Page 145 of Reluctantly You

I watch him go and then unfurl my fingers, my eyes dragging down to the piece of paper in my palm. My vision grows blurry, a swirl of shapes and lines.

Basil.That name.

The address. It’s the same place I’ve sat outside every day this week.

The room spins and I slump in my chair, feeling all the blood rush from my face.

Oh shit.

Oh fucking shit.

It was him.

My dad.

My fingers hover over the phone screen, aching to tell anyoneanythingabout what I’m dealing with, how my heart aches and burns. But how the fuck do I even start? Do they even care?

The only one I’ve told how I feel is Little Pants, and she honestly doesn’t seem to care as long as I’m available to feed her. I’ve debated calling Magnus, but shit, I don’t even know what to say.

What the fuck do I say?

For the past two days, I’ve sat outside Basil’s house, trying to muster the courage to go tell him who I am, but part of me doesn’t want to ruin what he’s built. From what I can see, he has a family. He’s built a nice life and I’m going to come in and wreck it all.

He doesn’t deserve it.

I don’t deserve him.

Even from that short encounter in the restaurant, I knew he was a better man than I’ll ever be.

God, what would my life have been like with a dad like that instead of the one I was given?

I stare forward, my eyes stinging, a swirl of blues and gray, like the tumultuous ocean right before a storm.

Me, I’m the storm. Set on a path to destroy this poor man’s life.

“I can’t do it, Pants. I can’t,” I whisper, and she just stares up at me and purrs, not a care in the world. What the hell would that be like? To not worry, to not be sick with the anxiety I’ve lived with my entire life?

“What if he doesn’t want me?” I murmur, giving voice to my fears, but she just licks her paw. “He probably won’t want me.”

My fist digs into my eye as I swipe those tears away.

It’s okay to cry, I tell myself. My therapist affirmed it. Real men can cry. It doesn’t make me any more gay than I already am.

“What if, after all this, I’m fatherless?” I ask, my voice just a wisp of letters strewn together, a sting of fear and need.

I stare down at my phone just as a message pops up from Gideon. They’ve grown shorter, less frequent, and shit, I miss him. Miss him wanting me too.

Maybe at the end of this it will just be Pants and me on the road. Two abandoned souls searching for something, something that one of us will never find.

My eyes slide back to Gideon’s message and my breath catches.

Gideon

Thinking of you.

I swallow, my throat clicking loudly. Fuck, I miss him. I want him here. I’d be stronger with him by my side. I know that he might have used me early on, when he first bought the company, but now that I’ve had time to think about it, about us, I truly believe that there’s more to us.

More to what we have.

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