Page 8 of Tender
He made his way outside and as he turned, he knocked hard into a man trying to get to the door. He was short and thin and was wearing a hood up over his head. Emmett dropped his bags in order to catch him and straightened him up before he hit the ground.
“Shit. Shit. I’m so sorry,” the guy said. He had a very familiar, slight accent that Emmett recognized from his own daughter.
He searched the man’s face, then slowly lifted his hands to sign, ‘It’s fine. Are you okay?’
The man looked panicked, wrenching away from Emmett and hurrying inside without another look back. Letting out a rush of air, Emmett rolled his eyes up toward the sky. It felt like everything he was trying to do lately was one big fuck up.
Something needed to give, damn it.
Something had to change.
Or he was going to completely fall apart.
CHAPTER THREE
MILES
Whenever Miles’scochlear implant processor was on the fritz, it gave a sort of unpleasant, crackling, buzzing sound.Like electrodes were misfiring or something. He’d had them since he was a baby, so he didn’t really have anything to compare his experience to, but he couldn’t help a small pulse of jealousy when he looked over at his girlfriend.
Selene was pinning her hair back, her white processor bedazzled in small, glittery stones that matched her purse. She had four pairs of them in different colors so she could coordinate them with her outfits.
She was different from anyone Miles had ever known, let alone dated.The children of high-earning doctors rarely ever glanced his way growing up.When he was in high school, he was still bouncing around group homes.He was the weird, sometimes smelly kid because he didn’t always have access to showers.
And his CIs back then had been really, really old—and they were archaic now.They were flesh colored and bulky and lacked the new, sleek design of the modern age.His clothes had also always been out of date, and his shoes never fit because theycame from charity donations or the clearance rack at thrift shops.
He didn’t have holiday or birthday celebrations growing up.
He’d existed from one moment to the other until he aged out.
The fact that he was both deaf and a foster kid gave him one single advantage—and that was scholarships and grants.He managed to get a full ride for college because in spite of his circumstances, he kept his grades up and wanted to do something with his life.He wasn’t sure what getting his Ph.D. in ancient history was going to do for him except offer him a teaching salary, but at least he was doing something.
Plus, he did have Selene.
Kind of. Mostly.
Their relationship was weird, sure.Rocky on their better days, and volatile on their bad ones.Selene was very spoiled, used to getting her way, floating along on her trust fund and her dads’ credit cards.He was pretty sure she’d never seen a bill before.
They’d bonded over their shared experience straddling the lines between two communities.Selene could sign—she’d been taught ASL growing up, though she never used it now.But she understood him in ways a lot of people didn’t.They’d met their senior year in a group for deaf students who weren’t involved in the Deaf community, and while they were an unlikely pair, she’d gravitated toward him.
It had taken Miles months to believe that she was interested in him.And it had taken him a few more months afterthatto trust she wasn’t pulling an elaborate prank when she said they should go on a date.
Four years had passed now. Four years of struggle and fighting and bending to her will because it was easier to give in. Four years of not being sure he wanted his life to look likethis, but being so fucking tired and burned out through his master’s program, and now into his Ph.D. Four years of being so damn unsure of himself but finally giving in when she said they should move in to this damned apartment where all he felt was stressed.
Never mind how it made him sick to his stomach because deep down he knew Selene didn’t really want him for anything other than his willingness to be her errand runner. But what could he do? He was trapped financially now that he’d given up everything to live with her. This life was not the one he’d pictured, but it was the one he was settling into.
And he knew that’s what it was: settling.
He wasn’t happy, but at least he had someone.
Those were his abandonment issues talking, but he supposed things could be a lot worse. Hell, they had been a lot worse, and every time he felt like he was ready to walk out, he reminded himself that he’d always been a survivor and he could get through this.
It wasn’t going to be like this forever.
Not to mention they really didn’t see each other much. With his lecture schedule and her social life, they were almost like roommates. Hell, he couldn’t even remember the last time they’d been intimate. But they collapsed in bed together at least three nights a week to sleep—so long as she wasn’t on one of her many vacations—so he was calling it a win.
Life would even out eventually.And he could accept that not everyone was like Oliver or Juno.
Not everyone got their big, grand, toe-curling happily ever after.
