Evan looked past him toward the parking lot, and when he looked back, CJ could see the resignation on his face. “What do you want from me?”
“An actual conversation.”
Evan frowned. “We had one.”
“That wasn’t a conversation,” CJ said. “That was you, drunk on your couch, throwing emotional bombs at me and then trying to kiss me.”
Evan flushed and his shoulders tensed. “I said what I needed to say.”
“Well, that makes one of us,” CJ said. “And you did it while you were drunk.”
Evan’s mouth tightened. “I think we’ve covered that.”
“I don’t think we have.”
“You made it pretty obvious how you felt about everything I said.” Evan’s gaze flicked back to him, and CJ could see the irritation sparking in his eyes. “That was humiliating enough, and I’m not going to keep throwing myself at someone who’s already made it clear he doesn’t want me. So what exactly do you think there’s left to say, CJ?”
CJ blew out a breath and dragged a hand through his hair, pushing the brim of his baseball cap up as his fingers slid through the straight light-brown strands underneath. He turned the cap backward and settled it into place, the bill tapping lightly against the back of his neck. This was harder than he’d expected.Evan’s walls were firmly back in place, and the man standing in front of him barely resembled the one who’d sagged against CJ’s shoulder two weeks ago with his voice breaking.
“You think I turned you down,” CJ said quietly.
Evan didn’t answer right away, but then he nodded once. “You did.”
“No,” CJ said immediately. “I didn’t.”
Evan’s eyebrows lifted in disbelief. “Pretty sure I remember the wordnobeing involved.”
CJ stepped closer, closing the last few feet between them until Evan had to tilt his head slightly to keep eye contact. He spoke quietly. “You showed up outside my door drunk enough that you almost face-planted into the wall. You could barely walk straight.”
“That doesn’t mean I didn’t know what I was saying.”
“I never said you didn’t,” CJ replied calmly. “But it does mean you couldn’t actually consent to anything.”
The anger in Evan’s posture faltered slightly, and CJ knew he was finally listening.
“I wasn’t going to kiss you like that,” CJ continued. “Not when you’d been drinking and pouring your heart out and could barely stand up.”
Evan looked at him carefully now. “That’s why you said no?”
“Yes.”
The silence that followed stretched longer, and Evan rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “That’s…not how I interpreted that night.”
CJ huffed quietly. “Yeah. I figured that out.”
Evan’s brows drew together slightly and his gaze drifted just past CJ’s shoulder for a second like he was staring at something only he could see. The muscles in his jaw worked once as he exhaled slowly, and CJ could almost hear the gears turning. The familiarity of it hit CJ all at once.
Evan had always done this. Back in college, whenever something big landed in front of him, he never reacted right away. He’d go quiet instead, retreating into his own head while he worked through it piece by piece. CJ used to tease him about it, calling it Evan’s “internal replay booth” because he processed conversations the same way he studied game film: rewind, analyze, adjust.
CJ had learned early on that interrupting that process was useless.
So he waited, watching the familiar rhythm of it play out and anticipating the slow shift that would come as Evan worked his way toward whatever conclusion he was going to land on. Seven years hadn’t changed that part of him at all, and CJ hadn’t realized how much he’d missed that until this moment.
Evan’s gaze sharpened again as he came back to the present, the distant look fading as everything clicked into place. When he spoke, his voice was quieter. “So you didn’t say no because you didn’t want me.”
CJ held his gaze. “No.”
Evan searched his face, eyes narrowed like he wasn’t sure he believed the answer. “You said no because I was drunk.”
