Nally let out a huge breath and snuggled back against Jude, a smile on his face. He didn’t say anything, but that was definitely more like it. This was the way they were supposed to be together, how they were supposed to fit. Jude’s body was warm and familiar, his scent was better than any blanket wrapped aroundhim, and his steady breath against Nally’s neck was an invitation to let go and believe everything would be alright.
Sleep hit them both hard. However anxious Nally’s mind was about the degree of closeness forming between the two of them and the disasters that could unfold because of it, his body knew exactly what was right. And the constant rain through the night didn’t hurt to keep them sleeping deeply until well after the sun came up the next day.
It all would have been wonderful if Nally hadn’t woken up with an erection as hard as the stone that the old part of the cabin had been made out of. Worse still, he could feel Jude’s morning wood against his backside, too. It would have been amazing, and if Jude was anyone else, Nally would have rolled over, shimmied down, and woken his friend up with a top-notch blowjob.
The fact that he entertained doing that anyhow for a good five minutes as he listened to sea birds crying outside and the waves crashing against the rocky shore felt as dangerous as trying to navigate a storm in the dark. They’d run all the way up the length of the country to an island to escape from Quentin, but now they were trapped with just themselves and the massive elephant in the room.
Fuck it. They were going to have to have the talk. There was no way around it now. They would have to be adults and sit down face to face, tea in hand, and discuss what the fuck to do about the time bomb hovering between them.
At least thinking about that made his erection go down.
“Are you awake?” Jude asked groggily a few minutes later, pulling the lower half of his body away from Nally.
“Yeah,” Nally said, twisting to face Jude and scooting away from him until his back was almost against the cabin’s cold wall. “I’ve just been lying here thinking.”
The problem with falling for a man you’d been best friends with for more than half your life was that he could read you like a book. Jude’s sleepy expression snapped to wariness, and before Nally could figure out how to launch the conversation, he scrambled to get out of bed. “I have to pee so badly,” he hissed, shoving his feet into the slippers he’d wisely left beside the bed the night before and rushing out of the bedroom.
Nally sighed and flopped against his pillow. The conversation had to happen, but it was going to be harder than he’d anticipated.
He threw back the bedcovers, then cursed loudly at how cold and damp the room was. Everything felt like it was coated with a layer of salt mist, even though they were inside. He put on his slippers and stood, then dragged himself into the main part of the cabin, grabbing his coat from its hook by the door and put that on to ward off the chill. Jude must have gone outside to do his business, so Nally set to work building up the fires, both of which had gone out, thanks to their absolutely dismal fire-building skills.
“At least the rain has stopped,” Jude said when he shuffled back in from the great outdoors, hugging a thick, wool sweater around himself. “Although it still feels as wet as my ass when it’s Bear Night at The Chameleon Club.”
Nally didn’t break into a smile like he was sure Jude wanted him to. The comment felt designed to deflect from what was really going on, but it did the exact opposite.
“We need to talk,” he said, standing from the hearth, where a reasonable fire was starting to catch on the logs.
Jude’s face pinched into misery. “Do we have to?” he asked, almost whining.
“Yes,” Nally said, sighing and shoving a hand through his bedhead hair. “We’ve been dancing around this for too long, and it’s starting to get in the way of what really matters.”
“You’re what really matters, Nally,” Jude said quietly, taking a step closer to him. “You’re the only thing that really matters to me, and I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize that.”
“Neither do I!” Nally said forcefully. It simultaneously felt like they were arguing and like they were avoiding an argument, which left him completely off-balance. He sighed, lowering his shoulders. “Let’s make some tea and figure out breakfast, then we’ll sit down like the grown men we are and discuss what we can do about—” he gestured between them and the room, “—all this.”
“Fine,” Jude said, starting toward the stove. “But I’m going to insist that there isn’t an ‘all this’ for as long as I possibly can.”
Of all things, that made Nally smile. Anyone who didn’t know Jude wouldn’t see that it was an admission of the truth. And in a way, it began the conversation before either of them could even gather their feelings into thoughts and their thoughts into words. Nally knew that Jude loved him. He’d always known. As they worked together to heat the water enough for tea and a skillet enough for bacon and eggs, the first seeds of confidence that taking their love to the next level might not destroy them after all began to sprout.
“Once again, I would like to commend the women of the past for keeping the rest of us alive under extremely trying circumstances,” Jude commented in his influencer persona as they finished their meal. He saluted Nally with his tin teacup, took a sip, then winced and made a disgusted sound after swallowing. “We’re rubbish at this.”
“We’re rubbish at a lot of things,” Nally said, grabbing the opportunity before he chickened out. “Admitting how we actually feel about each other, for example.”
Jude’s goofy grin dropped. He lowered his arm and his head for a moment, then peeked up at Nally. “We can’t just ignore it, can we.” It wasn’t a question.
“No, we cannot,” Nally said, resorting to crisp formality to shield his vulnerability. “We’ve both felt things changing between us for a while now.”
Jude nodded, then drew in a breath and straightened, facing the truth like a man. “I can’t deny that,” he said. “Our relationship has been changing for a while. But I’m terrified?—”
“—of a Timothy repeat,” Nally finished his sentence. “So am I.”
Jude relaxed by a hair, but that quickly shifted to guilt. He grabbed his plate and got up to take it to the wash basin instead of facing Nally as he said, “That whole thing was a terrible mistake. I ruined everything by hooking up with Timothy.”
“You didn’t ruin everything,” Nally said, twisting in his chair but not getting up to join Jude yet. He needed the slight distance between them to keep his head in order. “Who made the first move anyhow? You or Tim?”
Jude turned back to Nally, his brow lifted. “You don’t know?”
Nally shrugged. “I never thought it was my business to ask.”
