CHAPTER 3
Murphy
“You’re sure you don’t want any of this?”
The aroma from Mom’s shepherd’s pie is still lingering in the kitchen, making my mouth water as she wraps up the casserole dish.
“No. Jesse should be here any minute.”
“Where are you two headed tonight? It’s kind of early.”
My face heats at the implication she suspects we’re not hitting up the Dew Drop directly. I am probably the most confusing son in the world, but she’s never questioned why I go to a female strip club. I’m not ready to tell her I finally broke the news to Jesse, at least not until I know how he’s taken my truth now that he’s had a few days to process it.
I can’t believe he invited me out tonight. It sprouted a tendril of hope in my chest when I got his text earlier. It’s been three days since I shared my news. I was starting to think he was going to fade into oblivion.
JESSE: Maloney Baloney, you want to hang out tonight?
ME: Sure.
‘Sure’ was a much less enthusiastic response than the one I felt inside. He even called me ‘Maloney Baloney,’ that stupid nickname he gave me when we were nine.
The last few days on the orchard have dragged by. My emotions have teetered between guilt, over keeping my sexuality a secret from him for so long, and dejection, over the possibility that it shocked him so much that he won’t know how to remain friends with me. Dusting a piece of fuzz off my blue paisley button-down, I can’t believe I’m anxious about hanging out with my best friend. I’m excited that he wants to see me, but can’t help worrying that our relationship is still in limbo. If he does the finger-fighting and twenty questions thing again, I need to try not to lose my cool. He’s trying. That counts for something.
I hear Delores’ engine rumble up the driveway. My palms are sweating, and I practically jump out of my boots.
Get a grip, Murph. It’s just Jesse. It’s just us hanging out like we always do.
Except… some foreboding feeling tells me that this won’t be like our usual hang outs. It’s only five-thirty. Mom’s right. We never go out this early at night. He didn’t say where we’re going, and I was too grateful for the invite to ask.
His signature playful knock resounds at the front door. Watching him invite himself in like he always does calms my nerves. At least, that hasn’t changed.
“Hey, Jesse. How’s harvest going for you and your folks?” Mom calls from behind the kitchen counter that overlooks our dining area.
“Hey, Charlotte! We’re doing good. We finished up the first pick of the Jonagolds today.”
“Oh, I bet your parents are happy! I’m itching for the weekend so I can help Murphy with ours. The hospital had two day-shift nurses on vacation this month, so I’ve been stuck on days.”
“Mom, it’s fine. Danny and I can handle it,” I interject, grabbing my house keys and heading toward the door. I don’t need the reminder that Jesse didn’t stay to help Sunday afternoon, nor do I want him to think I’m salty over it. “Are we doing this?” I ask him as I near the place where he’s waiting.
Why does it feel like I’m addressing a stranger? A stranger in a Jesse suit... er, polo. Why the fuck is he wearing a polo?
When I came out to my parents after high school, Mom asked me several times before I shipped out to the Army if I had told Jesse ‘yet.’ I know she was just curious and invested in my life, but asking made me imagine there would be a fuse attached to revealing my truth to him like it was a bomb. Each time she asked, the fuse got shorter, the bomb bigger. I finally told her I didn’t want to find out if he’d take the news badly.
“Honey, if he takes it badly, then he’s not a good friend,” she had said.
I remember being aggravated by her remark on Jesse’s behalf because how could someone who filled me with so much joy over the years not be considered a good friend? She’s never mentioned it since.
Glancing back at her to wave goodnight, however, I catch the signature little smile she always gives me when I leave to hang out with him. Maybe I’ve always known and just ignored it, but I swear there’s a hint of sadness to it. Has she been biting her tongue all these years, just waiting for the day he leaves me high and dry?
That’s not reassuring right now.
Outside, there’s even less reassurance as we climb into Delores without a word. If we’re going to do a repeat of the awkward silence we had on the way home from town the other day, I’d rather hop out right now and go bury myself balls deep in reruns of Breathless.
When he starts down the driveway, the lacey thong on his rear-view sways back and forth. It feels like it’s mocking me, washing a sense of inadequacy over me. What the hell is that about?
And is that… Taylor Swift on the radio?
Glancing over, I catch Jesse sneaking a peek at me in return. He flashes me a weird smile that doesn’t belong on his face. It almost looks like his ‘I’m-not-scared’ face, the kind he wore when I dared him to pet that sleeping badger we found in the woods when we were twelve. Do I make him nervous now?
“So, what’s on the agenda?” I ask, leaning back in my seat like I usually do, once I realize how rigid I am.
Maybe my body language is throwing him off. If I don’t act like the old me, he won’t treat me like the old me.
That bit of conversation starter has the excited Jesse smile I know lighting up his face. “I thought we could try out this new place downtown.”
“You want to drink downtown? That explains the polo.” Shaking my head, I chuckle as I gaze out my window.
“What’s wrong with my polo? You don’t like it?”
I glance back, fully expecting one of his playful smirks, but he’s frowning, scrutinizing his bright white shirt.
“We always go to the shitholes outside of town or The Dew Drop. You only dress up when we go downtown where the tourists are.”
What’s with that face? Don’t tell me stating the obvious actually hurt his feelings. We give each other shit on the reg. Raising my hands, I laugh.
“Jesse, I’m fine with the shitholes. I wasn’t giving you crap. If you want to go downtown, let’s go downtown.”
Nodding, that seems to calm whatever nerve I touched on. He flashes me a little smile and says, “Well, it’s a surprise.”
A tingle trickles through my chest along with a pang of dread. Jesse’s surprises can go either way. They range from entertaining as fuck to ‘why-in-the-hell-did-I-agree-to-this?,’ like the trip to Velma’s Gift Shop on Sunday. Tonight, though? The fact he balked at me giving him shit over something as insignificant as a polo shirt might be why the dread seems to be outweighing the excitement.
My palm is sweating against the window frame, watching the road to town crawl toward us with each passing minute as silence starts to grow like a fungus between us. He doesn’t even have the strip club’s greatest hits playing on his radio tonight. Something feels off. Maybe I just want too badly for things to go back to normal, back to before I had an emotional outburst after seeing Pete and Cam hold hands.
I’m mentally analyzing facial expressions. This is silly. Everything will be fine. We’re fine.
Wiping my hand on my jeans, I hate that it requires actual effort to remember how to be the me around Jesse I always am. I’m actually having to search for small talk. Freaking small talk with my best friend.
“How’s the hot tub project coming along?” I throw out, knowing it’s a topic that always lights him up.
Grinning, he looks like his old self, relaxing the tension in my shoulders. “I decided I’m going to put up a big-ass pole building instead of a gazebo.”
“A pole building? You’re going to put up an entire building just for a hot tub?” I scoff at his newest addition to the project he’s been talking about for over a year. “You said you wanted to sit in it and look at the stars. Won’t that defeat the purpose?”
“No, I’ll get skylights put in the roof. This way, though, I can sit out there in the winter and not freeze my ass off when I get out. We can hop out, sit at the bar, and watch the big screen while we eat, then get back in when we’re done.”
I’ve heard every single development of this party pad he’s been planning for what feels like forever, but all I can focus on right now is the word ‘we.’ He said ‘we’ as in, I’ll still be in the picture if he ever does put his money where his mouth is and build the damn thing. I think it’s the first time I’ve smiled, truly smiled, since Sunday.
Popping Delores into park, he announces, “We’re here.”
It’s now that I notice we’re in the new business district of downtown that’s slowly taken form over the last few years. It’s lined with retro shops that still don’t feel like they belong in the Wenatchee I grew up in. Trendy mannequins with their eyeless faces, in gothic and new age apparel, stare back at me blankly from a clothing shop. I’m as lost as they are as to what Jesse wants to do in this part of town where the tourists and younger generations flock.
I peel myself out of Delores and meet him on the sidewalk, mustering a positive attitude. His anxious smile has my heart palpitating. I wish to hell he’d quit doing that. It reminds me of one day in high school, and how he acted all the way through last period before he finally confessed that he’d broken the passenger door handle off my truck. There’s nothing to break right now except me.
“Are you up for coffee? They supposedly have everything. They’ve even got a five-star rating on Yep.”
‘Yep?’ What the fuck is Yep?
“You mean Yelp?” Squinting at a neon sign over a café next to the clothing store, I follow him warily toward Un-bean-lievable. Is he seriously taking me out for coffee on a Saturday evening?
“No, it’s Yep. Isn’t it? Like, ‘yep. This place is great.’” Cackling, he opens the door, holding it for me. He never holds the door for me. “Why would they call a review service Yelp? That sounds like a noise you make if someone dumps hot coffee on your lap.”
A hot wall of coffee-scented air hits my face when we enter, and I’m assaulted by the sharp notes of jazz music being blasted from overhead speakers.
A giant chalkboard menu hangs on the wall behind a brush-metal counter strewn with a sea of coffee variations that I don’t understand. Why did I think we’d be going out to dinner?
“Welcome to Un-bean-lievable,” a dark-haired teen with a messy man bun behind the counter drones out with the enthusiasm of Ben Stein. “What can we make you fresh from our un-bean-lievably wicked menu?”
Did he just refer to beverages as ‘wicked?’ “Um, what’s good?” Jesse asks, looking lost as he gapes at the five hundred different coffee selections on the menu board.
“I recommend our wheatgrass avocado latte. We make them with real wheatgrass.” The kid gestures behind him to a flat of bright green grass that I thought was some type of eco decoration.
Where the fuck has Jesse brought me?
Glancing over at him, I’m intent on discerning if he’s recently suffered a head injury that I don’t know about.
When he looks at me, and his brows raise in intrigue, asking, “What do you think?” I’m certain of it.
“Are you feeling alright?”
“Yeah. Why?”
Trying to subdue a disbelieving scoff as I take in the rest of the café, I fail. There are no chairs at any of the tables, just bean bags. It looks like the daycare my niece goes to but in black and beige. Did he freaking read the wrong business review and get confused?
“I didn’t have dinner yet,” I supply, patiently. “I thought maybe we were going out to eat.”
Man bun barista interjects with another spiel, gesturing to a convex case with pastries in it to our left. “Our lentil chocolate chip cookies and kelp bacon quiche just came out of the oven.”
I get another hopeful look from Jesse, almost like he’s awaiting my approval. He cannot be serious. I’m starting to think he is a legit stranger in a Jesse suit now.
“Jesse, I’m not eating kelp, and the only wheat I touch is the winter cover crop I plant in the back twenty for the game birds,” I inform him in a low voice so as not to offend our enthusiastic barista.
“But you like bacon,” he counters, motioning to the green-tinted egg pastry.
“Whoever did that to bacon should be taken out back and given a beatdown. Why don’t we just go to the Grease Pit?”
Shoulders hitching back, his chest puffs up on a wounded inhale. “I thought it’d be nice if we tried something new. Look. They have muffins.” Glancing at the barista, he asks, “What are those? Blueberry?”
“Oh, no. Those are acai berry and chai. They’re gluten-free. We do have a blueberry and hazelnut granola parfait, though, if you’re interested.”
Another flash of Jesse’s big blue puppy dog eyes comes my way. Is he for real? I’m going to slap him. I swear. Someone needs to knock some sense into him. What in the hell is going on? For all his excitability and the wild schemes he comes up with, his eating habits are predictable. Why are we here? Did he meet some chick who’s into health food?
“No,” I finally let out when he doesn’t read the fuck-no signal in my eyes.
Damn it. Now he’s doing the lower lip pout thing.
Sighing, I surrender and turn back to the barista. “I’ll just have a coffee. Black.”
“We don’t have coffee, actually,” he informs me. “We have espresso. You can choose from fifteen different blends. They’re on the right side of the board.”
“Wow. Fifteen,” Jesse lets out and gives a little swat to my arm. “Cool, huh?”
My stomach growls. It feels like it’s eating itself at this point, but there’s a hint of nausea too from breathing in all the potent, overwhelming aromas. Fixing my death glare on him right now is apparently not effective.
“I don’t care. You order.” Eyeballing the low-lying coffee tables, I add, “Are we having it here?”
“Yeah. Find a table and relax. I’ll bring it all over.”
Another survey of the place still turns up not a single chair. Flashbacks of kindergarten flood my brain as I stare at the black beanbags plopped around a table in the corner. Shaking my head, I drop onto one of them, sinking in as it molds around my ass. I am never going to get out of this thing.
Jesse makes his way over, two pastry bags tucked under his elbow. There’s a drink in each of his hands. The one that looks like a green smoothie better not be for me.
Smiling, he sets the bounty down on the table. “Well, this is…different,” he comments as though he were searching for a positive descriptor but came up short.
Leaning forward to grab food off the table shouldn’t require this much strain on your ab muscles. When my fingers finally snag the hot paper cup and one of the pastry bags, I suck in a breath and settle back on my bag chair.
Holy crap, that’s bitter. The hot liquid is so acidic that my mouth feels parched after just one swig. That kid was right. This isn’t coffee, but guaranteed it’s enough caffeine to keep me up past midnight.
“Are we pulling an all-nighter or something? What’s on the agenda after this?” I ask, rifling open the white paper bag I claimed.
“No. I thought we could just visit.”
My hand freezes mid-rustle. “Visit?”
“Yeah.” He shrugs, too focused on trying to figure out how to sit on his bean bag to look at me. He puts his knees underneath himself, but then sways to his right.
“Visiting is what you do to people in retirement homes. What’s the deal?”
An errant thought flitters through my mind. He only acts evasively collected like this when he’s afraid to ask for advice or he’s done something wrong. Watching the sour expression he makes when he takes a sip of his smoothie is a bit of humorous redemption, but then he gasps. “Ah, crap.”
A minty green droplet landed on his polo. Stupefied, I watch him try to blot it out with a napkin. All he accomplishes is spreading it, so the stain now looks like he has a green nipple patch. Since when does Jesse Carver care so much about his appearance?
No way.
Maybe he did meet a woman. The possibility has my heart sinking. The odds of retaining my friend-time with him will significantly drop if he’s met someone he’s serious enough about that he feels the need to show off for them with polo shirts and fancy coffees.
His knee slips off the bean bag, and he nearly tumbles onto his side, too preoccupied with his wheatgrass stain to realize he’s getting his ass kicked by this daycare furniture. Standing up, he huffs at his shirt and then the not-a-chair before dropping his ass back down on one side of it. Leaning into the bulge it produces under his arm, he gives up on his stain and throws the wadded napkin on the table.
“Is it before or after Labor Day that you’re not supposed to wear white?” he asks in all seriousness, swiping up his pastry bag.
“Are you trying to impress someone?”
“What? Who?”
Rolling my eyes, I dig into my bag for whatever mystery food he bought. If he wants to play the aloof game, so be it. He should know I always win.
“The fancy coffee place. The health food. The polo. Did you meet someone? Does she work here or something?”
“What?” He laughs. “No. Why would you think that? I just wanted to hang out.” Pulling a giant cookie out of his bag, he studies what look like flecks of herbs in it. Man, this place can’t even make a cookie. I refuse to feel sorry for him, though. The dumbass came here willingly.
“Oh, I don’t know. Let’s see. The summer we turned fourteen, and you had a crush on Miriam Biggs—you dragged me to the public pool with you five times a week and almost killed yourself trying to dive off the high board to impress her.”
“That was planned, and you know it. How many times do I have to tell you that? She was the lifeguard. I knew what I was doing.”
The quiche I unveil from my bag isn’t kelp green, but it sure as shit isn’t pastry-colored either. Why does the cheese on it look curdled? There’s no way that’s properly pasteurized.
“Yeah, your blue lips and the water you puked up in her face said you knew exactly what you were doing. Tell me—has she called yet?”
“Fuck you.” He snickers, taking a bite of his lawn clippings cookie. It’s so hard, I can hear the crunch from here. Half of it breaks off, leaving a trail of crumbs down the front of his polo as it falls to the floor.
“Damn it,” he whispers.
“What the hell did you get me, anyway? Is this parmesan?”
“No, he said it was goat cheese and rosemary with Canadian bacon.”
Dusting at his crumbs, he leans forward, then curses at how it causes the crumbs to pool in his bean bag. Ripping open my quiche, I decide to forgo the goat cheese and dig for bacon’s sad cousin as he gets up and shakes out his bean bag.
“So, what’s the deal, then? Are you on a health kick? Because I know you, and this isn’t the answer to a long life. You’ll be dead from starvation by next week if this is what you’re planning to live off of.”
Scoffing, he drops the bean bag, and does a wrestler’s elbow drop into it, landing on his side, leaving his legs kicked out on the floor. He’s half-child. How he’s not a master of a bean bag chair is beyond me.
“Oh, my gosh. What’s with the conspiracies, Baloney? Can’t a guy just take his buddy out for coffee? It’s a chain. I looked it up. They have them in Seattle, so I thought you’d like it.”
My hand pauses halfway to my mouth with the lone fleck of sad-ass bacon I found. Seattle? He brought me here because I told him my rodeo trips weren’t actually rodeo trips? That’s what this is about?
I can feel a frown trying to form on my face, but do my utmost to fight it. My brain tells me this is about me being gay as I stare at his stupid shirt while he squirms to get comfortable. My heart tells me it’s a sweet gesture, that he at least thought about my feelings and is trying to make an effort to accept my truth. I don’t want to have to be accepted, though. I don’t want him to have to try. I just want to be us. The us we’ve always been.
Scoffing, I jest, “Yeah, I’m gay now, so that means I only drink grass and eat rabbit food. Good call.”
Snorting, he gives up his living room lounging pose and gets to his knees. Walking on them, he circles behind his bag and lays over the top of it on his stomach, trying to get the perfect angle to reach his smoothie.
“Well, I don’t know what you guys like. I thought you liked the rodeo, so how was I supposed to know this place sucks? I had to try something.”
I’m torn between grappling him into a headlock for a noogie and smothering him with his bean bag. He gets points for finally admitting this was a bad idea, but I don’t like being referred to as ‘you guys’. You gay guys—that's not what he said, but it’s what he means. Why can’t he see that I’m just a guy? Is it that difficult a concept for him?
“I eat and drink the same stuff I always do when I go to Seattle. It’s a Saturday night. Let’s just go to The Dew Drop. Ralph can throw on a pizza for us.”
“Uh uhn. No way.” He shakes his head, breaking off a piece of his cookie.
“Why not?” I laugh at his severity. “What did you do? Did they finally ban you?”
“No,” he scoffs, but then shrugs, going somber on me. Mumbling, he adds, “I can’t take you there.”
His words are a sucker punch to the gut.
Me. I’m the problem.
My heart and my brain have a serious disagreement over which one is in charge right now as I reassess the logic he must have put into tonight’s events. I try to make my next words come out casual, but I can hear the challenge in them.
“Why not? We go there all the time.”
A puff of breath ghosts past his lips as he jabs his straw in and out of his smoothie. Is Jesse Carver blushing?
“Well, that was—it’d be weird. Right?”
He didn’t even look at me. The split second his gaze satellites to mine before darting back to his smoothie further compounds the anger erupting inside me. It seeps through my core and down each appendage, inflating my entire being like a heavy, flammable gas.
I told him I’m still me, that I go there to spend time with him. How else should I have flayed myself to convince him of that? Ugly interpretations of his vague narrative flood my brain, making me bite back the instinctive reaction to further explain myself.
It’d be weird for him because he knows now that I’m gay. It’d be weird to have a gay friend with him in a crowded public place that we frequent. Is he worried the locals will sniff out my truth and he’ll be guilty of some crime by association? No matter which way I cut it, it’s ugly and has me sick to my stomach.
“You know what? You’re right,” I concede, tossing the fleck of meat back into the bag and closing it up.
His relieved smile is the nail on the head, making something die inside of me. I’ve been banished to bean bag island where we don’t know a fucking soul. He couldn’t say it any plainer.
Hefting myself out of the ass-eating pit, I manage to stand with only one pop from my knee. “I think I’m going to head out. Thanks for… the grass.”
“Wait. You’re leaving?”
I’m too spun up to answer. Making my way around the table in silence, I imagine the sensations inside me are my insides rotting and sloughing off into a putrid pile of decay. Maybe Jesse was right—our entire friendship has been a lie.
“We just got here. I thought we were going to hang out. Murph!”
Glancing back at his alarmed cry when I reach the door, I watch as he flails, rolling out of his bean bag onto the floor before scrambling to his feet. Leaning over the table, he snatches up my pastry bag and holds it out.
“You said you were hungry. Don’t you want your quiche?”
A humorless laugh chuffs past my lips. He’s offering me a parting gift of good riddance now—in the way of a freaking non-edible snack to boot. It’s not even a good parting gift. For the first time in my life, I feel like we’re strangers. How is that possible?
Shaking my head in frustration, I push through the door to escape the acrid scent of this painful over-caffeinated life lesson. Why did I ever tell him?
Out on the sidewalk, the breeze washes away some of the heat from my skin. I breathe in the fresh air, letting it flood my burning lungs. The bell to the café door jangles behind me, though, sending my spine rigid.
“Murphy! Come on! Wait up!”
Pinching my eyes shut against the onsetting darkness, I let out a breath. It’s already bad enough. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to hear platitudes said to assuage his guilt, but twenty-plus years of friendship have me turning around to face the impending closure that’s apparently sealing our fates.
“What did I do? Are you pissed off at me or something?”
Great. So, this is how he wants to play it? It’s going to be all my fault. I worried he’d be awkward if he ever found out about my preferences, but I never imagined he’d be cruel or shady.
“I never should have told you,” I say more to myself.
Standing in front of the shops, I’m suddenly reminded of Sunday with Pete and Cam, the way Jesse hid behind a shelving unit like a voyeur to an absurd scene. I should have known then.
“What?” he asks, looking dumbfounded. Is it even genuine?
“Is this all just a joke to you? The way it was with Pete and Cam on Sunday, getting a kick out of seeing your brother with a guy? Do you treat him like this now too—taking him out for wheatgrass and goat cheese at the fucking Romper Room?”
Blinking at me with his mouth agape, his brow furrows. I don’t know why, but it just pisses me off more.
Finally, he speaks, sounding confused. “Pete doesn’t like cheese.”
How did I ever think his cluelessness was cute? He insinuated I was the one living the lie, but he’s the one with the convenient smoke screen.
I can’t do this. I’d rather just forget it ever happened than have my last memory of him be tainted by dishonest pleasantries and feigned confusion.
“Forget it. Thanks for the invite, but I’m starving. I’m going to go find a steak.”
Spinning around, I start down the street. I didn’t know it was possible for your soul to feel crushed. It’s like someone died and I didn’t get to say goodbye.
“Wait! Do you want some company?”
“No! I don’t want your company.” The words blast out of me with no chance of holding them back.
“Murph…”
His pitiful call cracks something in my aching heart. I want it to mean that he gives a damn. Maybe part of him still does, but I’m in no headspace to subject myself to any more of his potential friendship erasures—white polos, disgusting beverages in clandestine coffee shops, Taylor Swift songs in his stripper mobile. I don’t think I’ll ever be in the headspace to deal with that after this.
I need a fucking vacation. Somewhere far away from every piece of scenery that holds thousands of memories of Jesse tied to them.
Sighing, I stop and turn around. “Just… go to The Dew Drop or… whatever you want to do. I need some time to myself.”
Hesitating, he stammers, “Do you… want to hang out tomorrow?”
I can only imagine what cockamamie plan he’d come up with for another outing. Probably something like a Pride flag making class. In Siberia. Another day date. Listen to me. I sound like a rejected lover.
“Jesse… I think we should just… spend some time apart.”
There. I gave him the out that he doesn’t have the courage to admit he wants.
Staring at me with his lips parted, he actually looks shocked, like the idea of us not seeing each other regularly never crossed his mind. I want it to mean that I’m wrong. I want it to mean that he’s just still adjusting to the thought of me being gay, albeit poorly and sloppily.
Except his lips move. “O-okay.”
I’m an idiot, such a fucking idiot. Are grown men allowed to cry over losing a friend?
‘Okay.’ Just like that. Twenty-some years and he takes the out.
“Have a good night,” I choke out and spin around.
“Wait! Do you need a ride home?”
Pity. Now, here comes the pity.
“I’ll get an Uber!” I yell without looking back.
“Uber? Do we even have Uber here? Murph!”
Head throbbing, my stomach churning the bile in my empty gut, my footfalls and pounding heartbeat finally drown out his nonsense, his pitiful attempts to assuage his guilt. I don’t need a pity ride to be dumped off and gotten rid of. I can do that on my own.
As I move down the street, I can feel the distance growing between us in my soul. Why on earth did life even throw us together all those years ago if this was the inevitable outcome? The universe has a cruel sense of humor.
By the time I make it back home later, it’s proper dark outside—the time of night when two buddies should be heading out for an evening. I can hear the familiar voices of actors from Breathless playing on the TV in the living room as I toss my keys on the side table by the door. The sounds produce a mere flicker of intrigue that dies a death as quickly as it was born. Fantastic. He even managed to kill my enjoyment of my favorite soap opera.
“Murphy? You’re back early,” Mom calls, telling me I didn’t stare long enough at my dinner at the grille I stopped in after I left that new-age coffee hell.
I tried to kill as much time as I could. Tried to stay away long enough to expel my demons from the night’s events. Mom doesn’t need to see me like this.
“Hey,” I reply, infusing as much warmth as I can into the word as I saunter into the living room.
The glow from the television casts shadows over the darkened room. Auggie hops up off the floor from his resting place next to Mom’s recliner. I’m grateful for the distraction, bending down to scratch his ears so Mom can’t see how pathetic my face probably looks right now. Tail wagging slowly, he gazes up at me with empathy in his big brown eyes, like he knows I feel like my heart has been stomped on.
“How was dinner?” Mom asks.
“Good,” I lie, barely recalling the taste of the bites I had to force myself to chew.
Hitting the pause button on the TV, she glances over at me. “I’m sorry I didn’t wait for you. I had to know if Rodrigo returned from the medical mission in the Amazon. It was killing me. I can restart it.”
As much as I’ve wanted to know if Barrett and Rodrigo get their well-deserved reunion, and as much as I love that Mom is as invested in one of the show’s same-sex couples as I am, I can’t muster any enthusiasm for watching television right now. How freaking long am I going to feel sorry for myself?
The irony is that I feel sorry for Jesse, too. I’ve never behaved so petulantly in my life. Did I overreact?
My freaking head is still a damn mess. I replayed each of Jesse’s desperate pleas for me to stay while I sat at the grille down the street from that eclectic café. Maybe I was just trying to hear what I wanted to hear. Trying to distort the recent memories into an alternate version that convinced me I was wrong and that he truly cares.
“No, I’m… kind of tired. Think I’ll just turn in for the night. I’ll catch up tomorrow.”
Turning toward the hallway, I only make it to the archway. The click of Mom’s end table lamp switch resounds, and yellow light floods the room.
“It’s only eight-thirty. Are you feeling okay?”
Shit. It sure as hell felt like the evening crawled along a lot slower than that. Half-turning back, I force the corner of my mouth to flick upward.
“Yeah. Just… a long week, I guess. I didn’t sleep great last night.”
Frowning, her chestnut eyes look laser-focused as they study my face. “Murphy, what’s wrong?”
My head shakes before I can get my words past a damn lump in my throat. “Nothing.”
Get it to-fucking-gether, Murph. This is ridiculous. You’re a grown-ass man.
Her frown morphs into a scowl. “Don’t do that.”
“What?”
Huffing, her lips purse together, and she sits up her recliner. “You think I haven’t noticed how you try to carry the weight of the world since your father’s been gone? I’m not fragile, Murphy, and I’m still a mother. You can still tell me things. Something’s wrong. Isn’t it?”
It’s like I’ve been warped back to that first day when she asked me if I had told Jesse. I don’t want to hear her tell me again that he’s not a good friend, but maybe it’ll be cathartic this time. Moreover, she looks ornery as hell right now, like she’s strong enough for me to unload a few ounces of the pain in my chest onto her.
“I told him,” I inform her. It comes out barely audible though, so I have to reiterate. “I told Jesse… finally.”
That sobers her features instantly. Her reply comes out eerily calm. “You told him you’re in love with him?”
In love with him? Where in the hell did that come from? How can she—
“What? No, I… I…”
There are nearly two hundred thousand words in the English language, but I can’t get a single one to follow my stammering as my heart slams into my ribs with each beat. My bones feel like they’re disintegrating under her pitying gaze, my skin melting off my face.
No. That’s not—
It’s not why I—
I’m not in—
Oh, God.
Oh, my God.
I can’t breathe.
Fuck. Why can’t I breathe?
“Oh, Murph,” she whispers sadly.
Fuck.
No.
Lips parted, her gaze scans my face like I’m one of her patients at the ER and she’s assessing me for injuries. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart.”
I think I just swallowed my tongue. At least, there’s air back in my lungs, albeit now I feel like I’m hyperventilating.
It was bad enough when I thought I’d lost my best friend. Now, I’m a dumb motherfucker who fell in love with the world’s straightest man and didn’t even realize it.
How freaking cliché is that? And how in the hell did Mom know, but I didn’t?
I’m suddenly annoyed with her again, like I was years ago, but for different reasons. They say ignorance is bliss, but she just stole mine with her unnerving intuition.
Tomorrow, I’m deleting every episode of Breathless. She’s officially watched too many soap operas.