The only person in our family who had never pretended, never lied, was our youngest brother Will. He’d become a bit of an outcast for it, making the dynamic me, Nolan, Brad…then Will on his own.
Now I knew how Will felt, and it fucking sucked.
Something thumped the side of my head, and I looked down to see an apple core rolled up in a napkin hit the ground.
“Hello? Earth to Jonathan? We were talking to you,” Nolan said.
“Nice, fuck-face.” I bent down and picked up his trash. “What did you say?”
“I asked if you had plans this weekend,” Brad said.
I shrugged. “I was gonna go into Atlanta and see Will.”
Everything got quiet between us, awkwardness and tension making a home there. It was sad that it happened so easily now, or at just the mention of Will’s name. Before I came out, I never would have gone into the city to hang out with him, and me doing that reminded Nolan and Brad that I was gay too—well, Will was bi. He liked women as well. I’d tried, tried for years and years to convince myself I was attracted to women, but I could never do it.
It was so fucked up that me being gay made things weird. That going to spend time with Will made things weird, as well, but that part I could blame on myself too. We’d never been fair to our brother, always making excuses for why we weren’t close to him, when really, it was because we were homophobes—me, clearly internalized.
“So you guys are like, um…pretty close now,” Nolan said.
Jesus, did he have to say it like the words got stuck in his mouth? “He’s our brother.”
“Yeah, but how often did you hang out with him before you were…gay?” Brad asked, making me roll my eyes.
“I was always gay, jackass. I just lied about it. And we didn’t hang out with him because we’re dickheads.”
“Fuck that. I don’t care that he’s gay,” Nolan countered, and I didn’t bother to correct him and remind them Will was bi. “I don’t spent time with him because we don’t have shit in common. I still love the little twerp.”
“Yeah, same,” Brad agreed.
And maybe in some ways they were right. I knew they loved him. But even though we tried to get past it—tried to become more of a family once I admitted I was gay, and Will shared how he’d felt blacklisted his whole life—we were still a fucking mess. What made this even shittier was that sometimes it was awkward with me and Will too. I’d gone right along with Brad and Nolan, giving Will the shaft before I’d come out to him. I’d left him to deal with feeling like an outsider all alone, while internally I felt the same.
Oh, and that didn’t even include the time when Will brought his boyfriend home and I realized he’d been one of my anonymous hookups. Jameson had given me a handjob, and I’d run out on him without returning the favor. Both Will and Jameson said it was in the past, and it didn’t seem to bother them, but I couldn’t be around them without feeling like the world’s biggest dickhead. It was another reminder of how I’d failed at basically fucking everything in my life. I was good at making a mess of things.
“Whatever. It doesn’t matter. Anyway, anything I need to know about work?” I’d always taken control of most things Carson Construction related. Keeping busy had helped me forget other shit. I was the oldest. I’d been Dad’s favorite, the one he’d wanted to take over the business. It had always rested on my shoulders.
Truth be told, we’d been struggling for a while. We’d almost had to call someone in to bail us out, and likely would have lost the company my father built. If Will hadn’t come through and helped with some funds, I wasn’t sure what would have happened. Nolan and Brad seemed to forget that, but I didn’t.
Speaking of, the two of them were looking back and forth at each other in a way that told me they had something to say. “What?”
Nolan spoke first. “Listen, um…we were talking, and things are steady right now but not too overwhelming. If you ever wanted to take some time off or something, this would be the perfect opportunity.”
I froze, my insides turning to ice. “Are you trying to fire me from my own business?”
Brad huffed. “You know that’s not what we’re doing, just like you also know you haven’t been into it for a while. You’ve been delegating more responsibilities to us and dropping the ball on things. We’re just trying to say that if you wanted to figure shit out, you can.”
“No one wants you to go anywhere,” Nolan added. “But it’s been a tough year for you, and, well, if there’s shit you wanna do or you need some time, we’ll be fine. You could come back anytime you wanted, obviously.”