Page 39 of Sam & Justin (Gomillion High Reunion #4)

Two Months After the Reunion

I spent the whole weekend with Justin, and after the hell of the last few weeks back in King’s Bay, it felt good.

It felt so good that come Monday, I didn’t hit the road as soon as he left for work.

I knew I needed to be home for my Tuesday appointments, but I wasn’t ready to leave.

That was a first when it came to Gomillion.

Hell, just a few months ago, I was counting down the moments until I left the second I crossed the town line.

Funny how things changed.

I wanted one more dinner with him, so I decided to stick around. I’d get home late, take a shower, and still get a good night’s sleep. I’d be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for my appointments, and more important than that, I’d be in a better place mentally.

But that meant I had eight hours to kill after he went to work. I thought about just vegging on his couch, and I did that for a few hours. But I was getting restless and antsy.

I decided to go for a short walk. There were a few shops down the road from Justin’s, and I was thinking about hitting one of the shops, picking up some stuff, and making a good dinner for Justin.

I wasn’t much of a cook, but I knew how to make enough to get by.

I could whip up a good chicken dish or something, depending on what the store had.

There were a few other little shops I wanted to check out, too.

Maybe I’d find him something to keep at the house, something to remind him of me.

Or hell, maybe I’d just buy some cat toys for Biscuits.

I was bonding with that cat, even though I’d always been more of a dog person myself.

A few buildings down from the store, I found myself distracted by a For Rent sign hanging in a window.

It was a two floor brick building with a lot of natural lighting.

I peeked in, and for a moment, I saw a flicker of a future.

I saw my name on the door. I saw new clients in a waiting room, and a new blue couch in my office, made of the same material as the couch at Justin’s place.

I could imagine Christmas lights hanging on the front of the counter I could see through the window.

And then it faded, because that wasn’t my future. My future wasn’t in Gomillion.

I kept walking, but that storefront and the vision I had just kept coming back to my mind.

And it kept expanding. Walking to work on a nice day.

Going down the road to see Justin, curling up with him after a bad day.

It would be easier to spend time with him if I let that vision become a reality.

I passed by the stores I planned on hitting and rounded the block, all the way until I ended up back in front of that building.

I walked around it properly. There was a little parking lot in the back, big enough for about eight cars.

There was a back entrance, too, a gray metal door that could let staff in and out.

I pulled out my phone as I walked back to the front of the building and made the call.

I thought it’d be a process. That no one would be able to show me around the building, and it’d go in the pile of whims I didn’t follow through on.

That was probably where it belonged. But the realtor answered the phone on the second ring, and he recognized my name.

It wasn’t until he showed up thirty minutes later that I recognized him.

“Fuck, man, Beezy?”

Jeffrey Biesel was one of the guys I’d run around with sometimes, back when I was younger.

He’d been a few years older than me, and he had no problem buying booze for me and my friends.

Back then, he’d been all hard angles, surrounded by the same cloud of cigarette smoke I’d been walking around in.

He’d had big gauges in his ears, and he’d worn his hair long.

Time had changed him just as much as it’d changed me.

His light brown hair was cut short now, and it was streaked with silver.

He had a salt and pepper beard hiding his once too pointy chin, and time had softened the rest of him.

But the grin he gave me? It was like a blast from the past. “Never thought I’d see you around here,” he laughed. “I thought you got out, man?”

“I did,” I told him, looking from him to the building.

I’d gotten out of Gomillion, and now I was thinking of going right back in.

Because I met someone that made this place seem better than it ever had, someone who had a whole life here.

I mean, I had a life in King’s Bay too, but one of us had to make a change if we wanted this to be long term.

And I wanted that. “But my boyfriend lives here.”

“Boyfriend?” Beezy asked with a raised brow.

I could see the scar from an old piercing, and I wondered when he’d had that done.

He hadn’t had any facial piercings back when I knew him.

I had a lot of questions, truth be told, about how he’d gone from high school party boy to a real estate agent.

Same could probably be said for him, because the last time we’d seen each other, I’d been going off with some blonde girl I hadn’t had any real interest in.

“Justin Kirkwood. He was in my year back in school. We reconnected at the reunion.”

Beezy clapped me on the shoulder. “Good on you, man. Glad you found someone.”

I noticed the gold ring on his finger and asked him a few questions about his life while he showed me around the building.

The downstairs of the building would make a perfect office.

It was even nicer than the place I had back in King’s Bay.

The offices were bigger. There was more natural lighting.

There was even a break room with a little kitchenette.

But the real perk of the place was the small one bedroom apartment upstairs, hidden away by the back door.

It wasn’t much, but it would do. The rent wasn’t too bad either.

It felt like fate, so I filled out the application.

I couldn’t wait for Justin to get home. I was pretty much floating on cloud nine while I cooked our dinner.

I had it timed right, because five minutes after he got home, I was pulling a pan of baked chicken out of the oven.

I waited until we were settled at his small kitchen table and he’d told me about his day before I brought up the office space.

When I first mentioned it, he seemed excited. But then, it seemed to settle on him and the excitement in his eyes dimmed.

“Am I jumping the gun?” I asked, cutting myself off.

Maybe he didn’t want me living in Gomillion.

Maybe he was happy with the way things were, us living on opposite ends of the state.

Or maybe he thought we were moving too fast. Or maybe I should stop trying to figure out what he was thinking, stop thinking the worst of everything.

He put down his fork and folded his hands in front of him.

Even though I was trying not to think the worst, those thoughts just kept coming.

He looked really serious, and that was never a good thing in my experience.

“No,” he said slowly, “but also, yes. Maybe?” He took a deep breath. “I thought you hated Gomillion.”

I shrugged. “Wasn’t a big fan of it growing up,” I confirmed.

“There’s a lot of bad memories around here, but there’s a lot of good shit too.

Ran into Beezy—Jeffrey Biesel—earlier. We spent some time catching up.

And I’ve actually been messaging a bit with Robbie.

You know, from the reunion? I was thinking about asking him if he wanted to join the practice, after I move it here. ”

“What about your clients in King’s Bay?”

I’d thought about that. After I filled out the application, I started thinking through the logistics.

I couldn’t just abandon the patients I had back in King’s Bay, but that didn’t mean I had to be there in person every session.

“Online appointments. It might work better with some of their schedules, plus traveling back once a month for a few in-person sessions for clients who want that.”

“Do you think that’d work for them?” I nodded.

“Okay, but that doesn’t…” He rubbed the back of his neck, and my stomach dropped.

Maybe I was jumping the gun here and he was trying to figure out a way to tell me this wasn’t what he wanted.

“Is this really what you want? You’re not running away from everything going on in King’s Bay, are you? ”

It was my turn to pause. Was that what I was doing?

I thought about it. I hadn’t been thinking about moving to Gomillion a few days ago.

I’d thought about how things would work long term with Justin, especially after he showed up at my place when I was having a bad day.

It had changed things. Seeing him in action this weekend, it made me realize that there was no way to make this work long term anywhere other than Gomillion.

I couldn’t ask him to give up his life, his thoughts of running for office, the legacy he wanted to leave behind, just to be with me.

Just like I knew he’d never ask me to give up my life in King’s Bay. One of us had to make the leap, and I wanted it to be me.

I had my answer. “This is what I really want,” I assured him.

“I want to have a future with you. Past few months, you’re all I’ve been able to think about.

I just don’t think it’ll work out with us living on opposite ends of the state.

One of us has to make a move, and I can work from anywhere. You can’t.”

“I could do politics in King’s Bay.”