Twelve
A s soon as I stepped foot out of the bedroom door, Darwin ran over from the living room, tried to stop near me, but slid a couple of feet on the polished hardwood floor because he was wearing socks.
“Tatum said you’ll stay. Is that true, or is it still just until after Thanksgiving? Are you sticking with the original plan, or is there a new one?”
He was always so precise about things. “There’s a new one.”
“Really?” There was no missing the hopefulness in his voice.
I gestured at Luke, who smiled as he walked over to me. “I want Nash to stay with us because you all love him and so do I.”
Darwin squinted at his father. “You love him?”
“I do.”
“Like a friend?” he delved.
“More than a friend,” he assured his son.
Darwin’s attention turned to me. “And you?”
“You know I love you guys, and your father’s growing on me.”
Luke laughed over that.
“What? I need to be truthful.”
“Fair,” he agreed, nodding.
Strangely, the smile on Darwin’s face was making his darker eyes—they were the deepest midnight blue of everyone in his family—practically glow. He looked—and this was unusual for him— radiant .
“What’s with you?” Luke asked him.
“All that romance and lovey-dovey stuff is stupid,” he said flatly.
“I don’t like it, and I don’t believe in it.
You and Mom stopped loving each other. All my friends with divorced parents, they stopped loving each other too.
The only thing I know for sure about love with grown-ups is that it doesn’t last.”
“That’s terrible,” I told Luke.
“Then why do you seem happy?” Luke asked him.
“Because you love Nash, but it’s different than it was with Mom. You’re friends first. That’s right, isn’t it?”
He nodded. “It is.”
“And Nash likes you, but he’s not in love with you, not yet.
Maybe never. But still, you’ll be friends, and I think that’s better.
I think that lasts longer,” he said to his father.
“That means you’ll be happy from now on, and you need that.
I like you how you are now. I don’t want you to change back.
And if Nash is with you, then you won’t. ”
Luke rushed forward, and Darwin met him. They collided hard, hugging tight before Luke went down on one knee so Darwin could lean into him.
“I was super worried that if Nash went, then all his rules and stuff that we do might go too,” he said into his father’s shoulder. “I don’t wanna go back to how it was.”
“No. We won’t go back,” Luke promised. “We’re a different family now.”
“But you love him, and he loves us, so he’ll love you too, don’t worry about it.”
“I will not worry,” he said, chuckling.
“The most important thing, like I said, is that he likes you and you’re friends. He won’t ever leave if you’re friends.”
“Plus, he loves you guys.”
“That’s right,” he said with a smile.
“How do you know he loves you?”
“He makes me feel important, so I know how he feels. He loves us.”
I did. He wasn’t wrong.
Darwin turned to me. “Nash?”
“Yes, buddy?”
“I think it’s good that your stuff is in Dad’s room. Don’t move it again. Just stay there.”
“Okay,” I agreed, because what was the point in arguing?
“I hope it won’t bother you when kids say your father is gay,” Luke told his son. “It won’t bother me, but kids, especially, can be cruel.”
“But everyone at school already thinks that.”
I squinted at Darwin. “What?”
“Yeah. Once you were here, moved in, everyone asked if you lived with us, and we all said yeah. And my friends asked me what you did, and I said you take care of us and you’re our guardian, so they all assumed you and Dad were a couple.”
“And you didn’t clear that up?”
He shrugged. “I don’t care. Two of my teachers are gay.” He lowered his voice. “Plus, I told you—Teddy thinks he is too.”
“Yeah, but nobody has given you any crap about it?”
“About my father being gay?” he asked, his voice back to its normal decibel level. “Why would they? It was a bigger deal when Mom left and they got divorced and everybody knew that she was cheating with Mr. Conti.”
“Everybody knew about the cheating?” Luke asked him.
“Yeah. That’s how I found out. I heard it at school, and I came home and asked Griff, and he said it was true. I’m sorry, Dad. That sucked, huh?”
Luke glanced at me and then back to his son. “It did, yes. But, buddy, I’m so sorry you didn’t hear it from?—”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s just that me and Tate had to tell Dr. Marlowe all about it, and she felt bad for you.”
“Oh, well, isn’t that nice,” he said dryly, shooting me a look. I made sure I didn’t laugh, but it was hard.
“Nash, love,” Viola called—she was at the stove, stirring soup, “I made you my world-famous chicken dumpling soup. Are you ready to have some?”
“Yes, please.”
“Well, sit down, and I’ll bring it to you.”
“I can?—”
“No,” she said, her voice like steel. “You will do as I say and not argue.”
Holy crap, she was a little scary. I hadn’t noticed that before.
I took a seat, and Luke was right beside me, his knee pressed to mine under the table. I couldn’t help it, I needed the closeness with him, and leaned sideways and kissed the patch of skin right under his ear. His sigh of happiness made me smile, until his father sat down across from me.
“Sir,” I said as his wife set in front of me a bowl of soup that smelled heavenly.
Tatum was right there with the spoon and a napkin and two ibuprofens.
“What is this?” I asked her as she settled next to me.
“Nana said you’re gonna be sore.”
I turned to Viola.
“What? You will. You’re not twenty anymore.”
I grunted and started on the soup, my attention on John, whose entire focus was on Luke.
“You’re gay?”
“Clearly not,” Luke said, putting his hand on my thigh under the table. “I’m bi, like Nash, or more likely, it’s just him I’m interested in. I’ve never been attracted to another man.”
John nodded.
“Viola, this soup is amazing,” I assured her.
“I’ve won prizes with that recipe.”
“I have no doubt.”
“Do you think this is a response to your wife cheating on you and you’re afraid to love another woman?”
He wasn’t yelling, instead asking questions. I considered that a very good sign.
Viola took a seat beside her husband and propped her chin on her hand, looking at Luke and me. “You know, you two make a beautiful couple.”
“That’s because you two made him so pretty,” I said.
“Why, thank you, sir,” she gushed.
“Oh God,” Luke groaned, his gaze back on his father.
“To answer your question, no. I have no issue with women and still find them as beautiful as I always have. I simply have no desire to spend any time with anyone else but Nash. When he hugged me the first day I got back, it was… Everything was swirling around, my life was unbalanced, up in the air. I felt like I was losing the kids, but then…then he hugged me, and my world that was coming apart became solid again. I felt like me.”
“That’s gratitude for all he’s done for you,” John remarked.
“Hah, see?” I told Luke.
He rolled his eyes. “No, Dad. It’s not. You don’t feel gratitude way down deep in your gut, and gratitude doesn’t make you want to?—”
“Small child,” Viola interrupted, pointing at Tatum.
“—keep someone with you for the rest of your life.”
Tatum sighed happily. “I was scared.”
“Why were you scared, Tate?” her grandfather asked her.
“I didn’t want Nash to go away. I love how everything is now, and I love how happy Daddy is. He’s never been this happy. Not ever. I know. I watch.”
“Is that true?” John asked his son.
He nodded. “It is.”
“Hey,” Griff said, arriving at the table, standing there, not sitting. “I wanted to give you time to eat, but I’m dying to hear about the guy you chased.”
“Of course,” I said with a smile. “Take a seat and I’ll?—”
“Are you guys gonna get married?”
Funny that he’d changed topics. “I thought you wanted to know about the guy?”
“I do. I really do. But I wanna hear if you’re gonna get married too.”
“Not right now.”
“Griff,” Luke began, “we should probably talk about?—”
“But probably? Someday?” he pressed, and I saw how invested he was in the answer.
“We’re not quite there yet, buddy,” I replied honestly.
“Yeah, but if everything goes great, then you will, right?”
“That’s what people do,” I said, thinking of the endless wedding I had attended and smiling for whatever reason. My boss was married. I needed to let that sink in.
“But from now on, no matter what, you’re gonna stay with us.”
The kids loved me, and I was an idiot to think I could have ever left them. “That’s my plan.”
“And you’ll move all your stuff in here.”
“It’s not a lot of stuff once you take out my ugly furniture, but yeah.”
Quick inhale of breath. “You’re gonna stay with us and marry Dad, and you guys will be together, and you’ll be here?”
“I will.”
“And you won’t leave?”
He was forever going to worry about people leaving him if he didn’t work through that with his therapist. “You know I won’t ever leave you.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t ask me something so stupid.”
“Okay.”
“Good.”
Eyes on his father now. “And you want all that? To be married to Nash someday?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” Griff said, exhaling deeply. “This is really…this is great news.”
“Is it?” Luke asked his son.
“Yeah. I’ve been scared about what would happen when Nash left, and I want you to be happy too, Dad. You need someone who will stay and won’t ever leave you, so…yeah.”
He cleared his throat. “People might say something to you about Nash and me being together, and I want you to be ready for that.”
“Like what? Like my father’s gay? Nobody cares. And besides, all my teachers and my lawyer, and Benny’s mom and Sean’s mom, they all think Nash is crazy hot. It grosses me out, but I’m dealing with it, ya know? I mean, even Dr. Marlowe was all, your father’s partner is a very handsome man .”
“When did I say I was your father’s partner?”
“I think it was…what’s the word?” Griff asked his grandmother.
“Implied,” she offered.
“Yeah. Implied.”
“And it grosses you out?” I asked defensively as Viola started laughing.