Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 79621 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 398(@200wpm)___ 318(@250wpm)___ 265(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79621 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 398(@200wpm)___ 318(@250wpm)___ 265(@300wpm)
I turned onto Walnut Street, the beginnings of a speech forming in my head as I parked in my driveway. I unfastened my seatbelt and twisted to face him.
“Talk to me, Bry.”
“I can’t do this,” he whispered.
“What?”
“This…us.”
Panic robbed me of oxygen for a beat. I stared at him in confusion. “What do you mean? Is this about Jake?”
“No. It’s about me realizing I’m in over my head.” Bryson rubbed his nose and licked his lips. “And I’m losing myself in a fantasy.”
“Okay, I’m fuckin’ nervous here. What’s going on and why do I feel like you’re about to say something I’m not gonna want to hear? I—”
“I love you.”
The words echoed in the confines of my truck.
“Wh-what?”
He jutted his chin proudly, his mouth quirking at one corner.
“I love you,” he repeated. “I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it did. I know you care about me, but—”
“Yes, of course I do.”
“Well, I feel more than that and it’s complicated.”
I furrowed my brow and bit the inside of my cheek. “This doesn’t have to be complicated, you know.”
Bryson smiled sadly. “Too late for that. I don’t know how to balance the way I feel with reality. The reality is…I’m older than you, I’m a father, I’m a boring real estate agent who lives in a sleepy town. I know you like this place and maybe you’ll stay for another year. Maybe two. But you might change your mind, and that’s okay. You’re still young. You might meet a nice woman or a younger man, adopt a few kids, start a family, be a dad, and have all the things I can’t give you.”
“Jesus, Bry. I don’t want—”
“You don’t know what you want, Smitty. Not really.” His nose flared as he inhaled sharply and glanced out the window. “This place is a bubble. In some ways it’s not real. And I want it to be…for a lot of selfish reasons. But the spotlight will be on Jake and everyone in this town again. You’ll be in the spotlight too, like it or not. That’s the real world. I don’t think either of us is ready for it. ’Cause this weekend—that’s what hiding in plain sight, pretending to just be good friends while your world is falling apart feels like. I’m in too deep and I’m tired of lying. It’s not healthy.”
“I get that and I’m going to come out. I just—”
“Don’t do it for me,” he rasped. “I don’t want that. I don’t want it to be for the wrong reasons. When you’re ready, do it for you.”
“I…”
Shit, I had nothing. Words wouldn’t come.
Bryson rubbed his hand over his jaw, looking more undone than I’d ever seen him. “We’ll figure this out. We’re neighbors, we’re friends. I just…I need to think things through. I’m going to organize my schedule at work, then fly to Utica early before the next game, but…it’ll be okay. We’ll be okay.”
His smile was wobbly and strained, and probably didn’t deserve to be called a smile at all. He was obviously miserable and I was…fuck, I couldn’t process this, and the only thing I could think of saying was, “Don’t go.”
Bryson leaned across the console and kissed my cheek.
He pulled his suitcase from the backseat and rolled it across the street to his house. I opened my door, stumbling over my feet as if to go after him. He was too fast. My heart pounded as I watched him fumble with his keys and disappear inside.
I stood there for so long my fingers went numb from the cold, but I couldn’t move. I felt like I’d been hit by a truck. I had a flock of birds and stars dancing around my skull while I tried to make sense of what the fuck had just happened.
He said it was over, but he said he loved me.
He said he was leaving, but he was coming back.
He said it was complicated, but my God…
“This is real,” I whispered.
Was it love?
Sure, I loved how I felt when I was with him. And I loved the feeling I got when he walked into a room. I loved his sweet smile and kind heart. I loved his sexy body. I loved holding him, kissing him, being inside him. I loved everything about Bryson. Even his endless supply of bad dad jokes.
But love…I wasn’t sure I liked that word.
It scared me. The last person I’d said that word to had trampled my heart and made a mess of me. I didn’t want that kind of love, and I didn’t want complications.
This was complicated, though. Look at me now, staring after the man I’d secretly been hooking up with for months, willing him not to leave me. Willing him to tell me we could still be something and that nothing had to change.
Or was it too late?