“Sorry,” Cade said, but he didn’t sound sorry at all. “I didn’t want you to worry.”
“It’s my job to worry about you. You know that,” Caleb told him. “Look, they only gave me a few minutes with the radio. Said we could keep your spirits up but then we have to go.”
“I get it,” Cade said. The sadness in his voice made me want to wrap my arms around him, but I held back. Maybe I could have held him a couple of days ago out of spontaneity, but now we were having sex – and only sex. I didn’t know if he would appreciate that kind of intimate gesture or get stressed out that maybe Caleb would somehow be able to tell. I wasn’t going to risk it, either way.
“Mom’s on her way here,” Caleb said. “I don’t know if they’ll let her speak to you, but she’s coming. She’ll be here waiting for you to come out.”
“Oh, god,” Cade said. He sniffled and rubbed the palm of his hand over his nose. “Don’t. Tell her to go home. I can’t.”
“I’ll get her to stay in a hotel,” Caleb said, gentle but firm. “I won’t let her stand around out here all day. But when you’re out, she’s going to want to see you.”
“Okay,” Cade said, his voice cracking slightly. “Okay. You better go.”
“I’m passing the radio over,” Caleb replied. “Love you, bro.”
Cade didn’t reply. He just put the radio down and sniffed again. I wanted to hug him so badly, to get him to rest his head on my shoulder and cry if he needed to. I wanted to tell him it was alright.
“Thorny?”
I jerked my head around to look at the radio, then grabbed it off the table. “Harvey? That you?”
“Yeah,” Oliver Harvey replied. “How’s it going in there?”
“You mean to tell me Cade got his big brother and his Mom to tell him how loved he is, and I just got you?” I asked. I knew it sounded offensive, and I also knew Harvey wouldn’t take it that way. We’d played together long enough now. He knew when I was joking to hide what I was really going through.
And he would know that underneath the question, I actually was a little hurt that I didn’t have anyone there to speak to me.
“It’s not their fault,” Harvey said. “Your folks have been here since yesterday. Team can’t let them on the site. We’re only passing through.”
I nodded. Well, that made me feel better at least. “They’re really here?”
“Local town,” Harvey replied, his usual self: as few words as possible to get the message across.
“Alright.” I nodded to myself. “Well, tell them I’m doing fine.”
“I will.” Harvey paused. “Hang in there.”
Well, that was just about as good a pep talk as you could expect from Oliver Harvey. “I will, man. I mean it. Thanks. Means a lot to know you guys are safe.”
“We’ll see you guys soon,” Caleb said quickly. In the background, I could just about make out someone telling him to put the radio down.
“Bye, Caleb,” Cade said hurriedly as I thrust the radio in his direction.
There wasn’t a reply.
They were gone.
But they had left behind hope: things were going to be okay.
A hope that chilled me to the bone.
Because it meant all of this was going to be over soon.
Cade
I woke up nestled in Aiden’s arms, and for a second everything in the world actually felt right.
That was messed up, wasn’t it? I woke up under who knew how many feet of snow, far away from my friends and family, my aspirations and dreams, in the arms of a straight man – and it felt better than any morning I could remember.
