Blaze’s POV
College, sophomore year
I sat across from my parents at our kitchen table during winter break. The same table where I'd eaten breakfast every morning for eighteen years. Where we'd celebrated birthdays and holidays and report cards.
My hands trembled in my lap. I'd rehearsed this moment a thousand times in my dorm room mirror. Practiced the words until they felt smooth on my tongue.
They didn't feel smooth now.
"Mom. Dad." My voice cracked on the second word. "There's something I need to tell you."
My mother smiled encouragingly. My father set down his coffee cup and gave me his full attention.
They thought I was going to announce a girlfriend. Or a scholarship. Or some other normal thing their normal son would share over Christmas break.
"I'm bisexual."
The word hung in the air like smoke.
Silence. Complete and suffocating.
My mother's face crumpled first. Tears streaming down cheeks that had kissed my forehead goodnight for twenty years. Her hand flew to her mouth like she was holding back a scream.
My father's expression shifted slower. Confusion first, his brow furrowing as the word processed. Then understanding. Then something that made my stomach turn to ice.
Disgust. Pure, undisguised disgust directed at his only son.
"Dad…"
"You're not my son."
Four words. Twenty years of love, erased in a single breath.
My mother wouldn't look at me. Just kept crying into her hands, shoulders shaking, as if I'd told her someone died instead of simply told her who I was.
Maybe to her, someone had.
"Richard, please…" she started.
"No." My father's chair scraped against the floor as he stood. His finger pointed toward the hallway. Toward the front door. "Get out."
"Dad, if you'd just let me explain…"
"There's nothing to explain." His voice was cold. Final. "I didn't raise a—" He couldn't even say the word. "Pack your things. I want you gone within the hour."
I packed my bag in my childhood bedroom for the last time.
Hockey trophies lined the shelves. Photos covered the walls—me at seven, gap-toothed and grinning after my first goal. Me at twelve, holding up a championship trophy. Me at seventeen, signing my college letter of intent.
Evidence of the son they'd been proud of. The son who apparently died the moment I opened my mouth.
My mother appeared in the doorway while I shoved clothes into my duffel. Her eyes were red-rimmed, mascara streaking down her face.
"Blaze, sweetheart…"
"Save it." The words came out harsher than intended. "You didn't say a word. You just sat there."
"I need time to process—"
"Process what? That I like men and women? That I'm not the perfect straight son you wanted?"
She flinched like I'd slapped her.
I zipped my bag and pushed past her without another word. My father wasn't even in the hallway. Couldn't be bothered to watch me leave.
The front door closed behind me with a sound like a coffin lid.
I haven't spoken to them since. Nine years of silence. Nine years of birthdays and holidays and milestones without a single call or text or card.
They never reached out. Neither did I.
Some wounds don't heal. Some bridges burn too completely to rebuild.
***
Four years ago
Another hotel room. Another night pretending we were just teammates grabbing dinner.
The restaurant had been nice. Candlelit. Romantic, even. I'd reached across the table for Asher's hand without thinking.
He flinched away like I'd burned him.
A split-second reflex. Someone at a nearby table had glanced our direction, and Asher's hand vanished beneath the tablecloth like my touch was toxic.
I didn't say anything then. Smiled through the rest of dinner. Pretended the knife in my chest wasn't twisting deeper with every careful inch of distance he maintained.
Back in the hotel room, I exploded.
"I'm not your dirty secret!" The words ripped out of me with years of frustration behind them. "I'm so fucking tired of this, Ash!"
"Blaze, calm down."
"Don't tell me to calm down!" I was pacing, hands shaking, vision blurring with angry tears. "It's been two years! Two years of hiding and lying and pretending I don't exist when anyone's watching!"
"I just need more time."
"You've had time! How much more do you need? Another two years? Five? Should I just wait around forever while you decide if I'm worth the risk?"
His face crumpled. "That's not fair."
"None of this is fair!" I stopped pacing, chest heaving. "I lost my entire family for being who I am. My parents haven't spoken to me in five years. And you can't even hold my hand in a restaurant!"
The comparison landed like a blow. Asher's shoulders curled inward.
"I'm not like you," he whispered. "I can't just—"
"Can't what? Be brave? Take a chance? Actually commit to me?"
"I am committed!"
"In private! In hotel rooms and secret apartments and that fucking cottage! But the second we're in public, I might as well be invisible!"
The fight was ugly. Raw. Every frustration I'd swallowed for two years pouring out in a toxic flood.
Then Asher broke.
Tears streaming down his face. Voice cracking on every word. "I'll come out. I promise. I just need more time."
He crossed the room and grabbed my hands. His were shaking violently.
"Please, Blaze. Don't give up on me. I'm trying. I'm so fucking scared, but I'm trying."
My anger crumbled at the desperation in his eyes.
"I'll do it," he continued, voice barely a whisper. "Soon. I promise. Just give me a little more time to figure out how."
We made love that night. Desperate at first, then unbearably tender. Asher whispered promises against my skin with every kiss.
I believed every word.
I didn't know those promises would remain forever unkept. That "soon" would stretch into years of the same excuses, the same fears, the same invisible walls.
***
Present
My phone buzzes on the nightstand.
Unknown number. Boston area code.
I open it without thinking. A photo loads first—grainy, clearly taken from a distance, but unmistakable.
Asher leaving a club at 2 AM. A young dark-haired man walking close behind him. Too close for friends. Too familiar for strangers.
The caption underneath makes my blood run cold.
Thought you'd want to know your ex has moved on. Completely.
My heart stops.
I stare at the photo until my vision blurs. Asher's face. The stranger's hand on his lower back. The intimate distance between their bodies.
He moved on. Of course he did. I was the one who ended things, I don't get to be hurt that he found someone else.
But I am. God, I am.
Another text arrives.
Ottawa vs Boston. Two weeks. Can't wait to watch you two destroy each other.
I recognize the sender's style immediately. The cruelty dressed up as concern and manipulation disguised as information.
Jackson.
That fucking snake. Still playing games after all these years. Still trying to drive wedges between us even when there's nothing left to split.
I hurl my phone across the room.
It hits the wall with a satisfying crack and clatters to the floor. The screen's probably shattered, still I don't care.
My chest feels like it's caving in.
Asher moved on. I should be happy for him. Should be relieved that at least one of us isn't drowning anymore.
Instead, I curl onto the hotel bed and try to remember how to breathe.