Page 112 of You Are Not Me

“You love Leslie pretty well.”

“Not really. I lie to her. I never lie to you.”

The fucked-upness of that statement struck me hard, and I knew that even three months ago that would’ve been enough to make me feel special. Now, though? It just wasn’t.

I tussled with myself over whether or not he deserved to know everything. If what I’d shared with Daniel had been meaningless, Iwouldhave told Adam, like with Jeremy and the GHB. The problem was I had feelings for Daniel. And Adam had feelings for Leslie. Was I so different from him now?

“I just need time,” Adam said. “Just a little bit of time to figure it out. One more year, Peter. Can you give me one more year of everything being a confused, fucked-up mess?”

I dropped my eyes to the kitchen floor, the tiles crisscrossing their way to where Harry’s water bowl used to sit. “And what doIget while I give you this?”

Adam didn’t seem to get the full breadth of my question. “Eater, we’ll see each other every weekend. Ipromise.”

“How do you figure that? And did it occur to you that maybe I have obligations too? I can’t just come down there every weekend or host you here.”

Adam’s chair scraped on the tile. His bare feet slapped across to me, but I didn’t look up. I noticed the hair on his toes and the tuft on his instep. I suddenly became anxious. I didn’t have any photos of his feet. Anything could happen. Things could change at any moment. Words could be said that’d end things between usright now. I might even be the one to say those words.

But I had no pictures of his bare feet.

“I’ve got a single at the dorm,” Adam said. “No roommate. You, me, and Atlanta every weekend you can make it down. And if you can’t come down, then I’ll come up. I promise.”

“You mean, you, me,Leslie, and Atlanta. Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

Adam chucked my chin up and gazed into my eyes. “Okay, so Leslie will be around, but she won’t be in the bed with us, will she?”

“I don’t know, will she? It feels like she’s with us everywhere.”

Adam ignored the last bit. “Not unless she’s suddenly up for a threesome where her boyfriend might get screwed in the ass.”

As a distraction went, the thought of topping Adam was a pretty good one. I hadn’t thought he wanted to do that again.

I didn’t take the bait. “So a year at Oglethorpe, and then you’d move up here. When does this end?” I asked, waving my hand between us.

Adam looked confused. “Huh? Never.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Are we talking about the same thing?” Adam looked genuinely confused. “You, me, us. We’re a forever thing.”

Not like this we weren’t. Not if he and Leslie were a forever thing too. I stared at his feet again until I couldn’t stand the sickness crawling up my throat. “I need to get my camera.”

“Eater?”

“I need to get some pictures of your feet. I’ll be back. Stay right there.”

Adam grabbed my arm and held me in place. “I love you.”

Something inside broke, and instead of making me weaker, it made me stronger.

Still, I said, “I love you too. Now let me go.”

Adam was crazy if he thought it’d be easy to integrate our new lives. I’d waited this long and already alienated my few new friends by choosing Adam. What did I have left to lose?

So what if nothing felt right anymore? So what if I was tempted to tell Adam about Daniel just to see what happened ifIthrew an unexpected wrench in the works? So what if it all felt like a ticking bomb waiting to go off?

Since when didn’t our relationship feel that way?

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe once Adam got settled in at Oglethorpe he’d realize we weren’t going to last unless he came out of the closet and committed himself to me. Or maybe he’d decide to commit himself fully to Leslie. Or maybe he’d fall for someone else down there, the way I’d fallen for Daniel.

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