FOURTEEN

 

“Hey. You got a minute?”

Tristan glanced up, a little surprised. He and Grant hadn’t been exactly talking a lot, and Tristan even knew that it was his own fault. It was just that he didn’t really have any idea how he was going to balance everything that was going on with him.

He could lose everything if he let himself be with Grant, if he was open. And actually, Grant could also lose everything. So he was definitely struggling, and he knew that he had been pushing Grant away because of it. He just wasn’t sure what the better choice was.

Still, Tristan had to admit, to himself, at least, that he had missed Grant. And not just sexually, either, like he would expect. It wasn’t like him, but Tristan was thinking about Grant’s smile, and the deep, rich blue of his eyes, and his strong hands, and his grace and his honor and his sense of humor.

He missed Grant. All of him. Even the judgmental comments which Grant made when Tristan drank a little bit too much. Doing homework with him, all of it, everything.

So even though he knew that he was an idiot, even though he knew, logically, that this had to be nothing more than some stupid crush, the reaction of his pheromones and Grant’s, he couldn’t help the smile which stretched his lips when Grant spoke to him.

“Yeah,” Tristan admitted. He was already ahead in all of his classes, and his studying, at this point, was just to keep his brain from going too crazy. When he was learning something, it was easier for him to focus on that and the mess that was the rest of his life faded into the background a little bit.

“Tristan, what is this to you?”

Tristan’s smile faded when Grant asked that question. He should have known. Grant seemed to have this driving urge to label everything, define it. Tristan could have related to that if it had been in a science lab, but this was a slightly more complicated situation.

“Don’t,” Tristan growled, suddenly irritated. Had he really been thinking about how much he missed this man? How much he had wanted him around? Not so much anymore. Why couldn’t Grant just let things be what they were?

“I sort of thought so,” Grant said, with a soft sigh which just irritated Tristan all the more. It sounded so resigned like Tristan was being deliberately difficult when it was Grant who was making things so awkward between them.

“Look, can we just …” Tristan started, but Grant interrupted him.

“Yeah. We can just not,” Grant spoke, and his voice was slow and heavy, and it was then that Tristan felt the first pricklings of foreboding, skating along the edges of his nerves and irritating him, sticking in the deepest corners of his heart and soul, impossible to really ignore.

“Wait, hold on,” Tristan protested, because when he looked at Grant, and he gazed into his eyes, he saw sorrow, and resignation, and despair. He didn’t like it, any of it, because it suddenly seemed like this wasn’t just Grant throwing another temper tantrum.

“I’m sorry,” Grant said, and the way he spoke, it really sounded like he meant it. Like he was actually sorry, like he hated to have to do this. That only made the sense of foreboding rise up, looming over Tristan until it felt like Grant had his heart clenched in his strong hand, and he was very sure that Grant was going to crush it.

“No,” Tristan whispered, or maybe he just thought it. He wasn’t sure. Either way, Grant didn’t respond to the statement.

“I think we both knew this could never work,” Grant continued, his eyes sad like he couldn’t even hide that. “You and I are too different. I’ll talk to Manny. I bet he’d be willing to do a roommate swap.”

“Grant,” Tristan heard his own voice, and he was sure, this time, that he had actually said the word. Grant looked at him, but Tristan saw no hope in his eyes. No sign that there was any point in speaking to him. But Tristan had to try. “You really want this?”

“No,” Grant admitted, but there was no time for Tristan to find any sort of comfort in that one word. “I don’t. But I need it. I love you, Tristan, but this can never work. We want different things.”

It might have been a good thing that Grant turned and left then because if he hadn’t Tristan might have said something that he would regret later. He might have said that he didn’t like ultimatums, that Grant could go fuck himself if he couldn’t handle Tristan’s need to remain secret about this.

And honestly, that would have been the best case scenario, because what Tristan really wanted to do was to call Grant back and tell him that he would do anything he wanted if Grant just didn’t leave. He would be as open as Grant wanted to, and they could walk around the frat house holding hands if that’s what Grant needed.

Old habits, thankfully, died hard, and instead of doing any of those incredibly humiliating things, Tristan just collapsed onto his bed and closed his eyes. He just let himself fall into the deep pit which had opened up under him when Grant had pulled away, the only thing really holding Tristan up.

Not that Grant was wrong, because he wasn’t. It could never have worked out. So then why did Tristan keep remembering the look in Grant’s eyes those four words which terrified and elated Tristan more than any others ever had?

I love you, Tristan.

He literally couldn’t remember a time anyone else had said those words to him. Not his parents, not friends, not lovers. No one. So that was probably why it hurt so much, losing Grant. Because for once, he could have almost believed that someone did love him.

Until that person left, of course, he thought. That sort of screwed that whole idea over, that even someone who was supposed to love him couldn’t bear to be around him for very long.