Page 94 of Just a Footnote

Aiden ignores him. “Your wish. You want a house with a white picket fence, a wife, two and a half kids.”

“What?” Liam asks, confused, not following along at all. That cute furrow he gets between his eyebrows appears again. Usually Aiden loves the sight of it but right now it infuriates him.

“When I asked you what your wish was you said that’s what you want. That’s your wish.”

“Aiden…” Liam trails off. “I said that in passing. But what makes you think I can’t have that with you? We can build a life together.”

Aiden closes his eyes tightly against the searing pain in his chest. “It would be easier…if it wasn’t with me. If it was with someone else.”

“Not easier than not having you.” Liam sighs loudly. The silence between them is stifling while Liam fights to gather his words. “Living life without you is a half-life. I can’t even enjoy my favorite foods. Everything tastes like fucking cardboard. The idea of you with someone else makes me fucking sick.” Liam pauses for a second to run a hand over his face, sheer exhaustion wracking his body. “I think it could boil my blood. I convinced myself for so long that it was just me, that everything I felt was all one-sided, but I don’t think that’s true. I think you love metoo. But you’re running out of some twisted idea of protecting me, thinking that’s what I want. You think I want some picturesque American dream type of life, but I don’t. Aiden, I just wantyou. Maybe that scares you too. I don’t know. But I’m tired of not trying. Sometimes I need you so much that it hurts.”

Breathless, face flushed with anger, Liam kneels before him with something that looks a lot like fear etched across his face. This must be the most vivid dream of Aiden’s life. Slowly, Aiden lifts his hands to cup Liam’s face. He’s glowing in the light of the fire, embers in his eyes, his warm skin heating Aiden all the way through to his bones. Liam’s eyes close at the touch, lips trembling.

Aiden softly pulls him up to kiss him. If this is a dream, then he’s going to live out every single fantasy he’s ever had. Liam whimpers into the kiss, hands flying up to gently cradle Aiden’s head. The world somehow keeps spinning around them even though it feels like gravity has suddenly stopped working. A few times his heart stops and restarts just from being under Liam’s tender touch.

“Aiden, can you say something?” Liam asks breathlessly when Aiden slowly pulls away.

Aiden laughs. The sound is weird to his ears. “I think I’m dreaming.”

“No,” Liam says firmly to bring Aiden back to reality. He always knows what to say. What tone to use. He’s so perfect. “This is real.”

“We’re so stupid.” Aiden hangs his head in defeat. This is all so impossible. It’s a fever dream.

“You more than me,” Liam points out, leaning down to kiss Aiden’s closed eyes. “How did you get into medical school?”

“My rugged good looks obviously.”

“Obviously,” Liam teases, smiling softly, he brushes a kissacross Aiden’s smiling mouth. “Can you use your words? I gave an entire speech. It would be nice to get one in return.”

“What do you want from me?” Aiden asks, suddenly bone tired and exhausted.

“Don’t you love me?”

“I love you, but loving you breaks my heart. This is too impossible. Not having you was hard but having you would be even worse. We live a country apart. You’re Liam Walsh and I’m just Aiden.”

“You’re notjustAiden,” Liam interrupts him, voice firm and eyes ablaze with some unnamed emotion. “You’re Aiden Clark, the man I love. Can’t that be enough?”

Once upon a time Aiden had thought that his heart breaking was worth Liam’s perfect future. A future with a family, Olympic golds, and happiness so blinding that Aiden is just a distant memory to look back. Aiden still believes that. They can never work. He’s too damaged, too distant. Liam deserves someone warm to make a life with. Not the shell of whatever Aiden is.

“Liam,” Aiden shushes him, reaching up to pet his hair. His heart breaks anew when Liam slides his eyes closed at the gentle caress. “I love you so much that I’m letting you go. Let me go too. I’m just a footnote in your life. We need to let one another go or we’re going to just keep breaking each other's hearts.”

“No, you’re thewholedamn book,” Liam says so fiercely that it makes Aiden’s heart skip a beat. “Don’t make me live without you anymore. I’m not above begging, Aiden. If you walk away from me again there won’t be anything worth for me to go back to anymore. You mean more to me than ten Olympic golds. More to me than twenty Stanley Cups. I’m so fucking in love with you. Just let me love you. Let me.”

Fuck. It’s like Liam has been in his head the entire time. Maybe he is. Maybe Liam can see right into his fucking soul. Ifsoulmates exist, then surely Liam Walsh is the counterpoint to his own tortured soul.

“Where does this leave us?” Aiden asks around the lump in his throat. “I’m in New York and you’re in Seattle.”

“We do long distance for a while, until we can figure it out. But we will. I want you so badly and I know you want me back. You do. I know you do. Let me love you?” Liam begs, voice trembling. He stares Aiden down, daring him to fight this, fight against the inevitable tide of his love. “Everything will work out if you just let me love you.”

“Okay. I’m in love with you,” Aiden says like it’s a secret, like Liam doesn’t know, like the whole world doesn’t fucking know.

Liam presses a tender kiss to his temple. “I’m in love with you too. I have been for so long. I’m going to spend the rest of our lives proving it to you.”

The words should scare him. Worlds like that should send Aiden spiraling, fleeing out of the urge to protect himself, but for the first time in his life they don’t. The words settle into his bones, into his very marrow. For the first time in his life he’s sure of someone else’s love that isn’t Archer’s.

“You haven’t been with anyone else?” Aiden asks, attempting to tease, but his voice comes out small, a little frail even.

Liam shifts up higher onto his knees so they’re even and he smiles. That smile that makes Aiden feel weak. “No. Just you. It’s always just been you.”

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