Page 54 of Coming Clean

A hawk circled high abovethe trees and Jeremy watched Connor watching it. “Beautiful, aren’tthey?”

“Yeah, predators canbe.”

Jeremy considered Connor’sstatement, wishing he knew what Connor was thinking. What predatorshad he dealt with in his life? Jeremy was considering asking whenConnor said, “My dad died when I was three. My mom remarried soonafter, when she realized she was pregnant with her boyfriend’sbaby.”

How soon? Did that implyhis mother had been cheating on his dad before he died? Jeremywanted to know but he wasn’t going to ask. He did occasionally knowhow to keep his thoughts inside.

“The boyfriend hated me.And he taught my half-brother to hate me too. My mom didn’t doanything to stop it. I think I reminded her too much of my dad. Mystepdad expected perfection, nothing I did was good enough. I spenta lot of time hiding so he wouldn’t know I’d screwed upagain.”

Jeremy laid one of hishands on top of Connor’s, wishing once again that he knew the bestway to comfort him. Connor turned his hand palm up and laced hisfingers with Jeremy’s. At least touching him had been the rightthing to do. “So you joined the Marines to get away?”

“Yeah.” Connor gave abitter laugh. “I wanted to get away from his rigid rules. Icouldn’t measure up, so I joined the military. Makes a lot ofsense, right?”

“I’m guessing you didn’tthink you had a lot of options.”

Connor nodded. “No way inhell were they going to help me pay for college, and my gradesweren’t that great anyway. Partly because I’m not all that smart,but also because my stepdad made me work at his shop all thetime.”

Jeremy hated hearing Connorput himself down but he sensed that more than anything, Connor justneeded someone to listen. “Did it help? Joining up?”

Connor nodded. “Yeah. Atfirst, I thought I’d traded one asshole for another. I was sure mydrill instructor thought I was dumb as a brick. He yelled at meconstantly and picked on me when he left the other guys alone. Butit turned out he was hard on me because he saw my potential. Hemade me into a damn good soldier, and it was because of him that Ihad the courage to apply for recon after I’d gotten someexperience.”

For a moment the mantle ofsadness that had settled over Connor lifted. He’d been proud of thework he’d done, Jeremy was sure of that, but something hadhappened, something that made him leave the Marines.

“You’re still hiding now.”Jeremy winced after the words came out. He probably shouldn’t havesaid that.

Connor went eerily still.Why hadn’t Jeremy just kept his mouth shut?

“Yeah, I am.”

You have no businessgoing out with a man who’s ashamed of who he is.Jeremy heard the words in David’svoice.

Before Jeremy could thinkof a response, Connor surprised him by continuing. “I couldn’t comeout while I was in the desert. Sure, they’ve repealed Don’t AskDon’t Tell so technically, I couldn’t be kicked out for being gay,but I had to trust my life to the guys on my team. They didn’t wanta fag for a team member, at least not most of them. There were afew recon guys I served with who were openly gay, but most of thetime it wasn’t easy for them. I’d been put down enough growing up;I didn’t need to hear everyone talk shit about me again. In theMarines, I could fit in. I knew how to look like the man theyexpected so I kept being that man.”

“And now?” Jeremy held hisbreath. How far could he push?

“I can’t get all thosevoices out of my head—the ones that tell me I’m unnatural, that areal man would like women—and I…”

Connor got that farawaylook, the one he’d had the day before when he’d almost kissedJeremy and then run out. Jeremy squeezed Connor’s hand and cuppedhis chin, turning him to face Jeremy. “You don’t have to tell menow or ever if you don’t want to. I’m just trying tohelp.”

“You don’t want to hide,”Connor said.

Jeremy shook his head. “No.I’m not going to, but if you need to hide for a while, I…” Fuck,why was he such an idiot when it came to theseconversations?

“And if I can’tever…”

Jeremy drew in a shakybreath. “Can we just see?” Was he setting himself up to have hisheart broken?

Connor nodded. “I guess. Ifyou’re okay with that.”

He looked so pained thatJeremy longed to do something, anything, to make that look go away.Words were his life but he didn’t have any to say. Words writtendown on paper were fine, but when he needed to say them out loud,in person, on the spur of the moment, he typicallyfroze.

Would a blow job work tocomfort Connor? Somehow that didn’t seem appropriate, but it wasthe best thing he did with his mouth. “It’s okay to tell meanything you want. I promise. Sometimes I don’t say the rightthings, but I’m a good listener.”

“I want to be the man youthink I am.”

Jeremy studied Connor,tilting his head. From anyone else he would think that sentimentwas sarcastic. He had a hard time believing anyone could be thatheartfelt. But Connor was one of the most sincere people he’d evermet. “You’re already better than the man I thought you were. Betterthan I could ever have imagined.”

Connor stared at him, alook of disbelief on his face.