The Internet’s Most Haunted Influencer
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“Do you want to tell them?” he asked.
“Tell them what?”
“That your name’s Danny. That we found out who you were.” He looked at Leo. “And that you’re a hero.”
Leo frowned. “Why am I a hero?”
He sounded genuinely puzzled, which made Nate want to kiss him. That was getting to be an inconveniently frequent problem.
“Because you keep choosing love even when it’s hard. The world could use a bit more of that.”
Leo looked down at the laptop. “I don’t think that’s particularly heroic.”
“I do.”
“You might be biased.”
“I’m definitely biased. I’m still right.” Nate shifted toward him. “And you probably kept a lot of people safe here. How many people do you think decided to stay away because they were scared of you?”
Leo considered that. “I hope I scared away a lot of people. I hope I helped.”
Nate’s smile softened. “Tomorrow you’ll remember.”
Tomorrow, Leo would be able to tell him. About the people who’d lived here, about Walt, about the life he’d had before any of this. Nate wanted that for him.
He did.
And still…
Sitting here with Leo leaning close, a small pang of unease lingered.
Danny.
He tried to imagine calling him that. It should have been easy. It was only a name, and it belonged to the same man sitting beside him. But Walt had known Danny. Nate knew Leo. Tomorrow, years of memories would flood back to Leo.
Would they change the way he thought about himself?
The way he thought about Nate and the life he wanted?
Nate didn’t like entertaining those doubts, but he couldn’t quite banish them.
“We should wait until afterward,” Leo said.
Nate looked up. “What?”
“Before we tell everyone. I’d like to remember it all first.”
“Oh. Yeah. Of course.”
Leo studied him for a moment. “Are you tired?”
“A bit.”
“Then stop reading comments. Whoever wants to know about your faucets can survive until morning.”
Nate laughed and closed the laptop. He set it on the paint bucket, then got up to unroll his sleeping bag.
Leo watched him do it. “Why haven’t you set up a bedroom for yourself?”