Page 56 of Someone Like You

Semantics.

An abrupt silence fell. Even the wind stopped blowing, leaving an unnatural stillness around them. Motionless trees and their dead leaves, no one in sight. Just the two of them and an uncomfortable truth that should’ve stayed buried for the sake of a friendship that had become nothing but a facade.

Ian glanced up at Phil with an anguished expression of shock and betrayal and then cowardly away again, a sorrowful crease in his brow.

“What? Thought I didn’t have the guts to say it?” Phil snarled. “I love you.” He spit it out venomously, as if he didn’t know it was as painful for Ian to hear as it was for him to pronounce. But the pain was soothing. It was familiar. It was comforting. Still better than the nothing Phil had lived with all this time. “Iloveyou,” he repeated, spite and desperation merging in the quaver of his voice. “Look at me, Ian, for fuck’s sake!”

Ian obeyed, his posture slack with resignation. “Stop.” Blue eyes watered turning to the harsh grey light. “Please, don’t make this any—”

“No. I want you to hear this, if it’s the last thing I get to say to you.” Phil’s hands clenched into fists. He wasn’t going to keep quiet any more, whatever the consequences. “You were like an earthquake under my feet. Since the day we ran into each other—”

“Ach, so it’smutualresponsibility now?”

Phil had to stop for a second to shake off an unwitting laugh and start again. “Since the day we ran into each other, you’ve been altering my fucking brain chemistry — you and that insufferable smart mouth of yours. And you know what? Being alive finally tastes likesomethingagain. So forgive me —for-fucking-give me— for latching onto the very first feeling in forever that wasn’t uttermisery! I’m sorry it turned intothis. But you dragged me out of a very dark place and you can’t make me regret how I feel about you! Can’t make me regret—”

The words died in his mouth as Ian sprang to his feet and grabbed his face, thumbs pressing into Phil’s lips to seal them. “Shut. The fuck. Up.” Ian pressed their foreheads together, breathing heavily, as his grip tightened to the point Phil couldn’t move his jaw. “Shut your fucking mouth, Phil, I swear to god.”

“Make me.”

The taunt, devoid of any real provocation, managed to extort a soundless laugh out of Ian, but it was the most broken and most heartbreaking laugh Phil had ever heard.

“You’re a bloody arsehole.” Ian’s iron grip melted into a reverent touch, his hands moulding around Phil’s face, ever so gently, like handling an extremely fragile piece of glass. “Don’t do this,” he implored. “Don’t fuck up the best thing in your life for something that might not work. You’re smarter than that.”

Phil granted Ian and himself a few seconds of respite, just to savour that unexpected closeness and soak up as much of its intimacy as he could, as long as he could. It was just another stolen moment, but, as wretched and forbidden as it was, Phil couldn’t see anything wrong in it.

It shouldn’t be like this.

Love shouldn’t compromise love.

Love shouldn’t outrule more love.

“I’m not smart,” he heaved out, holding on to Ian’s wrists for dear life. “I’m a fucking moron. A greedy, selfish son of a bitch who hastwobest things in his life and doesn’t know how to live without either of them.”

A reluctant laugh pushed through Ian’s teeth. He inched back from Phil but didn’t let go of him, which Phil was thankful for because he felt dizzy and wasn’t sure he’d be able to stand on his own.

“We really fucked up, eh?”

Phil bobbed his head as he gulped. “Big time.”

It didn’t feelfucked upthough.

And that was the problem.

How could they feel bad about something that felt so right?

How could they ignore that they’d found each other across the world, against all odds, and it’d felt like coming home?

“You wouldn’t actually leave Abigail,” Ian muttered, and by the tone it was unclear whether it was a statement or a question.

“No,” Phil grudgingly admitted. “I could never.”

It seemed cruel to say it so straight-facedly, but the answer pacified Ian, who let go of Phil’s face to give his shoulders a firm squeeze.

“Good.”

“But maybe she’ll be the one to get rid of me, who knows.” Phil shrugged. “Do you take sloppy seconds?”

The squeeze turned into a shove. “You’re full of shit.” Ian waited for Phil to breathe the dizziness away. It took a few tries. “Ready?”

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