“Have you? You’ve wanted LA ever since I met you and way before that.”
He didn’t have a quick rebuttal. He did want LA, but he wanted this more. “Things change.”
“On the day you’re supposed to move?”
Cameron grabbed his chin. He needed to see the Walker that was still in there. Not this spokesperson. “We can make this work.”
“No, we can’t.” Walker pushed away Cameron’s hand. “I’m not going to hold you back.”
“You won’t. I’m making this choice on my own.” Cameron didn’t think he’d have to try this hard. He thought by now, Walker would’ve swooped him up in his arms.
Walker pulled him into a hug. Cameron breathed in his lingering shaving cream scent. Everything seemed too final in this moment.
“You’re not staying here,” Walker said softly. His eyes burned with feelings his mouth wouldn’t say. “You’re going to get in your car, drive across the country, and make something happen in LA.”
This wasn’t the plan. This wasn’t the moment they were supposed to share. Walker’s hands felt alien on his skin.
Cameron yanked himself away. “I don’t get it.”
“Did you really think we would be together? We weren’t thinking clearly.” Walker seemed to be saying that as much to himself as Cameron. He had never seen Walker so angry, so red. “We had fun. We had some great sex. That’s all it was.”
“You don’t mean that.” Tears beaded at Cameron’s eyes. He knew Walker didn’t believe that.He couldn’t.But the words still hurt.
“You were supposed to leave.” Walker glared at him. “So leave.”
“This isn’t you.” Cameron couldn’t breathe. He was standing on a cliff, ready to jump. He thought Walker would catch him, but now.... “I’m scared. You’re scared, too. We can be scared together and figure this out. I feel it, Walker. I love you.”
Walker grabbed his arms and pushed Cameron up against a tree. He tried to act cold, but he was failing. His eyes burned with a barely contained fire. “Whether you stay or you go, we’re breaking up. So if I were you, I would go. I gotta get back to work.”
He let go, turned around, and headed back inside without so much as a backward glance.
No looking back.
Cameron wiped his eyes. That would be the final set of tears he would cry over that man. He returned to his vehicle, just as he’d left it. He peeled out of the parking lot. He didn’t look around as he drove through the rest of Duncannon. He kept his eyes on the road ahead. Once he got to the interstate, everything would be better. His life here would crystallize into memories. Scabs would form. Wounds would heal. By the time he reached California, Browerton and Walker would be firmly in the past.
CHAPTER thirty-Two
Walker
Walker didn’t want to wake up. If he woke up, he would have to sit up. If he sat up, he would have to look at himself in his mirrored closet door. And he wasn’t ready for that.
He sucked it up and trudged through his morning routine. His brain shifted to autopilot. He didn’t realize he was brushing his teeth until he was spitting into the sink. Clothes found their way onto his body. It was another morning before work. Same routine, same blips. Maybe zombies had the right idea. No thinking. No feeling. Just eating and destroying everything around you.
He made himself a cup of coffee in his fancy Keurig machine. His fancy appliances and chic furniture surrounded him, yet it all seemed empty. He had accumulated such nice things. That was all they were. Things. What had he sacrificed for them?
That’s what an adult does. He sacrifices.Yet Walker didn’t understand why sacrificing had to suck so much.
He poured the coffee down the sink.
I did the right thing. I couldn’t hold him back.He had told himself that repeatedly for the first few days, but soon he stopped wanting to remind himself of what happened. The things he said. The way he acted.I did the right thingdidn’t seem to cut it.
His stomach dipped below sea level when he drove past campus. College students strolled on the sidewalk. They all reminded him of Cameron. Young, confident, full of energy.
He found himself in his office building’s lobby. His routine carried him along. Walker pressed the button, but skipped the elevator that came. And the next one. He had to push himself into the next elevator, like when he made Hobie eat all of his broccoli.
Walker sucked in a breath before the elevator doors opened.
“Thank goodness it’s Friday!” A fellow elevator rider said to him.What difference did it make?Next week, the grind would start all over again.
