I pushed my head back against the couch cushion and closed my eyes, which were burning just a little. I wouldnotcry over my father like I was a fucking toddler. I wouldnot.
“Then maybe stop trying,” I choked out. “If it’s sodifficult.”
“I’ve tried,” he said baldly. “But it’s like you and yourwriting. Somehow I just can’tstop.”
I said nothing. There was a part of me that craved his love and approval—always had, always would. But I also knew I’d never actually earn either, and that kept mequiet.
“In any case,” he said finally. “Thanksgiving.”
I took a breath and let it out. “I haveplans.”
“Where?Alone?”
“No. I’ll be with…”Huh. Well. There was another issue I’d done my best not to think about for the past week. Friend didn’t seem appropriate anymore, friend-I-kissed-occasionally was TMI, and fake-boyfriend was too ridiculous, even if I’d love to hear my father sputter over it. “I’ll be staying local. In O’Leary. Thanksanyway.”
“Hmm. Then we’ll expect to see you at Christmas. This foolishness of you cutting yourself off from the world has got to end. And before you suggest again that wedisownedyou, we certainly didnot. We said that it was time for you to find a stable career. To live up to your potential. If you chose to take that in the most dramatic possible way, that’s yourproblem.”
Of course it was. “My potential. As aMichaelson.”
“Exactly.”
“Exactly,” Iechoed.
I would rather spend Christmas at the bottom of a lake than discussing my potential as aMichaelson.
“And Daniel, consider lightening up, hmm? You hold people to an impossibly high standard,” my father the hypocrite said. And then hedisconnected.
“Jesus Christ. JesusfuckingChrist!” I threw the phone against the sofa cushion and ran both hands through my hair, yanking at the longishstrands.
Honoria looked up from her spot on the rug by the fire, and She-Ra darted into the living room from wherever she’d been hiding, like she was afraid of missing somedrama.
“The man is going to make me mental,” I told them. I paused and considered. “No, scratch that. I’m therealready.”
She-Ra jumped up on the couch by my legs and sat down primly, staring at me the wholewhile.
“What?” I demanded. I blew out a breath. “He’s ridiculous.You hold people to an impossibly high standard. Lighten up. Can you even imagine? What does that evenmean? I’m light! I’m nothingbutlight. The man doesn’t evenknowme. I don’t own hundred-dollar shoes anymore, I drive a rusted truck, I don’t have cable, and I don’t care what anyone thinks ofme.”
But that last bit was a lie, wasn’t it? Because I did still care what he thought of me, or he wouldn’t have pissed me off the way he had. And though the trappings of my life had changed completely, in some ways I was still runningscared.
Case in point, the way I’d neatly avoided Julian allweek.
“Helpful,” I mumbled, scrubbing at my cheeks. “I kissed the man, then told him it washelpful.” I was definitely crazy, because I couldn’t think of many thingslesshelpful than that kiss. It had been hard enough to avoid thinking of Julian as anything but a friendbefore.Now, it was absolutelyimpossible.
We’d hiked back here to eat pie, and never in the history of the universe have the simple tasks of walking and eating been so torturous. Every step Julian took I spent either marveling at the miraculousness of the way his body was put together—Just look at all those muscles bunching and flexing as he put one foot in front of the other! How had I never noticed howhotwalking was before?—or shaking my head at my own idiocy and actively trying to block myself from being aware of him. And then when we’d gotten back here, there’d been pie. Pie that Julian licked off his spoon. Pie that tasted tart and sweet, simple and perfect, just likeJulian.
For the first time ever with Julian, I’d cut our conversation short, let out a loud yawn, and told him I was ready for bed. I hadn’t protested when he’d offered to leave, either. I was pretty sure he hadn’t bought my excuse about an early bedtime, though. Mostly because it had only been 4PM.
And then I’d doubled-down on that awkwardness when I texted him—a rarity in and of itself—to say that I wasbusyand that I’d call him later in the week to get together. That was nearly a weekago.
Running scared? Let me rephrase. More like frozen interror.
I’d never felt anything like the rightness of that kiss, though. Every bit of it. The tangy, sweet taste of him, the scratch of facial hair under my hands, the spareness of his frame and the solidity of him. In the half-second before our lips touched, I’d been worried I’d hate it and he’d know. I’d been worried I’d hurt his feelings. But by the time I’d been capable of rational thought again, I’d realized I’d gotten everything ass-backwards. Now, I was worried because I’d liked it a lot—too much—and hehadto have realized it, but I still didn’t know what the heck it meant that I likedit.
There was no way in which I was a good candidate for a—my mind stuttered for a second—boyfriend. Not a real one, anyway. I was a failure as a writer, I had a shit track record with relationships, both platonic and romantic, and I hadn’t the first clue what the fuck was happening with this sexual awakeningthingI seemed to beundergoing.
Julian, meanwhile, was a permanent sort of person, a guy who was devoted to his family, his friends, and his career. And he lived in O’Leary, which was about the most permanent, unchanging place west of the Pyramids of Giza… and come to think of it, even Giza had a fuckingPizzaHut.
I cared about Julian a lot, and I didn’t want him to think I could give him anythingreal. I didn’t know if I was even capable of it. And even though I’d been ready to kill the cockblocking squirrel that had interrupted us when I was about to tell Julian it looked like I was maybe, possiblynot-straight, by now I was glad we’d been interrupted. Better Julian think his fake boyfriend was having a heterosexual freak-out after a practice kiss than for him to know I was a late-blooming, possibly-bisexual hot mess who was shit-scared to commit toanything.
