Page 46 of A Series of Rooms
“I’ll be there,” he said, short and clipped.
“Great.” Nate smiled, a wolfish grin. Before he left, he turned to Jonah one more time. “Good seeing you again,Jonah.”
Liam waited until they were back inside the car before he pressed his palms against his face. “I’m so sorry,” he said miserably.
“For what?”
“For using your real name, for one. And for the fact that you had to interact with him at all.” Liam dropped his hands. “Believe me when I say he was the last person I wanted to run into tonight.”
“It’s fine.” Jonah glanced his way long enough for a quick smile. Liam watched as he fidgeted with his sleeves, visibly on edge.
“Are you okay?” Liam asked.
As if catching his own tell, Jonah stilled his hands, flattening them against his lap. “I’m good,” he said. “I’m having a really good time. Don’t let him ruin it for you.”
Liam shook his head, forcing a cleansing breath. “You’re right. Sorry.”
As expected, the house was dark when they arrived. Liam took Jonah to the back door, since it was a more direct route to his room.
Jonah crouched to unlace his shoes as soon as they stepped inside, but Liam waved him off. The last thing he needed was his parents finding a pair of unfamiliar men’s shoes on the way to the bathroom and jumping to the most obvious conclusion.
“On your left,” he whispered, pointing toward his room. Jonah moved with eerie silence behind him, his footfalls barely registering on the carpet.
They slipped in undetected. Once the door shut behind them, Liam turned to find Jonah smiling at him. “What?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Jonah said. “That just seemed very practiced. You have a lot of experience sneaking guys in?”
Liam snorted. “You know me. A real Casanova.”
“You gotmehere, didn’t you?”
There was still that curl of a smile at the corner of his mouth, and for a moment Liam couldn’t find the line between the truth and a joke. Jonah seemed to have the realization at the same time, turning away to instead examine the inside of Liam’s room for the first time.
It was surreal to see him there, outside of a bland hotel room and transported into Liam’s most intimate space, like a dream come to life.
Jonah toed off his shoes in the corner and walked the perimeter, fingertips drawing lightly over the collage of Liam’s sketches plastered to the wall.
“You did all of these?” he asked.
Liam hadn’t accounted for the attention this visit would bring him. He shoved his hands in his pockets, putting on his best impersonation of someone who was very, completely cool about his work being observed. “Yeah,” he said, then added quickly, “Some of them are years old.” He pointed to the one Jonah had stopped in front of. “I drew that when I was fourteen. Not my best work.”
“Fourteen?” Jonah looked back at him. “Liam, that’s amazing.”
He was pretty certain all the blood in his body had pooled in his face.
Jonah continued his tour, and Liam watched with sudden horror as he stumbled on the most embarrassing piece on the wall. “Oh, that’s... God, don’t look at that. I can’t believe I still have it hanging up.” In truth, he had almost torn it down a number of times, most recently after his twenty-first birthday. But every time, some pathetic part of him held him back from throwing it out.
“Is that...?” Jonah crouched to get a better look: three young boys with their arms around each other, as depicted by a ten-year-old Liam.
Jonah looked up at him. Liam stared at the picture, if only to avoid Jonah’s eyes. “Believe it or not, there was a time when things were good.” Back before they had been oldenough to notice the differences between them, or to care about them even if they did. “I guess some part of me clung onto the hope that things could be good again. What does that say about me?”
Jonah stood to his full height and turned to face him. “That you’re a good friend,” he said. “They don’t deserve you.”
An edge of real anger laced his words.
Liam watched his expression, the encounter from the diner parking lot still close to the surface. “I never did ask you,” he began cautiously. “I mean, I assume you had to spend some time with them the night we met? Nathan and Ben. Were they...?” He cleared his throat. “I know how they can be.”
Jonah turned back toward the wall. “It wasn’t a long walk back to the hotel.”
