Their waitress came by at that moment to take their order, and CJ ordered pancakes without hesitation. Evan rolled his eyes and ordered a cheeseburger. When they were alone again, CJ leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, quiet as he stared out the window. Evan nudged his knee against CJ’s under the table, and when CJ didn’t look at him, he reached over and squeezed his leg, then left his hand resting on CJ’s thigh. CJ looked at him, surprised, and he scanned the room to see ifanyone had noticed. But no one was paying them any attention, and he reached down and curled his fingers around Evan’s.
They sat that way until their food came and the quiet between them was easy and comfortable. There was no pressure to fill it, and the low hum of the restaurant carried on around them without really reaching their table. But by the time they were finished and had pushed their plates to the side in a small, messy stack, Evan could feel the moment beginning to fade.
CJ shifted first. He leaned forward and rested his elbow on the table, chin propped in his hand and his gaze fixed on Evan with the kind of focus he usually reserved for games.
“What are you thinking about?”
Evan didn’t answer right away, and his eyes drifted out the window. “Going home,” he said finally.
CJ frowned, and Evan watched some of the light in his eyes dim. “Yeah.”
The server returned, efficient and unobtrusive as she cleared their plates and set the check down on the edge of the table. It was a quiet reminder that the moment was over, whether they were ready or not.
CJ reached for the check. “We should probably get back to the cabin.”
Evan nodded, but he didn’t move. “Three days wasn’t enough.”
“No,” CJ said softly. “It wasn’t.”
CJ stood and turned to leave before Evan could see his face, and with a sigh, Evan pushed his chair back and followed.
24
CJ
It hadn’t been nearlyenough time.
That was CJ’s only thought as they drove away from the cabin. The road down from Juniper Creek unwound in ribbons of asphalt and the pine trees gave way to scrub as the mountains grew smaller behind them. He sat angled toward the window, one arm bent and braced against the door so his fingers curled loosely near his mouth. Next to him, Evan’s gaze was fixed on the road, and he had both hands on the wheel, his thumbs tapping absently against the leather.
He’d been quiet since they’d left the cabin. Not withdrawn exactly, but it was clear to CJ that Evan had compartmentalized their trip and turned it into something he could hold without it spilling into the rest of his life. CJ knew that look. He’d seen it on his own face years ago, and he knew how that story ended.
“Hopefully, we’ll make good time getting home,” he said finally because the silence had started to make him twitch.
Evan’s grip tightened on the wheel before he relaxed his fingers and hummed in acknowledgment. “Yeah.”
That was it. Just “yeah.” CJ was starting to feel like Evan had one foot out of whatever they’d had in the mountains, and hischest tightened. Three days hadn’t been enough time. It hadn’t even scratched the surface. He swallowed hard and shifted in his seat, and for a few miles, they fell back into silence.
Evan had a couple of different forms of quiet. There was the comfortable kind that lived between them when they were relaxing at home, Evan reading and CJ watching a movie. And then there was this kind: a silence that wasn’t quite uncomfortable but had a tension running through it, the way air pressure changed before a storm. He’d made peace with the knowledge that their lives would go back to the secrecy and hiding. What he couldn’t make peace with was Evan sitting two feet away from him, already looking like he was somewhere else.
CJ left it alone. He’d learned to recognize the story Evan’s posture told, knew that he had turned inward because the last three days had gotten too close to something real. He hadn’t been like that in college, but this Evan had learned to pull back so easily that it looked effortless. CJ was starting to learn that trying to force conversation when Evan went quiet only pushed him further away.
They drove the rest of the way like that, with conversation coming in short bursts that never took hold. But every time CJ tried to pull them into the kind of easy back and forth they’d shared at the cabin, Evan gave him short answers, if he even used words at all. By the time the city came into view, CJ had given up trying and turned up the music.
They pulled into the garage just before seven and unloaded their bags. The elevator was empty, and the silence continued as they rode up to the fourteenth floor. CJ watched the numbers change, and when the doors opened on their floor, they stepped into the hallway and stood there for a moment before walking down the hall. They stopped outside CJ’s door, and he pulled his keys out. CJ had no idea whether he should ask Evan to stay or give him space. He was pretty sure he knew the answer anyway.
“So,” Evan said.
CJ looked at him, surprised that he’d spoken first. Evan had his hands in his pockets and the look of a man who had been running a conversation in his head for the last few hours. And he looked tired again. The mountain air had done something for him this week, and the city had already started trying to undo it.
“So,” CJ said back.
Evan stared down the hall toward his apartment for a long moment. “I had a good week,” Evan said.
CJ watched him. “Me too.”
Evan nodded and tilted his head toward his own apartment. “I should probably…”
“Yeah,” CJ interrupted because he knew how that sentence would end and he didn’t want to hear it all the way through. “I’ll probably just crash anyway.”
