The first thought that crossed my mind when I woke the next morning was Gabe was too far away. I could hear his soft snoring, so I knew he was there somewhere, but I didn’t feel his body pressed against mine. I wasn’t hot and sweaty the way I normally was. I missed it, even though I’d always rushed out of bed to shower because there was little appealing about the smell of sleepy, sweaty men.

I rolled over and opened my eyes to see Gabe still passed out. He’d likely be that way for a while. I brushed back his hair and kissed his forehead, whispering that I’d be back in a few minutes. Luckily, the bottom drawer of his dresser was filled with clothes I’d left here when I’d slept over, because it felt wrong to saunter around his parents’ house wearing his clothes, and I didn’t want to risk Mom realizing where I’d spent the night based on my wardrobe choice. It didn’t make any sense, but then again, nothing was turning out the way I’d expected.

I snuck across the hall to take care of my morning business and hurried back to Gabe’s room to dress. I’d heard voices downstairs and wanted to check on Seth before he headed back to Wilmington. When I’d last seen him, he’d finally worked up the courage to introduce himself to a guy rather than crushing on him from a distance. I was curious to hear how that’d gone. Selfishly, I hoped they hadn’t felt an instant connection, because then I’d be even more of a dick for making Gabe resort to asking Seth for a ride up here.

Strong arms wrapped around me as I pulled a T-shirt over my head. Before we went anywhere, I’d have to ask Gabe to borrow a sweatshirt, because it was yet another cold morning and I was still without my coat.

“I like sleeping with you in my bed,” Gabe whispered as he started nibbling at my ear and down the side of my neck. I ground my ass against his morning wood, wanting to torture him as much as he was me. We couldn’t do this here, but I couldn’t bring myself to stop. Gabe reached around our bodies and slid his hand to my dick, which didn’t seem to care where we were as long as it led to orgasms, preferably mutual.

The idea of moving out of the dorms before fall was starting to appeal to me. More privacy. Bigger bed. Privacy. Yeah, that was on the list twice, because being so turned on by Gabe made me realize how much I didn’t want to move home for the summer.

Gabe bit my neck as he jacked me off. His other hand came up to my mouth, stifling my moans and whimpers. God, I couldn’t believe I’d thought for a second that he was pulling away from me. Every time we were together like this, it proved again how amazing we were as a couple. I thrust harder, loving the feeling of his erection sliding through my crack. I moaned, louder this time, as my balls tightened. It wasn’t going to take long now.

“Boys, breakfast!” Gwen yelled, louder than necessary. My entire body flushed beet red. No way was she downstairs, which meant she knew what we were doing.

“I’m not stopping until you come for me,” Gabe whispered, redoubling his efforts. My flagging erection quickly sprang back to life. My mind wanted to object, to tell him it was wrong to screw around in his parents’ house, but my body was unwilling. “That’s it, babe. Fuck my hand. Think about how much better it’s going to feel when we get home and that’s my ass strangling your dick.”

I tossed my head back against his shoulder, giving Gabe easy access to my neck and jaw.

“You love that, don’t you? I know you wonder what it’s like to be the one doing the fucking,” he continued. His dirty words were even hotter than feeling him stroking me closer to the edge. I had been curious what it felt like for Gabe when we made love, but we both loved the way things were now, so I didn’t see a reason to change things up.

“I want that, you know. Want to feel you filling me with your spunk,” he continued. “You’re always so damn cautious, but I want to see you when all that careful resolve snaps and you can’t help but fuck me into next week. Will you do that, baby? Will you fuck me when we get home?”

“Yes. Anything,” I promised. “Hurry.”

He loosened his grip, teasing the head. I was about to beg for more when Gabe stepped back and I felt a damp finger slide down my crack. I leaned forward, widened my stance. If needing him so desperately made me greedy, I’d wear that label with pride.

Gabe breached my entrance, creating a push/pull between my ass and dick. The sensations weren’t enough. Were too much. I lifted a fist to my mouth and bit down hard, choking off the shouts of ecstasy as I spilled over Gabe’s hand. My body sagged against his chest and he held me, whispering how much he loved me. How sorry he was for scaring me. How he’d never leave me.

We’d almost finished cleaning up when there was an insistent knock at the door. “Guys?”

I’d forgotten Seth was still here. Shit. “We’ll be right down.”

“Okay. I thought you’d like a heads up that you have company.”

I opened the door and saw Seth hugging himself as he kicked the carpet. A quick glance back showed me Gabe was dressed enough for Seth. It wasn’t like the dude hadn’t seen both of us in various states of undress since the start of the school year.

“What do you mean we have company?” Gabe asked once I’d shut the door.

“Trevor’s mom is down there,” he warned us. This was bad. “She was freaking out because apparently you left some lights on and your bedroom door open when you left last night. Gwen’s doing a damn good job keeping her downstairs, but you need to get down there and own up to what’s going on.”

“I still can’t believe your mom didn’t lose her mind when I blurted out that we’re together.” Seeing how well she’d taken the news, I felt guilty about exerting so much energy fighting Gabe about coming out to everyone. Almost.

“Yeah, well not to stick my nose where it doesn’t belong, but I get the feeling your mom’s the one you guys need to worry about,” Seth observed. “She’s down there trying to push Gwen to tell her what in the hell’s going on and why you tried to hide from her. I know you say she’s cool and loves you, but your mom’s kinda scary.”

“That’d be Aunt DeeDee in Mama Bear mode,” Gabe informed him. Since Gwen had insisted I stop referring to her as my aunt when she found out we were a couple, it sounded strange to hear Gabe call my mom his aunt. Thinking about any sort of familial connection used to fill me with shame, but knowing some people accepted us made me see loving Gabe wasn’t wrong. It was everything.

“You’re meeting her at her worst,” I pointed out, because I didn’t want Seth thinking I’d been lying to him about my Rockwellesque upbringing. “She’s pissed off at me, with good reason. Staying here last night probably compounded the problems. And when she realizes she’s the last to know about us….”

“Don’t think about that right now,” Gabe suggested, wrapping me in the safety of his arms. “We always knew she was going to take this the hardest. And yeah, maybe we’ve hurt our case here, but you did the right thing. Nothing good would’ve come from you opening up to her when everyone was tired. You’re a good man, a good son. She’ll remember that.”

“I hope you’re right.”

“Seth, if you want, you can hang out up here. No need to suck you into our family drama.” Gabe quickly pointed out the remote, gaming console, and shared his password for the clunky old desktop computer.

He stopped me at the top of the stairs, placing a hand over my racing chest. I closed my eyes as Gabe leaned in to kiss me tenderly. “Relax. If you go down there acting like you’ve done something wrong, she’s going to latch onto that.”

“But in her eyes, we are,” I pointed out.

“No, we aren’t,” he insisted. “We’re two men who fell in love. Our circumstances are unique, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be together. And I’ll fight anyone who says different.”

Yeah, he totally would. I didn’t give in to the temptation to hold Gabe’s hand as we walked to what I could only hope wasn’t our demise.

Both sets of parents sat around the kitchen table when we walked in. Ignoring the elephant in the room, I avoided making eye contact with anyone while I poured coffee for Gabe and me. I wasn’t nearly the addict he was, but this seemed to be one of those conversations better had with caffeine in the system. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mom and Dad have a conversation of their own with nothing more than glares and jerks of their heads. When Mom moved to stand, Dad grabbed her forearm and told her to sit down. Knowing he knew the truth didn’t help as much as I thought it would. All I could consider was that three-fourths of the adults knew, leaving one well-meaning mother out of the loop. It was a type of betrayal I wasn’t prepared for.

Gabe pulled two bar stools to the end of the island closest to the table so we weren’t hovering over the parents. He cradled the steaming mug in his hands, muttering something about gifts from the gods. I shook my head at his theatrics. Yeah, the drama department was going to be a good fit for him.

Tension was so thick in the air it was hard to breathe. Or maybe that was my paranoia closing my throat. It was up to me to start talking.

“Mom, Dad, I’m sorry I worried you last night,” I began, hoping the apology counted for something.

Dad’s eyes shifted between Gabe and me, a silent reminder that he knew and didn’t hate us for what we felt. “Your mother was worried because it was apparent you’d been to the house, but there was no sign of you when we got home and you didn’t answer your phone.”

Come to think of it, I wasn’t sure where my phone was. It was on silent, so I wouldn’t have heard it anyway. Last night, I hadn’t been in the mood to talk to anyone. Today, it was bugging me that I couldn’t remember where I’d left it.

“I really didn’t mean to make you worry,” I reiterated, looking directly at my mom. “I’d texted Dad about coming home this weekend, but he hadn’t responded. When I got home, the house was empty. Like really empty. So, I came over here instead.”

Here I was, still skating around the truth. Wasn’t I the model child? Gabe stretched and rested his arms across the counter, his thumb rubbing the center of my back. Although we were right in front of everyone, no one could see that simple, vital point of contact.

“Where’s the Jeep? I suppose it makes sense that you didn’t want to stay at the house alone, but your Jeep is gone.”

Dang. Total backfire. “I parked it in Gwen and Joel’s garage.”

“Why?” she demanded, leaning forward to glare at me. “You better start talking, Trevor James Bruce. I know there’s something you’re not telling me and I’m tired of it. I can’t go on trying to figure out where I failed so miserably as a parent that my own son can’t be honest with me.”

“DeeDee, calm down.” Wrong answer, Pops. I shook my head because even I was smarter than to tell her she was being irrational, which is basically what he’d just done in not so many words.

“Do not tell me to calm down,” she spat back. “Honestly, have I given you any reason to think you couldn’t talk to me when you’re having problems? What’s going on? Did you meet a girl and she’s pregnant?”

Everyone in the room seemed to choke at her accusation. This wasn’t good at all. She glared at everyone and pushed back from the table.

“Someone had better start talking. Now. I want to know why I’m such a horrible person that I’m apparently the only one being kept in the dark.”

“Dee, sit down,” Gwen demanded. She turned to face her stepsister, ignoring everyone else in the room. I was impressed by how gentle she kept her tone because from where I was sitting, I could see the way her manicured nails dug into Joel’s thigh. “You’re a wonderful mother. You haven’t failed Trevor. But have you considered that reacting the way you are, when you don’t even know the situation, might be part of why he didn’t talk to you sooner?”

“Well, if he talked to me, maybe I wouldn’t overreact!” she shrieked. Yeah, this was going even worse than I’d expected. She turned to glare at me. Not once in my life had I felt such contempt radiating out of my mother’s eyes. “I’ve worried about you for a few years now. You think I’m stupid? You think I don’t feel you slipping away from me?”

“Mama, it’s not like that at all,” I assured her. When I tried to slide off the stool, she pointed a finger at me and told me to stay where I was. “Please, don’t act this way. You’re making it seem like I killed someone.”

“Have you?” She folded her arms tightly across her chest. Dad gaped at her. It was the first time I truly feared Mom’s grip on reality might be slipping.

“Of course not,” I shot back. “How could you even think such a thing?”

Gabe fisted his hand in the back of my T-shirt.

“You’re the one who mentioned it,” she pointed, seeming satisfied with herself. “And again, you won’t talk to me, so I have nothing better to do than assume the worst.”

I couldn’t take it any longer. Listening to her, I realized how much hell I’d put Gabe through with my obsessing over everything that could go wrong. Ignoring that we weren’t alone, I turned to Gabe and took his free hand in both of mine. “I’m sorry.”

I watched his Adam’s apple dip as tears formed along his lash line. There I went, botching things up again. I leaned in to kiss his cheek.

“Babe, don’t cry,” I whispered. “I’m still here. I’m not going anywhere. I’m only sorry if I ever drove you nuts thinking about everything that could go wrong. I love you.”

“You’re not that bad,” Gabe reassured me at the exact moment my mom finally snapped.

“You what?” she yelled. “How can you love him? You’re not even gay! I’d know if you were. What has he been doing to you since you moved down to Wilmington?”

Gabe opened his mouth to say something, but I elbowed him in the ribs hard enough he doubled over.

“Mom, he hasn’t been doing anything to me except showing me that I’m the center of his world.” Since the cat was officially out of the bag, I laced Gabe’s fingers with my own, resting them in plain sight on my knee. “We’ve been together since junior year, but it wasn’t until we moved out that we were able to actually be together.”

“That’s a lie!” Mom was pacing the room, Dad behind her, trying to get her to calm down. “I’m your mother. I would’ve known….”

You could practically see the moment the light bulb went off in her head. She whipped around to bury her finger in Dad’s chest. “You knew about this, didn’t you? When they went to New York at Christmas, you helped them, didn’t you? How long, Randall?”

Oh, she was working up a good head of steam. As I watched their interaction, I wished I’d gotten more of Dad’s levelheadedness and less of Mom’s doomsday obsessions. He guided her back to her chair, and Gabe’s parents excused themselves. I watched them walk to the sitting room adjacent to the kitchen, close enough to jump in if the need should arise.

“Yes, Dee, I knew they were seeing one another,” Dad admitted. “Gabe’s a good man and he treats Trevor right. That’s what you need to focus on right now.”

“But it’s unnatural,” she argued. That was the straw that broke this particular camel’s back. I lurched out of my chair and hovered over her. Yeah, I knew it was a bad way to de-escalate conflict, but I didn’t care. She was not going to talk about Gabe and me that way. Not now. Not ever. One good thing that’d come from the past twelve hours was I honestly believed we’d be okay. My mom may come around, she may not, but Gabe and I were not degenerates for loving one another, and we had enough family who accepted us as we were.

“Why Mom? How are Gabe and I disgusting to you? Is it because we’re two men? Would your opinion change if Gabe was the daughter of your best friend instead of the son?”

“It has nothing to do with whether he’s a man or a woman,” she countered, still breathing so hard I could see her nostrils expand on every exhale. “Gwen isn’t just my best friend, she’s my sister.”

“Your stepsister,” I clarified. Four little letters made all the difference in this situation. “This is why you didn’t know sooner. Gabe wanted to be honest with everyone, but I knew you’d act like this. I love you, but I also love him. You’re my family, but so is he. And I’m not going to break both of our hearts just because it makes you uncomfortable.”

“What about my heart?” she pleaded. I backed away slowly, needing the physical connection to Gabe so I wouldn’t crack under the pressure.

“Mom, I’m an adult. You need to remember that you raised me to be intelligent and independent. I was never going to be your baby boy forever.” Gabe squeezed my fingers, giving me the strength to continue. “Someday, I hope you’ll be able to be as happy for us as everyone else has been so far. I truly wish you’d see how happy I am, how lucky I am to have someone like Gabe in my life.”

“I don’t know if that’ll ever happen.” Mom stood from the table and walked out of the house without another word. We all stared at the back door, stunned by how poorly she’d taken the news.

I kept waiting for the guilt, the shame, the feeling that I’d disappointed her. Instead, I felt Dad’s strong arms around my chest. My boyfriend’s fingers still gripping mine tightly. And over Dad’s shoulder, Gwen and Joel with matching sad smiles on their faces. Maybe mom would come around, maybe she wouldn’t, but this was what family was supposed to be. These were the people I would always be able to count on to love me unconditionally.

“I’m proud of you, son,” Dad whispered. That’s when I lost it. Tears streamed down my face, some happy, others sad. “Give her some time and she will be too.”

“I hope you’re right, because I meant it when I said I can’t leave him.”

“And that’s how I know you two are going to last.” He turned and offered a hand to Gabe. “Take care of him. It’s going to be rough for a while.”

“Always.”

We left home that weekend knowing things had forever changed. Eventually, I hoped my mom would realize there were worse things in the world than me falling in love with Gabe, but that would be up to her. I couldn’t fight, not when I finally felt free for the first time since I realized I was attracted to him as something more than a friend. We’d been inseparable since birth, and God willing, we’d stay that way our entire lives.