Come Home

by Raleigh Ruebins

  “They wouldn’t dare put anything more like that in town,” Don said, coming back with the drinks. “One is enough.”

  “Sorry, Gavin,” Linda said, finally looking at me sympathetically. “I guess we shouldn’t be bad mouthing developers while there is a very successful one right here with us. But at least you have the sense to stick to Seattle. That’s where that kind of stuff belongs!”

  I cleared my throat. Now Hunter was looking at me, eyes burning into my face.

  “Ah, well,” I started, trying to figure out how to approach this. “If you look at it from a different perspective, the complex in town can be seen as a very beneficial thing for Kinley.”

  “Hah!” Linda’s laugh ricocheted through the room like a gunshot. “Gavin, you’re even funnier than Hunter.”

  “Units like those are very energy-efficient and allow for more residents to come live on the island.”

  “Yeah, and clog the streets with more traffic and smog,” Don said, shaking his head.

  “But also bring money and business and life to the island,” I countered.

  “Well!” Hunter interjected after taking a long swig of his drink. “I just remembered—Mom, Dad, have I told you guys about Meatball’s skin oil issue? He just produces so much, and—”

  “Christ, Hunter!” Linda called out. “We’re having dinner! We don’t need to hear about that—”

  “But you really have no idea,” Hunter continued, leaning in over the table. “We have to bathe him at least twice a week, otherwise—”

  Caleb and Don both groaned, practically in unison.

  “Alright, who’s helping me clean up?” Don asked, and Linda gladly got up to start clearing the table. I bit my lower lip, looking over at Hunter, knowing exactly what he’d been doing in changing the subject.

  He didn’t want me to tell his parents about the bridge project. Maybe he didn’t want me to talk about development in Kinley at all. He’d gone from zero to sixty in a few seconds flat in an effort to change the conversation, and he’d succeeded.

  It hurt me more than it should have. I knew that it was going to take a while to get Hunter to understand the project, but right now it just felt like he was an adversary instead of a friend.

  I wanted him on my side. I wanted him to support my vision, but I had no clue how to make him see it how I saw it.

  Frustration bubbled up inside me with no outlet. Typically I’d go to the gym or write out a list, but I was stuck here, with no clue how to handle the situation.

  I leaned over to Hunter, close to his ear. “I know what you’re doing,” I whispered.

  I could smell his scent, distracting as ever.

  He turned to me, scanning my face for a second. And then his lips were close to my ear. “Trust me,” he said, his voice barely audible, “unless you’re fond of the idea of losing limbs tonight, don’t bring up the bridge.” I could smell the faint hint of lime and gin on his breath.

  I sighed, leaning back. “They’re going to find out soon, anyway,” I said, not bothering to keep my voice down anymore.

  Hunter immediately leaned back in, pressed his finger to my lips, and fixed his gaze on me like he was pinning me to a wall.

  Fuck. That shouldn’t have made my cock perk up the way it did. But Hunter’s finger was on my mouth, and that only made me think of a million things that weren’t the Kinley Bridge project.

  “Shh,” he said forcefully, then removed his finger. Caleb shot a look at him from across the room. I realized he’d seen the whole interaction. Hunter rolled his eyes, but Caleb only grinned in response.

  What the hell was that about?

  “Alright, Zeke’s on me tonight,” Don called out from where he and Linda were stationed at the sink.

  “Oh, fuck yes,” Caleb said.

  “Now you see, Gavin, Zeke’s is a local ice cream shop…” Linda said, turning to me and winking.

  It was her way of ribbing me again for being a Seattle outsider. Of course I remembered Zeke’s—the ice cream shop at the center of town was synonymous with summer in Kinley. In all my years trying fancy ice cream places in Seattle, nothing had ever compared to it—the crisp caramelized sugar in the waffle cones, the insanely fresh and potent blackberry pie ice cream. Zeke’s also specialized in boozy milkshakes, and it was a one-stop shop for anyone on the island on a summer night.

  And I knew better than to tell Hunter’s parents that I was avoiding sugar. I would get Zeke’s, for old time’s sake, and I would deal with the inevitable headache and stomachache later on.

  It was only when I stood up that I realized I was somewhere approaching drunk. Don didn’t mess around with the gin in his drinks.

  ...And now it was becoming a problem.

  Because Hunter had stood up, too, and now I was singularly fixated on that perfect fucking ass.

  It didn’t help that he was currently bent over the kitchen table, reaching to pick up the rest of the silverware. Was it going to be this much of a goddamn nightmare every time I was around him? I thought I had gotten over it by now, but I was apparently permanently, hopelessly attracted to my best friend.

  When he turned around and caught me staring, I felt heat rising in my cheeks. I had to get the fuck out before I embarrassed myself further.

  I excused myself to the restroom and I took a few deep breaths after splashing water on my face.

  What in the hell was happening to me? I hadn’t been focusing on my goals, which were usually the guideposts of my daily life. The most pertinent one for today was that I was not allowed to freak out about Hunter Wilson, and now that I was a few gin and tonics into the evening, I needed to keep that in mind.

  It didn’t matter that I knew him like the back of my hand. That the second he’d tried to steer the conversation away from real estate development, I’d known what he was doing. It didn’t matter that in the last hour, I’d been consciously trying to keep my legs away from brushing against his under the table, or that I couldn’t stop thinking about how that lime on his lips might taste.

  I had to summon my willpower, to try harder.

  I left the bathroom full of resolve, ready to approach the rest of the night like a business deal.

  And then when I stepped out and saw Hunter by the front door, everything was shot.

  He was sitting on the steps of the staircase, waiting where he always used to wait for me when we were kids. For a split second it felt like no time had passed at all: there was Hunter, running a hand through his fluff of hair, leaning against the banister.

  Suddenly there was no bridge project, no time and distance between us at all. We were still just Hunter and Pepper, waiting to walk down to Zeke’s on a summer night when we were sixteen, after sneaking into his parents’ liquor cabinet and taking a sloppy shot of vodka straight from the bottle.

  I loved him so stupidly much, and it was never going to change.

  He scooted over on the step, patting the empty space next to him. I went and sat there, breathing deep as he leaned against me. He had absolutely no clue what that did to me.

  “I miss this,” he said softly. I could feel his breath, gentle at my neck.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. It was the only word I could manage.

  He knocked his knee against mine playfully. “Can we go back to the way things were? Before, y’know, we were supposed to be mortal enemies?”

  “Oh, Hunter,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m not… we aren’t enemies.”

  “Good, because it would be super weird to love my enemy this much,” he said. “Just… don’t bring up the bridge around my parents, okay? Not yet. Not tonight.”

  “But why?”

  He paused. “I just… want one night,” he said. “One night where we can pretend everything’s fine. Before everyone gets so pissed off about local politics their heads pop off.”

  I let out a long breath. “Okay,” I said, relenting. “For tonight. But then I have to keep doing my job.”

  He nodded. “We’ll talk about
that later,” he said. “Tonight I’m going to pretend your job is something else. Want to be a ballet dancer? A firefighter? A professional golfer?”

  “Nah, those all sound like they require talents that I don’t have.”

  “Alright. Then… for tonight, you… don’t have a job. You’re just Pepper. Okay?”

  He reached out, squeezing my thigh.

  I puffed out a laugh, warmth flooding my whole body. I could have lived in that moment for the rest of my life.

  “You’ve got to agree, Gavin, or else we don’t have a deal,” he said.

  “I agree, I agree,” I said.

  “You mean it? You’re a man who knows his way around a verbal contract. Tonight you’re mine, no take-backs.”

  “Tonight I’m yours,” I said. “Promise. Pinky-promise, no take-backs.”

  “Excellent.” He stood up, holding out his hand for me. I clasped it and he pulled me up, just like he used to back when I was skin and bones and he was the more athletic of the two of us.

  His eyes were unfair. He could ask me to give him the whole world, and I’d die trying to get it for him.

  “Let’s go get ice cream,” he said.

  A half hour later, I stepped out of the crowded bustle of Zeke’s, following Caleb and Hunter through the side door of the building. People tended to congregate inside in droves, but there was a back patio with a few umbrella tables and string lights hanging between the trees where we always used to hang out.

  The memory was so vivid that I was almost surprised there wasn’t a haphazard crowd of teenagers outside tonight. Caleb, Hunter and I were the only ones out here—the air was a little brisk still, but I needed the respite from the chaos.

  I took my first long sip of the rum and blackberry pie milkshake, and I swear, it was like a religious experience.

  “Oh my God,” I said, furrowing my brow and immediately took another sip. “Did they start adding pure endorphins to the mix? This is unreasonably good.”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me,” Hunter said, taking a sip of his own chocolate Kahlua shake.

  “This is the first refined sugar I’ve had in over a year,” I admitted.

  Hunter looked at me like I’d just physically hurt him. “You’re killing me, Gavin. How does it hold up?”

  I took another long sip. “It’s almost like there’s a reason people eat this stuff so much. God damn, it is perfect.”

  Hunter smiled. “Welcome back,” he said, “to sugar, and… to Kinley.” He reached out, using his thumb to wipe away a tiny drip of milkshake from my lower lip. I fought an urge to grip his hand there, to kiss his thumb and a dozen other parts of his body.

  I was drunk, on booze and on Hunter, too. I was startled to realize at that moment that I was enjoying being on the island. Crickets sounded out all around us, punctuated by the occasional early summer croaking frog. When I looked up, I could actually see the stars for the first time in who knew how long. It was typically cloudy in our region to begin with, but even when it wasn’t, I was often in my office so long that I left bleary-eyed and focused only on the quickest route home so I could fall asleep.

  It wasn’t often that I stopped and looked at the stars, especially in a place so unpolluted by city lights.

  I was slipping already.

  It was obvious.

  I’d only been on the island for one day and here I was having sugar and dairy, tons of alcohol, barely thinking of my goals or my work. I was completely losing myself in Hunter again, so quickly, as if nothing I’d done in the past two years had helped me get over my best friend.

  I didn’t know if I even felt guilty, either. If I had any guilt, I was content to ignore it, to fly in the face of everything I’d been working toward.

  I just wanted Hunter. Every instinct in me was telling me to lean in and kiss him—silent urges telling me to give in, to give up.

  He reached out to me, putting the straw of his shake close to my mouth, offering me some of his drink. I closed my lips around it, drinking in the cool rush of incredibly rich chocolate. Hunter was always like that—anything he had, he’d share with me.

  Who fucking cares if your friendship and career are ruined—one kiss would be worth it.

  I had always felt that way about Hunter.

  Only now, it wasn’t quite so easy to resist.

  5

  Hunter

  Should brushing my thumb along Gavin’s lip have given me a hard-on?

  No. No it should not have.

  But I also was now trying to figure out the best way to stealthily arrange my junk without him or Caleb catching on to the fact that I had an extremely insistent tent in my pants. A tent that showed no signs of disappearing.

  Yes. I absolutely, unequivocally had a hard-on for my childhood best friend.

  I felt strange, like I’d accidentally gotten into someone else’s car and was slowly realizing it wasn’t my own. Everything felt similar—I knew what it was to be turned on, to be attracted to a hot guy, to want to fuck.

  But I had no idea how to navigate the fact that those feelings were happening because of Gavin.

  “There really is no better ice cream in the world,” Gavin said. He seemed to be avoiding all eye contact with me, marveling at his shake.

  “I missed Zeke’s when I was gone, too,” Caleb said, taking a big bite of his waffle cone. “Nothing like it in the world.”

  “I am glad you’re back here too, Caleb,” Gavin said. “And you seem to be doing phenomenally well.”

  Caleb nodded. “Working at Luna’s Diner.”

  “That’s fantastic,” Gavin replied. “You enjoy it?”

  “Not a ton of money, but it keeps me busy. I need to do something on my feet.”

  “God, I remember the eggs being amazing at Luna’s Diner. I’ll have to come by with my team sometime this week.”

  Caleb fixed his eyes on Gavin.

  Shit. I knew that look. That was the look Caleb gave people when he was about to be way too honest.

  “Is that going to be before or after you guys bulldoze the diner to make room for a new condo project?” Caleb said.

  Knew it.

  “Jesus, Caleb,” I said, slapping his shoulder.

  Caleb just shrugged, lifting an eyebrow. “Am I wrong?”

  I typically loved the fact that my brother couldn’t help himself from being brutally honest—it was refreshing, and often necessary. But at times like this, I also kind of wanted to sock him right in his stupid tattooed arm.

  Gavin looked a little disappointed, but not exactly surprised. Even though I agreed with Caleb, I felt an instinctual urge to protect Gavin. I’d stood up for him back in school, and this felt no different. Gavin didn’t need protecting now, but I couldn’t help myself.

  “We get it, Caleb, you’re a badass,” I said, rolling my eyes. “And we can definitely talk about this later, but now’s not the time.”

  “It’s fine, Hunter,” Gavin said, his voice soft. “I get it.”

  “Doesn’t mean Caleb has to be a total dickhead to you.”

  “Whatever,” Caleb responded, waving us off. “I’m going to go check on Mom and Dad. Susan Millred probably has them caught in a two-hour-long conversation about knit socks. Have fun talking about destroying our hometown.”

  Caleb disappeared back into the shop, leaving Gavin and me outside on our own. I clenched my teeth, taking in a breath.

  “C’mere,” I said to Gavin, nodding my head to the brick side of the building away from the door.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, leaning against the cool brick facade.

  Gavin shook his head. “It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay.”

  He shrugged. “There’s going to be a lot of that coming my way, from a lot of Kinley residents. I know that. I might as well get used to it now.”

  I bit my lower lip in an attempt to stay quiet, but I failed pretty quickly. “Yeah,” I said softly. “There’s going to be a lot of pushback.”

  He nodde
d.

  “And that’s why you shouldn’t go through with building the fucking bridge, Gav.”

  Gavin just smiled, puffing out a laugh as he looked down at me, leaning against the wall next to me. The light was dimmer back here, only illuminated by the string lights between the trees on the other side of the walkway.

  And Jesus fucking jumping chipmunk, something about it made him look beautiful. He was beautiful, to begin with, of course, but it didn’t always hit me in quite this way. And I knew I was a little drunk, but it was obscene how sexy he looked right now, the slight stubble on his face only highlighting his perfect jawline.

  Had it always been that perfect? Was I losing my mind because Caleb had idiotically suggested that Gavin used to have a crush on me?

  I was steeped in a strange mix of frustration and love and, weirdly, an increasing desire to press my body up against Gavin’s.

  “You have not changed a bit, my friend,” Gavin said, sucking down at least another inch of his milkshake. He was drunk, too, I could see now—he seemed so much more relaxed than he’d been at the cafe earlier, or even at my house. I could have bounced a tennis ball off the tension in the house earlier, but now Gavin was actually looking at me, for what felt like the first time in years.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I responded. “How haven’t I changed?”

  Gavin’s eyes moved, then, looking me up and down from head to toe, slowly and methodically. Yowza. There went my cock again, ready and at attention, feeling Gavin’s gaze on me. I willed it not to get too visibly hard. No matter how drunk we both were, I wouldn’t know how to explain a hard-on to Gavin right now.

  He looked me in the eyes again. “It means… I forgot you have too much power over me,” Gavin said.

  I snorted. “I feel like I don’t have enough,” I replied. “You’re the one with all the power now.”

  Gavin’s gaze was intense now as he watched me, in a way I couldn’t interpret.

  “I… think I need to sit down,” he finally said. He broke eye contact and moved over toward one of the little brick benches under the lights.