Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Theo
I glanced at Cameron’s text.
I’ll be home soon. Just getting ready for tomorrow night.
I had to smile. I didn’t know which of us was more nervous about the opening of the exhibition. I typed: Don’t worry. Pizza for dinner. Can you pick it up on the way home?
No problem. Meat Feast gets my vote.
I chuckled. Yeah, I noticed you like your meat.
I prefer yours.
That had me smiling like a lunatic.
I put the kettle on, and the doorbell downstairs rang. I went to the door and pressed the intercom button. “Hello?”
“It’s Gary.”
I froze.
“Theo, let me in.” His voice was like steel.
Fuck.
I pressed the entry button, then opened the door.
Gary didn’t so much stomp up the stairs as charge up them, his boots heavy, his breathing harsh, his face already twisted with fury, his eyes blazing.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
My stomach dropped through the floor. “Gary—what—”
He shoved past me like I wasn’t there. “I want an explanation.” The words came out as a snarl. He turned, his phone already in his hand, holding it up between us.
The portrait.
The room went cold, and it felt as though someone had sucked all the oxygen out of the flat.
“Gary—listen—”
“Don’t fucking Gary me.” His voice cracked, raw and furious. “I trusted you. I asked you to look out for him. And you—” He shook the phone, his hand trembling. “Tell me this isn’t what it looks like. Go on. Lie to my face.” He wasn’t shouting.
That was worse.
“Tell me you’re not fucking my baby brother.”
The word baby was like a punch.
“First of all,” I said, too fast, too defensive, “he’s not a baby. He’s twenty-two, and—”
“How long?” Gary snapped.
I froze. “How long what?”
His eyes burned. “Don’t insult me.”
I swallowed. My mouth tasted like metal. “Not… not that long.”
His laugh was sharp and ugly. “And you thought what? That I wouldn’t find out?”
“I wasn’t hiding—”
“You didn’t tell me.” His voice dropped to a lethal level. “And we both know why. Because somewhere in that over-analysing head of yours, you knew it was wrong.”
“I care about him.” The words tore out of me.
Gary’s mouth twisted. “I’m sure you do.” He stepped closer. “And that’s the problem.”
I frowned, my breaths shallow. “What does that mean?”
“You don’t even realise how much power you have over him,” he said, low and furious. “You’re older. He’s living under your roof.”
“I didn’t pressure him,” I shot back. “I never—”
“You didn’t have to.” Gary cut me off, his eyes blazing. “Cameron has been orbiting you since he was a teenager.”
The air left my lungs.
“You’re his safe place,” Gary went on. “His north star. And you think that doesn’t matter?”
My chest tightened until it hurt.
“You’re the experienced one,” he snarled again. “You’re his hero.” His voice rose, breaking. “And you let him fall for you?” Disgust flickered across his face. “I expected this shit from Luka. Not from you.”
That name.
That name.
I flinched. Gary saw it and pressed harder.
“What happens when you get scared?” he demanded. “When you shut down like you always do?”
I opened my mouth.
Nothing came out.
“What do you think that will do to him?” Gary’s voice cracked. “You break people when you pull away. You always have.”
The silence after that was unbearable.
“I trusted you,” he said quietly.
That hurt more than anything else he’d said.
He straightened, his jaw locked, eyes cold and resolved. “I came here to protect my brother.” He stabbed a finger at my chest. “Stay away from him. If you care about him at all.”
Then he was gone.
The door slammed. His footsteps thundered down the stairs.
I stood there, shaking.
The door closed behind him. I couldn’t move. I could still hear him in my head.
You don’t even realise how much power you have over him.
You’re older. You’re his safe place. His north star.
What happens when you get scared? When you shut down like you always do?
What do you think that will do to him?
Gary hadn’t said it outright, but the message was clear.
You ruin things just by being you.
He left convinced he’d saved his brother.
I was left convinced I was the danger.
I moved on autopilot.
Bedroom. Bag. Shirt. Socks. Underwear. Toothbrush.
Fold. Stack. Zip.
Living room. Laptop. Charger.
Don’t think. Don’t feel.
Cameron’s sketchbook lay on the coffee table. I couldn’t touch it. I grabbed my notebook instead, tore a page from the back, and wrote three lines.
Each one was a lie.
I didn’t look at them again.
I put on my coat and walked out.
I didn’t look back, because if I did, I wouldn’t have had the strength to leave.
Max opened the door in socks and a T-shirt, took one look at me, and stepped aside without a word.
That alone nearly broke me.
I walked in, dropped my bag by the wall as if it weighed a hundred kilos, and stared at the floor.
When the door closed behind me, Max didn’t rush to fill the silence. He just leaned against it, arms crossed, watching.
“When you asked if you could come over,” he said eventually, “you didn’t mention the fact you’d be staying.” His eyes flicked to the bag. “That’s… not great.”
“Just a night or two,” I said quickly. “I need some breathing space.”
Max exhaled through his nose and headed for the kitchen. “Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m having a drink.” He opened the fridge, grabbed two beers, and held one out without asking. “I think you need this.”
I huffed a laugh that sounded wrong even to my own ears. “Is it that obvious?”
“You look like you’ve been hit by a truck,” Max said flatly. “What happened?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
He popped the tab on his can and leaned against the counter. “Try me.”
I dragged a hand down my face. My skin felt too tight. “Gary came to the flat.”
Max went very still.
“Ah. Let me guess. Nude portrait. Internet. Protective big brother with a martyr complex.”
I nodded. My throat burned. “He thinks I’m hurting Cameron.”
“And?”
My voice cracked. “What if he’s right?”
That did it.
Max straightened, eyes sharp, every trace of humour gone. “No. Stop. Right there.”
I looked up, startled.
“You do not get to decide you’re poison and call that noble,” Max snapped. “You don’t get to frame self-loathing as sacrifice.”
I flinched.
“And you don’t get to walk away and pretend that’s care,” he continued. “That’s fear wearing a halo.”
“I’m older than him,” I said weakly. “I have more power.”
“And Cameron is twenty-two, for fuck’s sake. He isn’t a child,” Max shot back. “He’s not fragile like glass. He’s choosing you.”
I shook my head. “He deserves better.”
Max laughed, and the sound was short, sharp, and joyless. “No. He deserves honesty. Not martyrdom. Not silence. And certainly not you disappearing because you’re scared.”
My chest tightened until it hurt to breathe.
“I don’t know how to stay,” I whispered. “I don’t know how to love without hurting someone.”
For a moment, Max’s expression softened a fraction.
“Then learn. Because Cameron already has.”
The words hit like a blow to the ribs.
I took the beer, walked into the living room, and collapsed onto the sofa, suddenly exhausted, hollowed out, as if someone had scooped me clean.
Max followed and sat across from me, elbows on his knees. “You think leaving fixes anything? All it does is confirm his worst fear.”
I closed my eyes.
That when things get hard, I disappear.
God.
“What you did tonight,” Max went on, relentless, “was choose your fear over his trust.”
Silence stretched between us.
Finally, I said, barely audible, “Can I stay?”
Max let out a long, heavy sigh.
“Fine, you can stay. Tonight.” He pointed a finger at me. “But tomorrow, you stop hiding and you fix this.” Another sigh. “I’ll get you some sheets.”
He disappeared down the hall.
I leaned back and stared at the ceiling, the beer untouched in my hand.
I wanted to shut my brain off. Drown it. Anything not to picture Cameron coming home to an empty flat and those three neat lines of lies.
Because for all my rules, all my control, I knew exactly who I was hurting.
And I wasn’t sure I could justify it to myself.
Cameron
“I hope you’re hungry,” I called as I pushed the door open, pizza boxes balanced precariously in my arms.
The words echoed.
That was my first warning.
The flat wasn’t just dark, it was hollow and quiet, not the calm, lived-in quiet we’d been building together.
This was absence, and it felt wrong.
Theo’s shoes weren’t by the door. My stomach dipped.
“Theo?” I called, already knowing.
Nothing.
I flicked on the light, my pulse picking up as I scanned the space. Bedroom door open. Bathroom dark. His coat missing from its hook.
And then I saw it. A folded piece of paper on the coffee table.
I set the pizza down with shaking hands and crossed the room. My fingers felt clumsy as I opened it. Three lines in Theo’s careful handwriting, so familiar it hurt.
I need space.
This isn’t about you.
I’m sorry.
I stared.
Read it again.
What the hell?
I sank onto the sofa, the note still clenched in my hand, my brain scrambling to catch up with my heart.
Okay. Okay. Don’t lose it. Theo needs space. Theo always needs space. This is just Theo doing what Theo does when things get overwhelming.
Except he promised.
He’d promised he wouldn’t disappear without talking to me.
My gaze slid to his desk. It was empty. No laptop. No bag.
Cold threaded its way down my spine.
This wasn’t a pause. This was a withdrawal. And suddenly the truth was right there, heavy and brutal.
Theo didn’t trust me enough to stay when it got hard.
My throat burned. I dragged my phone out of my pocket, my fingers tight around it.
I need answers.
Then it buzzed.
Hope flared so fast it hurt, until I saw it was Gary. I ignored it.
Then it buzzed again. And again.
With a tired, bitter breath, I unlocked the screen.
Voicemail received.
My chest felt constricted. That crawling sense of wrongness intensified as I hit play and Gary’s voice filled the room, controlled, tense, stripped of warmth.
“Cameron. It’s Gary.”
My shoulders went rigid.
“I’m calling because I need to be clear about something.” A pause. “I spoke to Theo earlier.”
My pulse spiked.
“I told him to stay away from you.”