We strolled down the sidewalk with Noel leading the way. When we turned the corner at the end of the road, we reached the hiking trails. I pulled Alex’s hand from his pocket and linked our fingers, needing some kind of connection. There were definitely moments that this still felt like a dream. I worried someone would pinch me and I’d wake up to realize Alex had just been a figment of my imagination. Touching him just made it… real.
“It’s so beautiful today. Better than all the rain we’ve been having.”
“Yeah. Everything smells so fresh.”
“Wasn’t it in Spokane?” I asked.
He paused a beat before answering. “No. We lived in an apartment downtown, and Grant wasn’t too thrilled with the outdoors.”
Grant.So that was his ex’s name. He hadn’t mentioned it until now. I almost didn’t like knowing it because having a name made it easier to imagine what the jerkwad looked like. He was probably tall, with dark blond hair and green eyes. And he probably wore thin metal glasses too to make him look more sophisticated.
“He was a journalist for The Spokesman-Review,” Alex said, surprising me. “So he was the kind of guy who liked being the hustle and bustle, you know. Always looking for the next big piece of gossip.”
I squeezed his hand. “What did you do when you lived there?”
He shrugged. “Bounced between jobs mostly. I’m originally from a smaller city near the coast, about an hour north of Seattle. But after my dad died, I just couldn’t take it there anymore and needed to get away. So I moved to Spokane to be with a friend who was attending Gongaza University. That’s how I met Grant. Friend-of-a-friend kind of thing.”
I waited, hoping he’d say more. I’d been anxious to hear about his past, and I didn’t want to say the wrong thing and make his walls go up again.
“Honestly, Vaughn, I knew I wasn’t in the best place when we started seeing each other. I was still grieving my dad, and Grant just… well, I think he numbed that pain in some ways.”
“How so?”
“My grief had made it next to impossible for me to function really. Making choices on my own seemed impossible. There were some days I couldn’t even decide what I wanted to eat for breakfast. Austin, that was my roommate, used to get so frustrated with me because sometimes I’d leave half-eaten toast right next to a half-eaten bowl of cereal before heading out to work. I switched between meals because nothing satisfied me. Or worse, I’d end up eating nothing at all. I just couldn’t do it, you know? My mind was too fuzzy.”
“And Grant helped clear that?” My voice cracked on his name, tasting like bitter ash on my tongue.
Alex squeezed my hand, letting me know he’d picked up on my discomfort. “He started to make those decisions for me. Telling me what I’d eat or wear. He even told me to quit my job when I was mad at my boss because he said I didn’t need that stress. I was too blind and numb to figure shit out on my own back then, so I just went with it. Believing everything he said.” He shook his head. “It was easier, you know, following him around. It meant I didn’t have to deal with what I was going through.”
“I get that,” I said. “Bri was kind of the same way after a bad breakup a few years ago. She came out of it pretty quick, thankfully, but it was rough. Mom almost moved back from Newport to help her.”
“Newport?” he asked. “As in Newport, Oregon?”
“Yeah. She has a condo there.”
“I love that city. I used to go there with my dad every summer.”
“Really? You should come when Bri and I go visit her in a few weeks.”
Alex didn’t react or even look at me, and I wondered if I’d pushed him too far. We’d been careful not to talk about our future or make plans that were too far ahead, mostly because everything about us seemed to revolve around Roxy’s recovery. But after we’d turned around a bend in the path, Alex said in a quiet voice, “I think I’d like that.”
A rush of relief went through me, and I had to work to contain my excitement. “No pressure. Just know you’re welcome to if you want. Mom has plenty of room. Or… or we could share a room too. She’d be okay with that.”
That had him turning his head to look at me, a mix of confusion and joy in his face. “She’s pretty supportive, then?”
“Oh, definitely. She knew I had a crush on a boy long before I did. She and Bri used to encourage me to go talk to him. Of course, I also had a crush on that boy’s sister, which is why I was so confused about things, sooo… yeah, talk about awkward.”
Alex burst out laughing. “She sounds great. A lot like my dad was.”
I wanted to hear more about his dad, but I also wanted to know more about Grant and how the guy had gone from being Alex’s sorta support beam to total asswipe.
Alex heaved a sigh. “Anyway, Grant and I were together for about two years. He moved in with Austin and me only a few months after we started dating, and completely took over our lease when Austin decided to move out. I didn’t care because it was just one less thing for me to worry about, you know?”
“When did things start to change?”
Roxy squirmed in the sling, barking at something she saw up ahead. Alex quickly wrapped an arm around her to keep her steady.
“My… depression, I guess it was, had started to seep into my work. I told you I switched jobs. That’s partly because I couldn’t hold on to one very long. I think I had”—he stopped to think, counting something off on his fingers—"six jobs in those two years we were together. Yeah, six. And the last one was the hardest. I worked at a retailer in the mall during Christmas, and you know how shoppers are. They expect us to be all… happy and smiley during the Christmas season. I just couldn’t, though. I still had that dark cloud over me. So it was hard to bring the holiday spirit into it. I finally lost that job a couple of weeks before Christmas.”
