Page 45 of One Little Problem
“I didn’t say that so you’d disagree. I still don’t get it. Yeah, things were going good, but. It’s like you just got really scared, like things would change if you left. That, I did get. But not the part where you didn’t go at all. Since when do you let fear stop you?”
I had no answer for that. Wasn’t sure I agreed but I didn’t like how I felt, not having an answer, being found wanting; it shouldn’t matter anymore, what he thought shouldn’t matter. “Didn’t feel like fear. It felt like,” I stopped abruptly. I couldn’t tell him what it felt like. Love. “Not fear,” I finished stupidly.
“There was probably a time when you couldn’t wait to get out of here.”
“Things were different then. I have more friends now. I have, uh. I had you.”
Awkward. Except Luke only regarded me seriously. “I wouldn’t like myself very much if I felt like I was holding you back.” Before I could object, he said, “I know you don’t feel that way, which is why I said I would feel like that, which I would.”
I sighed. “Can I go back to hating you now?”
“Can’t stop you. You’re always going to do whatever you want.”
Did that make me hard to date? If I were more easygoing—
“I like how headstrong you are,” Luke continued. “But you’re right.” I thought I’d always love Luke saying those words, but they were cold comfort. “Things have changed in your life. You have more people who care about you, so maybe it’s not the worst thing in the world to actually listen to other people for a change?” he suggested before leaving.
I held my head high and marched to the beat of my own gay as hell drum. Only way to be here. I steamrolled, didn’t let people get a word in edgewise, played by my own rules. Relationships weren’t really supposed to be like that. But yeah, stupid Luke was stupid right.
I was scared. I wanted things to stay the same, obviously, I had made that clear. But like Mrs. Reynolds said, that wasn’t possible. Things would still change. I wanted things to stay the same over the summer, but it was also like I didn’t want that point to ever come. I wanted to stay here, right here, in this moment in time, or no, a little ways back when Luke and I were together and my dad moving on was that thing out there in the distance but I didn’t have to face it yet.
Yeah, I had more people in my life now. Yet it was the two most important ones, my dad and Luke, who I worried about the most. It felt like both of them were going to slip away and then it didn’t matter about the rest of the people I had now because there weren’t enough people in this town, maybe this whole state or country, to fill the absence they’d leave behind.
