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Emerson was that man, but he also wasn’t. Emerson didn’t care what people thought, and he thought more about giving to others. Emerson wanted a simple life because the rest of the world hurt too damn much.
“Jesus, Em. I’m sorry. I’m so fuckin’ sorry you had to go through that. I ain’t leaving you. You hear me? You can try and push me away, but I ain’t goin’. I’m a determined little shit and you know it. Don’t care if we stop fucking and you just need a friend. That’s what I’ll be, but I’m not leaving you to kill yourself all alone.”
I let go and sobbed then, loud, soul-vibrating cries. I hadn’t done this, not ever. Not when my parents kicked me out. Not when they told me not to call again. Not when Daniel had died or I’d gone on trial. Not when his parents had looked me in the face and told me they hated me, that I’d killed their son and I deserved to die.
“I gotcha,” he said again.
I cried a lifetime of tears, my pain evaporating into his skin. I held him tight, and he held me, kissed my temple, the top of my head, rubbed my back. I felt so pathetic, but I couldn’t make myself do anything other than cling to Sam and take everything he was willing to give me.
I’d never felt so exhausted in my life, and before I knew I’d passed out, I was waking up. I’d cried myself to sleep, and he hadn’t moved. I opened my eyes to see the living room going darker, evening peeking through the windows. Sam was sitting on the hardwood floor, leaning against the back of the couch, my head in his lap, my arms around him.
The light in the kitchen was on, the glow painting the space with a muted beam.
“Hey, you.” Sam looked down at me and gave me a sad smile. “Did I ever tell you I used to be addicted to hokey-pokey? Eventually I turned myself around.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“But’cha smiled.”
I hadn’t realized I had. “Shit. I’m sorry for losing it like that. And for telling you that by text.”
I sat up, kinks in my neck, my back, all my joints. Turning from him, I stood, tried to get myself under control. It was something my dad used to tell me—to control myself; not to be so emotional. Jesus. I’d forgotten that. How could I have forgotten that?
“Don’t try and shut me out now. I won’t accept it. You told me about your past, and I’m honored that you did, but you can’t shove that in a box and pretend it didn’t happen.”
“I know.” He was quite possibly the strongest person I’d ever met. I wondered if he knew it, wished I could be more like him.
“Good. How about we get a drink and go to the back porch? Get some fresh air while we talk.”
It was subtle, him letting me know I wasn’t off the hook and he wanted more, but he deserved that. He was right. I’d told him about my past to chase him away, so he would see I was broken and know what I’d done, but I should have known Sam was too good for that.
We got two cups of water, then went out. Crickets and toads serenaded the sun as it went down, and the sky changed colors.
He pulled the chair out for me, and I was struck dumb for a moment. I thought he might feel silly because his cheeks turned a little pink, but he’d already started, so he nodded, and I sat down. I waited for it to make me feel weird, like I couldn’t take care of myself, but it was just so nice being close to someone, letting them penetrate the walls I’d worked so hard to reinforce, that I couldn’t focus on anything else.
“We were together four years.”
He whistled. “Dang. I can’t imagine bein’ with someone that long.”
“But you will. It’s what you’ll eventually want. Your circumstances have just prevented it. You deserve it too.” We both knew it was true.
“Well, yeah, of course. I don’t wanna be alone, but that don’t mean I’d just take it from anyone, if that’s what you think. I wouldn’t just cling to the first queer man I found because he was my only option. He’d have to be…” Sam shrugged and looked away. “Special. But this ain’t about me. It’s about you. If you didn’t want that, why did you stay with him?”
“It wasn’t that I didn’t want to be with Daniel. I cared about him. It’s hard to explain.”
“Try.”
“Bossy,” I joked, but neither of us was in the mood. “I think…the shit with my family. It fucked me up more than I realized. And that’s probably not fair, blaming it on them. Maybe it’s just who I was. I told Daniel from the start: I didn’t want marriage. I didn’t want a family. I wasn’t going to risk fucking up a child the way I’d been screwed up. I didn’t want to leave the city. New York was who I was, and I needed to be the best.” I hated how true that was, how selfish I had been, how I’d cared about the wrong things.
