Rush Read Free Page A

business thinking about. When we’re close I need to make conversation so I ask, “How’s Joshua?” He’s their little brother. He was born premature the last summer we all spent together—the only one we spent here instead of Lakeland Village. I guess their parents had decided with both their kids going to college, they weren’t ready to be alone yet. So with two boys in college, they also have a two-year-old running around.
    “He’s a monster. Healthy and growing like crazy, but a terror,” Nate answers, before killing the engine in their driveway.
    “What’d you tell your parents?” I ask. They’re not even my parents and I know they’d still love Brandon if they knew. They don’t talk about “faggots” the same way my own dad does, but I never gave Brandon hell for not being able to tell them. We each deal with being gay in our own way.
    “They know you’re his friend. They know you’re Charlotte’s best friend. We said you wanted to come see him.”
    I nod before getting out of the car. It doesn’t seem like their parents are home when we get inside their quiet, oversized house. My stomach hurts like hell. It feels like something’s burning its way through. I’m scared to see him. Scared he’ll tell me to go. The first time he walked away stung enough. The last thing I want to do is go through it again.
    “He looks pretty bad. I mean, he’s okay, but he has the scar on his chest. He’s already lost some weight because he’s not eating the same or doing anything.” Charlie’s obviously nervous and rambling.
    “It’ll be okay.” Really, I’m not sure it will be.
You can do this. Be strong. He’s okay . . .
    I know exactly where his room is. I snuck into it a lot, in the middle of the night, that last summer. When we reach it, we all three stop a few feet from his door.
    “Mom and Dad shouldn’t be home for a while. If they get here, we’ll make sure they don’t bother you.” Nate leans on the wall, looking a little nervous. I’m sure thinking of his brother with another guy weirds him out.
    Nodding, I take a deep breath before going to Brandon’s door, and knocking.
    “Tired. Don’t feel like talking,” his voice croaks out. It sounds tired. It sounds broken.
    Pushing it open, I say, “I don’t care.”
    I actually see him tense but ignore it. Closing the door behind me, I click the lock and walk over to the bed.
Brandon.
    He does look smaller, but his dark brown hair is the same, kind of longish and messy. He still looks like the jock football player he is. I used to tease him about that. I’ve always played and loved ball too, but despite his hair color, Brandon always looked like the golden boy, the football player.
    The lamp by his bed is on. He’s got his dark blue blanket up to his waist and he’s wearing a white button-up shirt. I see a bandage or something through it.
Because they cut his chest open to fix his heart.
    Turning his head to the left he looks at me, his face thinner, but his jaw still tight and strong. “What if I can’t do it?” he whispers. “It’s who I am.”
    Football. It always comes back to that. I also can’t help but relax. Even after all this time, he talks to me. “No, it’s not. It never fucking has been.”
    I drop my bag on the floor and kick out of my shoes. My whole body craves to touch him so I know he’s really here.
    It doesn’t matter that Charlie and Nate are in the house, that his parents could come home, or that we haven’t talked in a year and a half. That he might shove me away or that he cracked open my chest the same way the doctors did to him, only no one put mine back together again.
    He’s hurt. He could have died. I know him. He needs me.
    I sit on the bed, turn, and lie down on my side next to him, my breath making the hairs on his arm move.
Don’t push me away, don’t push me away.
When he doesn’t everything inside me lets go, all the time between us disappearing and it’s that last summer again when