Javier had been respectful about my ban on PDA from the first time I'd mentioned it, but there were times when I could tell it bothered him. Many times.
One time in particular was the last straw for him.
We were at a house party for our friend Damien's birthday.
I was standing with Javier and a group of pilots and flight attendants, but I was watching Bianca across the room. She'd been cornered by Damien, who everyone knew had had a thing for her since the first time he'd seen her.
A lot of people thought this was juicy gossip, since they assumed she was with me, and they knew we were all friends.
That wasn't why I was staring. I was watching only to see if she needed me to run interference.
She liked Damien and was trying to be nice, but I could tell he was making her uncomfortable.
Damien was one of our closer friends, and one of the few that knew Bianca and me weren't together. Sometimes I wished he'd never caught on. Bianca was never going to care about him the way he wanted. She just didn't feel that way about him, and if she could have used me as an excuse to keep him at bay, I knew she would have.
"I don't know why you put up with that shit, Stephan," one of the pilots said loudly. His name was Allen, I was pretty sure.
I glanced at him with a raised brow. He was an overweight guy, in his early thirties, I guessed. A first officer, I recalled, and one that had a reputation for being difficult to work with. I barely knew the guy, but he sounded like he had a very strong opinion about my life. Of course, he wasn't exactly sober at the moment.
"Excuse me?" I asked, hoping to politely deflect him.
He was red in the face, his brown hair messy and falling in his eyes. He waved a hand toward Bianca and Damien. "He's after your girl. Everyone knows it. And he's supposed to be your friend? It's none of my business, but I don't know why you put up with it."
I gave him a bland smile. "You're right. It is none of your business."
"You need to put a ring on that one," he said, tone snide, "before Captain Dimples snatches her on up."
He was getting on my nerves in a major way, but I still made a mental note to harass Damien about that nickname as soon as I could.
"I'm not worried about it, so I don't know why you are," I told him pointedly. Though I did know. I recalled there was some kind of beef between him and Damien, something involving a woman that preferred Damien more, though I didn't know all the details.
Apparently he thought that could be solved by egging me into fighting him.
"What kind of a guy isn't worried about someone else hitting on his girl?" Allen asked, tone snide.
I gave him another bland smile, though this one was harder to fake. "Listen, it's Allen, right?"
He nodded.
I continued, "I know you and Damien have some beef between you, but don't drag me into it. I'm guessing you've heard that I can handle myself in a fight, you probably heard the rumor that I used to be a cage fighter by the way you're acting, but listen carefully to this part: Nothing you can say is going to get me to go over there and do your dirty work for you, and we all know if you tried to kick his ass yourself, he'd clobber you."
He tried to respond, looking angry, but I spoke over him. "Now you, you aren't a close friend of mine, and you're starting to piss me off, so you I could be convinced to fight, but not him, and not by you. So move along before you find out firsthand if I did really used to fight pro."
That had its desired effect, and he left with a few grumbling complaints about me being a prick.
That was fine with me. I was smiling when he left, thinking I'd defused the situation well enough.
A look at Javier's face told me otherwise.
I sighed. I didn't know what, but something about that exchange had deeply bothered him.
He'd been playful and engaged before that, enjoying the crowd we were hanging with. He became withdrawn and stiff after.
There was no good way to get it out of him there, no subtle way to get him alone that wouldn't look suspicious, so it wasn't until later, post-party, that I got him to talk.
"What's bothering you?"
We were getting ready for bed, brushing our teeth side by side in the mirror. I saw his mouth tighten.
He set his toothbrush down and met my eyes. "You really don't know?" he asked quietly, but something in his tone was very loud, so loud it was screaming at me, trying to tell me something that I wasn't ready to hear.
I shook my head. "I know you got upset after I threatened Allen. You don't think the way I handled that was appropriate?"
He grunted. That was it. Just grunted and went to bed.
I followed him, a kernel of annoyance moving through me. I was plainspoken, and sometimes I really wished that he were too.
"I don't speak fluent grunt," I told him as I got into bed. "Want to tell me what yours meant?"
He didn't even crack a smile. "I think it bothers me the most that you don't even understand how screwed up that all was."
I sighed. I hated arguments like this, so full of riddles and land mines. "I guess I don't. Explain, please."
"You were so willing, happy even, to get into a real fight over a fake relationship. You weren't bluffing. You would have followed through, kicked Allen's ass if he kept it up."
"The guy was being a jerk, talking that way about Bianca, trying to stir shit up with me and Damien. And he never would have fought me, so it was a bluff. I'm twice that guy's size."
He grunted again, and this time I could interpret it into a noise of utter frustration. "You don't get it!"
"Explain it to me then," I muttered sullenly, wanting nothing more than to get off this subject.
He was in my face suddenly, eyes wide, passionate. "You're so scared to show the world who you are that you would cripple your life for it! Why?! What are you so scared of? The world is not your sick dad. Half the guys we work with are g*y. Do you see the straight ones stringing any of them up? This isn't the fifties. We don't have to hide anymore!"
My jaw clenched, and I just stared at him, refusing to talk about this.
He cupped my face in his hands, eyes imploring. "There's nothing wrong with you, Stephan. Nothing at all. You are who you are, and even if you wanted to, you couldn't change it. No matter how you hide it, you can't run from yourself, and you shouldn't want to, because there's nothing wrong with you."