Chapter 12
TIAGO
Standing in the hallway, I could hear voices. My brother, one of my sisters-in-law, and my mom. They were near the back door, and I could smell smoke from what I assumed was a bonfire.
And they were talking about me.
“…never going to get married. I never worried too much about grandkids when it came to Tiago anyway.”
“Imagine if they inherited that shit,” Sarah said.
Peter laughed. “That’s all we need. A bunch of blind kids stumbling around the house. Everything would be covered in braille.”
I wanted to jump out like, Aha, you ableist fucks! But my feet were stuck. I was still slightly damp from my shower and just looking for a fucking cup of tea. I knew my family talked shit about me, but it always sucked to hear it.
“Has he ever brought someone home?” Peter asked.
“No,” my mom said. “He was dating a very nice-looking girl. I saw her on Facebook, but the last time I checked, they’d broken up.”
“At least it’s not a guy,” Peter said.
“I thought he liked both—” Sarah started.
“Oh, let’s not worry about that,” my mom said in her most simpering voice. “But I doubt anyone’s going to want to take on that kind of burden, you know? You can’t be a full wife if you’re also a caregiver. No one wants that life.”
My stomach twisted into knots, and I took several breaths as their voices began to fade. This wasn’t the first time I’d overheard my mom lamenting about how unmarriable I was. Like I was some sort of fucking Victorian leper with bones showing through my skin.
Crisse, I needed out of there. I needed to nut up and call the rental agency that always hooked me up in the offseason and make them find me a place where I didn’t need to listen to this every time I walked into a room.
But for now, tea. I moved into the kitchen when I was sure I was alone, and my hand skimmed the wall until it found the switch. Light flooded the room, and while it didn’t do much for me, it did something.
I turned my head from left to right, regretting that I didn’t have my phone with me. The counter was covered in random items, and most of them blended into the black marble.
This was hell on Earth. Literally. I made a mental note to tell the rental agent to make sure the place they found for me was bright with high-contrast counters. Anne wasn’t wrong about it being difficult to find a place, but she also didn’t understand what money could buy.
And that at least gave me power in this place that wanted to make me feel like I had none. My fingers itched to go find my phone and make the call now. They’d forgive me for the late-night demands if I paid them enough.
“Why the hell is it so bright in here?” Ah, the gruff voice of my dad. I’d been hoping to avoid him until I had another place to go.
His heavy footsteps shuffled into the room, and then he stopped moving. Turning my head, I caught a glimpse of him—his brown cardigan and his house pants and slippers. From what I could see, he was a lot greyer than the last time we’d gotten together, and his profile seemed thinner.
Maybe he was sick.
“Am I talking to myself?” he demanded.
I rolled my eyes. Usually, he got pissed at me for addressing him at all. “I need it to see what I’m doing. I came in for tea.”
“Tea’s on the counter, and I’m sure you can cope in the dark. We’re not wasting electricity on you.”
I blinked rapidly. “Are you serious?”
“Do I sound serious?”
I said nothing. It wasn’t going to make a difference, and I did my best not to groan when he flicked the light switch and the entire kitchen plunged into darkness just before his shuffling steps headed for the back door.
Turning away, I spread my hands on the counter and tried not to bash my head against it. It was cool marble, a little dirty under my wandering fingers. As my sight gradually disappeared, I started to notice that people who cleaned with their eyes never did the best job.
My mother would be horrified to hear it.
After taking several deep breaths, my heart started to calm down. “This is what you expected,” I reminded myself aloud. “He hates your guts, your mom will never stand up to him, and your brothers are jackasses. And this is your own fault for being foolish enough to fall for Thierry’s bullshit.”
In all honesty, I deserved whatever they threw at me for thinking that, even for a second, they had changed. I knew better. I hated that I wanted to believe things would ever be different.
I hated that, even after all this, I still wanted to be fucking accepted.
“Who the hell is pulling up to our house at this hour?” someone shouted, drawing me out of my thought spiral. I could hear the voice clearly from the back door that was cracked open. It sounded a bit like Peter. “Did someone order DoorDash?”
“They don’t do DoorDash out here,” my mother said.
It really was late—past nine now, so who was coming up to our house? As much as I’d wanted to flee, I hadn’t ordered an Uber, and it wasn’t like my family made friends everywhere they went, so…
“Aravind,” I whispered aloud. Oh god, it had to be Aravind. He was bold enough to do it and reckless enough not to care what a stir it would cause.
And fuck me, but I wanted it to be him so badly I nearly cried. I could still taste him on my tongue, and while I should keep hating him for being an ass, he’d been the only person who treated me kindly in the last twenty-four hours.
But I was also too afraid to get my hopes up. It could be delivery. It could be some late-night order. It could be—
The doorbell rang, startling me out of my thoughts, and I heard footsteps on the floor. “I’ll get it!” Sarah called out. “If this asshole wakes up the twins, I’m going to kill them!”
There was a loud creak of the front door swinging open, and then…silence.
I took a breath, then strained my ears to try and hear what was being said, but whoever it was spoke too quietly. Was that a low, rumbling voice? Was it an awkward laugh?
“Tiago! Someone is here for you!”
I jolted at the sound of Sarah screaming my name, and it took me a second to remember which way I was facing and which way the front door was.
I could barely think as my fingers touched the wall and I guided myself toward the sound of the people at the front door. The light grew brighter as I turned the corner, and while I still couldn’t see for shit in the dim house, I knew it was him.
Aravind.
It was like I could sense him.
“Tiago,” he breathed when I was almost at the door.
Sarah was in my way, and I cleared my throat. “Do you mind?”
“Who even is this?” she demanded.
I sure as shit wasn’t going to answer that question. “Can we talk outside?”
“Yeah,” Aravind said. “I…can I help?”
I couldn’t see him at all, but I knew his hand was out, so I reached mine toward his and let out a sharp breath when our fingers collided. Touching him should not have felt that good, but god, all I wanted was to sit here and bask in the sensation.
Following him past the small lip in the floor, I closed the door behind me with a loud click, then froze on the porch. “How many people are watching from the window?”
He burst into a peal of laughter. “Just that woman.” He went dead silent, then said, “Not your girlfriend, right? Or your wife or…whatever?”
“Oh my god, I’m not a monster.”
“I don’t know your life,” he said, then stopped and cleared his throat. “Nope. No. I did not come here to be a dick. Again.”
I lifted a single eyebrow. “Why are you here? It’s late.”
“It’s nine o’clock. God, you are such an old man,” he groaned. I felt his warmth as he swayed closer to me, and I had never hated nighttime more because I wanted to see him. Even if it was just a shadow or a messy blob of whatever bright colors he was wearing.
I could have touched him, and that would have felt close to the same—hell, maybe even better—but I didn’t think I had permission for that.
I swallowed heavily. “I’m not even thirty-five yet. And this place shuts down at sunset.”
He snorted. “Fair. But you still act like an old man.”
Aravind said that with so much affection in his tone it made me weak in the knees. It took a second for me to regain my composure, and I squeezed my hands into fists to keep from reaching for him.
“So, I—” I started.
“You showered,” he said, speaking at the same time as me.
“Um. I was on a ferry all day.”
Aravind let out a heavy breath, then said, “Yeah. And I kind of made a mess out of you.”
Fuuuuuck me. I had no idea what to say to that. “So why are you here?” I asked for a second time. “Looking for a round two?”
He choked a little. “Uh… I mean. I wouldn’t say no, but you probably should.”
My heart gave a heavy thud in my chest. “What do you mean by that?”
“Only that I was a giant fucking asshole and didn’t bother to read what went to print. I trusted that Daryl wasn’t going to be a complete fucking jackass about me quitting and—”
“Aravind.”
His jaw snapped shut with an audible click. Then he shuffled even closer, and I could smell soap on him. Had he showered? Was he all damp like me? God, his skin would be all warm and soft, and—
“Tiago?” The sound of his voice stopped the fantasy.
Right. We were having a conversation. I cleared my throat as I attempted to process what he’d just babbled at me. “What are you trying to say?”
He huffed a heavy sigh. “I read the article. My article. I didn’t write half that shit, but I was so eager to be out of that job I didn’t bother to check what Daryl had added to it before it went to print.
And it sounded terrible, and I am so sorry.
I mean, I didn’t write it, but it’s my fault because I should have done my due diligence to make sure it was my words—”
Fuck it. I reached out, and it took two tries, but I managed to palm his cheek and pull him closer. His words died between us, and I leaned forward to take in a deep breath of his soft, floral scent.
“It’s okay.”
He laughed, and the sound was bitter. “It was not okay. Jesus, please don’t tell me that.”