Aidan made one last survey of the kitchen and was surprised to find Oz, still in his suit and remarkably put-together for someone who’d downed so much champagne, leaning against the doorjamb and watching him.
He had the look of someone who’d been there a long time. That was no reason for the hair on the back of Aidan’s neck to stand on end. It’s Oz, he reminded himself. You found him surrounded by old candy wrappers and dirty laundry.
Aidan nodded at Oz. “Night. See you in the morning.”
“There’s an early interview,” Oz said, his tone flat. Aidan couldn’t say he relished the thought of another interview either. “Don’t miss it.”
Aidan left the lights off in the bedroom and got into bed as quietly as possible, but it was no use. Caleb stirred.
“Oh,” he said. “It’s you.”
“Yeah. Who else would it be?” Aidan joked. “You feeling any better?”
“A little,” Caleb said. “Why? You planning on keeping your promise?”
“It’s a lot less sexy than you’re making it sound,” Aidan said. “Not that I won’t make it up to you. But if I start at the beginning, it’s not going to put either of us in the mood.”
“I want to hear it.”
Aidan lay on his back and stared up into the darkness. Maybe this would be easier in the dark. He could tell Caleb to rest, or that they’d get to this in the morning, but that was cowardice, and he’d had enough of it.
“Do you remember that night I showed up in your apartment at like three in the morning?”
“Uh.”
“I know, I know, I need to be more specific.” Aidan had developed a few bad habits in his life, and dropping in on Caleb at inopportune times was one of them. He’d only recently realized it was kind of an asshole thing to do, constantly showing up in the middle of the night with some nightmare problem dogging your heels. “I’m talking about the night I broke up with Brian.”
“Oh,” Caleb said. “Brian.”
“You never asked for any details. You probably thought it was my activism—or maybe my personality—that drove us apart.”
Caleb did him the courtesy of exhaling a silent laugh at this weak joke.
“Anyway,” Aidan said, collecting himself. He didn’t really want to tell this story. Maybe it was the memory of the small hurt Caleb had done him that night—something so trivial it shouldn’t have made a difference, not after what Brian had done, and yet the sharp point of it was still buried deep in his flesh.
But Caleb deserved to know.
Aidan had fled the apartment he shared with Brian, their fight still echoing in his ears, and materialized in Caleb’s living room and kitchen area. It was dark, of course, being three in the morning. Normally Aidan knew his way around the place just fine, but that night he was out of sorts. He’d knocked his shin into the wooden edge of the coffee table, then missed the couch entirely, landing on his ass on the wood floor. He’d been cradling his bruised shin in his hands, his head leaning against the couch, when Caleb had trudged into the room. He’d been wearing a faded grey t-shirt and blue plaid boxers. Even in the dark—even when he was wounded—Aidan registered these things. The moment had such clarity because Aidan, hurting in every way, had experienced a second of relief. There’s Caleb, he’d thought, now I’ll be alright.
Caleb had rubbed his eyes and grumbled, “This isn’t a fucking all-night truck stop, Aidan. It’s not a motel. You can’t just show up whenever you want.”
Aidan had sucked in a breath like somebody had kicked him. He didn’t think of Caleb’s apartment like a motel or a truck stop. Those places were way stations, temporary reprieves. This was home.
Even when he’d been living with Brian, this was home.
“Shit,” Caleb said, finally catching sight of Aidan on the floor between the couch and the coffee table. “Are you hurt? Let’s get some ice on that.”
Caleb had helped him to his feet and set him on the couch, then returned with an ice pack wrapped in a dish towel. He’d pulled Aidan’s leg into his lap and applied it. They’d sat there in the yellow light cast by a single table lamp, not speaking, until Caleb had observed, “You look worse than a little bruise can explain. Am I gonna see headlines about this tomorrow?”
“No.”
“Okay.” Caleb had grasped right away that it must be trouble with Brian, and Aidan had been grateful he didn’t have to explain. “You wanna talk about it?”
Aidan had shaken his head. Caleb had offered him tea or coffee or “something stronger, even though I know that’s not your usual,” and Aidan had declined it all. Then Caleb had removed the ice pack and said, “You take the bed, then.”
“No, I can’t—”
“If this is about what I said earlier, I’m sorry. I think I’m entitled to a moment of irritation when a crash in my living room drags me out of bed. I didn’t really mean it, and you’re obviously having a shitty night, so how about you let me do this one thing to make it up to you? Take the bed.”
Aidan hadn’t had the energy to argue, but as he’d lain down in Caleb’s bed, the sheets long since gone cold, he’d wondered about that phrase I didn’t really mean it. Brian had lied to him for months and he’d had no inkling. How could Aidan be sure of who really meant anything they said?
It had been a memorably bad night in so many ways.
“When I broke up with Brian,” Aidan said, restarting his story while Caleb lay beside him, waiting in expectant silence, “it was because we had a fight. I found evidence he’d been lying to me. Our whole six-month relationship was a sham. He was working for someone. Quint, I assume. Brian was trying to find a way into the Union, trying to locate more runners. In retrospect, it’s clear they would have ended up as experimental subjects at some place like that cell in Facility 17.”
“Shit,” Caleb said.
“I was… angry. I know. You think that’s my default state. But I’ve never been angry like that. Caleb, he had… files. Recordings. Long-distance surveillance photos.”
“Creepy,” Caleb said, detached, as if Aidan were telling a ghost story instead of recounting something that had actually happened to him.
Creepy didn’t cover the half of it. Aidan took a breath. “Some of them were of you.”
“But I’m not a runner,” Caleb said at length. “Or… I wasn’t a runner when this happened.”
“Right. He was considering using you as leverage. I knew then that I had to distance myself from you, that you’d never be safe as long as the world knew we were friends.”
Caleb had been strangely quiet for this whole conversation. Into the darkness of the bedroom, he said, “Wow.”
“I couldn’t ever really stay away from you,” Aidan said. “Even when I knew every moment we spent together was putting you in danger, I still wanted to see you. You probably thought I was ashamed of you. I know it seemed like I was exploiting you, showing up in the middle of the night and asking for help. And I guess maybe I was, but the truth is that whenever I was in trouble, you were the first person I thought of. The only safe person. And I always wanted to see you. I like you too much. I love you, I guess I should say. That’s always been true.”
“Oh.”
That was a little discouraging, as responses went, but it was okay. Caleb could probably tell that he wasn’t done yet.
He continued, “And ever since you got me out of that cell, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. The cell, I mean, but also the photos. That could’ve been you, Caleb. The worst thing that has ever happened to me could have happened to you. And it would be my fault. Anyone who abducted you or tortured you or tried to kill you, they’d be doing it because they were after me.”
“I don’t think it would be your fault,” Caleb said. “If someone else attacked me.”
“It would feel like it. And I’m terrified of that, Caleb. I don’t want to be the cause of anything happening to you. I thought maybe I could keep you safe if I left you. But then you said all that stuff on TV
today and… God, you scared the shit of me, but you were brilliant. Once I saw you choosing for yourself, I realized I’d been trying to choose for you. I shouldn’t have done that and I’m sorry.”
“Good.”
“So that’s what I wanted to tell you. I love you. It’s terrifying and I don’t know what to do, but I love you.”
It was a relief to speak the words.
It was not a relief to hear Caleb say, “Well.” A silence followed. “You’re important to me, too.”
Not the response Aidan had been hoping for, not after the day they’d had. But maybe, after what he’d just revealed, it was the response he deserved.
Aidan woke up feeling like shit. As usual, he’d had nothing to drink at the party. It was an emotional hangover.
Caleb’s side of the bed was cold.
Strange that he’d gotten out of bed so early in the morning, considering how tired he’d been. Aidan had given him a lot to think about, he supposed.
He got dressed and went into the kitchen. Caleb was there, an empty plate of what had been eggs and toast sitting in front of him. It smelled like bacon, which was strange, because Caleb didn’t eat that. The Feldmans didn’t keep kosher, but they also never had pork products in the house, their food traditions having endured far longer than any others.
Laila was Muslim, and about as religious as Caleb—barely at all—but it was still hard to imagine that she’d been the one to cook the bacon. Then again, while they’d been in the cell together, she’d rhapsodized about the barbecue she could have been eating in Nashville if they hadn’t been abducted to space. Aidan gave up on conjecture.
He was in a bad mood and it was making him suspicious, that was all.
Oz wasn’t there, even after he’d lurked in the kitchen to remind Aidan of their morning obligation last night.
Laila, wearing a huge pair of sunglasses in addition to the black makeup stippling her face like she was a greyscale comic book character, mouthed are you okay at Aidan from across the room. Whatever his face looked like, if she was already asking that, it must be bad. He poured himself coffee and shrugged.
“What’s this interview about, again?” Caleb asked.
Aidan and Laila glanced at each other.
“The same thing as all the other ones,” Aidan said.
“No, I mean, who’s it with?”
“Uh. Mandy Dawson, I think? It doesn’t really matter. She won’t be hostile like Ken Garnett was, I don’t think, although she’ll probably ask about yesterday.”
“It’s been all over the news,” Laila said. “They’ve been replaying clips all morning.”
“Sorry,” Aidan said. “I know you don’t like having your name brought up like that.”
“It’s the first time I’ve ever seen anyone say anything nice about me on TV,” Laila said. “It’s okay. Besides, look at this.”
She instructed the house to turn on one of the wall displays, and a panel of two pundits in suits, a man and a woman sitting behind a table, appeared. They were in conference with another person, a bespectacled man whose face was shown in a rectangular frame in the rightmost third of the screen.
“He experimented on U.S. citizens,” the woman was saying.
“He experimented on wanted criminals,” her co-host said. “Besides, the crime was committed outside U.S. jurisdiction—and not by him, we should specify. Jennifer Heath and Vaughn Winslow are already in prison.”
“So you don’t think authorities should pursue him at all? I don’t think that’s an option, Jim,” said the man in the glasses. “Quint is clearly dangerous. He can’t be allowed to continue.”
“Caleb Feldman is clearly dangerous, going by that unhinged tirade we were all treated to,” Jim, the male co-host, answered. “And Quint has shut down Quint Services. He offered everyone working for him a generous severance package. Would someone as villainous as you think he is do something like that? The man promised to turn himself in, for God’s sake, let’s give him a little credit.”
“He hasn’t done it yet,” said the woman. “And frankly I don’t see why we should trust him to. If the authorities have the evidence, they should knock down his door like they do everyone else’s.”
“I doubt they do,” her co-host scoffed. “If Quint were really involved in abducting and torturing people, he would’ve been caught a long time ago. The whole thing’s a hoax.”
“House, turn it off,” Laila said, and the screen went dark. “I know it’s annoying to hear it debated when we know what happened, but at least they’re talking about it.”
“I don’t think anyone’s ever called me dangerous before,” Caleb said. It was the first time Aidan had seen him smile all morning.
“We have time to take a car to the studio,” Aidan said, finishing his coffee. He was troubled by the implication that the police might come for Oz early. The plan depended on Oz turning himself in at the time of his choosing, so two runners could be on call to get him out of prison and put Quint in. But Aidan couldn’t talk about that with the house listening, so he addressed Caleb instead. “It’ll save you the jump. I know you didn’t feel great after the one yesterday.”
“Yeah, and then I can come with you,” Laila said. Aidan frowned at her—she’d already provided a styling consultation, so she didn’t need to go—but far be it from him to stop her.
“Thank you,” Caleb said. “We’ll be glad to have you there, as moral support.”
What the hell did that mean? It sounded like Caleb had asked Laila to come with them, but Aidan couldn’t figure out why he would have done that. He picked up his mug like the answer might be in his coffee, but that was gone, too.
Confessing his feelings had been a terrible idea. Aidan stared out the window all through the car ride and saw nothing. He’d have to overcome this during the interview, but that felt impossible. How could he pretend to be happily in love with Caleb when he was desperately, miserably in love with Caleb?
Oz wasn’t making his usual irritatingly cheerful small talk this morning, so the atmosphere in the car was frigid. Laila played a game on a tablet she must have picked up somewhere in Quint’s house, seemingly unbothered by the silence.
Things didn’t warm up after they arrived. Aidan slipped into the green room to catch a moment of solitude. He sat heavily on the couch, grabbed a bottle of water, and took a desperate gulp. A little hydration wasn’t going to fix anything, but he wanted to believe it could.
Someone stepped inside after him. Only the change in the light from the door shutting alerted him. Aidan turned.
“Caleb.”
He didn’t smile. But why would he? “Hey, Aidan. You ready for this one?”
“Yeah,” Aidan said, taking another swig of water. Caleb had been acting so fucking weird since—well, since Aidan had tried to change their entire relationship. There was a logic to Caleb’s behavior, seen in that light. It was natural to be a little chilly.
Logical or not, it had blindsided Aidan. Caleb had wanted this, yesterday, or so he’d thought. And then in addition, Caleb had stood up for him and for all runners on TV. He’d nearly tanked their whole plan because he felt so strongly. Aidan had finally been sure they felt the same way about each other.
They’d known each other for two decades and Aidan had never misread Caleb so badly.
The cold, faintly cucumber-flavored water in Aidan’s mouth went down the wrong pipe, and he curled over in a coughing fit.
Caleb watched. He didn’t take a step forward or reach out or say raise your arms.
Throat still raw and eyes watering, Aidan sat back up and said, “You remember that time after prom when we both got really drunk and threw up a disgusting amount?”
“Yeah,” Caleb said. “Why?”
Shit.
“I feel kinda like that, that’s all,” Aidan said. That, at least, was true. His empty stomach roiled. The coffee he’d drunk this morning threatened to spew right out of his mouth. He’d been fucking oblivious.
&nb
sp; The man standing in front of him wasn’t Caleb.
Frantic, he filed through all his recent interactions, seeking the moment. It had to have been when he’d found Caleb—the wrong Caleb—in the hallway on his way to take out the recycling. Aidan had kissed the wrong person. He’d confessed to the wrong person.
Where the hell was Caleb?
Oz—no, not Oz—poked his head through the doorway. “We’re up. Let’s go.”
Somehow the real Quint had gotten free from Facility 17. He must have encountered Caleb’s double while the latter was sneaking around and then convinced him to help. Sometime during yesterday’s festivities, they’d made the switch.
God, Caleb. Had they killed him? Aidan’s heart dodged a beat and stuttered. He could almost sense the Nowhere. His urge to disappear rose fast and hard. He didn’t know if he could jump yet. If he ran, how would he ever find Caleb?
He followed Quint and Fake Caleb out onto the set.
Quint wasn’t going to say and by the way I murdered the love of your life on a live broadcast, but maybe there would be some hint.
This one was similar enough to all the others, with a live audience in the studio, an attractive host—Mandy Dawson turned out to be a brown-skinned brunette in a pink sheath dress, her slender fingers pinching a sheet of paper with notes on the interview—and an arrangement of leather armchairs. The leather was white this time, and there was a deep blue carpet with an irregular grid of thin yellow lines running through it. Aidan’s shoes sank into it when he sat down. He dragged one toe through the pile, disrupting the pattern with a line of lighter color.
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