Chapter 26
Hilliard
The days following their meeting with Ezra passed surprisingly fast. By the middle of their final week of filming, Hilliard had seen the inside of a recording booth more than he’d seen the sun. They needed voiceover audio for the backlot scenes shot from a distance and several of the action moments. Fortunately, he found the work enjoyable. It wasn’t something he’d done a lot of playing minor roles.
The challenge came afterward, when he wanted nothing more than to go home and find the easy companionship he’d grown accustomed to with Monty. Instead, the closer they’d gotten to the end of filming, the more irritable his friend had become. He was extra sarcastic and snippy with his words. Hilliard worried Monty would become distant next, choosing to sit in a chair rather than sharing the sofa or returning to the guest room instead of sleeping in Hilliard’s bed for their last few nights together.
They’d been intimate, but Hilliard couldn’t help but notice how each time felt a little frantic; a little frightened. It was as though Monty couldn’t focus on the special moments they did share because he was too preoccupied thinking about the ones they wouldn’t get once he left. He’d even said as much one night, apologizing for his lack of focus. Hilliard assured him it was all right.
Though, despite all of Hilliard’s efforts to be supportive and encouraging, it only seemed to make things worse. Monty was hurting. He didn’t want to talk about life “going back to normal.” He avoided the topic whenever possible. At first, Hilliard thought it was because Monty was scared that he’d return to his old ways, or that he wouldn’t be taken care of any more once he left. But he could only ignore what the magic in his own vulnerable heart was telling him for so long.
So that night after Monty fell asleep in his arms, Hilliard allowed himself to feel. He searched for the pain. It was there, but only in the way a box is wrapped in thin paper to dress the present underneath. And beneath the pain, there was love. Strong, reaching, desperate affection that pierced Hilliard like an arrow.
Hilliard knew Monty loved him. But to feel it in such a big way nearly brought him to tears there in the dark. It was undeniable–his dearest friend loved him as more than what Joan Dupree had written in her article. Loved him enough for brunch dates, and kissing in public, and there was only one thing to do. He just had to decide the best way to do it.
“I received a letter from home,” Hilliard said as casually as he could, using his toes to keep his chair rocking in a slow, steady rhythm. It was Thursday evening; possibly one of the most somber Hilliard could recall. Director Chen and the studio were finished with them two days earlier than they’d anticipated. News like that called for pimento cheese sandwiches and sweet iced tea on the porch.
“Oh?” Monty asked. He’d been staring detachedly into the middle distance for nearly half an hour as they ate. “My folks usually only write to tell me about marriages, births, and deaths,” he grumbled.
“It seems word about our situation has finally reached Momma.”
That got Monty’s attention. “Our situation?”
Hilliard tilted his head sideways toward the house before taking a sip of tea.
Monty grunted his understanding, expression falling back into something far too dejected for Hilliard’s heart to handle.
“Are you going to tell her about your success in reorienting poor Monty Kincaid? How you rescued him like an injured bird and nursed him back to health, ready to be set free again?”
Hilliard’s brows went up at the comparison. It was more raw and emotional than anything Monty had said for days. A crack in the wall he’d put up the moment they left Ezra’s office.
“Augusta Burke is a sixty-seven-year-old woman from South Carolina. I cannot simply confirm that I’ve been living with another man for the past two months, for any reason, without her making grand assumptions,” Hilliard explained wearily. “She’ll either pester me about whether or not I can afford to live alone and begin asking me to move back home…” he said with the shadow of a grimace.
“Or?” Monty prompted.
“Or,” Hilliard echoed after a pause, “she will ask why I’m cohabitating and breaking her poor Southern heart.”
Monty scoffed. “Is she truly so old-fashioned?”
“Did I mention she’s an old woman from South Carolina?” Hilliard shook his head and gazed out across the lawn, his eyes pausing on each brilliant bloom. “I broke her heart when I told her I didn’t want to become a doctor like her and my sisters. I broke her heart when I moved to Los Angeles. I broke her heart when I told her I wasn’t going to marry Wesley, though I think that was mostly because she’d already started planning our springtime wedding.”
Monty was quiet for a long moment. Then he abandoned his chair to stand at the edge of the porch instead, shoulder propped against one of the thick white roof posts, hands shoved in his pockets.
“I suppose she’ll be relieved when you tell her it’s only for a couple more days,” he said into the calm of the evening.
Hilliard studied his slumped posture. He considered the melancholy in the tone of Monty’s reply. He reflected on how Monty’s grumpy mood had shown itself most in the moments that surrounded any reminder of his impending departure. He slowed his chair to a stop and took a steadying breath.
“It would be better for both of us if I told her our intentions are virtuous,” he tried with careful levity. “Only that our actions were made a little premature due to very important circumstances beyond our control.”
“That makes it sound like I knocked you up or something,” Monty said dryly. “I doubt that’s any improvement.”
Hilliard grinned at the prickly reply. He pushed himself to his feet and slowly walked the few steps to where Monty was. His hand found the shorter man’s popped hip and he rubbed it up and down a few times, setting his chin on Monty’s shoulder.
“I was thinking we could start a little slower than children,” he said quietly. “Perhaps a true courtship first. I may not be as bad as Momma, but I do hope to get married someday.”
The tension in Monty’s body was practically radiating off of him; shoulders tight, spine rigid, jaw set. It was a striking position, and Hilliard braced himself for the sardonic blow of a comeback he knew would follow.
“Don’t tease me,” Monty whispered pitifully.
