Chapter Text
They haven’t been together long enough for this.
That’s the first thought that pops into Gavin’s head when he gets the invitation in the mail. Him and Connor haven’t been together long enough for this. It, technically, hasn’t been a year yet, even if this was around the time when they first got together. Sort of. They moved so slowly at first that, despite the fact they were mutually exclusive, nothing really happened for another month or two. It was a fact of who they both were. Uncomfortable with the basics of holding hands and kissing. Sex wasn’t even a topic that either of them brought up until the summer when Gavin’s apartment’s air conditioner kicked off and he spent a week at Connor’s place, laying on the floor with ice cubes in his mouth and staring at the ceiling.
So it doesn’t feel like they’ve been together long enough for this.
Gavin should shred it. If he leaves it out, Connor will likely find it. He likes tidying Gavin’s apartment in the night when he can’t sleep. He will find it and he will tell Gavin it’s a good idea. Great idea! He can hear it in Connor’s voice, urging him to go see his family this Christmas.
It’s been so long, Gav, I really think you should see them.
Gavin is preparing his argument in his head, in this fake conversation they have going on.
You of all people should know what it’s like to want to avoid your family. No. Too mean. Too defensive. Out of line, even. Gavin’s family is nothing like Connor’s. They aren’t conservative or cruel, even if they’ve made missteps in their language towards Gavin’s identity as a gay man. They are overbearing in an effort of kindness, in their comfort, that it is suffocating.
Better to be killed with kindness, though, and Connor knows that. Gavin’s seen the blisters on his feet. He knows when Connor leaves his side in the middle of the night to find something to do with himself. Dancing in the living room, quiet and slow. Gavin doesn’t watch him, but sometimes he peeks out of his door just to know what he’s up to. He’s not sure if he should ever interfere.
So no, Gavin cannot compare his family to Connor’s family. That would be a disservice to the both of them.
It’s been a long time for a reason. It’s easier this way. I’m not really welcome in my family. —A lie, sort of. But not entirely. His family never turned their backs on him. That was Gavin’s fault. After what happened when he was a teenager, after everything, he doesn’t blame them for moving on. He doesn’t blame them for having lives. He doesn’t blame them for struggling to reconnect with him, and in their misguidance, asking him a dozen times every hour how he was. It just didn’t work. His friends had filled the place that he left and moved on and never reopened it wide enough for Gavin to squirm his way back in.
It’s the kind of thing that eats him alive. Being forgotten.
Well, Connor, I just don’t fucking want to. — Another lie. Isn’t that funny?
In truth, Gavin does want to go. He misses them. Seeing Connor’s family, seeing the strain he had between his parents, it made him remember all the happy childhood memories. It made him remember itchy sweaters and over-baked cookies and waiting in the closet for Santa and always falling asleep too soon. It reminds him of running around outside the lodge and throwing snowballs and climbing up trees and getting sap stuck on the back of his neck. Christ, it doesn’t even seem like the idea of seeing his family for Christmas even stops at reminding him of how good Christmas used to be. It reminds him of summer vacations and sand between his toes and floating across the backyard pool with water that always looked green. It reminds him of spring and following a trail of half eaten carrots to an Easter basket stuffed with things his parents knew he would love.
Gavin had a good childhood with caring parents and everything crashed down around them. But, it is too soon, he thinks. Connor wanted to move slowly, right? He couldn’t kiss Gavin without a troubled expression for three months. The first time they had sex, he held onto Gavin and told him it was exactly what he wanted but it felt like something was wrong. And Gavin knows that feeling particularly well. It faded for him some time ago, but he remembers being young and being scared of who he is and what society decided to label that sexuality as.
So maybe Connor shouldn’t be introduced to his family after a year, not after the year they’ve had, but—
But he wants Connor to meet his sister and his brother. He wants him to meet his parents. He wants Connor to see his nephew and nieces and he wants to have a happy Christmas with him to make up for the ones Connor lost out on before.
Fine, he grumbles, have it your way.
“My parents aren’t rich,” Gavin says.
“Excuse me?”
“I didn’t come from an extremely wealthy family,” he repeats. “I just want you to know that.”
“I—Okay?” Connor carefully moves the tray of silicone molds to the other side of the room. Let the soap solidify into tiny little light bulbs to mimic the string of lights on Christmas trees. It’s barely halfway through November and they’re incredibly behind on their work, which Connor likes to blame Gavin for. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I’m going to invite you to come with me to visit them this Christmas.”
“Oh?”
“Oh? That’s all you got to say?”
“Well, I’m surprised, that’s all. You told me you haven’t spent a holiday with them in what was it… twenty years?”
“You calling me old, baby-face?”
Connor smiles, pushing the tray back against the wall, next to the three other ones. “What does this have to do with your parents' wealth? Or lack of?”
“Every year them and my siblings go in on renting a giant fucking lodge in the woods. We take all of our stuff there, spend a few days together. It makes us look rich. We aren’t.”
“Okay, okay. I believe you.”
“Good. Okay,” Gavin draws in a deep breath. “So will you come with me? I won’t be mad if you want to stay, but I think I should go.”
“Can Chloe come?”
“Huh?”
He shrugs, trying to figure out the best way to explain himself. Gavin knows the situation with Chloe better than almost anyone else, but he has to find an excuse acceptable for Gavin to pass along to his family. He doesn’t exactly think it’s right for Gavin’s parents to know that Chloe’s husband is dead, that the only thing she has managed to hold onto since his death was his parents. And they’ve grown a lot closer in the last year since they decided not to return to that place. Enough to know that Chloe doesn’t like to announce the fact she’s a widow anymore than Connor likes to announce that his twin brother is dead. It’s their shared secret.
“I don’t want her to spend Christmas alone.”
“There’s room for her,” Gavin replies. “I’m sure she can tag along. Maybe she’ll befriend my brother.”
“Not your sister?”
“Well…” Gavin shrugs. “Tina is a difficult girl. Elijah is much more tactful in his friendships. He’ll at least be polite on the surface. Even if it would kill me a hundred times over to see them hanging out.”
“Why not Tina?”
“Having a few kids sort of messes up your filter. She doesn’t waste time anymore.”
“Okay. I’ll call Chloe tonight.”
“Good. Okay.” Gavin steps across the room and leans up, placing a kiss against Connor’s cheek. “Thank you.”
It’s another month before they go. A month of Gavin being completely and utterly tortured by the decision he’s made. His parents were fine with Chloe coming along, and Chloe was ecstatic to go somewhere other than Connor’s parent’s place. Connor, though, spends all of his free time making checklists. He packs two weeks early, unpacks when he finds he wants to wear a sweater that was stuffed towards the bottom of his suitcase, and packs it all back up again.
The day before they leave, Gavin spends an hour in Hank’s office, lingering around, trying to get him to revoke their vacation days but it doesn’t end up working because all Gavin really manages is to annoy Hank enough that he cuts them loose an hour earlier than they’re meant to leave. Gavin spends the night watching Christmas reruns of an adult cartoon show, wondering how he can get out of this. Fake a car crash? Maybe, but it happened to him for real once, and he was lost to the world for three years because of it. Some would still say he’s lost.
“You’re panicking,” Connor says quietly, his hands on Gavin’s shoulders, rubbing the tension out of his muscles. “It’ll be fine. I’ll be there. It can’t be worse than last year, can it?”
Gavin thinks of waking up early to go hunting, of listening to people call him a coward, of finding ways to make him feel disgusting about him and his sexuality in ways he hadn’t thought of before, or had managed to grow comfortable in his solitude to forget that people really thought that way.
“If someone gets murdered it can be.”
“This isn’t a Ruth Ware novel.”
“I was thinking Agatha Christie.”
Connor leans forward and kisses the side of Gavin’s head. “Don’t be annoying.”
“You started it.”
“Did I?” Connor says quietly. “I think you’re the starter of things. Especially annoying things.”
“Fine. I started it. You continue it.”
Connor rests his head against Gavin’s shoulder, his hands moving from his shoulders to wrap around his waist. “Everything is going to be okay, Gav.”
“I know. You’ll be there. No one will get murdered. I’ve got a good gift for you for once. It’ll be okay.”
“Positivity.”
“Mhm.”
They have to fly across the country. A long flight where Chloe falls asleep on Gavin’s shoulder and Gavin falls asleep on Connor’s. He tries to sleep, but he can’t. His head feels too stuffy, his stomach too unstable. He tries to pay attention to the holiday movie that the plane has put on for its passengers. An old animated claymation thing he remembers catching snippets of when his parents would set him and Niles in front of the television so they’d stay out of the way.
Connor holds onto Gavin’s hand, rubbing his thumb along Gavin’s palm. His hand is so warm, fits so perfectly. He is obsessed with it. He can never let it go. How lucky he was that he found someone who fits into his body just right. The nights they don’t spend together he pulls a pillow close and clings onto it tight, but it’s not the same.
When they get off the plane, they rent a car and drive out from the city. Connor sits in the passenger seat, nursing a hot chocolate from the airport to try and keep the chilly air away.
It takes longer to get to the lodge than expected, snow and traffic slowing them down, but when Gavin parks the car in a small lot surrounded by trees, his face suddenly hardens. Not in anger, but in guilt.
“We have to hike the rest of the way.”
“We have to what?” Chloe asks, piping up from the back seat. She’s been trying to steal little bits of sleep here and there to quell the nausea from altitude.
“Hike,” he says quietly, looking back to Chloe. “It’s not a long way up. You can see the lodge from here. It’s just… annoying.”
“I think you’re lying to us,” Chloe says. “I think it’s a lot longer of a walk up than you’re saying. Otherwise you wouldn’t be making that face.”
“Excuse me? What face?”
Connor leans his head back against the seat. “The guilty look.”
“What guilty look?”
Connor reaches his hand out, tapping him lightly on the nose. “That face. Why didn’t you warn us before?”
“I forgot.”
“You’re lying. You’re a liar.”
“Chloe, back off,” Gavin says, stumbling his way out of the car. “I’ll feed you when we get up. There’s always a fuck ton of food waiting.”
“You think food is going to get you out of this?” Chloe calls to him. The door slams shut before she gets an answer.
Connor cranes his neck to look up the hill above them. Gavin wasn’t lying. The lodge is visible from down here, but that doesn’t mean it’s close. It’s barely visible above the tree line, and then the only give away is the smoke coming up to the sky. The points of the roof are camouflaged by the trees. It’s hardly close.
“Food,” he says quietly. “It’ll make it worth it.”
“I hope.”
It’s hell. It’s worse than Gavin remembers. The path up is steep and snowy, with a path that they follow that winds up and around, trying to find the flattest places to get up. The snow is smoothed down from sleds and suitcase wheels and boot tracks. There’s already two cars parked in the lot below and it likely hasn’t snowed since their arrival, but there’s not been enough traffic to flatten it so the walk is easy.
Connor takes Gavin’s free hand, holding on as they make their way up. When Gavin glances back, he sees Chloe’s hand is wrapped tightly in the mesh pocket of Connor’s backpack.
Up, up, and away.
It’s not so much that it’s too steep to climb up, but that there is hardened ice under the snow, and it’s fucking cold. The wind blisters his face, turning his cheeks and his nose first cold then numb. His fingers feel like they’ve frozen into place around Connor’s. He’s imagining them all tumbling back down the hill, rolling up into a snowball that gets bigger and bigger and destroys the closest city like some kind of cartoon.
“Almost there,” he says, trying to force his feet to walk a little faster without tripping and falling. “Just a little while longer.”
Chloe muffles something behind them and Gavin twinges with the slightest bit of guilt. He should’ve warned them, but even more, Chloe told him before they got on the plane that she doesn’t like flying. She slept through the whole flight, but she kept leaning against one of them while they waited for their car, her face pale and her eyebrows drawn together in pain. He’ll have to ask his mom for something. She always gets sick on flights, too, and she carries a pharmacy of drugs to help her with it.
They reach the flattened out top of the path after maybe thirty minutes of walking. It’s a straight stretch to the lodge, which looks just as Gavin remembers it. Wooden logs making up the exterior, large windows, trees clustered around the place tightly. The porch is dark oak planks with a swinging bench on one side, a cluster of wicker chairs around a glass table that’s been covered in snow. On one of the trees out front is a tire swing, hanging empty and unused. He used to ask his dad to push him on it until he got high enough to leap off and fall in a pile of snow. He broke his arm that way one year and they weren’t allowed to use it again after.
Gavin is about to turn around and joke that they made it without anything more than a few moments of skidding on ice when Connor yanks him back and down into the snow. Gavin’s knee hits the frozen ground hard and he lets out a small, pained noise.
He lets go of Connor’s hand, stumbling back onto his feet. He looks down at Connor, then up at Chloe who has seemed to save herself by letting go and not being taken down with them. Her hand is over her mouth, either in shock or in trying to suppress a laugh. Connor, who is laying on his back, staring up at the sky with a blank expression, finally cracks. He laughs. Chloe laughs. Gavin stares at them.
“What the hell happened?”
“Chloe took me down.”
“I did not!” she says. “I started to slip and Connor caught my fall.”
“Funny how I’m the one on the ground and you aren’t,” he replies.
“That’s why I said you caught my fall.”
Gavin is flabbergasted. Completely confused by the way the two of them are laughing like this is the funniest thing that could have happened in their lives. Connor has his hands to his eyes, brushing away tears. There’s a moment in Gavin that makes his stupid little heart grow a little fonder for how Connor and Chloe are so happy right now, but they’re also acting like absolute children.
“It’s not that funny!” Gavin says. And it isn’t! He doesn’t get it. Not in the least, and it seems to only make the pair laugh louder. Great. They’ve truly lost it.
Gavin steps forward, holding a hand out to Connor. “Come on, Con.”
Connor’s laughter subsides a little, in the way that laughter trails off into small little laughs that aren’t quite ready to stop yet. When he takes Gavin’s hand, he doesn’t do anything to help get up. He’s dead weight, in fact, pulls Gavin down into the snow beside him again, which restarts Connor laughing again.
Gavin grabs a handful of snow and tosses it at Connor’s face. “You’re stupid.”
He brushes the snow aside, still laughing. “So are you.”
“You’re both stupid,” Chloe replies.
“You think you’re exempt from this?” Gavin asks. He’s grabbing up a handful of snow again, packing it tight into a ball. “Because I’ll fucking show you who’s stupid.”
“You already have,” she replies, but she’s watching him, glancing back up at the lodge still thirty-yards away.
Gavin isn’t faster than her. He has shit aim and the first snowball misses her as she takes off. The second one hits the steps on the porch as she stumbles up into safety, somehow managing the entire run without slipping again.
He pushes himself up to his feet, looking back to Connor who has seemed to finally start to become normal again.
“You ready this time?”
“Mhm,” he says. He takes Gavin’s hand, letting Gavin pull him up. They retrieve their suitcases from the snow, making their way up the path. Chloe is leaning against the wall, catching her breath.
Gavin knocks twice before opening the door to the lodge and stepping inside. The warmth envelops them quickly, along with the scent of gingerbread and vanilla. Inside the lodge looks like a cozy cabin. A fireplace to the right, a tree to the left (bare, aside from the Christmas lights wrapped around it, shining bright green, blue, and red in the dim space). The place isn't decorated to be Christmas-y, but it doesn't need to. It feels like the perfect place to be.
"Tina?" Gavin calls. "Are you here?"
He's answered by the sound of feet on ground, running along quickly. The culprits arrive at the top of the staircase above them. Two children and a dog.
"Uncle Vinny!" One screams, barreling ahead with the dog in tow. The younger one hangs back, following quietly after.
Gavin leans down, picking up the kid before she collides against Gavin’s legs, lifting him up as she squeals. Connor looks to Chloe who is looking away. At her hands, then her phone. The dog brushes up against Connor, asking for attention, sniffing his jacket. He leans down, petting his little head, checking the tag on the collar. Peanut. A little beagle.
"You've gotten so big," Gavin says, setting her down. "How the hell did you get so tall?"
"Mama said you shouldn't swear."
"Mama isn't here," he replies. He pulls a quarter from his pocket. "Our secret?"
She takes the quarter, holding it close to her face for inspection. "Our secret."
Gavin smiles and turns to the two of them. "Ellie, this is Connor and Chloe."
"Hello," she says, holding her hand out to Connor. A very distinguished girl, with pigtail braids and a fuzzy green dress designed to look like a Christmas tree.
"Nice to meet you," Connor replies, taking her hand. She shakes it wildly, then repeats it with Chloe. Connor looks to the little boy hiding back by the staircase. "And your brother?"
"Topher. He's quiet," Ellie takes a step forward, lowering her voice. "He doesn't like strangers but if he does talk, just don't treat it like it's a shock. You'll make him uncomfortable."
Connor nods and looks to Gavin, who has moved to pet the dog with him.
"His name is Peanut," Ellie says. "He likes the snow."
It is hard not to smile. There is something very soft and sweet about the way Ellie talks. Very matter-of-fact in everything she says. She can't be older than eight, but she acts as though she knows the secrets to the universe and Connor full heartedly agrees that she does.
"Where's your mom?" Gavin asks.
"Kitchen. She's making cider."
“Okay. Thanks,” he looks over to Topher on the stairs as Ellie moves to leave, dog following close behind. “Merry Christmas, Toph.”
The little boy nods and clutches the teddy bear tighter, following his sister back to the safety of the upstairs bedrooms.
They leave their bags by the stairs, Chloe trailing after Connor, Connor trailing after Gavin. The two hang back as they reach the entrance to the kitchen. A large thing with an island and step stools, a table tucked back against a large bay window decorated with a small Christmas tree in the center, bowls of candy and a cup of candy canes on either side of it.
The girl is leaning against the counter, reading something on her phone. An array of cookbooks and printed pages lie behind her. A stockpot on the stove sits boiling. The kitchen smells like cinnamon and apples, reminding Connor of last month on Thanksgiving when him and Gavin tried to make apple pie. It had turned out terrible. The filling was good, but the crust was impossible to flatten out properly.
Connor assumes the girl is Tina, but he doesn’t know who the guy is. He’s not Elijah. Connor’s seen pictures of Elijah at Gavin’s place, peering over his shoulder at Gavin’s phone, teasing him about their similarities. But Gavin is ecstatic to see him, walking further into the room and reaching out to do a handshake with the typical hey dude that makes Connor internally cringe.
He never had that kind of laid back friendship. He never really had any friendships at all. It was strictly business in his family growing up. Gavin and Hank are the closest to friends that he has, and he was barely thirty-one when he met them. Not the hey dude type.
“Who’re they?” the guy asks, gesturing over to Chloe and Connor standing awkwardly in the doorway. At least they have each other in this endeavor.
“Connor and Chloe,” Gavin says, pointing toward them. “This is Chris.”
“Please, continue to ignore I’m here,” the girl says. “I know how little I matter to you.”
“And Tina,” Gavin says, narrowing his eyes at her. “Don’t mind her. Chris is my friend from high school. He’s very happy to be here. Aren’t you, Chris?”
“Technically I’m Tina’s friend,” he says. “Not yours. You’re only allowed to invite one person and you invited two, so she has to claim me.”
“Connor doesn’t count. He’s my boyfriend.”
Connor feels his face flush, butterflies light up in his chest. He will never tire of hearing Gavin refer to him as such. The first time Gavin said it, Connor hid his face in his hands to try and keep himself from making some kind of strange laughing noise.
“I still get to claim Chris as my plus one,” Tina says. “It doesn’t change anything.”
“‘Course not. When is Eli getting here?”
“Tomorrow morning. He’s flying in with your parents,” she says. “Did you say hello to the kids yet?”
“Yeah. First thing I did. I missed them the most.”
Tina smiles in the way that is polite but unhappy, “You wouldn’t miss them so much if you visited more often, asshole.”
“Remind me why I would if you’re going to be around.”
Tina steps over to him, hitting him on the shoulder. By Gavin’s expression, it wasn’t a particularly soft blow, either.
“If we’re just going to be bullying here, I’m leaving,” Gavin replies.
“Good,” Tina says. Chris is doing a poor job at hiding his smile behind his palm.
Gavin moves back to their sides, taking Connor’s hand as they leave, mumbling something to himself about ungrateful siblings.
“Is that Tina’s husband?” Connor asks, picking his suitcase off the floor.
“No. Family friend,” he says. “Tina got divorced a few years back.”
“And the kid’s dad doesn’t want to see them around Christmas?” Chloe asks.
“Nope. Guess not.” Gavin replies. He doesn’t actually know enough about the situation to comment on it. Tina got divorced three years ago. They haven’t spoken about it. “Come on. I’ll show you to our rooms.”
Chloe’s room is right next to theirs, and she gets hers to herself. A single bed in a cramped space with a bathroom connecting to Gavin’s and Connor’s room. There’s a quilt on the bed that Gavin’s grandmother made when he was little. Elijah always made sure it was here. Gavin reaches out and touches it softly. He wonders how it got here. If Tina packed it and unfurled it on one of the guest beds. She always liked to go from room to room and ready them for whoever was staying.
In Gavin and Connor’s room, there’s a little box of peppermints inside. The soft kind that melts away in his mouth. He used to love these. He still does. His mother gets a room on the first floor so she doesn’t stress her bad leg, and there’s always a little bag of chocolate-almonds with it. Elijah gets the room by the office, since he is always working, even in the middle of nowhere with poor reception, and there’s a basket of granola bars so Eli doesn’t forget to eat while he’s locked away. Tina’s kids share the room with the bunk bed and the chest of toys that she always fills up. It’s her ritual. Chris’ is setting up the tree with Elijah, but apparently had to do it alone this year, or maybe with the kids.
Gavin’s is taking a bath. Getting here, stripping down, soaking in hot water until Tina or Chris is banging on the door telling him dinner is ready. When he was a kid, he filled the tub with bubbles and took out his old toys and used the faucet as a diving board. As an adult, he just liked to warm back up and be away from having to participate in conversations with people that already had their shit together. Tina’s husband wasn’t bad to talk to, but Ed was rather selfish, always wanting to talk about Gavin getting a job at his business, like Gavin could ever pull off a suit.
He turns around to face Connor, to tell him he’s going to leave, when he sees Connor has stripped down to nothing, laying his pants over the back of a chair tucked underneath the small desk in the corner.
“Oh.”
“Oh?” Connor says, looking back to him, then down. “Oh. Right. My clothes were soaked from falling down. I needed to change.”
“And you plan on putting clothes back on?”
“I think it would be the polite thing to do when I’m visiting your relatives.”
“Smart ass,” Gavin says. He moves over to him, hand on his waist, tugging him closer. “I meant—”
“No,” Connor interrupts him. “Not right now.”
“Okay,” he says. He leans up, presses a kiss against Connor’s jawline. “Do you want to take a bath with me? Warm back up?”
“Do you have bubbles?”
“Of course I do.”
It smells like cotton candy and the water is green around them, sparkling in the spaces where the bubbles have dissipated. Gavin leans against one edge, splashing water towards Connor’s side. The bath here is so much bigger than the one in Gavin’s apartment. The bathroom Connor has at his place with Markus is nicely sized, too, but it’s the only one there with a tub, and Markus is always dyeing fabric and leaving it there to soak overnight.
This is one of the few places they have found to be vulnerable with each other. Water connecting the two like they are different ends of a river. Long nights equate to quiet morning showers. Gavin leaning against his back, half-asleep. They spend it scrubbing away bad dreams and bad memories, their touches gentle and reassuring that yes, they are there, even if they don’t feel like they are. Bubble baths are for making jokes, teasing each other, finding ways to laugh and smile that they would never do in the company of others.
In the summer they visited the beach and floated out far from the shore together, holding onto each other’s floaties with rope looped through holes and Gavin told Connor that he’s afraid sometimes of falling asleep and not waking up again for years and years. Afraid that he will lose out on his life and never find his way back again. It is hard to reassure someone of something like that. It’s hard to know for sure what the right thing to say is. There have been nights that Gavin wakes him up thrashing or his phone rings and it’s him, asking to hear Connor’s voice.
If Gavin slipped into another coma, would Connor be by his side the entire time? Would he wait? Would he pull the plug? Could he ever truly move on?
He doesn’t know. He tries not to think about it. Lightning doesn’t strike the same place twice, right?
Gavin moves closer to him, displacing the water, sending some over the edge and sitting on Connor’s lap, holding his face carefully.
“What are you doing?” Connor asks.
“Water is getting cold. I need you to keep me warm.”
“Mhm,” he says. He brings up a hand of suds, placing them carefully on Gavin’s nose. He looks like a clown. “You didn’t tell me about Chris. Or Tina’s divorce. Or the kids.”
“I know.”
“Why not?”
Gavin shrugs. “Makes it hard to justify why I left all those years ago and didn’t come back. I haven’t seen my niece or my nephew in five years. Just a video call once a year, maybe. And Chris…. haven’t called him since….”
The way he trails off makes Connor wonder if he remembers or is too ashamed to say it. Falling away from his family sounds like Gavin’s worst nightmare. For Connor, it was freeing. For Gavin, it was the end of everything.
“They worry. My parents, I mean. After I woke up they were divorced and they spent all of their energy watching over me like I might die again,” he says quietly. “And Tina… she had already moved on. She was getting married and she was only nineteen. Chris was in college. Elijah had started his own business. Life moved on and they wanted me around but it felt like…”
“Like three years had passed for them and nothing for you.”
Gavin smiles. Sweet. Soft. Sad.
“Yeah.”
“You know you can trust me, right?” Connor whispers, leaning forward to press the words against his neck.
“It’s not about me not trusting you,” he says. “I don’t want you to change your opinion of me.”
“Why would I?”
Gavin squirms underneath Connor’s grip. “You… lost your brother. You would give anything to be able to talk to him and see him, wouldn’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“So what do you think of someone like me, that dodges my family’s phone calls? That doesn’t visit them? That doesn’t appreciate them while they’re here and alive?”
Connor stills, resting his head against Gavin’s shoulder. Yes. Gavin has a point. And put so bluntly, it hurts. Niles is dead. Connor barely spoke to him for ten years. They grew up estranged and in constant competition for their parent’s affection. But it’s different. It’s so completely and utterly different.
But Gavin is right.
Connor didn’t appreciate Niles while he was alive.
“That’s not how I see it,” he says. “And you’re right. The water is cold. We should get out.”
“Con—”
He’s pushing Gavin off his lap, retreating from the bath and finding one of the fluffy towels to wrap around his waist.
“I’m sorry,” Gavin says. “I didn’t mean—”
“It’s fine,” he replies. “I’m fine.”
“You aren’t. Come here. Come back to me.”
He leans against the counter, looking at the sink drain. Shiny gold. Perfectly clean. The granite countertop is dark shades of brown and neat white. Marbled together with streaks of bronze separating them. He focuses on the colors, the pattern. There’s a slosh of water behind him, dripping on tile. Wet arms wrap around him, pinning his arms to his sides.
“I’m sorry,” Gavin whispers again. “I know you loved Niles. I wasn’t trying to say you didn’t.”
“I did,” he says, his voice cracking in its effort to sound normal.
“I’m sorry,” he repeats. “Really—”
“It’s okay. Really.”
Gavin’s arms squeeze tighter around him. Another, quieter version of you’re not . And he isn’t. Sometimes Niles’ death hits him all over again. How preventable it was. How much Connor could’ve tried to reach out and help him. But he hadn’t. He doesn’t think he’ll ever be over this, either. Niles is a part of him. Niles dying is like part of himself being cut off, no matter how estranged they were.
So he lets Gavin hold him tight. He lets Gavin’s warmth radiate around him. Soft kisses against his shoulder, a caress across his stomach. They stay like that until Connor feels a little more stable, a little less damaged, but damaged still. He turns and kisses Gavin on the forehead, running his hand through his wet hair.
“I love you.”
Gavin smiles up at him, “I love you, too.”
It’s not really the first time they’ve said it. A year ago, Gavin told Connor he was in love with him or falling in love with him, and Connor couldn’t say the same back. He was in a terrible place. He didn’t know how he felt. And they were words that were hard to say. He grew up not knowing if he was allowed to love a man, and even after he could say the words once, it didn’t mean it was like a dam breaking. It didn’t mean he was suddenly capable of saying it whenever he wanted to.
And Gavin is similar. Much cooler, much calmer, about the concept of love. But not entirely firm-footed on the subject. It is a rare thing, but Connor doesn’t want it to be rare. Not when he never told his brother he loved him, not when his parents never said the words to him.
They could lose everything.
“I love you,” he repeats. Again and again, moving forward to kiss Gavin. Forehead, cheek, chin, neck. Kissing him and touching him and listening to Gavin laugh as he says it back just as many times.
They stumble their way to the bedroom, Gavin falling against the bed, tugging on Connor’s towel, pulling him closer. Rough palms against the curve of Connor’s spine, soft lips pressed against the slope of his neck. They need to stop. Connor doesn’t want to do this here, now. Everyone is awake. This is a lodge where Gavin’s family stays. It’s weird. Too close for comfort.
He pulls back slowly, his head fuzzy. “Gavin…”
“Yeah?”
“I…” he trails off. “What you said before.”
“About Niles?”
“Yes. You said it was wrong of you not to appreciate them while they were alive. You can still do that. You can still love your family and the people around you.”
“That’s why I’m here.”
“I know. But it’s more than just Christmas, you know that, right? It’s more than just being here for this trip,” Connor says. “You can fix it. You can still be their son and their brother and their friend.”
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “Con, I don’t want you to think I’m like… using your trauma as a teaching tool.”
“I know. It’s okay,” he says. He wants to make a joke that Gavin should. That at least his trauma would be worth something if it taught Gavin to be with his family, but he can’t quite manage it. “I just don’t want you to lose them. There’s no going back if you lose them.”
“Con, I…” he’s sitting up, trailing off. Words stuck on his tongue. He’s looking at Connor the same way he looked at him when he first fully said the words I love you on their third date. Scared, expectant. “I—”
There’s a knock on the door. Tina’s voice loud through the wood. “Dinner’s ready. Hurry up.”
He waits for the retreat of footsteps, then leans a little closer, whispering like this is a secret, “What were you going to say?”
“Nothing. Just that I’m glad I met you.”
There’s a box sitting in the bottom of his suitcase. Shoved between three other presents, though this one isn’t really a gift. It’s a question. It’s a question that leads into another question that involves a ring and suits and vows.
They sit around the table and they laugh and they eat and the dog begs and Gavin watches Connor trying his best to get along with Chris and Tina. Unsteady, but trying. Laughing at their jokes, but uneasily so, like he isn’t sure if he’s allowed. And Gavin wonders if he asked Connor to move in, would he say yes? Because there are words tied to that question. Do they get a new place? Does Connor come to live in his apartment when Markus’ place is so much nicer? And there’s a future after the fact. Marriage and kids. That would be the inevitable end, wouldn’t it? Does Connor want that?
Does Gavin?
It’s something he gave up on when he was twenty-three. When he felt like his life was starting to come to an end already. If he hadn’t found the one, he surely would never. The older he gets, the more he questions if there’s enough time to ever know if somebody is the right person to spend the rest of their lives together. He wants someone to grow old with, yes. But what if he makes the wrong choice? What if they get stuck half-way and start to hate each other because it’s too hard to start again?
That’s why he gave up. He was young, but he wasn’t young enough. And then he met Connor, and he feels this thing ticking like a clock in the back of his head, telling him that he’s running out of time. He hasn’t done anything with his life. He hasn’t done enough. He has a job he likes, but not his passion. He has a shitty apartment he hates. He lives in a city that makes him yearn for a quiet country-side. Nothing in his life is really right or good besides Connor.
And when he smiles like that, when he laughs, when he is sitting at a dinner table surrounded by people that are making him happy, even though they’re strangers, Gavin thinks yes, this is the one.
Connor is absolutely the one.
And Gavin does want all of that.