The night before each of these trips, I try to convince myself to pull the thorn, to make the first move required to get us back to at least acquaintances rather than the damn-near enemies we are.
Each time he makes me wait as if I were born to serve him, and those plans are shot to hell before I even climb inside his car.
Maybe he won’t piss me off before the drive back in a couple months, and I can open my mouth then.
Chapter 2
Rick
These days, I get my thrills in the smallest things. Right now, I’m practically elated at the frown on Landon’s face as he looks around Jake’s, the local bar in our hometown.
I didn’t offer to take him straight home when we reached the city limits. I simply drove right to the bar.
He didn’t argue, although I know he’d rather see the end of this long-ass day. I’m sure as far as he’s concerned, the sooner he can get rid of me, the better.
Pettiness seems to be my love language these days.
In past years, I’d go out of my way to make him comfortable. I’d bend over backward to make his day better. Those days came to an end before we graduated from high school.
According to our families, we’re still the best of friends. We’ve served that illusion on a platter that is actually coated in animosity and disdain. In everyone else’s mind, we’re as close as we ever were, and I’m grateful for the nearly nine hundred miles between this place and where we’ve spent the majority of our time the last three years.
It would be impossible to keep our actual hate and intolerance of each other under wraps if we were closer to home.
It’s not my hate and intolerance I have to worry about, but that of the man I once considered my best friend. I love him no less today than I did the night we kissed, but that kiss, despite him kissing me back in the moment, has always been a bitterness on his tongue rather than the sweetest taste ever to grace my lips.
I lingered in the perfection of it for too long, smiling myself to sleep that night even though he begged me to forget it ever happened the following morning. I spent the weeks following that night waiting for him to come to his senses, as if loving him was enough to change who he was in his core.
I doubt I’m the only boy to fall in love with his best friend in the hopes that the connection we shared was enough for him to see the bright light of our future together.
I’ve read posts, blogs, and articles online that should help me put all this shit to rest, to make me realize it will never happen, but I’m still a young boy in love in that regard. I’ve never been able to let go of this feeling deep in my soul that Landon Andrews is the love of my life, and one of these days, he’ll realize I’m the same for him. It’s a torturous undertaking, so hard in fact, that I was the one to take the first step in putting distance between the two of us.
After that night, it just hurt too much to see him and not be able to touch him. The small, friendly touches that were allowed between two guys who were just friends suddenly became forbidden, a boundary I put in place because I showed my hand, and he called my bluff. I didn’t want him to think I was pushing some sort of agenda, but those boundaries quickly turned from a line I shouldn’t cross to a crater I could no longer see the other side of.
The smile on my face is as fake as I can manage, and I know if he really looked at me, he’d know I was faking this entire jovial mood I’m portraying to everyone around us.
Landon was once the boy that loved me unconditionally. He stood up to those that would so much as offer a negative look in my direction, ready and willing to burn the world down so that I didn’t feel any pain. Now, I doubt he’d offer me a glass of water if I were set on fire.
I don’t have any illusion that he hates me for being gay. That was never a problem. My attraction to him is the source of his contempt.
I knew before I made my confession that night that it was risky. I just never considered losing him completely would be a consequence.
Although he has no problem with my choices, he’s no longer comfortable around me at any point, much less so when another guy is involved.
So, living in my constant state of pettiness when he’s around, I push those boundaries as much as I can, like I did earlier when I was on the phone with Rex. The man on the other end of the line isn’t my lover, but my closest friend. Rex’s longtime boyfriend might have something to say to me if I ever had any illusions of making a pass at his guy. We joke about it often. Rex knows about what happened with Landon that night, and although I know he feels sorry for the way things have turned out, he’s never held his tongue when he voices his opinions about my stupid move.