Fuck, shit,fuck. “Oh, you know,” I say quickly, thinking on my feet. “Just contemplating how ridiculously unfair all ofthatis—” I gesture broadly to the front of him. It’s not a lie, but if he questions it, it can easily be explained away as mere jealousy instead of salacious ogling, “—and how that highway is starting to look like a great place to take a nap.”
Luke stares at me blankly, like he’s buffering before he suddenly bursts out laughing and drops his jaw, gaping at me with awe and the unmistakable glint of satisfaction. “Didyoujust make a joke about unaliving yourself? Mr. ‘I’m too serious to joke about serious things?’”
My eyes widen in shock. “Shit. I think I did.”
“I’m rubbing off on you!” Luke crosses his hands over his heart with an exaggerated look of pride, like he’s watching his child walk for the first time.
“Shut up, dick.” I roll my eyes and shove him backward playfully as I turn and head toward the restrooms. He follows with a Cheshire grin plastered on his face.
I know Luke’s teasing me about the joke, but he’s not wrong. Before I met him, no one would have caught me making jokes like that,especiallygiven my history. It shocked me how often he casually wished to take what he called a ‘forever nap’ when we started talking, and how unserious he was about it. The dark sense of humor is part of his personality, and being chronically online seems to have made words like “unalive” and “delulu” become a permanent fixture in his vocabulary.
The first time Luke used the phrase “I’m going to lie down on the tracks,” it confused the shit out of me, making me feel incredibly old and out of touch. He had shared a TikTok of two men in a long-term relationship spanning multiple decades since high school. It posited whether their younger selves had any idea what kind of life they were beginning all those years ago, now that they were married, bought their dream house, and started a family—if they’d ever believed something as simple as that would have been possible for them all those years ago.
Then Luke sent that little phrase in the middle of a string of crying and heart emojis, and I eventually caught on that he meant it was just too cute for him to handle. Watching this random internet couple live out their dream made him incredibly jealous and immensely happy for them, hence the intense desire to end it all, albeit unseriously. I had never seen anyone act so blasé about death, but I saw similar sentiments throughout the comment section, and it finally clicked where Luke picked up the colorful phraseology.
As much as I found the video adorable, it made me realize something. Luke may have felt those same things for himself growing up, wondering if a stable, happy home would ever be an option for someone like him. I mean, when we were kids, same-sex marriage wasn’t legal yet, so I can only imagine it was a sore subject for him growing up, thinking he could never have that kind of security. It also hit me how much I’d taken that concept for granted.
Still, while Luke claims to ‘joke’ about killing himself on a near-daily basis, I have to wonder if there’s any truth in it. If he’s ever really gotten to the point of wanting to end it all. I’ve been hesitant to tell him that I reached that point when I was younger, worried he might start looking at me differently because of it. I don’t want to mess with how things are. Not if it means Luke will start hiding this part of himself to avoid offending me.
After all, I’m getting used to it. So much so that I’ve apparently started joining in on the jokes. I wonder if that counts as growth.
We eventually reach the campground, the first in our group to arrive. As a result, we get to pick the best spot to put up our tent, closest to the beach with the best view—perks of punctuality.
Luke and I don’t waste time getting everything unpacked from the truck and setting up the area we’ll be staying at for the next three nights. I have a decently sized tent and a king-sized air mattress that still doesn’t manage to take up all the floor space inside, so there’s no question whether Luke and I can coexist in the cramped quarters.
Experience has taught me that if I don’t make the bed early, it only leads to regrets and back pain later. I make it up with all the blankets and pillows so it’ll be ready to fall into when I’m too drunk to function later. When it’s done, I can’t help but beamwith pride at how cozy it looks. I’m sure Luke will appreciate it, too.
Suddenly, my eyes go wide, and I freeze, feeling like I’ve been hit by a ton of bricks as the realization that Luke and I will be sleeping together in this bed grips me in an unexpected state of paralysis. My brain immediately jumps to the image of the two of us lying side by side underneath the blankets, in such close proximity that we’ll practically be touching.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I must have known that this would be the outcome. After all, I didn’t have the gear to give us two separate beds, and I’ve never had any issues sharing with my guy friends in the past… But I’ve also never been sexually inclined toward any of them either, so this somehow feels entirely different. It’s like my brain decided to leave out the most essential aspect of this situation, ignoring that Luke and I would be sleeping next to each other the entire weekend.
Alone.
In theonefuckingbed.
It’s like some kind of tropey romance novel shit, where the unwitting couple is forced to share the only bed available at the inn, forcing them into their inevitable romantic entanglement.
Oh,god.
Despite my hopes that something would happen this weekend, it’s not like I was trying to set this up as an elaborate ploy to trap Luke, but now I’ve gone and trapped us both. I can’t even believe it never crossed my mind before now. Am I stupid?
He’s going to think I’m a creep who was angling to sleep with him this whole time, giving him no other alternatives, and taking advantage of him when he didn’t have any gear of his own. He’ll be so pissed that I assumed this would be fine and never want to speak to me again, demanding that I take him home for being so insensitive. I wouldn’t even blame him.
Maybe I should volunteer to sleep on the ground right now and get the awkwardness out of the way. That’ll salvage this train wreck.
As if Luke can hear the gears grinding in my head, he suddenly appears behind me at the tent entrance and looks at the freshly done-up air mattress over my shoulder. “Oh my god, that looks socomfy,” he says instantly.
Gliding past me, he flops face-down on the covers in a grand, sweeping gesture, letting out a dramatic moan of contentment as he buries his face in his pillows. Then, he settles in like he could easily take another nap.
My eyes widen, and I quickly school my expression to something more neutral in case he turns around to look at me. My brain feels tingly as it processes what just happened and how it didn’t match my negative expectations. It was such an easy movement for Luke, done without a second thought. No worries, no concerns. Not even a single remark about it. He made it look so…natural.
Jesus, it must be nice to have a brain that doesn’t overanalyze every little thing.
Even though it’s a king-sized mattress, Luke still hangs off the edge a bit. There’s more than enough room next to him for me to lie down without us touching, and I debate for a split second about doing so. It was easy enough for him, so why shouldn’t it be for me?
I crawl up next to him and lie on my back with my arm under my head, trying to make it look as effortless as he did, even though I feel wound up like a spring. The bed is more comfortable than I thought, which helps me relax a bit. Now I just have to tell my heart to stop thrashing around in my chest like a canary trapped in a too-small cage, trying to break free.
Surprisingly, it doesn’t take long. After a few minutes of lying here, exhaustion hits me as if all the energy I’d expended on thedrive and unpacking has depleted me. It lessens the pressure of having the hottest man in human history beside me as I feel my body settling.
