Page 97 of We Are Just Us

They sat for a while, watching the landscape shimmer in the heat, the desert sprawling out below them, the dogs dozing nearby.

TWENTY-NINE

The sun was starting its slow descent when they made their way back to camp.

The light had shifted, still bright, but softer now, golden instead of white-hot. It painted everything in warmer tones, made the rocks glow amber, and turned the Joshua trees into silhouettes against a sky beginning to blush pink.

Rory knelt by the fire pit, arranging kindling with focused precision. He struck a match and it caught, flames licking up through the structure.

Kieran watched him work, then turned his attention to the cooler. He pulled out the fish, the buns, and the vegetables he’d optimistically purchased.

This is normal.

Two people. A campsite. Food that would probably be mediocre at best. Two dogs sprawled in the shade. The crackle of a fire coming to life.

Rory stood, brushing dirt from his knees, and walked over to where Kieran stood.

“You going to cook or just stand there looking domestic?” Rory asked.

“I’m manifesting competence,” Kieran replied.

“How’s that working out?”

“Poorly.”

Rory laughed. He moved closer. “We don’t have to eat yet.”

Kieran looked up at him. “No?”

“No.” Rory’s hand came up, fingers brushing along Kieran’s jaw. “We’ve got time.”

The fire popped behind them. Kieran’s pulse kicked hard in his throat.

Rory kissed him, slow at first, then deeper, his hand sliding to the back of Kieran’s neck.

Kieran leaned into it, his own hands finding the warmth of Rory’s bare chest.

When they broke apart, both breathing harder, Kieran glanced toward the tent.

“Inside?” he asked.

Rory shook his head. “Too small. There’s more room in the back of my truck.”

He ducked into the tent and came back with the sleeping bags bundled in his arms. Kieran watched as he tossed them into the bed of the Tacoma, spreading them out to cover the metal.

“Get in,” Rory said.

Kieran climbed up into the truck bed, and Rory followed, pulling the tailgate closed behind them.

The sleeping bags were soft against Kieran’s back, smelling of sun-baked canvas and cedar dust, the rigid lines of the metal beneath. He inhaled the scent of the hot truck bed, dust, and Rory’s clean sweat. The sky stretched endless above them, pale blue fading toward gold at the edges, without a single cloud. The Joshua trees stood silent around them like strange witnesses.

They were completely exposed. Anyone could see them, if anyone were here.

No one was.

Kieran had never done anything like this before. Never been this bare, this open, this visible under an endless sky. His whole life he’d kept everything hidden—his desires, his body, his wants. Sex had always been behind closed doors, in dark rooms, under covers. Safe. Contained. Secret.

And now here he was, in the back of a truck in the middle of the desert, about to let Rory take him apart with nothing between them and the heavens.