Just What the Truth Is (15 page)

Even as I said the words, I realized how ridiculous I sounded. Noah wasn’t uptight, and I wasn’t thirteen years old. So why did I sound like a whiny teenager?

“You want the truth, Ben, or do you want me blow smoke up your ass?” He was serious when he asked the question. Then he blinked and cracked up. “Oh, shit! I’ve done that before. Not sexy at all.” He fake shuddered.

I shuddered for real and hoped he thought I was just kidding around. “About my brother? I want you to tell me the truth.”

“I think the reason your brother’s giving you shit is because what you were doing at the bar isn’t the same as what I did during all those years I was single and living it up.”

I didn’t think he meant that what I had been doing was way tamer than what he was implying his life had once been. “How do you mean?”

“I mean that I was having a good time. Sure, I was fucking around, but I was happy. And I don’t need to know you well to know that one thing you aren’t is happy. So I gotta ask myself, what the fuck are you doin’?”

I glared at him, ready to defend myself and tell him off. But I couldn’t. He was right. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t living it up or whatever he said about his single days. I was miserable.

He nudged his chin toward my glass and refreshed his own drink. I shook my head to let him know I didn’t need more, then lifted my glass to my mouth and sipped at the vodka. I was used to beer and wine, not hard liquor, and I didn’t really like it.

“Come on, now. It’s not that fucking bad. Whatever the hell’s eating at you, it’s not that bad.” He smiled suddenly and shifted in his seat. “Hey, you know what they say you should do when life gives you lemons?”

The sudden change in topic made my head spin. “Make lemonade?” I answered weakly.

“Lemonade? Who the fuck do you hang out with, Girl Scouts? No, when life gives you lemons, you add vodka and make a lemon drop. So here’s what’s gonna happen. You’re gonna chug that drink so I can pour you another one. And when that one’s done, we’ll repeat the cycle until you’re totally wasted. Then we’ll pour your drunk ass into the guest room bed, and tomorrow you’ll wake up with a nasty as fuck hangover and an empty stomach. Just try to aim for the trash can that I’ll leave next to your bed, yeah? I like the sheets in that room. We make use of them every once in a while just to spice things up.”

I only realized my mouth was gaping open when he reached over and pushed my chin up.

“Why would I do that? How will getting drunk help anything?” I asked.

Zach smirked. “Oh, it won’t help. It’s just your farewell pity party. Meaning farewell to your fucking pity. It’s your last night feeling sorry for yourself, so live it up. Get plastered, cry about how unjust
it
all is. Not that I know shit about your particular ‘it’, but whatever’s got you all wound up, you can cuss at it and shout at it and whatever the fuck else you wanna do.”

He handed me the bottle, got up from the table, and kept talking as he opened the fridge, pulled out some lemons, and started slicing them. “But tomorrow morning, you need to wake up and start taking responsibility for your life. We’ve all had shit to go through, Ben, some of us worse than others. But wallowing doesn’t do dick to get it fixed. Hey, consider yourself lucky, you’ve got your brother and Clark and Aaron to help you get through it. They’re good guys and they care about you. I’m sure they’d be happy to stay up all night talking, if that’s what you want.”

“What about you? Aren’t you going to join the talking extravaganza?”

He turned to me, grinned, and shook his head. “Nah, I’m just the guy who’ll hold your hand while you drink yourself into a stupor. Emotions and talking aren’t my style.”

I thought about arguing with him and telling him he was doing a bang-up job talking to me about my emotions, but I decided to take him up on his offer instead. A good bender and then I would pull my head out of my ass and take control of my life. Because Zach was right: I hadn’t been happy over the past couple of weeks, and the bar hookups weren’t helping. Frankly, I hadn’t been happy in … well, … forever.

Except for the time I had spent with Micah. I had been happy then. Really happy.

Okay, bender now, thinking tomorrow
. I swallowed down my drink and slammed the empty glass on the table. “I think we’re gonna need bigger glasses.”

Chapter Fourteen

“S
O
LET
me ask you guys something,” I said, noticing that my tongue felt unusually heavy. Maybe it was time to stop drinking those lemon drops.

“Ask away,” Aaron replied with a smile.

“Would you ever be with a guy who wasn’t, uh, out?”

I figured there was no harm in talking openly with them. I mean, all four of them were gay men in stable relationships. That was what Micah said he wanted, so maybe they could give me some insight. Clearly, the vodka had unlocked the door in my brain that I had used to section off all thoughts of Micah. It hadn’t been working anyway, but sitting in Zach and Aaron’s living room, feeling tired, relaxed, and drunk, it was hopeless to try to ignore the ache in my heart. I missed him so much.

“No way,” Noah said harshly. “I’d never agree to be some guy’s dirty little secret.”

Yeah, that wasn’t a surprise. My brother was very black and white.

“Come on, Noah,” Clark interjected. “What if he had a good reason?”

“I get that people have reasons, angel, sometimes even good reasons.” Noah wrapped his arm around Clark’s shoulders as he spoke. It amazed me how my usually gruff brother sounded so gentle when he spoke to his partner. “But unless he was making steps to come out, I don’t think I’d want to get involved. I want to be able to celebrate holidays together, go out without looking over our shoulders, be a central part of each other’s life. How could I do that if my partner was hiding me?”

When he explained it that way, Noah’s issues with our parents suddenly made sense. They had forbidden Noah from bringing Clark into their home, so my brother had stopped coming over. I thought he was doing it to spite them, just his usual stubborn antics. But now I understood. Clark was the center of Noah’s world. He wanted his partner with him. Noah had the strength to walk away from anyone who refused to allow him to be himself. I wondered whether I could ever do the same.

“What about you, Aaron?” Clark asked. “Would you date a guy who was still in the closet?”

Aaron chewed on his bottom lip and furrowed his brow, thinking over the question. “I don’t know. I mean, it’s hard to answer a question like that in the abstract. Who knows how any of us would act if we were really crazy about a guy, right? But I can tell you that one of the things that attracted me to Zach right from the start was how sure and confident he was in himself.” He turned to his partner, and his blue eyes sparkled with pride. “I admired his strength and his sense of self. And I think respecting the guy you’re with is the key to a relationship. I can’t think of anybody I respect more than Zach.”

Zach snickered and got up off of Aaron’s lap, where he had been sitting all night. “All right, big guy. It’s time for us to go to bed before everybody goes into a hypoglycemic coma from listening to you gush.” He turned to me. “Ben, the invitation to crash here still stands. The guest room is the first one on the right. It has its own bathroom, and there are fresh towels in there. If you hear any screaming or grunting in the middle of the night, that’s just Aaron fucking me into the mattress, so don’t run into our room in a panic.” He hesitated and then spoke again. “Well, I mean, if you want to watch, we keep the door unlocked. It’s usually a pretty good show.”

Aaron shook his suddenly red face and took Zach’s hand, following him to the bedroom. “Good night, guys. Thanks for coming over,” he called out over his shoulder. “We’ll see you for church on Sunday. Lock up on your way out.”

“Since when do you go to church?” I asked.

“By church, he means brunch,” Clark responded. “We have a standing date every Sunday with a group of guys. You’re welcome to join us anytime.” He stood and started picking up empty glasses. “I’m going to wash these out so they don’t wake up to a mess in the morning. You guys can finish talking.”

When Clark left the room, Noah turned to me. “I’m sorry if I was a little, uh, harsh earlier.”

“Saying you were a little harsh is like saying Jeffrey Dahmer had odd eating habits,” I mumbled under my breath. Well, I was going for a quiet mumble. All that vodka made volume control a bit of a challenge.

“Damn, Ben, what’s with the serial killer references tonight? You’re starting to freak me out.”

I shrugged and almost fell off the couch.

“You’re drunk,” Noah observed.

I nodded. “Prolly.”

“Well, maybe it’s a good time for us to talk.”

“Huh?” My brother wasn’t making any sense. Or else I wasn’t able to comprehend a simple sentence. Either scenario seemed plausible.

“Maybe you won’t put up your walls like you usually do and you can just listen to me for once,” he explained.

“I always listen to you, Noah.”

“No, you don’t. But I know it’s not all your fault. I don’t have to be such an asshole all the time.” He ran his fingers through his dark hair. “The reason I gave you a hard time tonight is because you deserve better than bar hookups. That’s not who you are.”

I rested my head on the back of the couch and closed my eyes. “I’m an idiot,” I said. “We could create a new drinking game where everyone takes a shot every time I do something stupid. We’d all spend our life wasted.”

“You’re not an idiot. A lot of guys I know who came out later, like you, went nuts at first. It was like a second adolescence or something. They’d hit the bars and bathhouses, party too hard, and get lost for a while before they finally got their shit together. That is if they ever got their shit together at all.” He paused, and I felt his hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes and met his concerned gaze. “I don’t want that for you, Ben. You’re a good brother and a good person. Don’t think I don’t know that. I’m glad you’re in my life.”

My jaw dropped. Noah had literally never been that nice to me. Not ever. He continued talking. “So I take it things didn’t work out with that guy you were telling me about a couple of months ago. Did he drop you because you’re not out? Is that why you were asking those questions earlier?”

“Sort of. He hinted around about meeting Mom and Dad, and I freaked out on him. But I never told him why exactly. I mean, I tried, but it came out all wrong and I just made everything worse. That conversation alone was worthy of a full bottle’s worth of shots.”

I curled up on the couch and rested my head on my brother’s lap. I knew I was acting like a baby, but I didn’t care. The ache in my chest had spread to my entire body.

“You want to get him back?” Noah asked quietly.

“More than anything,” I answered with a sigh. “But that’s not gonna happen. He doesn’t want me anymore. I don’t blame him, either. I really blew it, Noah.”

“Maybe you’re right and maybe you’re not. There’s only one way to find out. If you really want him, then you need to talk to him. You have to be honest, completely honest. Tell him why you freaked about Mom and Dad, tell him you’re just now coming out, tell him everything. Then it’s up to him to decide if he’s willing to give it another go.”

I
ENDED
up sleeping over at Noah and Clark’s house. They lived just a couple of streets over from Zach and Aaron, so we left a note thanking those guys for their hospitality and ambled home. Well, for me it was more like stumbled, but I got there without falling on my ass. Is that applause I hear? Thanks.

Noah’s guest room had shutters that did a nice job of keeping the sun out, which was great because I was able to sleep in. By the time my body finally felt ready to face the world, it was after ten. I lay in the bed and stared at the ceiling for a while, thinking about what I needed to do.

I could go to Micah’s house and beg him to take me back, but that wouldn’t work. First off, he probably wasn’t there. Even though it was Saturday, I guessed Micah was at the office. His big trial was coming up, and everyone on his team was working them self ragged around the clock. But that wasn’t the only problem. Convincing the man I so desperately wanted to give me another chance wouldn’t accomplish anything if I just turned right around and blew it again. So before I tried to get him back, I had to make some changes in my life.

With that decision made, I threw off the blanket and dragged my ass into the bathroom. I brushed my teeth with the new toothbrush Clark had left for me on the bathroom counter. Then I flossed and made a rookie too-hung-over-to-think-clearly error. Don’t rub your eyes right after manipulating minty floss. The experience is way too refreshing.

After my shower I felt almost human. I got dressed and walked into the kitchen, pausing at the doorway. Noah and Clark were standing close together. Clark’s arms were resting on Noah’s shoulders. Noah had one hand on Clark’s neck and the other on his lower back. And they were talking quietly to each other, affection clear in their expressions and tone. I wanted that kind of connection so much it made my teeth hurt.