Jessica skillfully pumped her for information, and that was an incredibly good thing. It kept Hannah busy because there seemed little doubt to Skyler that otherwise, she would notice how Matthew kept looking at Skyler.
Skyler didn’t know how to interpret that look at all. Was Matthew trying to warn him? Or was he just acknowledging their past? He would have loved to be able to know that, but he just had no idea. And no idea what he should do about it, either.
“Skyler,” Matthew finally said, when the meal was over, the original purpose for it completely forgotten. Skyler hadn’t told Hannah that Craig was his boyfriend, although that had been the main reason that he had come. “It’s been a long time. Let’s go for a beer and get reacquainted.”
Skyler tilted his head curiously at the other man. Get reacquainted? That seemed like such a casual thing to say, given what their relationship had been. Like they were nothing more than old friends from high school.
That was probably done on purpose, to send a message to Skyler—Matthew wanting to tell him that he had moved on and that their past couldn’t stand between himself and Hannah. If that was it, Skyler had no issue with reassuring him. Actually, he would be reassured himself if that were the case.
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot you two used to hang out,” Hannah said, with an adoring little smile at her fiancé. She was clearly crazy about him.
Used to hang out.
Well, that was one way to put it. But, of course, Matthew had never given anyone the impression that he had ever done more than that. Casual, friendly hanging out. The quiet, strange little nerd who was unaccountably friends with the brilliant, popular head of the debate team. The boy who defied labels, who was just as happy to hang out with the captain of the football team as he was the lowliest member of the chess team.
Skyler glanced over at Craig and saw that his lover’s face was very pale. He frowned, meeting Craig’s eyes, and he shook his head slowly. He shouldn’t go. There was no way on earth that he should go. He knew that the moment he met his boyfriend’s eyes.
“We did,” Matthew replied, and Skyler sighed and turned to look at his sister, at Matthew. This was exactly the sort of social situation that he had never been very good at.
“I don’t think …” Skyler started, and then Matthew, just as he had in the old days, all smooth persuasion, broke in.
“It will be good for me to relax a little before the big day. You’d really be doing me a favor, and Hannah, too.”
“I could use some time to relax a little, myself,” Hannah agreed, though she looked a bit baffled, as well she might, by her fiancé abandoning her two days before the wedding.
“Good. It’s settled. It’ll just be a few hours, and we can reconnect,” Matthew said, and somehow, through the years, his always formidable ability to arrange situations to his liking, to weave a masterful tapestry of words, had only gotten stronger.
“I shouldn’t leave Craig,” Skyler replied, but when he looked over at Craig, Craig’s gaze wasn’t fixed back on him anymore. He didn’t even look interested in the conversation.
“Nah, no big deal, go ahead. Jess and I will hang,” Craig replied, and it seemed that, although Skyler had no part in it and wasn’t sure he wanted it, that everything had all been arranged. “Why don’t you go now?”
Skyler shrugged. If Craig didn’t care, as much as it stung him to think that he didn’t, he supposed that there was no real reason not to. And there were definitely things that he wanted to ask Matthew, actually.
“Okay,” he finally agreed and then had to glance away from the triumph which showed up in Matthew’s eyes, from the sense that he had always had, faintly nagging in the back of his mind, that he was nothing more than a pawn on the chessboard of Matthew’s mind.
* * *
The bar was very quiet, and Skyler and Matthew were tucked into the furthest corner of it. No one was around to hear what they had to say, and that wasn’t that surprising because it had been Matthew, of course, who picked the table. Matthew who picked everything. That was how it had always been.
“You have to help me.”
Those were the first words out of Matthew’s lips since they’d left the restaurant and gone across the hallway to the bar. Skyler had been silent, not sure what to say, not even sure what they were doing, and so, unusually, had Matthew.
“What do you mean?” Skyler asked, surprised by the request. This man, who he hadn’t seen in almost a decade, was asking for his help with a tone of desperation, unlike anything that Skyler had ever heard from his lips before.
“I mean, I can’t do this. I can’t marry your sister.”
Skyler blinked. Of all of the things that he had thought might happen, it hadn’t occurred to him that he would hear such a blunt admission. As he was still goggling at the other man, Matthew continued on.
“You have to help me. Please, Skyler.”
Skyler took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. His brain seemed to be chugging along as if through molasses, but he did his best.
“Of course if you don’t want to marry her, you shouldn’t. Hannah deserves better than someone who doesn’t want to be there. But what do you think that I …”
Moving as quickly as a striking snake, Matthew reached for Skyler’s hand and held it across the table, his fingers warm and dry as they cradled Skyler’s.
“What you can do is be with me again.”
