Chase pushed to his feet and approached him. “Well, don’t you look sharp?”
“I'm not wearing a fucking tie, but I did my best.”
“Don't worry. You're still as sexy as ever.”
His words put Mason at ease. Like in the bedroom, he was just happy to know he was satisfying Chase.
They hopped into Mason’s truck. Mason plugged his iPhone in and said, “I made some music for us to listen to on the way into town.”
“Ooh, like a mix tape?” Chase teased.
“Yeah. Like a mix tape, you goofball.”
Mason turned up the volume as the first song came on: Alanis Morissette’s “Ironic.”
Chase's eyes lit up, and he didn’t hesitate to sing along.
They shouted the words out to that song and made their way through ’NSYNC, Britney Spears, No Doubt, and Sheryl Crow.
Even though they’d enjoyed themselves the day they sang with Emery on their trip to the mall, there was something about it just being the two of them that made the moment so special for Mason. Perhaps because it was a moment that was like so many others they’d shared—one that reminded him of being young and in love, feeling invincible and unstoppable.
When they arrived at the restaurant, the host sat them.
Chase kept looking around like he was lost.
“This place looks a lot different,” he said.
But Mason hadn’t noticed. It was still the same steakhouse they’d come to when they were kids.
“Does it?”
Mason had been there several times over the years, and it looked the same as it had when they had first started going there.
“You don’t notice it? They added that bar in the back,” Chase said.
“Oh, I guess they did. It’s just changed here and there so much, I didn’t really think about it.”
“And the artwork has been totally redone. It used to be that gaudy shit. And they had that singing bass over the entrance to the bathrooms.”
“Oh, I remember. God, I wouldn’t have even thought about that if you hadn’t brought it up.”
“A lot of things have changed,” Chase said, making eye contact. It was clear he wasn't talking about the restaurant anymore.
“All the important things are still here.”
“Yeah. Nothing important has changed.”
Chase shifted the conversation back to the wedding, talking about how annoyed Emery was with Tessa—the fights, the drama, the different crises they've had to put up with through the past few days. Mason laughed at the stories and enjoyed the commentary and watching the way Chase's eyes lit up when he got excited about a particular story. When they finished eating, they made their way down the main strip in town, Chase noticing the subtle differences—the places that, like the restaurant, had altered over the years. Some of them were completely gone while others had just been refurbished.
“Strange,” Chase murmured, “to think of how many times we walked this road together.”
“Yes, it is. And to see how much the town’s changed, and not just these physical things. In some really amazing ways. The people here definitely aren’t as homophobic as they once were.”
“I like to think we played our small part in that.”
“For sure, considering we were the onlyoutkids in high school, but I wasn't ashamed of anything.”
“I wasn't ashamed of anything either. We were both so in love back then that we didn't take into account how dangerous what we were doing really was, being out in a small, conservative town.”
