Epilogue

“BEN!” LIAM’S mother enveloped him in a hug, and Liam’s father was right behind her, then all around her, enveloping them all in a sort of uber hug in which boundless enthusiasm made up for limited reach.

“Hi,” Ben said as soon as he could wriggle a little bit free. “Thank you so much for inviting me down here!”

“Oh, thank you for coming,” Lillian, Liam’s mom, said. “When Liam suggested it, Richard and I were over the moon! We’ve missed you so much!”

“I missed you too.” Not as much as he’d missed their son, but, still—the Marshalls had been a second family to him, and Christmas cards and occasional emails hadn’t made up for the loss of visits and phone calls. “I’m not sure how to handle the next part—I feel like I should be offering condolences or something, but I get the idea you’d rather have congratulations?”

They looked temporarily confused, then Lillian said, “Oh, the divorce!”

Ben exchanged a look with Liam. Oh, the divorce! That old thing—I’d forgotten all about that!

“Congratulations are appreciated,” Richard said firmly. “And I’m really glad to have the two of you here to share the celebration with us. It seems appropriate, somehow. Lillian and I may not be married anymore, but we’re still part of each other’s lives. And the two of you were apart for quite a while, but now you’re back together because you never really forgotten each other. Formal relationship labels aren’t the important thing, are they?”

“Hear hear,” Calvin said as he, Seth, Dinah, and Tamara climbed out of their own rental car. “We get too caught up in the details and forget to appreciate the important things.” He stretched his arm out, offering the cooler he was carrying to Richard. “Important things like Dan Stuart’s kielbasa!”

“Oh!” Lillian cried in excitement. “And we’re so happy you could all come see us as well! Seth! I can’t believe you’re a daddy! And your beautiful wife, and your precious little girl! And Calvin.” She sounded less excited for that last bit. Still interested, but more—cautious, maybe? Preparing to be amused but also worried about being shocked? It was a reasonable reaction to Uncle Calvin, Ben was pretty sure. “Thank you so much for coming.”

“And for wrangling the kielbasa,” Richard said with more enthusiasm. He took the cooler and led the crowd toward the house.

Ben and Liam hung back a little. “Is it weird?” Ben asked. “I mean—it seems weird to me. They still seem totally content, totally in tune with each other. Why the hell are they splitting up?”

Liam shook his head. “I don’t know. I guess—I guess maybe they want something more. Fuck it, I think they want ‘passion.’ I can run away from that damn word all I want, but maybe Tristan wasn’t completely wrong. Maybe being ‘content’ isn’t enough. Just because they’re older doesn’t mean they’re dead, right? They still have a lot of life to live, and they want to be intense about it.”

“Intense with other people.”

Liam nodded slowly. “I guess?”

They were at the house then, kicking sand off their shoes before climbing the white wooden stairs to the wraparound porch. A moment to appreciate the ocean view before Lillian was in action, shepherding her guests to their respective rooms, giving them a rundown of the events for the weekend, and generally displaying a level of energy that should have been too much for someone half her age.

“Have we considered the possibility that your parents are breaking up because your mom has developed a serious cocaine problem and your dad just can’t handle it anymore?” Ben asked when he and Liam were safely in their room.

“Nah. You watch. She’ll burn out by nine o’clock and he’ll just take over, being the gracious host until the last guest has finally stumbled off to bed. He’s at least as coked up as she is.”

And the evening went as Liam had predicted. After dinner on the patio they all went down to a campfire on the beach, but Lillian was yawning before the sun was fully down, and she snuck away shortly after dark. Dinah took an exhausted but reluctant Tamara up to bed, and the men were left watching the fire and the water.

“You got sharks down here?” Uncle Calvin asked.

“Sure,” Richard replied. “It’s the ocean. There are sharks. But we don’t have many serious attacks—just nips, generally.”

“That right?”

“Well, maybe more than a nip. But not fatal.”

“And whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,” Calvin mused.

“I don’t know how much stronger you’d be if you were missing a foot or something,” Ben interjected. He did not want his uncle getting too adventurous on this trip. “If you want to swim, swim, but don’t go looking for sharks, okay? Don’t, like, rub yourself in bacon before you go in the water.”

“So careful all the time,” Calvin scolded. “You’ve got to live a little, Ben.”

Ben felt the gentle squeeze of Liam’s hand around his own. “I’m living just the right amount, thanks.”

“Smug bastard,” Seth said.

“Maybe we should do more,” Liam said suddenly.

“What?” Ben turned to face him. “You’d better not be talking about sharks and bacon.”

“No. But—”

“Oh.” The same thing they’d been talking about for the whole six weeks they’d been back together. Their future, and how exactly they were going to make it work when they were living hours away from each other. If it were short-term, it wouldn’t be a big deal. But Ben didn’t want to live in the city; his occasional weekends there were fun, but he didn’t really feel at home. And Liam? Well. Liam seemed happy as a clam in North Falls. But his work wasn’t there.

“Liam could be an architect anywhere,” Ben told the others. He wasn’t sure if this was a conversation fit for public consumption, but he really couldn’t consider the other men around the campfire as “public,” could he? “But he can’t be a great architect unless he’s in the city. That’s where the clients with all the money are, and for the really big, exciting projects, you need money. So—you know. He needs to be in the city. To be great, to do what he wants to do with his life. The city. He needs to be there.”

“No, I don’t,” Liam said quietly.

Ben frowned at him. “What do you mean? You just—you just said maybe you should do more. What does that mean? Is New York not enough? You need to go to Paris or Dubai or something?”

“Whoa, slow down.” Liam’s smile was gentle. “That’s not what I meant at all. I didn’t mean more professionally. I meant… more. You and me. Like living together? I know it’s fast, but it’s not like we don’t know each other pretty well already. And I feel like—I don’t want to waste time. I want to be with you, you know?”

“Yeah.” Ben did know. He wanted the same thing. The details? Well. He’d just have to make the details work, he supposed. “Is there somewhere other than right downtown? I know you like the hustle and bustle, but could we—I don’t know, somewhere quieter? A bit less central?”

“I was thinking of North Falls,” Liam said, sounding genuinely confused. “You don’t want to live in the city—you’ve told me that already.”

“But you need to—”

“No. I don’t. My career… it’s not the most important thing, not by a long shot. And it’s not like I’d be moving to Antarctica. It’s s a bit much for a daily commute, but if I have to go down to the city for a couple days a week, I can do that no problem.”

“And Tristan’s going to agree to that?”

“I doubt it. But I think that’s okay. I’ve walked away from that firm once. I can do it again.”

“But your projects….”

“I’m getting really interested in residential design. It’s not as glamorous, not as high profile, but there’s a lot of room for creativity. And I was thinking about doing some writing too. Like, helping people understand architecture with coffee table books or whatever. I like photography. And you can travel over the summer—I could work on getting my photography up to standard this winter, and next summer we could travel together. Take pictures of buildings. That’d be fun, right?”

“Like Terry,” Uncle Calvin said, and Richard nodded in agreement.

Liam frowned. “Terry?”

“Terry Franks,” Ben said. Was it possible? Could this work? “He died earlier this year? Oh, yeah. You were kind of at his funeral. But before he died, he was based in North Falls but he traveled pretty regularly. He wrote antique books.”

“Books about antiques,” Uncle Calvin clarified. “Not old books.”

“How could he write old books?” Seth asked. “I know he traveled, but unless someone thought he time traveled, I’m not sure how his books could be old.”

“Terry Franks?” Liam said. He seemed to be talking just to Ben, now, which was really just as well. “I thought he was—damn. I actually thought of how small his life must have been, how—I don’t think I actually used the word pathetic, in my mind, but I might as well have. But now I’m hearing…. Wait. Am I hearing that he wasn’t all that pathetic, or am I hearing that I’d be just like him if I moved back to North Falls, and that’d mean I would be pathetic?”

Of course Uncle Calvin couldn’t stay out of the conversation for long. “You’ve got a pretty high opinion of your opinion, son.”

“What?” Liam asked.

“You think Terry Franks gave a shit whether you thought he was pathetic or not? Sixty years from now when you’ve lived a full and interesting life, you think you’re really going to care what some snot-nosed kid thinks about you? I certainly hope you won’t.”

“Wait,” Liam said.

But his father was involved now, and waiting didn’t seem to be an option. “You need to live your own life, Liam. You need to do what’s right for you, not what other people will think is impressive.”

“Screw other people!” Uncle Calvin crowed.

Seth leaned in. “Not literally. Don’t go screwing other people just because Calvin said so. He was speaking figuratively.”

“Thanks for the tip,” Liam replied. Then he turned to his father. “But—isn’t it—don’t you want—”

“Liam. Do you remember when your mother and I told you we were getting a divorce?”

“It was only a couple months ago. Yeah, I remember.”

“I told you we weren’t looking for your approval, or even your opinion. And that goes both ways. You need to live your life for you. You and Ben, maybe. But not for me, or your mother, or the people you went to school with or your neighbors or the world. Just you.”

“Terry Franks lived that way,” Uncle Calvin said. He seemed serious, although of course there was no way to be sure. “And Terry had a pretty damn good life.”

“So—” Liam looked blankly at the people around the fire, and Ben fought the urge to step in, to help out, to do whatever he could to make Liam less confused. Possibly this was something Liam should figure out for himself. “I was already going to move to North Falls.” He turned to Ben. “Not in with you, necessarily. If you think it’s too soon, that’s fine. But the town? Yeah, I was going to move that far. And I knew it might hurt my career. But I was okay with that, more or less. So—this conversation hasn’t really changed anything. But—I feel like it has. What’s that about?”

“Maybe now you know you don’t have to be ashamed,” Uncle Calvin suggested.

“More than ‘not ashamed,’” Richard said. He beamed at his son. “You should be proud. You’re not quitting anything. You’re not running away. You won. You’re a principal in a major New York architecture firm. You’ve made it. Walking away now? You’re walking away with pride, looking for a new challenge.”

“Living with Ben,” Seth said. “Yup, that could be challenging.”

“Shush,” Ben told him. Then he turned to Liam. “I’m not proud of you.”

“Uh—what?” Uncle Calvin leaned forward. “That’s not quite the feel-good message we were shooting for, hoss.”

But Ben ignored him. “I’m not proud of you because ‘pride’ makes it sound like I’m taking some kind of credit for things. I’m not proud of Elon Musk for combining entrepreneurship with environmentalism, and I’m not proud of you for having a great career or for being ready to walk away from that career. But I’m—” Ben squeezed Liam’s hand. “Damn. I’m impressed. Whether you go on and build artistic skyscrapers or cozy, functional houses for people to raise their families in, I’m impressed. And whatever you do with your career, if you’re in North Falls? If you’re with me? I’m happy. More than happy. And if you’re proud of yourself? That makes me happy too.”

“I think I might start cooking meth,” Liam said. “Just as a sideline to see me through, financially. Anyone got any objections to that?”

“A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do,” Uncle Calvin said.

“Your mother worked hard to teach you to cook. I’m sure she’d be pleased to see you putting it in practice,” Richard said. Ben honestly wasn’t sure if the man knew what meth was or not.

“I’ve never tried meth,” Seth said. “Would you be offering free samples? Or maybe some kind of pyramid marketing scheme?”

“I’d still love you,” Ben said. “I’d kick your ass and throw you out and yell at you a lot. But I’d love you.”

“Okay,” Liam said slowly. “I’ll put the meth idea on the back burner, but I’m sticking to the idea that we should do more. Like—live even deeper, even richer than we are. You, Ben. You and me? I want that for us.” He leaned back and the firelight danced across his face. “But all of us. My dad, my friend, my—” He stopped, glanced at Calvin, then said, “My uncle. By blood or not, I don’t care. You’re mine, whether you like it or not.”

“I don’t object,” Calvin said.

“Okay. So, all of us. We can all live deeper and richer together. Does that sound possible?”

“It sounds like something Dinah’s likely to kick my ass over,” Seth said. “Can you give me some details before I commit to anything?”

“Nope. No details. But no long-term commitment either. For now?” Liam stood up. He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it on the sand. “For now, we swim. The sharks should know better than to mess with us. And if they don’t, we’ll teach them a lesson in manly fashion. Who’s with me?”

Ben stood up. He hadn’t needed to think. Of course he was with Liam. Always.

Seth was the next to rise. “I’m not gay. I don’t have to worry about pleasing the damn picky male eye. I’m sorry if I’m not as ripped as you guys are.” He pulled his shirt over his head and slapped his belly. “But I’m a good floater, and I’m ready to go.”

Uncle Calvin looked at Richard. “This younger generation,” he said. “They don’t understand what it’s like to be a little older.”

Richard nodded. “They don’t know about sore joints.”

“Low energy.”

Richard stood up. “Failing eyesight and hearing.”

Uncle Calvin stood up as well. “Increased craftiness,” he said, and he and Richard took off together, sprinting for the ocean, barely stumbling as they pulled off their shirts and tossed them to the breeze.

Seth ran after them, whooping so loudly it might have been heard up at the house, if anyone was awake to listen.

Ben turned to Liam. “Do you actually want to swim, or were you just trying to get rid of them?”

“I want to swim. I don’t want to get rid of them.” Liam pulled his own shirt over his head. “But since we just so happen to have a moment to ourselves….”

His lips were salty from the sea air, his skin warm compared to the cool night breeze. He was Ben’s. He’d been gone for too long, but now he was back. And he was damn well not getting away again.