Not People #3
The tug of his lip is tiny. The way he looks down at his lap seems tiny too, almost nothing. Which is exactly why it’s a gong getting struck behind my neck. He wouldn’t see it like I do, but doesn’t he see it at all? How amazing he is?
“Yeah, I’m…proud of it.” He folds the sandwich flannel, aligning its corners like complex origami, except it’s a plain old square.
“But?” I ask, stuffing the last of my sandwich into my mouth.
“But, I don’t know. It ain’t… I ain’t exactly…” He shrugs, not looking up. Then sighs forcefully like he’s fed up with all the hesitation. “I do what the horses need, and sometimes I’m too much, and I know I’m too much, but—”
“You’ll always be too much for people who are too little. Fuck them.”
He smiles at his hands. “Yeah, well… I ain’t that confident.”
I can’t help but snort. “Since when are you not confident?”
“I am around horses.” He rubs his face with both hands. “But around people I just pretend, and it’s…” He takes a deep breath, in and out. “God, so exhausting.”
Would’ve never considered such a thing. Coming from him ? Wow. “If this is you pretending around people, then kudos. You’re crazy good.”
“You ain’t people,” he says so casually, eyes on the creek, glittering under sunset hues.
I grin. “So I’m a horse. Oh, wait—I know. A bipolar gay disaster.”
“No.” He chuckles. “You’re just...you.”
Just…me?
I don’t even know who that is, who me is. How does he…?
Slowly, my chest glitters too, like the creek, trickling with heartbeats, filling my lungs with the breeze of a wide meadow in a beautiful valley.
As if the meadow is me. The water, the oak, the flowers, all of them. Me.
As if I am what is here. What he sees when he looks at me. Really looks.
And what I think I don’t know about myself still exists, in all its beauty, regardless of whether I can name it or recognize it or not.
It’s too much. It’s…something I didn’t realize I needed.
My throat tightens. I gulp the words loose, voice tiny. “That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about me.”
It hangs there, quiet and fragile in the air between us. Eli doesn’t answer, just keeps his gaze tender and on me, keeps his smile soft through the ache in my bones. For a long moment, I feel he’s breathing for us both, like I forgot and he picked up the slack, shared his with mine.
Is this what people mean?
Being seen. Truly. Is this how it feels?
Before I realize why, Eli is standing up, extending a hand to me. I take it, and he pulls me to my feet, and only now do I notice how there is barely any sunlight left, fading fast behind the mountain.
We walk to the horses, agreeing without a word that it’s time to go back. AP and Ruin nicker softly as we approach and slip in between them, Eli returning the flannel to its pouch while I gather Ruin’s reins, my fingers clumsy and slow.
I don’t mount. Eli doesn’t either.
When I glance behind my shoulder, he’s looking right back.
God, I want to kiss him.
But I pause, because while I feel a calm I don’t think I have in all my life, Eli is stiff solid, eyes trembling, like he’s forcing them to hang onto me, a life-or-death thing.
Eventually, his gaze drags away, jaw clenching.
And it feels I’m watching him take a lash to the back, self-inflicted because of something he just lost. Whatever he thinks he did.
I don’t know what’s happening. Don’t think I have the energy to figure it out right now.
So I turn back to Ruin, a dry quip already cocked and ready to leave my mouth. Because that’s how I survive this slow death of turning away.
But he grabs my wrist.
I spin back. He’s still not looking at me, just at the ground like before. He’s shaking—I can feel it up my arm. Can hear his breaths, forced in and out through his nose, way too fast.
He’s trying so hard. What for? Can’t he just tell me?
I try to see it written on him. But all I see is that he’s hurting. Is he? Why?
I want to kiss him. I want to make it better. Would I make it better? What if I can’t?
He presses his eyes shut. His lips too, like he’s biting them steady. Like there’s something somewhere that he’s desperate for but can’t find, can’t reach. And I know that feeling. I know how it feels to have a room too full and a door that doesn’t open.
I can’t see it on him. It’s too painful on him.
His hand unlatches, defeated.
His lips too, about to say something. An excuse I don’t want to hear, an apology I don’t need.
I don’t wait, can’t bear it. To wait this out and let whatever he struggled so hard to pull to the surface crawl back inside him, back to the darkness where it hid.
With both hands, I cradle his cheeks. I catch his gasp—tiny, raw—as my eyes stare deep into his. So he knows that I’m here completely, and that I know I’m sure.
I kiss him. And I hold my breath so not even air can spoil this for me.
For us , he answers without me asking, wrapping his arms around my body and pulling, keeping, guarding me close. I do the same around his neck, hands behind his skull to make sure he doesn’t slip away.
And I wonder if I’ve ever truly kissed a man before.
I can’t tell how long we’re in it, don’t really care. He tastes like winter warmth and a summer breeze all the same, so it may have been a whole year, all the seasons.
Eventually, I need to break it just to hold onto the tears bubbling up my throat on their way to my eyes. Our foreheads stay glued together. My breaths are labored, mixed with his, out in waves through our smiles.
“Like this?” I whisper. Was this what he was fighting so hard for?
He huffs. And nods.
I grin. “Looks like I’m a you-whisperer.”
He smiles, hides it against my shoulder. “Thank God.”
As slow as the sun sinking into the horizon, we slip off each other. He turns to AP, I to Ruin, then I take the reins and hop on.
I can’t stop watching him as he checks the girth, as he adjusts AP’s reins and puts his hat back on, eyes on the saddle horn like he’s taking his time inspecting the leather, every crease. Then softly, like a prayer he hopes will be heard, he says, “I’ll fight harder next time.”
“Don’t,” I say instantly. He stiffens, but I don’t regret the word. Didn’t mean it as an obstruction, as a no to next time.
So I make it clear. “It was perfect. Just like this.”
And I smile at him, just enough to show I know what perfect means and I stand by it.
Then I turn, tug Ruin’s reins gently, and start walking.
I don’t tell him to come, don’t ask if he’s ready. For a moment, I wonder if I should have, if he thinks I’m walking away when I’m just taking point while he catches up. Whenever I’m as raw as he is, my demons get dumb too.
So a few steps in I glance back over my shoulder.
He’s coming, not too far and matching my gait.
With his head tipped down, I can’t see his eyes behind the brim of his hat, but I see a smile—soft, so pretty—and that’s enough.
His palm brushes under one eye, a finger under the other.
I look ahead again, give him the moment.
And a breath later, he falls into step beside me.