Felix’s back was towards him, but Loren traced the line of his profile. His familiar shape stirred all sorts of tangled feelings – the way his muscles had flexed and softened under Loren’s touch, that smooth, strong heat. The cool grass when Loren woke alone.
‘I waited for you.’ Loren slid his grip down Felix’s arm until their fingers curled together. His nerves fluttered, dangerous hope taking flight. ‘You left. But you’re here now. Aren’t you?’
For a long, honey-drip second, Loren thought he had him.
But the moment dragged, and Felix was a bowstring when angry. He pulled tighter, shoulders seizing, tensing to snap. To let the volley of arrows loose, send the spear hurtling, Achilles bringing down Troy.
Felix twisted free with a jerk. ‘Don’t. Don’t touch me. I hate when you touch me.’
The sting cracked whip-sharp, stealing Loren’s breath. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘Of course you don’t.’ Lithe even in blistering fury, Felix danced away.
Slanted light cut him in two. With the fresh distance, Loren took a moment to look him over, in all his messy-curled, stormy-eyed, agonised beauty. To watch Felix was to witness a tragedy unfold, and Loren tried to wrap his mind around him, fit him into a mould he understood. Myths he understood. Stories he made sense of. He cycled through the possibilities.
If not Achilles, raw from battle, Felix was the sun itself. The same sun Icarus flung himself at over and over. The same sun Patroclus died under, wearing the clothes of another man. Both sacrifices for nothing. Perhaps Loren was the gap in Achilles’s armour, trying – failing – to protect Felix from himself, waiting for the arrow to strike home.
Perhaps his mistake had been attempting to mythologise Felix at all.
‘That isn’t what you said last night,’ Loren said, training his voice steady.
Felix let out a cruel snort. ‘Were you that lonely? That desperate?’
Loren had heard that before, from a mouth both similar and not.Curls disappearing into a silver helm. Memories, seductive and deadly.Marble splintered through his stomach. For a moment, a twist of the light, he saw the splay of mist-drawn wings.
‘The helmet,’ Loren breathed. ‘Where is it?’
‘Sold it.’
‘Where is it?Did you – did you put it on?’
Felix’s face hardened. He took another step back, crossing fully into shadow. ‘You told me not to. I put it back. Like you wanted.’
‘This isn’t what I wanted.’ Telltale stinging warned him:compose yourself before you embarrass us further.But not from Ghost-Felix’s scratching voice. It was an old scolding from Loren’s father, still hounding him for beingtoo much. ‘You were what—’
‘Saying that will only make it hurt worse.’
‘You could stay. In Pompeii.’ Pleading now. Loren couldn’t help it. ‘I can’t – I can’t lose you.’
But Felix only shook his head. ‘You never had me. You saw what you wanted to see.’
The accusation stung worse than any words before it. Loren swallowed it in a slow, choking slide, the fears he’d held all along deepening their roots in his gut. Who was Felix? Loren thought he knew a versionof him, one removed from his nightmares. One who shared his bread, and listened, and chose Loren back.
Here in the alley, that Felix no longer existed. Maybe he never had. Maybe he’d been a ghost all along.
‘Is this why you run from town to town?’ Loren snapped before he could stop himself. ‘You trick, lie, steal, then leave before the fallout. Before you risk caring. Who are you, under all of that? You accused me of being a liar. Maybe I am, but at least I’m honest about what I want.’
Felix’s lip curled, and Loren hoped, however naively – however cruelly – that the words had hurt him. Hurt Felix the way Loren’s heart had been breaking all morning.
Then Felix said, ‘How much longer will you chase what will never want you back? You never should have left your father’s vineyard.’
‘What are you saying?’ Loren said slowly, roots twisting fresh.
‘I’msayingstop living in your dreams,’ said Felix, face hard. ‘I’m saying goodbye.’
Desperation mounted, filling Loren’s chest with wasps. He tried, ‘Come with—’
‘Telling me what to do again?’ Felix stepped once more, another foot of uncrossable distance, saying without speaking,Here, and no further.‘Go home, Loren.’
