By him.
By her.
By the fact that the two people who undo me most are standing within arm’s reach, breathing the same air, acting like this is normal.
It’s not.
Nothing about this is.
I focus on Vesper instead because she’s safer.Because loving her has always been allowed, even when it hurt.Even when it cost me sleep and sanity and seasons of my life I won’t get back.
She rinses her mouth, straightens, wipes her lips like she can scrub the moment away.Like she didn’t just scare the hell out of both of us.
“You’re hovering,” she says, pointing vaguely between Cally and me.“Both of you.Stop it.”
Cally laughs softly.“You puked and almost passed out.”
“Did not.”
“You threw up on the highway,” I say gently.“And again just now.You mentioned nausea earlier, and now I’m trying to piece it together.I have a feeling ‘two days’ is you minimizing it.”
“It’s recent.You’re just making nothing into a big deal.”
It’s a big fucking deal.This is in fact, personal.It’s wearing me down, because Cally leans closer to hand her the water, and when his arm brushes mine again—barely there, barely anything—my body reacts like it’s been waiting for permission it never got.
I hate that.
Loathe that my first instinct isn’t just to move away, but to imagine.
Him pressed too close in a locker room.
His mouth low at my ear, saying something he knows will piss me off, while he tries to turn me on.
I hate that my brain goes there so fast.Like it’s been pacing behind a door for years, waiting for the lock to slip.
That’s not me.
I don’t want men.
I don’t want him.That’s the lie I tell myself most often.
Because I did once.I wanted him and her.I not only fell in love with the girl, but also the boy.
Not sure why, but I did.It was just summers.I gave myself a chance to just let everything go, including the part that controls my life in ways that I know will make everyone around me accept me.I let them in and I let myself believe.
I loved him in glances that lasted too long.In the way my pulse reacted when he stepped too close.In the awareness that bloomed low and insistent whenever his laughter turned soft, whenever his confidence cracked just enough to show the boy underneath.
I let myself believe there was room for all of it.
For us.
Until we crossed the line.
The next morning, I woke up and remembered who I am.I survive by control.I was becoming a man who needed structure, boundaries, certainty.A man who knew exactly where lines existed and kept his feet planted on the correct side because stepping over them cost too much.
I told myself that wanting them both was a phase.That desire could be trained out of me like a bad habit.That I didn’t need that version of myself—the one who ached, who softened, who wanted to be undone.
Except Cally has never respected lines.
