I don’t know how to exit this situation well. My insides are a blender of countless emotions, shredded by my anxiety until they’re a messy, inextricable blur.
“Go on, then,” he says quietly, slipping his hand around my back, low and gentle. “Go.”
I glance from the view of his backyard, back to him, recognizing the moment as a threshold in more than one sense of the word. I want to stay and kiss him and ice his knee and draw him a bath and make him laugh and take care of him.
And I want to push him far away and pretend like none of this ever happened, like he didn’t show me a side of the sharp, harsh man he’s been and reveal what’s beneath that brutally cold façade:
Someone who cares. Who bleeds and hurts and fears.
Just like me.
I stare at him for a long moment. And he stares right back at me, his hand warm on my back, its pressure building every second that I stand there, pushing me where I know I need to go.
Finally, I force myself to do what I promised myself I would. I walk away. As I step onto his porch, I mentally congratulate myself. I’ve done what I failed to do before. I drew a boundary, put a firm stop to going where I shouldn’t with a teammate.
I should be proud of myself. I should be relieved.
But when Gavin’s door quietly slips shut behind me, I don’t feel proud or relieved at all.
15
GAVIN
Playlist: “Lonely Boy,” The Black Keys
“Well, that was an experience,” I tell Mitch. “Cough up the keys, old man. And let’s pray the next time I fuck up my knee and need a steroid injection, it’s the left one and not my gas leg again.”
“You don’t like my driving, that’s your problem,” Mitch says, slapping the keys into my palm.
I snort. “It’s not a matter of liking. It was a matter of not wanting to die before I even got to the doctor’s.”
He waves his hand dismissively, helping himself to a glass of water from my kitchen. “Serves you right. You should have asked Oliver.”
His name sends a bolt of heat searing through me. I shut my eyes, doing everything I can to block out the memory of kissing him, feeling him, tasting him.
I can’t tell Mitch there was no way in hell I was asking Oliver after last night, when I made out with him on my bed, fucked his mouth with my tongue the way I wanted to fuck him, then kicked him out after telling him this was a one-time thing that we were going to put firmly behind us, and that needless to say, keeping my distance is best right now.
So instead, I ask him, “Why do that when I have you?”
He sighs, scrubbing his face. “Because you need to rely on other people. Where’s your family? Where are your friends?"
“My family? Exactly where I want them,” I tell him dryly. “And friends?” I gesture to him, to the table where the group plays poker. “Right here. What more could I ask for?”
Mitch scowls at me.
“If you’re that upset about driving me,” I tell him, “you could have said no. Are you pissed about walking home? I told you I could manage to drop you off at your place and drive the short distance back to mine.”
“No! That’s not it.” He drops onto a kitchen stool as I walk gingerly past him and toss my keys onto the counter.
“Then what is your point, Mitchell?”
“My point,” he says sharply, “is that I’m tired of enabling your isolationist bullshit.”
I stare at him. “Isolationist bullshit? You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He nods. “You make sure of it. All I can do is read between the lines.”
“You really want to hear my shit, Mitchell?”
He shrugs. “Yeah. But I’m not the person you should confide in. At least, not the only one, and certainly not the first.”
I walk slowly into my living room toward the sofa that’s calling my name. “And to whom should I be confiding my deepest darkest secrets?”
“People your own damn age,” he says. “People who you build a life with. Friends. Family. Friends who become family.”
Groaning, I ease onto the sofa and lift my leg, propping it on a pillow. Wilde meows at me like I’m supposed to do something for him when I’m laid up like this. “What do you want?” I ask him. “There’s food in your bowl. Shoes I just took off for you to piss in.”
He meows again, then weirdly bounds up the couch and settles on my chest, purring. He’s a crotchety fucker, so he’ll probably end up sinking his claws into me, but for the time being, I savor the rumble of his purr and scratch his fluffy black and white cheeks.
“Hardly any point in forming relationships,” I tell Mitch, circling back to our conversation. “I’ll be laid flat in a game one of these days soon and won’t get back up. After that, I’ll leave.”
He arches a silvery eyebrow. “Nice to know you plan to split when shit hits the fan.”
I glare at him. “I’ll keep in touch with you when the time comes. Pay a visit here and there.”
“Exactly.” He bangs his fist on the counter. “Because I matter to you. And anyone else you built a relationship with here would matter to you, too.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue, to explain myself, but to explain that would be to reveal just how badly I hurt, how deeply I already live in anticipatory pain, how much I dread.
But you’re not part of the world that I’ll have lost, I almost tell him. You won’t be a reminder of what I’ll never have or be, ever again.
“It’s different with you.”
He shakes his head, standing from his stool and strolling toward my front door. “I’m outta here.”
“Mitch—”
“Nope. You’re bad for my blood pressure when you’re like this.”
“Now, hold on.” I try to sit up from the sofa, but Wilde sinks his claws into me just as Mitch shoves me back down with surprising strength. “Jesus. Now you’re ganging up on me.”
“You,” he says, leaning in and jabbing me in the chest, “need to do some thinking. And stop being so damn stubborn.”
I frown up at him. “I’m not stubborn. I’m practical.”
He rolls his eyes. “See you for poker tonight, knucklehead. Rest up, because you have an ass-whooping coming your way.”
“Where’s the Skittles?” Jorge yells from the pantry.
“Well stocked at the minimart down the road,” I tell him, shuffling the cards. They land with a satisfying snap on the table. “But alas, not here.”
Jorge pokes his pink-haired head out of the pantry and frowns at me. “I ask for one thing. One thing. Skittles.”
I point a thumb at Itsuki. “Don’t look at me.”
Itsuki sits primly in his seat, sipping his lemon seltzer, and says, “I’m not driving you to the dentist again the day after poker because you managed to pull out another tooth on those things. They’re too sticky.”
Jorge levels a glare at him. “What’s the point of having teeth if I can’t eat what I want, hmm?” His rant switches to Spanish as he dives back in the pantry, searching for other goodies.
“It’s not so bad,” Jim says, while stacking chips. “Let’s think of some alternatives.”
“There are none!” Jorge yells from the pantry.
“Sure there are.” Lou sniffs, frowning in thought. “Strawberry applesauce.”
Jim snorts. “Chocolate pudding.”
Itsuki hides a laugh behind his hand, then says, “Prune juice!”
Jorge exits the pantry, slamming the door behind him and looking thunderous. “You’re all dead to me.”
“C’mon, now,” I tell him, patting his place at the table. “Sit down and have your fancy pink lemonade and sort your cards. Takes you long enough.”
“Speaking of taking long,” Lou grumps, glancing at his wrist watch. “Where’s Mitch?”
I fumble the cards slightly but catch them in time to shuffle them together. Parting on bad terms with the old man left me uneasy. I glance up at the wall-mounted clock in my living room, frowning. He’s fifteen minutes late. Mitch is never late.
“Dunno,” I tell Lou. “He said he’d be here.”
Just as I finish my sentence, the back door opens.
And my stomach plummets to the soles of my feet.
There stands Mitch. And by his side…
Oliver.
“’Bout time!” Jim hollers. “Get your ass over here. We gotta start playing before Gavin shuffles the tits off the queens.”
Mitch waves a hand dismissively, shutting the door behind Oliver, who’s giving me a wide-eyed, deer-in-the-headlights look. I push up from the table with relatively more comfort and ease than I had this morning, thanks to that steroid injection, a result I can’t always count on. Sometimes the pain is worse for a day or two after the injection before relief finally kicks in, other merciful, less frequent times, I feel relief much sooner. Thankfully, this is one of those rare times, and now the pain in my knee is muted to a dull, persistent but not incapacitating ache.
“Mitchell,” I say tightly. “Why don’t you join our friends at the table.”
Mitch flashes me a wide smile, mischief twinkling in his eyes. “Look who I found outside. Isn’t it great that Ollie could join us?”