Chapter 47
47
SHILOH
I know it’s here somewhere. I haven’t let him throw out any boxes. It has to be here…
There it is!
I dig out the box of hockey stuff that is mostly just workout clothes and pull out the TU shirt. I know the history of the hockey team at Tibalt University. I mean, I lived in the same house with Eric for the last three years. I’ve witnessed the meltdowns, the self-hatred, the nightmares – all of it.
I figured it out the first time Eric went off his meds after I moved in. In my experience, people who were too friendly, too sweet, or too polite were the ones who would hurt me the most. People only showed their true colors when they knew you weren’t going to squeal, when they had you trapped. I was hiding in the basement to get away from everyone when I heard Eli and Spencer fighting about it in the kitchen.
Everyone was talking about that night back when it happened. A couple of the guys from my school were set to go to TU for sports scholarships, but had to scramble to find other schools who would take them and offer similar deals at the last minute. A lot of people were pissed off about the hockey program getting shut down. Most of those people blamed the wrong side for it, but you can’t argue with stupid, not if you want to keep all the blood inside of your body in my experience.
When I put it together that the victim was one of my new roommates, that was when I started to trust the guys at Kink Manor. Then, when Toby showed up about a month later, I realized that some people are just genuinely good and nice and kind. He changed my view of the world so much without even knowing it.
But I never put it together about Donnie being a part of Eric’s past until tonight. I knew they were friends through Matt, what with him being a professor with a caffeine addiction and all, but I never realized the connection with my favorite drag queen.
On the ride home, I was furious. After Mama… The only way I want to find out about anyone I know dying is from old age at this point. When I heard those words from Donnie, I wanted to lock him in a room where he couldn’t follow through with it. I wanted to go back in time to destroy whoever put that in his head.
I can admit. I flew off the handle. I don’t do it often. Mama always reminded me that I can’t show my temper, not like the other kids. As I got older, I realized why. When confronted by anyone in authority, my skin color will never work in my favor... at least not in most situations. When I got hit, kicked, cut, and literally thrown down a flight of stairs in school, I got in trouble for saying a cuss word in the nurse’s office.
Shaking my head to clear the unwelcome thoughts, I pull on the TU shirt, knowing it’s time to push Donnie to open up to us. I’m not ready to lose either one of them, and it’s about damn time the world gives me something good.
Coming out of my room, I barely make it two steps before my arms are filled with Toby. It’s been a while since he’s hugged me so tight, pressing his ear against my chest to listen to my heartbeat. I smile down at him, but he’s not paying any attention.
Well in that case.
I look across the room to see my roommate, looking like he’s going to be sick. I feel the smile fall off my face as he meets my eyes.
He’s afraid.
“Let’s grab a seat in the living room, pup,” I say as I nudge Toby toward the couch. “We all need to have a nice little chat. It’s time we put all of our pasts on the table so we can move into the future together.”
Toby trips over his own feet and I have the option to let him fall on the couch by himself or bring us both down. I hold tight as we crash to the cushions and he lets out a squeak.
“Together? Like all three of us together? That kind of together?”
I push myself upright, leaving the stunned pup half sprawled on the seat next to me .
“If that’s what you want,” Donnie says with a hopeful look in my direction as he comes around the back of the sofa to sit in the recliner we picked up last weekend. I nod at him in response with a small smile.
Toby scrambles to sit up on the couch, almost kneeing himself in the eye in the process. I narrowly avoided a flying elbow myself.
“Oh, I want, Daddy. I want.”