Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Tim
THE BARTENDER SETS DOWN two whiskeys before we reach the bar. He gives us a solemn nod, then walks away.
“How’d he know?” Keannen asks as we sit.
“I was drinking one before I got, um, interrupted. I guess he figured you’d want the same.”
“Because I’m your boyfriend?”
Keannen cocks a smirk at me, but it lacks its usual confidence. I shrug and take a sip of my drink to try not to react too much. Something happened out in that parking lot, but I’m not ready to believe it, even with a lump forming on Keannen’s jaw.
“Here,” the bartender says, setting down a towel wrapped around something. “For the jaw.”
He leaves us again, and Keannen unwraps the towel to find a big square whiskey ice cube inside. He issues a short, harsh chuckle and then presses the wrapped ice to his face.
“Does it hurt?” I ask.
I still can’t believe he took a punch for me. Like, a real punch. From a guy who really intended to kick his ass.
Keannen shrugs. “Not bad.”
I shake my head. “I can’t believe you did that out there. I… Thank you for coming to my rescue.”
Keannen smiles, but doesn’t follow up with a quip or joke like I might expect. He turns serious again all too quickly, his dark eyes picking over me.
“We were going to talk,” he says. “I think we should do that.”
It’s painfully clear how uncomfortable this makes him, which only goes to show how important it is to him, and that’s intensely weird. After all this time, it took a literal punch to the face to make him want to sit down and talk this thing through. I’ll take it, even if it’s not how I imagined this going.
I take a deep breath. Then I explain the past eight years of my life.
“My parents confronted me that day my mom caught us,” I say. “Said some … pretty nasty stuff. Then they sent me off to a few different schools. I guess they saw you as some sort of corrupting force. They thought if we were separated, it might ‘fix’ the problem.
“I moved around a lot that next year and a half. Like, a lot. I was never in one place long. Seattle was the last stop. They ran out of time, I guess. After I graduated high school here, I just sorta stayed. I guess in a way their plan worked because I never tried to reach out to you. I never tried to kiss another guy. I never did anything. I just … survived. Kept to myself. Didn’t risk messaging you and having them find out or something.”
“Is that why?” he says. He scowls at himself. “All these years, I’ve wondered why you never texted. You never called. You didn’t even send a DM. I thought…”
“I was ashamed? I suppose that makes sense. I mean, what else could you think? I disappeared. But no, Keannen, I wasn’t ashamed. Not of you. I was just…”
“Scared.”
I nod. We lock eyes, and sudden understanding passes between us. Eight years of not speaking falls away, and I realize he must have lived with that same fear this whole damn time.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I should have told you that a long time ago, but even when I realized you were in town, I figured you’d hate me. In my defense, I was kinda right.”
He chuckles wryly. “You were definitely right. I did hate you. A lot.”
That stings, but all I can do is accept it. I’m the one who left him without a word. Of course that would hurt.
“But that was unfair,” he says.
I blink in surprise. Keannen sets down the ice he’s holding against his face and takes my hand. If anyone in the bar cares, they don’t say anything. If they’re staring, I’m too absorbed in Keannen to notice. All the wood and neon signs and guys in biker jackets disappear when I gaze into his eyes while he holds my hand.
Then he says the words I never would have expected from him.
“I’m sorry too. I was angry. I was angrier than you deserved. Taking it out on you the way I did… It could have affected both our careers. It was stupid.”
“You were hurt. I never explained. I could have and I never did.”
“Yeah,” he says, “but you were also a kid whose parents hated him and shipped him away to fix him. My parents gave up on me when I was fifteen. I should have understood, but I was too busy being hurt to give a shit what you might have gone through.
“Then I heard that conversation between you and your parents,” he goes on, “and I couldn’t face it. I couldn’t face that I screwed up, that my anger was irrational all these years. When I heard you talking to them back in Baltimore, it couldn’t have been clearer what you’ve gone through. I couldn’t deny it anymore. I couldn’t pretend I was messing with you to make myself feel better. I had to face that I screwed up, and that I cared about you a lot more than I wanted to admit.”
I’m breathless at the end of this speech, my whiskey forgotten as I gape at him. That was so much more than a simple “sorry.” I’ve never seen him so raw, so honest. He’s blunt, but he often uses that to mask the truth. He can present something harsh and true, yet hold back what he really means to say in the process.
Not now. That was him, all him. The full, raw, honest truth of Keannen.
“I didn’t know about your family,” I say softly.
He shrugs. “It’s fine. Old news.”
“It’s not fine.”
He laughs harshly. “Okay, sure, it’s not fine, but it isn’t going to change, and I got myself together a long time ago. You’re the one still living in that shit.”
“Not anymore.”
I gaze down at our clasped hands. Somehow, I’m sure that conversation with my parents in Baltimore was the end. There won’t be any miraculous reconciliation there. Any hope I was holding onto is dead.
Keannen strokes his thumb over my knuckles. “Hey. I’m sorry. I’m sorry they treat you that way. It gets better over time, especially if you have people around you to support you. That band of yours, that’s your family, not some assholes who want to pretend you’re someone you’re not.
“And I already told you: No one gets to mess with you except me.”
My heart does a weird flippy thing. Even outside in the heat of the moment it fluttered around at those words, but the effect is more intense now that there’s no risk of getting punched. I try to bite back a smile, but Keannen’s smirk strongly suggests I’ve failed.
“You like that?” he says. “God, you’re weird.”
“So? You like me anyway.”
“Yeah, it seems like I do.”
“Really?”
My question turns the banter serious. Talking about our crappy families is one thing, but talking about each other, about feelings? That’s way harder.
Keannen swallows. He goes for his whiskey and takes a big gulp. I watch his throat work, thoughts distracted as a bead of amber liquid slides down his neck.
He slams his empty glass on the bar. “Yes,” he says sternly. “I do. Is that a problem?”
“No,” I say. “No, not a problem at all, but … what does that mean?”
“What does it mean? Are you serious?”
“Yes,” I say. “I mean, this whole thing has been, well, kinda unconventional. I might not have a lot of experience, but even I can tell that most people don’t corner each other in hallways and elevators for weeks and then start dating.” Now that I’m talking, the words tumble out in a rush. “At first, I was sure you hated me. I guess I wasn’t entirely wrong about that, but then things started to change, and neither of us were willing to talk about it, even though we both definitely felt it. When I did talk about it, you said that’s not what you wanted, and I figured I was just being a clingy virgin.”
Keannen scoffs. “You’re neither of those things. I made sure of the latter point myself.”
A flush lights my cheeks, but I push on anyway. “Well, yeah, but that still doesn’t explain any of this. My head is spinning, Keannen. All the back and forth — I have no idea what to make of it. Now you say you like me as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world, but it was never obvious to me, and I have no idea how to tell what you really want.”
Keannen looks down and curses at himself. I sit there, unsure what to do with this sudden turn. When he looks back up, there isn’t even a hint of a joke in his expression. It’s the most flat and serious I’ve ever seen him.
“I like you,” he says. “I want you. And not just…” He waves a hand as though irritated with his own inability to find the right words. “Not just in the way we’ve been doing it.”
He huffs at himself, and it makes me want to reach out and help him somehow, but this is one thing Keannen is going to have to conquer all on his own.
“I’ve been an idiot,” he says. “Okay? I’ve been a huge idiot. And I’m sorry. I was holding onto the past so hard that I lost sight of the present. You’re not that guy I made up in my head when I was hurt and angry and alone and confused. I turned you into some kind of monster so that I could pretend you ran away and had it easy while I suffered alone. It was easier to think that than to think you were just as damaged and fucked up as me. It was easier to hate you than to miss you. Because…”
He looks down, fiddles with his empty glass on the counter. When he looks up, his eyes are a storm.
“Damn it, Tim, it’s because I loved you. You were the only guy I’ve ever loved in my entire stupid life. When you left, I tried to patch over the hurt by acting out and being stupid, but I never felt anything for those guys. And then you were just there again, plopped into the middle of my life, and the anger and the hurt got all mixed up and tumbled around. I thought I could take it out on you, but the more I was around you, the more I felt the way I used to. The more I … the more I couldn’t stop myself from loving you again.”
I blink. My mouth hangs open, yet I can’t seem to draw a full breath. There are a lot of ways this conversation could have gone, but never would I have thought it’d go this way.
And yet…
And yet. My answer is the easiest thing in the entire world, the most obvious thing in the entire world. It’s something I’ve known since I was seventeen freaking years old. It’s the only thing I’ve ever been certain of in my entire life.
I lean forward, cupping his cheek to make him look at me instead of down at his hands.
“I loved you too, Keannen,” I say. “Even when I was a dumb, scared kid, I knew I loved you. It was just about the only thing I knew.”
We sit frozen, the rest of the bar gone as eight years of misunderstanding and hurt crumbles.
“I want things to go differently this time,” I say. “I want to start over. Right now. Tonight.”
“How?” he says.
“Surely the motel has a room we can grab.”
Understanding lights his eyes. Without another word, he jerks to his feet clasping my hand.
This time, nothing but our own urgency chases us out of that bar.