Page 22 of College Town

“You gonna bring the little missus?”

Tommy flinches hard.

“That’s who she is, right?” Lawson presses, though it makes his chest ache, makes his hands tremble where he’s tucked them into his armpits. “The ring’s hard to miss. You guys, like, match or whatever.”

Tommy’s lips press tight together, and two bright flags of color stand out along his high, narrow cheekbones. He looks small; his bespoke suit seems to swallow him a moment. After a moment, he says, slow but firm, “Let me buy you a drink. Just the two of us.”

“What if I say no?”

His chin juts out, an old familiar, mulish angle. “Then I’ll come back tomorrow and ask again.”

“Fuck you,” Lawson murmurs without any real feeling. Shuts his eyes. “Fuck you, you’re such a brat. Just a littleshit, still.”

“Law–”

He slices a hand through the air, and when he opens his eyes, Tommy still looks stubborn, but a little contrite, too. “Flanagan’s. Eight. I’ll give you fifteen minutes, and then you’ll leave me the hell alone.” He doesn’t phrase it as a question.

Tommy’s brow furrows, but then he nods. “Flanagan’s at eight.”

“Fifteen minutes,” Lawson reminds, yanks the door open, and retreats back into the shop.

The fiancée is no longer at the window table, and Tommy, mercifully, doesn’t return.

10

Is there a word for wanting something so badly, so, so badly, and then finally getting it, and not believing it? Like walking through a day convinced you never woke up this morning, and that it was all a dream?

If there is I probably ought to know it. I’m a writer after all.

~*~

Lawson cried after their first kiss. Only a little, but it still left his throat aching and his face burning with embarrassment.

“Oh no, what–” Tommy said, worried, when he turned his face away, both of them breathless and shifting against each other, chests pressed together in a way they’d never been before; in a way that allowed Lawson to feel Tommy’s racing heart, and be comforted by it, because he wasn’t alone in this. Tommy was there, too.

“No, it’s fine, it’s fine, I just…” Lawson tried to laugh, and it turned into a sniffle instead. “That was really nice. That was great. Um.” When he tried to wipe at his face, Tommy beat him to it, brushing quick, small thumbs up under his glasses to delicately flick the tears away. After, still cradling his face that way, he urged his head back around so Lawson could see his knitted brows, the concern swimming in those big brown eyes he adored so much.

“Lawson,” Tommy said, helpless, “what–”

“I love you,” he blurted out, and felt as if he’d vomited his heart into his lap. “I really love you, but I didn’t think…Ineverthought…”

Tommy’s face smoothed all at once. He smiled. “But I do.” Then he leaned in and kissed him again.

They ended up flopped back across Lawson’s bed, trading clumsy, half-nervous kisses that got gradually bolder, and less nervous, and messier, until Lawson thought he might catch on fire. Tommy rolled off of him and they caught their breath lying side-by-side, staring up at the ceiling. Then they sat up, and got back to work on their Spanish project.

Lawson might have imagined that kiss for years before it occurred, but had been too fearful to form any sort of firm ideas about what might happen afterward. He’d conjured up misty, dreamlike visions of hands clasped together, fingers interlaced; had pulled his covers up over his head and thought about Tommy there with him, tucked up into a ball against his chest like a little cat. He was at that age when a stiff breeze could get him hard, but he’d been too skittish and anxious to envision anything specific when he touched himself in the shower; hadn’t dared to imaginedoinganything with Tommy.

So after that first kiss in his bedroom, after they’d righted themselves, and Mom came to rap on the door and ask if Tommy was staying for dinner; after they’d sprung apart though they’d been doing nothing more than leaning over the same textbook, hearts beating wildly at the idea of being caught, Lawson had no idea what to expect moving forward. It felt like his entire world tilted on its axis that afternoon in his bedroom; like a bomb had gone off, but no one else in his life had heard the explosion. How could thingsnotbe different? How could life just…continue?

But continue it did. Tommy didn’t stay for dinner – he rarely did – but he turned on the front porch when Lawson walked him to the door, and he blushed, and he smiled small and secret, and said, “See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah, see you,” Lawson echoed, grinning like an idiot.

And the earth righted itself, and the next morning dawned a little chilly and overcast, and things were as they’d always been, save for the stolen moments alone, when Lawson could catch Tommy’s chin and reel him in and kiss him. They still argued over stupid shit, and shoved each other, and slagged one another until they were both laughing so loud they wound up with detention, but they kissed, too, when they could, and when Lawson whispered that he loved him, Tommy’s smile was like dawn breaking over a still, clear northern lake.

11

We – humans – have this sick habit of pressing on bruises. Picking at scabs until they bleed. We revisit pain, remind ourselves of it. It’s terribly self-destructive, but we tell ourselves it’s a reminder of being alive.

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