17. SEVENTEEN
SEVENTEEN
The truth of it is, if I stay any longer, I’ll crack.
It’ll be easy, even.
Last night, I fell asleep without worrying who was next to me.
This morning, I was excited to get a hot breakfast—even if it came from a drive-thru.
Seeing the city for the first time left me in a state of awe, speechless and mesmerized by the grandeur of it all.
This foreign landscape and the man beside me are quickly becoming all I look forward to.
I’m hoping again, which ultimately leads to disappointment and heartbreak.
So, no, I’m not willing to change my mind.
And yes, I am being a fucking dick about it.
“Fine,” Hunter says and gets out of the car. I start to open my door, but he’s there before I can push it all the way. “If that’s what you want,” he says combatively.
It’s all over his face, in his voice, and posture.
He wants to argue.
Badly.
I’m not going to give in, though. This has to happen because, at the end of the day, nothing will change for him if he decides it’s all too much. He will go on with his life like I never existed. That won’t be the case for me.
So much has changed already, and I won’t forget he exists—even if I should.
Extending his hand—ever the gentleman—he waits for me to slip mine into it so he can get me on my feet.
Begrudgingly, I take the damn thing, hating how smooth and warm it feels against my skin.
The fresh scent of laundry detergent and residual tobacco smack me in the nostrils, luring me closer like some aphrodisiac.
And it’s not just his smell or gentle touch; it’s his eyes and his smile.
His unwarranted dedication despite the hot and cold I’ve been pouring over him.
I’m being pulled in against my will, and I will stop it before it gets worse.
When he offers me my crutches, not placing them under my arms like last time, I keep my face blank and do it myself.
“How can you go back there?” he demands suddenly.
Those hazel eyes of his shift color whenever his mood tanks.
I noticed briefly, but this close to me, the green swallows up the brown.
“Do I make you that uncomfortable that you can’t accept help? Do you want to stay homeless forever?”
“I didn’t get a fucking choice!” I roar, arms trembling as I hold the stupid crutches in a death grip. “I didn’t wake up one day and decide to ruin my entire life! No one asked me if I wanted this!”
“Then?” He steps closer, trapping me between his body and the open car door. “What’s the problem, Gray? I’m giving you an out.”
“A temporary one!”
His eyebrows furrow while he searches my face in confusion. “Temporary?”
“Yes, temporary ,” I sneer and try to move around him, but he doesn’t budge. “Will you fuckin’ move, man?”
“When did I ever say it was temporary?” To my surprise, he takes a step back, allowing me to hobble away from his body heat.
“It’s implied . No one, and I do mean no one, grabs a dude off the street for nothing. It’s not a thing, Hunter. And you keep… digging , wanting to find something or wanting to know me. Like I said earlier. What the fuck are you doing?”
“What am I doing?” he snaps, shoulders hunching up as he tries and fails to mask his anger. “I’m doing what I fucking want for once. Never in my wildest dreams did I think a person like you would try and dictate that.” The word you is spit out of his mouth.
I straighten as much as I can and spit at his feet. “Fuck you.”
What I wouldn’t give to run right now. Just dip the fuck out and leave him in the dust. After about three steps, I yell and throw the crutches.
Pain shoots through my leg, but I ignore it, favoring a faster speed so I can hightail it out of here.
I’m done with whatever sick fantasy he’s trying to play out.
“Gray, wait,” he calls, jogging up to me. I keep going, refusing to acknowledge that he’s got my crutches. “I didn’t mean that.”
“I did. Fuck you,” I growl.
Keep going. You can get a ride back home with someone. No one turns down free road head.
He picks up his pace to walk backward in front of me and keeps yapping, “It came out all wrong. I only meant that someone as free as you appear would understand wanting to do something that makes you feel good, no matter what anyone thinks.”
“Bullshit.”
“It’s the truth. There is nothing wrong with you, Gray. Not like that.”
“Yeah? Well, there is definitely something wrong with you . Did you not have many friends growing up? Is that it? Want me to be your little buddy? Get fucked, asshole. Move. ” I try to move my legs faster, but the pain is excruciating, and I’m sweating like a sonofabitch.
“Will you stop for a damn minute?” he growls, bass lacing his vocal cords in a way that makes my stomach flip and my movements halt.
Glancing over his shoulder, he curses under his breath, and I follow his gaze. We are almost at the sidewalk that’s full of people meandering by. A few of them look at us with curious faces, and that care I’ve been fighting back into the depths of my brain returns with a vengeance.
Someone could overhear him—us—and that wouldn’t be good.
Hunter is the goddamned governor’s son. Am I trying to ruin the guy just because I have attachment issues? I try to calm down when he rakes a shaky hand through his hair and takes a deep breath.
His cheeks are flushed, and I’m sure mine are too. “Please use the crutches,” he says gently, a complete 180 from the thunderous boom a moment ago.
I take them, feeling like shit and hating that I’m being such an asshole. Hunter hasn’t done anything wrong yet, and I’m acting like the worst has already happened. Call it survival instincts unwilling to relent. “Sorry,” I grumble while getting the crutches situated.
“I—thank you.”
Finding the strength to use my words, I swallow hard and meet his gaze. “What you’re offering me is too good to be true.” Another swallow. His eyes track the movement. “I don’t want to let myself get used to it, either.”
“Because you think I’m going to abandon you? Send you back out there with nothing?”
“Yeah,” I admit.
“Why didn’t you just say that?”
Caleb, that’s why.
When I’d gotten my first felony, fresh out of the group home with nowhere to go, I met Caleb.
He’d taken me in, promised me x, y, and z, and then one day, he was fucking a guy in fancy slacks over my bed.
Everything I had was no longer mine but Caleb’s.
I was thrown out the same night. The worst part was, I fought it.
I begged for my things, for more time to figure things out, and Caleb refused me.
But Hunter doesn’t want to know all that, and honestly, I don’t want to say it all out loud. So, I purse my lips and nod towards the clinic.
“Gonna be late.”
He searches my face for a few beats, wanting to push and find out what I’m not saying, but eventually, he concedes, nodding his head. “Let’s go.”
A hairline fracture in my shin is the diagnosis.
Doctor Perry says it’ll take four to six weeks to heal with a brace and stay off it as much as possible.
He writes me another prescription I’m meant to get filled in two weeks for my pain medicine and asks me about…
my other injury. After a lot of arguing, I let him examine me.
I already feel raw and exposed, like a hunk of meat, so when he’s done, I want to throw up.
“I meant to give you these pamphlets yesterday, but in my rush to get to you, I forgot them.” Perry hands me three different ones. One is for shelters, the second is about free trauma counseling, and the third is for state aid.
“Thanks,” I mutter, folding them and putting them in my pocket. I'll throw them in the trash after I leave.
With my new brace on my leg, everything else is squared away, and I’m ready to get the hell out of dodge. But the good doctor has more to say. Flicking his eyes from my chart on his tablet to my face, he asks, “Parker is it?”
“Yeah?”
“I knew a Hudson Parker once. Any relation?”
My already sensitive insides turn necrotic. Spit pools on my tongue, a stab landing smack between my chest. “That was my dad.”
His eyes soften. “We were in school together. I hadn’t seen him since, but I remember him well. Good man.”
“He was,” I croak, balling my fists and trying not to sob right here on his stupid exam table.
“Did he ever—never mind. I’m sorry if I upset you, Gray.”
Shaking my head, I quickly wipe away the moisture around my eyes and say, “He was going out for date night with my mom. It was kind of a celebration because he got his PhD. So, yeah, he did get to become a doctor.”
Perry nods solemnly. “I knew he would,” he smiles wistfully. “Anyway, before you leave, I got back your blood work and urine. Everything looks good. Nothing to worry about except some minor dehydration.”
“And the…” I trail off, unable to say it.
“No STIs.”
“Thanks.”
“My pleasure. Shall we?”
Exiting the clinic while sniffling is never a good look, but Hunter doesn’t ask about what happened or why I’m upset—thank fuck. It’s been a long time since I’ve heard my dad’s name or even talked about my parents. I’m homesick for a place I haven’t stepped foot in since I was twelve.
Even so, I’m determined more than ever to go back.
I don’t need anyone to understand my attachment to my hometown. I just need to be there.
I need that familiarity when everything else is so uncertain.
Within my life’s obscurity is security. I know the shadows and curves of my world like I do my own body. It’s the only thing I need right now so I don’t completely break.