The room fell very still.
“But do have your boss give my boss my regards,” he finished cheerfully.
As Kage returned to his office, Stafford’s gaze swept the room.
I waved.
Ian did too.
The “fuck you” was implied.
THAT NIGHT at home, without me even seeing it coming, Ian and I got into it again. It was good that we kept it out of work—both of us were being really careful about not talking about our personal life—but the second we crossed the threshold, the underlying issue exploded.
It was all my fault.
I wanted more than he had ever even considered, and because I’d given voice to my desire, I’d fucked everything up. What was sad was that I always did that, always wanted it all instead of being happy with what I had. My friends had different theories about why I pushed when the person I cared about—and in this case: desperately, madly, loved—wasn’t ready. The idea everyone liked the best was that because I was a foster kid who was passed around from pillar to post until I was legal, when I saw my happily ever after, I went after it like a charging bull. In Ian’s case, and only his, I could concede their point. In the past, it had been a test, me pushing to see how serious the other person was, see if they’d stay if I got serious too fast. But with Ian, it was all about me having him right there for the rest of my life. I couldn’t imagine it any other way.
In my defense, I thought Ian wanted me not simply as his partner on and off the job, but for more. It felt like it, it looked like it, so I assumed. There was a reason that was bad, and my mistake was in not checking.
“It’s not that I don’t want the same shit you want.” Ian sighed from where he was sitting at the table, peeling the label off an empty bottle of the Gumballhead I kept for him. “I just don’t get why it has to be that.”
“You don’t get why I want forever and ever, ’til death do us part?”
“No, that I get. I just don’t get the need for the ring and the piece of paper.”
Maybe it was stupid, but I couldn’t help how I felt any more than he could help how he didn’t. It was that part that was killing me.
The issue, he said, was not that he didn’t want to get married; the issue was that he didn’t understand why I wanted to so badly.
“Forget I asked,” I snapped, clearing the table after dinner.
“How can I forget it?” he replied irritably, following me to the kitchen. “You want something, you asked, I said no, and now everything’s all fucked up.”
“So it’s all on me,” I retorted, rounding on him.
“Well, yeah, you know it is.”
“You’re saying it’s stupid to ask for what I want?”
“No, but it didn’t go like you planned, and now you’re saying just forget it, but how does that work? You can’t just erase it and pretend nothing happened. You want something and you put it out there, and now we have to deal with it.”
I crossed my arms. “Why don’t you want to be married to me?”
Heavy sigh. “You know why.”
“Tell me again.”
“Because it limits you and it makes my life hard.”
“In what way?”
“You’ll never be promoted,” he said, his voice charged with annoyance.
“I disagree.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Fine, I’m an idiot. I don’t care.”
“Well, I do! The guys on my team might be okay with me, but no one else will be. You’re basically asking me to end my military career just so you can have a goddamn piece of paper!”
“It’s not just a piece of paper,” I argued, my voice brittle. “It’s a lot more than that.”
“Not to me,” he replied coldly. “It won’t change how I feel, I won’t love you any more or any less. It’s nothing, and it takes away who I am, what I do, and how far I can go.”
His words hollowed me out, and it physically hurt for a moment, like a punch in the gut, because it was the exact opposite for me. I wanted it all, always had. Husband, house, dog, and maybe even kids—I wasn’t sure about the fatherhood, not certain about the kind of dad I would make, but I sure as hell wanted the choice.
Ian was good with how things were, with the status quo, with us living together and being partners on the job, lovers at home. He was done moving forward; he was dug in where he was.
“Why can’t I be enough for you?” he asked hoarsely, clearly hurt.
“That’s bullshit,” I fired back. “It has nothing to do with enough and everything to do with wanting everyone to know that you’re with me.”
“But why does that matter?”