Noah turns and thrusts his fingers into my short hair. “I want to get back to where we were before,” he drops his forehead against mine, “but I refuse to hide what I feel for you behind closed doors.”
My heart feels lighter knowing what he wants. I just wish the nervous butterflies inside my stomach would disappear. I’m a grown fucking man. It shouldn’t be so difficult to say, “Hey folks, I’m gay.” My insides twist into a big tight knot when I think about it.
“You’re freaking out,” Noah accuses and pulls away.
I cringe. “Not exactly.”
He raises a brow.
“Okay, yeah. Yeah, I am. The thing is, I can’t figure out why. My brothers are cool about me. I’m not sure if one of my brothers have told Michael, but the others know and haven’t given me any shit, so I don’t know why I have this fear of telling my parents.” I pace back and forth. “They’re just as laid back as the rest of us.”
“Ramon.” Noah sighs and sinks into the sofa, an air of defeat in his actions. “They’re your parents. All kids want, no matter their age, is approval from their parents…I wish I was the one with the problem—with the parents needing to be told that I’m gay.” Noah drops his head into his hands.
Moving over to him, I drop to my knees and take his face between my hands and make him look at me. I search his eyes, for something, some sign, but all I see is sadness.
After placing a soft, lingering kiss to his lips, I offer him a wry smile and sit next to him on the sofa as I take his hand into mine and let our fingers entwine.
“I wish you had the same problem,” I admit. “Not just because you’d know how difficult this is for me, but because it would mean you still had your family.” I contract my fingers against his in comfort. “You, and Carla, are part of our family now, Noah. Nothing can change that.”
Noah kisses our joined hands before letting them rest in his lap.
“I’m tired, Ramon,” Noah admits in a heavy voice, as though he has the world on his shoulders.
“I know.”
Hearing him sound…lost, I need to give him hope. With my body relaxed against the sofa, I’m truthful, “I want you, Noah…so much it scares the fuck out of me. We had an amazing relationship before, and I want that again. I’m not going to lie to you and say it’s going to be easy. I still have that fear at the back of my mind…the one that grew there when you walked away before. I’m afraid something else will happen and instead of you coming to me, you’ll walk away again.”
“You know why I did that,” he answers, sounding upset.
I can’t look at him right now otherwise I won’t be able to say what I need to.
“I spent two years thinking you didn’t give a shit about me. Two years of hurt because you walked away, and until you came back I had no idea why. I’ve wondered over and over again what I could have done differently so that you’d have stayed…I can’t do that again.”
Silence follows my statement.
The emotion running through Noah right now, is evident through the death grip he has on my hand and the soft shaking of his body as he weeps beside me.
I’ve only known Noah to cry once before and that was when Carla’s ex had hit her. He’d been distraught that his sister had been hurt and that he hadn’t been around to defend her.
My tough guy doesn’t normally do tears, so this says a lot about his true feelings.
I sit beside him for as long as I can before I can’t just sit any longer.
Pulling my hand free from his, I turn and pull him between my spread thighs. Lying back on the sofa, Noah climbs up me and wraps his arms around my waist as his head rests against my chest.
“This,” he hesitates, “this right here, with you, is what I’ve always wanted.”
All of a sudden, I feel the courage course through me that I need to admit in front of all my family that I’m gay, and that…I’m in love with, Noah.
I’m finally ready to do this.
Noah
I hate the fact that Ramon has the power to reduce me to tears but at the same time, I feel a change in him.
He’s finally laid his cards on the table. Although he hasn’t come out and said, “I love you, Noah,” he’s told me what he wants. And he’s told me his fears, which I can understand.
What hurts me the most is that because of my actions trying to keep him safe, I’ve lost his trust. It’s something that I’ll be able to earn back, but it hurts hearing him admit it out loud.
My intentions toward Ramon have always been serious. Perhaps in the beginning, when we’d mess around, it wasn’t as serious. It was after the first woman we shared that I realized how jealous I was of Ramon being inside someone other than me. I didn’t really participate with the woman, but Ramon did end up sucking me off while he was inside her, and he came at the same time that I did. We’re so in tune with one another.