26
Oscar’s heart lurched as he saw Ryan’s car driving away, Finn still standing in their makeshift parking lot watching it go.
Dammit.
“Dammit,” he said aloud, breaking into a run just as Ryan passed the gate with the sign above it, swinging gently in the breeze.
He’d never catch up. Ryan wasn’t exactly speeding off into the sunset, but Oscar also wasn’t exactly the fittest man in the world.
A thousand times, he’d planned to take up running. If he’d done that, maybe he wouldn’t already be out of breath after making it maybe fifty yards.
His lungs burned as he forced his legs to move under him, as fast as he could go, the distance between him and Ryan’s car increasing even as he sped up.
Dammit, dammit,dammit.
He was going to lose Ryan because he’d been a handful of seconds too slow.
“Hey,” he called, though he wasn’t sure that was helping his out-of-breath situation at all.
An alligator watched him pass from where it was sunbathing by the side of the road.
“Ryan,” he shouted, chest tight. He couldn’t keep this up for much longer.
Maybe he’d collapse. Maybe the alligator would take pity and eat him.
When Ryan’s car finally stopped, Oscar thought for a second that he was seeing things. The driver’s-side door opening told him he wasn’t, and that little sliver of hope was just enough to give him another burst of energy, underused muscles protesting at the exertion.
The pain didn’t matter, though. All that mattered was that Ryan was stepping out of the car. That he wasn’t leaving anymore, not right now, and that meant Oscar had a chance to convince him to stay.
“There’s an alligator,” he called out when Ryan looked at him.
Ryan glanced at the alligator—now a solid twenty yards away—and then shrugged.
Shrugged.
He wouldn’t have done that a week ago. He would have gotten back in the car, Oscar was sure.
He was being brave.
Which meant Oscar could be brave, too.
Oscar crashed into Ryan’s chest, panting for breath even as he curled his hand around the back of Ryan’s neck and pulled him in for a kiss. He moaned at the contact, relief washing over him.
“Don’t leave,” he murmured against Ryan’s lips, brushing their noses together and then sealing their lips again for another kiss, biting at Ryan’s bottom lip, squeezing the back of his neck. Clinging to him, in every way he could, physically stopping him from going anywhere.
He couldn’t handle the thought of losing this man who meant so much to him. Who he’d fallen in love with. Not for anything, and definitely not over one fight.
Ryan was worth more to him than that.
“Don’t leave,” he repeated. “Please don’t leave me.”
“I’m sorry,” Ryan said, and Oscar’s heart sank. He was leaving anyway. He was…
“For everything,” he continued. “For overreacting, for not telling you when the settlement came through, for not giving you the benefit of the doubt. All of it. I can’t take it back, but… if you don’t want me to go…”
“I don’t,” Oscar interrupted. “I don’t ever want you to go.”
A broad smile lit up Ryan’s handsome face, childlike joy written all over it. “Then I won’t.”
