ONE
REX
All through college,Bennett’s diner had been a staple for me. A steady presence in my life, offering bottomless coffee and an owner who didn’t care if you stayed til closing to study. And it didn’t hurt my feelings that they served waffles all day. The fact I hadn’t been there in a couple years made me stop and think that maybe I was too busy. Maybe I was prioritizing the wrong things in life. I mean, what could be more important than waffles?
But today my streak ended, and I walked into Bennett’s, relieved to see that Ethan still owned it, and found a booth next to one of the windows. My brother and his fiancé had yet to arrive, which meant I got a few minutes to breathe.
Nigel was our parents' golden child. He was the miracle baby. The baby that Mom didn’t even know she was carrying until she went into labor. Most of the time, I think it was their guilt over not being ready or really into having another kid that propelled him into the golden child status. Nigel was ten years youngerthan me and despite being spoiled rotten, he’d turned out not half bad.
I’d paved the way for Nigel to get whatever he wanted from them. I went to school and became a veterinarian. My success put a feather in their cap, and not long after I opened my own practice, Mom started in on the whole “when are you going to get married and give me grandbabies” talk.
Reminding her that I was gay, had come out to her when I started college and had even introduced one of my boyfriends to her, seemed to have escaped her attention. She waved me off and said she thought it was a phase, and then said that plenty of gay men married women and had children.
I almost missed those conversations with her.
Nigel, on the other hand, came out when he was twelve, and it had been met with approval for being so brave at such a young age. As happy as I had been for him, sometimes I secretly hated how easily things came to him.
Case in point, I was here today to meet his fiancé. A man he’d only been seeing for a matter of months, but according to Nigel, he’d known right from the minute they met that this was the one. I’d have loved to have his luck, sometimes. To have something amazing fall into my lap they way things seemed to fall into Nigel’s.
I loved my brother. It wasn’t his fault that I sometimes wanted to take a cheese grater to his perfect face. I blamed Mom and the way she’d always treated Nigel like the golden child. I didn’t actually resent him, though. Only in flashes that were quickly snuffed out.
The door of Bennett’s jingled when it opened and my gaze lifted from the cup of coffee that had magically appeared in front of me. Nigel, my little brother, wasn’t so little. I wasn’t exactly small, but Nigel was a bear of a man. Broad shoulders, gianthands. Thighs that could squash a watermelon. He had the video to prove it.
The man that followed him inside was far, far smaller… and somewhat familiar.
Oh, holy fucking shit.
If I could go back in time, I’d go to the part of my life when I’d met the man who was hanging off my brother’s arm and I’d walk the other way. I wouldn’t have dated him. Had sex with him. Lied when I said it was fine that he wasn’t feeling it and just wanted to be friends. Or maybe I’d still have done all that, but I’d have introduced him to my family so that Nigel would’ve known that, once upon a time, I’d been in a relationship with his fiancé.
Trevor and I met when he’d been working as a dog walker. One of his doggy clients had gotten bit by another dog—not one of his client’s dogs—and rushed it to my office to be seen.
Looking back, there was no way Trevor and I would have ever worked out. We were simply too different, and not in ways that were cute or compatible. His love of trashy reality TV shows drove me off the deep end, and my love of my work drove him equally insane. He hated my hours. My dedication to my job. He hated that I’d rush down on a weekend if someone’s pet got sick and they couldn’t get in anywhere else.
It wasn’t a surprise when he dumped me, but it had fucking hurt. Trevor had been my longest relationship, and though I hadn’t introduced him to my family, I’d been delusional enough to think that one day I might want to.
I stood when Nigel approached the booth and let him crush me against him in a hug. “It’s been too long, Rex. Seriously, you’re such a fucking hermit.”
Nigel clapped me on the back, and I stifled a grimace.
“Sorry, you know me. All work and no play.” My gaze cut to Trevor whose expression shuffled through a thousand differentemotions, and I wondered for half a second if maybe Nigel knew about my past with his new fiancé after all.
“Rex, this is Trevor. Trevor, this is my big brother, Rex.”
Well, that answered that question.
Trevor thrust his hand out to shake mine, and he plastered on a wide, fake, customer service smile. “It’s so good to finally meet you.”
His eyes pleaded with me, begged me to go along with his lie. I shouldn’t have done it. I should have come clean to Nigel right then and there. But what was the point? I didn’t want to risk causing problems for them over someone I used to know.
I squeezed Trevor’s hand a little harder than strictly necessary, but I pasted on my biggest, best smile and went along with his lie. “It’s good to meet you too. Nigel hasn’t said much about you, but that’s only because I’m impossible to get in touch with if you don’t have four furry legs.”
Trevor’s smile tightened, and I counted that as a win.
They took the seat across from me and again I found myself despising Nigel a little. Was it his fault that he ended up with one of my exes? Not really, no. Especially since I kept my personal life far away from my family. Nothing I ever did was good enough for my parents, so that’s what I gave them—nothing. I sometimes made an appearance at holiday dinners. I usually called on their birthdays and their anniversary, but other than that, I stayed away, and my lack of openness had naturally extended to Nigel.
I don’t think he ever understood that we’d had two very different upbringings. But none of it was actually his fault, and when I remembered that, I could also remember that I loved my little brother.
“So, when’s the wedding?” I asked, flipping open a menu as if I didn’t already know that I was going to get the waffles.
