Before Dane could take another round on the spiral of anxiety, Aras himself walked over. He didn’t sit, but leaned over on the same chair Kyle had. “Hey. You usually come find me. Everything kosher?”
Dane looked at him, so handsome and hawkish and going out of his way to find Dane, check on him. “Everything’s good. Just trying to figure out what to do for dinner.”
Aras nodded. “Well, we can figure something out, I’m sure.”
There was a big part of Dane tempted to say no, to try to cut all ties. It felt, in some weird part of his brain, easier to cut and run than to have any kind of awkward conversation. They’d fumbled their way into what relationship they had, against all of Aras’s instincts. Dane turning around and saying he was thinking about pulling the rug out from under all of that seemedcruel. It didn’t sprout from the same worry that Aras had—talent in a relationship with someone from production—but it was still undue pressure on something fragile.
Dane’s reason won out, though. He stood and went to Aras’s side. “I was thinking something a little lighter tonight. Bet there’s a vegan place somewhere in Baltimore if you’re game.”
“Always.” Aras reached up and massaged the base of his throat, mouth tightening to a thing line, and looked down at him. “You sure you’re okay?”
Fuck no. “Fine.”
Chapter thirty
Aras
Arashadneverseensomeone less fine than Dane in his entire life. Like, idiomatically, he wasfine, though Aras would never use that turn of phrase. He was sitting cross-legged in a T-shirt and underwear, eating the last bit of a fennel, orange, and walnut salad, bathed in the too-vibrant colors of the anime they were watching in the dim hotel room.
But he seemedoverlyfixed on the show. Every other night, they’d paused, backtracked, talked, joked, flirted while watching. No matter what Aras tried, Dane was just staring. Like he wanted to scrub the pixels away with the force of his gaze. Or like there was something else he reallydidn’twant to focus on.
When they hit the credits, Aras finally reached over and tapped Dane’s phone, pausing the show. Then he turned on the light. “Okay, I’ve tried being patient with you, but this is driving me insane. What’s wrong?”
Dane put his salad down. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t bullshit me.” Aras fought down his normal biting anger. This was Dane. He didn’t deserve that, and Aras didn’twantto turn that on him. His normal instinct when he was anxious would bite him in the ass if he wasn’t careful. “Is there something wrong with us? With me? Because you’re just sitting there acting like you’d rather do anything other than acknowledge my existence. It’s starting to…” He breathed deeply. “It’s not starting anything. I’m worried, and if there’s something I did, then I’d really rather know so I can try to make it better.”
Dane stared, instead of at the TV or at Aras, down at his salad. Aras was ready to rip the damn thing away andmakehim focus where he needed to, but he took a breath again. Then another. His anxiety scraped and gnawed at his will, his stomach, his chest, everything it could reach, but giving in to its irrational demands wouldn’t do anyone any good.
Finally, Dane looked his way, jaw tight. “Kyle talked to me today after we wrapped for the day. He…thinks I’d be a good fit for a new project. More money. More opportunities.”
Aras was ready to push, find out what the actual problem was—your boss telling you that you were doing a good job was hardly reason to get weird—but it clicked into place before he could open his mouth. “A new job that isn’t here. With me.”
Dane hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah. That’s the rub.”
“Is it a good job?” Aras wasn’t about to dwell on this. That wasn’t something anyone needed in the situation. “Is it the kind of thing you want to pursue?”
Dane’s brow furrowed so deeply they were almost touching. “Is that the important thing right now?”
“Of course it is.” Yes, Aras was trying to keep things on the level and not make things unnecessarily intense, but this wasn’t that.Thiswas pure practicality. “If it’s not a job you want, then there’s no problem. So is it?”
“Is it an electrician thing to be so straightforward and clear-headed about things?”
“No. It’s a me thing.”
Aras would wait as long as it took, and itdidtake a bit longer than was entirely comfortable before Dane finally looked him in the eye and slowly nodded. “I do want it. I got into this industry to be important. And I know that being a lighting grip is important—”
“You don’t need to explain to me. I didn’t exactly feel vital to the world when I was just an apprentice, soldering and wiring outlets and light switches until my eyes crossed.”
“Right.” Some of the tension left Dane’s body, but certainly not all. “It’s not a huge move. Not like someone is offering me lighting director or greenlighting a script any other huge step. But if I’m recommended for the job, and then they take that and I do well, then I have another little toe in the door.”
“Five toes adds up to a foot, and it’s a lot easier to force the door open when you’ve got a whole foot wedged in there.” Aras’s stomach twirled and writhed in place, but every time the panic tried to settle around him, he would look at Dane. Dane was suffering more, and Dane needed his support in this, not him panicking about losing whatever relationship they had brewing. “If it’s something you want, you should do it.”
“And leave you?” The words shot forward as though Dane had been doing everything possible to hold them back, and it took a simple opportunity to loose that arrow.
“It cuts the schedule a little short, that’s all.” That wasn’t all, and it would be more than alittleshort. They could be losing over a month of hanging out, seeing if they would work well enough to try a long-distance relationship, watching their stupid little show together, getting to know each other on a deeper level.
“I don’t want to.”
