Page 39 of Leave

But then… he was gone.

And I was alone.

Again.

For fuck’s sake. Why is my alarm going off?

I felt around on the nightstand and grabbed it, then peered at the screen in the gray morning light to see what time it was.

That was when I realized I hadn’t set an alarm last night, and that wasn’t my alarm tone anyway—it was my ringtone.

Kevin.

Panic surged through me. Why was he calling me this early? Was there an emergency?

I accepted the call and asked, “Hey, what’s up?”

“That’s what I wanted to ask you.”

I blinked, then wiped a hand over my unshaven face. “You’re the one calling me at”—I pulled the phone back to glare at the screen, then put it back to my ear—“too fucking early. What’s going on?”

My brother exhaled sharply. “Did you really cut off Mom and Dad?”

I pinched the bridge of my nose. This was not a conversation to be had pre-coffee, but here we fucking went. “I did.”

“Seriously?” He huffed a harsh breath. “Dude, they’re beside themselves. What the hell?”

Dropping my hand onto the mattress, I stared up at the ceiling. “They were literally telling Nolan and me that we could easily find women, so they didn’t understand why we were… I mean, I’m just done. Seriously fucking done.”

“Over that? Just because they were trying to—”

“No. No, it’s because they’ve been digging at me about it since I was sixteen.”

“But it isn’t like they threw you out of the house. They still treat you good—they just don’t know what to make of you being gay.”

“And they’ve sure put in a lot of effort to figure it out, haven’t they?”

“Come on. They’re—”

“What if Mom and Dad didn’t like Laura?”

“What?”

“If they curled their lips every time you mentioned her,” I said. “Or if they’d tried to talk you out of marrying her, and then spent all these years letting you know how much they didn’t like you being married to her—what then?”

He was quiet for a moment, and some hope glimmered that maybe I was getting through to him. “So, that’s what this is about? You’re choosing this guy over your family?”

“No.”I had to fight to keep my voice steady. “I’m choosingmyselfover people who have had plenty of time to accept me but refuse to.”

“Riley…”

“Don’t. Just don’t. You say you don’t want to get in the middle of it. Fine. Then stay out of it.”

“I can’t stay out of it!” He sighed, and I could imagine him throwing up his hand in frustration. “Mom and Dad are a mess. My brother is—”

“Have you had this conversation with them?”

He was quiet for a few beats. “Huh?”

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