As we finished the rest of the hike with the group, walking close enough to occasionally bump each other but otherwise quiet, I became terrified. Regardless of the burst of bravado-infused affection that had inspired me to tell Angel about my feelings, there was still part of me cowering.
It wasn’t that I regretted telling him the truth. What I regretted was opening Pandora’s box of emotional discussions without an idea of what I wanted from him. Because that was what confessions were all about—one person vomiting up their feelings to another person in the hopes that their feelings would be met with a specific response. Why else would anyone fling those words into the air like emotional confetti? But I had no idea what I wanted from him. I wasn’t even prepared for a conversation past what we’d already talked about. He was in a great mood, but I was as conflicted as ever. It would have been wiser to stay quiet, but his sweet confessions had drawn out one of my own.
And I truly did love him. So fucking much.
I glanced at him repeatedly as we walked, but he just flashed me a smile or poked me in the side. As if everything was normal. Except it wasn’t. My mind was spinning, my heart pounding, and I had no idea what I was going to say during our campout. Not only because I wasn’t set up for this, but because I hated camping.
By the time the rest of my coworkers returned to the lodge and Angel and I made camp alongside one of the tiny peninsulas dipping into the lake, the cooling air blowing off the water had marginally calmed me down. It helped that Angel didn’t dive into the relationship topic as soon as we were alone. He was more interested in meticulously arranging the tent, the one blanket and sleeping bag he’d brought along, and the minor provisions.
“I can’t believe you know how to camp,” I said, watching him build a little fire. “Were you a Fresh Air Fund kid?”
“No. I watch a lot of Survivorman.” Angel sat in front of the tent, facing the fire, as the sun continued to sink below the horizon. “I don’t really like animals and nature, but I like being alone. You don’t get much more alone than when camping.”
I pointed across the lake where I could see dozens of people frolicking. “Not so alone.”
“Yeah, wise ass, but they’re tiny specks in the distance and not here talking my ear off.” Angel gave me a wry look. “We can go back if you don’t want to do this.”
“Who says I don’t want to?” I plopped down next to him in front of the tent. “I’m outdoorsy when necessary,” I informed him when he snorted. “It’s just usually not necessary.”
“Smoking pot at Baisley Park doesn’t really count.”
“Ha ha.” I swiped his little bag of goodies, and a grin swept across my face like a brisk wind. “You were going to make s’mores by yourself?”
“Fuck yeah. That’s comfort food right there. I used to make them on the stove when I was little.”
I could so easily picture mini Angelito standing at the stove, glaring at a burner and trying to figure out how to melt the chocolate without burning himself. I bet he’d have taken it so seriously.
“You’re adorable sometimes,” I said.
Angel snagged the bag and pulled out the graham crackers. “What am I all the other times?”
“Somewhere between a pain in the ass and a sexy bastard.” I removed the rest of the ingredients. “Do you think it’s too hot for s’mores?”
“Don’t be closed-minded.”
Man, he was taking this seriously. It was charming enough for my fear to dial back a little more, and I was able to relax. With my legs stretched out in front of me, a cool breeze blowing my hair away from my face, and the sky turning purple and orange the farther the sun sunk, it was perfect.
“Jerky, cheese, and water for dinner, with s’mores as dessert.” Angel shot me an apologetic glance. “Not very gourmet.”
“Angel, we’re gonna be here for one night. We’ll be fine. I’ll gorge on graham crackers and marshmallows.”
“That’s my girl.”
Angel shoved a long stick of jerky at me and stretched out on the ground, leaning on his forearms as he stared across the lake. The breeze whipped his dark-blond hair around, tangling it and sometimes covering his eyes. I itched to smooth it away or tie it back in a small knot, but settled for watching. He was so serious as he contemplated the water and the families in the distance. Was he thinking about going for a swim or had his thoughts drifted completely away? There was no way to know, but I wished I could read his mind.
“So we gonna talk about this?”
The question jolted me. Apparently telepathy was unneeded tonight.
I ripped off a tough piece of jerky, chewing with difficulty, and looked out at the water myself. “We can talk.”
“You said you wanted honesty.”
Nodding, I said, “I did. I do.”
“Cool.” Angel shifted his attention from the water to my profile. I could see his intense gaze in my peripheral vision. “Then I honestly want to know what changed your mind.”
The chunk of jerky caught in my throat, but I swallowed noisily. “What do you mean?”
“I mean you’ve been saying you wanted to be friends with benefits for months. Saying you prefer it to anything else. Never once did you admit to having feelings for me besides friendship or sexual attraction. I thought you didn’t like me in that way. Or . . .” When I raised my eyebrows, a sheepish expression crossed his face. “There were times when I did think you felt the same way I did, but you’d always pull back. I wondered if you didn’t want to be in a relationship with a guy.”
My jaw nearly dropped. “What the hell? What does that have to do with anything?”
“Because . . .” The sheepishness turned to outright reluctance. “I noticed in the past the only times you even seemed close to dating, it was with a woman. So, I wondered if you preferred women but still liked to fuck guys—”
“Angel,” I said sharply. “I’m bisexual. I am attracted to and capable of having feelings for both men and women. Being bi doesn’t mean I have to lean further one way or another. Bisexuals aren’t the seesaws of the rainbow.”
“I’m not saying that!” Angel exhaled slowly. “Yeah, this is coming out wrong. I just thought you didn’t want to date guys because guys are fucking trash most of the time, but you were still okay with casual sex. Does that make sense?”
Some of my defensiveness simmered. I relaxed again. “Okay, yes. That phrasing is better. And most cis dudes are trash, but you’re not. I would never lump you or Ray or Chris in with faceless randoms. But you do have a point that I was more comfortable casually dating women. I trusted them more to not try to pressure me into doing things I didn’t want to do. But it was still casual. I’ve never been compelled to get sentimental with anyone before now.”
“Then why now?”
I slowly rewrapped the rest of my jerky in the plastic. With each motion, I took a deep measured breath. This felt like dangerous waters, but I waded in. “After what you said, can you blame me for choosing this day? I feel like you’re always blitzing me with sweetness, and I get flustered and sweaty in response like a confused teenager.” I ran a hand through my hair and leaned backward so my pose mirrored his. “And . . .”
“And?”
I blew out a slow breath, like a regretful leaky tire. Stalling. That’s what I was doing. He knew it, and I knew it, but I couldn’t stop. This wasn’t me. None of this was me. I wasn’t this girl. Which meant I wasn’t the girl for him. That was the real kicker. Eventually, he’d find a woman who was his match.
“You said you wished you could fall for someone else.” I ran my tongue over my lower lip, squinting into the distance. “And the idea was like a kick in the gut.”
Angel rolled onto his side, face braced in his hand. “I’ve dated other people before.”
“Never for long,” I said grudgingly. “And I know you. If you get serious with someone, you’ll fall hard. You’ll end up married with—”
“Stop pretending you know what I want, Stephanie.”
“Don’t I?” I rolled onto my side as well so we were facing each other. “The problem between us is that you want something I swore to myself I’d never have. That I’d never want.”
“I want a fucking relationship, not a wedding and you in a white gown,” he growled, brows drawing down low over his eyes. “Do you think I don’t know you?”
“Do you think people don’t get into relationships pretending to respect what the other person wants but really having a secret goal to change them?” I countered. “It happens all the time. The whole relationship thing is a game people play because they want to lock someone down because they’re afraid of being alone, and usually lie to each other about who they are in the process. And about what they want.”
Angel’s expression morphed from irritation to incredulous. He sat up, leaning over me. “That’s what you think of Ray and David? Nunzio and Michael? How about your friend Ashton and his boxer—Val?”
“No, but just because some of our friends—”
“You can’t just make broad generalizations and then pick and choose when it’s applicable, Stephanie.”
There was time for me to reply and defend my thoughts, but his flashing green eyes froze me in my place. His angry face was sexy as hell, and I loved it when he said my name in that sharp tone. The way he leaned down to bring our faces closer together.
“You always talk about people being narrow-minded and ignorant, but how do you sound acting like everyone in a monogamous relationship is an asshole? Or boring? Or deluded fucks just spending their lives pretending they want something they really don’t?”
“I didn’t say all that, and you know it.” I pushed myself up, arms extended back and palms flat on the ground. When we were closer, his eyes automatically dropped to my mouth. They stayed here. “My entire point is that people tie all their hopes and dreams on one person because they’re afraid of being alone and that sounds terrible. It sounds fucking exhausting and like a letdown waiting to happen. All because people need companionship.”
“And you don’t?” he asked, voice pitching lower. “Maybe not need. But you don’t even want it?”
The no nearly leaped off my tongue, but it didn’t feel right. The shape of the word was clumsy in my mouth, and tasted too much like a lie. Wasn’t me wanting companionship how all of this had started in the past week? Not with any random person out of a sense of desperation not to be alone—but with him. Specifically.
Me wanting Angel to go places with me—first the party, then the retreat. Me wanting to parade him in front of my coworkers because of the flush of pride I felt when they liked him so much. Me wanting to be close to him because our bodies fit together like puzzle pieces, even though I’d sworn all this time we belonged in different boxes. And me wanting him for myself. Wishing he’d just up and wake up one day, and be like me. Capable of having sex with people without all the feelings, because the idea of him being in a serious relationship with someone else . . . It killed me, even though I didn’t think I was capable of giving him the type of relationship I’d always thought he wanted. But now I wasn’t sure what he wanted. Maybe I’d never known. I’d never actually asked.
“Be honest with me, nena,” he whispered. “It’s just you and me here.”
“And the moon and stars?”
Angel looked up at the sky. Dusk was giving way to night, and the moon was clearly visible above us. “Yeah. The trees too. Probably some dumb animals.”
Leave it to him to dislike animals while enjoying roughing it. He was as contradictory as I was, as unlikely as this entire conversation, but maybe that was why we worked. Neither of us made any sense unless we were naked and pressed together, sharing breath and time with our bodies connected.
“What do you want?” I asked. “I know you said you want to be with me, but . . . how? What does it look like to you if it’s not marriage and kids?”
“Honestly?” Angel smiled faintly. “I just want to be yours. Yeah, the only one you want to sleep with, but I also wanna be your go-to person. The one you call first when something happens, or when you get good news. And . . . I want us to live together one day. When I’m pining extra hard, I have these stupid daydreams about moving in to your place after letting Tonya take over the lease for our apartment. I think she and Mere would appreciate the privacy anyway, since there’s no way Tonya is ever gonna live in that fucking mansion. And Mere seems to hate the idea of ever going back for long periods of time.”
My heart had begun to pound halfway through his quickly spoken admission, and it was partially because I’d thought of those things too. I’d had fantasies of waking up with him on Sunday mornings, the raw ache between my legs and in my muscles following a night of sex, and then him whispering for me to stay in bed while he made coffee. Or the winter days when neither of us ventured out from the covers because body heat was more delicious even than caffeine. The look on his face when he watched me get ready—affectionate and infatuated. The way I ran my hands over his chest through a T-shirt, still a little shocked that the boy I’d known for so long had turned into this tall, solid man.
Cooking in my underwear and watching TV with him. Leaning against him and knowing he’d support me. Trusting him with everything from the confession that my parents had abandoned me and Vic to get high in a housing project in another neighborhood, to him helping whisk my brother away after Kings Park had exploded in gunfire and blood.
My lower lip trembled, my stomach flipping over. After so many years, it shouldn’t affect me so much. None of it should. I’d spent years forging steel around those memories, but the return of Victor had melted those barriers like butter. Now all I could do was remember the past. Shielding Victor from the sight of our parents getting high in the kitchen when I was only ten. Waking up to find him crying in the middle of the night because they’d both vanished, and it was just me and him in the dark basement apartment we’d lived in until getting kicked out. Crawling through the window to run down the street in my nightgown, to the house with boarded windows, to ask the big men inside where my mom was. The look of loathing on her face when I begged her to come home. It had been that moment when I’d known she’d never wanted me. Us. Later, when we’d gotten older and she’d tried to pick herself up as our father fell further down, she’d said it out loud.
“If it weren’t for you two, I wouldn’t be here with him. I’d have finished school and had a real job. I wouldn’t be fucking trapped.”
Then she’d started using again. And she’d left.
“Hey . . .” Angel put a hand on my back. “Let’s not talk about this.”
“No, I’m fine.” It was the worst lie, because my voice was thick and my eyes were wet. I felt so stupid, but there was no shame deep in my bones at him seeing me like this. It had always been okay for him to see me cry. Only him. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Angel. Ever since Victor came back, I keep thinking about our parents and how they’d never wanted us. And that day when Shawn got shot. How the kid who killed him didn’t get caught, and I’d see him around the park knowing what he’d done. I used to wonder if he’d kill Victor if he ever came back from Chicago because he saw it all.”
“That guy is in jail now for something else,” Angel said, still running his hand up and down my spine. “He can’t do shit to Victor.”
“I know, but I keep thinking about it all, and I get so fucked up.” I wiped my eyes, pulling in a shaking breath. “And the more I think about us, the more those memories bombard me.” I could tell he had questions, but he just stroked my back and watched me. Waiting for an explanation. Not pushing me like he was afraid he kept doing. “I had to be a grown-up before I had all my adult teeth. My first real thought about the future was that I didn’t want to end up like my mother. Trapped with some man and letting him control my life. Then, later, when I had to lie to everyone to keep us out of foster care, that promise was all I had that made me feel like I had control of my own life. I made my own choices. I fucked who I wanted, never letting anyone stake a claim. I picked my friends. I picked my high school. My college. Every decision about my life was made by me and me alone. No boyfriend. No girlfriend. No one to try to steer me one direction or the other. I didn’t even want to go to the same college as you and Chris.”
Angel stopped rubbing my back for half a beat. “That’s why you refused to apply to City Tech instead of John Jay? I figured it was because of the law thing.”
“City Tech had a decent legal studies program too, but I wanted to be on my own. Not always . . . depending on you guys to make me feel like I had my squad nearby.”
He nodded slowly, searching my face as if he’d never seen it before. I could sense things clicking together in his mind. Realizing this went far beyond monogamy and sex. It went far beyond him.
“So what changed?” That question again. He did not intend to stop asking it, I could tell. “You don’t want to depend on anyone, and you think being in a relationship is the ultimate sign of dependency—I get it. But then why are you acting different lately? Sometimes you treat me more like a boyfriend than a fuck buddy, but then you refuse to admit it’s true.”
I lowered my eyes, but he tilted my chin up. Not cutting me any slack.
“It’s not just me, Stephanie. Ever since we started playing this game this weekend, I’ve been getting the vibe that you’re enjoying it. You like pretending to be with me. A lot.” When I gnawed on my lower lip and didn’t disagree, the tiniest smile ghosted across his face before vanishing. “And I see how you get when someone else pays me any mind. You’re as possessive as I am. You don’t want me with anyone else. You don’t even want me to fuck anyone else.”
It was selfish, but it was true. Before Meredith got with Tonya, she’d looked at him a little too long on more than one occasion, and jealousy had taken hold of me fast and strong. I always talked about his jealous fits, but I was just as capable of them, though I was better at hiding it.
“I don’t know how to answer.” I collapsed against the ground again, looking up at the darkening sky and the faint pinpricks of light from the stars. “I’m not lonely. My life is going great. The only thing that changed is that in the past year, I only want to sleep with you. You’re the one I want to talk to when I first wake up and before I go to bed. And since Victor came back . . .” I shut my eyes. “You’re the only one I know I can talk to about my family, because I feel safe breaking down in front of you. I feel safe around you in general. Like . . . comforted by your presence. Happy in a way that doesn’t happen with anyone else, really.”
Angel settled beside me, his fingers brushing my hand until I relaxed my balled fist. He brought my palm to his lips before holding it against his chest. I could feel his beating heart beneath cotton and flesh and bone.
“I’ll be real with you: I think we would be good together.” Angel rubbed his thumb against my skin. “But I understand why you want to stay solo and unattached, more so than I ever did before, so I won’t push you anymore.”
There was no small amount of trepidation in my voice as I asked, “What does that mean?”
“It means now more than ever, I realize I need to respect your decision and not try to push you. I shouldn’t have been pushing you before. I need to stop hoping that if I’m patient enough, you’ll change your mind.”
There was a finality to his tone that made my stomach churn and my breath hitch. I knew we couldn’t sustain this forever, I knew we were just hurting each other, but the reality of it ending for real, was stunning. It knocked the wind out of me.
“Are you going to try to move on?” I asked softly.
“I have to, Stephanie. Even though I keep telling myself that I can settle for this thing we’re doing now . . .” Angel tightened his hand around mine, squeezing so tight it was nearly painful. “I know it’s only a matter of time before this starts hurting a little too much. After this weekend, I’m going to try my best to reset things.”
A chill cut through me now that the sun was gone and the wind was picking up, blowing cooler ripples of air off the water. “And for the rest of this weekend?”
Angel exhaled slowly. When he spoke, it was in a much lower voice. “I get to pretend you’re mine.”