Rare - Briar Prescott Page 0,80

adamant that I want my donations to be anonymous, but fuck what I want, right? So there they were, this man and a woman. Both had clearly had the shittiest week of their lives because they’d been scared to death about their kid.

“They took me to see the baby, and I couldn’t refuse because how do you say no to two people who’d almost lost their son? You can’t. So there I was, looking at that little, sleeping baby in his father’s arms. The mom was thanking me and telling me that the surgery was scheduled for the next morning. She hugged me and cried, and all the while, I was standing there, and all I could think was that she had her shirt buttoned wrong.” Noah looked at Alex. “Isn’t it stupid?”

“It’s the furthest thing from stupid.” Alex wiped the corner of Noah’s eye with his thumb. Noah hadn’t even realized there were tears in his eyes again.

“Anyway,” Noah said after a moment, “we went to the conference room after that, and my mom was there, and all the people from the previous day, and they just… ganged up on me. They had fucking pictures of other babies my blood had saved. Or maybe they were just regular old babies that had nothing to do with me and my mom lied. Who the fuck knows? It was just hours and hours of them all telling me how important my blood was. What it meant for science. What it meant for people it could save. You’re a hero, they told me. The world needs you.

“And then my mom took me to lunch, and she asked me if I was really ready for the consequences of being with you? That… a lot of people who needed rare blood would most likely die without me. There are only a handful of donors in the world. They only use the Rhnull blood in extreme cases, but with so few donors, the demand is always greater than the supply, so her point was that if I didn’t do it, I’d leave a lot of people in grave danger. Are you really ready to take that on your conscience for a summer fling? she asked me.”

Alex took Noah’s hand in his and linked their fingers.

“There’s no point in describing everything else that was said. What matters is that eventually, I caved.”

Noah forced himself to look straight into Alex’s eyes.

“In the end, I didn’t choose you.”

There was no stopping the tears after that.

17

It took forever for Noah to calm down. Ten years’ worth of heartache finding its way out of Noah. Alex held him through every teardrop and sob. Wiped away the salty tracks on Noah’s cheeks and held him close until the crying eventually subsided.

The enormity of the burden that had been placed on Noah’s shoulders was staggering, even though Alex suspected he was only seeing fragments of what was there. It made the whole thing even worse. If Noah had given Alex the condensed version, then Alex couldn’t even imagine what those days a decade ago had really felt like for Noah.

Alex was so goddamn angry. Angry at the situation they were forced into. Angry at those doctors that had bullied Noah. But most of all, he was angry at Noah’s mother for allowing things to play out like they had. She should have protected her son, first and foremost. Had anybody ever put Noah’s interests first? Or had every last person in Noah’s life only treated him as—how had Noah put it—a bag of blood?

“I’m sorry,” Alex said, voice breaking. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to make it all better.”

At one point they’d moved so they were lying on their sides, facing each other, Alex’s arms were wrapped around Noah, holding him tight, and Noah’s forehead was pressed against Alex’s chest.

Noah let out a wet laugh. “There was nothing you could have done. I pushed you away, remember?”

Alex hugged Noah closer. “You were just a kid back then. We both were.”

Noah wrapped his arms around Alex. They stayed quiet for a long time. Alex felt Noah’s heartbeat against his own. They were still naked. Alex had no idea what time it was, but he was not going to move until Noah forced him to. Whatever meetings his father had arranged for him for the next day could go to hell for all he cared. Alex was finally where he was meant to be.

“Why didn’t you tell me back then?” Alex asked after