“Gray, stop,” Roman said softly. “I don’t want this…I thought I did but I don’t.” He looked up to find Gray watching him with pained eyes.
“Roman, I swear to God, I’d change it if I could.”
“I know,” Roman responded. And he did. He finally fucking got it. “I don’t want to try to go back and fix the past.” At Gray’s crestfallen look, he hurried on. “Gray, I’ve been punishing you for months now but instead of walking away, you took it. All the unanswered texts, the deleted voicemails, not telling you I was in town…and then I show up on your doorstep because I had no place else to go and you were right there, no questions asked. If that doesn’t make you one hell of a good brother, I don’t know what does. But the part I need to figure out now is how to be a good brother to you because so far all I’ve done is condemn you for failing me.”
“You didn’t-”
“Cancer, Gray. You had fucking cancer and you never came to me for help. Because you weren’t sure I’d give it to you, right?”
Gray dropped his eyes and Roman had his answer.
“Can we just start over, Roman?” Gray asked. “We don’t have to pretend none of that shit happened but can we wipe the slate clean or something? Can we figure out how to be a family?”
“On one condition,” Roman said seriously.
Gray’s wary response was a quick nod of his head.
“You have to tell me if Nick Archer really was in the trunk of that car.”
Several long seconds passed before his words finally seemed to register for Gray because all of a sudden he let out a choked laugh/sob and then he was striding forward and dragging Roman into his arms.
***
“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?”
Roman didn’t bother trying to sidestep Gray’s question. A clean slate meant no more lies. “Yes.”
“How does he feel?”
Roman took a sip of his coffee and scanned the front yard of the cabin. “Don’t know,” Roman said softly as he glanced at Gray who was sitting on the porch step next to him. “We’re so different, Gray.” Roman turned his attention back to his cup and quietly said, “I don’t know how to make it work.”
“What’s the problem?” Gray asked gently. Roman knew he’d hesitated too long because Gray said, “His age?”
“That’s part of it,” Roman admitted.
“The self-injuring?”
“No,” Roman said adamantly and he absolutely meant it. “I mean, it hurts like hell knowing that he carries that much pain around inside of him but I can figure out how to deal with it…and he’s getting help for it.”
“Then what is it? Because from what I saw the other night, he’s got it bad for you.”
“I’m the first guy he’s ever been with…first person, actually.”
“And you think whatever he’s feeling might just be because of the newness of it all,” Gray observed.
“How could it not be? That piece of shit father of his controlled every part of his life and he’s just now starting to try and figure out who he is and who he wants to be. What if he figures out at some point that he wants someone his own age or someone with the same interests? My work has me traveling every week and he’s looking at another three years of college at a minimum. How do we make being apart more than we’re together work?”
“It’ll be tough but not impossible.”
Roman laughed and then ran his fingers through his hair in agitation. “A month ago my life was exactly the way I wanted it. I spent two days with him, Gray. Two days and I knew I was fucked – how is that even possible?” He turned to look at his brother. “It hasn’t even been two hours since I said goodbye to him and I feel like I can’t fucking breathe.”
“Fuck, Roman, you couldn’t just ease me into the whole big brother role with something simple, could you?” Gray groused.
The attempt at levity worked and Roman smiled. “No, I guess not.”
“Okay, you want the big brother speech, here it is. Don’t wait even one second longer than you have to tell him how you feel because that next second isn’t guaranteed. Will it hurt like hell if he doesn’t feel the same way? Yeah, it absolutely will. And if that happens…well, you just let me know and I’ll go and kick his ass for you.”
Gray’s accompanying gentle shove had Roman chuckling. Before he could say anything, Ripley jumped up from where she’d been lying at the bottom of the stairs and took off running towards the driveway. A second later, Luke pulled up in his truck. Roman looked over at Gray whose eyes were locked on Luke as he strode toward them.