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“Wow, I thought I was late,” another voice said from behind us. A young woman with long blonde hair came and took the chair next to mine, and she gave me a once-over as she sat. She had a very slight accent that I couldn’t place.
“Rock, this is Lilly, my… third cousin? From Sweden.”
“I think we are second cousins,” she said. “But it is very nice to meet you, Rock.”
She shook my hand.
Suddenly, the garden finally started to fill with people. A lot of them did seem weary and hungover, but after ten minutes, the place felt like a party again, albeit a much milder party than last night.
Family trivia began, with one of Perry’s other Swedish cousins hosting. The first few questions were easy ones, and Perry quickly jotted down on the paper in front of him the correct answers. I was, of course, lost completely, and had no chance in hell of getting a single thing right. It was the perfect opportunity for me to kick back and relax.
After a while I glanced over and saw that Lilly also only had a single answer scrawled out on her paper. I reached out with my fist and eventually she understood, giving me a fist bump.
“I’m so bad with all trivia,” she said.
“Me too. Especially this one, apparently,” I said.
She laughed. “My ex-boyfriend used to make fun of me for it, actually,” she said. “He told me I had a memory like a goldfish.”
“Funny you say that, because my ex-girlfriend used to tell me I had the same thing. I actually remember things pretty well, but she was a master at it.”
“Ex-girlfriend?” Lilly said, her bright eyes darting from me to Perry and then back again. “Oh.”
“Yes,” I said. “I haven’t only been into guys. Perry is my first.”
“Wow,” she said. “First gay relationship.”
Perry turned our way at the mention of his name.
“I’m just telling Lilly about how my ex thought I was a big ol’ dummy,” I said.
“Rock is funny,” Lilly said, smiling at Perry. “You’re very lucky.”
“Thank you,” Perry said. He still seemed like he was somewhere floating above himself, not really all here, somehow.
Last night had been earth-shatteringly good, and yet when we’d woken up in the morning, it was as if someone had pressed a reset button. All of the brazen confidence had seemed to evaporate, both from Perry and from me.
I wanted to access that feeling again. Being so sure that we both wanted each other. But this morning he was distant again. Aloof. I felt like I was being a bad boyfriend, fake or not. The whole reason I was here at this reunion was to help him, to keep him feeling like he had things under control, and today I couldn’t seem to do it.
Perry was an introvert, though, and this reunion made it even more obvious. I knew he needed alone time and some space. Every cell of my body wanted to touch him, but this whole week wasn’t about me. So I didn’t put my arm around him. I kept to myself, and treated him like I would a friend.
It was strange how quickly I’d fallen into the habit of touching him and truly feeling like he was a boyfriend. As the day wore on, the clouds got thicker, and when he finally took off his hangover sunglasses, I could see it in his eyes.
He really was only half here, and it broke my heart. But if the man needed space, I could give him space.
12
Perry
“Man, those two look good together,” Cam said, nodding over at Lilly and Rock. A light rain had just begun to fall outside in the garden, and the two of them were the only ones who hadn’t taken cover in one of the patio awnings or gazebos outside.
“They do,” I said.
Cam grinned. “If Rock hadn’t decided to bat for the other team with you, I’d have bet on them being a couple instead.”
I clenched my jaw, nodding once. “Almost like they belong together, huh?”
Cam just thought he was being silly, of course. To him, Rock and I seemed like a blissful new couple. Of course he wouldn’t have pictured Lilly as any sort of threat to what Rock and I had. She probably didn’t realize it either.
But for the last twenty minutes, all I’d been able to do was sit and watch from under this gazebo, witnessing Rock and Lilly hit it off.
This morning I’d woken up to not one, but two dreams of Rock. The first one was straightforward—he and I on some island somewhere, just the two of us, all over each other on a blanket in the sand. The sex had been amazing, but the second dream was really what set me off.
In the second one, Rock and I had been newlyweds. It was more simple, and far less sexual, but somehow the second dream had been a thousand times more intense.
