Chapter Nineteen
Milo
“Hey, sweetheart, ready to go?” I asked, sliding through the back door of the sweet shop, my heart warming as I saw Rupert standing at the counter.
He had his back to me and was carefully packing things into a gift hamper, nestling the items in amongst shredded paper.
There were several finished boxes next to him, and a few more stacked at the far end, ready to be labelled and posted.
I knew they’d had a lot of orders for hampers for Christmas, most being sent by locals to various relatives across the country throughout the whole of December. And while Rupert was pleased at how many there were, I also knew it was starting to stress him out.
He’d spent half an hour last night muttering about curling ribbon while we were making dinner, and maybe I was naive, but I didn’t think there were that many ways to do it. Or that it was that difficult.
But I didn’t have a death wish, so I’d kept my thoughts to myself and helped him relax with a blowjob instead.
As I’d reminded Darcy over the summer, orgasms were very good for stress relief.
“Nearly,” Rupert said as he turned his head, looking at me over his shoulder with a tired smile, adjusting his glasses with his free hand. “I just need to finish this one.”
“Need a hand with anything?” I asked, shutting the door behind me to keep out the evening chill.
The shop was quiet, the blinds drawn on the windows and the door bolted and locked.
Norman had already gone, and I remembered Rupert saying something about his husband being a tour guide up at the castle, so I assumed he’d already headed up there to see him.
I was kinda hoping we’d bump into them, just because I was desperately curious about Sidney.
We still hadn’t gotten around to having dinner with them, despite the longstanding invitation.
“No, thank you. I won’t be long.”
“Sure?”
“Just your company is enough,” he said softly. I smiled to myself as he returned to the hamper, pushing away the urge to walk up behind him, put my arms around his waist, and press kisses up the side of his neck. “What did you get up to today?”
“Not much. Did an exercise video, lay on the floor and contemplated my existence, did some doodling. Found a couple of freelance websites to sign up to for design work—not sure I’ll get anything, but if not, I’ll make a few digital designs and templates and sell them on somewhere like Etsy.
Although, if I do that, they’ll probably get nicked and used by other people, which is shitty as fuck. ”
I knew so many designers and artists who’d had their work stolen and used by dropshippers and cheap clothing companies, and they’d never get credit or payment for it either.
It was fucked up, and I hated the idea that one day I’d randomly see something I’d made popping up for sale on Shein or Temu without any say.
“That’s awful,” Rupert said. “The art theft, I mean. Not the rest of the stuff. Although, your exercise videos do sound a little like torture.”
“My offer still stands if you want to try one with me.”
“And my reply is still, thank you but absolutely not.”
I chuckled, leaning against the counter near him.
Not quite touching but close enough to see all the details of his face.
It was easy to lose myself in all the tiny things—the curl of his eyelashes, the little scattering of freckles across his nose, the curve of his lips, the little mole in one corner beneath it, the stubble starting to come through along his jaw, the couple of scars and dips in his skin leftover from spots he’d picked.
He was so beautiful and I wondered if he knew that.
Did he believe me when I told him or did he just think I was flattering him?
Sometimes, it was hard to know if Rupert was being honest with me.
Or at least being open. I was never sure if he was telling me the whole truth or if he was holding something back, hiding his true feelings and opinions.
It wasn’t exactly dishonesty, because I didn’t believe he had bad intentions, but I couldn’t think how else to describe it. The words were evading me.
I didn’t know if it was because he didn’t trust me, or if he thought I wouldn’t like what I saw if he allowed himself to be truly open with me, but I suspected it was a bit of both.
That didn’t mean I knew what to do about it, though. I couldn’t force him. Rupert wasn’t a clam I could tap with a stone like an otter until he cracked and opened.
“Okay, I think I’m done,” Rupert said, and I realised I’d basically been staring at him for ten minutes.
“Awesome!” I grinned and leant in to kiss his cheek. “It looks amazing.”
“Thank you. I’ll get my coat and we can go. How did you want to get up there? We can always take my car if that helps? We’d just need to walk back to mine to get it.”
“Sounds good,” I said. The centre of Heather Bay wasn’t the best for parking, but the town was so isolated you pretty much needed a car to get anywhere, including up to the big Tesco on the outskirts. There were buses, but they weren’t exactly frequent, especially in the evening.
I waited for Rupert to grab his coat, then followed him out of the shop and watched as he locked up. “Are you excited?” I asked, sliding my hand into his as we began to walk briskly back towards his flat.
“Yes, it should be fun,” he said, his eyes darting up to the castle, where it sat on the cliffs above the town. Technically, it wasn’t a castle but a fancy old house designed to look like one. But everyone called it the castle, so the castle it was.
“You don’t sound sure,” I said gently, squeezing his hand. “We don’t have to go if you don’t want.”
“But you want to go.”
“So?”
“That means we have to go,” Rupert said, like it was obvious. I frowned.
“Yeah, but if you don’t want to go, we don’t have to. It’s only a Christmas lights switch on, it’s not the end of the world if we stay in.”
“But… you… I don’t want…” He sighed and plastered a smile on. It was so obviously fake that it startled me. “It’s fine. I want to go.”
“Rupert, please, don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Lie to me.”
He stopped and looked at me, the forced smile cracking, falling away from his face like a broken mask, leaving uncertainty behind. “I’m not.”
“Really? Because it feels like you are,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound like I was accusing him of something. Because if he thought that, he’d only get defensive and it’d all go downhill from there.
Quickly.
“Look,” I continued, keeping a firm grip on his hands so he couldn’t run away. “I know it’s hard to be open with people sometimes, or to ask for things for yourself, but I’m not going to judge you. I promise. You don’t have to hide things from me.”
A hollow, broken chuckle slipped from Rupert’s lips before he could stop it, his gaze falling onto the pavement somewhere over my shoulder. He tried to pull away but my grasp was too tight. “Of course I do. Everyone hides things.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. It depends on the person, I think, and who they’re around.”
He shook his head. “No, Milo. You know that’s not true. Everyone hides pieces of themselves, especially from people they like. Some people are just better at it than others.”
“Sounds fucking exhausting to me,” I said softly.
“It is. But it’s the only way.”
“To do what?”
He paused, chewing his lip. Then he shook his head again. “Can we please just go? I don’t want to be late.”
“We don’t have to be there by a set time,” I said. “Doesn’t matter if we miss them hitting the button.”
“Of course it does,” Rupert said, his words sharp and biting, cutting deep into my skin. “I told Norman we’d be there for the switch on and he’ll look for us. We’re already late.”
“Hey, hey, woah.” I let go of his hands and held mine up defensively. “It’s okay. We can go, but I thought this was for us? Why does it matter if Norman sees us there or not?”
“Because it’s polite.”
“So? Fuck polite. Who gives a shit what anyone else thinks?”
Rupert stared at me like I’d suddenly grown three heads. “You don’t? No, wait, don’t answer that. Of course you do. You run a business, you have to care what people think.”
“No, I don’t,” I said, trying to keep my voice level.
Once again, the situation was unravelling and I had no idea what the fuck was happening.
It felt like I was standing on a wobbling platform that kept tilting precariously.
And my balance had always been shit. “Look, sweetheart, I have no idea what’s going on or why you’re having a go at me, but if you’re trying to push me away, I’m telling you now, it’s not going to work. ”
I folded my arms and levelled the sternest gaze I could muster at him. “You may think you’re stubborn, but I’ve never done a damn thing I’ve been told in my life. I once spent two hours outside, in the rain, in February, in nothing but my pants just to prove I could.”
“That’s not stubborn, that’s ridiculous!”
“Probably. But either way, you cannot out-stubborn me, Rupert. I am the king of stubbornness.”
“You’re the king of being dramatic,” Rupert said, but despite his glare there was a tiny flicker of something in his eyes. Something I instantly recognised because I’d felt it too.
Choose me, it said. Pick me, please. Notice me. Don’t give up on me, even though I’m hurt and I’m scared and I cannot ask for what I need.
Please, it begged. See me.
“Maybe I’m that too,” I said, unfolding my arms and taking a tiny step towards him, crowding his personal space until there was nothing left between us but atoms. “Either way, you won’t be able to get rid of me.
Because we both know you don’t want that.
” My fingers lightly caressed the side of his jaw, stubble prickling my skin.
“I like you, Rupert, I promise. If you ever really, truly want us to break up, then that’s fine.
But right now, I think you’re just lashing out at me because you’re tired and you’re scared and everything feels like too much all at once.
You’re worried about everything—me, us, getting orders out, Christmas, Norman, that you won’t like the food on offer at the market but you think I want it so you’ll force yourself to eat it anyway to make me happy. And I get it, really I do.”
“Do you?” Rupert asked, a tiny note of pleading in his voice as he tentatively wrapped his arms around me.
“Yeah, I do. Look, I don’t have a diagnosis, but I’ve always been labelled the weird one, the difficult one, the one who’s too loud, too much, too everything.
I forget shit all the time, I fidget, I change topic three times in a two-minute conversation, I get weirdly fixated on things, then drop them in a month.
And I figured, I don’t know, maybe my brain and yours aren’t that dissimilar?
Two sides of some neurodivergent dodecahedron.
That doesn’t mean I’m calling you weird or difficult, by the way, but I’m just saying I get it, because when I’m around you, it makes me feel like I’m not the only person who’s like this.
We’re different, obviously, but it’s not a bad thing.
But you can’t be too much for me, okay? Because if you’re too much, then I definitely am.
And I can’t allow you to be more trouble than me. I have a reputation to uphold.”
“But what if…?” His bottom lip wobbled slightly, and I felt him trying to clench his jaw under my palm. He was trying to be so strong, but he didn’t have to be.
If only he’d let me in.
He swallowed, visibly straining to straighten his face, to pretend everything was fine.
And then he burst into tears.