It was hard to envision Jaden getting into anyone’s space given how he’d spent half their time together so far shrinking back. But in the secure limits of his home, it made sense the real Jaden would come out. Henry drank in the knowledge eagerly.
“Oh, I see. Yeah. I’ve got a few sisters, and we…” Henry laughed quietly. “Yeah, did we ever fight growing up. About clothes, boys…”
The line never failed to get a grin, no matter what anyone knew about his history. Sure enough, it did the trick, and Jaden’s lips curved up into another of those rare, beautiful little smiles.
“We still call each other to talk about stuff,” Henry admitted freely. “Less about clothes, though.”
“More about boys?”
Henry grimaced and shook his head. “Haven’t had much time or energy.”
“Hence putting your ticket into…” Jaden gestured around as if to indicate their date.
“You got it.”
Jaden straightened up a bit and smiled. “So we’re both new to this. I’m not the ugly duckling. That’s good.”
“You’re not ugly at all,” Henry answered instantly, his eyes wide at the very thought. Then he blushed. That had been pretty quick. At least Jaden knew he was interested, right?
Jaden was red, too. He mumbled, “Thanks. I think you’re—I mean, you—you’re hot,” and stared out the window. He pressed a hand against his red cheeks, but he was smiling, too.
“Thanks.” Henry grinned, his own confidence soaring. Oh, boy. He was going to have to watch his mouth. He could get himself into serious trouble with this cutie, and they still had a few hours to go in the limo.
This time, when Jaden put his hand on Henry’s knee, Henry laced his fingers with Jaden’s gently. He didn’t say anything about it. He didn’t need to. It was clear from their body language and expressions that this was new for them both—or at least, the first time in a long while.
And it felt good. No need to push it further until they were ready. They’d started opening up, and they had so much more time together.
Henry trusted Jaden already, enough to tell him more about himself. Jaden wasn’t some alpha ad executive or suburban accountant with a trust fund. He’d been open and vulnerable, admitting he’d also been depressed, and Jaden hadn’t shot him down.
Henry’s fears were being put to rest, one by one, leaving him free to just enjoy himself like he hadn’t taken time to do in a long time.
Maybe this was exactly what he’d needed.
5
Jaden
Jaden had just left mile-high Denver for the first time since he’d fled there and shut himself away in his house. Even the dry heat crept into the car, and he was positive he was loopy from the altitude change.
In one way, breaking out of his comfort zone this way was the most terrifying thing he could imagine, but in another… it was exhilarating. He wasn’t rewatching Storage Wars for the eighth time.
The adrenaline crash would eventually come, and he knew he’d feel exhausted as shit, but he was going to enjoy himself here and now, goddamn it.
It was almost dizzying, letting go of his ideas about what he could do on a day to day basis. This was so far outside his everyday experience that his brain had stopped trying to dial the panic up. Now he just wanted to laugh hysterically, which was only slightly more fun than curling up in a ball.
He bit it all back and held Henry’s hand tightly as they walked to the helicopter pad. The desert sun assaulted them once more, even in September. The amount of sky and nothingness out there was hard to wrap his mind around. It was like walking the length of his living room ten times over just to get to the scraggly bushes on the edge of the launch pad. Helipad. Whatever the hell they called it. He’d tuned out most of the briefing.
“You doing okay?” Henry murmured in his ear.
Jaden liked that Henry was maybe four inches taller, but not a six-foot-something basketball player. None of that awkward stretching up to climb a fucking tree for a simple kiss.
Uh. Not that he was thinking about kissing him or anything.
“Fine,” he squeaked, cursing his nervous habit. But Henry hadn’t made fun of his voice warbling yet, and he just smiled at him.
“Good. Did you take in most of that briefing?”
Jaden guiltily shook his head. “Don’t touch a moving blade, don’t leap out?”
“That’s about it,” Henry agreed with a laugh before they reached the chopper and he effortlessly chatted with the pilot.
The small talk Henry did was still beyond Jaden. It felt like re-entering a whole social world he’d left behind, and not one toe at a time—a quick, icy plunge into the depths of Antarctic waters.
Henry seemed happy to do it, though. Much like Spence had been for the past few years, Henry was acting as a welcome buffer between Jaden and the world. Eventually, the pilot focused on things like starting the helicopter, so the chatter subsided.
Jaden stayed focused on his breathing and not how much of the world was out there, or who was seeing them hold hands, and what might happen as a result. At least Heart2Heart had arranged the date, so the limo driver and pilot were clearly the accepting sort.
In an open area like this, PDA was scary, and he kept flinching at shadows. But the pressure of Henry’s hand on his own helped Jaden’s nerves, too. It was a confusing cycle of ups and downs in his brain.
It was stupid to try to explain, so he just clung on tight to the dark-haired, muscled hunk who was treating him so gently.
God, I have to fix my damage, Jaden thought. But there’s not a chance he’ll stick around that long, will he?
When they were seated, strapped in, and fitted with helmets that had built-in mics, his brain caught up with all that panic he hadn’t gotten around to yet.
The white noise helped. It was a deafening din, and he could see the need for ear protection now. He was dimly aware of the helicopter rising, but tried to focus his attention on his own breathing. The sensation of the helicopter finding its balance in the air made his heart lurch into his throat.
But the whole time, Henry quietly held his hand and talked into his microphone about the Grand Canyon’s unique natural environment. The pilot joked that he was usurping her job, so Henry asked if she could interrupt him whenever she needed to give her usual spiel. That way he could continuously talk in the downtime when she had to focus on flying.
“As long as Jaden’s got something to focus on, we’ll be good,” Henry said.
“Oh, nervous flyer? They didn’t mention it,” she said.
Jaden tried to answer and say it was okay, but he was speaking too softly for the microphone to pick up. He couldn’t bring himself to make the half-shout that would be required. He resigned himself to communicating in gestures and expressions, which Henry had already proven adept at reading.
It took most of the flight before Jaden could finally bring himself to peek outside into the open air at the sights that Henry and their pilot—Shawna, he thought he’d heard—had been describing.
The canyon that yawned below him was… less terrifying than he’d expected. Sure, it was clearly huge, but the landscape was desolate and scarred deeply, and the human eye couldn’t quite pick up a sense of scale. Without that, it might as well have been a toy landscape.