A nicefamilyrestaurant my parents love. It’s perfect for the awkward conversations they like to have. You know the ones, ‘Come back to church, God loves all his children.’ ‘We love you, son, we just don’t love the sin.’ I’m sure the list could go on forever, just your standard judgmental parents trying to save their son from an eternity of burning in hell.
Daniel winces like I smacked him with a Bible.
“Christ. Chester’s? That place smells like overcooked meatloaf.”
“You say that as if it’s not the perfect backdrop for an intervention disguised as family dinner.”
He groans and hauls himself out of bed, heading toward the shared kitchenette. “I’ll make coffee. You shower before the holy water runs out.”
I salute him. “Yes, fake boyfriend.”
“Don’t forget to repent in there,” he calls over his shoulder. “We need you presentable for the judgment of the Lord and your parents.”
I laugh—dry and humorless—as I grab clean clothes andhead to the bathroom. “They should be honored I’m gracing Chester’s in anything besides leather and glitter.”
“That’s the spirit,” Daniel mutters, rattling around the cabinets. “But if I’m pretending to be your boyfriend, you better not come out looking like the after photo in a cautionary drug ad.”
I flip him off without looking back, shutting the bathroom door behind me.
The silence that settles after is deafening. Muffled sounds of coffee brewing. Daniel humming something off-key. And then?—
“Is Luke alive or…?” Will’s voice drifts in from the other side of the door, dry and amused.
“He’s showering off his bad decisions,” Daniel replies. “Should take a while.”
I roll my eyes, stripping out of my clothes and stepping into the shower. The water hisses as I crank the heat high enough to fog up the mirror and scald away the scent of tequila and smoke and Silas-fucking-Gray.
Because if I think about him—about what almost happened in that hallway—I might start unraveling.
And I’m not walking into family dinner carrying that kind of baggage.
Not when I’ve got Daniel playing fake boyfriend, Will hovering with concern masked as sarcasm, and parents who think glitter is the gateway drug to eternal damnation.
I kill the water and step out, toweling off just enough to not drip all over the floor. No time for styling, so I run the towel through my hair, leaving it damp and curling at the edges.
When I step back into the room, steam trailing behind me, Daniel looks up from where he’s lounging on my bed,coffee in hand. His eyes scan me like he’s evaluating a wine label.
“You know,” he says, voice casual, “you’re sort of sexy. In a twink apocalypse sort of way.”
I snort. “Glad to know I still do it for you, Dan. Maybe after dinner I’ll let you braid my hair and feed me grapes.”
Have we hooked up? Yeah. Once. We are not compatible to say the least. It was fumbly and the opposite of sexy. I do not need a repeat. We are better as friends and not the kind with benefits, no matter how much we flirt.
“Only if you cry again,” he deadpans, taking a slow sip.
I toss the towel over his face and swipe my phone from the nightstand. The screen lights up with the notifications stacked like a to-do list I’m not ready to deal with.
A single text from my mom hovers at the top.
Mom: Just confirming dinner is still 4pm. See you there, sweetheart.
I roll my eyes. Sweetheart, my ass. Last time I was her sweetheart, I hadn’t come out yet and still thought I might marry someone named Brittany.
The seven messages from Prism sit there. It doesn’t say who it’s from, just the little number 7 on the corner of the app now. But my stomach knows. My whole fucking body knows. There’s only one person it could be. Only one person I actually want it to be—and absolutely do not want it to be at the same time.
Silas.
I hover over it, thumb pausing mid-air. Nope. Not yet. I’m not in the mental space to see what Coach Gray has to say.
