Feel the Fire (Hotshots 3)

Wade made an indignant sound. “Hey, don’t I count? I’m already planning on being a regular on your couch. Bring on the pretty California people.”

“You count, but how about you let Walker have a chance to digest this news?” Even more than Heidi’s reaction, Tucker was studying Walker’s impassive face, noting the way he’d gone silent and still. “I know I’m kinda throwing this out there.”

Walker bit his lip and looked away. “I...uh... I need a minute. Alone.”

And with that, he fled the table, food barely touched, and headed to the backyard. Tucker’s heart sank all the way down to the floorboards. This wasn’t the reaction he’d hoped for at all. His whole body ached, a visceral pain at the idea that he’d hurt Walker.

“I need to go after him.” He stood, stopping Heidi with a hand. She had also left her chair and seemed ready to follow Walker.

“Yeah, I guess you do.” She gave him a frustrated look. “Try not to make this worse.”

“I’ll try.”

“Take your time.” Luis spoke for the first time since the chaos had broken out. “Don’t forget that you are a good dad.”

“Thanks.” That reminder did help as he made his way to the backyard where Walker was perched on the picnic table, hands on his knees, gaze off in the mountains in the distance.

“Hey.” Tucker carefully sat next to him. “I know you said you wanted to be alone—”

“I do.” Walker didn’t even turn his direction.

“But we should talk. You know our thing. No one goes to bed angry. We work things out.”

“We do.” Walker’s shoulders slumped, voice far from happy about that fact. “And I’m not angry exactly.”

“What are you?” Tucker tried hard to keep his expression neutral. Whatever Walker wanted to express, he wanted to hear, even if it was hard.

“Sad.”

Ooof. Yeah, that was a hard one all right. He could almost deal easier with an angry kid than a sad one. “Okay. Fair enough. Does it help if I say that I’m sorry you’re sad?”

“I dunno.” Walker’s voice was soft with a hopeless edge. “Guess I figured that at least you’d be here. If I stayed, at least I’d have you.”

Fuck. Walker might as well have plunged his fork into Tucker’s chest. Damn. He needed a moment to quiet his breathing before he could reply. “You’ll always have me. Always. Doesn’t matter where I live.”

“I know. But it’s not the same. Might be worth it to stay if it meant seeing you and stuff.”

“Walker. We’re always going to have that bond. But you have to stay for you. Not me.”

Walker waved away that advice with a flick of his hand. Big hand, bigger than Tucker’s now, but still a lost little boy expression on his face. “And it’s more fucking change. I just want everything to stay the same.”

“I get that.” Tucker didn’t even have the heart to call him on the cursing, instead patting his back. “But that’s not how life works.”

“I know.” Walker shrugged away from Tucker’s touch.

“I’m sorry. This is hard on you, and you’re already having a rough time. I didn’t mean to pile on that.”

Maybe Luis was right. Maybe he should have waited to tell the boys. This was going to be hard regardless, but right then it was brutal, his desire to protect Walker at war with his conviction that he was doing the right thing.

“Are you moving because of me?” Walker twisted his upper body toward Tucker. “Because you think that will make me follow?”

“No.” He honestly hadn’t even considered that possibility in all his calculations. Sure, there were marine biology programs in California Walker had liked once upon a time, but Tucker wasn’t about to use his move as bait. “I know it won’t. You have to make your own choices. Just like I do.”

“I get that.” Walker’s voice was calmer now and he lowered it further, almost to a whisper. “But how do you know this is really what you want to do?”

Ah. And there they got to the heart of Walker’s quandary, one Tucker wished like anything he could solve for him. But maybe the best he could do was simply be a good example.

“Because I have some dreams worth chasing. I don’t want to hurt you, and I’m going to do my damnedest to make things as easy as possible on you, but I need to do this.”

He braced himself for a biting response from Walker, but instead Walker was silent a long moment, seeming to shrink into himself before finally whispering, “You’re brave.”

“Brave?” Tucker hadn’t been expecting that, didn’t know how to respond.

“Because it’s a risk. What if it doesn’t work out? What if you hate it there?”

“Those are chances I have to take. If I hate it, then I’ll readjust my plans. I’ll talk to Luis, come up with something else that works.”