There wasn’t much to do at home when you had no couch, no TV, and no entertainment to speak of. I still had one shitty guitar left, and selling my couch had paid for my electricity to be turned back on—but other than that, I had precious little, and I spent my days at the library, using the computers and doing every type of promotion I could for my services.

The past week had been one of the hardest of my adult life. The day after Christmas, I’d had to beg Tom and Camilla to let me stay over—then had to disappoint them as I explained that it was not for sex.

I plastered flyers around the neighborhood for my confidence coaching—actual, paper flyers, something that I’d all but forgotten existed until now.

I had just about nothing left, and none of the usual things that comforted me were making any dent at all. What was the point of going to get trashed at the bar if I didn’t even want to fuck anyone? What was the point of being confident and independent if there was nothing else behind it?

I had been numb ever since the morning after Christmas, and the worst thing about it was that I knew it was my fault.

I’d had the opportunity for something so good, and I’d thrown it away because it didn’t feel like me. Being someone’s boyfriend, even as pretend, had felt like slipping into someone else’s skin, and suddenly I knew I wasn’t good enough, knew that whoever did fill that role for Mason would have to be better than me.

Feeling this big of a confidence dip was something I hadn’t experienced in many, many years. And it didn’t feel any better waking up on my bed, in my bare room, day after day alone.

Alone wasn’t enough anymore. And I had ruined everything with the only person who did feel like enough.

I was sitting on the ground in my living room, staring at the paltry remnants of a bottle of Jack Daniels, when I heard my phone ring. It was the first time it had made any sound all week, and I jumped, wondering if it might be a client.

“Come on, come on,” I said, running to the other room to grab the phone. “All I need is one. One client.”

I found the phone and stopped dead in my tracks when I saw the name on the screen.

Mason Hartley.

Was I dreaming? I couldn’t possibly be—my dreams were never quite this sad, even when they were nightmares. But I knew Mason wouldn’t be calling me, either. Unless… he was going to ask for a refund for his services. Which would be difficult considering I didn’t have a single penny to work with.

I treated the phone like it was a spider, cautiously watching it without daring to touch. I was amazed when I saw that Mason left a message. I picked it up, holding the phone to my ear, both dreading and anticipating hearing his voice again.

“Kade. It’s me. And if you’re home, I think you should come outside right now.”

That was it. No further explanation, no telling what exactly was going on. I ran over to the window, peering outside, but I saw nothing at all—my window faced the side street, not the front, so I had no clue what he was talking about.

I pulled in a deep breath, pulling on my boots and throwing my jacket on quick. I had a nervous pit in my stomach, but curiosity had gotten the best of me, and there was no chance I wasn’t going to see what the hell was going on.

I ran down the rickety steps inside the building and burst out the front door. The sun was bright, and I shielded my eyes, seeing nothing around me at first. But then I saw him: Mason was standing near his car, pulled up against the curb, the trunk open. When he turned and saw me, his eyes widened, and I felt like I might disintegrate into the ground.

He was so beautiful. So awkward and fumbling and clearly nervous, yes, but just seeing him after a few days was enough to make me feel like my glass was full again, like there was some good in the world.

“Kade,” he said, exhaling and running his palms against his pants. He was wearing the same clothes he’d worn to the big party at Tom and Camillas, but seeing him in them in the daytime was kind of adorable. He was still every bit as awkward as usual but in sleek, fashionable clothes. “Um—oh my God, you actually came outside—”

I exhaled, clearing my throat. “Your message sounded pretty urgent,” I said. “Did your car break down or something?”

He shook his head, then reached inside his trunk, pulling out a big black box of some sort and setting it on the ground. “I have something for you, actually.”

“What?” I said. “No, Mason—Jesus Christ, did you bring me a… gift? You don’t owe me a damned thing, Mason—please. If anything, I owe you.”

He cocked his head to one side. “You don’t owe me anything. What do you mean?”

I swallowed. “I already hurt you enough, Mason,” he said.

“Just let me come upstairs,” he said.

An image of the inside of my apartment flashed through my brain: the scattered empty liquor bottles, the gap where my couch used to be, the bare walls.

“No,” I said quickly. “Inside is… a bad idea.”

“Why?” he asked. “Whatever it is, it’s okay—I don’t care, Kade—”

“A rat got loose,” I said, saying the one thing I knew would work. “Not a dirty one. But… the neighbor’s pet rat. It’s running around my floors as we speak.”

Mason got a look of pure terror on his face and nodded. “Okay, we’re definitely not going inside, then,” he said.

A group of pedestrians walked down the sidewalk, and Mason paused for a moment, letting them walk by.

“What is it? You can show me out here,” I said. “I can’t accept a gift from you anyway, Mason.”

“Oh, jeez, this is kind of a busy sidewalk, isn’t it?” he said, nervously looking to a couple pushing a stroller past us, smiling as they went by.

“It can be,” I said.

Mason squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. “You can do this, Mason,” he whispered to himself. He was being adorably neurotic, and I wondered how I’d lived the past week without this man. God, there really was something wrong with me. Since when did I have those kinds of thoughts about someone? Not that I wanted to fuck him, but that he was adorable and that I hated living without him?

Those were the thoughts of someone who becomes attached. Not me.

“Okay, well,” he said, opening his eyes and taking a deep breath. “If you won’t let me inside, I’ll just… I’ll have to do it here. Thank God this thing has a battery pack.”

He reached down into the black box and pulled out some sort of speaker. He fiddled with the buttons on it and plugged something in, and when he stood back up, I saw that he was holding a microphone.

“Oh my God,” I muttered quietly. A song started playing from the speaker, loud enough that people from the other side of the street stopped to look over. I realized at once that this was a portable karaoke machine—Mason must have rented it. I didn’t recognize the song, but when Mason started to sing, I couldn’t believe it.

“I've a very strange feeling I've never felt before,

It's a kind of a grind of depression.

My heart's acting strangely, it feels rather sore,

At least, it gives me that impression.”

Mason crooned the words out, belting like I’d never heard him before. I felt like I was watching someone else—someone massively confident, without a care in the world. As he sang, people walking down the street watched, and I knew exactly how nerve-wracking that must be for Mason. Just a few weeks ago, he would have passed out from the thought of doing karaoke, much less doing it in public.

But he sang and sang, looking nowhere else but to me.

“Yes, I'm falling in love with someone plain to see,

I'm sure I could love someone madly,

If someone would only love me.”

My heart raced as I heard him sing those lyrics. I knew now that I’d heard this song once before—it was an old classic, probably done by Bing Crosby.

But… Mason was singing these lyrics to me. This was his gift—a serenade—but why had he chosen this song?

“For I'm falling in love with someone, some one boy,

I'm falling in love with someone, ah, what choice,

For I'm falling in love with someone, plain to see,

I'm sure I could love someone madly if someone would only love me.”

The orchestration in the song wound down, and by the end, some people walking by had even tossed five-dollar bills in his box. When the tune was over, I approached Mason, smiling wide.

I’d forgotten every other thing that had happened this week, and all I could feel was immense pride.

“Holy shit, Mason!” I cried out, reaching out and gripping him in a hug. When I pulled back, Mason looked a little woozy, and he dropped the microphone into the box, turning off the karaoke machine.

I noticed then that he was shaking.

“It—that—I—oh God—” Mason said, stuttering like he had the first night I met him. But he didn’t just look nervous. There was a wild smile on his face, like he’d just accomplished something impossible.

“You were amazing,” I said.

“See?” Mason said, out of breath like he’d just run a marathon. “You—you helped me—I can do things like this now.”

“You said you’d die before singing in front of other people—”

“Yup, p—pretty sure I am about to die—” he said, looking around at his surroundings like an alien who was just seeing Earth.

“Jesus, what a fucking voice you’ve got. How could you keep that kind of talent to yourself?” I asked. I was still reeling, and when he bit his bottom lip, smiling up at me, I realized that I wanted nothing more at that moment than to kiss him.

And then a slice of reality came crashing down on me again. I couldn’t kiss him, not anymore. I could be proud of him, proud of how far he’d come on his confidence journey, but Mason wasn’t mine to kiss.

It was a bittersweet mixture of complete pride and sadness, and I didn’t even know how to process it.

“I need… water,” Mason was saying, and I watched as he went and leaned against the side of my building.

I realized in that moment that it didn’t matter what Mason thought of me. It didn’t matter if he saw the inside of my apartment and judged me. He had climbed the Mount Everest of his confidence journey. He didn’t need my services. And I could never really be with him, so he may as well see me for what I was.

“Let’s get you inside,” I said, nodding over at him. He lifted one eyebrow in surprise, then nodded in agreement.

I hoisted the karaoke machine back into the trunk of his car and went back to Mason’s side.

“Come on,” I said, taking his hand and leading him into my building.