Then I laugh. The tension inside me breaks, and I keep on laughing.
“Who’s going to carry it up the stairs with you?” Griffin huffs as we ease the dresser up onto the porch.
“Roddy,” I gasp, still laughing.
“I can’t believe the first guy you’ve ever dated happens to be named Rod,” Griffin says. “I suppose it could be worse. Dicky, maybe. Or Hammer.”
It’s very difficult to carry a piece of furniture while laughing. We have to set it down just inside the door, so I can catch my breath.
Before he goes, Griffin wraps an arm around me. It’s half-wrestling maneuver, half-hug. “I still get to tease you, punk.”
“But not during dinner today.”
“Yeah. I saw nothing.” He gives me a manly squeeze. “Jokes aside—this is good, though, right? Sometimes we worry about you being kinda solitary. Although, not this morning.” He chuckles.
“Yeah, it is good. But it’s still private.”
“Is it ever going to be public?”
“Doubt it.”
“Okay. I sort of get it. See you in a while.” He whacks me on the back one more time and lets himself out the front door.
“Thank Ruth for the dresser!” I call after him.
“You can thank her later. Don’t bail, because you’ll be putting me on the spot.”
“Okay,” I say before shutting the door.
Although bailing sounds pretty good right now. What the hell have I done?
Roderick
The whole time Kieran and Griffin are outside, I’m a wreck. First, I pace the living room, hoping to somehow develop X-ray vision so I can see them through the oak front door. When that proves fruitless, I clean up the kitchen instead.
Finally, when I’m back to pacing again, they reappear in the driveway. I see Griffin grab Kieran into a hard hug and pat him on the back several times before releasing him.
Only then can I breathe again. I would never wish a sudden, unplanned outing on anyone. But hugging is a good sign.
I hide in my room when they come inside with the dresser. When Griffin finally leaves, I come bursting out of there. “Are you okay? That was… I’m sorry.” I babble. “Do you feel any better after speaking with him?”
“Fuck no,” he says, trudging into the living room to flop down on the couch. “What a mess. Griffin isn’t going to tell anyone. But he’s, like, Mr. Honesty. So I’m basically forcing him to lie to his wife and our entire extended family on my behalf. It’s a disaster.”
“So don’t force him?” The words slip out, even though I know it’s the wrong time to make this point. Kieran is in shock right now. He’s not ready to hear that staying in the closet is a choice.
The horrified look on his face is proof of that. “Roddy, I’m not you.”
“I know you’re not,” I quickly agree. “We’re walking different parts of the path.”
“That doesn’t even begin to cover it,” he says. “It doesn’t matter how nice Griffin was to me just now. The timing is terrible.”
A very familiar panic begins to percolate inside me. “You feel this way right now because you had a scare. But once you have a little while to get used to the idea, you might realize that it’s not so terrifying to show people who you really are.”
“Not happening,” Kieran snaps. “That is not how it works for me.”
His sudden anger is so shocking that I spend a long beat trying to figure out how I made him so mad. And I’ve got nothing. “Look, I know your family is important to you.”
“You don’t know the first thing about it,” he says icily. “Griffin isn’t the problem.”
“Then tell me what is,” I fire back. He only scowls. “I’m not trying to paint some rosy picture for you. I promise you that. But your cousins love you. One of them is bisexual, for fuck’s sake. Your dad is kind of a dick already. Is he really going to get any worse if he knows you like men?”
I take a badly needed breath into the silence that follows. I don’t know how we got here, arguing about whether or not Kieran can come out. This whole thing is probably my fault. I should have locked the door after I got his Christmas present out of the car. And I shouldn’t pressure him. Especially on Christmas, for fuck’s sake.
“Rod,” he says tiredly. “It’s almost time to go. I have to go find a nice shirt to wear.”
“Make sure it’s a really straight-looking one.” It’s a cruel thing to say, and I know it. So cruel that his eyes widen in shock. He waits for me to explain myself, or at least laugh it off somehow.
But I don’t. I just sit back against the couch cushions and close my eyes. “You should go, so you’re not late.” That’s as conciliatory as I can manage to be.
“Are you ready to go?” he asks quietly.
“Yes.”
He gets up and climbs the stairs, while I sit on the couch feeling like a complete shit. Kieran had a stressful moment with his cousin, and instead of listening, I threw a tantrum. I pushed him away, because I’m terrified that he’s going to end up like Brian—trapped in the closet, with me in there with him.
It’s not an idle fear. Kieran clearly isn’t ready. This is all new to him.
But not to me, unfortunately. Nothing about this is new at all. And I promised myself I wouldn’t end up here again. I promised.
Kieran comes back down the stairs a few minutes later, wearing a nice blue button-down shirt that I cannot even compliment because I was already an ass about shirt choices. “We’re going together, right?” he asks. “Driving two cars is a waste of gas. And everybody likes to save gas.”
I listen to this rambling bit of logic, and it hurts my heart. If I’m going to be in a relationship, it has to be with someone who doesn’t need a solid alibi for sharing a ride with me.
And while I know that Kieran isn’t ready to come out on Christmas, I can easily picture myself sitting on this same couch next Christmas, with the same fancy cake waiting in the kitchen, asking myself how another year has gone by in our secret relationship.
I take a deep breath and do the difficult thing. “Kieran,” I say quietly. “I’m not in the right head space to go with you today. Can you take the cake I made and just tell anyone who asks that I need to catch up on my sleep? Or that I have a headache?” It’s not even a lie. I can feel a headache blooming behind my eyes.
“What? You said you were coming. Everyone will be there.”
That’s the problem, isn’t it? I’ve been trying to make a life for myself in Vermont. But every single person I know in this town is related to Kieran, either by blood or through my job. I’ve done it again. I’ve painted myself into a corner by falling for a man who requires me to hide how I feel.
This is all my fault. But it’s still going to hurt both of us.
“I shouldn’t have agreed to go,” I say as gently as possible. “I don’t want to spend the day pretending that you and I are just roomies who split the heating bill. Not on Christmas.”
“Oh,” he says, and then frowns. “But this morning you said you were excited to go.”