Theo

Caleb and I were in his bed, sunlight spilling in through the window and lighting up the auburn in his dark hair and beard. He had his fingers in my hair and was still asleep, and I was watching him dozily, luxuriating in the feel of his skin, his smell, the weight of his leg on mine.

My phone buzzed and Caleb’s nose scrunched. I ignored it. Everything was perfect right now. My studio time yesterday had gone great, I’d surprised Caleb by driving here right from the studio, even though I’d just have to drive back into the city today, and we’d spent the night wrapped up together, finding one another in the darkness anytime we woke. The feeling of safety, in Caleb’s arms, Caleb’s bed, Caleb’s home, was starting to sink into me, making me crave his quiet strength whenever I was elsewhere.

My phone buzzed again, and Caleb reached out as if he could smack it away, narrowly missing hitting me in the face.

I saw it was my agent calling, and also saw that it was only 7:30 in the morning. But as I went to turn the phone off, Lewis called again and I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“Hey, what’s up?” I answered quietly, sliding out of bed with a longing look at Caleb’s thick torso and muscular arms and soft mouth, and walking into the living room to talk.

“Have you seen the story?”

“Uhhh. No?”

“Where are you?”

“I’m…not at home right now.”

I wasn’t sure why I was reluctant to tell Lewis about Caleb. One of the first conversations we’d ever had had been me saying that I wasn’t going to play it straight, and Lewis saying some crap about how it was fine because music fans thought queers were edgy now.

“Let me guess. You’re at the address I got you of that man. In Stormville.”

“Oh.” Right, Lewis had been the one to find Caleb’s address in the first place. “Yeah, I’m here. I’ll be back in town this afternoon, though. We’ve got another studio session.”

I wandered into the kitchen and started to make coffee, half forgetting that Lewis was on the phone as my mind started drifting to our session today and all the ways I wanted to change the two tracks we’d recorded the week before I took a break from the studio.

“They must have followed you,” Lewis was saying.

“Sorry, what?”

“The story in Scoop NYC. Look, it’ll be fine, just wanted to make sure you knew so you don’t parade around naked on the porch or anything.”

Lewis kept talking, something about publicity and capitalizing on something or other, but my ears had filled with a loud buzzing that drowned out anything else. I grabbed Caleb’s laptop off the coffee table and googled myself and Scoop NYC. The story popped up immediately. The headline read “City Boy in the Country? Where Theo Decker Spends His Time.” Below it was a picture of me in profile, standing just outside the front door of Caleb’s house. It was from last night, and clearly taken from the road. I hadn’t even noticed. I was so eager to get inside to Caleb, so excited at how well the studio session had gone.

“Oh, fuck,” I said, and hung up the call. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, this is not good.”

My first instinct was to make sure that Caleb never saw this, because I knew it was the last thing he’d want. He’d said as much. Said that he wanted nothing to do with the fame side of my life. Said that the last thing he could handle was trying to keep on an even keel and stay clean if he had eyes on him, and I knew that for him, a big part of that was exemplified by the publicity machine.

“Fuck,” I said again.

“What’s wrong, hmmm?” Warm arms enveloped me and the solid heat of Caleb’s firm chest and stomach made me melt against him. He rested his chin on my shoulder and kissed my neck, and I got in one good, deep inhalation of his scent before I felt him stiffen against me and knew he’d looked down at the laptop.

“What the hell is this?”

His voice had moved from honeyed purr to sharp ice in seconds and I winced.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know they were there. I swear, I had no idea.”

Caleb grabbed the laptop and peered at the picture, every muscle in his body rigid. He didn’t speak.

“I didn’t—I don’t know how—I wasn’t—fuck, I’m sorry, so sorry.”

Caleb dropped onto the couch with his face in his hands, shaking his head and muttering to himself. All I caught was “I knew it” and “terrible idea,” and a chill ripped through me at the thought that Caleb would think of me as a mistake.

“I…someone must’ve followed me from the studio. I left the car there because I was running late, so then when I came back here…I didn’t mean to, I swear. Caleb?”

He didn’t look at me.

I knelt down in front of him but when I caught a glimpse of his face, I wished I hadn’t. He looked stricken. Face pale, eyes distant, mouth tight. When he spoke, he was tightly controlled, like it was taking every ounce of effort he had not to freak out.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “I know this isn’t your fault. But this is my…my fucking sanctuary, and now these vultures know where it is. It’s…fuck, this is everything I was afraid of. What am I gonna do?”

This last was so plaintive it made me choke up. Seeing Caleb afraid…it shook me. I didn’t know what we should do. I really didn’t.

“See, this is why…” Caleb said to the floor. “This is why we can’t have a relationship.”

My head started throbbing with the beat of my heart, like the rush of adrenaline when I was wearing earplugs before a show.

“But, we do,” I said, and it came out thin and scared. “I mean, I thought we…don’t we?”

“We can’t,” Caleb choked. “Don’t you see? I can’t. Not with all this shit. How can I go outside to the garden if those fucking stalker groupies are here looking for you? How can I do anything? Fuck! I can’t deal with this.”

I heard Caleb’s words. I heard the way his anger was the thinnest veneer over an ocean of churning fear. I could recognize why he was so upset. Really, I could. But it all got twisted into the same refrain. It was simple and gutting, as familiar as breathing, since it was one I’d heard my whole life and written a hundred times.

I don’t want you. You’re not worth it. You’re too much trouble. I’m better off without you.

---

“Oh my god, Theo Decker! I love you! I love Riven!” The girl practically screamed it into my face and, though I tried to smile, her voice carried far enough that a whole pack of people turned around and made a loose semicircle around us. I smiled at her and said thanks, but people had their phones out, snapping pictures, and every click and giggle shot through me like a hammer on a mirror. My nerves were raw and all I wanted was the Thai takeout in the plastic bag hanging at my side, but I couldn’t quite figure out how to get home. The block and a half between me and my front door seemed to dilate indefinitely with every person who looked my way.

I should’ve gotten delivery, was all I could think. Over and over, as I smiled and murmured my thanks, as the food grew cold in my hand. I’d needed to get out of the house, clear my head, not think about how my obliviousness had fucked things up for Caleb and ruined the one good thing in my life.

“Sorry,” I said, and I could hear the thin edge of temper in my voice. “Gotta run.” I held up my food as if this were a logical group of people who would of course understand that I needed to go eat. But it still took ten more minutes to extricate myself and get back home. I dropped the food on the kitchen table and collapsed onto the sofa.

Sometimes it wasn’t so bad. It was gratifying that people liked our music. Hell, there was the occasional day when I could just flash a smile and keep walking, and it was vaguely fun, like I imagined being popular in high school might have been. But mostly it rubbed every nerve so raw that I started to see groups of people as packs of ravenous wolves, their presence inherently threatening.

The loud growl of my stomach a reminder that I hadn’t eaten all day, I grabbed the bag of food and my computer and crawled into bed. I just wanted to watch something comforting, so I put on an episode of Snowville that I’d seen a dozen times, and ate my cold food.

The food was gone and another episode had automatically begun, and I just sat there, not sure what to do. There was nothing to do, really. I’d left Caleb’s the other morning because he clearly wanted me gone and because I had to get to the studio anyway. But since then, I hadn’t heard from him and I hadn’t called him. This is why we can’t have a relationship, he’d said. Didn’t get much clearer than that.

Half buried in the covers, my phone lit up. Caleb. Usually this was about the time I’d be calling him, if all was well. I wanted to ignore the call. Give Caleb a taste of his own medicine. Show him how shitty rejection felt. But even more than that, I wanted to hear the sound of his voice. Wanted to talk about random things with him.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hey.” His voice was fire and thistles and everything I wanted. “Wasn’t sure you’d want to talk to me.”

“I wish I didn’t want to. I’m so mad at you.”

I could feel tears threatening and was suddenly glad Caleb was just a voice over the phone.

“I was such an asshole,” he said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“Well, you did.”

“I know. I’m so sorry.”

I could hear the sincerity in his voice and the tremble in mine and both made me so tired.

“I can’t help that paparazzi follow me. I wish to hell they didn’t.”

“I know that.”

“I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t even know anyone was there.”

“I know that, too.”

“Then…” I took a shaky breath. “Can I…come back?”

The second the words were out of my mouth I regretted them, because I knew what Caleb was going to say.

“Baby, I—”

“Don’t! God, please don’t call me that if you don’t want me, okay, I can’t take it.”

“I never said I don’t want you, Theo.”

“You don’t want me enough,” I said. “Enough to make it worth dealing with stuff you don’t want to deal with.”

“Don’t make it sound like I’m just avoiding something like doing my laundry. You have no idea what I’m going through, no idea how hard it is for me to just get through the day sometimes. Don’t make me out to be some petty asshole.”

I heard him sigh, and when he spoke again, the anger had turned to pain.

“I have nothing, Theo. I have fucking nothing except this scrap of land that was mine until you brought the vultures down on it. I know—I know it was an accident. But the result is the same. I can’t be with you because it’s not safe for me. Because I’m fucking terrified of myself. Of what I might do. I don’t fucking trust myself, can’t you understand? Not with myself, and not with you. I don’t know what else to say.”

It felt like a black tide was closing over me and I was hearing Caleb’s words through its sharp teeth.

“We could find a way,” I choked. “Work it out.”

“I…I don’t think we can, Theo. I’m sorry.”

“So, that’s it? You’re just giving up? You’re gonna do what, hide at the farm forever? You can’t, Caleb, you’re too good.”

“Was too good. Now I’m nothing.” His voice was emptiness and regret and loathing. But most of all, it was certainty. He’d already decided it was too hard, too risky, not worth it.

“Well, enjoy drowning in your fucking self-pity,” I shot back, the anger and hurt buzzing through my veins. And I grabbed onto the anger because if I didn’t, it would be tears. “I understand that being clean is the most important thing to you right now. But I hope you don’t wake up in a couple of years and realize you threw the baby out with the bathwater. You know, if staring at your walls is so hard, you might try something else. Try caring about someone else, or something else. ’Cause what the fuck’s the point of working so hard to get your life back if you’re stuck out there alone and doing nothing with it.”

I hung up and threw the phone onto the far side of the bed. Then I flopped back down, punched the pillows, and finally let myself cry.