Page 42 of Scrap Metal & Love Reforged

“We’ve had sex, and I’ve moved in with him. We’re practically…I don’t know. It’s complicated because I’m not technically out, and I feel like I’m being unfair.”

If only he knew. Troy keepingthatparticular secret, about being gay, was perfectly understandable. I knew a lot of people who stayed in the closet for a while, mostly because people could be complete jerks.

The only reason I kept this secret was because I'd dug myself into a hole too deep to climb out of gracefully.

“I don’t think that’s unfair at all,”I typed. “I’m sure the guy understands just fine.”

I glanced up, across the room. Troy’s eyes snapped from his phone and met mine, and my pulse quickened. He knew. He’d figured me out. I braced for the explosion, every nerve on edge. After what felt like a lifetime, Troy looked back down at his phone. I let out a quiet sigh of relief. So, he didn’t know.

But I was going to drive myself crazy worrying that he knew. Really, I ought to just tell him already. That would beso muchstress off my shoulders. But every time I thought about tellingTroy the truth, I couldn’t help but think that I’d just be trading my stress. Really, I should have told him the truthlongbefore I asked him to live with me.

But then, he probably wouldn’t have agreed, unless you’d lied and pretended that you’d just found out. You’d have felt guilty doing that, and eventually, you’d have to admit it anyway.

Troy continued on his phone, and I watched the small dots moving on my screen, indicating he was preparing another message. Would it betooobvious if I closed my laptop and disappeared at exactly the same time Godofdiscord did? Probably.

But that was assuming a lot. That was assuming Troy would somehow draw the connection between Godofdiscord and me, and that wouldn’t be possible unless he already had some idea of what I’d done.

“But what if he doesn’t?”Troy’s message popped onto the screen.“What if he doesn’t understand?”

A lump formed in my throat. This was going to blow up in my face some day. But maybe Troy could…get in a more financially stable position or something before that happened. Or maybe if I had more time to think it over, I’d be able to come up with some better way to tell him, so he wouldn’t hate me.

“He will. I promise,”I replied.

But no matter how much I understood, there was no way Troy could understand what I’d done. Because it was wrong, and even though I wanted to believe this was a necessary deception, I didn’treallybelieve that. I was man enough to know I’d screwed up.

“I’ll talk to you later,”I typed. “I’ve got to go now.”

I closed the window but left the laptop open, feigning I was still working on something.

Troy uncurled from the chair and crossed the room. I watched him as he stood before the window, my eyes tracing the linesof his broad shoulders against the setting sun. “What are you working on?” Troy asked, glancing over his shoulder at me.

“Nothing,” I replied.

That was truer than I meant. I just had an empty tab up and hadn’t even bothered to pull up a fake website.

“Just browsing.”

I was so far in over my head, and damn if I didn’t just keep digging deeper and deeper.

But Troy smiled and nodded, blissfully oblivious. How long would that last,couldthat last? I swallowed hard. There was no point in asking Brandon for advice. I knew exactly what he’d say. “I told you so,”coupled with a little, “you have to tell him as soon as possible.”Like I don’t already know that. I am the choir he would be preaching to. I just have to quantify “as soon as possible”.

This was getting absurd. Yet there he was, framed in the dying sun, the sky bleeding pink into purple, and he had never looked more heartbreakingly handsome. All my words died in my throat. Of all the mistakes I’d made in my life, this had to be one of my worst.

Life went on. I sat, sometimes just a few feet away from Troy, messaging him. And he messaged me back. We went on like that, Troy none the wiser. He went to work at the shop, and I went about my daily routine, getting up early and going to the gym before returning home. I’d grown bored, I realized. I needed another project, something to distract me.

But I didn’t know whether I felt bored because it had been a while since Brandon’s movie and I was in need of another project, or if it was that my guilt over Troy seemed so all-consuming that it felt like I had too much time and nothingto do. Despite having several vehicles, certainly more than most, I usually walked to and from the gym, especially if the weather was cooperative. I pounded up the steps, stowing my headphones into the pocket in my shorts.

When I finally arrived at the apartment, Troy was still there. He sat in his usual chair, flipping his phone between his fingers. “Hey,” he said, glancing at me.

“Hey, yourself.”

Troy tilted his head back and watched me for a long moment. “Enjoy your morning?”

It felt like a calm before some storm. A chill raced up my spine. Before Troy even opened his mouth, I knew my day of reckoning had come. I deserved every word he was about to unleash.

“When were you going to tell me?” Troy asked, his voice quieter and harsher than I’d ever heard.

I straightened my back and leaned, curled my fingers around the countertop, as if that would better help me brace against the argument that was coming. My excuses rose in my throat but refused to exit. It was as if I knew I’d screwed up so badly that my body refused to accept the excuses pouring into my head. I swallowed hard. “Tell you what?” I finally managed, choking on my own words.