“Now, are you boys going to tell me what brings you to my humble abode at eleven o’clock on a weeknight? Not that I don’t appreciate the company, but I’m sure they have rolling papers closer to home.”
“We were in the neighborhood,” I tell her.
“Is that so? Why, exactly?” She stares me down and holds the joint away when I reach for it.
“We came to see a friend of Lyot’s.” He arches his eyebrows when I kick him under the table. I haven’t spilled the details to Ren, but my mom knows all about Caleb. I’m already past the idiotic impulse that drove me out looking for him in the first place, and the last thing I need is her thinking I’m diving back into that tragic mess. She gives me a look that lets me know I’m not fooling her and gives up the joint with a sigh.
“Where’s Gia tonight?” she asks, adding a splash of half-n-half to her tea and giving it a swirl. “She’s usually driving your little adventures.”
Ren groans and drops his head onto his crossed arms. When I don’t reply, my mom gives me a sharp look.
“Okay, spill. Did something happen between you two?”
Ren props his chin up and raises his eyes to me, letting me decide how to answer. Part of me wants to shrug it off, even lie, because the truth is either gonna piss her off or break her heart, but another part wants to crawl into her lap and confess all my sins. I take another pull and let the smoke curl in my lungs until it burns, wondering where I’d even start.
“Start at the beginning,” she says, in that eerie way she has of reading my mind. “You had a fight?”
I still can’t get the words out, and this time, Ren kicks me under the table.
“They had a fight,” he tells her, then gives me an encouraging nod. “Tell her, mate. If she’s as cool as you say she is, maybe she can convince you to get your head out of your ass and fix it.”
“It’s not gonna get fixed.” I scowl at him. “And I’m not the one who broke it anyway.”
“What did she do? I can’t imagine—”
“She dumped me for another guy.” I look away, knowing it sounds petty and childish, even though my mom is probably the one person I’ve never fooled when it comes to my real feelings for Gia. She reaches for my hand, and I force myself to unclench my fist when she gives it a squeeze.
“Lyot. Gia has had other boyfriends before. So have you.” She lets the unspoken question hang in the air.Why is this time different?No matter how open-minded she is, I can’t tell her about Shadow or the details of our tryout with Gale, but I also know that’s only half the betrayal.
“He’s not her boyfriend,” I admit. “At least, I’m pretty sure neither of them would describe it that way.”Even though he’s definitely fucking her.Swallowing what’s left of my pride, I finally meet her eyes. “He’s her new straps partner.”
“Oh. Oh, honey.” She rises halfway out of her seat and reaches across to cup my face in her hands, laying a sympathetic kiss on the top of my head. My mom is the only one who knows my deepest secret dream, the one where Gia and I create an act together and take it to Young Stage and all the other top European festivals. It’s why I turned down the Cirque audition and why I was so excited to work with her at ACCA. Hell, it’s half the reason I push myself as hard as I do in my own training.
Ever since she blew me out of the water the day I met her, my whole life has been a crusade to make myself worthy of taking on the world at her side.
Ren is watching us curiously, no doubt trying to guess at the layers I’ve left out of my drunken rants.
“The guy’s also a raging cunt,” he adds. “And not in a good way.”
I snort, and my mom sits back in her seat, leaving one hand resting on my cheek.
“And how have you been handling all this?” she asks. I shake my head, preparing to lie.
“Like a total idiot,” Ren says, cheerfully throwing me under the bus. “He barely talks to anyone but me, drags me out to terrible pubs every night, only to try and ditch me for some sketchy twink, and then he sleeps through half his morning classes.”
“Shut the fuck up,mate.” I glare at him, but he ignores me.
“Like I said.” He shrugs. “Head up the ass.”
“I do not have my head up my ass,” I snap. They both stare at me, and the disappointment on my mom’s face shatters my pitiful bravado. “Look,” I say, begging her to understand. “Gia told me she wanted to work with this guy—that he inspired her, or something.” Even now, I can’t quite bring myself to betray her secrets. I jerk my head away from her hand and push back from the table, no longer able to sit still.
“And I didn’t like him, but I tried to go along with it for her sake, thinking it would be okay. That she could get what she wanted from him without giving up on us.” My knuckles whiten on the back of the chair as I fight the urge to throw it across the room. “But it didn’t work out that way, and I got left behind. And the worst fucking part is that it’s fucking working. She was right. He can give her something that Icouldn’t—something she needed—and I’m stuck watching her turn into the artist I always pictured at my side, only she’s doing it with him instead.”
I lose the battle with my self-control and send the chair crashing sideways onto the floor. Ren is staring at me, wide-eyed, and my mom is up and moving to my side, wrapping her arms around me and laying her head on my chest.
“Oh, baby boy,” she murmurs, hugging me tight. For a minute, I stand rigid, trembling in the circle of her arms, and then I lose it, throwing my arms around her shoulders and burying my face in her hair to hide my tears.
She lets me cry until the sobs subside and all that’s left is a hollow ache at the back of my throat, and then she draws me back to the table, righting my chair and pushing me gently down into it.
