Page 68 of The Boyfriend Boycott
“I was scared. All the time. Terrified. I never knew what I was going to go home to. There were large chunks of time when I didn’t even have a home to go back to. That was my mom’s doing, and she has no excuse for it. She left me to fend for myself and look at what good that did. I’m a fucking mess. The closest thing to a long-term, monogamous relationship I’ve ever had has been with that one Uber Eats guy who always picked up my order.” I feel Grady nod, but he doesn’t say anything. There are unspoken words there, at the end of my sentence.And us.But I leave them unsaid … I’m still terrified ofus.“Honestly, fuck Marla. I’m so done with her right now. I made it this far in my life without a father, what’s one more relationship down the drain, right?” I say, but I catch myself when I feel Grady flinch. “I’m sorry,” I say, a pang of guilt stabs at my chest. My mom may be a piece of work, but at least she’s alive.
“Don’t apologize, Spencer. Your hardships and struggles are valid. It’s just different from mine. My parents were wonderful parents when they were around. I grew up in a home that made me feel secure and protected. I never had to wonder where I was going to sleep at night. Our home was full of joy and love. Even until her dying breath, my mom made sure it felt that way for us. Now that she’s gone, I get to hold onto the good memories of her, the happy ones. Having an absent parent is a different kind of struggle. I never doubt how much my parents loved me, how worthy I am of having that same kind of love that they shared. But I can imagine that having a parent who is physically here but not emotionally would fuck with your psyche.”
Grady’s words ring true in some deep, primal place within me. As if awakening a beast that has been lurking in the dark. Do I not think I’m worthy of love? Maybe. I do know that I believe I’m worthy of the life that I’ve been working towards. It’s just that all my life I’ve grown up thinking that the two don’t exist in the same reality.
Men have always left. They’ve always taken. They’ve always torn apart whatever scraps of security I had left. I watched them do it to my mother over and over again. I’m sure there are exceptions to the rule. Grady feels like an exception. But that beast has poked its head out of the cave only to whisperit’s not worth the risk.
“I’m leaving in a few days. Whether I get the job or not, Grady.” I change the subject, hoping that the words remind Grady of what I’ve been trying to tell him all along. Relationships don’t have a place in my life. This doesn’t have a place in my life. “My landlord told me my rent is going up, and that I’m no longer allowed to sublet it. So, I’m going back, or else I’m going to lose it. Even if I don’t get this job, I need that place.”When I say it now it almost sounds as if I’m trying to make the words sound sincere. The way Grady has shown up for me the past few weeks, there are cracks in my argument, and I know it. But the thought of giving up everything I’ve worked for still makes me feel like a skittish horse about to bolt.
I don’t look back up toward Grady, because seeing the hurt on his face will be more than I can bear.
“It’s okay, Spencer. I understand,” he says, his voice soft but steady, even. I thought that seeing his disappointment would be worse, but it’s not. It’s this. This calm and gentle understanding. The way he has heard everything I’ve told him, and despite the fact that I know Grady would want nothing more than for me to say fuck it and stay, he doesn’t push it. “You know you always have a home here, too. No matter where you end up, know that you can come back to Heartwood. Know that my feelings for you are never going to change.”
He says the words that deep down, I want to hear, but they’re not realistic. Even Grady can’t promise that. Life happens, people make mistakes, people change. Nothing is constant, as much as you might want it to be.
I turn to look up at him, and he hugs me tighter, his lips meeting mine in a firm, steady, confident way. I let myself pretend that it’s true. That I can believe him, and trust him, and that I’m not going to leave.
I am going to leave, I have to. That shitty little apartment isn’t much, but it’s mine. I pull out of Grady’s kiss and find his eyes.
“Fuck me like it’s the last time,” I whisper into the thick, heady air between us. For the first time since I met Grady, those words feel true.Like this could be the last time, and it makes me feel sick.
Grady’s eyes search mine, but they darken as he furrows his brow.
“No,” he says, tone firm, jarring, coming from him.
“No?” I’m taken aback by the confidence, the surety with which he says the word. Like it’s a whole goddamn sentence.
“No,” he says it again, the same way but somehow even more solid, concrete. “Whatever you need to do, Spence, you do it. If you need to travel the world, go back to Vancouver, I’m on board. I will love you from over here like I have done for the last year. I’ve waited before, I can do it again. Don’t for one second believe that this thing between us is over once you leave.”
I let Grady’s words sink deep into my marrow, expanding and taking up the spaces between the fibres of my being. The words are something solid within me, immovable, concrete, just like the way Grady is peering into my eyes. They take up so much space that it feels like they are blotting out any previously held beliefs I had about relationships, that I had about myself.
Here is this person who is so confident, so sure, thatIam what he wants. So convinced that I am worth waiting for. Not in some possessive way, in a way that makes space for the person that I need to be, too.
It’s the first time I’ve ever considered not ending it with someone when I’ve left. The first time I’ve considered not saying goodbye but see you later. The first time that I would leave and call him from my phone to say that I landed safely at whatever destination I was going to next. That I would make plans for coming back.
Maybe this could work.
Maybeis a dangerous word. It’s admitting that you are taking a risk. It’s not a sure bet, but if there’s anyone I would bet on, it would be Grady. Dependable, reliable, unshakeable, Grady. Grady, who puts the needs of other people before his own. Who doesn’t back down from a challenge for the people he loves.
So, I answer him with a kiss, tender and soft, the way my heart feels in this new, unsure territory. When Grady fucks me, it’s with all the messy, uncharted, unknown future laid out before us.
CHAPTER 29
GRADY
Spencer wakesme up by sliding her hand under the waistband of my boxer shorts and stroking my length, hard from my night’s sleep. Her body is warm next to me, and I want to soak in every second that I have with her. I could wake up every morning like this. I love Spencer. I’ve loved Spencer since the moment I first saw her, and now she’s mine. Sort of.
She agreed to try long distance, at least to explore what we are to each other, and I think I have to be okay with that for now. Spencer is like a butterfly, she’s the most beautiful when she’s in flight, allowed to be free. But try to cage her, and her wings will break.
That’s the last thing I want to do to Spencer. I don’t want her to feel trapped. If, and when she decides to settle down with me one day, it has to be her choice. In the meantime, I will do everything I can to be her safe place to land. I will create a home for her that she wants to come back to and show her that I’m not going anywhere, that she can trust me not to pick up and move on without her.
This is what Spencer has been trying to tell me these last few weeks. That she doesn’t need crazy adventures, she doesn’t need grand gestures, she needs stability. She wants someone,somewhere, that she can rely on to be there for her when she needs it. Spencer may not have said it outright, she may not have even realized this yet herself. But I see her now, more clearly than ever. I can read her. She runs away from things so that she’s the one to leave it behind. She sabotages relationships from the very start so that they never grow into something that can hurt her.
All I can do is hope that what I have planned is the thing that finally convinces her that what she needs isus.That I never plan on leaving her. That I have woven her into the very fabric of my life, so much so that if she were to unwind herself from it, I would completely unravel and fall apart.
I trusted Hudson with the vision for what I planned, told him in detail what he needed to do as I wandered down the gravel back road last night in the dark, looking for a single bar of reception. I found enough of a signal for the pictures I sent him to go through. I gave him a few days to get it done, but by the time Spencer and I drag ourselves out of bed, get dressed and pack up the van, my stomach is clenched, nerves roiling in my gut.
Spencer is quiet for the drive home, most likely sensing my weird tension. As the van nears the entrance to the driveway of the house, I catch her glancing down at my left knee, bouncing with anticipation.
