“Sorry, but you’re the one who asked the pastor’s wife if she wanted to see the Statue of Liberty.”
The poor woman had apparently said it was a sight she’d always wanted to see and Gabe lay down in the middle of the living room and tugged at his Vienna sausage.
“I swear, if you ever tell anyone, I’ll be forced to retaliate by telling them about the time you yelled out that you were sucking your sausage in the middle of Easter brunch.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“I would.”
“Dang, you’re savage.”
“I know.”
“Okay, so now that we got that out of our systems, are you gonna tell me about this clandestine meeting?”
“Promise you won’t get pissed?” He seemed anxious, like he honestly thought I might be upset with him for having a social life.
“Unless you were at an orgy or sacrificing little humans, I’m pretty sure I’ll deal.”
“Okay… so… we…,” he stammered. I grabbed his hand and pulled him around into my lap. We probably looked ridiculous since he had a few inches on me, but it felt right. He held me when I was upset; now it was my turn to return the favor. “He was on his way to an LGBTQ Alliance meeting and asked if I’d go with him.”
“As moral support.” I repeated his words from earlier, wanting to know what his role at this meeting was.
“Well, that too, but he sort of…. Trev, don’t get pissed, but he knows about us.”
“You told him?”
“No. He?—uh?—apparently even though the walls are cinder block, it doesn’t dampen all the sound.” His entire face turned beet red and he couldn’t look at me.
My heart threatened to beat out of my chest, but this wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Close, but not quite. And I didn’t picture Seth as the type who’d blab our personal business.
“You weren’t worried about the meeting, were you?” Gabe shook his head. “You were worried I’d be upset that you’re not locking your closet door?” He nodded. “Oh babe, I’m sorry. This is another one of those talks we should’ve had sooner. I don’t want you feeling like a dirty little secret.”
“I don’t.” I clamped my hand over his mouth. Now it was my turn to speak. I needed to clear the air fully between us.
“Listen to me,” I demanded. Gabe stirred at the deep, commanding tone of my voice. It wasn’t the sort of play we got into, but I filed that knowledge away for future reference. “You know why I’m not ready to be out. I know it shouldn’t matter down here because no one knows us, but I can’t stop worrying that we’ll run into someone from high school, andthey’llknow. I’m trying, you know that.”
“I do,” he agreed. “And I really don’t want to drag you out with me, but being out isn’t just about being in a relationship. It’s part of who we are at our core.”
“The other issue is, once I’m out I know I’m not going to want to hide away when we’re around family. I do want to get to the point where I can tell everyone how much you mean to me, but I’m not there yet. That doesn’t mean I want you to stay completely hidden too. I want you to live your life, and if an LGBT club is where you find your tribe, so be it.”
“You’re really okay with this?” He finally looked up at me with hope in his eyes.
“Yeah, I am. There may be times I tweak about stuff, but as long as you’re not telling people certain details, I’ll try and play it cool.”
Gabe got off my lap and held out a hand to me. “Does that mean we can go to bed? It’s been an exhausting day.”
“Yeah, I’m beat. I keep waiting for the day when I’m treading water instead of drowning, but I’m sure that’ll come next semester. Maybe.” I followed Gabe into our room and changed for bed while he grabbed his shower caddy. As tempting as it was to take another shared shower, the rest of the guys would be home before long, and it seemed we already had issues with someone being quiet.
By the time he got out of the shower, I was falling asleep while trying to read my assignment for tomorrow’s lecture. He took the book out of my hands and carefully placed it over the arm of the smelly chair so I wouldn’t lose my place. When he returned, he carefully took off my glasses and set them on the nightstand. He climbed into the bed, pushing me closer to the wall. “Next year, we convince the ’rents to let us get a place of our own. I can’t keep doing this twin bed bullshit.”
“Could we not talk about them while your dick is nestled against my butt?” I still wasn’t comfortable with the number of lies we were telling our parents.
“Deal,” he agreed. Gabe pulled my body closer to his, holding me tight, as though he was afraid I’d disappear if he dared to let go. He kissed the back of my head, allowing his fingers to trace patterns across my stomach.
“You sleepy?” He asked, his husky voice making me aware he had other ideas than closing our eyes for the night.
“I could be persuaded to wake up.” It’d been a long day in a painful string of long days, but I wasn’t going to say no to whatever Gabe was suggesting. We’d been toeing ever closer to having what I thought of as “real sex” and I realized holding ourselves back might be part of the reason we both felt so much uncertainty about what was going on between us.
