Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135522 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
“Cole.” He shakes his head and lets out a laugh. “I figured out of everyone, you would’ve recognized it. I knew about you before you started telling people back in school. I thought you and I had a secret sort of understanding or something, at the very least.”
“No clue.” I can’t help but laugh as I clutch my glass of tea. “I really … really must have had my head up my butt or something to not have noticed.”
Saying those words, I realize it’s my father coming out of my mouth. His words from this morning.
“Hey, don’t worry,” says TJ, likely misreading my face. “Now that you know and there aren’t any lingering doubts, can you … do me a favor and …” He lowers his voice. “… maybe don’t tell anyone else? I trust you like I trust my left hand, and I’m a lefty.”
I frown. “Why don’t you want anyone to know?”
“Mmm, there’s a reason or three. I don’t know how my mom will be about it, for one.”
I find that very surprising. “Really?”
“I mean, sure, she’ll love having a gay son, but it might take her a hot second to get there. She has all these expectations of me she’s already laid out ever since I could walk. To be married by the time I graduate. To have two kids before I’m thirty. To have a wife who plays the guitar. Why is she set on the guitar? No one knows why she’s set on the guitar. She’s obsessed with getting someone in her family who’s gifted in music, because I took piano lessons for two minutes when I was a child and that poor grand piano in our living room has been gathering dust ever since. Oh, also, my wife apparently has to sing. Married, kids, guitar, sing.”
“Wow. I didn’t realize …”
“Not to mention the last thing I want is to be pulled into one of Mrs. Strong’s matchmaker hurricanes.” He leans in. “Heard you were a victim of that recently.”
I’m still shaking my head in disbelief. “TJ, I wish I knew. We … We could’ve been better friends or something.”
“It’s alright. Our friend circles didn’t overlap much. And I’ve acquired more gay friends than I can count on campus.” He takes a peek around the corner of the wall, as if hearing something, then returns to me. “It sounds like Malcolm might be back. Anyway, I guess this makes you the first person in Spruce to know. It was kinda killing me, y’know, not saying anything about it to anyone. So … thank you for being my ‘hometown confidant’, so to speak.”
I give him a smile of appreciation. “It’s my honor, TJ.”
He fights off a smirk, then lowers his voice again. “And what about you, Captain Secrets? Was I right? Is there a special lucky guy in your life, and are you two secretly a thing already, or …?”
For a moment, I’m tempted to tell TJ everything. Like a polite and mutual trading of secrets. But I promised Noah I wouldn’t tell anyone. Besides, I kind of thought Noah disappeared off to college himself after graduation, since I haven’t seen him until recently, so obviously he wasn’t the reason I didn’t scrape up the funds to hit up even Fairview Community nearby.
But he’s definitely a reason to stick around now.
“Never mind,” says TJ. “I can see twenty stories written on your face, and that might be too much to unpack over tea. I’m not gonna be my mom and probe you to death. I’m only here for the week before I gotta go back to campus anyway. Just … whoever it is … I hope he knows he’s one lucky guy.”
I smile, thinking about Noah this morning, how cutely scared he was of his mom catching us, how nervous he got when I started snacking on him before I left.
And all the time we spent last night searching our souls for places of familiarity and mutual happiness.
One such place being his shower.
And his bed.
I down the rest of my tea, including the raspberries, then nod at him. “Y’know you can hit me up anytime you need a friend to talk to, alright? Number hasn’t changed. We’re connected online. Shoot me a DM if you need to vent.”
“Will do. Just don’t be surprised if my next DM is a wedding invitation,” he says with a grimace.
TJ and I turn when we hear the murmur of conversation. Well, to be more precise, it’s the sound of Malcolm talking accompanied by Dean and Anthony’s footsteps as they follow. “There you are,” says Malcolm. “A far cry from the boys’ room.”
Malcolm is always so well put-together, stylish and dressed to perfection, with his dark hair combed neatly and his eyes focused and sharp. After the failed attempt of Nadine’s to set the two of us up, we’ve since become friends, though between his job of being Nadine’s event coordinator and his boyfriend Samuel, the two of us haven’t had much time to hang out or even talk.