You & Me

Your brain works in the background, without your permission, without your say-so. Marinating on things and turning them over. I’d let work issues simmer in brain juices for days until a solution came to me out of the blue. And for years, the problem of my marriage had rumbled on a low boil on a back burner, ignored but not unrealized.

My brain had been pumping away since the moment I’d met Landon. At 3:41 a.m., I popped awake in Landon’s guest bedroom and had my big, fat, fucking realization.

I was head over heels for Landon Larsen.

I craved everything about him.

And I was absolutely free-falling for him.

What the fuck? How had this happened? We were friends, best friends. How had I jumped tracks from friends to…

To what? What was I thinking? What did I mean when I said I was falling for him? I already thought the world of Landon, thought he was a perfect father and a great man and one of the best human beings I’d met in my life. I could think all those things and not be in love with someone, though. It was admiration, wasn’t it? I cherished him as a friend. I adored him as a person.

I wanted to sink my fingers into his hair and pull him close, as close as we were at the wine bar. No, closer. I wanted to brush my lips over his cheek and his chin, press a kiss to his closed and fluttering eyelids. I wanted to feel the hitch in his breath against my lips before and after we kissed like we were starving for each other, like we’d die without each other, like he felt everything that I did.

I rolled to my back and blinked wildly at the ceiling. At Landon’s ceiling. Jesus Christ, I was in his house. The wall behind my head backed up to his bedroom. He was feet away from me, and here I was, imagining that I was kissing him. Worse, imagining that he wanted me to kiss him, and that he wanted to kiss me back.

Heat flared like shattering glass inside my veins. Memories slammed into me. All our moments, all the times we’d spent together. The fair, sharing food, my lips closing around his fingertips. My listless emptiness after Tuesday, when I was lost and unmoored without Landon’s presence. Tuesday, my God, Tuesday. Our date—because that’s what it was, that’s what I’d turned it into—and how we’d moved closer and closer and closer. The things I said to him.

Every moment was a nail in my heart.

My memories shifted into sudden fantasies. What if I’d pressed a kiss to his cheek at the wine bar? What if I’d taken his hand at the fair? What if I’d kissed his marshmallow-covered palm?

What did it mean that I was thinking these things? Was I attracted to men? I should know, shouldn’t I, if I was? I’d have figured something like that out before I was forty and before I went and fell for my best friend.

Landon realized when he was an adult, my mind whispered. He was a grown-ass man before he knew.

How did Landon figure out he was gay? He’d been vague on the details. All he said was that he’d had his eyes opened. Was it something like this? Because my eyes were wide the fuck open now, and I was staring at a truth that was punching me in the face. I should ask Landon how he’d figured it all out—

Did everything circle back to Landon? All my thoughts seemed to start and stop with him.

Which should have been a sign, one big goddamn clue. If this were anything else, I would turn to him right now. I’d ask for advice, like I’d asked him how to cook and what to do with Em and—

Fuck, Emmet.

Jesus, Landon was Bowen’s father. Emmet’s best friend’s dad. How much could one man fuck up his son’s life? Apparently, I was still figuring out how.

There was no way I could ask Landon about this. Hey, I think I’ve fallen for you. I’ve never felt this way about a guy before, but wanna show me the ropes?

Jesus. No.

I stared at the ceiling and tried to still my whirring thoughts. Nothing settled. I wanted to scream.

I wanted him. I wanted Landon to walk through that door and tell me what I was feeling, help me figure this out.

God, I craved him, so deeply. And more than that, I felt wanted, with him and by him. Like I, my existence, my thoughts, the quirky way I saw the world, my hopes and dreams and desires, my shitty cooking and my fumbling parenting, my bad beanbag throws that went wide of the bottles, my weird taste in wine, everything that made up who I was, was okay with Landon. Maybe even more than okay. He didn’t want to push me aside or banish me to a parking lot or carve me out of this world until I felt like I had no choice but to fade away.

Here I was, exactly as I existed, and there he was, smiling at me like he wanted all that in his life.

I grabbed my phone from the nightstand and pulled it under the blanket. Paranoia ran like a rip current through my soul. What if Landon got up and saw the glow of the screen under the door? I’d busted Emmet for that when he was younger. What if Landon knocked and asked to come in, and then he saw what I was about to google? What if I saw him, and I opened my mouth, and everything came out?

Google stared at me. My thumbs trembled over my keyboard. What if you’re gay, I typed.

A million search results came rushing at me. Everything I saw was geared toward teens. How to understand your first feelings, how to talk to your parents.

I backed out and tried again. What if you think you’re gay later in life?

The first result was from AARP, and it was about retirees exploring their sexuality in their seventies and eighties. I thought back to the wheelchair-racing girlfriend Landon and I had laughed about. Now I imagined Landon in the wheelchair.

There, another search result. A how-to guide to coming out later in life. I devoured the article. Find your truth, live your authentic life, embrace the you you want to be. Those were the messages mixed in with stories, some good, some bad, of men who’d waited to come out.

But all those men knew they liked other men long before they’d come out in their forties or fifties. They weren’t huddled under a blanket in the middle of the night trying to google what it meant that they were imagining kissing their best friend out of the blue.

Another web page. Usually there are signs. Signals that, looking back, can offer insight into when same-sex attraction began. Often someone can pinpoint an earlier experience in their lives where they felt same-sex attraction.

Was there? I dropped my phone and thought back. Had I ever crushed on another man? My mind spun. I called up faces and friends from my past, going all the way back to first grade when Jimmy Lee kicked me in the shins and then asked to share an orange with me.

Nothing. Nothing at all like this firestorm burning through me. Nothing like the way my whole world had rearranged itself around Landon.

How was I so oblivious that I hadn’t even noticed Landon had become the center of my world?

Thoughts of Landon consumed me. Now that I’d imagined it, I couldn’t stop thinking of Landon and me together. I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to touch him. Run my hands up his arms, over those biceps and those shoulders. I wanted to sink my fingers into his hair, hold him close, press our bodies together. I wanted him over me, pushing down into me, his weight on mine on this bed, on my bed, in his bed—

Fuck. Heat roared inside me, so searing hot I thought I’d ignite. My cock stirred, and I glared down at my crotch. Really? Now? I hadn’t had an erection since Riley died. No, before that. We hadn’t made love in years, and other than the occasional hand job in the shower and the wet dream I woke up embarrassed by, my sex life had been nonexistent.

Now, in Landon’s home, my libido was on a comeback tour? No, I wasn’t going to jerk off in Landon’s bed with him sleeping on the other side of this wall. Absolutely not.

My heart pounded as I clenched the mattress. My cock was aching, fully hard, pushing against Landon’s borrowed boxers. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move. Every time I tried, I imagined the blanket was Landon’s touch or the shift of my thigh was Landon’s leg pressing into mine. I tossed my head and imagined his lips on my collarbone. Squeezed the sheets and imagined threading our fingers together. My hips thrust up. I wanted him to be there so badly, meeting my hips, driving into me, wrapping his arms around me.

A moan broke free before I could stop it. I flung myself to my belly and buried my face in Landon’s pillow. Fuck, fuck. What if he’d heard that? What if he came in here and saw me like this? Sweat covered, erection so hard it was nearly purple, panting his name as I tore the sheets from the corners of his bed?

If I thought terror would wash away my lust, I was wrong. Belly down, I could really thrust, and I started humping Landon’s guest bed with my eyes closed. In my mind, I pictured us kissing. We could have kissed so many times: at the fair, at the bar, on my couch. In Landon’s kitchen. What if I’d backed him up against his counter?

What if he was in bed with me right now? What if his hands were sliding up my sides and pulling off my T-shirt? What if he wrapped his arms around my chest and buried his face in the back of my neck?

I imagined him rolling me over and cradling my face in his palm. I imagined my legs falling open and him settling between my hips. I thrust my hand down my borrowed boxers to strangle the base of my cock. My fantasy played on. He was lying on me, his weight covering me, his elbows on the mattress beside my head as he looked me in the eyes. Cock against cock, body to body, him whispering my name before he kissed me, before he thrust against me—

I came with a strangled scream, muffled in Landon’s pillow.

Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking Christ. My come spread against the mattress, against the sheets. Landon’s sheets.

I scurried backward, skittering out of bed as fast as I could. I grabbed my dirty shirt off the dresser and tried to mop up my come. This was Landon’s bed, and I was pretty fucking sure Landon knew what come stains on sheets looked like.

I scrubbed and scrubbed, until I had everything I could possibly get soaked up out of the cotton. I did the same with Landon’s boxers, full-on Donald Ducking it while I dried them with my shirt and perched on the edge of his guest bed.

Fuck, I’d just come thinking about my best friend.

Landon had never given me any indication that he felt anything toward me more than friendship. There had never been a word, never a hint. Just because he was gay, that didn’t mean he liked every man he met.

I probably wasn’t his type. I probably wasn’t anywhere close to his type. I wasn’t attractive enough, or interesting enough, for a man like Landon. I was gangly, skinny, all hard angles and weirdness. Landon could have anyone. Hadn’t he wanted to change tables at the wine bar, even? And he’d moved away like he’d been struck by lightning when Annie saw us.

I was being ridiculous.

Landon had become so much to me so quickly. Of course, I realized now that was me tumbling headfirst for him, but… didn’t love begin above the waist? He was gorgeous, and I’d always known that, from the moment I laid eyes on him, but it was everything else about him that had captured my heart.

This attraction to everything about Landon was crushing me, and the desire I felt was a living, breathing, aching thing inside my body.

Was I willing to risk losing Landon, and everything we were together, if I told him how much he meant to me? Could I stand it if he pulled away? If he felt uncomfortable around me? What if he decided to end our friendship?

My phone’s clock turned over to 4:00 a.m. So much for my good night’s sleep. If I tried to shut my eyes now, I’d only dream of Landon. Him and me in another universe, where we were together and we didn’t have sons who were best friends. Where I was better-looking, more interesting, more worldly, more suave, more of everything that Landon desired.

Instead of sleeping, I sat up in bed, googling nonstop. Gay. Bisexual. What do you do if you fall in love with a man. Coming out in your forties. I fell for my best friend. How to hide what you’re feeling. How to fall out of love with someone.

I passed into a fitful slumber in the middle of another exhausted search—what do you do when someone means everything to you and you don’t to them—and woke up in a panic. My phone was facedown on the bed, as was I. The door was shut, the sheets were tangled around my knees, and the sounds of laughter and sizzling bacon burst from the kitchen down the hall.

Landon. Bowen. Emmet. I pulled a pillow to my face and breathed in, until down and cotton filled my mouth. I wanted to scream. I wanted to keep inhaling until my throat filled and I couldn’t breathe anymore.

Everything I wanted in my life was waiting for me in Landon’s kitchen. Emmet and Bowen were sitting at the continent, joking around as they waited in front of empty plates for Landon, who was scrambling eggs and pan frying bacon across from them. Everyone was sleep-mussed and rumpled. Bowen and Emmet had changed into pajama pants at some point. Emmet’s hair was tousled. Bowen’s was pulled back in a loose bun.

Landon beamed at them both, laughing at something Emmet said. He had an open carton of eggs beside him, a glass of orange juice to his right. Sunlight streamed in through the windows over the sink, haloing his hair and the laugh lines on his face.

Warmth, and joy, and a family that loved each other. Everything, everything I wanted in life. I wanted to cross that kitchen and sling my arm around Landon’s waist, press my face into the curve of his neck. Smile and kiss him where his ear and his neck and his jaw joined. I wanted to feel his hand find mine and squeeze. I wanted to share his orange juice and slouch against the counter and play with the hem of his T-shirt. I wanted him to look up and smile at me, like he’d been waiting for me, like he’d been missing me. Like he’d thought of me all night like I’d thought of him. Like he desired me as much as I desired him.

Instead, he dished breakfast onto Emmet’s and Bowen’s plates and then brought the pan back and started cracking fresh eggs all over again.

I moved in a daze. Part of me wanted to run. Part of me wanted to collapse. I went to Emmet and ruffled his hair and kissed him on the back of his head.

“Morning, Dad,” he said around a mouthful of scrambled eggs.

“Hey, Luke.” Landon cracked an egg one-handed into the pan. He smiled. My heart flipped over in my chest.

He nodded to the end of the continent, where a cup and a single-serve plastic coffee filter sat. “I tried to make you a cup of coffee. I hope it’s drinkable.”

“You don’t drink coffee.”

“I bought that this week in case you crashed on my couch.” Another smile. “Your eggs will be ready in a minute.”

I didn’t know what to say. It was too perfect, all too perfect, and yet not, because there I was, harboring this secret. My best friend was being wonderful, and I’d come to the thought of him humping me in his bed.

My hands shook as I took the cone off the mug and set it aside. That was a lot of coffee grounds.

Okay, Landon was wonderful about a great many things, but making coffee was not one of them. The first sip hit my mouth like melted tar. I looked across the cooktop to Landon. He was watching me. Could I swallow? Nope, I couldn’t. I delicately spat the coffee back into the mug. Bowen and Emmet started giggling like four-year-olds.

“I didn’t do it right, did I?” Landon was still smiling. He grabbed a plate from a stack beside the stove and dished out another heaping of eggs. Bacon sizzled on a skillet on an upper burner. He plucked out two, laid them in an X.

“It’s a little strong.” I held my hand at the halfway point on the cone filter. “Maybe only this much coffee grounds?”

“Next time.” Landon held out the plate to me. “Hungry?”

I thought I’d puke if I tried to eat, but I took the plate and gave him a smile. I sat beside Emmet and started to chew. Damn it, the eggs were delicious. I caught Emmet looking longingly at my plate, though, and I gave him half. “I should have named you Hoover.”

He didn’t get it. Landon did. He snorted as he finished scrambling his own eggs and turned off the stove. He ate standing, leaning against the sink, and asked the boys about their plans for the lake.

I insisted he sit down while I did the dishes. I’d rather he have stayed where he was—I’d rather have wrapped my arms around his waist and kissed him good morning and thank you and hello, beautiful and you are amazing, even when you mess up coffee—but I needed him to be five feet from me at least. I scrubbed, and he watched, resting his chin in his hand. The boys had thundered upstairs to pack, and we heard them moving like a herd of elephants over our heads.

“It’s a wonder the ceiling doesn’t collapse,” Landon mused. “I’ve worried about this old house a dozen times.”

Bowen and Emmet were ready twenty minutes later. I asked for a ride back to my place on their way out to the lake. “I’ll wash your clothes,” I mumbled at Landon. I’d balled up my come-stained T-shirt and Landon’s boxers, and I was wearing my jeans and Landon’s sleep shirt as I followed the boys out to Bowen’s car. It was like a walk of shame without the good times that came before.

“Are we still on for tonight?”

Shit. I’d asked him out, hadn’t I? I could bail. I could feign an insurance-related emergency. Someone’s rates had gone through the roof, and I needed to compute some urgent calculations. Reconfigure tables. Load balance that risk in some new way.

Of course I couldn’t. I wanted every minute, every second, I could get with Landon. I wanted to be by his side even if I wasn’t holding his hand, even if we weren’t together and never would be, because having him in my life was a million times better than my life without him. “Yeah. I’ll swing by around five. We can walk downtown together.”

“Great. I’m looking forward to it.”

5:00 p.m. was an eternity away. And then it arrived way too quickly.

I was infinitely more nervous for the art walk than I’d been for our date at Juice & Butter. All that fretting and worrying over trying to look as sophisticated as Landon. I’d wanted him to look at me and like what he saw, and I still did, but everything I put on looked like I was trying too hard.

One of the sweaters cut for a ten-year-old fit. Cheri was right, too. It did cling to all the good parts I had. My waist looked tiny—because it was—and the fabric made an illusion out of the width of my shoulders. I looked, at least a little bit, like I had a decent body. I slipped into the slim-fit jeans she’d sold me, pulled on my boots, and brushed my teeth.

Hey, Google, I thought. How do you break your own heart first so someone else can’t?

At exactly 5:00 p.m., I rang Landon’s doorbell. A minute later, we were walking toward downtown. He was in dark, snug jeans and a cream Henley. So simple. So devastating. He wore the same cologne from Tuesday, and every breath I took brought more of it inside of me. I was getting drunk on the smell of him, the sight of him. I kept my hands in my pockets and curled my fingers into my thighs to stop myself from reaching out and taking his hand.

“How are you?” Landon asked. I hadn’t said a word except hey when he’d opened the door.

“I’m good!” I tried to smile. I probably looked like a chimpanzee doing a fear grimace.

I wasn’t good. I was terrified. How had I acted before last night? How had I been around Landon when he was my best friend and not the man I’d fallen for? I was desperately trying to fake that I didn’t want him with everything I was. All I was doing was being silent and moody like I’d turned into Emmet.

This distance wasn’t natural. Holding back felt like I was peeling scabs off my skin before they’d healed.

We made it downtown without me blurting out my secret, which I counted as a victory. Landon talked about the revitalization of Old Town and pointed out houses that had been renovated or knocked down and rebuilt to mimic the old-timey look. I nodded along, and as soon as we arrived, I led Landon to the nearest outdoor bar. “Two glasses of wine,” I said, slapping down a twenty. “Your strongest, most intense.”

“Got a malbec,” the bartender said. He was a burly man in blue jeans, a plaid dress shirt, and a gray Stetson. “That strong enough?”

“Sure.” I resisted the urge to ask for a double. Or a triple. And I resisted knocking it back like a shot. I toasted Landon before we set off across the street, in front of the band that was still setting up, and toward the outdoor gallery exhibits.

He clung to me like glue. I’d promised to teach him all about art, but it was everything I could do to string together a handful of words about each piece. I sipped my wine, kept my free hand locked in my pocket. I could feel him brush against my arm or my chest as he leaned in and peered at a drawing, or a painting, or a wood carving we’d stopped to look at. His heat crawled under my skin, burned me from the inside out. I needed air. I needed him. I needed to breathe.

We bought street tacos and churros from a food truck at the end of the block. We ate and walked and ended up back at the square as the cover band finished their second song. They were a group of middle-aged men, urban cowboys with guitars and mics doing covers of all the classic country songs. They’d started with Garth Brooks and Tracy Byrd, and as we arrived, the opening chords to Billy Ray Cyrus’s “Achy Breaky Heart” tore through the speakers. Cheers rose. Women in short shorts, flannel shirts, and cowboy boots lined up next to men in Wranglers and Stetsons.

Landon laid his hand on my arm. “Please tell me you know how to line dance.”

“I was ten years old in Texas when this came out. I can dance this in my sleep.”

I was unnaturally aware of his touch, of the press of his fingertips against my muscle and the thin material of my sweater. I’d gone still, hoping he would never take his hand from me, that we’d stay like this forever.

He tugged me toward the blocked-off section of the street that had turned into a dance floor. The touch only lasted a moment, a single second’s pull, but my palm burned where his skin met mine. He was laughing as he lined up beside a short-haired brunette in a jean miniskirt. She gave Landon an appreciative thrice-over.

Landon grapevined, heel-toed, and spun. He clapped in time with the beat. Did it all again. Right-left-right. Heel forward, toe back. The brunette stumbled on one of her spins and ended up in his arms. She giggled as he set her back on her feet. He turned to me with wide eyes, mouthing oops before he laughed. Heel-toe. Clap. Grapevine, slide.

The brunette and her friend followed us off the dance floor when the song ended. I went straight for the bar cart, in need of emergency fortification. The women were both eyeing up Landon, and I bought four plastic cups of wine while he made small talk.

“Can you make mine heavy?” I asked. I slipped a ten into the tip jar. The bartender filled mine to the brim and I knocked back half in one gulp.

Brianna and Whitney, the brunette and her friend, were gushing about the art walk, the street party, and the cover band. They wanted to know if Landon came downtown often, and if so, how had they missed him? Whitney shifted her attention to me when I passed her a cup of wine, telling me how gentlemanly that was. I nodded. Tried not to be so achingly obvious about how my eyes kept dragging to Landon.

“Do you guys want to join us?” Brianna asked. “We were going to grab some appetizers and maybe dance some more?”

Landon turned to me. Question marks hung in his eyes. It was my choice. If I wanted to get to know these women, he would grin his way through the evening. He’d chat with them and make them laugh, and he’d probably work hard to make me look good, too. If I wanted, he’d be my wingman.

I didn’t want that. At all. “Sorry, ladies,” I drawled. “My friend and I were just stopping through to grab some treats for my dog.” There was a boutique pet store a few blocks away. I hoped it was still open so I could sell my lie.

They made sad noises and invited us to come back as soon as we were done at the pet store. We did the nod, smile, and shuffle, and escaped to the other side of the square as the cover band rolled into Blackjack Billy’s “Booze Cruise.”

“You don’t have a dog.” Landon eyed me as we slipped through the crowd.

“I didn’t think they’d believe me if I said we needed to see a man about a horse.”

Again, I was treated to his laugh. How was I this fucking lucky? How was I this fucking cursed?

We window shopped at a handful of boutiques. Landon pointed out antique knick knacks and Texas crafts and first-edition books, half turned to dust, leftover from the wagon trains in the 19th century. Every time he saw something he liked, he’d turn to me, lean in, point to it. When he did, I felt like a man who had won the lottery. He was turning his head toward me. His eyes were on mine. His hand brushed over my wrist, my arm, my shoulder.

He only had to lean in and touch me because the music was shaking the air around us. I knew this, but I couldn’t stop reading meaning into each of his movements, into each time he smiled and brushed his fingers against mine. I was throwing around reasons where I had no business doing so, searching for hidden desire and secret longing in the benign and the normal. Stop. He’s your best friend.

All the negative space was gone, the shadows vanished. We were in a color-saturated world, string lights and red brick and hay scattered on pavement. Still, Landon captured my gaze and all my attention. Everything I felt, everything I saw, wound into and around him.

We ended up back at the square again, opposite where Brianna and Whitney had wandered to. The streets were packed, and the crowd was roaring as the cover band twanged through “Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy.” Landon swayed with the beat as he sipped at the last of his wine.

“I’ll get you another,” I said. I strode away before he could answer. I needed to clear my head.

“Three wines,” I said to the bartender. I took the first and slammed it back. Whatever it was, it was cheap and went down like a lit match. The bartender said nothing, but he filled my glasses higher than anyone had before. I gave him a twenty as a tip.

“Hang in there, bud,” he said.

When I brought the wine back to Landon, all the seconds I’d spent walking away and scraping my nerves together had been a waste. His smile seized me, gutted me. His hand brushed against mine as he took the plastic cup. Those hands of his were so capable, so caring, so tender. He taped down electrical cords and fed high school boys and traced his finger over my tattoo. What would they feel like if they ran down my chest?

He spoke, but I couldn’t hear him over the band singing “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” Instead, I imagined all the words I wanted to hear from him: I want you, Luke and kiss me, and I’ve dreamed of you, too.

We were always in such perfect sync. What would that be like if we were in bed together? His lips on mine, our breaths shared, our hearts pounding as one? Sweat mingling, fingers tangling. His body moving against mine—his body moving into mine. Him whispering my name. Luke.

“Are you all right?” His breath tickled my neck and ear.

“It’s a lot of people,” I lied. “I don’t normally get into crowds like this.” That wasn’t a lie, but that wasn’t even close to what was bothering me.

“I know what you mean. I like things more intimate, too. Want to head back home?”

Home. Jesus, I wanted that to be true so badly the pain of my hunger was like a knife in my side. I nodded.

The street party faded as we walked away. The band, the crowds, the music was behind us. Adrenaline pounded through me, swam in my veins, and drenched my muscles. Don’t do anything. I’d never been this gone for anyone, had never yearned, craved, or agonized over anyone in my life like I was for Landon. Don’t jeopardize this.

I grabbed his hand and stilled him on the sidewalk. He turned, confusion in his eyes.

I couldn’t fight this anymore. I cupped his face. Dragged my thumb down his perfect cheek in a line that went from his temple to his jaw. Slid my hand around the back of his neck and sank my fingers into his short hair.

A truck was parked beside us. I steered him backward to it, one, two steps, both of us moving in synchronicity, like he knew what I was doing before I did.

We were still holding hands. My fingers were still playing in his hair.

Our stares locked. The world spun. I was dizzy—from the night, from the wine, from him. From holding back, from falling in love, from being so fucking oblivious to everything I’d felt until all of it hit me at once.

I whispered his name. Leaned in, and kept my eyes open as I brushed my lips against his. Landon’s breath hitched. My lips found his again, a dry brush of wine-flavored skin against skin. My eyes fluttered closed.

Landon exploded. He grabbed my sweater in his fist and spun me, shoved me against the truck, and then yanked me to him as he pushed into me. I was trapped between the door and the granite of his body, and I had a half second to gasp before his lips closed over mine.

None of my daydreams came close to the reality of kissing Landon. His kiss consumed me, burned through me like wildfire. The world reduced to him, the feel of him, his body against mine, his lips tangling with my own. I moaned, and he swallowed the sound. He gasped, and I swept my tongue against his lower lip. I took his breath into me.

I couldn’t get enough. I couldn’t ever get enough.

“No.” Landon wrenched away. He backed up, putting feet between us until he was against a picket fence. His eyes were wide. “No, God, Luke. No.”

I reached for him. I could still taste him, feel him in my arms. “Landon—”

“We can’t. We can’t.”

“Why not?” I couldn’t think. I couldn’t reason. All that existed in the world was him.

He stared at me. “I don’t want to be your mistake.”

I tried to find something, anything to say. My lips moved. My voice didn’t.

“I think you should get a Lyft home,” Landon whispered. “This never happened. I’ll never bring it up, okay? We can move beyond this. It’s okay.”

I didn’t know if he was trying to convince me or himself.

“I’ll see you later, Luke.” I’ll see you never.

He strode away, disappearing toward his house. I watched him go, and all the color in my world bled away.