The car was hushed after I told them the story, every gory detail in place, every embarrassing detail. Not only had I been cheated on, but I’d also acted desperate, needy, and creepy about it.

I hurried out of the car, grabbing my bags and slamming the door behind me. I didn’t want to know what they were thinking. I didn’t want to hear it.

I got into the hotel as quickly as I could and straight to the desk. I just wanted to get a room and shut myself up in it until we left for Fantasticon. Maybe if I was lucky, I would just die in my sleep and not have to face the two of them ever again.

At least, that’s what I had hoped until the woman across the counter checked the openings and looked up at me with a grimace.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “but it looks like we only have two rooms available for the next few days.”

“Of course you do,” I muttered under my breath. “They’re at least double suites, right?”

“No.” Her face was filled with genuine regret. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Epstein.”

Ah, there it was; she felt guilty because she knew me.

I leaned against the counter, head in hands. What was I supposed to do? I didn’t really want to be around either of them, but how was I supposed to tell them they needed to stay together? Maybe I could just tell them it was my money and I’d take a room to myself if it damn well pleased me. That had the upside of making me look like such a jerk that neither of them would want to talk to me in the future, and then we could avoid ever dealing with what had happened. They wouldn’t have to look at me with pity or disgust, knowing what a creepy loser I was.

I had actually convinced myself this was an excellent idea up until the moment Sam walked up to the counter. “What’s going on?” he asked, frowning.

I explained, and he just nodded along. “Okay, so it’s not ideal, but it’s not the worst thing that could happen. We’ll give one to Melissa and stay in the other ourselves.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. He was agreeing to stay with me way too quickly given the conversation we’d had. Was it because Melissa had expressed discomfort with me? I doubted it—she came walking in just after Sam approached me, and she gave me a smile while trying to dust snow off her luggage.

“You know,” I told him, trying to give both of us an out, “you two can stay together, if you want.”

“No,” he dismissed, frowning. “She’s a woman. It wouldn’t be right to force her to stay in a room with us. That might be uncomfortable for her.”

“We’re gay, Sam.”

“But we’re still men. That can still be uncomfortable. Geez, man, look up male privilege.”

I was too emotionally exhausted to try to figure out if he was joking, so I just said, “Sure.”

Melissa and Sam went to a side room with a little kitchenette and vending machines to microwave our dinners. They invited me along, but I lied and told them I wasn’t hungry anymore and that I was just going to head to the room. They both tried to convince me to stay with them, but I couldn’t. It was just too uncomfortable, and I soon slipped away to go to the relative comfort and safety of my room, soon to be my room with Sam. At least the bed was a decent size, so I wouldn’t have to be cuddled against him all night, even if I was a little bit cold there alone. I dove under the covers and curled up with all of my clothes still on, taking a moment to text Damien to let him know where I was. I considered telling him I’d run into Paul, but the last text Damien had sent me was a picture of himself with his fingers to the side of his head and miming shooting himself. I didn’t think he needed to deal with any problems from me.

I lay there, watching the snow drift down outside the window. The only light streamed in from the few lights in the parking lot, and I could see the distinct shimmer of every fluffy bundle of snowflakes that continued falling. It was too early for me to actually sleep, and even if it hadn’t been, I still felt horrible.

What did Sam think of me after finding out all of that? Did he think I was a creep, just like Paul did? Did he feel sorry for me? Oh, God, what if it was both? I would have to throw myself out the window if I had to spend several days hanging around him and dealing with pitying looks and grimaces.

I thought about the grocery store. It had been an awful experience seeing Paul again, but it hadn’t hurt as much as I would have guessed. It was strange, and there were a few things that hurt or made me angry, especially the fact that Paul and Ted were married, but Paul hadn’t stirred up any level of desire in me. I wasn’t envious or in love; it was just little pieces of the past grinding into the scar that had formed around my feelings for him. It sucked, but I didn’t feel like I would die if I didn’t have him back.

At some point in the past five years, I disconnected from Paul. He stopped being my one and only. I had never dated anyone else, never moved on in the conventional sense, and yet...I’d still found a way. I had dealt with it, and it was over.

The closure I’d wanted was there.

The thing that made my heart ache and my head spin was Sam. I could still feel his arm wrapped around my shoulders, his lips pressing lightly against my curls. I could still smell the soft, warm smell he carried with him. When I closed my eyes, I saw his too-big smile, and my whole body lit up.

I thought back to my dream, and I started to feel hopelessly aroused.

What could I do? I wanted to sink into a hole and never come out, but at the same time, I couldn’t banish the image of him smirking at me from between my legs. I felt my cock hardening and screwed my eyes closed, trying to force myself to think of anything else, but it was impossible. I could still feel everything from my dream and beyond—his lips on mine, his hands gripping my hips, his hard cock pressing against me...

I palmed at my shaft through my pants, ashamed but turned on all at once. I rubbed myself as hard as I dared, not willing to go any further than teasing myself. I didn’t want to commit to doing this, to giving in to these urges. It was too much. It was too strange. It was crossing a line.

But somehow, massaging myself through my jeans felt safe. It was frustrating, a form of punishment, and that made it better, less intrusive.

I don’t know how long I lay there denying myself any real satisfaction, but I continued until I heard the click of the door lock coming undone and the creak of the door opening. I let my body go limp immediately, my heart hammering against my chest.

The light didn’t even turn on. The door closed, and I heard Sam murmur my name, once, then again a little louder. I didn’t answer, choosing to close my eyes and steady my breathing. He must have given up, because I heard some discreet shuffling, the running of the tap in the bathroom, and soft footsteps before I felt the mattress shift under Sam’s weight. My cock was still as hard as ever, but I didn’t even think about moving.

This was going to be a very, very long night.

When I woke up, Sam was gone.

I checked my phone and saw that it was nearly three in the afternoon, which felt a bit early for me. It was still dim in the room, and I saw the window was completely caked with snow. I guessed that Sam and Melissa were hanging out somewhere, probably sitting in the hotel pool and gossiping about how weird I was being. The thought made me want to fall back asleep.

My stomach roared, reminding me that I’d missed dinner the night before, so I rummaged through my luggage and found the loaf of bread and the jar of peanut butter I’d bought at the supermarket. I used one of the hotel’s business cards I found sitting on the nightstand as a knife to spread the peanut butter, a trick I’d picked up during my first Fantasticon that I was absolutely banned from using around Damien, who found the idea horrifically disgusting. If there was any truth to his complaints about germs, though, I didn’t mind; after about two days of fasting, I put away three sandwiches with no problem.

I couldn’t bring myself to leave the room. Instead, I spent my day reading fanfiction on my phone.

“It’ll be okay, you know,” Anna Lee whispered, running her thumb over Elinor’s cheek, swiping away her tears.

The brunette shrugged her off and turned away. She didn’t want to be crying like this. She felt pathetic. She was supposed to be the strong one, the tough one who made sure Anna was protected, but she had failed. Anna Lee had disappeared, and her memories with her, and Elinor was starting to realize there might not be anything she could do to get her girlfriend back.

I had to wipe tears out of my own eyes. Sam’s work was almost devastatingly touching.

It was at that moment that the author himself walked into the room. I hastily rubbed at my eyes, making an effort to not look like I was crying.

“Missed you today,” Sam said.

I looked at the time, startled to see it was already night. I’d spent the entire day reading fanfiction and crying. God, I’ve somehow become an even bigger loser over the course of this week. “I figured I’d give you and Melissa some time to hang out,” I said with a shrug. “And I was hoping to catch up on some reading, anyway.”

“Really? You know all the fics you’re reading are a few years old by this point, right? There’s not much to catch up on.”

I looked up at him guiltily. I thought he would be annoyed, but he was just watching me with a patient expression. “I...actually didn’t realize that, no,” I said stiffly.

“They all have the dates on them.”

“Do they?” I pretended to be surprised. I don’t think he bought it.

Sam sat down on the other edge of the bed, staring at me intently. I tried to flip through my phone and ignore him, but it was no good. Finally, I sighed and said, “Okay, what do you want?”

“Why did you ignore us all day?” he asked. “And last night, why did you run off like that? Are you upset with us?”

“What? No!” I frowned, genuinely surprised. “How could I ever get upset with you two?”

He brushed that off. “Well, then, are you sick? Upset about seeing Paul? Narcoleptic?”

“No, none of the above. Especially not the last one, unless I seriously misunderstand the word. Why?”

“Because you haven’t been talking to us, and we’re worried,” he said simply. “You totally shut down on us, especially after the whole Paul thing yesterday, and I don’t know why. I’m concerned about you, Lance.”

The sentiment warmed my heart, but it made me feel even guiltier. “Don’t be. Seriously. It’s not a big deal.”

“It must be if you’re refusing to leave this room.”

I thought about arguing, telling him it was no big deal and I just didn’t feel like leaving, but I knew he would see that it was bullshit. Besides, I owed him a lot more than that. He didn’t deserve lies from me, not when I’d already deceived him into believing I was a decent person when there was really a creepy stalker living inside me. “I’m just embarrassed,” I admitted quietly. “I’m ashamed. And I feel bad for you guys for having to be around me.”

He frowned deeply, scooting a little bit closer to me. “Why?”

“Because now you know everything.” I shrugged, feeling exposed. I stared down at my twiddling thumbs. “You know the worst stuff I’ve done. You know that I’m...weird. Or off. Or whatever.”

“How are you any of that?”

I laughed. I couldn’t tell if he was being nice or just stupid. “Sam, I left over two hundred texts and voicemails on Paul’s phone after he left. I went to his house. I got fucking arrested. I’m...I’m disgusting. I’m just a creep, just like they said.”

“No.” He said it without hesitation, forcefully, full of confidence. It came so quickly I winced at hearing it. “No, Lance, you’re not. You’re not the one who was wrong here.”

“You don’t have to say that.”

“I know I don’t. It’s just true. That guy hurt you, man. He did something truly unacceptable and cruel to you. He lied to you for years, then lied to the cops, and didn’t even have the decency to admit he’d done something wrong. He’s the one who fucked up, not you. And you shouldn’t feel like you’ve done anything wrong or that he’s been in the right about any of this, because you’re great. You’re an amazing person, and he’s just a dick who was too blind to see that.”

I shook my head. Tears had started dripping down my face, sliding off the tip of my nose and splattering onto my blurry hands. “You don’t know that,” I said hoarsely. “You’ve only known me a few days. He knew me for ten years before he left me. He knew I was broken. I was born a fuck-up.”

A hand touched my shoulder. I flinched away, and I heard Sam sigh. “You’re not a fuck-up. And I don’t care how long he knew you. I know you, too. I know your heart. I’ve seen it. I’ve known it for years, from the second I read the first story you ever posted. I knew from that moment on that you are a good, kind, incredible person, and nothing this week has done anything to change how I feel about that. You are perfect just the way you are, Lance. Absolutely perfect. You’re smart and funny and weird in the absolute best way. I know you. I’ve always known you. And you’re good. You might even be the best.”

I smiled, but I still let out a tiny sob. “How can you say that when you know I’ve been lying to you?” I asked, sniffling through my tears. “The books don’t mean what you thought they did or even what you wanted them to mean. Maybe if I hadn’t fallen apart and I’d actually kept writing them, like I was supposed to, you would know that, and you would see why you don’t actually like the books, or the story, or me. Maybe my heart isn’t what you thought it was when you were reading stories about the importance of truth.”

I felt another shift. Sam was sitting so close his knee was brushing mine, and one of his fingers curled under my chin and raised my face to his. His eyes were steely and determined behind his glasses, and I shuddered just looking at him. “Then tell me.”

“Tell you what?”

“Tell me what the story is really about,” he murmured. “Tell me what was supposed to happen that would make everything so different.”

I had never answered that question. I’d been asked a thousand times what book five was going to do, what it was supposed to hold, but I’d never told anyone. Other than Damien, there wasn’t a living soul who knew any of my plans for my work, and I’d gone through a lot of effort to make sure it stayed that way.

But I told him anyway.

“The books they found were incomplete, Sam,” I whispered. “Elinor thought they might be, but Eli refused to admit it. He wanted to keep looking, to bring truth to the people, and it drove the two of them apart. Elinor left Eli to go on the journey alone. She went back home a refugee, and she lived with all those poor, uneducated people who had been taken in by all those lies. And when she was there...she realized that lies aren’t always terrible. That sometimes the truth can hurt people way, way worse than the lies, and that the truth isn’t even static and objective, anyway. She learned that everyone has a different truth, a different vision of the world, and that while people needed to learn some things, that some people needed hope more than they needed brutal honesty.”

I heard Sam swallow thickly. “And Eli?”

“Eli got...lost. He started to go insane looking for the rest of the books, trying to figure out these absolute truths, and he became completely obsessed with it. He started to not care who got hurt or who got in the way of his work. He let people die just for the tiniest scrap of information. By the time he found the writer, he had become a complete fanatic. It isn’t until the end that he saw what he’d done wrong. The whole story is supposed to be about balance. It’s supposed to be about how there is no real or false and no good and bad. It all runs on a spectrum, and you can’t have a bit of one without the other. You don’t want to have that. A world of absolutes is the worst thing that could ever exist.” I looked up at him with my wet eyes, biting at my lip. “I’m sorry, Sam. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to mislead you or make you believe something, I just—“

I was cut off by a harsh, rough kiss.

Every one of my nerves exploded, completely oversaturated with the sensation of Sam’s hot, wet mouth on mine, but my body ran on autopilot. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him to me in pure desperation, and his tongue parted my lips hard and insistently. I groaned and his tongue slipped into my mouth, running along my teeth before he nipped my lips gently. I gasped and moaned, my whole body flush against him as I pulled him down to the mattress. He pulled back, and his eyes were blazing with fire and passion as he tossed off his glasses and ripped off his shirt. I made short work of my own clothes, and soon we were naked, our limbs intertwined.

Sam’s insistent kisses moved from my lips to my jaw and my shoulder, where he bit and sucked whenever he could. It hurt, but in the best way, and I let out little cries and whimpers as I thrust up against him, trying to create any friction against my hard cock. I found it when my shaft brushed against his and found he was equally hard, which only made me moan louder.

He abandoned my neck, and I thought back to my dream for a second, back to the gentle kisses he’d laid over my chest, but he didn’t bother with that. He wasted no time, taking my shaft in his mouth and bobbing his head. I whimpered and clutched at the sheets. It felt even more incredible than it did in my dream; his tongue pressed hard at the underside of my cock, lapping at it relentlessly. One of his hands slid from my hip to my ass and he fondled it, grabbing my ass so hard I thought I might end up with bruises. My yelps of slight pain turned into whimpers of need, and his finger quickly found my entrance. I gasped, my breath speeding immediately, and I whispered, “Please, please, please, please...”

He pulled off my cock with a slight pop and I whined, but I didn’t feel neglected for long. Instead, I found his tongue probing at my entrance and my eyes rolled back. I was making noises, but I doubted any of them were coherent as I thrust up towards his mouth, desperate and needy. The feeling of his mouth on the most sensitive area of my body was pure bliss.

That too didn’t last as long as I had hoped. I yelped when he turned me over onto all fours, and I heard him spit before I felt something hard, blunt, and incredibly thick press against my ass. He ground against me a few times, silently asking me what I wanted, and all I could do was look back at him over my shoulder, into his lust-blown, dazed eyes, and whimper, “Please fuck me.”

He didn’t waste any time obeying.

He went slowly at first, working his cock into me inch by inch. It had been a long time since I’d had anything in my ass without a good amount of lubricant, but the slight sting didn’t detract from the pleasure that had me grappling with a pillow and moaning. It felt so good just to be stretched and filled, and from the way he dug his nails into my hips and moaned, I could tell it felt just as good for him. He rocked into me so slowly it drove me insane, his thrusts gentle and smooth until I started to push back against him desperately. More, more, more.

It wasn’t long until his patience broke, and he was hunched over me, nibbling at my shoulder blades and fucking me as hard as he dared. Pain and pleasure washed over me in equal parts, and when I felt his cock brush against the sensitive nerves inside me, my hand flew to my own shaft, stroking it in quick, staccato movements that mirrored his thrusts. He finally drove into me hard, biting into my neck to muffle a shout, and I felt something hot and sticky filling me. That was all I needed before everything spun and went black, and my hand was covered in my own cum as I whimpered and rutted back against him.

We both collapsed, our breathing ragged. I didn’t dare to look over at him, and he didn’t dare to look at me. Instead, we both just watched the ceiling, watching the shadows of snowflakes shift on the bright white paint until we both slipped into sleep.