Chapter 24 #2
“Because! You were so proud the first time you made it. And you said you were a terrible cook and that your ex was so picky you were convinced it was about your cooking specifically… When you served it that night in your old apartment, your face was just pure hope. How could I say anything to hurt you?”
“Oh my God, Ryan! This is humiliating.” He collapsed in his chair and put his face in his hands.
“It’s really not.”
“It really is. I thought I’d done something awesome in that little apartment, and now I look like an idiot.”
Jasper remembered that night clearly, even though it was years ago.
He was surprised to learn Ryan did, too, since it had just been dinner at home before going out dancing.
Just like now, Ryan did most of the cooking back then, but Jasper had offered to throw something together that night for mysterious reasons he still didn’t understand.
He’d put all his hope in that meal, and despite the strong funk of under seasoned hamburger coming through more strongly than Jasper had hoped, Ryan ate two bowls.
“You aren’t an idiot. And you did do something special in that apartment.
If you hadn’t made a nearly inedible goulash, I never would have experienced the displeasure of eating it.
The second I took my first bite, I knew I had to lie, because the thought of your sweet, hopeful face crumpling into disappointment made me sick to my stomach.
” Ryan reached up to stroke Jasper’s jawline.
Jasper pulled away. “That was probably just my disgusting goulash!”
“No,” Ryan said. He laughed. “Okay, maybe a little. But more than that, it was because I’d realized I was in love with you.
And I was desperate for you to be in love with me, too.
It became this fragile thing I carried with me through the rest of the meal.
When I went home that night—because you had to get up early for a class, remember? ”
“I remember.”
“Well, that night, I was brushing my teeth, and I stared at myself in the mirror and said, oh my God. I have to eat overcooked ground beef and mushy elbow macaroni the rest of my fucking life.”
Jasper blinked at him. He should have been offended by the idea that a lifetime together was borne of overcooked beef, but the idea of Ryan spending the night panicking about how to handle decades of disgusting meals was somehow the most Ryan thing he’d ever heard.
And unnecessary, because he’d realized he loved Ryan around then, too, and it had nothing to do with how good his acting was.
He couldn’t help but laugh. “An existential crisis as you flossed bits of parsley out of your teeth?”
“Yes.”
Jasper hummed. “That’s about when I knew I was in love with you, too.”
“Because you found someone to eat your goulash?”
His smile grew. “Exactly. I can’t believe we’ve never talked about this before. But we were out dancing at Sassy’s, and that big beefcake rubbed up on my ass. Remember?”
Ryan grumbled. “He’s lucky he didn’t swallow his teeth that night.”
Jasper let out a soft sigh. “Late-twenties testosterone Ryan. I liked him.”
“So, what, you realized you were in love with me because some loser rubbed his dick on your ass?”
“No. But I’d never seen you jealous before, and I really liked it,” Jasper said, rubbing his hand along Ryan’s thigh, slipping it under the hem of his shorts.
“I can rough up other people for you, possum. Any time,” Ryan said. “It’s been a while. I’m itching for a fight.” He leaned forward in his chair so his lips were a whisper away from Jasper’s.
“Okay,” Jasper said. He placed the hand not busy feeling up Ryan’s leg against his chest and brushed his thumb back and forth.
“You loved me then. Do you love me now?” Ryan asked.
Jasper hesitated, then nodded. Just slightly. His voice was quiet when he said, “Yeah. Of course. I never stopped loving you. When I said I wasn’t in love with you anymore, it wasn’t—”
Ryan cut him off with a firm kiss. Jasper smiled against Ryan’s lips, all the anxiety he’d felt earlier evaporating into the room.
Ryan pressed further, his desperate, heavy breaths brushing against Jasper’s chin and cheek, and his hand found its way to the back of Jasper’s neck to drag him onto his lap.
Jasper straddled him, but he was so nervous to touch Ryan’s bad arm, he pulled back and put a stop to their kissing.
Ryan looked panicked.
“I just can’t…” Jasper wiggled on his lap. “I’m afraid to touch your arm, and I’m worried I’m going to fall off.”
“I won’t let you fall,” Ryan said, wrapping his good arm around Jasper’s back, pulling him close.
“Why don’t we go to the bedroom?”
“That’s better. Yes, please.”
Jasper guided Ryan down the hallway, neither of them able to stop kissing, undressing, and touching each other.
Ryan kept catching Jasper every time he tried to pull back, attempts to walk more directly to the room derailed by Ryan’s hand sliding around his waist, neck, even his face, kissing him harder each time they stopped for even a second.
They crashed into the bedroom, rattling a framed poster of the Blue Ridge Mountains that Ryan loved, and things shifted from individual touches and moments to something desperate and continuous, with only one direction left to go.
Jasper pressed his eyes shut with the hope that the house would stay empty for just a little while longer.