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“We still on for our date tonight?” His smile is resplendent.
“Sure. Can’t wait.” There’s a short, stunned pause. “Great. I’ll pick you up from the library at eight.”
Stop it, Miller is so fucking excited
expecting to see Miller creeping up on me, feeling…I don’t know, feeling something when he doesn’t.
*disappointment
“Hey, baby,” he purrs. The sound travels up my spine and gets on my nerves. I force down my reaction, plastering it over with a broad faux smile and a “Hey, b-baby” that only sounds mildly uncomfortable.
“Where are we going?” I ask, though I’m pretty sure I can guess. Somewhere loud and flashy. Overpriced and expensive. Somewhere that the waitstaff makes you believe nothing you want is the slightest inconvenience despite the fact they’re quietly plotting your downfall. Somewhere Miller will feel at home, and I’ll feel like something that’s escaped from a specimen jar.
Bet money Miller takes him some place Ryan will be comfortable and that he put a lot of thought and care into the date
my bench stands out like a beacon. In the daytime, it’s school green and almost disappears into its surroundings. Tonight, there’s a profusion of pillar candles in glass hurricane lamps flickering around it.
STOP I AM GOING TO CRY THAT IS SO FUCKING CUTE
Half of me is sure it’s a joke, and the rest of me is hoping and hoping and hoping like hell that it’s true.
A date on my bench, away from judgment and prying eyes, is the last thing I expected, and I admit it’s throwing me a little.
Ugh I knew my baby would do a good job
“I got something for you.” “For me?” He says it with a hand clamped to his heart as if he’s never been given anything before. As if he’s not a spoiled rich boy. As if small things have meaning for him.
“Everything Bagel Seasoning?” he bellows. “Are you for real? This exists? Holy shit. How did I not know this?”
They are going to kill me
He laughs, cradling my dumb gift in his hands like it’s frankincense or myrrh dipped in twenty-four-karat gold. “I can’t believe you got this for me.” His eyes glisten, and I can’t be sure it’s just from the candlelight.
I am sobbing
“What are we drinking to?” I ask when I’ve managed to extricate myself from his grip and recenter myself. “Same thing we always drink to.” “Oh yeah, and what’s that?” “You,” he says as if it’s obvious. As if it’s something we’ve done many times before. He clinks our glasses together and fixes me with a gaze that starts out innocent and quickly turns blisteringly hot. His voice drops an octave. “And the fact you’re my guy.”
“I want a house called Annabel.” His voice is different. Dreamy. The smoothness is gone. Something almost scratchy has replaced it. I look into his eyes, and to my endless surprise, I see the same thing I feel mirrored back at me. Dark orbs in the night. Two windows. Nakedness to a soul level. “She's an old lady with white weatherboard with a wraparound porch.”
<3
“A sprawling double story with an unnecessarily grand entrance. She’s one of those houses that used to be graceful, but now she’s a mule. And just as stubborn as one. She’s one of those houses where every time you touch one thing, another falls down. She’s surrounded by a big garden lost to the wild. It needs to be redone, but there are a few trees and rose bushes that are worth saving. A lemon tree, at least. Maybe a lime tree too.”
“What do you say, baby.” He smiles. “Want to come back to my place?” I smile back, aware I’m trapped in a crazy dream with Miller, but no longer sure if I can or want to wake up. “Hmm, I’m not sure. Will your roommate be there? I hear he’s kind of a dick.” He kisses me again. Softly this time, just lips, no tongue. “He’s not so bad.”
“Sorry about the weather. It wasn’t what I wanted.” “What’s wrong with the weather? It was perf—” “I ordered a clear night, but we got this instead.” He waves to a mottled night sky, the moon all but hidden by a blanket of clouds. Murky, opaque blotches that swallow the light. “I wanted to show you the stars.”
Jesus Christ they are going to kill me
I only break the kiss to look at him. I have to. I can't stand having my eyes closed and not seeing his face any longer.
I move unhurriedly inside him. Taking my time with him for the first time. There’s no rush. No timer. He didn’t give me a limit this time. I have all night.
His walls are down, and there’s nothing or no one who’ll ever convince me this is an act. He’s right here. He’s with me. He’s where I am. He wants this too. It isn’t something I’m doing to him. It’s something we’re doing together.
Then he looks back at me, dark hair tumbling into his eyes, and says, “Please, Miller.” His voice is hoarse. Layers and layers of him have been stripped back. All his bullshit lies on the floor, discarded like our scattered clothes. “Please, Miller. Show me the stars.”
“No, scratch that. I’m Ryromantic. That’s what I am. I must be ‘cause I’ve never felt like this about anyone else. I’ve never lo—” His hand clamps onto my mouth, silencing me brusquely, muffling the words I was saying before they had a chance to become his reality. “Don’t say that,” he says.
“Need a shower.” For the first time, I don’t love the rejection. It doesn’t do a thing for me. There’s no heat, no excitement. Just a rip. A tear that makes my eyes water. “You’re wasting your time,” I call after him. “You can’t wash a night like tonight off you, Ryan.”
I’m keen to change the subject, not least because the last time I mentioned not being able to afford something in Miller’s presence, I ended up stark naked with my towel on the floor, and just look how that turned out.
Miller holds the door open for me, and as I cross the threshold, the onslaught of people and eyes and noise makes me hesitate. His arm is around my neck immediately and his breath laps at my ear. “It’s the same,” he whispers. “The same as what?” “The same as always.” He explains it slowly as if he’s talking to a child. “Nothing bad happens when you’re with me.”
“Mac. A. Way!” bellows Trip. “Har. A. Voy!” answers Dean.
“I need work on my gaydar, that’s what I’m saying. I didn’t get a flicker. Not even a blip.” “No, you don’t, Ryan,” Miller replies, his rhapsodic smile erased like steam wiped off a mirror. “You’re already having the only gay sex you’ll ever have, so why would you need a gaydar?”
Miller heads to the bar to buy a round, and I tag along for the simple reason his arm seems to be surgically attached to my neck, and as a nonmedical professional, I know of no safe way to remove it.
Women are so fucking lovely. How the hell are you supposed to know if they’re flirting or just being friendly?
Ha. This.
“Whatever you want, Ryan.” “Huh?” “Whatever you want, it’s yours.”
“All you gotta do if you want me to stop”—Miller rubs my ass, groping me till he finds a spot he seems to like and tapping it until my heart beats in time with the rhythm he’s drumming into me—“is tell me where my money is. Got it?” It takes me much longer to piece it together than I care to admit, but at last, what he’s doing registers. He's giving me a safeword. “Yeah, I’ve got it.”
The thought of being out of his body, being on my own, being away from him, hurts in a way I’m not sure I know how to handle.
“And you know there’s no part of me that won’t kick the living shit out of anyone who ever treats you like that again, right?”
“Ry,” I stroke his back softly, “I know you like planning shit, and your anxiety doesn’t like surprises, so I’m going to tell you something. You don’t have to say anything. I’m only telling you so you have some time to get used to the idea.” “Mm?” “You’re not leaving me tomorrow.”
“No. You’re not.” I kiss the back of his neck and nestle my head into my pillow. “You’re not because I’m not letting you go. Gonna make you stay by any means necessary.”
the threat of an errant mug of coffee hurtling my way is low but not zero.
“You have to promise you’ll never stop slapping me away.” I kiss his tip sweetly and lick a broad stripe up his slit, tasting the sweet saltiness of him and waiting for him to look at me before adding, “Don’t ever stop, okay? Not even when we’re old and married.”
Miller is killing me
This place is special. It’s the first land I’ve bought. This place is going to be big for us, Ry. It’s going to be the start of our future, you’ll see. I wanted to share it with you before I share it with anyone else.”
So delulu
“I’m going to show you the stars while we’re here, baby. You’re going to see them all night.”
I hate how some stupid part of me likes that someone finally got through my walls. An even stupider part likes that it’s him.
“Why Edith?” “‘Cause Edith means prosperity.” I don’t ask for more information, but by now, we all know that in no way means Miller won’t freely volunteer it. “Edith is the start for us, Ry. She’s going to put us on the map.”
“Derek MacAvoy. My old man. He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s going to buy Edith from me, or his entire development won’t get off the ground.” “What?” I sit up unsupported and crane my head back. “Yep.” He looks tired and unbearably happy. “Gonna make him pay through his nose to access his own land.”
I just fucking cackled. God I adore Miller
“You’re a monster, Miller. You know that?” “I do.” He kisses my neck until my head rolls back. “But I’m your monster.”
It’s panic and fear that it's over. It’s the fist in my chest, wrapped all around me, and it’s squeezing the life out of me. I can’t breathe. I can’t get air. I can’t. I can’t inhale or exhale. I can’t breathe unless I’m joined with Miller.
Miller MacAvoy is an addiction waiting to happen. I’ve tried to be sensible. I’ve tried to keep him at bay. I’ve done my best. His eyes track me slowly, and a heavy hand reaches back and sweeps up and down my thigh, and like that, I know I’ve lost. I know I’m going to give in. I know I’m going to spend years, possibly decades, possibly the rest of my life trying to get out of the hole I’m digging for myself right now.
For once, Miller is quiet. He doesn’t say a word. He doesn’t need to. He communicates with sounds, with hands that rake the bedding and hard muscles that cord in his back. I understand every word.
“Ryan.” He pulls himself up as I start moving away. “Ryan, I lo—” “Don’t,” I snap, covering his mouth with my hand. “Don’t say that.”
I take his hand in mine, holding it for a second because, for once, I don’t want to be rude, and then I place it gently on the bed away from me.
My heart hurts
“You could stay. You could, you could choose to stay. You could stay because you want to. Or, or, I could buy you again.”
“You can’t actually buy people. You know that, right?” There’s a pause. “Yeah, I know.” “You say that, but I’m not sure you do ‘cause you act like…” “I do know that!” Miller says with more heat than I was expecting. “Of course I fucking know that! I know because if it was possible, I wouldn’t have a cent to my name, and you would be mine.”
<333
“Ryan,” he says when there’s nothing else left to say. “I regret it. I regret everything.” He breathes in slowly, holds it, and lets it out slowly. “And I regret nothing.”
