Zac frowned. “What’s that got to do with it?”
“Mate, if you don’t know, then I really should stay here. Be far easier on both of us than me making a complete arse of myself.”
It took far longer than it should’ve for the penny to drop, and even when it did, it made little sense to Zac. He hadn’t been through the therapy Jamie had, but he knew enough about addiction to be sure that neither one of them had been capable of loving the other as much as they’d loved the junk. “You don’t love me like that. You think you do because you don’t know any better, but you’ll meet someone soon and you’ll see I’m right. You’re going to love someone else, Jay, and love them hard, and you’ll never look at the world the same way again.”
“Is that what happened to you with Liam?”
“Yes.”
“You love him?”
“Yes.” It felt good to say it, even tinged by the brief hurt in Jamie’s now clear-blue gaze. “I do. I love him.”
“Then I’m going to stay here and cook poshed-up ramen for American hipsters, and keep searching for my cool-dude Prince Charming.”
“Okay.”
“So I’m staying.”
“Okay.”
“I’m going to go now . . . I have to work.”
“Okay.”
“Is that all you’re going to say to me?”
Zac shook his head. “No. There’s one more thing.”
“Shoot.”
“Happy birthday, mate. I miss you.”
Liam let himself into the house to find Zac lying on the living room floor, tossing a rubber ball into the kitchen for Dave to charge after, knocking over everything in her path. By the destruction already wreaked, it looked like they’d been at their game for a while. “Where’s Jazz?”
Zac turned his head to the left. “In his bed. He’s got the hump.”
Liam grinned. Jazz often got jealous if Zac played with Dave, skulking to his bed to sulk until Zac went to get him. “What about Dad? Did he have the hump too?”
Zac finally treated Liam to one of his favourite grins. “Not at all. We played poker for a bit, then watched the Towcester races. It was fun.”
“Yeah? I’ll come with you tomorrow, if you want?”
“It’s not about what I want. It’s about you and your dad enjoying each other.”
Easy for Zac to say: he’d never known Len as anything more than the skatty, bumbling old man he was now. For Liam, visiting Len was devastating, even on his good days.
“You might wish you were anywhere else on earth when you’re there,” Zac said when Liam failed to respond. “But if you don’t spend this time with him, you’ll regret it forever after he’s gone.”
Shame rippled briefly through Liam’s veins. Zac had been his rock as he’d tried to confront the reality of Len’s illness, and despite the heavy dose of denial that often kept him from Len’s side, his heart knew Zac’s wise words to be true. “I’m in. Remind me to bring Dad’s bridge set. The nurse said it would be good for him to play, right?”
“Right.”
Zac’s gaze turned absent. Liam frowned. “Okay, so if Dad had a good day, what’s got you chewing a wasp?”
“I talked to Jamie.”
Ah. Liam had wondered when that would happen, and when Jamie would tell Zac of the job Marv had offered him now that he’d completed the rehab stage of his recovery and proved himself serious about staying clean. “How did it go?”
