by Coralee June
“Oh my gosh, I bet he was hot,” Lance joked.
Beside him, Decker looked like he wanted to punch something. I was enjoying his jealousy just a little too much. “He was very hot.” I made sure to draw my words out for emphasis. Decker rolled his eyes at my antics before slyly rubbing my calf with his foot. I stiffened.
“So,” A cough escaped my chest. “He told me to meet him at his house one time, and I didn’t think anything of it. I knocked on his door, and it was his mother who answered. We hadn’t met before, but we had been going out for a few weeks, so the timing was appropriate. I figured he just wanted me to meet his parents.”
“Why does this sound like it’s going to take a bad turn?” Lance asked. Decker’s foot drifted up, and I parted my legs, but he never touched me there, he kept his exploration of my body limited to my knees.
“Because it is,” I answered Lance. “His parents were lovely. They sat me down at the kitchen table and started talking about their son’s goals for his life. And then,” I began with a long, dramatic, drawn-out sigh. Lance was on the edge of his seat, and Decker was staring intently at me. “They started to give me the talk. The sex talk.”
“No!” Lance said while cackling. Decker had a wide grin on his face as he shook his head. His foot retreated.
“Yup. They wanted to make sure we were safe, and he just sat there the entire time, letting them tell me how a penis worked and how to track my ovulation to prevent pregnancy.”
Both men were bent over and laughing so hard that even Lance had tears streaming down his face. It had been one of the most mortifying moments of my entire life, but now I could look back on it and smile. “You officially win the competition for the worst date ever,” Decker said in a bright voice.
I leaned back in the soft chair while crossing my arms over my chest. I unintentionally pressed my breast up and blushed when I saw Decker drop his fork. “What can I say? I’m a winner.”
“But did you have sex with that guy?” Lance asked with a laugh. “Wait. Don’t answer that. Gross,” Lance quickly added with more chuckles. My eyes flickered to Decker, and I realized how awkward this was. We hadn’t exactly had the conversation about past relationships, and it felt weird to talk about it now.
“Nah. I eventually got tired of his parents asking me if I took birth control regularly and when my next cycle was. They were way too involved in their son’s sex life.”
After chatting a bit more, I got up and excused myself for the restroom and made my way across the swanky restaurant while thinking how perfect this night had turned out. I loved watching the two of them interact. Their friendship was strong and intimate. It was beautiful to watch but heartbreaking, too. I felt terrible knowing Decker and I were harboring this secret that could tear them apart.
After freshening up, I exited the bathroom and stopped when I saw Decker standing in the hallway. The moment our eyes connected, he pushed me back through the threshold and slammed the door shut, locking us both inside. “I’m sorry we couldn’t finish things back at the loft,” he rasped before kissing me.
I could’ve gotten drunk on the taste of wine on his lips. It was intoxicating; I never wanted it to stop. He cupped my neck and squeezed lightly before sucking on my collarbone. If he didn’t stop soon, I’d emerge from this bathroom with a dark, obvious hickey. “I’m having fun,” I said with a smile while guiding his face back up and away from my neck.
Decker kissed my forehead before speaking again. “I’m glad. Damn you look so good in this dress. I want you for dessert.”
It felt wrong, clinging to Decker in a fancy bathroom while Lance was sitting alone at the table. We were being too risky once again, and yet, I held him. I smiled at the perfectness of the night. I kissed his wrist and tugged on the waistband of his suit pants. He palmed my breast and grabbed my ass. We were two seconds from fucking in the bathroom. “Lance is waiting,” he whispered, though he sounded pained to say it.
“Lance is waiting,” I affirmed. And we went back out to the dinner table separately but feeling an intense longing for one another. Dinner was perfect.
28
Blakely
We slipped into a comfortable routine of secrets.
Thanksgiving was just around the corner, and somehow, we managed to survive two months of secret rendezvous, lingering stares, and brief touches that meant more than we could ever say. There was an intense yet hollow sort of happiness between us. We connected so deeply, so profoundly, so beautifully that it almost felt too good to be true, but then there was the added weight of secrecy beating us up. If hiding could leave me battered and blue, I’d have two black eyes, cracked ribs, and bruises. We were always too close to getting caught. Too open with the blinding affection and tension between us.
“You’ve been quiet today,” Decker observed while wrapping an arm around my waist as I washed dishes in the loft. I felt the scrubbing bubbles lathering over my skin as I tried to formulate my response. I didn’t want him to think I wasn’t happy, I was just exhausted.
“Are you tired of hiding?” I asked.
“Yes.” His response was immediate and blunt. I loved his honesty and how we were always on the same page.
Decker grabbed my hips and forced me to look at him. I wondered if he could see the exhaustion in my expression. School was kicking my ass lately. I had straight A’s, but it was hard to keep up. He helped me study in the evenings, and even gave pointers on a presentation I was going to give. I appreciated him tremendously but felt like I couldn’t keep up.
He leaned down for a kiss, making a smile break out on my lips. But instead of kissing me, he whispered over my mouth. “Lance is supposed to be gone tomorrow. Why don’t I take you out of town? We can make this feel more public in a place where people won’t recognize us?” he offered. It wasn’t the first time he had, either. It just felt too risky. This loft had become our prison and our safe haven. I didn’t have it in me to risk losing that.
Decker’s lips found purchase on my forehead just as the front door swung open. “Hey! I got home early.” Lance’s voice died off as Decker pulled away from me. A cool sheen of nervous sweat coated my skin as I turned away to greet Lance, who was staring at us curiously, a hint of anger on his angelic face.
“Hey,” I said with a smile before walking around the kitchen island to greet him. “How was work?” Could he hear the tremor in my voice? Could he see the intimacy bouncing between Decker and me?
“It was fine. What are y’all up to?” Lance asked while keeping his eyes on Decker. The speculation and assumptions were twisting like a tornado behind his blue eyes.
“Just talking about school.”
“You were standing awfully close to be talking about school,” he accused. It was right there, right at the tip of his tongue. Relief like a cannon burst through me, but I kept my mouth shut, offering Decker a curious glance to see if this was it. Would we finally tell Lance? He said he wanted to trial and error this thing between us, but I was ready for the next phase in our experiment.
And the look that greeted me was full of terror and pain.
Decker was gripping the island so hard I was confident it would crack. His lips were slightly curled, and his muscles flexed. Now was not the time.
I intervened, trying to salvage this moment, but it felt so, so wrong. “I’ve just been worried about my project in Chemistry. It’s embarrassing. He walked in on a total meltdown. And this shit with my dad is really freaking me out.” All of these things were honest. I wasn’t really lying to Lance, just avoiding telling him the full truth. It was ironic that the half-truths our relationship were built on still held us back now. Dad hadn’t reached out since he left two months ago. I was really fucking worried those men had him. School and work were wearing me down.
But none of it had me as worked up as Decker’s and my secret affair. And I was starting to realize that all these secrets were acting like a wedge between my brother and me.
“Oh, Blakely,” Lance sai
d before wrapping me up in a hug. I hadn’t even realized I was crying until my salty tears were saturating his shirt. “Why didn’t you tell me? Do you need to call in to work tonight? Take a break?”
Lance was a chronic fixer, and it made me feel worse.
Pulling away as I wiped my face, I answered him. “No. I want to go tonight. It’s a welcome distraction. I just need some extra help lately, and Decker saw me crying. I’m sorry.”
“Of course,” Lance replied. “And I’ll be around to help out more, too. Sean and I broke up this past weekend. I wanted him to come meet you, but he said that was too close to labeling this relationship for him. I knew I shouldn’t have dated someone that hadn’t come to terms with his sexuality yet. I can go to his grandmother’s funeral, but meeting my family is too much, apparently.” Lance rolled his eyes in a painful, slow motion that was brimming with pain.
“What? You didn’t tell me,” Decker blurted out from his spot in the kitchen. The shock was evident on his face, as well as a hint of guilt.
Lance shrugged. “You’ve been extra busy lately.”
I took a good look at my brother and noticed the heartbreak in his eyes. “I’m sorry about Sean,” I croaked.
“I’m sorry about your dad,” he replied.
The three of us stood standing there in silence for a long while, the things we weren’t willing to say making the air thick with tension. “Well, you better get ready for work. We can eat ice cream and watch movies on the couch tomorrow,” Lance finally offered.
Placing a hand on my brother’s shoulder, I nodded solemnly before disappearing.
Something told me this conversation was far from over.
“Why the long face, hot stuff?” Rose asked as I mopped the floor after closing. My feet were tired. There was beer on my shirt. I wanted nothing more than to curl up and cuddle Decker.
“I’m just tired.”
“What kind of tired?” Rose asked. “The emotional tired? The physically tired? The hopeless sort of tired? Are you the kind of tired that lamely uses a universal term for exhaustion but you’re really just falling apart?”
Rose was spit firing questions, one after the other, and I felt my body give in. My face contorted into pain, the kind that wasn’t exhaustion. “Oh, baby, come here. Is this about Decker?”
My mouth dropped open. “You know?”
“That boy tells me everything. Of course I know. I’m actually a little offended that it’s taken you so long to open up to me,” she tsked while grabbing the mop from my hand and wrapping me in a big hug. She smelled like vanilla and incense.
“Lance almost caught us tonight, and all I wanted to do was tell him,” I whimpered.
“So why didn’t you?” Rose guided me to a booth and sat me down, reaching across the table to hold my hand in solidarity.
“I was going to. But then I looked at Decker and saw his face. He looked terrified. It’s a lot of pressure, you know? Walking this tightrope between telling Lance and preserving their relationship while trying to build my own with Decker. Add the issue of school and living together, and it’s a clusterfuck of massive proportions.”
Rose nodded as I spoke, while pulling a joint out from her shirt pocket and lighting it up. She took a slow, deep inhale and held it in her chest for a long while before blowing out rings of smoke. “You love them, don’t you?” Rose finally asked with a smile. “I’m so proud of you. Look at that big ol’ heart opening up for the world to see.”
“That's your takeaway from all of this?” I asked incredulously.
“You’re focusing on all the wrong stuff. When you arrived in my office, you were closed off. Your aura was jaded and dark. Now you love two people so much that you’re crying in front of me. If that’s not progress, then I don’t know what is.”
I mulled over her words while tracing scratches in the wood on the table. “I do love them. It’s why I feel so selfish and guilty. My mama never cared who she bulldozed over to get what she wanted. I can’t help but feel like I’m doing that with Decker. I want—love—him so much that I’m willing to potentially destroy Lance in the process. It’s at the point where it’s not just our relationship that’ll hurt my brother, it’s the betrayal of keeping it secret that’ll ruin him.”
“It’s gonna burn, babe. But it’s all temporary.”
“Temporary? How can you be so sure?” I asked with a huff.
“Because, child, this whole damn life is temporary. You’re not promised forever. You’re not even promised tomorrow. You get one life. One heart. One opportunity to make your existence count, and even if Lance never speaks to the two of you again, it’ll all be temporary, even when it feels like forever, it’s not. And I don’t know your brother, but he’s not going to throw away decades of friendship over this. He’s not going to push you away like everyone else in your life has, Blake.”
“It’s Blakely, Rose. Blakely.”
“Atta girl.” Rose took another drag of her joint and closed her eyes happily as she held it in. Her smile was infectious, and I wished I could have the sort of confidence and optimism she spewed daily. “Tell them, Blakely. Life’s too short for secrets. Call Decker up right now and say it’s time to put his big boy panties on and handle his shit.”
“Right now?” I stuttered.
“Right. Now. I’m gonna sit with you while you tell him.”
I fished my cell phone out of my pocket and stared at the screen for a long moment, debating on whether or not I could actually do this. My chest constricted as I pulled up his name and hit dial. My stomach fell the moment his deep, tired voice answered on the other line.
“Hey, punk,” he greeted in a low voice. I envisioned him sitting in his bedroom, lying on his bed and staring at the ceiling. He was probably in sweats and rubbing circles along his abs. “Are you on your way home? Need me to come get you?”
“I’m about to leave. I can walk with Rose. How was your night with Lance?”
Across from me, Rose rolled her eyes. She damn well knew I was stalling. “Brutal,” Decker replied, snapping my attention back to him. “He knows me too well. Asked who I was dating, because I’ve been happier lately. I made up some bullshit about a girl online, but he wasn’t convinced. I think he’s onto us. Maybe we should tone things down a notch? We have to be more careful.”
I let out a shaky sigh. “What if we weren’t more careful?” I asked.
Decker didn’t immediately respond, and I suddenly felt very, very tired. “What are you suggesting?”
“I’m suggesting we try something new. I’m suggesting we tell him. I’m suggesting I switch schools. I’m suggesting we do this for real, Decker.”
The other end of the line went silent for a long moment. I could hear my heart pounding in my ears as I tried to calm myself.
“I can’t, Blakely. Not yet. It’s still too soon,” he finally said.
I glanced at Rose, but she was blurry from the tears in my eyes. “Then I can’t do this. I care too much about both of you.”
“Are you breaking up with me over the phone?” he seethed. “Is Rose there? Come home, Blakely. Let’s talk about this, okay? I’m not saying never; I’m just saying not right now.”
It hurt. It hurt so fucking bad. It felt like my soul was on fire, but I knew I had to end this. I refused to be like my mama. I refused to be someone’s dirty little secret. “And I’m saying when you’re willing to tell Lance, I’ll be willing to try with you again.”
I hung up like a child, slamming it down on the table. I was unwilling to hash this out any further. He was right, it was ridiculous to do this over the phone, but when else would we? It’s not like we could have a fight with Lance just down the hall. We couldn’t go out and do this thing over dinner. We couldn’t hash things out in his classroom. We were stuck, and Rose was right. Life was too short to feel stuck anymore.
But I was tired, so very tired. My chest was shaking with exhaustion. My eyes felt heavy as they shed tears. “Wanna stay at my place, baby
?” Rose asked with a tender smile.
“Yes, please. I just want to sleep.”
“That’s the best cure for being tired, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I cried all night and didn’t get a wink of sleep.
29
Blakely
It was impossible to sit through Decker’s class and not feel the urge to cry. I spent all of last night in Rose’s RV, sobbing my eyes out while trying to find a way to make this work and crumbling when every option hit a brick wall. I wasn’t willing to sneak around anymore, and he wasn’t willing to tell Lance.
Decker didn’t look too well, either. His eyes were bloodshot and surrounded by dark circles. His button-up shirt was wrinkled, and he barely put any effort into his lecture. It broke me to see him so broken. It hurt me to see the evidence of his hurt. But once again, the world stood in our way. I couldn’t approach him in class, and Lance would be home tonight.
We spent most of our class reading from our textbook, but I couldn’t bring myself to read. He brooded at his desk but kept his eyes on me. I usually would have bugged him for being so obvious, but I guess we didn’t have to worry about that anymore. My heart was breaking, but I didn’t know what else to do. I knew that we could overcome the age difference and the fact that he was my teacher. But I couldn’t keep the secret from Lance. It made me feel too much like my mother, and I didn’t want to deceive Lance.
“Blakely, please stay after class,” Decker instructed. I wasn’t expecting him to speak to me. What hurt the most was the feeling that he wasn’t willing to fight for us. Last night, I turned my phone off, but there were no messages when I turned it back on this morning. No calls. No pleas for me to come home. Maybe it was immature to want to be chased. It was undoubtedly unhealthy and something my mama would’ve done. But I wanted Decker to love me enough to at least try.
