Jamie looked over when he got to school to the tree, seeing Daniel and Steve talking, then watching as Daniel dropped his face into his hands.
He waved at Tyler, narrowly avoided Lucy, who was definitely lurking with intent. Doubling back to the tree Jamie looked nervously at Steve, who just smiled at him reassuringly before leaving the two boys to talk.
"Dan." Jamie tried to make his voice gentle but insistent, and Daniel lifted his head, his beautiful gray eyes glassy.
"Jamie." Daniel’s voice was thick and heavy with emotion
"You left without me." Jamie tried for a smile, but he knew it came off as weak.
"I needed to go. I’m sorry, I couldn’t face… I just couldn’t…"
"I know, I understand, honestly I do."
"Jamie, I’m really confused."
"Does it help if I say I’m not at all confused?"
"No, that just scares me, Jamie; it scares me a lot. That has always been you, confident, go-getting, knowing your own mind. That isn’t me; I can’t match that."
"I’m scared too, you know."
"Of what? Of Mom and Dad finding out?"
"No, well, yeah, I suppose that will be a difficult bridge to cross, but not one we couldn’t manage together. No, the thing that scares me is that you are deciding in your freaky Daniel head this is going nowhere."
"My freaky Daniel head?" Daniel snorted.
"Yeah, it’s a scary place, dude, and I bet it has already decided to leave home."
"Uh-huh, had that thought."
"What would that do?"
"Save you… from me… from these feelings…"
"Save me?"
"Yeah, you’re confused, and I’ve probably done something or said something, and now you don’t know what you're doing or anything, and it's all my fault." The whole sentence came out in one great rush of air.
"Jeez, Dan, what the fuck… Give me some credit here for knowing my own mind."
"Do you though, Jamie?"
"Yes, Dan, I do know my own mind. We need to talk. Can we at least talk, after school?"
"Yeah, we’ll talk, Jamie, we’ll talk."
"You know I love you, Dan."
"I love you too, Jamie… I do… you're my brother."
"We’ll work this out, yeah?" Jamie said gruffly.
Daniel wished he felt as convinced as Jamie sounded they would work it out.
"I have drama practice after school, but I’ll be home as soon as I can, and we’ll talk, yeah?" Jamie said one last time before smiling softly at Daniel’s frown and walking back to his friends. Daniel promised himself he wouldn’t look at Jamie as he left but did so anyway, a familiar heat pooling in his stomach.
* * * * *
Lucy worked her way to the tree area just as Jamie left and cursed her bad luck in not pinning the guy down yet for the prom. There might be three months to go, but she was going to the prom on the arm of the best-looking jock in school if it killed her. She couldn’t look too desperate though. She needed to be careful.
Exasperated, she stood out of the morning sun in the shade of the tree, biding her time until second period English, wondering what Jamie had been talking about to geek boy. She had never seen such a serious expression on Jamie’s face as she had just seen, and it amused her somewhat when she thought maybe pretty geeky Daniel was having girl trouble. She pitied the girl who linked up with Mr. Odd. Girl problems were certainly one thing his brother would never have once Lucy was in Jamie’s life fixing it and keeping him in check.
She could almost taste prom queen, taste it so bad that it sent tingles up and down her spine.
* * * * *
Steve must have caught a peculiar expression on Daniel’s face because he quickly slid back down next to Daniel when Jamie had moved off.
"You okay?" he asked cautiously, clearly not sure what had gone down.
"I’m cool…" Daniel started. Even he could hear the element of doubt in his voice.
"Is Jamie cool? Or is he being a dick about all of this?
"Yeah, he says we need to talk." Daniel screwed his face up, scrubbing his eyes with fisted hands.
"He’s probably right, Danny." Steve had a smile in his voice; talking was always a good thing in his book.
Daniel raised his gaze to focus on his friend, raw, naked fear tumbling inside him. "Jeez, Steve, how can this all have happened so quickly? I mean I’ve struggled for years with the whole ’I’m gay‘ thing. But Jamie…"
"But Jamie what?"
"Jamie, Mr. Straight Basketball Star, suddenly decides he is gay as well and wants me?" He heard so much doubt, yet so much wonder in his voice. His head told him it wasn’t true, but his heart desperately wanted to believe it could be.
They sat in companionable silence.
* * * * *
Lucy stumbled into the girls’ restroom, the look of fury on her perfectly made up face enough to send three juniors chatting at the mirrors scurrying for their lives. Raw anger swelled inside her.
Her.
The injured party. How could he? How could Jamie do this to her? String her along? Play her for a fool?
How could he promise delights with views of his body and hide wicked lies in his heart?
She should have realized. She felt sick, horrified, let down, and so furiously angry she could taste blood in her mouth, copper and sickening. She pressed her hands to the sink, staring into the mirror, her eyes blinking back furious tears, and her brain working. There was no fucking way he was getting away with this, no way he was going to treat her like shit and not get some of it pushed back his way.
She would find a way. She needed to calm the hell down, pull herself together and… and… find Greg…