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Before Des could react to that, Marcus waved a hand. "I get it, but only because if Thomas needed a kidney, he'd probably feel the same way you do. I'm a stubborn, selfish bastard, myself. I'd want the chance to live. But since you're just a stubborn bastard, let's look at it this way. You believe in fate, destiny, powers bigger than yourself, magic, Harry Potter?"
Des arched a brow. "Religion?"
"What the hell does religion have to do with God?" Marcus snorted. "Let's just say for a minute you answered yes, which I'm sure you would, because you sit up on rooftops on your break to commune with something. And you love our girl, and you can't truly love someone without some kind of belief in a power bigger than yourself."
"My girl. Not yours."
Marcus showed his teeth in a Dom-eating feral grin. "She's yours when I decide you're not going to be a dumbass. Stop changing the subject. I need to run something by you. Give me your opinion on the odds of this hypothetical situation ever happening." He settled on the ladder as if it was a comfortable chair. Des gave him points for the deception, because he knew the aluminum rung had to be cutting into the guy's perfect ass.
"You meet a girl from New York, who came down here because Madison happens to be friends with her and happens to need help with her community theater. You fall in love with her, and she introduces you to her two best friends. All around the time your kidneys are about to give up the ghost."
"Sounds like a Murphy's Law kick in the teeth."
"I haven't reached the Twilight Zone punch line yet. Since Thomas met you, you've felt familiar to him. He's not the New Age type, so he's not talking past lives. It wasn't until we came home here and showed his mother that picture he took of you and Julie that we figured it out. You look like his aunt, Elaine's sister, Christine."
Des felt an odd lurch inside of him, which he immediately ignored. He had no idea where this was going, but it couldn't be going where it sounded like it was.
Marcus tossed him a look. "Still sitting? Good. Well, here we are at dinner, talking about the chances of two people looking like they're related who aren't, when Elaine tells us one of the dark Wilder family secrets. Christine was a prescription drug addict, who basically drifted through life until she died of an overdose. But one of the things she confided to her sister on one of her rare visits home was that she'd given up a baby and never told anyone about it."
That lurch became a precipitous dip in his chest, but Des set his jaw. "That doesn't mean anything."
"No. That in itself doesn't. But Thomas contacted Betty, who has your blood work on file. He had her do a DNA test, and your markers, or whatever they call them, line up. He's your cousin, Des. Your mother was his Aunt Christine."
The roofline wavered, the sun suddenly much brighter and hotter. Des curled his fingers around the roof's spine, for the first time in his life feeling like he was up way too high. He closed his eyes.
"Des?" Marcus's voice was sharp. "You okay? Shit, I knew I should have told you to come down."
"I said no. Not your fault. Yeah. I'm fine." Des opened his eyes, willing it to be a true statement. "This is bullshit. It's bullshit." His voice sounded hollow, like through a megaphone.
"Yeah, that would be my reaction. But let's trace our steps back to the Fate crap. What are the chances one of Julie's best friends ends up being your cousin? And it just so happens that cousin is probably going to be a great match for the kidney you need, and he wants to give it to you. Hell, he'd cut it out and hand it to you right now if I let him. That is a lot of 'just so happens'. You turn your back on that, I wouldn't blame the Powers-That-Be for skewering your ass with a lightning bolt right here, right now."
Des struggled past the unlikeliness of it all and focused on what he could handle thinking about. "You can't be fine with the person you love giving up an organ."
"It's not my choice, it's his. No matter my feelings, I'd be just as clueless as you if I ignored a coincidence so close to a divine miracle that for a moment I almost believed there was something greater than my own awesomeness."
Des clasped his arms around his knees, his jaw set. It was too soon, too...abrupt. Yet how else could something like that seem? The real problem was he'd fought this idea for so long, denied himself the option. True, he'd started giving it some more thought, though he hadn't revealed that to Julie. She and Betty had been wearing him down. Well, his desire to be around as long as he could for Julie, to make her happy...that was what had worn him down.
Marcus shot him a look. "You may not want to take up a spot on a donor list, but Thomas has a kidney he's willing to give to you and only you. Unlike you, he accepts this big cosmic mash-up."
"Have you told Julie any of this?" Des demanded.
"No. This was your decision, and we didn't want to get her hopes up if we were wrong about Thomas's match or your interest in it."
"If I decide not to do it?"
"Then she'll never hear it from us. I won't hurt her needlessly." Marcus gave him that hard look again. "But I hope you won't, either."
"What if something goes wrong with his other kidney? How're you going to feel about this conversation then?"
Marcus shook his head. "Is that what this is really all about? You'd prefer to die than to feel obligated to anyone? Refusing to be the receiver, ever, is a form of selfishness. It's called self-imposed martyrdom, and there's nothing more annoying. But, hey, if you decide to go that route, you'll b
e the proudest, most selfless guy in the whole cemetery. Julie's heart will still be broken."
Des clenched his fists and stared off at the sky, the drift of clouds, a sunset so deep in colors it made his eyes and chest hurt. "Fuck you."
"Yeah, I get that a lot. Not usually from straight guys, though."
Des shifted his glance at the creak of the ladder. Marcus had removed his shoes and stepped onto the roof. He made his way up the slope to Des. "Hell, those shingles are hot."
