacting so poorly. Of course they wouldn’t abandon him now that they were together.
“He is. I’m not used to distance between us, and I hate that I put it there. But if I can’t be there for him right now, I’m glad he has you.”
Jonathan climbed down from the ladder to move it down the line. He tucked his hands in the pockets of his Carhart coat and looked right at Quinn.
“Like, it was shocking to see you two together at first. But I think you get him,” Quinn said. Jonathan’s smile gave away his feelings. He wasn’t a smiley guy. It was strange to see what his brother looked like in love after a lifetime of him being such a stoic person. “And I like the way you treat him.”
Jonathan shrugged. “I’d move fucking mountains for him.”
“I know. And I know Hunter and I have a ways to go, but I just want you to know I’m never going to try to fuck that up. He said something to me about me never thinking it’s his turn to be happy, or something, and he was right, to whatever extent. And I want to stop being like that. I want him to have happiness. And I like how happy you make him.”
Jonathan pulled him into a hug, giving his back two solid pats. “I appreciate that. Are you feeling better?”
“I’m coming up for air. I still don’t feel great, but a lot of the brain fog is gone.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
That was the most emotional conversation Quinn had ever had with his older brother. One of the things he loved about the duplex was how close Jonathan lived. Quinn may have made some bad choices, but if it brought him and his brother closer, maybe it could all turn out alright.
Jonathan climbed back up the ladder.
“Are you putting lights up on the entire house or just half?”
“I’m doing the whole thing,” Jonathan said with a laugh. “Hunter isn’t coming home to half a house of lights.”
“Okay. Thank you,” he said. “For a lot of things recently.”
“I know you’re hurting. You’re my brother.”
Quinn teared up and looked away. Jonathan worked another clip onto a shingle. Their relationship always had a lot of love in it, but it had few discussions of feelings. Quinn would jump in front of a bullet for Jonathan, but he didn’t know the names of his friends or what his favorite TV show was.
“I’ve kind of been talking to a guy,” Quinn said, itching to say this out loud to someone who wasn’t Sydney.
“Oh, yeah?” Jonathan shot him a smile.
“His name is Weston, and he lives in Duluth.”
“Medium distance,” Jon appraised.
“The drive wasn’t too bad. I went to see him this weekend.”
“Tell me what you like about him.”
“He’s charming. Cute. Really funny.”
The two of them made their way around the house slowly as Quinn recounted his weekend. Verbalizing the things about Weston that he liked solidified something in himself. Jonathan was kinder about it than Quinn deserved, and when they got back to the starting point, Jonathan dusted his hands off and started gathering his tools and leftover lights.
“I’d stick around but I’m going to bring Hunter lunch at school.” Hunter deserved someone to dote on him constantly. “Your help is appreciated, though. I’ll let Hunt know you were partially responsible for this.”
“Are you two living together now?”
“Nothing official, but I have a key. I usually spend the night.”
“Do you think Hunter would mind if I came home?”
“I think he’d like that.”
“Hey, Jon—I’m glad you’re my neighbor.”
“You too, bud.”
He gave Jon a quick bro hug and volunteered to put the ladder back in Hunter’s garage, while Jonathan took the rest of the lights to Hunter’s basement.
Jonathan hopped in his truck and headed out, and Quinn opened the back door to his place. It had been ignored for several weeks and smelled a little stale. Nothing smelled rotten though, so he’d take that as a win. Someone had done his dishes because the sink was empty, and his sink was never empty.
Another person to thank for keeping him from drowning when he wanted to slip under water.
Quinn hadn’t fully committed to coming home when he left his folks’ apartment, so he didn’t have anything with him. He’d come over under the guise of checking on his cactus, which was still on his desk. He picked it up and brought it into the kitchen for better light. It was unclear if it was dead, but he pulled the trash out from under the sink and tossed it. He needed to focus his energy on keeping himself alive before he could worry about something else.
The fridge had expired food that he tossed, and he noted the things he would need to buy to restock the place. He peeled his sheets off his bed and took them down to the laundry. He didn’t feel whole, but he felt like trying.
His phone informed him that Weston’s stream was starting in an hour. He sent him a photo of his house and told him he was going to move back in. In return, he got a string of black heart emojis and a preview of what Weston would look like on stream. He always looked so fucking flawless. Messy black hair, hint of eyeliner, coy smile. Weston was his comfort, his soft place to land, and seeing him in any capacity gave him a little boost of strength.
Quinn was trying to move forward, but that didn’t mean he was going to be missing any of Weston’s stream. He took his grocery list and got in the car.