A slight nod was the only reply Gabriel offered, and as Joel watched Gabriel's eyes fill with tears, one slid down his own cheek. Joel took a step back, but Gabriel grabbed his hand. “I told you there were things I still had to tell you. This was it, Joel, this was the last thing.”
Joel allowed Gabriel's hand to warm his before wrenching it free. “This is sort of a big thing, Gabriel.” He stepped back another pace. “We’re,” Joel choked on the words, “related?”
“Of course you’re related, he’s my brother,” Thomas accused, while Gabriel offered a small shake of his head.
“Yes, but… not really, no. By marriage only, Joel. Not by blood.” Gabriel's body seemed to be imploring Joel to see reason. There was another crack inside of Joel’s chest and he squeezed his eyes shut, willing the tears to remain at bay.
“This is huge, Gabriel.” Joel dug the heels of his hands into his closed eyelids and shook his head, as if he could will it all away. “This is a big fucking deal.”
“Bigger than what we talked about before? Bigger than what you said to me an hour ago?” Gabriel's voice took on an edge of panic as he stepped toward Joel to close the gap between them.
“I told you how important family was. You knew. Even if I don’t talk to mine, you knew it mattered to me.” Before Joel could take another step back, Gabriel advanced to only inches away and fell to his knees, grabbing Joel's hands and kissing his knuckles.
“That’s what I wanted, though. To be your family. To make a family, with you.” Joel eyed Gabriel, supplicant before him, both of their cheeks wet with tears.
“But you already were, and you didn’t even have the decency to tell me. You’re not devoted, Gabriel. You’re selfish. Keeping that knowledge to yourself was selfish.” Joel shook his hands free and stepped back. Gabriel didn’t move.
“I don’t know why you’re here,” he said to Thomas and his mother, not taking his gaze from Gabriel's begging eyes, “but I never want to see any of you ever again.”
Gabriel let out a watery cry but didn’t move from his position on the floor. Joel backed down the hallway, only turning when there was enough distance between them so Gabriel couldn’t catch him.
He pushed the door to his bedroom open. His bedroom. Right. The things that had earlier that night made him think of devotion and affection now made him feel nothing but rage. He’d had a family this entire time. Or rather, he could have had a family, but Gabriel had been too selfish to allow him that small shred of normalcy because it wasn’t what Gabriel wanted. He'd had no concern for what Joel had wanted, or needed, all that time he was alone.
Or maybe not so alone, since Gabriel had been there, hadn't he, hiding in the shadows and biding his time, while Joel had been so lonely it hurt.
The thought made Joel want to break something.
He grabbed his duffel bag, tossing loose clothing into it, and cinching it closed. He looked at the room around him, chin quivering and eyes freely shedding tears, and he screamed. At the top of his lungs, Joel let loose a shout of rage, disappointment and abandonment. He sucked in the cry that wanted to follow, he knew it would sound too much like heartbreak. Fittingly, not one of the three people in the living room came to see if he was okay. And that was fine, because he wasn't, and none of them could fix him. He didn’t know if he would ever be okay again.
What started as confusion, morphed into disappointment, and then to an anger that was boiling and quickly threatening to consume Joel entirely. With all the strength he could muster, he raised his shaking hands and swiped the pile of records into a heap onto the floor. It didn’t make him feel better. He crossed to the bookshelf and started pulling books out by the handful, throwing them across the room. Each one hit the wall with a thud that did nothing to satisfy the gaping fucking hole growing inside of his chest.
Next, Joel opened the closet and ripped every piece of clothing from the hangers, throwing them down into a pile and stomping on them as if he were a child throwing a temper tantrum. He knew in his heart, his actions wouldn't make anything better, but he was fucking destroyed. He needed to destroy something in return. All these beautiful things would now be broken, and ripped, and torn, like him. These tokens of affection were now destroyed, selfishly discarded, like he had been.
His eyes caught on the record player, and with one arm, he swiped it off the stand and it clattered to the floor, breaking apart with a deafening shatter.
Shattered, like me.
And still, no one came.
Joel hunched his body, hands on his knees, and heaved with the weight of his loneliness. His eyes caught a faded green book binding under his feet. Reaching down with a shaking hand, he had a feeling about what the book was. He grabbed it and turned it to read the faded, gilded gold print on its spine.Les Misérablesby Victor Hugo.
Joel screamed again, now in frustration more than anything else, and reached down to pick up the second volume from the floor. Without looking back, he walked out of the bedroom, slamming the door behind him. The scene in the living room was much as he’d left it. Gabriel, still on his knees, and Thomas and his mother gathered together a few feet away, most likely conspiring how to do further damage. Joel needed answers from the three people in front of him, but more than that, right now he needed space. The truth of his fucked-up family could come another day. He needed air and he needed to get out of this place he had almost begun to think of as home.
Joel squeezed the two books together in his right hand, raising his left to point at Thomas and his mother. “You two, I never want to see you again. And as for you…” He looked down at Gabriel through tear-blurred eyes, “Fuck you.” He threw the books down and they bounced off Gabriel's chest. Gabriel flinched when they hit, but otherwise he remained still.
Taking one last look at the condo, his mother, then at his… uncle, Joel walked out the open front door, slamming it closed behind him.
***
Joel pounded frantically on Athena's front door until he heard her footsteps on the other side. He had left his phone at Gabriel's, and it was probably just as well because right now he didn’t want any reminder of the man he loved. He sniffed, wiping the back of his hand under his nose as Athena pulled the door open.
“You didn’t really take one of Donny’s kittens, did you?” Joel asked quickly, as tears started to slide down his cheeks again.
“Of course not, Baby J, you know I…” Athena’s statement was cut off as Joel threw himself at her, sobbing uncontrollably on her shoulder. Without asking what was wrong, she wrapped her arms around him and hauled him inside the apartment. They stood together in her hallway where she held him and stroked his hair while he cried.
Joel was fucking stupid and he hated himself. Hated the way his heart grew warm and too big for his chest when he thought of Gabriel's first confession. For the first time in ages, Joel had been happy, truly fucking happy, and it was with Gabriel, because of Gabriel. It was cruel to have that snatched away so quickly.
Athena’s ministrations soothed him and his crying slowed, then his breathing returned to normal. She shouldered his weight and led him to her living room, dropping him down on the couch before going to get a glass of water from the kitchen. Joel swallowed it down, then reached for the hem of Athena's long black skirt to wipe his eyes.
