Page 71 of Jealous Guy

His expression turns faraway and wistful. “A jealous guy. That’s what you said. That’s what you called yourself.”

I nod to acknowledge that I remember. It was something I said the day we met. A throwaway comment that turned out to have serious weight behind it. Orion tightens his grip on me and buries his face in my neck. It’s a sudden embrace that feels close and needy in a way Orion usually isn’t.

Soft lips caress sensitive skin when he speaks. “Are you…are you my Jealous Guy, Jordy?”

My heart latches onto the last word he said, lurching and starting to beat as if it has wings.

“Jordy,” I croak, so scared, so helpless, so hopeful that I can’t make my voice work. My heart slams furiously, a pulsing, bloody organ that’s beating out of my chest. I take a breath to steady myself in case the conversation doesn’t play out how I want it to. “Been a while since I got a Jordy out of you.”

His breathing is shallow, his heart beating as fast as mine is. “It doesn’t mean…” His voice trails off, fading to nothing.

It wasn’t a question, but it sounded like one.

“It means something to me, Orion.” I wind my arms around him, knotting my fingers in the back of his T-shirt as I transfer the bulk of my weight to his body and cling to him. I’m nervous. Terrified. Excited. I know my sisters are right. I have to tell him how I feel. I have to, and this, right here, right now, is the time to do it. “It means everything to me because I love you.” My voice cracks and my eyes begin to water. “I’m in love with you. So please, say my name again, the way I like it, but only if it means the same thing to you.”

A tremor passes through me, and I realize with a jolt that it isn’t mine. The tremor is Orion’s. It comes from him. He’s trembling from head to toe.

His lips move tentatively against the base of my neck. When he speaks, it’s little more than a breath on my skin. A faint echo of the word I’m aching to hear. “Jordy.” The next time is louder, and so is the time after that. Each time he says it, his voice gets stronger and he holds me tighter. “Jordy. Jordy. Jordy.”

Rampant joy flows through me, coursing through my veins and rushing up my body. I wrap my arms around him as tightly as I can, squeezing him so hard that I hear his ribcage adjust. Good things go straight to my head and flow out of me freely as victorious laughter rumbles out of me.

“I love you, Orion,” I babble, losing any semblance of composure. “I love you. Like, seriously, I’m so in love with you it isn’t funny. I’ve been dying to tell you. It’s been killing me to keep it in. I’ve been driving my sisters crazy talking to them about you nonstop. They created a group chat to deal with me and everything.”

“A group chat?” Orion’s eyes widen as he pulls away enough to get a good look at me. There it is: the face I love more than any other. My friend’s face. My best friend. My favorite person. A beautiful man I’m crazy about. “I’m going to want to take a look at that.”

“What?” I laugh again, this time because if I’d had the opportunity to predict what his reaction to hearing about the group chat would have been, his response is exactly what I’d have expected. Damn. Falling in love with a friend is the best thing ever. “No way. That shit’s embarrassing, bud. I’ve been out of control.”

Orion’s lips curl, a slow, gentle movement that’s unlike any of the thousands of smiles he’s given me before. A simmering, burning expression of things that go way beyond friendship. “Turns out, I like you out of control.”

38

Orion

Idon’t feel great at all. My ears are ringing, and I get all woozy when I try to move my head. I’m lying on the sofa, hands crossed over my chest because that’s how Jordan positioned me when we got home. I know I look like someone at the mortuary, about to be buried, and I know it’s not a flattering look because my nose is pointed a little too high in the air and my bottom jaw is hanging open as a result. But unfortunately, I don’t have the wherewithal to do anything about it right now.

Now that the dust has settled, the scene that unfolded at the clinic is filtering through my consciousness, coming through in horrifying snippets that play out like the trailer of a bad movie.

Jordan inches a butt cheek onto the sofa beside me and brushes my hair off my face. He’s wearing the same expression he wore when I had the flu, only this time, in addition to over-the-top concern, it’s mingled with something a little mushy too. He leans down and kisses my forehead reverently, then he holds a bendy straw near my lips and offers me a sip of Pepsi with ice.

I accept it gratefully.

“I’m sorry I tried to run away,” I say.

Technically, I didn’t try to run so much as I successfully went on a rampage. I knocked one of those stainless-steel carts over, sent stacks of paper and medical equipment flying, and almost ripped a door from its hinges in my haste to escape certain death by needle.

It was unbelievably bad.

The more I think about it, the worse it gets. Oh God. I have so much to apologize for. “I’m sorry I kicked and screamed when you caught me.”

I wanted to get the tests done, so before we went to the clinic, I made Jordan swear that he’d do whatever it took to help me get my blood taken. I know him well enough to know I could count on his almost insane tenacity to make sure it happened. I knew things would be hairy, but I didn’t expect myself to behave quite so badly. I screamed in the street when Jordan caught up with me, loudly, and kicked like an animal headed for slaughter as he carried me back inside.

Because Jordan takes life supremely unseriously, he has the audacity to look mystified by what I’ve said. “Are you kidding, O? You don’t need to be sorry. It was completely fine. You did amazing, bud.”

“I cried, Jordy. A lot. And the five-year-old kid in the waiting room said, and I quote, ‘Chill, it’s not even that bad.’”

“I know it was a lot, but it was fine. When you think about it, the way it went down was actually a good thing.”

“Oh really?” This should be interesting. According to my recollection, the entire appointment was an absolute shit show. “How’d you figure that?”