Rare - Briar Prescott Page 0,79

That’s the word she used. Compromised.”

Noah remembered the moment so clearly. How shitty he’d felt that all these people were placing their hopes on him, but he couldn’t do anything. And why? Because he’d done the unthinkable and fallen in love? To all those people in that room, he had been a bag of blood, and Noah had never felt more like one than in that moment.

He guessed it was lucky that his last donation hadn’t been needed until then, and that was used to save the boy’s life, but then came the days of questions. What now? being the main one.

“The next day there was an emergency meeting. Me. Mom. A hematologist who’d been using my blood in his research for a couple of months. Two doctors. The moment I told them I was gay, and that I had a boyfriend, they just kept staring at me. Judging me silently. Nobody said it outright, but they were all thinking it. Why do you have to be gay?

“Like it was something I chose to make their lives more complicated. Like I’d chosen my sexuality out of spite. They were all talking about me like I wasn’t even in the room. Making decisions about my life, and I was sitting right there but instead of being sorry, I was getting pissed off.”

Noah took a deep breath. The emotions of the day were still inside him. It was easy to drown in the same desperation and anger he’d felt back then.

“They just didn’t seem to get that I hadn’t chosen to have this super special blood. It was just a freaking coincidence. Blood groups are inherited, but nobody in my family has Rhnull blood. Nobody. So my blood type is just a really, really unlikely mutation.” Noah’s voice had gotten louder as he spoke, agitation coursing through him in waves, even after all these years.

But then Alex pressed himself closer to Noah, and everything was better again. Noah took a deep breath before he continued. “I walked out of there. Just wandered around Portland for hours, trying to figure out what to do. Mom was calling me every five minutes, so I finally just turned my phone off. I went to an all-night diner when I couldn’t walk anymore, and I just sat there, nursing a cup of tea, staring at the wall. I have no idea how long I was there. The waitress probably thought I was insane, but she let me be.”

Noah gave Alex a scorching kiss then. Just because he could. Just because he was so unbelievably lucky that he got to lie in his bed with Alex in his arms.

“I texted Mom in the morning and told her where I was. She convinced me to go back to the hospital. Just listen to what they have to say, she told me. I didn’t take a cab. I wanted to walk. I guess Mom decided to entertain me and didn’t force me to hurry. It was a really sunny and cool morning, and I was walking there, and all I could think about was how much I wished you were there, holding my hand, and I felt better. Calmer. Stronger. By the time I got to the hospital, I was ready.”

Noah bit his lip. It was almost ridiculous now, to think about the surge of hope he’d felt and the determination. He’d been so young and so damn naive.

“I was going to tell them that I was done. That I was choosing you.”

Noah felt Alex suck in a breath at his words. A tender expression appeared on Alex’s face as he listened to Noah recount the details of that long-ago Sunday. Was Alex remembering what he was doing? Remembering the way he had been left waiting for Noah with no explanation, no phone call, no text message, no nothing?

“Go on,” Alex said quietly after a while.

“I was greeted by one of the doctors from the previous day. He said he’d escort me to the conference room so that I wouldn’t get lost, and I was kind of relieved because I could never have figured out where the meeting had been held.” Noah closed his eyes. “God, I was stupid back then,” he muttered.

He forced himself to continue. “They coordinated a run-in with the parents of the baby my blood was going to help. At least I’m pretty sure it wasn’t coincidental. The conference room where we were supposed to be was in a whole different wing… I’d always been