Now you’re home
You’ve come home
Now you’re home
Home home.
And I’ll always be here for you.
CHAPTER7
Then—Dante
Dante’s dadstowed the bass and rolling suitcase in the trunk of the rental SUV.His mom hadn’t let him out of her embrace since he walked through the arrivals gate.
But Dante didn’t notice.He couldn’t help seeing anything but Ellery.
Ellery and the way Casper looked at her.
He should have expected it.It wasn’t the first time a girl he’d liked had preferred his cis brother.
“Let’s go eat.We found this great place yesterday, Dante.”His dad opened the door for him, the same way he’d done when driving Dante to school when he was a kid.
Dante forced a tight smile onto his face.“Awesome.”Food was not at the top of his mind.
Casper wiggled his eyebrows in a weird, suggestive manner.“After ship food, I bet anything is welcome.”Dante just shrugged.Though they had been closer when they were younger, they’d drifted a bit since his transition.Dante would reach out more, but he had difficulty coping with the different expectations his parents seemed to have for the two of them.
“Ellery?”His mom belted herself into the front passenger seat.“Do you have any food preferences?”
“I’m all set, Mrs.Baker.”Ellery slid into the middle seat, sandwiched between him and Casper.Dante had to close his eyes.She smelled amazing, sweet and citrusy.It was impossible to focus on anything else, not even his irritatingly perfect brother.Maybe this wasn’t a good time to come out to Ellery.
“We are so glad to have you home, Dante,” his mom said.
Dante focused on the city of San Diego unrolling outside the window of the moving car.Palm trees, ships, buildings, playgrounds.How many cities had he seen now?How many countries?Some of the trans friends he’d met through online communities said the more you run away, the more your problems weigh you down.
He hated that they were almost always right.
“Seattle hasn’t been the same,” his mother said, her voice dulling to a murmur as he stared out the window.
Ellery nudged his arm.“You’re so quiet.I thought you couldn’t wait to tell us everything that happened on the ship.”
“I guess.”His neck heated, but that was ridiculous.He and Ellery were friends.That was what they had agreed to.Just because he found her ridiculously attractive, it didn’t mean— “It’s all a lot.The ship is kind of like the military, only with more customer service.You work pretty much every day.Your time isn’t really your own.You’re there with a bunch of people who haven’t been home in a long time.”He shrugged.“I always take a little while to process it when a contract ends.”
His dad pulled the SUV Into a parking spot on a small, tree-lined street.“We are so proud of you.Our world traveler and musician.Now who’s ready for pancakes?”
The ache in Dante’s chest that had yawned open when he saw Casper with Ellery, eased slightly.This was his family, and they were behaving far better than when he had come out to them three years before.They had missed him, and he them.“Pancakes sound great, Dad.”
* * *
The pancakes wereworth the thirty-minute wait in line, though the time passed quickly enough.His parents weren’t even bringing up the seven thousand ways Casper was better than he was.
Dante was less thrilled with his brother and the way he kept looking at Ellery.“So, how’s your girlfriend?”He cut his pancakes into tight, neat little squares.
Casper’s smile fell.“We broke up.”
“Oh.”People said twins could feel everything the other felt, even to the point where they shared some form of telepathy.While he and Casper had made up their own language when they were toddlers, they never quite had that twin ESP.Clearly he had missed a few things while he had been at sea.Unfortunately, it also made Casper eligible for Ellery.“I’m sorry.”
“It’s cool.”Casper always shrugged off tragedy.“Things happen.”
