I couldn’t keep my damn hands off of Devin.

It was a compulsion, and I couldn’t help but think he was going to notice soon, to call me out on it, to tell me to back the hell off.

The last thing I wanted was for Devin to feel uncomfortable. But somehow my hand kept finding its way to his hip, his back, his shoulder. When a lock of hair fell over his forehead I reached up to brush it back into place, or when the sugar from a doughnut left crystals on his lips I reached out with a napkin to help.

I wasn’t even sure if I could admit to myself that I didn’t actually want to be using a napkin. Fuck, I didn’t even want to be using my hand.

I’d tried to hold back the thought all night but the truth was that I wanted my mouth on him. I wanted to kiss him and taste the cider on him, I wanted to run my lips along the side of his neck where the skin looked impossibly smooth. And I wanted to see the rest of his body, what continued on underneath his fitted flannel shirt, to find out who he was now.

And the fact that Devin kept buying us beers didn’t help the matter. I was usually a very controlled person, and despite my relatively polite light touches on Devin’s back, I was a gentleman.

There was no way he could know I was having these thoughts. But with each beer, I felt myself getting looser. Or maybe it was that the more time I spent with Devin, the further deep in I fell.

I still couldn’t tear my eyes away from him. I was leaning against a big tree trunk, watching him in line for another round of pumpkin beers. As he reached up to mess with the back of his hair, his shirt rode up slightly and I glimpsed the skin above the hem of his pants.

Milky smooth, firm and pale.

There’s no fucking way he wouldn’t feel utterly incredible under my hands. I could picture him, twisting in my arms, warm beneath me, the way my name would sound on his lips—

“Hey!” I heard from behind me. A second later I nearly jumped out of my skin as Meredith ran up and punched me on the shoulder. “Scare ya?” she said, smiling.

I had to rearrange how I was standing, hoping to God that she wouldn’t see that I was starting to get hard just from gazing at Devin.

“Ow,” I said as I massaged my shoulder. “You’ve got quite an arm on you.”

“I work out,” she said. “And from the looks of it, you must work out, what… two hours every day? I bet you can take it. And what do you have here?”

I looked down at the plush dog in my hands. “Stuffed animal I won for Devin. He’s up getting us more beers.”

Emmett appeared at Meredith’s side. “Hey,” he said, giving me a nod. He had a pair of silly cat ears on top of his head, presumably a prize won from some game.

“See?” I said. “That’s how it’s done. Just a nice, calm walk up and a ‘hey,’” I said, grinning at Meredith. “Cat ear headband optional.”

“Yeah, that’s how you do it if you’re boring as hell like Emmett,” she said. “I am a fan of the cat ears, though.” She pinched one of the little ears between her fingers. “Where have you guys been?”

“Devin’s been re-acquainting me with the glory that is the fall festival. We walked around a lot, played some games, and we took some pictures in the photo booth.”

“That’s what we just did!” Meredith said, fishing out a strip of photos from her purse. The pictures were of her and Emmett, mostly making silly faces at the camera.

“Here’s ours,” I said, pulling the strips out of my pocket.

“Oh, my God!” she said, looking down at them. “This is the most adorable thing I’ve seen in years. You guys could be on the cover of the Abercrombie fall catalog.”

I felt my cheeks heating a little.

“I admit it, you guys do look pretty cute,” Emmett said. “Shit. I need to find a hot guy to take photos with.”

“What happened to that friend you guys made earlier?”

Meredith stuck out her tongue and made a thumbs-down motion. “Married,” she said. “He was really cool, though. At some point, we might meet up to go to a classical music concert.”

“Devin told me you teach orchestra, that’s really cool,” I said. “I tried to play the violin for a year, but then my fingers got way too big,” I said, holding up my hand.

She shrugged a shoulder. “You could always play the cello or upright bass.”

“Maybe I should,” I said. “I need a new hobby.”

“What, you mean you want to do something other than get dragged around and have Devin bugging you about how gorgeous the autumn leaves are every ten seconds?” she said with a grin.

I knew she was joking, but I couldn’t help but think how much I wouldn’t mind being constantly around Devin.

“I spent pretty much all of my twenties focused only on my career, and I need something else to do with my spare time. Something creative.”

“Rose Falls is a good place for that,” Emmett said. “You can’t throw a stone without hitting an artist.”

“Well, look who we have here,” Devin said as he sauntered up with two beers, passing one over to me.

“I know you missed us, Dev,” Meredith said. “Russ was just showing us the adorable lovers’ photos you two took in the photo booth.”

Devin rolled his eyes. “Sorry about her,” he said to me. “Meredith, don’t you know how to play nice? Russ has been back for a week, we can’t scare him off yet.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” I said. “Since Meredith is the second person tonight to call us lovers, I figure we might as well run with it. Maybe if we tell the attendants we’re dating they’ll give us the special couples’ discount on the Ferris wheel.”

“Ferris wheel! Yes,” Meredith said. “That’s the one thing we have to do before the end of the night.”

For a fleeting moment, I saw the shock in Devin’s eyes. I knew he still must have remembered the days when I wouldn’t have dared make a joke like that, suggesting that we should pretend we’re dating.

“Let’s finish these beers, then head over to the Ferris wheel?” I asked. Devin nodded and Meredith made a whoop sound.

“We should do it sooner rather than later,” Emmett said, looking up at the sky. “It’s gonna start raining soon and I don’t want to be stuck on a Ferris wheel in a downpour.”

“Oh, hush,” Meredith said. “A little rain never hurt anyone.”

We finished our beers after a few minutes, then made our way over to the Ferris wheel. As we approached, Meredith turned back toward me, eyeing me with a mischievous look.

“Are you really going to do it?” she asked in a conspiratorial whisper.

“Do what?”

“Pretend to be a couple and get the lovers’ seat?”

I bit my bottom lip, glancing over at Devin. A slow smile spread over his face, and he sighed before giving me a quick nod.

“Okay. Let’s see if this even works.”

Meredith clapped and did a little gleeful dance as I walked over to Devin, putting my arm around his shoulder and bringing him close. It was unfair how good he felt under my arm, fitting perfectly close against me. He looked up at me with a sheepish grin and his face was so close to mine. Suddenly, all I could picture was leaning in and pressing a kiss to his mouth.

“This is ridiculous,” he said.

“We don’t have to do it if you don’t want.”

He snorted. “Nah, let’s do it. Meredith would kill us now if we didn’t.”

We walked up to the attendant at the Ferris wheel, a teenage girl who looked more interested in the video on her cell phone than anything else. She glanced up at us as she chewed on a piece of gum.

“My fiancé and I would like to request the lovers’ seat for the next ride if it’s still open?” I said.

“Four dollars,” she said, holding out a hand. I reached into my pocket for my wallet, pulling out the cash and paying her.

“Thanks, baby,” Devin said, glancing up at me from under his lashes with a wicked grin. He leaned up and pressed a tiny kiss to my cheek.

He couldn’t have known what that did to me. The thought of him calling me that, of it actually being true, short-circuited my brain. Christ, I wanted him.

But instead, as we walked away from the attendant, I released him from my arm and immediately missed his warmth underneath.

“I’d say she believed us, but really I think she didn’t care at all,” Devin said.

“At least now we get the seat with all the pretty lights on it, though, right?” The lovers’ seat on the Ferris wheel had rows of twinkling pink and red lights, and the shape of the seat was a huge heart.

“Totally worth it.”

Meredith and Emmett came up after us in line, and Meredith gave me a high-five for my performance. Within a few minutes we had loaded onto the Ferris wheel, and slowly but surely, we rose up over the town.

“Lord, that is a stunning view,” I said, completely taken by it. “I knew it would be good, but it’s like… cinematic, almost.”

“It really is,” Devin said, looking out at the rolling hills and the lights of the small town. The university had the biggest impact, but even the small lamps and trees on the residential streets looked great. “Did you miss this?” he asked.

I let out a long breath. “I did,” I said. “San Diego was pretty in its own way, but… not like this. You know I only went there because of Erica.”

He nodded slowly. “Well, if you’re looking to date… I don’t know if you know this, but I’ve become an excellent wingman in the years since you left Rose Falls. You wouldn’t believe how many women I know who complain that all the good men here are either taken or they’re gay.”

I glanced at Devin, swallowing hard.

“What? I could introduce you to at least five incredible women,” he continued.

I knew I had to tell him.

Devin was still under the impression that I was straight, and I felt like I was lying to him by continuing to keep it a secret.

Somehow, coming out to Devin felt monumental. I’d known him longer than anyone, and obviously, I knew he wouldn’t react badly. But it was still difficult.

As we slowly turned in the Ferris wheel, I felt my palms getting a little clammy, and every time I was about to speak, I kept hesitating.

“Russ?” Devin asked, eyeing me closely. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?”

“Just seems like you kind of zoned out there for a minute. Is everything alright?”

“Oh, yeah,” I said.

“…It’s because I brought up Erica, isn’t it? Shit. I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, no, it’s… not that. Well, not really.”

“Hmm,” he said, scanning my eyes. “Not really?”

I pulled in a long breath, breaking his gaze. I looked out at the lights and hills below us. I saw the sloping land that led down to the big waterfall and was hit by a wave of memory.

“Do you remember the first time we ever tried beer?” I asked Devin.

He snorted, nodding. “Yup. I remember it. We stole that bottle from my parents’ fridge and snuck it down to the waterfall in my backpack. We were stupid at age seventeen.”

“So stupid. Even splitting it between the two of us, we couldn’t finish the whole bottle.”

“Yeah, well, my dad loves IPA beer. The stuff is pretty bitter. Makes sense that we couldn’t handle it as our first taste of alcohol.”

I nodded slowly, my eyes still fixed on the hills down near the falls. I felt like there was something expanding in my chest, filling me up and threatening to burst if I didn’t tell Devin what was on my mind.

It felt impossible and inevitable all at once.

“Devin, I…” I started to say, then trailed off when I realized how fast my heart was pounding in my chest.

After a few moments, he turned to me, raising an eyebrow. “What’s up, Roo?”

Roo. Now I was sure my heart was going to burst.

“I… I lied to you, that night,” I said, finally turning to meet Devin’s eyes.

“Huh?” he said, his face blank. “What are you talking about?”

“That night. The first night we ever tried alcohol. Do you remember what we talked about?”

“Ahh…” Devin said, chewing on his bottom lip and looking to the side. “I don’t think I remember anything we said that night other than the fact that the beer was too strong. Is that what you lied about? Did you secretly have a taste for IPA at seventeen?”

I puffed out a little laugh, but unfortunately, it didn’t do much to stop my heart from feeling like it was going to beat out of my chest.

I didn’t know why this was so difficult. I’d told plenty of people by now.

But… well… none of them had been Devin.

“No, I lied about something else. It makes sense, really, why you wouldn’t remember it and I would.”

Devin gave me a look like I was crazy. “Russ, you’re really gonna have to tell me what’s up soon, otherwise my brain is going to get fried. Is everything okay?”

“You asked me something when we were sitting on that big rock down by the waterfall. I think we were both pretending to be drunker than we were, probably, because I don’t think a quarter of a beer is enough for even a seventeen-year-old to get drunk off of,” I said.

He nodded, his face serious now as he waited for me to speak.

“You asked me something you’d never asked me before. You asked if I’d ever been… attracted to guys.”

“Oh,” Devin said, suddenly staring at me intently.

“I said no, obviously, which is probably why you don’t remember this conversation. Because I told you exactly what you expected to hear: that I was straight.”

“…Yeah?” he said slowly.

“But, uh… I lied, Devin. I wasn’t straight. Not really.”

“Holy shit,” Devin whispered, so quietly I could barely hear it.

“And I’m still not straight now.”

“You’re… not?” he said, his voice as weak as before.

I shook my head, finally managing a small smile as I met his eyes. “I’m not. I’ve known I was able to be attracted to men pretty much ever since I started being attracted to women. I tried like hell to deny it, even to myself, and repressed it until it became too much of a secret to bear.”

“Wow,” he said, looking at me with a surprised but fully empathetic gaze.

“So,” I said, “The truth is that I did get a little bit sad when you brought up dating women. Not because I’m so miserable about Erica, but… because I don’t know if I’m really looking for women to date right now. I’ve been attracted to men my whole life but have never opened up about it until this year. It’s like I’m discovering a whole new part of my life at age thirty.”

“Russ, thank you for being willing to share this with me,” Devin said softly as he put a hand on my knee. The warm weight of his touch instantly brought me back down to earth, and I realized that my heart rate was finally beginning to calm. “Trust me, I know how hard it was to come out at sixteen, and it must be infinitely harder at thirty.”

“I feel kind of silly, sometimes,” I said. “I feel like it should be easier now, because I’m an adult, and I don’t have to worry about high school bullies. But I was so nervous to tell you, Dev. I almost did the first night I got here, but I just… couldn’t muster it.”

He shook his head quickly. “I completely understand.”

“I hoped you would.”

Devin took a deep breath, a smile forming on his face. “Well, okay then. My offer still stands.”

“Offer?”

“I know a lot of women who want a handsome guy, but I sure as hell know a lot of guys who are single, too. I can find you a date. As I said, I am an excellent wingman.”

I laughed, suddenly feeling as if a massive weight had been lifted. “Oh, yeah? How’s your track record?”

He cocked his head to the side, thinking. “Well, I set up a blind date for Emmett, with this gorgeous guy from a university class I taught.”

“And how did that work out?”

The corners of his mouth twitched into a smile. “They hated each other. But I got him another date with a guy in a bar once, and they actually dated for a few months!”

“Wow, what a track record,” I joked, and he playfully elbowed me in the ribs. “Hey, no elbowing me when we’re at the top of a Ferris wheel. The last thing I need is to fall out of this thing and break my neck.”

“Oh, we’re fine,” he said but then reached down and squeezed his hand against my thigh again. “I’m so glad you’re back, Russ.”

“I am, too,” I said.

As the gentle motion of the Ferris wheel rocked us back down to the ground, I felt the first few drops of rain from the clouds that had hung overhead all night. It made one more turn, sweeping us up again, and by the time we were lowered and the wheel stopped completely, the rain had started to come down in earnest.

“Told you so,” Emmett said when we met back up with them, his cat ear headband beginning to droop in the rain.

Meredith had hitched up her denim jacket to cover her head. “Did you two enjoy your lovers’ ride?”

“We really did,” Devin said.

A group of teenagers nearby shrieked as the rain started coming down even faster.

“Okay! That’s it, we’re walking home now,” Meredith said, starting to trot back toward the entrance.

I was starting to get soaked, but I didn’t care. I felt incredibly light in my body, a weight so big lifted from me.

I’d told Devin something I’d wanted to tell him for my whole life, and his reaction had been almost perfect. I felt like I was buzzing, newly energized even though the night was winding down.

“Walk you home?” I said to Devin.

“We live on the same street,” he said with a smile. “Let’s go home.”

* * *

As we approached my house, Devin and I said brief goodbyes to Meredith and Emmett before they headed back to their houses. The rain had pelted us the entire way home, and there was no part of me that wasn’t soaked.

We stopped for a moment under my front awning, finally stepping out of the rain. I pulled the stuffed dog out from under my sweater, where I’d been holding it.

“I think she’s still okay, if a little rained on,” I said, handing it over to Devin. “I had a lot of fun tonight.”

“I did, too,” he said, looking up at me. A few tiny raindrops collected on his eyelashes, and he raked a hand through his dark, wet hair. We hovered in silence for a moment, and for a split second, it felt like the end of a date.

I wished that it were the end of a real date.

Somewhere from the side of my house, I heard a tiny sound cut through the rain, breaking my attention from Devin.

“Did you hear that?” I asked, taking a few steps over toward the yard.

A moment later, I heard it again.

“I heard that one. It sounds like a scared animal or something,” Devin said.

I walked down the steps of the front porch, looping around to look under the back of the stairs. It was darker than hell, and even though the rain had started to slow, it was still hard to see.

Devin came up behind me, using the flashlight on his phone to illuminate under the stairs.

“Oh, my God,” he said, pointing to the very back of the space. Curled in a little ball up against the front of the porch was a little dark grey kitten, looking wet and shivery and ten kinds of terrified.

“We have to bring it inside,” I said, already down in the mud, crawling forward on my hands and knees toward the cat. It kept mewling and crying as I approached, its eyes darting from side to side.

“It’s okay,” I said softly. “Come here.”

I reached for the cat hesitantly. I knew that when most cats were scared, they certainly wouldn’t react well to being picked up by a stranger.

But this cat must have been a young-enough kitten that it didn’t seem to mind at all when I picked it up, holding it against my chest as I shuffled back out from under the steps. It shook in my hands as it cried out.

For a few minutes, Devin used his flashlight to search around the yard and the neighbors’ yard before he came back up my steps.

“I didn’t see any sign of other kittens or a mother anywhere around here. Looks like it’s probably old enough to be wandering around on its own, too.”

“Yeah, definitely not a newborn, thank God.”

“Is it okay?” Devin asked, gently petting the damp grey hair. “Oh, this poor thing,” he said.

“I definitely think it needs to be wrapped in a dry towel. I’m going to take kitty inside for tonight. I can head down to the vet’s office tomorrow and see if it has a microchip, but if we leave it outside it’ll be crying all night.”

“Are you sure? I can definitely take care of it, too if you need the help,” Devin said.

I walked back over to the steps, heading up and under the awning again. I looked down at the kitten, still crying in my arms. “No, I’d love to take care of a kitten. I’d been considering adopting one anyway, so… why not have a one-night trial run with this little one?”

I fished in my pocket for my keys, pulling them out and handing them to Devin. “Do you mind opening the front door? It’s the big gold key.”

Devin opened it up and we stepped into the house. He flipped on the main light in the hallway and then in the kitchen.

“I’ve got a bunch of towels in the hall closet,” I said.

A few seconds later, Devin came back with a handful of towels and laid them out on the floor of the kitchen. I gently lowered the kitten onto them, and we worked to slowly dry it off, making sure not to be too rough. After a few minutes of sitting on the floor next to it, it seemed to calm down just a little.

I got up to look in the pantry, taking out a can of tuna. I put some onto a plate and brought it near the cat. After some inquisitive sniffing, it started to eat.

“Success,” I said gently, smiling over at Devin.

“So you think you’ll be fine tonight?” Devin asked.

“Yeah. It’s kind of embarrassing, but… I already bought a litterbox and some litter when I did my first big shopping trips this week. I felt like an idiot buying it before I’d even adopted a cat, but I’m damn glad I have it now.”

“That’s awesome. Okay,” Devin said. He gave the kitten a little gentle scratch around the neck. “I’ll get out of your hair now, but please call me if you need anything tonight. Anything at all. And promise you’ll let me know how it goes tomorrow?”

“I promise. Thank you so much for tonight, Devin,” I said.

“Good night, Russ,” he said, waving before he headed back out the front door.

I stayed with the kitten on the floor for nearly an hour, helping it calm down and making sure it had a good helping of food and water. After it had dried off and eaten, it was remarkably friendly, and when I set up the litterbox it knew how to use it immediately. I knew that it had to have been someone’s pet.

“Okay,” I said, after it seemed almost fully content. “Time to go into the bedroom.”

I had planned to make a makeshift cat bed out of a bunch of towels near my bed on the floor. It wasn’t perfect, and I had no idea how the cat would behave overnight, but I had barely any furniture so far in my bedroom and wasn’t afraid of anything being destroyed. What was the worst a little kitten could do? Scratch at my nightstand?

I picked the cat up and headed toward my bedroom.

But when I opened the door to my room, I felt a sinking feeling in my chest. Something was very clearly wrong.

First, it was just the smell. Rainwater. Mud. Something dank and murky. And as soon as the light filled the room, my jaw hung open.

“Oh, God,” I said out loud.

Somehow, the heavy rain had come through the roof and made a small but substantial hole in the ceiling—directly above my bed. The rain had soaked through the entire top half of my mattress and box spring, covering it in dirty rainwater.

I sucked in a long breath of air and let it out. I had considered getting a brand-new bed when I’d moved to Rose Falls but had decided against it.

It looked like I was going to have to get that new bed after all.

“Ok, kitty, I guess we aren’t sleeping in here tonight,” I said, crossing back over to the living room. I had purchased a new couch since moving to Rose Falls, so I could sleep there until I was able to get a new mattress.

I looked around the room as I held the cat in my hand, trying to think of how to make it more comfortable.

“Aha,” I said, eyeing the huge cardboard box that my dining room chairs had been shipped in. I created a little nest inside with towels, lowering the cat inside. For a few minutes it meowed, but I kept peeking over the side of the box to reassure it that I was nearby. Eventually, it relaxed, licking itself for a while and then dozing off.

I grabbed the one spare blanket I had in the linen closet and tried to make myself comfortable on the couch.

Sleep didn’t come easy, but when it finally did, I dreamed about Devin. In my dream we lived together, and instead of the kitten sleeping in a box, it was asleep in a warm little curl at the foot of our bed.

And Devin kissed me, as we lay in bed together. His lips pressed against my mouth, then my cheek, then on the side of my neck, nuzzling against me.

A couple times I briefly woke up, my back aching from the strange sleep on my couch, and one time I got up to feed the kitten and make sure it got some water.

But every time I fell back asleep, my dreams were only of Devin.