The airport was in the far northeast corner of Columbus, and even with the GPS, we still got turned around trying to find the right exit and had to hurry to get Jasper to the drop-off point on time. It was only when Conrad slammed the trunk after Jasper grabbed his stuff that it really hit me that I was about to be alone with Conrad. Days and days of alone. In the chaos of Jasper’s emergency and doing what needed to be done, I’d lost sight of the enormity of that reality. And judging by Conrad’s stunned expression, he had too.
Our eyes met. Held. Neither of us said a word. We were truly on our own now. No turning back.
Chapter Eleven
Conrad
It was only the two of us now. Two guys, one big, black monstrosity of a car, an increasingly optimistic itinerary, and a burning desire to make it to the convention on time. We weren’t doing this just for our own selfish reasons anymore. We were doing this for Professor Tuttle and Jasper both. The weight of that added to the little hitch in my pulse as we left Jasper at the airport and headed out on our own. Alden had been…impressive that morning, and he continued to be in all-business mode as he rearranged the contents of the trunk to make sure Jasper had all his stuff.
After the way he’d frozen when Professor Tuttle had been injured, I hadn’t expected much of Alden in an emergency. Hadn’t really expected him to be the sort of guy who could sympathize with a family crisis either. But not only had he stepped up with the credit card, he’d been good at locating flights and keeping us all on track to get Jasper to the airport on time. And he’d seemed to care, in a way that I hadn’t seen from him before. While he hadn’t been patting Jasper on the back or anything, the efficient way he’d packed him up and his little reminders to eat and such all showed a depth to Alden that I hadn’t seen before. It was more than a little humbling, realizing that maybe I’d prejudged him based solely on who he was playing the game.
“That was nice of you, man. You did Jasper a real solid,” I said as I slid back behind the steering wheel after Jasper had dashed into the terminal. Surprisingly, Alden hadn’t argued when I said I’d drive, instead installing himself and all his papers in the passenger seat.
“Like you said, he would have done it for us.” Alden’s neck flushed pink, and he looked away. Even though he seemed embarrassed by the praise, there was something…different about him now. Hard to pin it down, but it was a sort of confidence to his voice, a new level of firmness that made him seem more…real in a way he hadn’t previously.
“Yeah. He would have. He’s a good guy.” I followed all the signs back to the highway. The interchanges here were every bit as confusing as Philadelphia, and I’d set my GPS to get us back to I-70, but I still had to concentrate to not accidentally end up at the capitol or the university. Traffic was predictably heavy for a Monday morning, and our detour to take Jasper to the airport had put us right in the thick of rush hour.
“I didn’t know about his sister.” Alden sounded wistful. “He talks about his family all the time. Maybe I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Nah. Don’t beat yourself up. I only know because I had to crash with them a few days last year. She’s a cute kid—like fifteen or so now. I really hope she’s okay.”
“Crash? Were you guys…” Alden trailed off.
He’d been nice enough that morning that I tried to let his nosiness slide. Besides, something about his reflective tone made me soften mine.
“Dating? No. We’ve never been like that. He was with someone when I first got to Gracehaven, and after that, he was already in the friend zone. Didn’t want to screw with my access to his employee discount.” I laughed, but predictably, Alden didn’t. “Kidding. He’s a bro. Too good a friend to mess with only for a hookup. You know how it is.”
“Not really.” Alden drummed his fingers against the console. A quick glance his direction revealed that he was blushing again, a deep stain on his usually pale cheeks.
“What do you mean? You hook up with your friends? Or you don’t friend-zone people?”
“Not that it’s important, but I…uh…don’t hook up. With friends or otherwise.”
“You’re a virgin?” The question was out before I could call it back. In front of us, a school bus jockeyed for lane space with a semi, both creeping along with the clogged traffic. A nearby billboard advertised some sort of history museum, and I wished I could make my ill-thought-out question part of the past too.
“It’s not scarlet fever. You don’t have to sound so horrified.” Alden’s reply was about as bristly as I’d expected.
“You’re missing out.” Of that I was sure, but why it made me a little sad to think of Alden alone, I wasn’t so sure.
“Perhaps.” His sigh was a soft, fragile thing. “But not all of us see college as a nonstop chance to party.”
Instead of getting defensive the way I had back at Professor Tuttle’s place, empathy over Alden always being on the outside looking in, combined with gratitude for how he’d helped Jasper, broke free a chunk of my truth.
“I didn’t. I know people say I did, but I loved school. Just because I liked to let loose on weekends doesn’t mean that I wasn’t taking my GPA seriously. It’s possible to make honor roll and have hookups both.” As we crept forward, another billboard advertised a personal-injury law firm, and I totally would have volunteered to sit through a hour of cheesy law-firm commercials to avoid this uncomfortable topic.
“But… Why leave then?” Alden sounded more thoughtful than demanding, which kept me from giving him a flip answer.
“No choice. It’s a long story that I’d rather not get into, but my parents kicked me out. Couldn’t work out the financial aid, despite the college trying to help. No money, no school.” I kept my voice even, as if reciting a multiplication table rather than summing up all the awful the universe had thrown at me.
“They kicked you out? What did you do?”
“Do?” I laughed, but it came out crackly, laced with all the bitterness of the last year. “I didn’t do shit.”
That wasn’t precisely true, but I didn’t want to air the entire tale to someone who wasn’t likely to get it at all. Do. Fuck that noise.
“If you didn’t… Then… Was it because you’re gay?”
“Yeah. A-plus deduction, Sherlock. Can we talk about something else now?”
“But…why?” The outrage in Alden’s voice was gratifying after his initial skepticism, but after all these months, I was more resigned than angry myself.
“Because. Not all of us get the TV-show perfect family with two great moms and cookies when we come out or whatever. Some of us get assholes.”
“Oh.” Alden was quiet a long moment, and I figured I’d shocked him into giving up the conversation. His GPS—the normal-voiced kind, not the wacky version Jasper ran—warned me that we were approaching the merge back onto I-70. Finally, as I made sure we were in the correct lane, Alden spoke in a soft whisper. “It’s not always. Not always perfect.”
“Them caring about your grades doesn’t count, sorry.” I’d picked up before on his moms probably being hard asses where GPA was concerned, but hell, I’d give a lot to have someone worry over me like that.
“It’s more than… You don’t get it.” Alden huffed out a breath. I waited for him to enlighten me, but what came out was even more surprising. “Mimi wasn’t always a part of our family. My dad died when I was a toddler. Plane crash. And I’m not saying that’s the same as whatever happened to you, but quit acting like you have a monopoly on life being unfair at times.”
“Sorry.” He was right. I was being an ass. Outside, we were finally out of downtown Columbus, heading more into the suburbs again, exit signs advertising fast-food chains and golf courses. Someone needed to take a nine-iron to my head, keep me from putting my foot in it, but somehow I kept talking. “Guess that’s why you have your thing about flying? I was kinda surprised that you were so in
favor of Jasper taking a plane back.”
“Yeah. I do get scared for other people too. I’ll worry until Jasper texts you that he’s safe. And when Mom or Mimi travels, I’m…a mess. Somehow, both of my sisters are normal. They fly all the time. They don’t have panic attacks when the moms have to fly. I’m the one who ruined vacations and stuff like that as a kid and who still can’t seem to get over it.”
“Don’t they make meds that can help people with phobias like that?” My hands tensed on the steering wheel. I didn’t like thinking about him being so miserable. And shame coursed through me that it hadn’t occurred to me that he’d care about whether or not Jasper was safe.
“This is with medication. It’s not a magic cure.” He sounded so disgusted with himself that it made my chest hurt.
“Sorry. And your moms… They give you a hard time about the anxiety?” We were starting to leave the suburbs behind, signs shifting to tell us how many more miles to Springfield and Dayton. I should have been hungry by this point, but the weirdness of the conversation distracted me from the rumbling of my stomach.
He groaned. “You have no idea. Yes. The neurologist who can’t fix my brain. It’s a pride thing with her, I guess. But trust me, if it’s out there as a possible evidence-based solution, I’ve tried it.”
“That’s rough. But at least she cares, you know?”
“There’s caring and then there’s the third therapist that month and the trip into the city to see yet another specialist and the new medicine that might possibly help or might actually be worse than the old medicine. At a certain point…”
“It’s just all too much.” I got it then, at least a bit of it. “You want to feel like their kid, not a problem to be solved.”
“Exactly.” He shot me a grateful smile.
“My parents—Dad especially—thought they could fix me too. So I kind of get it. It’s hard when it feels like they aren’t seeing you any longer.”
“You being gay is not a problem to fix, medically or otherwise.” Alden’s indignant tone soothed places inside me that I hadn’t even realized were still raw. “My anxiety at least has some actual science behind things that could help. It’s no one’s fault that none of it works for me. Flying and other things are simply going to always be hard.”
“But…” A thought that I’d had ever since Professor Tuttle had said that Alden didn’t like to fly popped out before I could find some tact. “How the heck are you going to cope with the pro tour if you get a space on it? It’s a lot of conventions and travel. You can’t drive to every stop.”
“I can try.” Alden’s chin had a stubborn tilt to it when I glanced over at him, and his voice was full of fake bluster, as if he was trying to convince himself as much as me. “And like you said, there are pharmaceuticals for the trips where plane travel simply isn’t avoidable. They’re not perfect, but they at least can hold off the worst of a panic attack. I want to work on this. I want to get over it. I know logically that flying is safer than driving. Maybe if I do it enough times… And I want to be on the pro tour. I need that win.”
So did I, but this wasn’t the moment to bring that up or to play the I-deserve-it-more game. “Well, if you’ve had the anxiety all these years, it seems silly to think you can white-knuckle the fear into submission.”
“I choose to believe I can.” His voice was firm, back to the haughtiness I was used to. Well, okay then. And maybe he legit didn’t need my sympathy—I sure as hell didn’t need his—but I couldn’t seem to stop the way my mind sped ahead, worrying about other situations that might trigger panic attacks for him. And my body went all floppy, as if it couldn’t decide how it felt about all this talking. This was more talking than we’d done in the three years that we’d been around each other, and getting to know Alden, to have him be a complicated person rather than just an annoying rival, was a development I wasn’t sure I was ready for.
Chapter Twelve
Alden
If there was one thing I was fast learning, it was that a hungry Conrad without access to the continuous stream of sugar and junk he seemed to favor was a cranky Conrad. And as we approached Dayton later than we’d planned, Cranky Conrad kept muttering under his breath about the traffic.
“Why is the game store Professor Tuttle picked clear on the other side of Dayton? And why are all the idiot drivers out here at once? God, I just want to get to the stop.”
“We need food first.” I tried to make my voice sound as no-arguments as it did when I was playing the game. Somehow it was far easier to be bossy there than in real life. But some of my earlier confidence from helping Jasper had carried over to the rest of the day, making me more relaxed. Obsessing less over Conrad’s driving and every little detail beyond my control.
“Guess I could eat lunch. All I’ve had were those mini doughnuts for breakfast.”
“You really need to overhaul your eating. It’s not healthy to live on crap food.” I pulled out my phone and my folders of papers, trying to find some food options.
“At the moment, I’m kind of a freegan.” He laughed. “Doughnuts were free. Therefore, I ate them. But growing up, my mom was a major health nut. Dad, too, really.”
“Ah. So junk food is like your grand rebellion?” I’d never attempted anything resembling rebellion before myself, but I understood on an academic level how it could be appealing.
“No, I think going to a liberal East Coast college instead of the school where my dad is the football coach pretty much handled that. And the whole being-outed thing took care of the rest.” Conrad’s voice was dry and distant, no more laughing.
“Your dad is a football coach?” Certain things about Conrad were starting to make more sense.
“Yup. Smaller religious college in Kansas. Been there over twenty years now, first as an assistant, then as the head coach. Every now and then he’ll get interest from a bigger program, but he never actually ends up leaving. So, where are we eating?”
“Do you trust Ohio pizza?” Picking up on his desire to change the topic, I surveyed a list of places along I-75, which would take us to the other side of Dayton where we needed to be. “Oh, wait. Their menu is showing pictures of square slices. Just no.”
That got another laugh out of Conrad. “Square pizza goes against Alden’s rules of order? How dare they.”
“Some things are not meant to be improved upon.”
“Says the guy who tinkers with his decks nightly,” he scoffed. A strange, warm feeling spread through my chest. What were we doing here? Joking like this? It was unfamiliar and more than a little unsettling. Needing distraction, I scanned the list of restaurants further.
“In the also wrong-bad category, they have a zombie-themed hot dog place. Cheap, but—”
“Put it in the GPS,” Conrad demanded. “This I have to see.”
“It’s nowhere near Halloween,” I complained even as I complied.
“I love scary movies any time of year,” he countered.
“And I’ve never seen the appeal. Deliberately scaring yourself? No thank you.” Life was bad enough all on its own. I didn’t need help getting scared silly, but I also didn’t want to be too much of a wet blanket. “But you go ahead.”
“See, this is where the whole never-hooking-up thing is working to your disadvantage.” Conrad dispensed advice as though he was a good ten years older than me, making my teeth grind together. “Watching scary movies definitely increases your chances of getting lucky. You’re all cringing and hiding your head and freaking out—”
“None of which is exactly sexy,” I had to point out. I’d had plenty of freak-outs, and none had ever turned me on in the slightest.
“You need more imagination.”
“You’re hardly the first to think that.” I paused to let the GPS direct us off the interstate. “But I’m still not seeing how you go from being scared to making out or something.�
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“Subtlety. First, you sorta put your arm around the other person. Then you wait. And then before you know it, you’re kissing.” He made it sound ridiculously easy when I knew perfectly well that it was anything but. “That’s how it happened the first time for me at least.”
“When you were probably some absurdly young age. What were you, thirteen?” I tried to ignore the flush creeping up my neck at the thought of Conrad kissing anyone.
“Fifteen,” he corrected me with a smug tone. “His parents’ basement. He moved the next year, but man… While he was there, life was pretty sweet. Lots of horror-movie marathons.”
“I don’t need all the details.” I knew I sounded like a prude again, but for all that he told me to get an imagination, I wasn’t sure I could handle visions of Conrad tangled up with some nameless, faceless person. “And we’re almost there.”
The zombie-themed hot dog place looked like an old pizza parlor that someone had redone in shades of orange and black, decor from various horror movies on the wall, big spiders and other mutant creatures creeping along the counter where we ordered. Conrad got the “nightmare” dog, which had jalapeños, onion, and spicy relish loaded on it. I wanted to make a joke about how it was good he wasn’t planning on kissing anyone that day, but I wasn’t sure how to say it without making it sound like I was dropping a hint. Which I most definitely wasn’t.
At least I didn’t think I was.
Did having constant flashes of Conrad kissing someone mean that I wanted to kiss him myself? I honestly wasn’t sure anymore, and that made my stomach churn, back muscles tensing as I ordered my own chicken hot dog with only standard toppings. I wasn’t up for any bizarre combos that might make my insides that much more rebellious.
Conventionally Yours (True Colors) Page 8
