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This is creepy, Tommy thinks.
He wouldn't want anyone standing in front of his house, staring through his windows like that. Like an intruder.
And yet, he can’t look away.
Can’t look away from the familiar mop of curls that sometimes appears in this little bright cutout of a life.
Can’t look away as Evan works in his kitchen. Maybe he’s cooking. Or baking. Is he wearing the apron Tommy gave him? Is he humming under his breath? Or quietly talking to himself, about a topic he has been consuming all night?
Is he happy?
Please be happy.
Tommy worries his bottom lip between his teeth and drums a restless rhythm on his steering wheel. The faint taste of iron hits his tongue after a while.
He really should leave.
He should go home.
He should …
Someone knocks on the car window.
Tommy jerks and hits his head. “Ouch!” One hand flying up to the instant pulsing spot on his head, he turns to see - Howie.
Uh oh.
Howie stares into the car, stares at Tommy. He narrows his eyes and raps his knuckles lightly on the window again.
Tommy’s face heats up. A thousand things he should or should not say race through his mind. He reluctantly opens the door. Forces a lopsided smile. “Heeeey. Uh. I was just … I was in the area, and …”
“Don’t ever sign up to be a spy, Tommy,” Howie says dryly. “You’re not being subtle.”
Tommy doesn’t know what to say. He really hoped no one would notice his regular drive-bys. It’s just … a few minutes of looking, really. Well. Sometimes he drives around and looks again. Sometimes.
Howie sighs and hands Tommy a little box. “Here. Buck is baking again, and I can’t eat any more biscuits. Are you sure you don’t want to come inside instead of lurking out here in the dark like a cat?”
Tommy looks at the box. It’s red with rows of little Christmas trees and smiling Santa faces. His stomach dips. He swallows around the lump that forms in his throat and mutters, “I can’t.”
“Why not?” Howie asks, “I got news for you, man. Everyone knows you’re doing this … thing. And no one said you wouldn’t be welcome. I fear that’s all you.”
“What do you mean, everyone knows?” Tommy asks in disbelief.
“Buck doesn’t tell me much. But he did tell me about what you said back when you two met at that bar,” Howie says, raising a brow.
“Oh.”
Well. Seems like Tommy has to stop. This is embarrassing. He ducks his head. Clings to that box. Sees that there’s even a little note sticking to it. Saying: Merry Christmas. A child wrote it. Jee? Probably. His chest clenches. Aches. Yearns.
“You don’t want to see him?” Howie asks.
“I always want to see him,” Tommy says with a weak smile that hurts. “Always.”
That’s the problem.
Howie sighs, pushing his hands into the pockets of his jacket. “Look. I can’t pull you out of there and push you into that house. But I can tell you that whatever you think you’re protecting him from is probably not as much of a dealbreaker as you think it is. Because if you are out here, and he is in there, and you’re both still moping over this … Maybe it’s just a be real and get your shit together kind of deal, you know?”
He shrugs. “Anyway. I have to go back inside. Or they will think I’m sick again and went off to hallucinate in some alleyway. You do what you have to do. Bye, Tommy.”
Howie pats Tommy's shoulder. And then he closes the door, walks back to the house.
Tommy looks after him, his throat tight and heart still racing. Howie’s words echo through his head.
Maybe it’s a be real and get your shit together kind of deal.
He sighs and closes his eyes for a moment, thinking back. Back to that moment when he made breakfast and pictured a conversation that ended with a smile, a soft kiss, a laugh. A disbelieving chuckle and wow, why did we break up again? So stupid. Another, why be apart when we can be together?
Instead, the conversation ended with Tommy driving his car to some lonely place where he could cry in peace before accepting that somehow, he ruined a potentially beautiful thing yet again.
It would just be nice, Tommy thinks, to hear things like, I love you. You are the only one for me. You will always be my forever. Things you hear in the movies. Things you read in the books. He just fears those things aren’t for someone like him. And yet. Every time he imagines Evan saying them … He got this fluttery feeling in his chest. As if his heart was growing wings.
Don’t you want to see him?
Be real and get your shit together.
Deal.
Be real.
Is Evan really in there, moping? Is he still yearning?
Would he agree to meet one more time? Would he agree to hear Tommy out? Would he listen to the things Tommy didn’t tell anyone else? The things he so desperately wants, but pushed down and covered with a stone, because he learned that being that vulnerable usually ends in getting your heart shattered into pieces you have to put back together all by yourself?
Would Evan look at the real Tommy and smile?
What do you have to lose anyway?
Right.
Tommy looks at the box. He carefully opens the lid a just a bit, looking inside. His eyes widen and his lips part slightly in surprise.
There are biscuits. But there’s also a gingerbread man. It has a blue flight suit made from coloured sugar. He's smiling in bright red. And on his chest, there's a tiny red heart.
Oh.
Tommy blinks tears out of his eyes and takes a deep breath.
He closes the box and gently puts it on the passenger seat. Then, he opens the car door.