Page 124 of The Locker Room

“She was a baby, Chris, and I couldn"t. She was nineteen—Jesus. I

don"t know if we"ve ever been that young.”

Chris leaned back against him, moving slowly, comfortably, like,

say, a man who had been happily married for ten years. “We were,” he

said softly. “Some ways, Xander, I think you still are.”

106 Amy Lane

Xander wrapped his arm around Chris"s chest, and rubbed his

cheek against that short, short hair. The stillness of the locker room

settled around them, and he thought he heard Chris"s breathing echo

against the back wall, and maybe even out in the frighteningly dark small

gym, where they practiced.

“Not you?”

Chris grunted. “No,” he said softly. “Not after what I"ve made us

do.”

Xander felt a growl start in his chest, and he pulled back from their

comfortable “lean” on each other and shoved at Christian"s shoulder.

“Look at me,” he rasped, and he used his longer reach to grab

Chris"s smartphone and put it in his pocket.

Chris dropped his leg to the floor and turned his shoulders around,

but he couldn"t look Xander in the eye, and Xander grasped his chin

between his fingers and forced him to. His eyes were still wide and dark,

but up close they were red-rimmed and puffy. Xander swallowed.Oh,

Christian. Me too. I looked just like that, every time we"ve ever met here.

Every time you left with a girl and came home to me.

“It was both of us,” he whispered. “That first night, what you

needed was for me to take charge. You needed me to say „No" and to

claim you in front of the whole wide world, and to say fuck all this other

bullshit, we are who we are. And I didn"t. I let you go. I let this… this…

thingstart, and it hurts us. It hurts us more every time. And I"m saying

„No" now. We can"t live like this anymore. We don"t have to come out,