“They can’t know about us,” he finishes for me, and the words come out flat. A little angry.
“Mike—”
“No, it’s fine.” He takes a step back, and another, putting a distance between us that he’s never wanted before. “I get it.”
Something isn’t right. I stand up to follow him, and he turns around, pacing back and forth in front of the dresser. I watch him, waiting for whatever this is.
“Can I ask you something?” he says, still not looking at me.
“Yeah, of course.”
“What exactly is the plan?” He finally turns toward me. “Like, long term.” I open my mouth, but close it when he keeps talking.
“Because right now it looks like—” He laughs, but it doesn’t sound right. “It looks like I’m your big gay secret that you only want when it’s convenient for you.”
“That’s not what this is.”
“Isn’t it?” He finally looks at me, and his eyes aren’t shining anymore. They’re clear and direct, and whatever he’s feeling right now, I’ve never seen it before.
“Ryan says something to you, and you come home all freaked out. Pissed at me like it’smyfault. And now you won’t even—” He gestures at my suitcase. “I’m not allowed to meet your family because they’ll knowright away.”
“That’s not fair, Mike. You know I can’t—”
He crosses his arms. “Alex, I can promise you that people have come out in worse situations, and at some point—”
“At some point, what?” I can hear the defensiveness leaking into my own voice, and I can’t do a thing about it. “Do you think I’m choosing this?”
“I think,” he says, choosing every word carefully as he twists a blade into my heart. “that you’re using it as an excuse to never have to be brave.”
The room goes quiet.
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
“Isn’t it?” His voice cracks. “Because from where I’m standing, you’re perfectly happy being with me in private, but the second there’s a chance of someone knowing? Any chance of us beingreal? You shut down.”
“Wearereal.”
He stares at me for a long moment, his blue eyes piercing in a way I’m not used to. “Are we?”
“Mike—”
“I’ve been alone for most of my life,” he says, and his words scare me more than Jason’s anger ever did. “Iknowhow. I’m good at it.”
“But regardless of that, I still asked you, for once, to give mesomething, and—”
He stops and shakes his head, the tears in his eyes doing something terrible to my heart. “It doesn’t matter. Forget it.”
“Don’t do that—”
“I’m not doing anything.” He looks up at me, and the look on his face… “I’m just tired.”
He doesn’t wait for me to respond before he leaves the room, and I don’t know what I would even say. Something to stop him from going into his bedroom he hasn’t used in months, and shutting the door with a final click.
Mike doesn’t come to bed for the first time since that day in October when I told him he could always sleep here, sex or no sex.
I lie there staring at the ceiling for a long time, listening to the quiet of the house, and for anything that could be him. His half of the bed is cold. I keep reaching for him without thinking and finding nothing.
I don’t even know exactly what I did wrong.
