Page 29 of Stars Like Confetti

With one more squeeze around my shoulders, Kaylee patted me on the back. "Go get your man. You want another drink?"

"No, I'm good. Shea gets me drunk enough."

Whereas Jordan may have rolled his eyes at the comment, Kaylee smiled and disappeared inside, letting the screen door bang shut behind her. Instead of getting up right away, I watched Shea for another moment. He and Tyler were deep in conversation and when Shea lifted his shirt, I assumed he'd deemed Tyler worthy enough to know about his past—about us. I was unsure of exactly how many people knew, but I couldn't imagine it was information that he handed out voluntarily.

Then both boys looked in my direction, and I took that as my sign: My boy needed me.

Chapter Fifteen

Shea

My arms felt empty without Theo. I kept reaching for my soother, desperate to have something on my tongue again, but it wouldn’t be the same as suckling them.

I hadn’t realized how long I was asleep. Not until they woke me up, grimacing with overstimulation. They wouldn’t accept any of my apologies either. They simply cleaned themself up and hoisted me onto the changing table since I was wet. They offered to let me rest in their bed or come with them while they dealt with some admin issue that Jordan insisted he needed them for, but there was something I needed to do. I wanted to go to the bonfire, and I wanted to go with Tyler. I hadn’t seen him since that morning when Jordan ushered him away from all the chaos, and I needed to make sure he was okay.

Despite praising me for making the right decision, Theo’s eyes swam with nerves. They were a Da to their core, unwilling to let me out of their sight at the best of times, much less after something so scary. The first time they saw it in high school, they slept on my floor for a week—even after my parents kicked them out.

Twice.

It had taken some convincing to separate Tyler from his new Daddy. It was the most regressed I’d seen him the entire week. He seemed less pale and hungover after some rest, but he was still wary of leaving Jordan. As we walked from the cabin to the bonfire, Tyler had his finger in his mouth. I reached for my soother out of habit, only to realize I couldn’t talk with it in my mouth and nerves immediately flared to life.

“I’m sorry,” I blurted.

Tyler released his finger with a pop. “For what?”

“That…” I sighed. “This morning couldn’t have been fun for you. I’m really sorry you had to see it.”

One of the caregivers supervising the bonfire handed us a bag of snacks each and a blanket. Tyler spread out the blanket away from everyone else, giving us some privacy. “You have nothing to be sorry about,” he said.

“I made you cry!”

“Well, yeah, it was scary, but I was already sensitive from the hangover. Besides, you didn’t get stung on purpose, did you?”

“No,” I laughed. “Trust me—if I was going to do that, you should worry about what I’m trying to avoid.”

When I was met with silence, I looked over to see Tyler crooking a brow at me, wrist deep in a bag of marshmallows.

“You’ve been secretive enough, Shea. Spill.”

Heat rushed to my face. My parents never did figure it out, and to this day it was one of my favorite stories.

“I got stung on purpose once to get out of bible camp.”

“Bible camp?” Tyler garbled. “Gross. I’d rather die than be put through that too.”

My bottom lip rolled between my teeth. If there was ever an opening to tell Tyler about my past, this was it.

“Oh, shit, was that the wrong thing to say?”

“Tyler, language,” a caregiver scolded.

“Sorry—why are you laughing at me?”

I laughed so hard my belly hurt and tears formed at the corners of my eyes. Tyler only continued to eat his marshmallows.

“That’s probably the realest thing anyone’s said to me in years. Most people get scared with the dark humor—Theo included.”

“You’ve known them that long?”