Chapter 1 #4
“We’re not talking about me. I fixed my shit,” Nate pointed out, which was unfair.
It wasn’t like Lane didn’t want to fix his; he did, desperately.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re fucking happy, we get it,” Lane said morosely.
“And if you fucked Trevor, would you be happy?” Nate asked.
Truthfully, Lane barely let himself think about it these days. Pushed the fantasies away every time they crowded into his brain.
“I . . .” Lane hesitated. “I don’t even know, okay? But you wanted to know, and now you know. You’re the only one who knows, so if someone else comes up to me, like Aidan fucking Flynn, thinking my problem is now his problem, I’m gonna know exactly who told him, okay?”
“Okay,” Nate said gently. He cupped Lane’s elbow. Drew him into a half hug. “I get it, man. You don’t want to talk about it and you don’t want to fix it. Just want to mope about it.”
Lane made a face. “Ugh, you’re the worst.”
“Or the best?” Nate grinned. “I gotta go find my guy. You have a good rest of your night, okay?”
Lane rolled his eyes and decided that he didn’t give a fuck if it was a bad idea, he felt so raw from the conversation that he’d skip the champagne and toast in the New Year with another tequila on the rocks.
He was just at the bar grabbing a fresh glass when he felt a body slide in next to him.
Heaven and hell, Lane thought. Because he knew what that body felt like and looked like. He turned.
“Hey, there you are,” Trevor said, head tilted sweetly up, eyes lighting up as they gazed at each other, like he’d been looking just for Lane and nobody else.
For a half second, Nate’s words clanged in his head like church bells. Why haven’t you fucking told him? Then, even worse, You don’t know he’s straight.
“Here I am,” Lane said stupidly, sipping his tequila so he wouldn’t say anything else even stupider.
“Having fun?” Trevor asked.
“Yeah, uh, it’s a great party. Wouldn’t expect anything less from Ramsey, though.”
“Are you still bummed he was into Nate and not you?” Trevor asked, that same crease forming between his brows, the one that kept Lane in a chokehold every single fucking time Trevor bent over one of his puzzles.
“Ah. Um. No.” Lane couldn’t confess he’d never really been into Ramsey; that he’d only hit on him because that had seemed like the right thing to do.
The safe thing to do, because it had been obvious to anyone with eyes that the only person Ramsey had been interested in from minute one had been Nate Bishop.
The crease faded, wiped away by Lane’s words. He wasn’t going to look into that either. Trevor was just happy that he wasn’t pathetically panting after his best friend’s guy. That was all.
“Good,” Trevor said.
A call went up around the bar. Two minutes to midnight.
“Guess um, you didn’t find anyone to kiss either,” Trevor said. He was still gazing up at Lane.
Lane realized then that he’d made a massive tactical error. He should have been finding someone to kiss—anyone else, really, even if it wasn’t someone he actually wanted to kiss—instead of ending up here, standing in front of Trevor while the countdown started and they just stared at each other.
He should have convinced Trevor, even, that he actually did like Victoria, even though it had been obvious he’d been searching for a way to gently dissuade her.
“No,” Lane said. His mouth wasn’t working right. He really shouldn’t have had this last glass of tequila. Something was lighting up his veins, a drug that he’d never tasted before, but already could tell he couldn’t get enough of.
It was the way Trevor was looking at him, like he hadn’t ever seen him before.
“Me either,” Trevor said. He licked his lips. “I—”
But Lane never got to find out what Trevor was going to say, because the countdown started.
The whole bar shouted along with the TV, counting down from ten.
With each number echoing through his ears, Lane felt something in his chest tremble and unwind just a little bit more.
Was Trevor swaying towards him? He couldn’t be.
He couldn’t be. But Lane swore he was an inch closer, maybe two, than he’d been before.
Maybe that was the tequila providing conveniently wishful thinking.
“Um,” Trevor said.
One, the bar as a collective screamed and there were the sounds of bottles popping and people yelling and confetti flew through the air. Classy confetti, because this was Ramsey’s bar. Gold and dark blue and purple, sifting onto the shoulders of Trevor’s suit jacket.
“Happy New Year,” Lane said, and because he couldn’t do what he wanted, what his whole body was yelling at him to do, he reached out and tugged Trevor into a hug instead.
It was still ruinous, their bodies pressed together for one beat, then two. Trevor didn’t pull away as fast as Lane thought he would, and he was having trouble getting his fingers to unclench from Trevor’s shoulders. But finally he let go.
It was less ruinous, though, than it could have been.
Still, Lane was left feeling, as they both turned to the bar and picked up their flutes of champagne, Lane’s fingers trembling, that he’d dodged a bullet only to get knifed in the side.