“I’m sure it was the same for you. Well, maybe not a tattoo. But didn’t you know that you wanted to play ball?”
He laughs softly. “Absolutely.” He inches a little closer, his voice turning reverent. “Do you remember the first time you stepped up at the plate when you were a little kid? And you dug in there, staring down the pitcher?” He sounds mesmerized, lost in time.
I nod, a tingle running down my shoulders as I picture it. “Like it was yesterday.”
“Yeah, and it was just magic, wasn’t it?”
I shake my head, amazed. “Nothing like it.”
“It was all I ever wanted to do.” He takes a beat. “Now, what about this?” He slides a finger down my bicep to the bands, black ink sketched like water, with waves. “Water is life? Go with the flow?”
“Sort of,” I say, a touch embarrassed. “It’s kind of cheesy.”
He wiggles his fingers. “Bring on the Swiss, rookie.”
“My grandpa has this one. On his arm. It’s the first one I had done.”
“Did you want to be like him?”
“Yeah. He took me to his shop. And he’s an athlete too. Not pro, but he runs marathons, and as I said, I always liked his ink as a kid. So, I wanted to have the same.”
He smiles. “Not cheesy at all. More like . . .” He stares into the distance. “Like a strawberry. Sweet.”
“Okay, now you’re making fun of me,” I say, but I’m smiling too.
“Nah. I think it’s cool. I like that you have the same one.” His fingers travel down my arm to the compass tattoo near my wrist. His touch warms my skin. “And this one?”
I swallow. Do I tell him? This one is even more personal. But he seems determined to know its meaning, since he doesn’t wait for my answer. He asks another question. “Is it for travel? Did you just want to see the world?”
“No. It’s a reminder,” I say, a little heavily, wondering if I should voice it. “To find my way out of the dark.”
Declan shifts, studying me more intensely, his brow furrowing. “Is this about being gay, like how you came out? Or something else?”
Lord knows it could be about the way I came out. Or really, the way I was outed. But nope, that’s not what this is.
“It’s not about sexuality.” Dragging a hand through my hair, I push past the discomfort. “It’s just shit from my parents. I told you they weren’t happy with each other. They weren’t happy with a lot of things. There were things they said to each other in the heat of the moment that were hard to hear.” The words taste like acid. Something black and tar-like twists inside me as memories jostle to the front of my mind, the terrible things they said to each other.
About me.
About my sister.
I swallow those down, tucking the dark truths into the far corner of my mind where nobody can know them.
His voice softens to a warm rumble. “I’m sorry you went through that. It’s not easy.” He sounds as if he understands what it’s like to have to deal with shit.
Something in me wants to get to know Declan more. “Spoken from experience?”
“Yep. Absolutely.” His eyes darken, and so does his tone.
I’m tempted to ask about his family, but that would be way too much for tonight. It doesn’t seem like he wants to talk about that either.
His eyes stray to my mountain tattoo. “And what about this?”
“Actually, this is the one that’s for adventure and travel,” I say, easy and breezy now, because that’s the nature of this ink in some ways. “When I was a kid, we didn’t go to many places. I never got on a plane until high school for state championships. And when Reese and I were younger, we used to plan all the places we would go.”
“What made the list?” he asks, more curiosity in his tone than I would have expected.
“Back then, we didn’t care. We would pick the globe, spin it, and put a finger on it. And then we would just pretend. When we were really young, we would grab our backpacks and wander down the street pretending we were escaping to China or Alaska or Canada. Then later, we would talk about what it must be like to live in New Zealand and Australia. Honestly, I just wanted to get away.”
Declan heaves a sigh, drags a finger absently down my arm. “Man, do I ever know that well.”
This is my chance to understand him. Maybe he keeps mentioning it because he wants someone to open the door for him. But I’m not sure how much I want to hear or how much he wants to say. I take only the most tentative of steps. “You were trying to escape from shit at home too?”