Wild Star: Under the Stars Book 3

by Raleigh Ruebins

  “Yeah?” he said. “What else would you call it? I couldn’t fucking afford to pay it and so you used your family money to do it. Without even asking me.”

  “I didn’t ask you because I was sure you’d refuse,” I said, a little too forceful. “Grey, I was trying to do something to help you. To alleviate your burden. I thought… I thought this would make you so happy.”

  He laughed bitterly again, the sound of it like a dagger in my heart. “Trying to help me,” he said, turning to lean in the doorway, the dim light from inside his living room illuminating his profile. He was beautiful and terrible all at once, his features so soft in the light but so clearly upset.

  “I could have fucking taken care of it on my own, Adam. But you didn’t trust me.”

  “I just wanted to help,” I whispered again. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I wanted it to be… to be a surprise.”

  “I could have done it,” he said bitterly. “That’s the whole fucking reason I’m moving to Portland anyway, you know that, right Adam? I have to move away. I have to get out of here, get away from everyone I care about who cares about me. Like my mom. And like you.”

  Grey’s voice was still hollow, but in the light reflecting off his profile I could see one tear streak down his cheek, leaving a shiny path behind it.

  “Fuck,” he said, shaking his head and looking upward. “And she doesn’t even fucking know that I’m in love with you,” he said.

  My heart slammed in my chest. Had I just heard him right? His eyes widened slightly and he met my gaze, like a shocked deer in headlights, before returning again to their sleepy, drunken state.

  “Like you didn’t know that,” he said, another tear falling down his face. “Don’t act all surprised. I’m in love with you, Adam.”

  I felt tears stinging at the corners of my eyes, too, welling up in my field of vision. “I love you too,” I said, still unable to keep my voice above a whisper.

  He shook his head. “I wish you did,” he said. “But I think you’re just in love with the idea of helping me.”

  I paused, grappling with the weight of what he’d just said.

  Was it true?

  I did love helping Grey. I loved helping anyone who deserved it, in any way I could. It was an undeniable aspect of my personality.

  But was that all Grey was to me? Could that even possibly be true?

  “No,” I said, before even realizing I was speaking. “No.” I shook my head, and now tears were coming down my face in earnest, too. “I love everything about you, Grey. And I… I should have talked to you about the money first, but I knew you wouldn’t accept it, knew you’d rather hurt yourself than take any help.”

  He shook his head, eyes fixed on me in an unrelenting gaze.

  “But I’m not going to fucking let you do that, Grey. I just can’t. I can’t see you hurt yourself, can’t see you hate your life so much, and that’s why I haven’t said a damn thing to you about how much I love you. Because you need to follow your dreams. Go to Portland. Live your life, and forget about me.”

  He buried his face in his hands.

  “Maybe it’s better,” I said, choking on my words, “Maybe its better that you’re pissed off at me. Better if we don’t see each other anymore. Because I don’t want to get in the way of your dreams, Grey. All I want to do is see you happy. …Even if it’s without me.”

  He was completely silent, staring forward, eyes wide as an occasional tear still fell.

  “I love you, Grey,” I said one last time, and then I turned, stepping down from his porch, and crossing back over to my house. I went inside, not looking back, and I grabbed my keys, my wallet, cell phone, and a jacket.

  And then I went back outside to my truck, started the engine, and began driving down the street. It was only when I got to the end that I dared look in my rearview mirror—and Grey was no longer there, the front door of his house shut, the light inside already off.

  Sixteen

  Grey

  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  It was all so fucking stupid and completely and totally my fault.

  After watching Adam walk and then drive away, going fuck knows where, I sauntered back inside. I shut off the light. But I didn’t move. I just stood there, gently swaying, feeling like I was on the precipice of either being wracked with sobs or running to the bathroom and being sick.

  The image of Adam’s eyes was still burned in my mind. Big and dark, open and caring. He was so earnest, the look on his face almost innocent as he stood in my doorway, but all I could do was throw jab after icy jab right at him.

  Because that’s what I do, isn’t it? Isolate myself. Whether it’s by staying in Fox Hollow all my fucking life while all my friends moved far away, finding success and forgetting me, or whether it’s by pushing away people that care for me.

  And obviously I couldn’t deny that when I saw Adam’s eyes.

  There was no hint of malice there. No sign that he had purposely kept secret paying for my mom’s bills so that he could pity me from atop a mountain of pretension.

  He really just fucking wanted to help me, and I couldn’t accept that.

  I took in a deep, shaky breath in the dark and then pawed at the side table for my keys. I didn’t grab anything else, and I left out my front door, wandering out into the moonlit night completely aimless. Adam’s truck was still gone, of course. For all I knew, he’d be gone permanently. His reputation preceded him, and everyone seemed to know that Adam never stayed in one place for very long.

  Maybe he was gone forever. Maybe he’d be out of the country by tomorrow, or the end of the week. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time Adam had moved unexpectedly.

  The clouds broke in sheets in the sky, occasionally allowing the moonlight to peek through and otherwise shrouding even that small bit of shine.

  As I walked, stuffing my hands in the pockets of my hoodie, I could barely keep track of reality. It didn’t help that I was drunk as hell, but honestly I felt more intoxicated by the swirling vortex of emotions than anything else.

  Had I seriously told Adam that I loved him? My skin prickled as I remembered bits and pieces of what I’d said to him.

  It was dumb. Why even tell him the truth about how I felt if I couldn’t even be with him? It was like a last ditch Hail Mary pass, as I realized that if I was going to lose Adam forever, he might as well know how I really felt. It wouldn’t make a difference. I’d still been an asshole. Ungrateful. Cold.

  Hell, I’d probably been undeserving of Adam the entire time I’d known him.

  And with my mom…

  I felt fresh tears at the corners of my eyes, cool in the night air as I quickened my pace down the street and around the corner. It was all too much.

  If my mom’s medical bills were completely paid off now… why did I suddenly feel paralyzed about leaving Fox Hollow? Why did I feel like I couldn’t leave, no matter how hard I tried?

  I realized slowly that part of me was still scared to leave.

  And maybe that’s part of the reason I hadn’t left far sooner. Because who would I be, in a different city? Just another fish in a huge pond, searching aimlessly for something to make me happy.

  And as I thought about my mom, and what everyone always said about me: that I was a “great son,” that I did so much for her, and that she was so lucky to have me, all I could feel was that I was a liar.

  I lied to my mom about who I was. I’d known probably since I was 14 that I was attracted to men. But I’d never told her, and the only reason was my own fear. Fear that she’d judge me. Even fear that it would just be awkward.

  I stopped in my tracks on the sidewalk, trees surrounding me, as I realized something chilling.

  Was I pushing Adam away because I was too scared of what being in love with him might mean? Because if he loved me even a tenth as much as I loved him, the implications were massive. I wanted him. I wanted all of him, and I wouldn’t mind if I had him forever.

  But forever mean
t there would be nowhere to hide. I would have to tell my mom, unless I wanted to spend the rest of my life in secret. How could I do something like marry another man, let alone having him as a long-term boyfriend? The obvious answer was that I couldn’t, I couldn’t live like that, I would have to choose one way or the other.

  Being truthful with my mother, or never being able to be with a man I loved.

  I continued down the street, walking slow and in a daze. I walked past my old elementary school, then past the park, and then down the familiar streets of my childhood.

  And then I saw it. A lamp post, a house, a moment in time.

  It was the house my bully lived in when we were kids. I remembered all the times he’d shouted at me, thrown rocks, called me a “sissy.” Even the one time he tried to punch me, and he’d barely made contact but still scraped the side of my face.

  But then I remembered Adam.

  I’d told Adam about the bully, and he’d pulled me under this lamp post, kissed me, and told me to remember him whenever I walked by the house.

  I staggered to lean against the post, bending over slightly as tears streamed down my face faster than they’d fallen all night. I sobbed, the sound echoing just lightly in the night air, though no one was around to hear.

  I stayed that way for a good ten minutes at least, though I certainly wasn’t keeping track of time. But after I let it out, and the tears slowly stopped coming, I felt a clarity like I hadn’t in weeks, or maybe longer.

  Because I knew what I had to do. It seemed so obvious to me, now, like there was no other option, and I didn’t feel trapped or sad or scared. I just felt resolute.

  And so I started back up the road, going the opposite direction, back up to my street, knowing that even if I never saw Adam again, he had changed my life forever.

  Seventeen

  Adam

  I had no idea where I was going when I got in my truck. I just knew that I had to get away, couldn’t bear to be in my house, so close to Grey but knowing that I couldn’t have him in my arms. My house was full of the gifts he’d brought me, and even some of his clothes he’d left strewn on various surfaces in the house.

  Grey had become a seamless part of my life, and now that the seam had broken, I could see and feel him everywhere.

  I drove aimlessly around the short roads of Fox Hollow until I saw a shining 24-hour beacon in the night: Fox’s Diner. I pulled my car into the gravel parking lot, not even sure if I was going to go inside or just sit there in silence, probably crying in my truck.

  I’d never been to the diner at such a late hour, and in the daytime it was always packed to the brim and you had to fight to even find a parking spot. But now there were only four other cars in the lot, and I was sure at least two of them had to belong to the workers inside.

  I cut off the engine and for a good while I just sat there, trying to keep my breathing even, trying to think about the horrible mess I’d made.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have paid off all of Grey’s mom’s bills. But I couldn’t help but feel like Grey’s problem was bigger than that. That maybe it went beyond just the bills, and further into him thinking he didn’t deserve love. It was clear that he had issues asking for help, but when he told me he loved me he seemed scared, almost broken somehow.

  And it absolutely crushed my heart. Because I had never felt like I did about Grey for anyone else. I felt right when I was with him, like he understood what I needed before I needed it, and everything felt effortless. And I wanted so badly for it to feel that effortless to him, to make him trust in how good it could be.

  When I started to feel more frustrated than I did sad, I headed inside the diner. There was one cook working behind the griddle, leaning against the counter reading the newspaper as I walked in, and one young waitress who was playing a game on her phone. She seemed glad to have another customer and told me to sit anywhere in the place.

  I took a booth and ordered just a coffee. I stared into the middle distance, my mind completely blank, until she came back with the mug.

  “You doing okay, sir?” she said, her curly blonde hair bouncing, a bright spot in the otherwise lifeless restaurant.

  “Oh,” I said, looking up at her, slightly startled by the human interaction. “Yeah, I’m…” I started to say, and then realize that being dishonest was too much effort. “No, actually, I had a pretty shitty night.”

  “Aw,” she said, making a slight pouty face at me. “That’s a shame, darling. Is it going any better now?”

  I held up the mug of coffee. “I hope this will help. But I don’t know if my… problem is gonna be resolved anytime soon.”

  “You get in a fight with the missus?” she asked, leaning against my table.

  “Kinda like that,” I said, meeting her eyes and taking a sip of the too-hot coffee. “Fight with my boyfriend. Or at least, my kind-of boyfriend… which I’m pretty sure after tonight he’s not.”

  “Oh no,” she said, furrowing her brow. “Is that the cute guy I’ve seen you come in here with before?”

  My eyes widened. “You remember us?”

  “’Course I do, sweetie,” she said. “I’ve got a great memory for faces. And you two came in, like, twice a week.”

  I puffed out a small laugh. “Fair point. Yeah, it’s him. And I’m pretty sure he wants nothing to do with me anymore.”

  “This your first fight?” she asked.

  “Um…” I said, thinking, “Kind of. Certainly the first big one.”

  “Well why don’t you just make it up to him? That’s what I always do with my husband. If I blow up at him or he blows up at me, it doesn’t matter, I’ll always come home with a nice pie from the case up front. He likes lemon meringue but he’ll accept apple, too.”

  I smiled up at her. She couldn’t have been more than twenty-two years old, but I liked the idea of her going home to her husband with a whole pie.

  “I don’t think a pie could fix this one,” I said, looking down at the napkin on the table and folding it neatly in half.

  “Shame,” she said, shaking her head. “Well, what about something else, then? Get him something big.”

  “That’s kind of the problem,” I said, “I already got him something big, something too big. And… he’s mad that I got him too much without telling him about it first.”

  “Oh,” she said, eyes widening as she nodded in understanding. “That’s happened with me and Davey, too. Shit, I was so excited—I saved up for two months and clipped coupons for the Super Shopper in order to get him this huge flat-screen TV he’d been talking about for months. I went out and got it, all stealthy, while he was at work one night. Put a big red bow on it and everything. But when he got home and saw it, he was upset. Asked me why I didn’t talk to him about it before, told me that it was something he was working toward.”

  “Wow,” I said.

  “I know,” she said, shaking her head. “At first I was dead angry at him. Wanted to leave him. Like, I’m just trying to do something nice and you act like that? But then he sat me down and talked to me, and told me the real reason he was upset was because he felt like he could never repay me. Made him feel like he couldn’t provide for the family. But I told him it’s not about who provides—it’s that we both get to appreciate it. I want to make him happy, and he wants to make me happy. We both win. Because we aren’t at odds, we’re a team.”

  “And did he understand?” I asked.

  She nodded. “He did, believe it or not. He said he had to get over some crap about gender roles or whatever, and also learn to accept that he can’t control anything. And I’ll tell you what, he’s never been mad about any gift again. Especially not the pies.”

  “I’m so glad. Wow. Thank you so much for telling me that story,” I said with a smile.

  “Oh, anytime. Your story might be different, though, y’know. Maybe if he doesn’t like big gifts, that’s just part of his personality that you can’t really change. What about little gifts, though?”

  I
thought for a moment. “He is actually really great at little gifts,” I said, “He brings me little things all the time that he makes or finds somewhere.”

  “Oh! Well there you go, sweetie, little gifts. Clearly they’re special to him, right?”

  “Definitely.”

  She gave a little shrug. “So maybe make him a little gift. Something that doesn’t cost a lot, but shows you care. Some people feel weird about too much money, but no one can say no to a gift from the heart, right?”

  “God, you are so helpful,” I said to her, puffing out a laugh. “I am so glad we talked.”

  “I’m definitely not perfect, but I’ve been married 2 years, I’ve learned a thing or two about compromise.”

  “I really appreciate it. I hope it works.”

  “I think it will. I mean… do you love him?” she asked. She seemed so casual about it, like it was such a nonchalant thing to say, but my heart started slamming in my chest as I answered.

  “Yes,” I said, “I do. So much.”

  “And he loves you back?”

  I paused for a moment. “He told me he did. Tonight, actually, while we were fighting.”

  “Oh wow,” she said. “Then there’s definitely still hope. You gotta show him you love him. If it’s meant to be, he will come back to you.”

  I took in a deep breath. “I’m gonna try,” I said. “Thank you.”

  “No problem,” she said, and as she walked away she turned and said with a wink, “I always did like your dance moves back in the day. My older sister was a huge fan.”

  I didn’t know if it was possible to blush with your entire body, but if it was, I was doing that. I had no clue she recognized me at all—usually if people did, they’d tell me sooner—but I was thankful she hadn’t mentioned it until the end of our conversation.

  I left a 20 dollar bill on the table even though the coffee was probably only a buck, and I headed out the front door. I got in the truck and immediately started thinking about what I could do for Grey—something that would cost very little but would show him how I actually felt.