Page 68 of Ring Rust

“That’s true.”

“My bed is really big.”

“I know. I bought it.”

Jasper sighed. “Do you want to sleep in my bed? Just for tonight.”

Ryan stood immediately. “Yes. I really?—”

“Not for… I mean, just because you don’t have a bed. It doesn’t mean anything,” Jasper said, eyes focused on the couch.

“Of course not.”

“Okay. Wait, do you have any clean clothes, or did the chickens destroy them?”

“I got lucky, they were all in the wash.” On purpose, because Ryan didn’t want to risk getting chicken poop all over his clothes. But Jasper didn’t need to know that.

“All of them?”

“Yeah. Laundry day,” Ryan said, shrugging.

Jasper nodded questioningly. “Okay. Well, I’ll see you in there, then.”

When Ryan came into the bedroom a few minutes later, Jasper was already asleep, snoring softly from his stuffy nose.He’d placed a wall of pillows down the center of the bed to drive home the point he’d made earlier. Ryan let out a quiet laugh and climbed into the bed, pulling up the extra blanket Jasper had left on his side. He shoved his hand under one of the pillows, just far enough to feel the warmth from Jasper’s now feverish body.

Chapter Eighteen

“One more night!”Nina shouted, running through the house.

Jasper threw his hands in the air in celebration. “One more night!”

It was a huge relief, and Jasper had been riding that high all day. It was nearly Nina’s bedtime, and he was desperate for some peace and quiet, not used to the chaos he’d been living in since his house of one had turned into a house of four. Unfortunately, the relief lasted about six seconds before Nina ran back into the living room, knocking over a basket of clean laundry they were getting ready to pack. Something crashed in the kitchen, Winnie shouted not to come in, and Calliope yowled at her food bowl.

Ryan walked through the house collecting chargers and tablets and the endless crap from the miniature grocery store Nina had been working on all week. Jasper watched him scoop up miniscule egg cartons and milk jugs from under the couch, Ryan muttering under his breath and pressing a hand to his back. Jasper felt a growing sense of dread about how he would probably find tiny toy produce and dry goods around the housefor the rest of his life, and at the increasingly agonized noises coming out of Ryan.

By the time everything was put away and ready to go, it was well past Nina’s bedtime. The energy in the house had shifted an hour earlier when Winnie disappeared into the bedroom to be alone, and Nina, sensing her absence, had broken down in tears because she felt left out. Ryan had tried to fix it the way Ryan always tried to fix things, by offering a gift, only to remember halfway through that they were completely out of ice cream. It took another ten minutes of exhausted crying before Nina finally gave up and fell asleep on the couch. Jasper winced when Ryan picked her up and hissed through his teeth before carrying her to the bedroom.

Finally, the house was blissfully quiet. Ryan had returned, sprawled on his end of the couch, and Jasper’s eyes focused on the empty cushion between them. The one he wanted to be sitting on, to be closer to Ryan.

Instead of being bold, Jasper settled for resting his hand on the cushion. Since Ryan was always the more courageous of the two, it shouldn’t have been a surprise when his hand brushed along the cushion or when his fingertips rested against Jasper’s. But it was.

The touch was gentle, but it felt purposeful. Jasper flipped his hand, so the pads of their fingertips were flat against each other.

They looked at each other and smiled shyly, Jasper’s heart beating so fast it was like he was fifteen again and on his first date, when he had sweaty palms and his nerves rattled around his ribcage, all from the magic of sitting in an older boy’s car.

This was better than that, of course. That night hadn’t been nearly as romantic as he’d hoped for. Mostly it had been the guy he was with getting progressively more handsy while Jasper justsat there, too inexperienced and desperate to be liked to ask the guy to slow down.

Looking at Ryan now—this man whose heart he'd broken, staring back at him with something achingly close to hope in his eyes—Jasper couldn't help comparing himself to the kid he used to be.

For years, well into adulthood, he’d been terrified of disappointing people or wanting too much. He’s folded himself into whatever shape would make everyone else comfortable, addicted to the praise he got for being so kind and understanding. It impacted every corner of his life—taking the blame for trouble his friends got into, volunteering for boring administrative tasks nobody else wanted at every one of his jobs; providing childcare to Beni and Stevie with increasing frequency as they discovered new hobbies; celebrating Ryan’s career wins, no matter how much time it took away from their relationship.

Eventually, he learned the true cost of ignoring the voice inside him. The one that said it wasn’t a requirement to burn himself out at work, to see his husband fifty days a year, or to quietly accept a new kayak when Ryan cancelled anniversary plans because of a chance at a match.

When he finally left Ryan, it hadn’t been because he truly stopped loving him. It had been because, for the first time in his life, he was confident enough to know he was worthy of what had gone missing.

For a long time, since even before Ryan’s retirement, Jasper had assumed whatever love they once had was gone, permanently lost to what Jasper had taken as Ryan’s painful indifference. Lost to bad choices from them both, lost to Jasper’s determination to never feel taken advantage of—ironically, a confidence he’d developed, at least partly, from the trust he found in Ryan.

But sitting here now, with Ryan’s fingertips warm and rough against his, he found himself wondering if their story was as finished as he’d convinced himself it was.