THIRTY
They eventually climbed out of the truck bed as the sky shifted from gold to deep purple.
Rory rekindled the fire while Kieran, still loose-limbed and satisfied, finally attempted to cook the fish.
It was harder than it looked in the firelight, but they ate anyway, sitting cross-legged by the fire, plates balanced on their knees, neither of them caring much about the result.
Neither had bothered getting fully dressed. Just boxers. There was no one around to care.
The first stars appeared tentatively, then bolder, multiplying until the entire sky was scattered with them.
“Jesus,” Kieran said. He’d never seen so many.
“Wait until later,” Rory said. “When the fire dies down, it’s even better.”
They finished eating. Kieran cleaned up while Rory tended the fire.
“You ever camp out here alone?” Kieran asked.
“A few times,” Rory said. “After Britt died, I came out here a lot. Just me and the quiet.”
Kieran looked over at him. Rory was staring at the fire.
“I’m glad I’m here,” Kieran said.
Rory’s expression softened. “Me too.”
Rory stood, stretching. “Come on. Let’s lie down. You’ll see the stars better.”
He grabbed the sleeping bags and spread them out on the ground near the fire, close enough for warmth, far enough that the light didn’t interfere.
They lay down side by side, shoulders touching, faces turned up to the sky.
The stars were everywhere. Thick and clustered and impossibly bright.
Kieran was small in the best way. His problems were small too.
“This is perfect,” he said.
Rory’s hand found his, fingers threading together.
Then Kieran saw it.
A streak of light, quick and bright, slicing across the sky.
“Oh my god.” Kieran sat up on his elbows. “Did you see that?”
Rory smiled. “Yeah. That’s why we’re here.”
Another one. Brighter this time.
“There!” Kieran grabbed Rory’s arm. “That was incredible.”
Rory turned his head, watching Kieran instead of the sky. A kind of fondness in his expression.
“What?” Kieran asked.
“Nothing. You’re in for a surprise.” Rory shook his head, still smiling. “Keep watching.”
They came in waves after that, sometimes one at a time, sometimes three or four in quick succession. Kieran stopped counting after a dozen.
At some point, Kieran realized his cheeks were wet.
He wasn’t sad. He wasn’t even sure why he was crying. It was just the vastness of it. The beauty. The fact that he was here with someone who’d thought to bring him.
He wiped his face quickly, hoping Rory hadn’t noticed.
Rory reached over and took his hand again. Didn’t say anything.
Kieran stared up at the sky, and realized he was breathing deeper than he had in months. Maybe longer.
For so long there had been this invisible weight on his chest, like wires wrapped around his lungs, tightening with every worry, every what-if, every thing he couldn’t control.
His mom’s illness. Her death. The move. Starting over.
And then Hank disappearing, and nearly two weeks of dread that followed.
He’d been bracing for impact for so long he’d forgotten how to exhale.
But right now, in this moment, everything he cared about was in one place.
Hank and Mabel curled up near the embers, finally together again. Rory beside him, warm and solid.
His whole world. Right here.
They watched until the shower began to thin.
“Thank you,” Kieran finally said. “For this. For knowing I’d want to see it.”
“You’ve got Orion on your arm, Kier,” Rory said simply. “Figured you should meet him properly.”
Kieran laughed, watery but real. He looked down at his inner elbow, at the three small dots he’d had tattooed there fifteen years ago.
“Have you ever been in love?” Rory asked. The question landed in the dark.
“I don’t know,” Kieran said. “Maybe…once?”
Rory didn’t push.
“His name was JB,” Kieran said. “John Brendan. I met him in New York when I was twenty-four. At a church social, of all places.”
“A church social?”
Kieran laughed. “I know. I’d gone with a coworker who was trying to set me up with her cousin. A woman. Very awkward.” He paused. “But JB was there. Catholic. Marine Corps Reserve. This total contradiction. Buttoned-up and proper, but with a secret underneath he was trying to hide.”
“Like you?”
“Yeah. Like me.”
Above them, a meteor streaked across the sky. Neither of them pointed it out.
“We never talked about what we were,” Kieran continued.
“Never used words like boyfriend or gay or any of it. We existed together on weekends. Museums. Central Park. Takeout in his tiny apartment in Astoria.” His throat tightened.
“I’d spend the whole week counting down until I could see him again.
And then he’d pull back. Get scared. I wouldn’t hear from him for weeks.
And then he’d show up again, and I’d let him back in. Every time.”
Rory exhaled slowly beside him. Not a sigh. The sound of someone absorbing the weight of it.
“I thought that was what love felt like,” Kieran said. “The waiting. The uncertainty. Never knowing where I stood.” He laughed, but it came out broken. “I didn’t know what it was supposed to be.”
“What happened?”
“My mom got sick again.” Kieran stared up at the stars, blinking hard. “So I moved back to California, and JB and I just ended. No conversation. No goodbye. I left, and we never spoke again.”
Rory was quiet for a minute. “Do you regret it?”
“Leaving? No. I wanted to be with her.” Kieran swallowed. “But I never told him how I felt. I don’t even know if it was love or just the first person who made me feel less alone.” He paused. “I’ve never said it to anyone. Not like that.”
He didn’t look at Rory when he said it. But he felt Rory shift closer, his shoulder pressing against Kieran’s.
Somewhere in the distance, a coyote called.
“Did Britt know?” Kieran asked. “About you?”
“She knew everything.” Rory’s voice warmed. “I told her early. Before we got serious. I didn’t want to hide any of it. And she didn’t care. She said she loved me, not my history.”
“She sounded incredible.”
“She was.”
“She really was. You know about the drinking,” Rory said. “But what I didn’t tell you is what it looked like. Who I was hurting.”
Kieran turned onto his side, facing Rory. Rory stayed on his back, staring up at the sky, as if it were easier to say this without being looked at.
“There was Meg,” Rory said. “You know that part. But what I told you before, that it was casual, that was her version. Her experience of it.” His voice roughened. “On my end, I was drowning. I was using her to not feel alone. She thought we were having fun. I was trying to survive another night.”
Kieran rested his hand on Rory’s chest, his heart beating faster under his palm.
“She’s the one who told me I needed to stop,” Rory continued. “She looked at me one night and said, ‘you’re killing yourself, and I can’t watch it anymore.’ And I wanted to argue with her. Wanted to tell her she was wrong. But she wasn’t wrong.”
Kieran pressed closer, his forehead against Rory’s shoulder.
“And it wasn’t just her. There were other people during that time.
A guy named Michael. I met him at a bar, both of us figuring ourselves out.
It was what it needed to be. After Meg said what she said, I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
Three years ago I stopped everything. Drinking, sleeping with people, all of it.
I stayed celibate for about a year. White-knuckled my way through every day, trying not to fall apart. ”
“That must have been lonely.”
“It was,” Rory’s voice was barely above a whisper. “But I needed to learn how to be alone without destroying myself. I’d never done that before. Not since Britt.”
Kieran blinked hard against the sting in his eyes.
“Then about two years ago,” Rory continued, “I downloaded an app. Not because I wanted a fucking relationship. Just because I wanted to feel something. To remember what it was like to be touched by someone.”
“And?”
“It happened. Once. Some guy. It wasn’t anything.” Rory finally turned his head, meeting Kieran’s eyes in the darkness. “And then nothing. Until you.”
Kieran leaned in and kissed him. Gentle, careful, tasting salt.
When he pulled back, Rory’s eyes were closed.
“You know what gets me about the stars?” Rory said, voice unsteady.
Kieran looked up. “What?”
“Most of them are already dead. The light we’re seeing, some of it left those stars thousands of years ago.
Millions, even. By the time it reaches us, the star might not even exist anymore.
” Rory opened his eyes, staring up at the infinite dark.
“We’re looking at ghosts. Echoes of things that used to be. And we still think they’re beautiful.”
“I never really thought about it like that.”
“I used to think about it a lot after Britt died,” Rory said quietly.
“How she was gone, but everything she’d done, the way she’d loved people, the jokes she made, the way she saw the world, all of that was still here.
Still moving through everything, like light.
” He paused. “The light doesn’t stop just because she’s gone.
It keeps going. It still matters.” He paused again, shorter this time. “I've never said that out loud before.”
Kieran couldn’t speak. He just pressed closer, his face against Rory’s shoulder, and Rory’s arm came around him, pulling him in.
They lay together for a long time, breathing together under the dead stars.
“I’m falling for you,” Kieran said finally, the words muffled against Rory’s skin. “And it scares the shit out of me.”
Rory’s arm tightened around him.
“Good,” he said. “Because I’m already there. That’s why I couldn’t tell you about Britt.” A pause. “I didn’t know how to be the guy with the dead wife and also be the guy you were falling for.”
Kieran pressed closer. “You are, though.”
Rory didn’t say anything for a long time. Just held on.
The fire died down to embers. The cold crept in. Neither of them moved.
“We should probably go to bed,” Rory said eventually.
“Probably.”
But they stayed a while longer, tangled together under the vast ancient sky, holding on.