Page 64 of The Way We Swing

“What the fuck was that, you two?” I said.

“You were seriously going to say something about Gavin walking in on us?” Easton said to Zach. “For that matter, how did you even know?”

“I thought you two grew the fuck up in the last year. Apparently not,” I said, pacing around the room.

“You guys think this shit is funny?” Easton said, pounding his fist on the couch cushion. I had never seen him this angry.

Both of them were still laughing. Zach found words first. “I was going to say the exact same thing that Tanner did. I have no desire to talk about any of that stuff with Mom and Dad.”

“You know what, Zach?” Gavin said, ignoring both Easton and me. “This conversation is better than the one Mom wanted to have.”

Easton and I looked at each other, neither of us having any idea what he was saying. I shrugged my shoulders and looked back at Gavin.

“Why is this so funny, Gavin?” Easton said. His voice was rough, annoyed. He never talked to Gavin like this.

“Because you two are so pissed off at us, you forgot you were pissed off at each other.”

Easton’s eyes came back to me, my favorite color no longer dull and lifeless.

“I give up,” I said, throwing my hands in the air.

“You two should kiss and officially make up,” Gavin said. “I want to see that.”

Before he finished his sentence, I jumped on top of Gavin. I pinned his shoulders down with my knees, not letting him move an inch. Staring daggers at him, I said, “Gav, I love you and everything, but if you don’t shut the hell up right now, I’m going to smack you back to the second grade.”

Easton walked to the end of the couch, bent down to Gavin’s eye-level, and said, “If you keep this up, little dude, I’m going to tell your brothers what I found in your search history.”

Gavin’s head snapped up, and he shouted, “I don’t look at that stuff much. How did you know?”

“I didn’t,” Easton said, falling to the floor and laughing. “Thanks for the heads-up, though.”

I rolled off Gavin and landed on the floor next to Easton. “How the hell did you fall for that, Gav?”

“Shut up,” Gavin said, his face as red as the shorts he was wearing. “It’s normal.”

“No one cares,” said Zach, who remained curled up on the couch. “And we don’t want the details.”

“Should we have Mom give you a talk about internet safety?” I was still on the ground, my stomach in pain from laughing.

Easton and I locked eyes, and all my anger evaporated. He had apologized and seemed to mean it. Somehow, Gavin’s idiocy had forced us to do what he’d wanted.

I realized then that Easton had rolled with Gavin’s joke about us kissing. Maybe he was…accepting what had happened? Or accepting the situation?

Regardless, he at least wasn’t sprinting out of the room.

Easton broke eye contact, rolling over to his side. I looked up at Zach, who had caught the connection. He raised his right eyebrow, giving me the same smirk I had been getting from him since we had met Easton. Now, Iknew he was on to me. I not-so-subtly gave him the bird before diverting my eyes to the ceiling.

Easton still wasn’t being completely honest, but he was trying to make amends.

But I had been honest. I had come out to my parents. I hadn’t been shunned; I hadn’t been smothered. I’d just witnessed a sarcastic towel snap and received Mom’s reminder to use condoms. Knowing my family, that was probably the best-case scenario.

Now came the harder part.

How was I going to tell my friends?

CHAPTER 23

Itook a seat in journalism class away from my friends, already committed to the plan that had formed overnight. In our usual corner, Bella’s brows pinched together, Lacy mouthed,'What are you doing?'and Easton gave a mock salute like I’d gone off to war. This story wasn’t for them, though.