Wait.
Wait.
I don't know if Ian kept talking after dropping that on me, and I can't claw my attention back.
Ian is bisexual.
Ian likes guys too.
Ian and his kind eyes and fluffy hair and charming smile and bulging arms and his everything…likes guys too.
Ian, who's been hugging and comforting me for the past five minutes like I'm his best friend, likes guys too.
And now he’s shuffling backward, the absence of his touch almost painful. But necessary. Under any other circumstances, he would be safe. He'd be finewith me.
But not when he's afriendwhoI'm living with.Not when he's him and I'm me.
Sure, he likes guys, but there are a lot of guys. I'm one, and I'm a basket case.
“That’s not a problem, is it?” he asks, crossing his arms and resting against the opposite arm of the couch, twisting his fingers in a throw blanket. “Sorry, I probably should have told you before you moved in?—”
I shake my head faster than I need to. “No! Not at all. Absolutely not a problem whatsoever. That’s cool. I’m cool with that. So cool.”
What's not cool right now isme, and it’s not like I can help myself.
“I don’t think I’ve met a gay guy before,” I continue.
Other than myself.
“Bi,” he corrects, and I mentally kick myself. “I mean, I lean toward men for the most part, I’m still way too into chicks for my own good.”
He probably means that as a joke, so I laugh, trying not to show that I'm still hung up on the fact that Ian's into men, too.
That fact changes everything and nothing.
Everything, because we have something else in common.
Nothing, because Iwantto do something with that fact, but I absolutely, one hundred percent can't.
“Sorry. I'm not good with all the terms and such,” I say. “Small town, remember?”
“No problem. I get it.” Ian pauses, pursing his lips. “Did you ever, like, contemplate not being straight? I can't imagine it was even presented as an option for you.”
My mouth hangs open. That’s an invitation. He wants to know if I’m not straight.
“You don't have to answer if you don't want to,” he rushes to say. “No big deal.”
It's a huge deal. I want to tell him. I want him to know, butunlike him revealing it to me, everything between us actuallywillchange if I do so as well.
It'd be so much harder to hide my inappropriate, one-sided crush.
My heart is in my throat as I gulp down the rest of the beer in front of me. “No. I never thought about it.”
That's not a complete lie—I didn't have tothinkabout liking guys; it simplywas.There was a crap ton of denial on my part, so thatcouldcount as thinking, but getting lost in the underwear aisle at the supermarket when I was twelve served as all the confirmation I needed, even if I didn't acknowledge it for years.
That, and Mr. Crofton’s tight polos.
I shove the thought aside, not wanting to go back to that dark time in my life.
