of his cell phone vibrating on Justin’s nightstand. He groaned and shut it up, then folded himself around Justin again. He didn’t need to be up until at least nine. But his phone was blowing up before eight, and that was a crime after the night he and Justin had had.
His phone buzzed again. And again.
“Answer it,” Justin grunted. “It might be important.”
He sighed and reached over his head, fumbling for his phone and dragging it by the charging cord over his shoulder and into the bed. He swiped on the screen.
One hundred and seven text messages. He blinked. “What the…”
“What?” Justin rolled in his arms and propped himself up on one elbow. He yawned, his hair sticking up. “Everything okay?”
“I don’t know.” He unlocked his phone and pulled up his texts. Fifty were from Colton. Had he gotten drunk the night before?
Dude. DUDE.
What the fuck. What the ACTUAL FUCK.
You’ve been lying to me for years! You’ve been lying to us!
“Oh my God…” His heart began to pound, heat and ice racing through him in dizzying swells. “Oh my God, Justin…”
How could you let us find out like this?
How could you keep something like this from us?
Are you actually, for real, gay?
Is that guy, Justin, your boyfriend?
You let me believe you were dating a girl!!
You lied to me!
How long have you been lying to us all?
What the fuck
What the fuck dude
“Justin, they know. Oh my God, everybody knows. Everybody knows.”
“What? How?” Justin scrambled up, grabbing Wes’s phone and turning it to him. He saw Colton’s texts, then swiped back and pulled up the other texts, from Orlando, Art, Devon, Quinton, Josh, Patrick, and even Coach Young. Coach’s text was a link to an article.
He clicked, and a full-page image of the Marché d’Aligre loaded. And there they were, in the background, in perfect, damning clarity. Justin had the lavender and baby’s breath to his nose, and they were standing far too close to explain away.
More pictures, scattered throughout the article, sealed their fate: two more from Paris, holding hands, arms around each other’s waists. Pictures of them on campus. Wes gazing at Justin like he was smiling up at the sun. A grainy picture of them sitting inside Wes’s truck, talking intently. Wes holding the door open for Justin at the nursing school. Wes coming down the fire escape outside Justin’s window.
There were quotes, too, from students on campus. One from a Beta Theta fraternity brother, who described Wes and Justin coming to a party and disappearing into a dark bedroom together, reemerging fifteen minutes later, disheveled and sweaty. Students who had seen them together around campus. “They’re close. There’s definitely something there.”
“Oh my God…” Wes dropped his phone. His thoughts raced in a thousand different directions at once. Everybody knew. And they had found out in the worst possible way. Not from Wes, but from the media. From an investigative reporter. They will turn your life upside down. Inside out.
Well, they had. They had dug and dug, until they stumbled on pictures of cowboys in Paris and found Wes. And found Justin. And then they’d found their secret.
Justin’s phone started to buzz. He lunged across Wes, grabbing it off the nightstand. It was an incoming call, and the caller ID said Dad. Justin sent the call to voicemail. His dad called again. And again. Justin turned his phone on silent.
Colton’s texts to Wes had gone from confusion and shock to pure rage.
I don’t even know who you are. I don’t know anything about you. You fucking lied to me. You fucking looked me in the eyes and lied to me. Fuck you.
You’re with him right now, aren’t you? Jesus, you’ve been with him all season. Every time you stayed out. You were with HIM.
He dropped his phone like it was molten lava. It landed facedown on Justin’s bed, Colton’s words finally blocked out. He scrubbed his hands over his face, screamed into his palms.
It was over. It was all over. Football. His friendship with Colton. His scholarship. Everything he’d ever dreaded, everything he’d feared, had arrived at sunrise on a Friday morning, on the biggest game day of his career. Well, not his career anymore. Not after this.
He pitched sideways, falling into Justin’s lap as he screamed again, as his tears started to fall.
Justin wrapped his arms around Wes and held him as his heart shattered, and the tattered pieces of his soul ripped fully apart, and the crushing weight of failure rolled over him like a wave, sweeping