“It was mine, you shouldn’t have eaten all of yours first. You still have some tuna.” I gesture towards the thinly sliced pieces of tuna still sitting on his plate.
“Yellowtail is my favorite though,” he groans and I chuckle. It’s always been his favorite. I prefer tuna, so when we were younger we would share plates.
I reach for his plate, gently grasping the glass chinaware and bring it over to my plate. I distribute the yellowtail pieces onto his plate, and take the tuna off his. Sitting it back in front of him, I wave my chopsticks at him. “Well, eat it.”
He stares at me, mouth slightly agape. The hint of his pink tongue pokes out and traces over his top teeth.
“What do you think, Jericho?” Rodney asks me, and I snap my attention away from Raiden and towards Rodney. Liam is staring at me and my face flames red with guilt.
“Sorry, I wasn’t listening.”
My dad chuckles and slaps Rodney on the back. “That means he agrees with me, like father like son. Right, Jericho?”
“Right dad,” I laugh, halfheartedly. Attempting to change the subject I tell him, “I finished putting the bolts under the carriage for you. I didn’t tighten them all the way in case you needed to make more modifications.”
“Hell yeah, thanks. I was planning on doing it after everyone left, but now that I don’t have to do that I have plenty of time to fu-”
“Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” my mom warns, pointing her finger directly at him. He smirks and the tuna I was eating threatens to make an appearance.
“Can you two not? Seriously, at the dinner table?” I pretendto gag and my mom’s face flushes. My dad has no care in the world though, if anything his smile gets wider.
“Jericho… How do you think you got here?”
“Nope, hell no. We are not having this conversation. Especially in front of other people. Mom gave me the detailed version of the birds and the bees talk when I was in, like, eighth grade.” I still remember sitting on the couch while my mom went through the full spiel. Looking back, it really didn’t do much good since I’m not attracted to girls. But it was helpful to know about condoms and the risk of STIs. There was no stone left unturned by the time she finished. And afterwards she took me to get ice cream and the conversation never got brought up again.
“Not the birds and the bees,” Raiden cackles and I cut my eyes to look at him. He shrugs his shoulders likeso what?Asshole. “My parents didn’t even give me that conversation. It's like they knew something I didn’t.” He cuts his eyes to his mom, quirking his eyebrow.
“Honey… The closet was glass,” she remarks easily, popping a rice ball in her mouth and chewing. Raiden makes an affronted noise and places his hand across his chest, clutching his non-existent pearls.
“Mother! How could you say that about your favorite child?”
“Only child.” Rodney pipes up before he smiles and dips his head down.
“Both of you!” Raiden gasps and grabs onto my wrist above the table. “Jer, help me out! Defend my honor or something.”
“There’s nothing to defend, honey. We knew the minute that you said, and I quote, ‘I’m going to marry that man one day’. And then proceeded to ask me to help you plan a wedding. You wanted a daisy flower crown and a pink suit. You would have been so handsome.”
Raiden has planned so many marriages in our friendship,but the one thing that has stayed constant since the first time I helped him plan his wedding to Chad Michael Murray was the need for a daisy flower crown and a pink suit. I want to ask him if he had that at his wedding with Josh. I wonder if it was everything he ever wanted, or if his vision fell flat when it was time to come to fruition.
“I was ten, mother, and I’m sure any other ten year old boy would have wanted to marry Frankie Muniz when they were my age.”
“I actually wanted to marry him as well,” Liam offers looking at Raiden. I don’t like him looking at Raiden like that. Like they’re sharing something I’m not privy to. Which is outrageous. Liam ismyboyfriend, I don’t have to worry about him leaving me for Raiden. I should take the conversation for what it is. A semblance of an olive branch, Liam is making an effort to be friends with Raiden because he knows about our tumultuous past and knows that I’m trying to make my friendship work with him.
The table goes back to their own conversations, while I sit in my seat. The overwhelming feeling of being alone while everyone else carries on. Like I’m not being pulled apart by the seams, my threads being stretched past their max and waiting for me to disintegrate.
A blast of thunder rattles outside, slightly shaking the foundation of the house. I jerk up quickly, realizing I left my bike uncovered in the driveway. “I’ll be right back.”
After I’m soaked to the bone and slightly shivering, I have my bike tucked neatly into the garage between the car my dad is working on and the wall. I wipe it down, making sure no rain water sits on it. I’ve worked too hard on this bike to let a little bit of rust ruin it. Not that it would ruin it, but I would be very disappointed in myself for letting it happen.
I dry my hands on a paper towel, the roll my mom keeps forback ups stored into herextrascloset. I’ll take it home with me when I leave and then she’ll never know it’s missing.
The door to the garage opens and I look over my shoulder to catch a glimpse of who came out here. If it's my dad, I can talk to him about looking at my muffler and seeing if we can change it out for something louder. It wouldn’t be anything too hard, but it's been a hot minute since we’ve worked on anything together.
It’s not my dad, it's Raiden. All of the air is sucked out of the space between us, growing smaller with every step he takes towards me. The storm outside crescendos, the sheets of rain beating against the earth in a restless tempo.
He stops right in front of me, close enough I can feel his breath puffing out with every exhale against my skin. I tilt my head down to look at him, into his dark brown eyes framed with even darker lashes. A bolt ofsomethingpasses through me. Something I refuse to name while myboyfriendsits inside with my parents.
“What are you doing?”Out here? Right now?
