Chapter 22
WATSON, CRICK, AND ALL THAT JAZZ
Oscar had never been more grateful to be able to study from the comfort of his kitchen. The bus seemed as done with the voyage as he felt, puffing out its exhaustion as the middle doors swung open, allowing him out.
Aaron had texted to let him know he wouldn’t be at the bus stop because he had to take care of dinner.
Oscar had pretended to be okay with it, but he hated that when the doors closed behind him and the bus drove away, he was standing in front of an empty bus shelter, gazing at a printed timetable with colorful route lines instead of the dropped pins of his destiny across Aaron’s freckled cheeks.
Maybe his mother lived in him, too, in this small part of him that stamped its feet and demanded attention when it was already being given. As though Aaron hadn’t been slaving away for hours to make him a welcome home dinner.
Oscar tore the disappointment off his expression as he walked the short distance to their building and started making his way up.
The landing on his floor was flooded with the scent of garlic and wine, and Oscar turned into the Golden Retriever Aaron had once told Gemma he was, salivating and slobbering all the way to the door.
His key had barely turned when it opened.
Oscar fell into Aaron’s arms, kicking the door behind him, and for a moment wished there was no dinner, that they could disappear into his bedroom and make up for every night they’d spent apart.
Instead, Oscar pulled away and looked into his face, drew in the scent of his blueberry shampoo, the fresh soap on his skin, washing away the evidence of a day spent at work.
“Hi,” Aaron said, leaning in to kiss him on the lips.
“Hi,” Oscar replied.
He raised a hand to cup Aaron’s cheek, brushing his fluffy bangs with the tips of his fingers.
How was this a man he hadn’t even known a year prior?
As they stood in front of each other now, he seemed to Oscar like someone forever known, a line of code that had been written into his firmware, double slashed and greyed out for years, invisible on the dark mode background of Oscar’s past, until the fated moment during which their paths had collided and he’d flashed to life like he’d always been there.
Maybe this was why it was nakedly evident that something was amiss in his gaze. Oscar registered the twitch in his own expression as the familiar feeling of overwhelm flooded his chest, rising to choke him and heating his skin.
“I have to go plate up,” Aaron said a little too quickly.
He didn’t give Oscar a chance to respond, turning on his heel and dashing away to the kitchen. It left Oscar with Luigi and a million questions, but for the time being, he would focus on the cat rubbing against his shin for attention.
“Hey, bud,” he said, bending down to rub the fur between his ears. “Missed you too.”
Luigi trilled his agreement.
Dinner was delicious. Even though he’d been at work until five in the evening, Aaron had managed to put together a beautiful plate of tender garlic chicken, sautéed mushrooms, and crispy roast potatoes with soft buttery centers.
It would have been perfect. It should have been.
Aaron had sat Oscar down and put his food in front of him, poured him his diet soda, asked him about the journey home.
It should have felt great.
But how could it? Aaron kept playing with his food, cutting up his chicken and barely touching any of it, not even finishing his favorite part: the roast potatoes.
Oscar told him about the bus trip home, about his phone call with Grandma early that morning before he’d left his room, about being anxious to receive his results and find out whether he’d get these credits added to his transcript.
But if Oscar wanted to be honest, he couldn’t care less about his transcript or even about the exams he’d just taken. Aaron looked like he was crumbling. Like he already had while Oscar wasn’t looking.
“I’ll make some hot chocolate,” Aaron said when Oscar finally put down his cutlery.
“No, I will. You’ve been cooking all afternoon.”
Oscar made to get up, grabbing his plate as he went, but Aaron beat him to it, standing so quickly he banged his thigh into the corner of the table.
Tears jerked out of his eyes as the pain registered, followed by a string of curses, foreign on his mouth, but nothing he said was ever ugly, and even shit sounded like music when he said it.
“Please. Just let me, okay?” he muttered.
Oscar would have argued on any other night, but something of Papa told him not to.
He’d left him with a cipher, it seemed, able to read the desperation in Aaron’s eyes, the need to do something evident in his jittery fingers as he grabbed their plates and stacked their cutlery on top of them, heading to the kitchen without another word.
Maybe Oscar had done something, said something, over his time away from home.
Everything had been great between them when he’d left.
Oscar remembered kissing Aaron over and over again at the bus stop, lingering until he nearly missed his ride, pictures of cookies baked in secret, quizzes over their video calls. Had he asked too much of him?
His mind was still reeling with questions when Aaron sat down, passing him a mug of milky hot chocolate and settling with his coffee at the other end of the couch.
Over the years he’d spent in therapy, Oscar had learned a lot about restraint.
Christina had nodded along as he’d finally worked his way through the maze of his past and come to the conclusion that he’d have fared much better if he’d only learned to keep some of his opinions to himself, if he’d only been alright with taking a step back from a situation before poking the bear.
It did nothing to excuse his mother’s awfulness, but maybe he’d have suffered less if he’d stepped away from the fire.
When it came to Aaron, all the lessons flew right out the window.
Restraint was no longer a working concept, and it had never served him.
Oscar set his mug down on the coffee table and turned to look at him, said nothing for a moment as he studied the hard set of his jaw, the way his lower lip was just a little too stretched, taut like a bowstring, the glaze over his eyes betraying him regardless.
“Tell me,” Oscar said at last.
Aaron breathed. It was a shaky thing, stuttering like a diesel engine in the cold. Oscar told himself it was relief, that Aaron wanted to be asked.
“I’ve had a hard time,” he mumbled after a while. He paused, taking a sip of coffee and setting his cup down on the warmer that always sat on his side of the table. “I don’t know how to tell you.”
Oscar wished he could be a blanket for Aaron. On the chair that sat adjacent to their couch was the abandoned knitting project that was supposed to do this job, draped over the arm, untouched since Oscar had left.
“What’s happened?”
Oscar told himself not to imagine the worst. If Aaron had met somebody else, he would lose it.
Not with Aaron—never with Aaron. Oscar would lock himself in the bathroom and scream at the mirror for letting it happen.
But he couldn’t imagine doing that. Because he couldn’t imagine Aaron with somebody else. Not Aaron, not his Aaron.
“I haven’t been focusing.” Aaron gnawed on his upper lip, stretching his mouth as he curled his knees into his chest, resting his chin on top of them. “It’s been weeks since I enjoyed a show.”
“What are you talking about? We watched Lord of the Rings just last week. You loved it. You kept saying the quotes before they even spoke them! It’s only because you’ve watched Schitt’s Creek a million times.
Maybe you just need a break from it. It’s not funny for you anymore,” Oscar said, frowning.
“I’m not enjoying my video games,” Aaron said.
His throat moved as he swallowed. Oscar had never wanted more to kiss something so tenderly. He wished he knew how to soothe him. He wished he didn’t believe that wrapping his arms around him would send him into a fit of tears.
“Play something different,” he said, because he couldn’t understand why Aaron was so upset.
He’d been spending so many hours at home.
Why was it so unthinkable that he’d eventually get bored?
Aaron had been accustomed to working, changing jobs and roles and uniforms more often than any average person did.
Of course doing the same thing day in and day out would get old.
“That’s coffee from an instant jar. I broke the machine,” Aaron murmured.
His voice had gone so quiet now that Oscar became aware of how noisy his fridge was.
Soft as this had been, it tore something into Oscar, the discordance of Aaron’s defeat with the act of breaking.
“Last Thursday. On purpose,” Aaron added.
His eyes skittered to Oscar’s then, glacier-like as he waited for the verdict. But Oscar had grown up with a mother whose tongue was as cutting as the blades he’d used to punish himself after those ugly fights. So there would be no verdict. Not on this night.
“It’s okay,” he said, sliding his hand across the couch and turning his palm up in invitation. Aaron shook his head, eyes filling up more rapidly as his cheeks pinked. “Boo, it’s okay. Did something happen?”
“Whether something happened or didn’t happen makes no difference here.
It’s not how I behave. I don’t break things on purpose.
I don’t yell at Tobe. They called to ask for my advice about something, and I called them a self-centered asshole.
I said they make everything about themself.
They pretended not to be hurt, but I know Tobe.
I feel like shit.” Aaron rubbed his face, held his hands in front of it a little longer than necessary, and Oscar knew he had started to cry when his back began to shake.