He’d showered and dressed after the water and food, and followed Reece out into breezy San Francisco. It was actually cooler in the Bay Area than it had been in Portland, and Angus shivered in the wind.
“You cold?” Reece asked. It was amazing how quickly he noticed anything about Angus. Of course, most of the time Angus noticed every little thing about Reece too. They’d always been like that. Lately, well, obviously not. But he’d wanted it that way, so he couldn’t bitch about it. It just felt… cold. Everything felt cold.
“It’s kinda chilly, I guess.”
“Here. Take this. I’m not cold at all.”
Reece unzipped his monster-sized hoodie and handed it to Angus. The damn thing would be like a dress on him, but there was comfort in that. He took the sweatshirt from Reece and pulled it over his shoulders. It smelled like vanilla and tea and Reece’s cologne. The smell hadn’t changed for years. Something about it was home to Angus, and he felt immediately better for having it surround him. Not good, but better.
“Thanks,” he murmured, inhaling deeply.
“Of course.” Reece slung an arm over Angus’s shoulders. A guy walking by gave Angus an envious look and a small thumbs-up. That’s when Angus realized the guy thought Reece was his boyfriend. He chuckled dryly. Laughing felt weird. He hadn’t done it in so long.
“Hey, you laughed. I missed that sound. What’s funny?” Reece squeezed his shoulders lightly.
“That guy who just walked by us thought you were my boyfriend. He was jealous.”
“Of me probably. You’re gorgeous.”
Angus rolled his eyes. Reece would never have a clue, would he? “Yes, and that’s why he gave
me
a thumbs-up for snagging you and not the other way around. How come you’ll never realize how hot you are?”
“How come you won’t?” Reece countered.
“I’m a mess,” Angus said. He’d looked in the mirror for a long time that morning, and nothing he’d seen was good. His hair was dull, his skin grayish, his eyes looked sad and bulgy in his too-thin face. Angus wished he could turn back time to who knew when and make the past few months not happen. Life didn’t work that way, though, did it?
“C’mon. Let’s walk around for a while.”
HE FOLLOWED
Reece around the Castro, into a diner where he picked at some lunch he wasn’t interested in, and then through Ghirardelli Square, down to Fisherman’s Wharf, and a few other places he was… sort of paying attention to. Angus knew what Reece was trying to do—wear him out so he’d sleep for once and sleep well. Reece had to have heard him tossing and turning the night before. But Angus doubted it would work.
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Brad’s contempt for him, the way he’d just walked away, that damn engagement announcement, and even worse, the sappy pictures of Brad and Eric that showed up the next day with avalanches of supportive comments from people Angus had known for years.
It was such a blow. It wasn’t just the breakup; it was that he was so easily replaced with what looked like a younger, hotter copy, that none of Brad’s friends were even surprised. That he’d gone to dinner with Brad and the others, and they’d probably
known
. Known there was someone else who—
“Babe?” He’d almost forgotten Reece was there. In that comforting way, when he wasn’t directly focusing on Reece, but his presence was still there if Angus needed it.
He didn’t want to admit he needed it.
“Just thinking about things.”
“By things do you mean Brad?” Reece asked. His voice was sharp, but then he bit his lip like he’d remembered not to say too much.
It was kind of weird how that had changed for Angus. It used to be so hard for him when Reece would get pissy about Brad. He’d wanted to separate the anger and put it in a little box he didn’t have to deal with. Now that anger he felt seething under the surface in Reece wound around his own, the rage he knew was buried under layers of heavy, downy apathy. It felt a little good to get that spark. He took it out on Reece.
“I can’t just turn it off, you know. Shit. If I could, don’t you think I would have by now?”
Reece didn’t answer at first, just slung his arm over Angus’s shoulders like he had that morning. “I shouldn’t have brought him up. You want to go back to the room?”
“Kinda.”
San Francisco was nice and all, but he wasn’t really paying attention. The wind was cutting through his fog a tiny bit, but it was still there, and he was
tired.
Tired from walking and not sleeping, and tired of being him. It was exhausting.
“We can go back.”
They walked for a while until Reece found a cab and hailed it. Angus followed him into the vehicle and slouched against the somewhat smelly pleather seats. He realized that everything they’d done that day, Reece had plunked down the money for. Plus the day before. And the hotel. He felt bad. Angus
had
money, even if he hadn’t been using it to, like, pay anything recently. He started to grab his wallet and insist on paying for the cab, but he realized he didn’t even have it.
Again. I’m such a mess….
How could he have been gone all day and not even realized he didn’t have his wallet with him? Better question, how often had that happened lately?
He didn’t say anything on the short cab ride back to the hotel, probably a symptom of having nothing to say in general. He was embarrassed—by the last few months, by how Reece had just rescued him. By the fact that he’d needed to be rescued from his own damn mess. He didn’t want to talk about what had happened to him. Angus didn’t even know what
had
happened.
Reece paid when the cab stopped, and Angus winced.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
“Why?” Reece asked.
Angus simply shook his head.
He followed Reece back up to the hotel room just like he’d done the night before.
“Hey, is it okay if I do some work?” Reece asked. He cringed a bit, and Angus felt another wave of guilt. Reece felt bad reminding him that he still had a job and Angus didn’t.
I hate myself
.
“Yeah. Of course. I think I’m going to take a nap or something.”
Reece got his computer out, and Angus lay down on the bed that had been his the night before. He closed his eyes but opened them again when the room started to spin.
The alcohol from earlier had completely worn off, leaving him with a faint but annoying headache with an incredibly unpleasant undertone of nausea. Angus didn’t know when he’d feel normal again. He wasn’t even sure if he’d remember what normal felt like when he got there. If he got there. His normal would be different too. It had been ten years since he’d felt without-Brad normal. Angus wasn’t sure what he’d do with that feeling when he got it.
“God, I’m so fucking in my head,” he grumbled. He was even annoying himself.
“What?” Reece asked from the table in the corner of the room. He had his laptop open and had been clicking on it for a while. Doing the job he still had. Angus supposed he was lucky Reece could edit books from wherever he wanted to edit books. Or else Angus would probably be stuck back in his apartment, counting down the days until he was booted out.
“Nothing. I want a drink.”
“Probably not the best idea, babe.” Reece didn’t say no. Reece never actually told Angus no. But somehow whenever Reece wanted something, Angus ended up doing it. It had always been like that between them.
“Yeah. I know. Maybe I need to eat something.”
“Wanna do room service?”
Angus slumped back against the bed. He’d brought up the idea, but actually doing something about it, like taking out a menu and picking something to order, sounded like too much work.
Reece got up from the table and came over to sit next to Angus in bed. He ran his fingers through Angus’s hair, slowly, like he used to when they were kids. He hadn’t done it in a long, long time. Angus hadn’t realized how much he missed Reece’s touch. It had gotten more rare over the years he’d been with Brad—for good reason, he supposed, respect and Reece and Brad’s general dislike for each other—but it was a comfort he couldn’t get anywhere else.
“Why don’t I order us some pasta?” Reece said quietly.
“Do they have milkshakes?” Angus asked. “And a salad?” Healthy sounded good, like maybe he wanted to put something in his body that would make him feel a little better. Then again, there was always ice cream.
Reece gave him a gentle smile. “Let me look, okay?”
They ended up curled on the same bed with matching milkshakes, a chicken Caesar for Angus, and a cheeseburger for Reece. Angus couldn’t say that he felt amazing. He couldn’t even say that if he let himself think for more than a second at a time, he didn’t see Brad’s sneer and those soppy, horrible Facebook engagement pictures. So, no. He wasn’t fine, not even close, but he had Reece again, and somehow that made everything just a little bit better.
ANGUS WOKE
up far earlier the next morning than he had in a long time. He decided to turn on his phone, which might have been a huge mistake. There was an avalanche of messages—from his family, friends at work, his mother. That was the worst one. Angus had become a master at avoiding his mom lately, not enough that she’d come up and check on him in person, but enough that she didn’t know what was going on in his life.
Angus decided to bite the bullet and call his mother. She was a gentle hippie until she decided one of her children needed to be taken to task. It was always best not to get to that point. Angus figured he was well past it, and it was better just to get it over with.
He pressed the call button next to her name just as Reece was coming out of the shower. She picked up right away.
“Angus, where are you?” she barked out.
“I’m okay, Mom. I’m with Reece.”
“Oh, thank God. Are you at his house? Cherry said something about moving you in there.”
“No, Reece and I are taking a few days. He’s… trying to help me with some things. We’ll be back soon, though.”
“Where are you?”
“San Francisco.”
His mom made a dry, hissy, heaving noise. “Some warning might have been nice.”
“I’m thirty,” Angus reminded her drily. Another thing he didn’t like to dwell on for more than a few painful seconds at a time.
“Well, that hasn’t helped you much lately, has it?”
Low blow
. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m just so worried about you. Cherry told us what’s been going on.”
Angus sighed, then took a long, deep breath. “I’m not great, Ma. Not going to lie. But I’m with Reece.” Reece looked up from where he was pulling on jeans and smiled. “I don’t think there is a better place for me right now.”
“Home?”
He shuddered and hoped his mom didn’t somehow hear it.
“Nah, I think here is where I need to be right now.” The thought of going home, of his mom’s well-meaning but overwhelming affection… he couldn’t handle it. He didn’t want to
talk
about Brad, or how he’d fallen apart and fucked up his life. She’d want to talk about it, do some, like, soul-searching or something. He didn’t want to hurt her, but Angus wasn’t ready for his mom. Maybe soon.
“What are you going to do?”
Not being there apparently wasn’t enough to keep the conversation from happening. His heart picked up a little, and his palms all of a sudden started to sweat.
“I….”
What the hell am I supposed to say?
Reece held out his hand, and Angus gladly passed the phone over to him. “Hey, Kelly,” Reece said softly.
Angus could easily hear his mother through the phone, talking a mile a minute, probably telling Reece he should bring Angus back up to her.
“I just think he and I need some best-friend time. We’ll be back soon, okay?” He made a face at Angus and rolled his eyes a little. They both adored their mothers, and each other’s mothers, but they’d spent years helping each other out of scrapes. Maybe they hadn’t done it in a while, but talking down one of the moms was ingrained behavior by that point.
Angus scooted over and laid his head on Reece’s bare shoulder while Reece talked to his mom. His shoulder vibrated a little bit with his voice, and the skin was warm, tacky from the shower, and smelled like Reece and home. Angus’s first instinct was to curl closer, feel more skin, smell more. Let Reece’s warmth seep into his pores.
He was almost disappointed when Reece got off the phone. “What made you call her?” he asked with a laugh. “I would’ve taken care of all the family stuff for you for a while if you’d asked me to.”
“Just figured she wouldn’t let it go until she heard my voice,” Angus said. “I didn’t really want to deal with it, but I figured earlier was better than later.”
“She’s just scared for you, babe. She doesn’t know what’s going on, and she’s worried.”
“I know. I’m worried for me too.” Angus wrapped his arms around himself and curled up. He’d spent a lot of time like that lately. Helped him feel better somehow.
“I got ya, babe.” Reece pulled him closer and gave him a kiss on the top of his head. It felt so familiar, even though they hadn’t been like that physically for a long, long time. Angus just wanted to sink into it. “If I have anything to do with it, you’re going to be just fine.”
“Love you,” Angus said softly.
It only hurt a tiny bit to say those words to someone who wasn’t Brad. And then he thought of how many times he had said those words to Brad when he was probably with the new Eric guy… fucking him, most likely. And that was the hardest part. Feeling like an ass for having no idea that he wasn’t the only one. Feeling like an even bigger ass because apparently other people knew. And feeling like the biggest ass on the planet for giving Brad his entire twenties.
AN HOUR
later, they were full of breakfast and coffee and on their way south to LA. Angus felt better yet after two actual meals that didn’t consist only of caffeine or tequila. He didn’t love the clarity, though. He was reclined nearly as far as he could go in the passenger seat. Reece had made the executive decision to take the scenic PCH instead of the more convenient I-5. Angus wasn’t exactly in sightseeing mode, but there was something kind of soothing about watching the sky go by, passing through small towns, and smelling the ocean. It was a long day of quiet driving, food and drinks, and a lot of staring out the window. Quiet like the first day, but better somehow. Like the quiet wasn’t as heavy or something.