car, and we’re on the road in minutes. Driving through the streets of London.
“We made it on the road in good time.” Pierce is energy. After weeks of seeing other sides of him, some sweet, some subdued, he’s back to how he was when we first met. He’s let his beard grow a bit, the brownish-blond patches more apparent in the low light. “I’m going to take the long way out of here,” he says.
“Oh, okay.”
I’m oddly content with this human.
There are better ways to say that, I’m sure, but it’s how I feel. I’m used to this kind of partnership, riding shotgun and feeling that connection with someone—a friendship based on the same destination. Even when you don’t know where you’re going, like when Megan and I would try to get ourselves lost in the winding roads of the Ohio Valley.
His hand’s on the shifter. Mine’s on my lap. I want this to feel like more than friendship. And I know it does for me, and I hope it does for him. And I feel ridiculous, because we’re not twelve and at the movies. But it’s not like I ever got to be twelve and on a date at the movies. So, yeah, I want to hold his hand.
I reach out. Hesitate.
His hand turns over and meets mine. His fingers lace between mine, and I feel so whole and comfortable. And his hands are big. I haven’t done this much hot and heavy hand-holding since middle school.
He pulls my hand to his lips. Gives it a light kiss. He tilts his head and that smirk is out again, on a mission to melt my heart. He lets go, and I miss it immediately. My chest rises and falls, catching both ways.
“I’ve got to shift with that hand, love. Try again once we’re on the motorway?”
I chuckle. “Noted.”
We bolt down streets, stopping harshly at each light. He keeps checking the map on his phone, and I keep looking out the window. It looks like we’re taking a detour out of the city, but I don’t mind.
“You haven’t seen much else in the city, yeah?”
“Haven’t had time. Went to King’s Cross and St. Pancras for Sophie’s busking, walked around Soho a few times.”
“Her performance was top-notch this week,” he says. “And it seems like she and Rio have been getting on a bit more lately. I think they both figured out they are epic musicians and infighting isn’t going to do anything. Did you have any drama like that in secondary?”
“No,” I say flatly. “I just got all the solos.”
He busts out with laughter. “I see. Any bad blood there?”
“Sure, some. There’s always competition, I guess. But I graduated early, so our feuds ended pretty quickly.”
“So why did you leave early? I know you wanted this experience, and you wanted to get away from fried chicken land, et cetera, but why graduate early? Did you not get on with your mates?”
“When did you accept you were gay?”
“Ah, the age-old question,” he says. “Are you asking me because we’re going to Brighton, which you’ll see is the LGBT capital of the UK?”
“No, not when did you realize you were gay, which every straight girl on television asks, or when did you come out, which everyone else asks, but when did you accept it?”
He shakes his head, slowly. “A few years ago, I suppose. It was in school. I broke up with my girlfriend and told her why. Hell, I think Shane and I were the only ones from our school who were public about it—and Shane only at the very end. It’s a shame we weren’t closer.”
“He’s a really good guy,” I say.
“So what about you? When did you accept it?”
“I was six, Pierce. I would think about guys a lot. Like, I would think about kissing some of the boys in my class and it felt so wrong. But I accepted, eventually, that it wasn’t how everyone secretly felt—it was me and I was gay. Even in middle school, when I tried holding hands and liking girls, I knew.”
I clear my throat. “See, I love Kentucky. It’s home. I feel more comfortable on the back roads there than I’ll ever feel here. At least, I think that’s true. I had my safe spaces, I knew how to survive, but it can’t be my home anymore. When I was a kid, there was a gay hate crime on the news, just a couple counties over. My parents were generally appalled in an