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“I’m Felix,” he said, because of course his name was Felix. It was probably gifted to him by his influencer mother who had a forty-and-loving-it Instagram that was sponsored by Target and Hidden Valley Ranch. She was probably blonde with honey highlights like he had, and he probably had her smile.
And his parents probably loved the shit out of him.
Dmitri had once read an adoption account where a person was talking about how their birth parents never mattered because they felt deeper love by being chosen—and he laughed until he cried, and then he cried until he couldn’t breathe. Then he hoped his father rolled back into Savannah so he could punch him in the face for dragging him into this world where he was chewed up and spit out by everyone, and then judged for not looking as pristine as they did.
His extended family loved him, but he had never belonged in one of those marshmallow stories about chosen children.
“Are you going to tell me yours?” Felix pressed after far too long a silence.
Dmitri sighed because it would mean explaining why a Chinese kid with a Mexican aunt was named after a Russian guy who helped win the Stanley Cup decades before he was born. He’d give his father an extra kick to the gut for that one, if he was ever allowed.
“You don’t have to tell me. I mean, if you don’t want to.”
He sounded young, which made Dmitri want to laugh becausehewas fucking young, but so damn bitter, and this guy was staring at him like he had something important to say. “I’m Dmitri.”
“Cool.”
Cool. That was it? And maybe it was because he was used to meeting kids with names like Stardust and Yarrow that he didn’t really think twice when a name didn’t match a face. But right then, he didn’t hate the guy for being an interloper who would be more well liked in the five minutes he was there than the years Dmitri spent as a resident.
“Anything fun to do at the lake, Dmitri?”
He laughed. “Kayaks, but only if you can swim.”
“I was told you had to rent a cabin to use them, and my family’s staying downtown.” Felix shifted forward and dipped his toes in the water. Dmitri thought about warning him that there were turtles there and they did bite, but he liked to let people learn the hard way. He was an okay person, but he wasn’t necessarily nice.
“I know the park ranger if you really want to go out on the water,” Dmitri said after a beat, “but it’s not as fun as it looks.”
“The wheelchair guy?”
Dmitri scowled because it was just like some out of towner asshole to boil Roman down so cruelly and pointlessly. But it didn’t surprise him either. “His name is Roman. I’ve known him most of my life,” Dmitri said, which was just shades of a lie.
Felix hummed a bit, then shrugged. “Does kayaking sound good to you?”
“No,” Dmitri answered, and this time he could be honest. “I hate it. Some guy almost drowned a couple summers ago, and I lost my taste for it.” He pushed himself up to his feet, and he wasn’t entirely surprised when Felix followed him, but he felt the first stirrings of annoyance. “I better take off.”
“Do you want company?” When Dmitri looked back, Felix threw up his hands in surrender, and his smile was dimpled and sweet, and it probably got him his way. A lot. “Okay, stupid question. Most people don’t come to angst by a lake if they want company. Just hopeful thinking on my part.” He spoke with a vocabulary older than he looked, which meant he was either gifted in genetics or had lived a stricter life than he was pretending, but Dmitri was betting on the former.
“I was going to take a drive toward the mall,” Dmitri said with a shrug. He felt oddly soft toward the guy, and he wasn’t quite sure why. Maybe the loneliness and the fact that it was his birthday was starting to get to him. “There’s an abandoned church up the road from it, and I was thinking about getting some take-out and eating in the parking lot.”
“By yourself?” Felix asked, taking a step closer.
Dmitri nodded.
“In an abandoned church parking lot?”
“It’s not that weird,” he started to defend, but his voice trailed off when Felix reached out and touched his wrist. It was a searing hot second of skin to skin, and Dmitri pulled back before Felix could do it again.
“I don’t think it’s weird. I think it’s sweet.” Felix cocked his head to the side, and there was honesty in his words Dmitri wasn’t expecting, so he nodded and shoved his still burning hand into his pocket.
“You can come with if you want.”
“Not the screaming endorsement of my company I was looking for,” Felix said with a grin, but Dmitri wasn’t willing to give him more. Not yet.
He led the way to the dirt parking lot in front of the ranger station and unlocked the car with the click of his keys. The car was new to him, but used, and it still kind of smelled like someone else’s cologne. But it was nicer than he ever expected to get—nicer than Jayden’s car, and he wasn’t sure how to shoulder the burden of deserving something like this, because he had never done anything to earn it.
But Jayden’s face when he handed over the keys was like the sun was rising behind his eyes, and Dmitri wouldn’t rob him of that joy for anything in the world. So, he thanked him, and hugged him, and let his emotions show in the mist forming at the corners of his eyes. Then, he’d taken it for a drive and hadn’t gone home yet.
Felix climbed in beside him and said nothing—which meant he wasn’t impressed, but he didn’t look entirely disgusted either. He looked more like thrilled to be doing something that was probably against the rules his parents set.
