His brows pull together. “Luke, that’s not fair?—”
“Then whatisit?” I snap. “You’ve got ‘plans’? What kind of plans? A date? A secret second hookup? Don’t worry, Igetthe dynamic—Coach-slash-closeted hookup doesn’t have time for the guy who sleeps in his bed and tries really fucking hard not to ask for more.”
He flinches.
Good. Because I’m already drowning in it.
His voice drops low. “I just have something I need to do. Something important. A friend I’ve been putting off visiting since we’ve been seeing each other.”
A friend. Afriend.
Jealousy slices through me before I can stop it. “What friend?
He hesitates. Doesn’t answer, as if he’s weighing whether I deserve to know.
He shakes his head. “No one you need to worry about.”
And just like that, something in mesnaps. Tears I didn’t agree to sting my eyes again, hotter this time.Fuck, no. Not here.I turn my face, swipe them away fast and vicious.
“Hey—hey, no,” Silas says quickly, stepping into my space. His voice drops, loses that clipped coach edge entirely. “Luke, look at me. Don’t cry.”
“I’m not,” I lie, breath hitching. I keep my gaze locked on the metal bleacher rail as if it personally offended me. “I’m fine.”
He reaches up anyway, fingers hovering near my jaw as though he’s not sure he’s allowed to touch me here. “You’re not fine.”
“Congrats,” I mutter. “You cracked the code.”
“Luke.” My name sounds different on his tongue now. Softer. Regretful. “It’s not what you think.”
I laugh, sharp and humorless. “People always say that right before it is.”
He exhales, long and heavy, like he’s been carrying this all day and finally ran out of places to put it.
“It’s Xavier,” he says quietly.
The world tilts.
“Oh,” I whisper.
Of course it is.
Xavier.
The name he messaged me late one night and spoke about another night, voice rough and raw in the dark. The name that lived in the space between us whenever Silas went quiet, whenever his eyes went distant as though he was somewhere else entirely.
The man he loved.
The man he lost.
The man I’ve never competed with, because you don’t compete with ghosts.
“I should’ve told you,” Silas says. “I just… I haven’t gone in weeks. And it’s been eating at me. I can’t keep ignoring that part of my life because I’m happy now.”
I nod, because that makes sense.
“So,” I say carefully, swallowing around the lump in my throat, “when you said you had plans…”
“I’m going to see him,” he finishes. “Today.”
