Chapter 12
Kit
I’d just like to know how every other person my age manages to have multiple different crushes every week, and then there’s me. Over a year strong, pining for the impossible. Like, the worst possible option. I could say it gets easier, but I’d be lying.
I’ve just gotten better at hiding it.
Better at sneakily avoiding. Putting inches of distance between us.
I may be getting better at it, but Bowen doesn’t make it easy.
Sometimes, when he looks at me, I feel like I’m going to burst right open at the seams.
Like right now.
Today is the first day at the cabin for the summer.
My parents and their mom headed to the grocery store to stock up, and it looked like Brett and Bowen were going.
I used the excuse of wanting to rest. That trying to read on the drive here gave me a headache, and that's not even a lie. I had been trying to read in the car.
The headache came from trying to ignore how my body went full force into a rushing, sizzling sort of panic when Bowen rested his head against my shoulder in the backseat. I couldn't read anything after that.
And now he's here. Crawled onto the bottom bunk with me after making me sit up to take a pain pill and drink water. We're sharing the same pillow, and he's running his fingers through the hair on the side of my head, giving my temple a gentle rub with every few passes.
I can hardly breathe.
"Bowen, I'm fine," I mumble, trying to wiggle my head back. I know my face is reddening by the second, especially when he drops his hand to rub over my burning cheek.
"Boe," he says back, clearing his throat before taking his hand away completely. He tucks it under his cheek, leaving my skin to tingle where he touched me.
"What?"
"You don't call me Boe anymore. Haven't in a while."
"That's not…"
"And you're…I don't know, kitten. You're weird around me now," he continues, talking over me.
"Am not," I scoff. This isn't the first time he's accused me of being weird. Far from it, and it makes my chest tighten with dread just like every other time.
"You are."
"Maybe I just want some…some space. Sometimes."
He doesn't respond right away. Just gazes at me with the inches between us, trying to understand all the things I won't tell him.
I hope he never figures it out.
"You don't need space from Brett," he says, then carefully, "but you do from me?"
I flinch. God. It's so obvious.
You're making it so obvious!
"You're my person, too, kitten."
I try to ignore the hurt in his voice. Pretend like it doesn't crack something vital inside me, knowing I'm the cause of it. But I'm not his the way my heart wants to be. That's why I don't stop him when he rolls out of bed and leaves. It's better this way.
It doesn’t happen the way I thought it would.
Believe me, I’ve had plenty of time to consider all the different ways I could come out to my best friend.
Many, many nights of debating the best way.
From just blurting it out to writing it in icing on a chocolate cake.
I know Brett won’t give a crap that I’m gay.
It’s silly that I’ve taken so long to tell him honestly. But I’ve been stalling.
Because while I may be ready to tell him I’m gay, I don’t think I will ever be ready to admit to him how I figured it out.
“It’s Theo James, isn’t it?” Brett asks quietly, not taking his eyes off the screen. He reaches over and takes M&M’s out of my candy bag, even though he has five different open bags of his own candy in his lap.
My heart skips a beat, knowing where this is going before my brain can catch up.
“What do you mean?” I whisper back. He finally glances over at me, and my breath hitches at how similar he looks to Bowen when he smirks.
“I think Shailene Woodley is a babe, and you’re drooling over Theo James. Right?”
Insurgent continues playing in the background like I’m not having a full-on gay panic right now.
“Brett…”
“Thought so.” His smirk blooms into a smile, and he grabs the whole bag of M&M's from me. “Theo James is pretty hot, though. Even I can agree to that.”
A breathless, relieved laugh shoots out of me.
That’s it.