Carrick
“Shit… Um, sorry?” I chuckled sheepishly as I glanced at Zac; I probably should have felt worse, but what could I say? This wasn’t the first time I’d been walked in on, and knowing me, it wouldn’t be the last.
“It’s… it’s not your fault.” Zac looked terrified, and it startled me. Sure, it must’ve been embarrassing as hell, but we hadn’t even been naked yet. I started to nod, but paused.
“You sure about that?” Maybe it wasn’t my fault Tay walked in, but dry-humping Zac against the mixing board while his brother sat a few feet away probably wasn’t the brightest idea.
“You didn’t… we… I wanted to…” Zac stammered, and I was struck again by just how shaken he was by this.
“Yeah, but your brother didn’t seem too happy about it.” I ran a hand through my hair nervously, replaying Tay’s reaction in my head. If it were me, I would’ve laughed it off, or maybe just ducked back out. But he’d stood there, staring, for a good few seconds. Something about that just seemed… Hm…
“My brother… is an asshole.” Zac moved away from the mixing board, but didn’t even take a step before his legs gave out.
“Whoa!” I caught him before he hit the ground, easing him to the floor. Okay, now I knew something major was up.
“I’m… okay,” Zac said, blinking. “I’m fine.”
“Bullshit.” Did he honestly think he could fool me? Me, who knew him almost as well as his own brothers, if not better? Me, who’d been there for him at times when even his family wasn’t? Me, who… Well, he should’ve known better.
“Zac… He didn’t know, did he?” I could understand his fear, being outed like that suddenly; but Zac shook his head, his lip shaking.
“No, he knew.”
“You told him? Then why…” Why was Zac so spooked? I couldn’t think of any other reason, and something about Tay’s expression seemed… familiar… I’d been walked in on before, more than once by my partner’s ex (or soon-to-be-ex, in at least one scenario), and I never forgot that face. That ‘oh shit, my whole world just imploded’ face.
“Would you want to walk in on one of your brothers like that?” Zac offered a weak attempt at a smirk, but the gears were grinding.
“That didn’t look like walking in on a brother.” Hell, my brothers had walked in on me, and they didn’t look anything like Taylor had. “It looked like…” I paused, looking at Zac; he tried to keep his expression blank, but it was me, so of course I saw right through it. I lowered my voice, tilting my head a bit, gauging Zac’s reaction.
“It looked like a guy walking in on someone he cared about, being with someone else.”
“Well of course he cares about me…”
“Cut the crap, Zac.” I held Zac’s face in one hand, forcing him to meet my eyes. Didn’t he know he could tell me anything? I wasn’t just saying that. “Talk to me,” I whispered.
“I… um…” Zac stammered, his eyes shifting.
“You know I’m here. Whatever you’ve got to say, I’m not going anywhere.”
“You say that now,” Zac mumbled, shaking. And there it was, in his eyes; everything I needed to know, written all over his face.
“It was him.” I didn’t have to wait long for Zac to nod; he flinched a bit, probably expecting me to flip. And maybe I should have, but for whatever reason, I didn’t.
“Oh, Zac…” I brushed his cheek lightly; I wanted to comfort him, but he seemed so tense as his eyes fell closed, I wasn’t sure a hug would do more good, or harm.
“I didn’t mean… for you to find that out.”
“Hey. Look at me.” I tried to keep my tone soft, but firm; after a second, Zac looked up at me sadly. “Do you really think you’re gonna get rid of me that easily?” I tried to put on my usual smirk, to lighten the tension a bit. It seemed to work a little, as Zac smiled weakly.
“Wasn’t really trying to. But you’re not… like, freaked the fuck out right now?”
“Do I look freaked the fuck out?” I let my smirk grow a bit as I threw his words back at him.
“No… But why… how are you not freaked out?” It was a perfectly valid question. I’d just found out that my best friend had just gotten out of a very emotional, and sexual, relationship… with his brother. And yet, I couldn’t find a speck of disgust, or even shock.
“Dunno… It just kinda makes sense.”
“It does?!” Zac looked about as shocked as I probably should have, and I couldn’t help smirking, both at his reaction, and at my own screwed-up logic.
“Yeah. Can’t explain how, but it does. You two… make sense.”
“I guess…” Zac tilted his head, pulling the perfect ‘confused puppy’ look, and I smiled.
“So… What really happened?”
“It was mostly like I told you,” Zac started, frowning. “We did meet online.”
“Okay, but tell me the parts you left out. What happened when you found out it was him?”
“That… That was bad.”
Zac took a deep breath, then launched into his tale. I tried to keep my comments to a minimum, but it wasn’t easy. It was a hell of a soap opera, and I had to laugh at how adorably clueless Zac was. I mean, Tay went by ‘Jordan’? Seriously? And then the way they found each other out, IM’ing each other from across the room; you can’t make that stuff up.
“So, he faints, and of course I’m freaked out. Like, doubly freaked out now.”
“Did he need CPR?” I couldn’t help snorting at the image of Tay just keeling over, one hand going to his forehead, like a Victorian damsel.
“That is not even funny.”
“Sorry…”
“So he recovered just fine; just being overly dramatic, probably. And I’m just standing there, trying to make sense of it. Because ‘Jordan’ was so… so understanding, and sweet, and just everything Taylor hadn’t been lately. And I had no idea Tay was bi. I mean, okay, I had some idea.”
“Really? Dude, your gaydar sucks.” I knew mine was pretty spot-on, but even a blind man could see Tay was more flaming than the olympic torch.
“No shit, Sherlock. It didn’t even pick up on me. But like… there was all this shit we talked about, as Sam and Jordan, that I had no clue about. Like how unhappy he was with Natalie. And it just didn’t make sense at first. I couldn’t look at Taylor, my asshole brother, and see the guy that I’d…” Zac took a breath, his voice lowering. “…fallen in love with.”
“Well he must’ve had a lot on his mind too. I mean, no offense, but you probably weren’t your usual cheerful self either, were you?” I knew Zac when he was stressed; it was one of those ‘stay out of punching range’ kind of deals.
“No, I wasn’t. God, we had this one fight in the studio, right after the first fight Sam and Jordan had; like a knock down, drag out fight. Ike had to pull us apart. And so I was thinking about that fight, right? And also, Taylor said he knew about… uh, that one night with Kate. And I had told Jordan about that, too. So I started thinking Taylor did know it was me, online. I mean, I put two and two together, and got like, three.”
Not only did Zac have a microscopic fuse, but he also tended to get a bit… dense. Not exactly the next Spock, if you know what I mean. So it wasn’t surprising to me that he jumped to conclusions, but the particular one he landed on… Well, even I was a little surprised he’d think Taylor would do that.
“So I pin him down, and ask him again if he knew it was me, and he’s like, about to start fucking crying. And I realize he’s telling the truth, and he’s just as… whatever as I am. And then he starts fucking wiggling, trying to get away from me, and I just look at what I’ve done, and, uh… Well, I had to let him go before he noticed…” Zac motioned towards his nether regions, and I struggled to keep the smirk at bay. “Like, I don’t know. Mind of its fucking own. So we both sit back and try to calm down and like… make sense of it all.”
“How’d that go?”
“Well, he went from zero to flirting in about sixty seconds. You know how Taylor is; if it has a pulse, he’ll flirt with it.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.” I realized as soon as I snorted that I should’ve kept my mouth shut; Zac was eying me, one eyebrow up. I had the decency to look away, but not fast enough, apparently.
“He hasn’t… you… Carrick?”
“What happened next?” I looked at Zac head-on; he blinked a bit, but continued with his story. I hoped he’d forget my little slip-up, especially since there wasn’t even much worth telling.
“Um… Well, we talked a little bit. About how unhappy we both were, and my sexuality. Somehow, it just kept getting flirtier and flirtier; it was… strange. And so, I guess we both started to accept that we did still feel the same way, even though we shouldn’t. And then we realized we were making out on the studio floor.” Zac laughed at that, the first real smile I’d seen from him since before we got to the studio. “So we left, and went to my studio.”
“Your art studio? In your garage? Is that where you bring all your secret love affairs?” I shot Zac a wink, making him giggle; it was hard not to picture them together now, on Zac’s couch, surrounded by his art. The images weren’t bad, but I had a hunch Zac wouldn’t appreciate me mentioning them, so I kept my dirty mind to myself.
“Well Taylor’s freaking out because we’re brothers, and so he gets the bright idea that he’ll call me Sam and like, pretend I’m not me or something. And I’d have to call him Jordan. And I said okay, ’cause I figured that was the only way he’d go through with it. Carrick, you gotta know… I’d never thought about doing that with Taylor before then. Really.”
“I can understand his reasoning, though, his way of dealing with it.” I could; from what I’d seen, Tay was the kind of guy who solved problems by focusing on the parts he could handle, and denying the existence of the parts he couldn’t. Not the most healthy way of dealing with things, I supposed, but it could’ve been worse.
“Yeah… and things are going really well, except I’m dying a little inside every time he says ‘Sam’ and I say ‘Jordan’. Then he slips up. He says ‘Zac’. And he looks like he wants to get up and run away, total deer in the headlights look. And I’m just thinking, there’s no way I’m letting him leave now. So I say his name right back. Apparently it really fucking turned him on, and then… Well, you can just imagine how the rest of it went. Actually, how about you don’t imagine that?”
“Too late.” Those images I was having? Now in surround-sound.
“Oh god…” Zac turned bright red; I laughed and nudged him, and he composed himself enough to continue. “So things are going really well, and we have this romantic dinner thing one night. And he starts talking about like, what if we could be together for real? Like if we weren’t brothers or whatever? Saying he would leave Natalie… and I said I would leave Kate, too.”
“…Wow.” That was something I didn’t expect. Zac hated change; the bigger, the worse. So agreeing to leave his wife, for a guy he’d only known a couple of months, that was a shocker.
“And then he, um…” Zac lowered his voice to a whisper, even though we were the only ones in the room. “He asked me… if I would marry him.” Zac paused again, and I swear I was holding my breath as I waited for him to finish. “I said yes.”
“Zac…” I let out the breath I’d been holding all at once; and here I thought him agreeing to leave Kate was a surprise.
“Yeah?”
“Just… wow.”
“I know. And I meant it, I really did. If I could… if we could… absolutely.”
I nodded sadly; what was there to say? To be that in love with someone, but never being able to announce it, or make it official; I couldn’t imagine a whole lot that would hurt more.
“So, fast forward again. We’re laying in the studio one day, you know, in the afterglow or whatever. And he tells me he’s seriously thinking of leaving Natalie, and she wants a divorce too. And I’m thinking he wants me to leave Kate, too; he keeps saying he won’t ask me to, but… He’s still telling me how awful she is, and I know he’s right. And then he decides it’s the perfect time to mention how I was her last choice of a Hanson brother. So she’s a cunt, and so is Taylor.” Zac laughed darkly, and it made me uneasy to see him so cynical.
“Definitely not the best timing.”
“I was still… trying to defend her, trying to explain why I couldn’t just leave her. Hell, do you think she’d actually give me a divorce anyway? Like hell. She’s got her claws in too deep; she’s not letting go.” There was that cynicism again, that jaded edge to Zac’s voice that seemed so unlike him. It hurt me almost as much as seeing him in pain, because it looked so much like giving up, something Zac never did.
“And anyway, it just didn’t seem like… What difference would it make? I still couldn’t be with Taylor.”
“Not legally, no. But does that really matter?” I was a little confused bu the sudden shift in logic.
“I guess not… But then why make a big deal out of leaving our wives, if we’re still just a big secret?”
I stared at him blankly. He was kidding, right? I prayed he was kidding. No one, not even him, could be that oblivious. I loved the kid, but sometimes… damn.
“Because it shows commitment.”
Zac
“I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
I blinked dumbly as I stared at Carrick. I still didn’t even understand how he hadn’t run from the room the second I had admitted that I was in love with my brother. That’s what any sane person would have done – not that Carrick ever claimed to be sane, of course. So here he was, not only listening to the whole, awful tale but… giving me advice?
No, not giving advice. Pointing out the fucking obvious.
So he was okay with it. He hadn’t gotten up and run. He hadn’t punched me. He hadn’t called me sick. He hadn’t done anything of the things I had expected him to do if he had ever found out the truth about me and Taylor. He had sat and listened to me, still interjecting little bits of his awful sense of humor even though I barely even had it in me to laugh. And now he was staring at me expectantly. Was he waiting for me to say something? What else could I say?
He was right. I hated to admit it, but he was right. It seemed so obvious, and I suddenly felt like crawling underneath the floor and hiding – not because he knew I had dated my brother, but because he had so simply pointed out how much of a shitty boyfriend I had been. It wasn’t logical, but there it was. The awful truth.
With just the cliff notes version of everything that had happened, he had managed to cut right through the bullshit and point out what I couldn’t see. I knew there was a damn good reason I had invited him out here. I hadn’t known then that he would be okay with this; then again, maybe a part of me had suspected it when his was the first number I dialed. Carrick had always been that one person – sometimes even more than Taylor, and always more than Kate – who I could turn to with anything.
“So let me get this straight,” he said, blinking a few times as he stared at me. “You guys were fighting, because you didn’t want to leave your wife, who you pretty much hate, but you still wanted to have Taylor too?”
“You make me sound like a giant douchebag,” I replied. Maybe he hadn’t exactly said that, but it was certainly how I felt. “I guess am.”
Carrick blinked again, and I thought I could see him starting to lose his patience with my idiocy. “No, just… well…”
“Okay, on a scale of one to Kate… how awful am I?” I couldn’t help cracking a joke and a smirk. Someone had to bring my mood up, and I was suddenly beginning to doubt that Carrick was going to do it.
He returned my smirk, but only briefly, before sighing deeply. “Okay, so is that when he split?”
“No, not quite yet,” I replied. I had almost forgotten that I hadn’t even finished the story. Awesome. Because living through it once clearly wasn’t enough.
“There’s more?” Carrick asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Oh yeah. Way more,” I replied, then took a deep breath. “So, he’s basically calling me a coward, and he’s right. Talking about how I won’t come out, how I’m afraid to admit the truth, and so on. So what do I do? Stick my fucking foot my fucking mouth. I mean, it practically lives there.”
Carrick stared at me blankly and blinked. I supposed he didn’t see where I was going with that. Maybe he didn’t think even I could have been that awful, but he was wrong.
“I point out that he’s in the closet too.”
“Barely.” Carrick snorted.
“Still, though,” I replied. So he found his sense of humor again, I guess.
“Yeah, okay,” he said, no doubt trying to fight the urge to make some other comment about how flaming Taylor is.
“So he pulls out his fucking phone and…” I paused for emphasis, certain that Carrick had no clue what was coming next. “He. Calls. Nat.”
Carrick’s eyes widened. “He didn’t.”
“He did. He fucking did.”
“Holy shit…” Carrick said. “And he…?”
I nodded. “He came out to his soon to be ex-wife over the phone. Like it was fucking nothing. Like ‘hey hon, I’m bi, what’s for dinner,’ basically.”
Carrick snorted, obviously trying to restrain his laughter just a bit. He tilted his head as he said, “Wow…”
“I wish he’d had the phone on speaker,” I replied with a laugh.
“He must really love you,” Carrick said, his voice suddenly turning sincere.
It was odd enough to hear Carrick say anything sincere. But here he was, once again pointing out the obvious in a situation that was so fucking strange, I still didn’t understand how he could find any logic in it at all.
“I guess… I guess he does.”
“Well, yeah,” Carrick replied. “I mean, putting himself on the line like that? Throwing it all out there, just so you’ll feel safer about it?”
At the time, it had seemed like a slap in the face – just Taylor proving, once again, that he was a better man than me. And he was, but not just for the reasons I had thought. He loved me, and he actually acted like it. Reeling a bit from the thought, I added, “He was ready to call Ike… even Mom and Dad… I mean, he didn’t. But he threatened to.”
“Threatened? Or offered?” Carrick asked, his eyes narrowing a bit.
“It sounded like a threat,” I replied. “Or a challenge? I don’t know. I was just in shock.”
Carrick nodded slowly. I didn’t think he totally accepted my answer, but he was going to let me get away with it. “Okay… so then what?”
“So he keeps asking me…” I paused to take a deep breath. “Would it be different if I was with someone who wasn’t my brother? And I don’t… I mean, yeah, it would. Of course it would. But that doesn’t mean I don’t love him. But I just froze. I didn’t know what to say.”
“So… if you could be with ‘someone else,’ you’d be willing to come out?” It was practically the same exact question Taylor had asked me, but something about the way Carrick said it made it easier to swallow.
“It’s not that I’m not willing now,” I said, and it was the truth. “I want to, but it’s so fucking scary. And it means dealing with Kate.”
“Well, yeah. Of course it is,” Carrick replied. Again, he had this way of just being so blunt and saying everything that was so fucking obvious, and yet not pissing me off. I didn’t understand it, but I liked it. It was just impossible to get mad at him. “I think all he wants to know is if you’re willing to commit to him. Not an unfair question, is it?”
“I guess not.” And it wasn’t. It wasn’t unfair at all, but something about the way Taylor had gone about asking for it had just gotten under my skin in the worst way. “He just has a way of… being so fucking frustrating.”
“Well, yeah,” Carrick replied, laughing lightly. “You guys are still brothers.”
I nodded, my eyes watering a little. It wasn’t really from sadness, though. I was just so overwhelmed by all of this, everything that had happened since I got to the studio – including the fact that my best friend was sitting right next to me, basically telling me it was okay to be in love with my brother.
“So what, he thinks you were using him as an excuse not to come out?”
There was the bluntness again. It was like a punch in the gut, and I was almost breathless as I replied, “That’s… that’s exactly what he said.”
“And are you?”
“I… I didn’t really see it that way…” I replied, not quite meeting his eyes.
“Zac…” He began, his voice the tiniest bit softer. “Answer me honestly. If we were dating, would you come out for me?”
I stared blankly at him, and he reached out to touch my cheek. Me and Carrick? Dating? I wasn’t sure why that seemed like such a strange concept, considering what we had done the night before – and that morning – but it did. “That’s… that’s different.”
“Is it?” He asked softly.
I sighed. “No.”
“So?”
“So… I’m a fucking coward.”
Carrick smiled softly. I got the impression that he was almost proud of himself for leading me to that realization. It was different to consider coming out with Carrick by my side, but only in that it would be a tiny bit easier. But even if it wasn’t easy, it was still something I needed to do.
“I just wish that I knew that it would be as easy as it was to tell you. But it’s not gonna be.”
“I know,” Carrick replied, smiling sadly.
I felt my eyes watering again as I imagined myself coming out to everyone and showing Taylor that I was committed to him. It almost seemed pointless to even think about. Sniffling, I said, “I do love Taylor. I really do. But I don’t think he’ll even believe me now. Not after… all of this…”
Carrick sighed. He knew that I wasn’t just referring to the fight I had with Taylor, but to what he and I had done as well. I hoped he didn’t think I was just using him to get back at Taylor or something like that. The thought that I might have hurt Carrick with all of my stupidity made me feel sick all over again.
“I am really sorry I drug you into the middle of this,” I said, hoping he understood what I meant. But it was Carrick; of course he understood all the things I didn’t actually say.
To my surprise, he smiled. “Do I look upset?”
“Well… no,” I replied. “But you’re a fucking weirdo.”
He laughed, but it didn’t really soothe my worries.
“I think I probably just fucked things up even worse, though,” I said. “I mean… no offense.”
“None taken,” Carrick replied, his hand gently brushing over my cheek. “But hey, you should go talk to him.”
“I can’t imagine that ending well,” I said, trying not to wince at the thought of it.
“Never know until you try.”
“Can you like… stay nearby? Preferably with 911 on speed dial?” I asked, laughing nervously. It was a joke, but there was some real fear behind it.
Carrick gave me another smile and rubbed my back in that soothing way he had. “Sure. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Thank you so much, Carrick,” I replied, feeling my worries fading the tiniest little bit. “You are so, so, so amazing.”
He grinned. “Yeah, yeah, I know…”
“Best friend a guy could ask for,” I replied, not even caring that I was shamelessly stroking his ego. In this case, he absolutely deserved it.
To my surprise, I saw a few tears gathering in the corner of his eyes. I didn’t know if that was a good reaction or not, but he was still smiling at me, so I decided it must have been good. Nudging me slightly, he said, “Go on.”
“Ugh, fine,” I replied, groaning, but standing up nevertheless.
Carrick stood up as well, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Hey. You know where to find me.”
I nodded. “Just uh… keep your phone handy?”
Carrick gave me a nod as well. I couldn’t find any other reason to delay, aside from pure cowardice, so I decided to just go for it. I walked out of the control booth slowly, and wandered up and down the halls of our office. I didn’t see Taylor anywhere, and there really weren’t very many good hiding places. As I checked what few places there were for him to hide, I called out his name, even though I doubted he would answer.
When he didn’t reply, and didn’t appear to be hiding anywhere inside the building, I finally walked out to the front. Through the large window, I could see that his car was gone. It didn’t surprise me that he had just left, but it still left me with a sinking feeling.
I walked back inside and peeked my head into the control booth. Carrick had taken a seat in one of the chairs and was playing with a few of the action figures scattered around. “Carrick, uh… he left. So I’m gonna go look for him. You’ll be alright here?”
“Yeah, I’ll just hang here,” he replied with a nod, then smirked. “Go get your man.”
I rolled my eyes and laughed in spite of my worries. “I’m gonna try…”
He gave me a thumbs up and a wink.
“You are such a dork,” I replied, shaking my head as I walked back out of the room. I could hear Carrick chuckling as I went.
I drove around aimlessly for a while, trying to think of where Taylor could possibly have gone and what I could even say to him once I found him. I didn’t really come up with an answer for the latter, but I had a feeling that he would go to this one park that we took the kids to a lot. It wasn’t really busy, despite being in the middle of downtown, and it was close enough to our office that we could head over there for a little time off in the middle of the day sometimes. I don’t know why, but I just had a feeling he would be there. When I spotted his car in the parking lot, I had to give myself an internal high five for finally being a little bit smart.
I parked my truck and took a few steps out into the grass of the park. I was pretty sure I saw Taylor on a bench not too far away, his back turned to me. I walked toward him as quietly as I could, fearing that if he even saw or heard me coming, he would get up and run. When I reached the bench, I stepped directly in front of him in an attempt to block him from leaving.
“Taylor.”
He didn’t look up, but I could see him cringe. Sniffling loudly, he said, “What.”
“We need to talk.” I knew it was the most cliche thing I could have said, but it was true.
“Zac,” he said, sighing heavily. “It’s fine. Really. I’m… happy for you.”
“Tay, that’s not…” Did he think…? He couldn’t. “That’s not what I mean. I’m not… it’s not what you think.”
He looked up at me and smiled sadly, his eyes puffy and red. God, how long had he sat there, crying over me? I felt like running away from him. He didn’t deserve this. But I knew I had to try to talk this through with him.
With the tiniest, saddest smirk I’ve ever seen, Taylor asked, “So he wasn’t dry humping you against the mixing board?”
I cringed. “No… that was pretty much what it looked like.”
Taylor nodded and looked down again.
“And I…” I began, my voice sounding weak and pathetic. “I’m sorry I did that right there in the office. It was stupid and selfish.”
Taylor shrugged. He wasn’t making this conversation easy, but I hadn’t expected him to.
“But Tay, Carrick and me… we’re not…” I trailed off, noticing that Taylor was shaking. I had to tell him, though. I couldn’t stop. “We’re not… dating. It’s not like that.”
“Why not?” Taylor asked softly. “You should. You’d make a great couple.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I mean, maybe we would, but I don’t care. He’s not who I want.”
Taylor cringed. Was it that horrible to hear that I wanted him? I didn’t understand at all. I knew this wouldn’t be easy, but it didn’t even make sense.
“Tay, I mean it. He’s my best friend and I love him but not… not like that.” More softly, I added, “Not like I love you.”
His shoulders shook a little and I knew what was coming. Tears began to fall from his eyes and I had to muster all my strength and will to keep myself from crying too.
“Taylor…” I said softly. “Look, I know I’ve been a coward and a douchebag and…”
At that, he looked up and met my eyes. I half expected him to make some snarky comment, but he wasn’t Carrick. He wasn’t going to confirm that I was a douchebag, and he really didn’t need to. I already knew it.
“And I’m sorry, okay?”
Taylor closed his eyes and nodded softly. His voice so low I could barely hear him, he said, “I know. Me too.”
He was… what? It didn’t make sense. “Tay, you… you don’t need to apologize.”
His eyes snapped open. “I wasn’t. I just meant, I’m sorry this had to happen.”
“Oh,” I replied. That wasn’t what I expected, but I suppose I should have understood that was what he meant.
“Just…” Taylor sighed. “Go be with Carrick. He can give you what I can’t.”
“Tay, no.” My voice was almost frantic. How much clearer could I make it that that wasn’t what I wanted? Taylor looked down, more tears falling, and I tried again. “Taylor, I want to be with you.”
He looked up. “But you can’t. Not the way you want to.”
“So?” I asked, shrugging.
Tay’s fists tightened at his sides, and I backed up. Was he going to hit me? Not that I wouldn’t have deserved it, but I didn’t really think this was going to go that way.
“Zac,” he began, his voice shaking. “I’m telling you. Go be happy.”
I groaned. “I’m not gonna be happy without you. Don’t you get that?”
“Yes you will,” he replied, not meeting my eyes.
“No. I. Won’t.”
“Please…” Taylor whispered.
I sighed. He obviously wasn’t going to back down. I knew it was dumb, but I couldn’t help thinking that if I made him think I was going to take his advice, he would suddenly take it back. Standing up as straight as I could and trying to keep my voice calm and firm, I said, “Okay. You know what? Fine. You’re wrong, but fine.”
Taylor didn’t say a word. His shoulders hunched and he seemed to shrink in on himself. He suddenly looked so much younger than twenty-nine. I stared at him, silently begging him to say something, anything. But he didn’t.
When it seemed there was nothing else I could do, I turned and walked away. I could hear him crying, but I knew that it wouldn’t stop even if I turned around and went back. Hell, that would probably only make it worse.
I refused to let myself cry until I was back in my truck, behind the safety of the tinted windows. The tears fell and fell, and were still falling when I decided I had been gone long enough that Carrick was probably starting to wonder what happened. With shaking hands, I pulled out my phone and dialed his number.
After a few rings, he picked up. “Hey…”
“Hey, umm,” I said, trying to hide my sniffles. “I found Taylor.”
“And… I take it you’re not having sweet make-up sex?”
In spite of myself, I chuckled. “Yes, Carrick. I’m balls deep in Taylor right now and it just seemed like a good time to call you.”
“Kinky,” he choked out between laughs. “So you top and bottom, huh?”
“Seriously, umm,” I said, sniffling again. “I know I started it, but… can we not? Not right now?”
“Yeah,” he replied, his voice surprisingly serious.
“It, umm… it did not go well.”
“Kinda guessed that, by your oh-so-cheerful tone.”
I wiped back a few tears. “Yeah… it was really fucking bad, actually. Although, surprisingly, he didn’t punch me.”
“No?” Carrick replied, and I wondered if he had thought that was a possibility, too.
“He was just… really quiet.”
Carrick sighed. He was no doubt holding back some comment he wanted to make, and I didn’t know whether to be glad or upset that he wouldn’t say it. I tried to prepare myself for what I had to say next, but it wasn’t easy.
“And he said… he said…” The sentence trailed off and turned into a sob.
“Zac…” Carrick said softly.
“I’ll umm…” I said, fighting back another sob. “I’ll be back at the office in a few minutes, okay? And then let’s get the fuck out of there.”
He chuckled softly. “Sure.”
“Okay. See you soon.” I let out one last sniffle, then hung up the phone.
I drove back to the office as quickly as I could, even though my eyes were so clouded with tears that I could barely see the road. I didn’t need to see it. I knew it like the back of my hand, and in just a few short minutes, I was sitting outside the office. I pulled out my phone and sent Carrick a quick text to let him know I was outside. For some reason, I couldn’t even bear the thought of walking inside again after what had happened there.
Barely a minute passed before Carrick opened the passenger door and climbed into my truck. I quickly wiped my tears away and tried to pretend I hadn’t been bawling, but there was no use. He could have seen right through me even if the evidence hadn’t been all over my face and the front of my shirt.
“Oh, Zac…” he mumbled, reaching his hand out to touch my cheek.
I sniffled a little, but stopped trying to fight the tears. I let them roll on down my face, and Carrick tried his best to wipe each and every one away. It was an impossible task, but I couldn’t have even put into words how much I appreciated him trying. Things were far, far from okay, but with Carrick there, they were the tiniest little bit better.