Page 13 of The One Decent Thing

Fuckinghell. I turned and went back to the coffee maker. He was still afraid of me.

I’d driven him home, and sat on the couch eating pizza with him, and told him ten fucking times I didn’t hold any of what had happened against him — and he was still afraid of me.

For the first time since my arrest, I actually felt like the monster the prosecution had made me out to be.

Chapter Seven

Sebastian

Aidan’s shoulders looked like rocks, hard and hunched and tensed. He was probably afraid I was going to tell him to leave. Well, screw that. I’d stepped back because I was startled and half asleep, not because I really thought I was in danger. Even in high school, when he’d been the biggest dick to me and to nearly everyone else, he’d only hurt someone once, and that douche had more than deserved it. Maybe prison had changed him and made him violent. I hadn’t seen any signs of it, though, no matter how scared I’d been the day before when he got in my car.

I wasn’t going to kick him out. Former bully or not, he deserved better. But I wasn’t going to take crap for my clothes in my own house, either, if he reverted back to his old habits. Been there, done that, gotten mocked until I cried for the t-shirt.

“I’m still gay, you know.” The words dropped into the silence without leaving a ripple. Aidan stood there unmoving, leaning over the coffee maker. “If you have a problem with that, keep it to yourself. And I know my clothes are still weird, okay? I don’t want to hear about that either.”

“I was just curious about it. That’s all. Sorry.” His voice was tighter than his muscles. “Won’t happen again.”

With excruciating slowness, like he was doing that make-myself-not-intimidating thing again I’d noticed him doing the day before, Aidan filled both of the mugs he had sitting out on the counter and set the coffee pot back in the machine. Still with his back to me, he picked up one of the mugs and headed for the back door.

“There’s milk and stuff if you want?”

“I’m good. Thanks.” He disappeared outside, carefully easing the back door shut so that the screen didn’t bang.

And that left me in the kitchen, still sleepy and slow, with crud in my eyes and with my hair sticking up, and feeling completely unequipped to deal with this. Was he upset about our conversation the night before? That wouldn’t be unreasonable. I mean, I was still upset about it. But…he’d been so adamant that he didn’t blame me.

I added milk to my own coffee, managing to drip some on my bare toes as I did. Ripping off a paper towel, wiping my foot, and wrangling the trash can open took another burst of frustrated effort. Why did everything have to be so damn hard in the morning?

Finally. First sip of coffee. I fished my phone out of my pajama pants’ pocket and browsed Facebook. Nothing interesting, just the usual updates from my friends, who partied a lot more than I did and had the photos to show for it. Last night they’d been out at a club, and there were a lot of kissy-faces and toned bare stomachs on display. Nice. But too early in the day.

Well, not really. But it was too early in the day for me to face how little of a life I had outside of school.

It was only Wednesday. How was it only Wednesday? Regardless, I had class that afternoon, and work to make up since I’d missed both of my classes and a section the day before. I’d emailed my quantum mechanics TA to plead a family emergency, so hopefully he’d let it slide. The guy was a total stickler for attendance in his section. Luckily my other class was a huge lecture and nobody gave a damn if you showed up.

Aidan was still outside, probably smoking, or staying out of my way, or both. I was enough of a coward that I was longing to go hide in my room, but I knew I couldn’t. I’d finally come out of the Xanax haze enough last night to process Aidan’s situation as a newly-released felon. He had whatever odds and ends were in that bag and the crappy clothes on his back, and that was it. Maybe he had a little money? He’d bought cigarettes, and I was pretty sure he’d filled my gas tank too. But basically, he was destitute, had nothing, and needed everything.

Talking him into letting me buy him stuff was going to be so much goddamn fun, I knew it. It’d be a little better since he knew it wasn’t my parents footing the bill, maybe, but not easy. But I had to. He couldn’t hang around in the same horrible jeans that — not that I would have told him this for every glittery purple tchotchke in the world — smelled like mildew and feet.

Of course, if he washed them and didn’t have anything to wear in the meantime, he’d have to hang around naked for an hour…

No. Okay, no. Not going there. Straight guy. Hated my clothes. Possibly hatedme.

Although I couldn’t quite believe that. Maybe he wasn’t super comfortable around gay men, but a lot of straight guys weren’t — and if I’d been spending less time surreptitiously checking him out, I might have had more of a justification for being annoyed by his discomfort. Aidan didn’t hate me for being gay, and he didn’t hate gay guys in general. He’d proved that when he took me home that night.

I bit the bullet and went outside.

My yard was nice, or it would’ve been if I’d ever done anything with or to it. The house belonged to my uncle, and the landscaping service he’d hired long before I moved in came every other Thursday to mow and pick up tree branches and do…other stuff, that I didn’t really know about. What I didn’t know about gardening could and did fill about a million websites.

Either way, it was a pleasant enclosed space with an orange bougainvillea climbing up the fence and adding a splash of color, some flagstones in between patches of weedy lawn, and a Weber grill shoved against the side of a little shed. The porch was really more of a patio, a rectangle of concrete right behind the laundry room. I had a few chairs out there, a small table, and now, apparently, an ashtray repurposed from one of the several empty flower pots stacked by the grill.

It also had Aidan, who popped up out of his seat the second I appeared. “Sorry, I’ll head inside,” he said quickly, and moved to go back into the house — walking in a big half circle so as not to come within two feet of me.

And that was enough, all of a sudden. “What iswrongwith you? Or what’s wrong with me?” I demanded. “Last night we were sitting on the same couch! Do you think you’re going to get gay nerd cooties if you stand next to me or something?”

Aidan froze, his eyes wide. “That’s not…” He swallowed and licked his lips. It was almost enough to distract me from how annoyed I was. “I’m trying to give you some space. So you know I’m not going to make any sudden moves, or anything.”

That deflated my attitude like someone had stuck a pin in it. Damn it. He was tiptoeing around me so he didn’t scare me, not because he didn’t want to come near me.

I lifted my chin and looked him in the eyes. “My shirt’s pink with a rainbow atom on it because I’m gay, and I’m studying particle physics, and I liked it. Okay? I know you’re not going to beat me up for my shirt. You never even did that in high school.”

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