Page 139 of Guitars and Cages

His eyes gazed up at me, half-lidded and filled with exhaustion. “Are you short on beds?”

“No, nothing like that, it’s just been kind of traumatic around here, and I guess you can say we’re like big puppies—when things go wrong we curl up together in a pile.”

“I don’t mind. I, uhh, could kind of use a pile right about now. I want to stay with you, please. I haven’t been in the best of head spaces thinking I’d fucked up our friendship, so I don’t care if you’ve only got a corner of the bed for me to sleep on, as long as you don’t kick me out.”

It was still hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that he was bent out of shape over what had happened between us. But there was no way I was gonna send him home looking so messed up and exhausted, especially knowing what I knew about him and knowing what I’d do to myself if the shoe was on the other foot. Maybe it was a good thing, all the lies that had been revealed, all the truths that had come out, all the secrets we didn’t have to keep anymore.

As I led him up the stairs, I found myself wondering what I would have done had I still been living with Cole and Conner had asked to stay. Would I have let him, or would I have insisted we walk back to his place—or would he not have said it at all, knowing the way things had been with Cole? At least here we didn’t have to hide, and I didn’t have to face that choice, though I wanted to think I had learned my lesson, that I would have made the right choice and let him stay.

With my hand on his back, I guided him down the hall to my room, knowing I could take the easy way out and take him to Alexia’s room and the empty bed there, or down to the end of the hall, to the empty room that would have been Cole’s if he had wanted it. If it were anyone else, that’s exactly what I would have done, or driven them back home if they were too tired to go on their own, but Conner had been the one to start shining lights on all my secrets, and in a strange way, he’d already sort of wiggled his way into our odd little family.

Maybe we’d never be more than friends, with all the baggage I was carrying and the issues I was still struggling to deal with, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t protect each other and take care of one another and be there when the rest of the world threw us away. Wasn’t that what family was supposed to be, anyway? Smiles and tears, triumphs and tragedies; more than blood. But it was the moments that bound us together, and the promises we made that etched themselves on our souls.

I tucked Conner in beside Alexia, and then climbed in behind him, unable to keep from chuckling at the way Rory clung to Alexia and had wrapped himself around her in a tangle of arms and legs. I was pretty sure we’d all be in a big tangle by morning.

“Asher,” Conner’s sleepy voice muttered as I slid my arm around him and tried to get comfortable.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

I hugged him and pressed my chest to his back, feeling his warmth through my T-shirt. “No, Conner, thank you, for everything. You didn’t give up on me; how could I do any less?”

He hugged my arm to him, words dying between us. I didn’t close my eyes until he fell asleep, and even then I lay awake watching over him, Rory and Alexia, and understanding, for the first time, the way Morgan felt when he’d come in to check on us or watch us sleep. It was reassuring to know I wasn’t alone, but more than that, it was reassuring to know they were safe.

For a moment I let myself think about Cole, and felt the twinge of fear I always did when I thought about him leaving the city, going God knows where, never letting us know what was going on with him. I swallowed the lump in my throat and held Conner tighter. I loved my brother, I did, but feeling Conner in my arms and watching Alexia cuddle Rory, I knew I could never give this up to be with him; I could never go back to lying and hiding who I was just to try to belong. You shouldn’t have to try to belong to your family, anyway; that wasn’t the way it was supposed to work.

And maybe it took me a long-ass time to realize it, but finally I knew.

Family was the people who knew the truth and loved you anyway. And this...this was my family.