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“Relationships end,” I said, quietly.

“I was thinking more that wrestlers age out of professional wrestling,” Jefferson countered. “And when you think about it, that’s the only certainty here.”

“He must’ve been so scared.”

Jefferson leaned back on his outstretched arms. “And angry, and confused, I bet. Talk about a fucking gamble.”

“It’s difficult to think of anything so important, to make that gamble feel worth it.”

He chuckled. “Nah, lil bro, it’s not.”

I swallowed past the lump in my throat. Knowing that Jefferson was correct, and frustrated at myself for needing to hear him say it before I could allow myself to believe it too.

“Do you think he’ll be different, when we’re back?”

Easier to shift the subject, even if I knew that was the coward’s option.

“Less of a hard-ass, you mean?” Jefferson laughed. “Dream on, dude.”

I smiled. “I think I’d be worried if he was. Some things, you need to be able to depend on them.”

He didn’t reply. Just reached out to pull me into the splay of his legs. My head resting on his chest, feeling its steady rise and fall. Both of us looking out of the open tent, into the sheer distance of space that was so terrifying if you thought about it too much.

Then again, there were things down on Earth which could be equally terrifying. If you let yourself dwell on them, anyway, or tried to force some sort of answer before it might be fully ready.

Jefferson’s arm across my chest felt grounding, as safe and as reassuring as a seatbelt. Only with a heat against my back that was impossible to ignore.

“We could zip our sleeping bags together, tonight,” I suggested, tentatively.

His chuckle rumbled through me.

“Feeling cuddly, lil bro?”

I blushed at the accusation.

“No, I just...”

“I’m only teasing, Eoin.” Jefferson’s voice solicitous, his arm squeezing me a little tighter as further punctuation. A grip I couldn’t help but wriggle further into. “You don’t have to feel embarrassed about asking me for things.”

There were, in that moment, so many things I could ask for. And so few words in me with which to ask them.

“I just thought it might get cold,” I said, instead. “And you always run hot.”

“For you, lil bro, red hot.”

“Come on,” I complained, but I was smiling when I said it. Somehow couldn’t stop myself from smiling, in fact.

Jefferson sat up, to better wrap both arms around me. Warming, reassuring, and more than a little bit intimidating, all at the same time.

I still didn’t have the words, but maybe - for a while, at least - I could get on without them. Not like Jefferson didn’t seem to always know what I was trying to say, even if I couldn’t figure out how to actually say it.

“We’d get bitten half to death by mosquitos if we left the door open all night, right?” I asked. Already knowing his answer, what the sensible thing to do was. And yet there was something about that sky, and the stars, and the vastness of the opportunities up there. So many possibilities that it made wishing for things down here, beneath that incredible vista, feel less outlandish, less ridiculous.

“I was planning on doing all the biting tonight, lil bro,” he teased, and leaned down to nip playfully at my neck.

“Jefferson!”

He laughed as I swatted at him, as I struggled against the iron grip of his hug, and then I was laughing along with him. Knowing we were being loud enough for the other guys to hear us - for Coach to hear, and Luke - and knowing, too, what they’d assume came after that playfulness. The trajectory of two friends, two teammates, who had found each other, and with that discovery a sense of belonging and brotherhood. A family, and the knowledge that accepting family means accepting you might not always appear your best in front of them, but knowing that they’ll treat you with grace, and kindness, and love all the same.