Chapter 10 - Ethan
The warmth of the fire made everything a little softer — the ache in Ethan’s calves, the throbbing gash on his knee, even the memory of how close they’d all come to disaster that afternoon.
Shadows flickered across the ring of faces, sharpening the jawlines, sanding down the years.
The flask made its way around the circle, everybody tipping back more than the polite splash.
Ethan felt it etch a hard burning warmth behind his sternum.
For a few minutes, nobody said much. The exhaustion had a thickness to it, as if every word might cost more than it was worth.
Riley leaned back on a downed log, arms folded behind his head, eyes gone slack and content.
Harper squatted by the fire, prodding coals.
Cole, as always, perched just outside the center, knees bent, hands clasped in the kind of working-man knot that looked like he could strangle a bear with a thought.
For a while, that was all—banter, laughter, the scratch of Harper’s stick stirring up sparks. Ethan watched the constellation of embers spiral, rising into the black where the branches webbed overhead.
He was just sinking into a gentle, happy blur when Harper stood, dusted off her palms, and, with theatrical precision, unzipped a secret compartment in her rucksack. Out came a glass tube and two rolled joints, paper white as bone.
“Been saving these for when we were properly broken in,” she said, her voice lighter than it had been all week. “Looks like we’ve earned it.”
The group let out a collective gasp.
Harper flicked a lighter and held it to the tip, drawing slow and steady until the end glowed a little sun. She coughed once, then exhaled a puff of smoke that was instantly eaten by the wind.
She handed it to Riley, who took it like a connoisseur. “Don’t mind if I do.” He inhaled, let the smoke twist inside him, then released it, “That’s some good shit.”
“My friend grows it on her balcony.” Harper said.
The joint made its way to Jack, who hit it like he was trying to win something.
He doubled over in a cough so extreme that Ethan thought he might actually pass out, but Jack straightened up, gave a thumbs up, and said, “Don’t you guys know? The more you cough, the higher you get.”
The joint continued its lap as it was handed to Ethan.
He paused a fraction too long, then, with a glance at the faces around him, shrugged and took a long, steady drag.
The smoke burned, not in a bad way, but in a way that made every nerve ending light up and pulse with a slow, honeyed electricity. He handed it off to Cole.
Cole just stared at it. “I haven’t smoked since college,” he muttered as he lifted it to his lips. The drag was hesitant, careful, almost reverent. The coughing fit began shortly after and lasted long enough to make Jack look like a pro.
“That’s how you do it Walker,” Jack cheered.
Cole hit it a second time, this time he held it longer, deeper, letting the smoke fill his lungs. When he exhaled, his whole face shifted—less iron, more human, he even smiled, big and bright, the look of pure happiness.
The second joint got lit shortly after and started making the rounds. Flasks alternated with the weed, and the night dissolved into stories told louder, insults leveled with more love than heat, bodies falling into each other when the laughter got too much.
Riley started a game of “one truth, one lie,” and nobody could keep track of which was which.
The more they drank, the more the laughter sharpened.
Every joke came with an undercurrent, a subtext.
Sometimes Jack would throw an arm around Ethan’s shoulders and the warmth would be so intense it almost hurt.
Sometimes, when the smoke and stories got thick, Ethan would catch Cole’s eyes across the fire—glassy, but clear, the blue of them impossible in the dark.
Ethan found himself floating outside his body, hovering over the log, watching his own hands make wild gestures as he told stories. He liked this new version of himself: loose, buoyant, untethered from the polite, safe routines of his old life.
At some point, Riley leaned against Ethan, close enough that Ethan could feel the heat of him through both their layers. “You good?” Riley whispered.
“Best I’ve been in years,” Ethan said, voice raspy.
Riley smiled, a sly, knowing thing. “Good. Stay with it.”
And he did. He let the joy pin him in place, let the feelings surge up and sweep through his arms and his spine and down into his feet. He wanted to remember this. The ache of muscles gone soft, the smell of burning resin and whiskey, the edge of every word and touch and glance.
Even Cole was different tonight. He spoke more, voice gentler, the words less guarded. When he laughed, he’d tip his head back, neck bared to the stars.
The world outside the ring of fire didn’t exist. It was just them—five bodies and a thousand secrets.
Eventually, Harper sprawled on her back, looking up at the sky, and announced, “If I die tonight, I want you all to know I was happier here than at any time in the last decade.”
“That’s so fucking sad,” Riley said, but he smiled.
Jack stared into the flames, voice unexpectedly soft. “Isn’t that what this is all for? To feel something bigger, even if it’s just for a night?”
Ethan nodded, the words ringing so true he thought he might cry.
Nobody answered, but it didn’t feel like a question.
Someone started humming an old country tune, and the others joined in, off-key but together.
As the fire burned down to a red glow, Ethan pulled his knees up, resting his chin there. He watched the shadows dance on the faces he’d started to care about, on the man he was maybe a little in love with, and decided he wasn’t going to hold anything back anymore.
Not tonight.
Maybe not ever again.
Ethan noticed Riley’s focus shift from the group to him, a silent bullseye drawn in the campfire light. He could almost feel Riley’s gaze burrowing through his clothes, down to the place in his chest where all the chaos pulsed.
“Hey, come help me with the firewood?” Riley said.
Ethan followed Riley into the darkness, away from the circle. The forest was full of tiny noises: the scrape of branch on windbreaker, the hush of moss underfoot, Riley’s slightly ragged breathing. They stopped by the pile of cut logs, moonlight silvering their edges.
Riley turned to face him, his pupils enormous. “You know I love you, right?”
Ethan grinned, the words catching him off guard. “We’ve known each other less than a week.”
Riley put his hands on Ethan’s shoulders, squeezing just enough to get his attention. “Doesn’t take that long to recognize your own kind.”
Ethan stiffened, felt a familiar urge to bolt, but Riley held him fast. “Don’t fucking panic,” Riley said, eyes both amused and deadly serious. “I’m not hitting on you. This isn’t about me.”
“Okay,” Ethan said, still feeling the edge of old, brittle defenses.
Riley took a deep breath, let it out slow. “You need to go for it with him. Cole. Stop pretending you’re just bros with intense eye contact. You two are going to combust if you don’t do something.”
Ethan shook his head. “I’m not—I don’t even know what I’m doing.”
“Bullshit.” Riley smiled, not unkindly. “You know exactly what you’re doing. You’ve just never had the chance to admit it before.”
Ethan tried to laugh, but it caught in his throat. “I was married for ten years.”
“I know,” Riley said, voice gentler now. “But you’re not anymore. And I don’t think you ever had what you needed, not really. You’re dying for something real. And I think he’s the same. You just have to get out of your own way.”
The words hung there, bright as coals in the dark. Ethan heard them echoing, knew they were right, but also knew he was afraid to be that honest.
“I’m serious,” Riley continued. “You don’t get many chances in life. You want him, you take the shot. Worst case, you get rejected and drink more bourbon. Best case, you get to stop hiding.”
Ethan looked down at his shoes, the laces caked with mud. The ground felt suddenly unsteady, like it might crack open and swallow him. “I’ve never even—” he began, but the words withered.
Riley nodded, knowing exactly what he meant. “Nobody’s keeping score. You don’t need to know what you’re doing. You just have to want it.”
Ethan said nothing, and Riley’s hands softened their grip.
“Look,” Riley said, “you’re scared, I get it. The first time I hooked up with a guy, I threw up after. Thought the world would end. But it didn’t. It got better. It got fun. You’ll figure it out, or you won’t, but at least you’ll know.”
Ethan felt the truth of it, the inevitability. It wasn’t about being gay, or bi, or any of the labels. It was about wanting—about letting himself want.
The cold night air prickled along his skin, but the fire inside him was brighter, stronger. “Thank you,” Ethan said, the words small but clean.
Riley patted his cheek, a little too hard, then let go. “Anytime, Hayes. Now get back in there and don’t fuck it up.”
They gathered two armfuls of wood, barely enough for an excuse, and trudged back to camp. As Ethan stepped into the fire’s circle, he felt something new settle over him: a readiness, a hunger, a sense that maybe, just maybe, he was finally allowed to be exactly what he was.
He looked at Cole, who was staring into the flames like he could will the universe into making sense.
Ethan smiled, and this time, he didn’t look away.
The bourbon had dwindled to its final half-inch. Jack was sprawled backward, hands behind his head, gazing up at the spray of Milky Way overhead.
“Shit, I’m too crossed for existence,” Harper declared, standing up on wobbly legs.
She overcorrected, nearly toppled, then righted herself with a flourish.
“If anyone wakes me up before sunrise, I’ll bury you in a shallow grave.
Night, losers.” She pointed a lazy finger at each of them, but her eyes lingered on Ethan for half a beat, soft and proud.
Jack managed to pull himself upright, peering at the dark perimeter. “I have to piss really bad and I feel nauseous. I am going to go try and walk it off.” He wandered off, not quite in a straight line.
Riley watched him go, then turned back to the fire, the light carving deep shadows into his face. He caught Ethan’s eye, smiled gently, then yawned, big and performative. “That’s my cue,” Riley said. He stretched, bones cracking, then patted Ethan’s shoulder. “Enjoy the stars, yeah?”
And just like that, Ethan and Cole were alone.
For a minute, neither moved. The silence was charged, but not awkward—more like the whole world was holding its breath. The fire’s heat pressed against Ethan’s bare chest, still tingling from the cold.
Cole didn’t speak, he just stared into the flames, jaw flexing as if he was working through a lifetime of words.