Page 40 of Sam & Justin (Gomillion High Reunion #4)
I nodded. He could. “But you’d have to start all over.
You have connections here. People know you.
” I paused. “Besides, your family’s here, and you actually like your family.
” I couldn’t ask him to give up any of that for me.
I knew my friendship with Axel would survive being a few hours away.
I’d still go to King’s Bay and see him, every time I went to see my clients or I wanted new ink. He could come here, too.
It was the right choice.
“So… you’re moving in then?”
Moving in? My eyes went wide. “Think that might be jumping the gun.”
“Then where would you be staying?”
Fuck. I hadn’t finished telling him about the office.
I hadn’t told him about the little apartment.
“There’s an apartment over the office. Included in the lease.
The last people who rented the building used it for storage, but I figured I’d stay there.
” At least until we’d been together longer.
I didn’t want to rush things, but I wanted to give us a real chance.
I wanted to see what happened when we were seeing each other every day.
“Just gotta wait for Beezy to tell me if I got it, but he said it shouldn’t be a problem. ”
We talked more about the office, and the more we talked about it, the more I wanted it.
I wanted to move to Gomillion and be with him.
I wanted to be around him every day. I wanted more dinners like this, the two of us in person and not just eating our own dinners and staring at each other on a little screen while we watched our show.
I wanted the day-to-day parts of being with Justin. I wanted a future with him.
Even if it didn’t work out with this building, my mind was made up.
I was moving back to Gomillion.
Three Months After the Reunion
The last month had been hectic.
Two days after I got back to King’s Bay, I got the call from Beezy that I’d been approved for the office and the apartment.
After that, I had to figure things out with my clients.
Most of them were okay with the idea of online therapy.
Hell, most of the teenagers I worked with preferred it.
It meant they didn’t have to traipse across town or miss class or practice to have their sessions with me.
They especially liked the fact that they’d still see me once a month.
After I got them signed off, I had to figure out a secure platform to do my online therapy.
It would be a bit of a cost, but I found some things that worked.
Axel and I spent three days testing out different ones from our respective apartments, but I settled on one and then hired someone Axel knew, a friend of a friend, to build me a new website so that my clients could find that information easy.
I even got Robbie to sign on as another therapist in my office, though he wasn’t going to be dealing with my King’s Bay clients.
He had some of his own clients that he’d be bringing with him.
Packing was the last thing on my list, and I got the last boxes packed the night before I was set to move.
Moving day came bright and early. Axel showed up with a rented box truck, and we made quick work of loading up my entire life.
It was strange, seeing how little I actually owned.
I had a few bits of furniture, some boxes, and that was it.
There was space in the back of the truck, even after we secured my motorcycle.
I gave Axel the address to the office, and then we hit the road.
Justin was waiting for me when I pulled into the parking lot.
He was sitting on the backstop, a grin on his face.
I didn’t even turn off my car before I jumped out and took him in my arms. I was still kissing him when Axel pulled up with the truck.
He honked the horn, and it was like a splash of cold water thrown over us.
Probably a good thing, because my car was still idling.
Me, Justin, and Axel started unloading the truck.
I might have been moaning about the fact that I didn’t have a lot of stuff when I looked in the truck, but by the time we got the last load up the stairs to my new place, I was grateful for it.
We got the furniture all put into their respective rooms, and I figured I could unpack the boxes later.
Justin and I showed Axel around Gomillion, and he seemed to like the place well enough.
He stayed the night, and the next day, I drove him back to King’s Bay.
A week later, the apartment and office were both set up.
I even had that new blue couch I’d been thinking of, though once I had it, I found myself missing the leather couch from my office in King’s Bay.
Maybe I should’ve brought it with me instead of leaving it behind.
Robbie had started coming by to set up his office, and I’d heard him taking one of his telehealth clients already.
Everything was coming together.
Fourteen Weeks After the Reunion
“I can’t believe you’re dragging me to a football game,” I moaned as I followed Justin up the bleachers.
It was homecoming weekend at Gomillion, and that meant I was following Justin around to all kinds of activities.
I’d seen glimpses of my mom and dad once or twice, but we’d ignored one another.
My dad looked right through me, and I thought I saw a flicker of sadness from my mom.
It wasn’t enough to make her come over, to make her reach out, and I decided it was for the best. My life was better without them in it, and the past twenty years may have changed a lot, but it hadn’t changed that.
“I’ll buy you a pretzel,” Justin promised me as we reached an empty spot in the bleachers.
I looked over and saw Vanessa sitting close by, and I waved to her.
I’d gotten to know her a little better since I moved to Gomillion.
She’d referred a few clients my way, kids she recognized as needing help in her new role as school principal.
I’d only been in business for a few weeks, and my client list was growing.
She waved back before turning her attention down to the field.
“You better buy me a fucking pretzel,” I muttered as the cheerleaders came out.
I didn’t know enough about football to know if the team was any good.
I guessed they were decent, given that they had more points on the scoreboard by halftime than the other team did.
I didn’t know when to cheer either, so I just went along with what Justin was doing.
If I was being honest, I hadn’t paid much attention to the game at all.
I spent the whole time looking at Justin.
He was really into the game, and he seemed to know what was going on.
I loved watching the way his eyes lit up based on what was happening on the field.
I loved watching the way he reacted to every little thing.
I didn’t even mind how he sometimes got caught up in conversation with people around him.
Almost every person in the stands knew him, and most of them were friendly enough to me when he introduced me as his partner.
I caught a few wary glances when they heard my name, but I figured that was going to be par for the course until they realized I wasn’t the same guy I used to be in high school.
It was happening surprisingly faster than I thought it would, now that I was in Gomillion full time.
Hell, one of my client’s moms had gone to high school with me, and she seemed pretty impressed when we were talking about her kid and his problems. At the end of our conversation, she said that knowing who I’d been in high school gave her faith that I’d be able to reach her kid.
It felt so different than what happened back in King’s Bay, and it just told me that I’d made the right call.
Halftime had a lot of goings on. The homecoming court was crowned, and right before the game came back, a familiar looking teen joined the makeshift stage in the middle of the field. She cleared her throat right as I nudged Justin. “Why does she look familiar?”
“It’s Amber,” he whispered back. “You met her at the reunion. She was the one going around, collecting votes for the new mascot.”
That would do it. And it turned out, Amber’s announcement had to do with the mascot voting.
She made a speech about the different mascot designs.
She took us through the process of narrowing it down, the voting process, all of it.
Then at the end, she introduced the new mascot with a hearty Go Millions!
I looked at the winning design and shook my head. “Damn, I really wanted the other one to win. The scary looking one.”
The one that had won looked like a cartoon character, and the real life version looked goofy as hell. Justin, on the other hand, was pretty much bouncing in his seat. “Yes! I voted for that one.”
We realized what the other said at the same time, and we almost fell out of our seats laughing.
We’d voted for opposite designs.
His hand found mine as we stopped laughing, and the team took the field for the second half.
If someone had told me a few months ago that I’d be here now, happy in Gomillion, I would’ve laughed myself sick. But now? I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else. I couldn’t imagine being with anyone else.
Gomillion had never been home for me, but going back had brought me to Justin. It had brought me home.