Page 49 of Chasing After You

“I’ll always keep you happy from now on.”

That made something inside me ache. I looked away.

“I know I’m intense,” he said, softer now. “I know I scared you at the start. Thinking back, I probably should’ve just approached you normally, but at the time, I was afraid you’d take one look at me and disappear all over again.”

I didn’t answer. He wasn’t wrong.

“I need you,” he added. “I need you too much.”

I nodded slowly, staring into the trees. I needed him, too.

He brushed his shoulder against mine. “You’re not still scared of me, are you?”

A beat of silence.

“No. I don’t think so. It’s more like… you confuse me.”

Dorian tilted his head back, letting out a quiet, satisfied laugh. “I confuse you?”

I leaned the rest of the way back, lying flat on the rock with my hands hooked together on my stomach. “Yeah.”

Dorian mirrored me, lying back to gaze at the sky above us. We stayed like that for a while, in comfortable silence, just taking in the world around us.

“I would do anything for you. You know that, right?” Dorian asked.

“You don’t have to do anything for me, Dori. Just being here is enough. You already brought us back together. There’s nothing more for you to do,” I quietly replied.

“Hm.”

I turned my head towards him, taking in his calm, serene expression. “I mean it, Dorian. You—I’m sorry I didn’t try to find you. I feel like a failure of an older brother.”

Dorian scoffed. “I both love and hate that word.”

“What word?”

“Brother.”

“Why do you hate it?”

Dorian turned his head as well, his right cheek lying against the cool surface of the rock, his striking eyes capturing me in their gaze. He murmured, “I wonder why?”

My brows furrowed. “I don’t understand,” I whispered, still entranced by those pools of blue sucking me in.

His small smile felt sad, but I wasn’t sure why. “I know.”

We didn’t speak for a while after that. Not because it was awkward, but because something about that moment begged for silence. The kind of quiet that didn’t need to be filled. It felt sacred, important. Heavy with things unsaid.

Eventually, I sat up again, shaking off the weight of the conversation like water off my shoulders. The stars were out in full now, glittering above the tree canopy like they’d been spilled from a broken jar. Dorian followed my lead, propping himself up on one arm, his eyes still fixed on me.

“You’re quiet tonight,” he said softly.

“Just thinking.”

He tilted his head. “About?”

I sighed, shrugging. “Stuff.”

Dorian gave me a look that saidbe serious.