Harry laughed. “True that. Are you still freaking out about Angelo and Dylan?”
“I was never freaking out.”
“Liar.”
“Yup.” Rhys binned the milk. “And I’m sorry I ripped into you about it. You just—I dunno—caught me off guard. I’ve been trying to move on from all that stuff at the club.”
“Why? I mean, I get that you’ve maybe outgrown partying at the club, but Angelo and Dylan have always talked about you like you’re friends.”
Rhys didn’t feel like dissecting his non-relationship with Angelo for the millionth time. He sighed. “It’s hard to explain.”
“Try.”
“Why? So you can tell me I’m emotionally stunted?”
“I’ve never said that.”
Harry’s tone was mild, but Rhys caught the hurt. Always did. “I know. It’s me that thinks that. Or, at least, I did until I met them.”
“And you wanted more than just sex?”
“No. I just hated seeing them so happy. Before them, and you and Joe, I’d never seen blokes look at each other like that.”
“Why would you when your only social interactions are in sex clubs and hook-up joints?”
Rhys winced. “Brutal.”
“And true. But when it comes to Angelo and Dylan, I get it. I was so jealous when I first saw them together, lonely, too. I thought it was such a rare thing that it couldn’t possibly happen for me.”
“Yeah, yeah. Then you met Joe and lived happily ever after. I get it, bro. You don’t have to sing me a song.”
“Andyoudon’t have to pretend you’re okay when you’re not. Do you know how much it hurt to hear Dylan telling Angelo how worried he’s been about you these last few months? To know you’ve been unhappy and I can’t do a damn thing about it because you just won’ttalkto me? Jesus, Rhys, I—” Harry broke off with a frustrated sigh. “Look, I miss you, okay? Nothing else really matters anymore.”
Rhys dropped heavily onto the couch, his sleepless night catching up with him. “I miss you too.”
“What are you doing for Christmas? Do you have to work this year?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen December’s rota yet.”
“If you don’t... come down, please? Maybe you can bring your, uh, new friend with you?”
That woke Rhys up. Somehow he’d clean forgotten that even Angelo was bound to have remembered Jevon and mentioned him to Harry. Not to mention Joe.
Rhys’s brain swam with images of Jevon as he’d last seen him, smiling and waving from Angelo’s doorstep before he’d turned away to do a man he’d just met a fraternal solid. Then he pictured them together at Joe’s big table, enduring a rowdy Christmas. A real one.Right. ’Cause life’s just that kind.“I’ll let you know.”
“Do it. Oh, and Rhys?”
“Yeah?”
“Just so you know, Joe gave me hell for not telling you about Angelo and Dylan, even though he knew I couldn’t. Reckons I could’ve told Angelo and let him deal with it, but there’s a reason I didn’t do that.”
“It’d better be a good one.”
“It is—it was because you’re my brother, and there’s no way you were going to hear that shit from anyone but me, even if it did take two years and a crisis to make it happen. I love you, man.”
“I know that.”
“Good.”
