“Get it together,” I muttered to myself, checking my teeth in the mirror for any embarrassing remnants of my road trip diet. “It’s just Aunt Dolly. She’s family. She offered you the apartment. She wants you here.”
The last part felt like a lie even as I said it. She’d sounded surprised when I called three days ago, rambling some barely coherent explanation about needing a change of scenery for the holidays. I’d probably woken her up. I hadn’t exactly been tracking time zones while having my meltdown. But she’d said yes without asking too many questions.
Maybe she felt sorry for me. Maybe she remembered the skinny ten-year-old who’d visited that one summer and ate his weight in her chocolate chip cookies. Or maybe she was just too polite to say no to family, even family that had basically ignored her existence for fifteen years.
I pushed open the car door and immediately got hit with the full force of small-town Texas in December. It was cool, probably fifty-five degrees, and the air smelled like grass and barbecue smoke and cinnamon. A gentle breeze ruffled my hair, and I couldhear the faint sound of Christmas music drifting from one of the storefronts down the street.
It was disgusting how pleasant it all was.
The diner’s door chimed when I pushed it open, one of those old-fashioned bells that announced every arrival to the entire restaurant. Conversations paused for exactly the amount of time it took for a dozen pairs of eyes to catalog every detail of the obvious outsider who’d just walked in. My jeans were too expensive, my sneakers too clean, my sweater the wrong shade of blue for Texas, probably.
I felt heat creep up my neck and fought the urge to turn around and walk right back out.
“Well, I’ll be damned.” The voice came from behind the counter. It was high-pitched, warm, slightly raspy, and with the kind of Texas drawl that turned one-syllable words into three. “My God, look at you, sugar!”
I turned toward the voice and felt my breath catch. The woman standing there had to be Aunt Dolly, but she looked nothing like the vague memory I had of her. She was probably in her early fifties, with big bright blonde hair, red acrylics, and a pair of blue eyes that would knock you off your feet. Those eyes were one family trait we both shared. She wore a polka-dot blouse that was cinched tight at the waist by her apron, making her look thinner than seemed possible. Despite the fact that she worked on her feet all day, she wore heels, and there wasn’t a damn hair out of place on her entire head.
“Hayden, is that you?” she smiled wide, her teeth whiter than seemed possible. She held her arms out wide. “That is you! Come here and give your Aunt Dolly a hug!”
I put on the best smile I could muster, walking forward to meet her. She threw her arms around me even though the top of her hair only came up to my chin. I hugged her back, trying to muster up some enthusiasm.
“Hi Aunt Dolly,” I said, my voice a little shaky since everyone in the entire restaurant was staring at us now.
“Let me get a good look at you,” she replied, grabbing my shouldersand forcing me back. She did a once-over before her gaze landed back on my face. “Well, I will say, you’ve done a damn fine job growing up! No wonder you’ve been a model; you’re mighty handsome!” She reached up, booping my nose. “And you’ve got your mama’s freckles. I’m sure the boys love that!”
I furrowed my brow. “You… you know I’m gay?”
“Honey, no offense,” she grinned. “But I knew you was gay the moment I met you. The first thing you ever said to me was that you wanted hair like mine. And the second thing was you wantin’ to know if my jukebox had Cher on it.” She gave a little shrug. “I might be blonde, but I can still put two and two together.”
Despite everything that had happened, despite the anger and exhaustion and general misery of the past few days, I felt my mouth twitch into what might have been an actual smile. “Cher, huh?”
“‘Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves,’” she said with a wink. “You made me play it six times in a row. Nearly drove your mama to drink.” She patted my cheek with one manicured hand. “Course, your mama was always a little high-strung. Not like us, sugar.”
The casual way she saidusmade something tight in my chest loosen just a fraction. Like maybe I wasn’t completely alone in this godforsaken cheerful place after all.
“Now,” she continued, steering me toward an empty booth in the corner, “you sit yourself right here and let me get you some food. You look like you ain’t eaten a proper meal in days.” She wasn’t wrong. “And don’t you dare tell me you’re not hungry, because I can hear your stomach growling from here.”
I slid into the red vinyl booth, the cracked leather sticking slightly to my jeans. The table was one of those old Formica ones with silver edges that people had been carving initials into for years. The whole place had that lived-in feeling that expensive restaurants tried to fake but never quite managed.
“I could eat,” I admitted, suddenly aware that the bacon smell was making my mouth water.
“Course you could. You’re skin and bones!” Dolly shook her headdisapprovingly. “What have you been eatin’ out there in California? Air and good intentions?”
Before I could answer, she was already bustling away, calling out orders to someone in the kitchen. I heard her mention chicken-fried steak and mashed potatoes, and my stomach practically whimpered with anticipation.
The other customers had mostly gone back to their conversations, though I caught a few curious glances. A table of older men in work shirts and baseball caps kept looking over, probably trying to figure out what my story was. In the booth across from me, a woman about my age was feeding a toddler who seemed more interested in throwing Cheerios on the floor than eating them.
It was all so normal. So... wholesome. Like something out of a Hallmark movie, if Hallmark movies included gay nephews having public breakdowns in small-town diners.
God, I hoped I didn’t do that by accident. The last thing I needed was to make a scene and get a reputation for being the town mess in the first five minutes. I leaned forward, resting my forehead on the cold surface of the table.
I just had to survive another month. Then I could go home and cry alone in my parents' mansion that I had no business being in at twenty-five years old.
Fuck, I felt pathetic…
Chapter 2
Diego
