All that frustration stiffens up my spine. I feel an inch taller at once. “And why the hell should I want to catch up with you?”
Chad flinches, taken aback.
Even without seeing his face, I feel his surprise.
Inspired by it, I take a challenging step toward him. “Maybe it didn’t mean much to you, Chad, but the way you and your friends treated me—humiliating me, taunting me, tormenting me all those years in high school—did a number on me. It hurt deeply. It made me angry. It made me cynical. It embittered my soul. It turned me against everything and anything that reminded me of small-town, small-minded, small-hearted assholes like you.”
The air between us vanishes.
I’m standing inches from his shadowed face.
The tension is wire-tight between our bodies, and neither of us dare to move.
“Wow,” breathes Chad at last.
I flinch. Wow …?
Then Chad slowly brings a hand to his head, cups his hat, and pulls it off. It takes all the shadow away, revealing to me his gentle blue eyes, his high-set, model-boy cheekbones, his sharp jawline dressed in a light, sexy stubble, his dimples at the corners of his permanently smirking mouth, his pillowy, inviting lips, his cute, round ears, his squared chin, his strong nose …
It’s too much Chad all at once.
It takes everything in me not to let my knees buckle.
How often can you say the mere sight of someone makes you want to faint? I’ve never in my life wanted to faint just at the sight of a man as beautiful as him, standing so close to me in the dark that I can feel the steam coming off his strong, muscular body.
He pierces my heart with his baby blue eyes.
Then he says: “I was sure a mean, mean piece of shit to you, wasn’t I.”
“Yeah,” I snap back. “You were.”
“And you didn’t deserve it one bit. I should’ve been a better … a much, much better man to you.”
“Yeah,” I agree firmly, though my resolve is fast fleeing me.
“I had so many buddies who just … followed suit, like a bunch a’ sheep, huh? I could’ve set such a better example. I could’ve been the change us teenagers needed, especially livin’ in a place like this, a place like Spruce, where you just plain shouldn’t treat your neighbors like that.”
“We weren’t neighbors,” I cut in awkwardly.
“In Spruce, we’re all neighbors.”
I swallow and fight a blush on my face. He was being figurative.
I don’t know what to make of this version of Chad.
I think I’m still trying to figure out whether he’s being sincere or totally dicking around with me. Are all his buddies about to jump out of the bushes, laughing? Is Chad about to break this good ol’ boy character he’s playing and tackle me to the concrete? Is he going to finish up here, then return inside and laugh with his friends about what a gullible, fruity dumbass I am?
He presses his hat to his chest, bows his head slightly, then eyes me. “I can’t defend that … kid I was back then. But I can speak on behalf of myself right now. And all I got to say is, I’m sorry.”
I stare at his beautiful eyes.
What in cowboy hell am I supposed to do with that? Forgive the gorgeous man? Let it go and move on with my life?
“A lot has happened in ten years,” he goes on, lowering the hat to his side, then running his free hand through his light brown hair—all choppy, short, and as messy as a country boy who just climbed out of a haystack. “I ain’t the kid I was, that’s for sure.”
With every word that falls from those lips, I find myself less and less willing to fight.
This is what he did with every teacher who tried to flunk him. He sweet-talked. He was known for it. He sweet-talked every girl he wanted to every dance Spruce High threw. He charmed his way into every person’s heart—everyone he wasn’t bullying, that is.
I wonder if he treated anyone else the way he treated me.
Why can’t I recall seeing him torment anyone else my whole four years at Spruce High? Why was it always just me?
“Listen, I know I’m about the last guy you were hopin’ to chat with,” says Chad, having no idea, “but if I’m being totally honest here, you’re one of the few I was lookin’ forward to seeing here.”
“Really?” I blurt, a tone of happy surprise in my voice—before I quickly regain my resolve and deepen my register. “Really?” I try again more sassily, brows furrowed.
“Yeah.” Chad lets out a short, amused laugh. “Really.”
I stare at him. “Why?”
“Well, shoot, Lance, ‘cause you’re pretty much Spruce legend, don’t you know? I mean, there ain’t been any openly gay teens since you. Well, other than Billy, but no one really counts him for some reason. I mean, look, you’ve even gone off to Hollywood—”