Page 22 of Find Me Again (KRK Security #3)

Ryan was in his parents' kitchen, making coffee and tea for everybody, when he got a call from Neil. Ignoring the way his heart skipped a beat—they were usually texting, not calling each other—he picked up right away.

"Hey."

He almost asked if Neil was okay, but it didn't feel right. Neil had probably answered a bunch of questions today already, so the least Ryan could do was to give him space.

"Hey, I'm about to drive back and thought… Are you busy?"

From the sounds of it, Neil had him on a speaker phone in his car, and Ryan pictured him sitting there, alone and still reeling from the interview, no matter how it went. As Ryan glanced around the kitchen, the question must have hung between them for too long, because Neil spoke up again.

"Shit, sorry, of course you're busy, it's Boxing Day, for fuck's sake, and I'm— Sorry. I guess I'm—"

"Hey, hey, it's fine," Ryan told him. "It's fine. Tell me what you have in mind."

"They're airing it in, like, an hour and a half, and I was planning to listen to it at home with my parents, but I thought that, maybe, you and I could…" Neil's voice grew hesitant and quiet. "This is stupid."

It wasn't stupid at all, not to Ryan. Neil wanting to share this with him felt important in ways Ryan couldn't quite explain.

"It's anything but," he told Neil, staring at the counter in front of him as his heart fluttered in his chest. "At least not the part that I heard so far, okay? So give me the rest and let me decide."

"I had this idea of the two of us up on the hill, listening to the interview together," Neil admitted slowly after a bit of silence. "Dramatic, huh?" he added with a chuckle, obviously trying to cut it with a joke, but Ryan wasn't having it.

"Yeah, well, you're entitled to some dramatics on a day like this. I'm in."

"You are?"

The disbelief in Neil's voice made Ryan shake his head. This was not the time to get into it, but, honestly, how could this moment not be important to Ryan as well? If only for the teenage version of himself, who would've loved it so much.

"Of course," he said instead.

"Shit, okay, I'll—I'll pick you up at your parents' place?"

Ryan looked down at himself. "At my brother's. I'm not dressed for the occasion right now, so I need to change."

"Okay," Neil whispered, still in disbelief, but maybe everything was hitting him just now.

It was definitely hitting Ryan.

He stared at the counter after they disconnected, full of cups and mugs in different colors and sizes, willing himself to move, yet feeling stuck in place.

"Ryan?"

His mom's voice pulled him out of his stupor, right before he saw her walk up to the dishwasher with another small stack of empty plates.

They'd never seemed to run out of those during the holidays.

"Are you leaving?"

"Yes, I need to go, but I promise I'll be back for dinner, okay?"

"Honey, it's not that I'm trying to tell you what to do," she said with a sigh, in a tone signaling she was about to do exactly that, "but are you sure spending so much time with Neil is actually good for you?"

"I wouldn't do it if I thought it was bad for me, Mom."

Dangerous, yes. But not bad.

"I worry he's going to hurt you again."

Ryan hung his head for a moment. It wasn't like that thought hadn't crossed his mind, but…

"We're not the same people, now, and our situation is different. And even if it weren't, I don't want the fear of something going wrong stop me from living my life."

It was almost funny how Ryan had never actually admitted to either of his parents that him and Neil used to be a couple, and yet they were now talking about it as if they'd gone over that part already.

"Besides," Ryan added, fiddling with a mug decorated with a reindeer nose, "this is a really big day for him. I wouldn't skip out on the Boxing Day if it wasn't important, I promise."

The whole world would know soon enough, but Ryan wasn't going to be spilling the story to anyone, even his mom.

"Okay," she said with a shake of her head. "I hope it turns out well for you."

Me too , he thought. Me too .

* * *

As soon as Ryan got into Neil's car, he could tell Neil was calmer than he sounded over the phone. Not calm, exactly, but still far from the nervous wreck he could've been.

"I feel like I'm about to play the last game in the finals, and I suddenly have no idea how to even get onto the ice," Neil said in greeting, and Ryan took a moment to consider his reply.

"I'm pretty sure most of the hard work is behind you now, so it's the last period of that game, if anything."

Neil snorted as he headed towards the hill. "I wish."

Not wanting to discuss the semantics, Ryan changed gears.

"How was it? The interviewer, I mean, and the others?"

"They did not see that coming, that's for sure. They were ready with the usual 'hometown idol returning for Christmas' kinds of questions, not this. They were professional about it, though. Even thanked me, after, for choosing their platform to share." Neil shook his head. "It was weird but fine, so I'm counting that as a win."

"It sounds like a win, yeah."

They got up onto the hill less than ten minutes before the interview, but then they simply sat there, waiting. Once again, Ryan was taken aback with how much calmer Neil seemed—as if most of the tension he'd been carrying for weeks suddenly disappeared. Could that be only from the weight of his secret no longer dragging him down?

"Listen, for what it's worth—" Ryan started, but the song on the radio ended and the intro to the afternoon show began playing.

"Hello, everyone, welcome to our show. I'm your host, Gabriel Ferrera, and I hope you're having a good time and you're not in a food coma yet, because today's show may be the biggest surprise you've got this holiday season. We're talking to one of our local sport heroes, Neil Hopkins, and, in his own words, he's been more honest in this interview than ever before. You do not want to miss it. But first, the word from our sponsors—"

"This is weird," Neil muttered, staring at the radio. "It's not like I don't know what happens, and the suspense is still killing me."

"Do you listen to your interviews often?"

Neil shook his head. "More like never. I tried, at first, so I could learn from it, but I couldn't sit through them for long."

"No wonder you find this weird, then. It is weird."

Before Neil could say anything, the interview started, and they both tuned in to listen.

The first few questions were easy—the holidays, the hockey season so far, his injury. Neil had a good flow with the interviewer, and there were a few laughs here and there.

"Do you have any plans for the rest of the break?" the guy said and, from the way Neil's hands tightened on the steering wheel so hard it squeaked under his palms, Ryan knew this was it.

"Well, I think I'm going to be busy after this interview airs."

"Oh? And how's that?"

"You see, I've spent the last few weeks thinking about my life and my career, and what it may look like going forward. I've talked to the people around me, my family, my team, and I've received an enormous amount of support which makes it… maybe not easy, I'm not going to lie, but easier to open up about the fact that I'm gay."

Ryan inhaled sharply. He'd known it was coming, he'd known , but hearing it…

He glanced at Neil, who had his eyes closed and his head tilted back to lean against the headrest.

Over the radio, the host seemed to get his voice back.

"Okay, I think I heard it right, but I'm making sure—did you just say you're gay?"

"Yeah." Neil sounded half-amused, half-disbelieving. "Yeah, I did. For years, I thought it's my business and mine alone, and, truth be told, I still think it's my business. But we live in a world where it matters, and I'd be lying if I said that my decision to stay silent until now wasn't dictated at least partially by how much it may matter to some, in a bad way."

"What changed?"

"I guess I finally realized what I could gain and stopped focusing so much on the things I may lose."

"Nice," Ryan murmured. It was a good line, even if it was only that, given how Neil had been forced into it.

"Thanks," Neil whispered. "It's the truth, if not the entire truth."

Over the radio the host tried to dig a little deeper into why Neil was doing it now.

"Because now is the time," came Neil's reply. "I understand it's probably cryptic for everybody else, but it's true for me. Over the years, I heard so many times that everyone has their own timeline for coming out, and I wasn't so sure about that, but now I can finally say that I agree. I'm as ready as I could be, in ways that I weren't before."

"You said that your decision to stay in the closet was dictated by you knowing there would be backlash. Do you not worry about that anymore?"

"Of course I worry. I love hockey, I love the game, my team, and the fans. However, I'm also aware that there are people out there who won't be happy to cheer for or play against a gay man. This is the world we live in, unfortunately, and it will be a challenging time for me. But I figured I can face it like I've faced any other challenge in my career—with the tenacity I bring to every game, and also with the incredible support of my team, my family, and, I hope, the vast majority of our fans. What I want people to understand is, I was always a gay hockey player. Every win and every loss, that's me winning and losing as a gay man. I'm not going to play any differently from now on, because I'm not becoming somebody else. This is who I've always been. So if some people see me differently after today, that's on them, not on me."

"I think that's a perfect place to end for today—"

The host was still talking, but Ryan stopped listening, too busy pulling Neil in for a kiss. There was a rush flowing through him, buzzing under his skin, and he didn't know what to do with it other than channel it into this, right here—the connection that cracked him open all over again, healing most of the wounds he'd still carried, and making room for something new.

"That was amazing," he whispered against Neil's lips, then leaning away to see him grinning.

"The interview or the kiss?"

They both laughed, all the joy and the pent-up stress needing a release.

"Both, of course," Ryan said after they calmed down, and Neil offered him a softer smile.

"I agree about the kiss, at least. The interview… could have been much worse."

"The host seemed okay, especially caught off guard like that. He avoided the most cringe-worthy questions."

"Well, I have a general list of topics the interviewers aren't supposed to ask me about, so that helps. And with how vague that list is, I didn't have to add anything to it for today. It's more 'don't ask about any romantic and/or sexual relationships', not 'don't ask me if I have a gay lover'."

Gay lover . Breath caught, Ryan turned away to stare at the valley below them, his emotions all over the place.

"Or a boyfriend," Neil added, unsure, and Ryan had to look back at him. "Listen, this is probably…" Neil ran a hand through his hair. "We should probably talk. About things. Us. What we're doing."

A small part of Ryan expected Neil to jump out of the car trying to escape this conversation, not to actually initiate it.

Now Ryan was the one caught completely off guard.

"Okay," he finally said, but didn't add anything else, wanting Neil to speak on that first.

Which might not be fair, given that Neil had already gone through one very difficult conversation today, but Ryan felt like he deserved not to be the one doing the harder work here.

"I—" Neil stared at the steering wheel. "Fuck, how does anyone actually do these things?" he muttered, which prompted a small laugh out of Ryan, breaking some of the tension in the car.

"How about you tell me what you want and we'll go from there," Ryan offered gently.

As if his own heart wasn't trying to escape through his chest.

"What I want and what is actually possible may be two very different things," Neil said, letting go of the steering wheel and curling his hands in his lap.

Ryan stared ahead, his heart sinking. He'd heard this song before. He could already tell what came next.

"I guess it depends on whether or not you still want me on the other side of the blowout that's about to happen," Neil continued, and Ryan turned back to him so fast, his neck protested painfully. "I don't even know what I can offer you right now, let alone later."

Neil wasn't looking at him, but Ryan heard the sincerity in his voice and the words that were an invitation—to the unknown, yes, but still an invitation.

"Your call," Ryan told him quietly, and when Neil glanced up, Ryan gave him a half-smile. "It's not really about the wanting part, I think we have that covered. But it's one thing when we take a Christmas trip down the memory line, and another when it's real life. And I can't afford to confuse the two." Or hope for too much . "So what I need is for you to figure out what you can—and want to—give me, and we can go from there. It doesn't have to be today," he added quickly, when Neil opened his mouth. "I know you have a million things to do and a million people to talk to. I'm sure your phone is going to explode any second now. But I can't say yes or no when I don't know what we're talking about, here."

Neil swallowed hard.

"But you're not… completely against it."

Ryan might have put forward all the safety precautions he could think of, but at the end of the day, he still needed to decide whether to take this shot or not.

And there was only one answer, really.

"I'm not against it, no."

This time it was Neil who rushed forward to kiss him, and Ryan welcomed him happily.

Maybe hope was going to kick him in the ass and leave him bruised and broken all over again.

Or maybe it was going to make things exactly right.