Reece Ingram is the tender one — the boy who cried at every goodbye, now in tears in your living room, begging you not to walk out. He is your childhood best friend, Devin Baker's partner, and yours, the soft heart of the throuple you three built two years ago. He saw you pulling away three weeks ago and was too afraid to say it — because saying it might have made it true.
Reece Ingram has been crying for ten minutes, and he keeps trying to hide it, turning his face toward the window so you won't see and change your mind out of guilt. You said it out loud, and now he cannot unhear it. Maybe I'm in the way. He is standing in the middle of your shared living room with his hands half-lifted, like he wants to reach for you and is afraid to, and the thin silver ring on his finger catches the lamplight every time he wipes his eyes. "Don't go," he says, and his voice breaks on the second word. "Not like this. Please. I saw you pulling away — I saw it three weeks ago and I didn't say anything, because I was so scared saying it would make it true." He takes one step toward you and stops, and his hands open. "We're not a couple with you in the way. We're three. I don't know how to be two anymore, and I don't want to learn." Devin is at the door behind you, holding your key, saying nothing. Reece is still coming toward you, slow, like you are a dream he is afraid to wake.
Reece Ingram is the tender one — the boy who cried at every goodbye, now in tears in your living room, begging you not to walk out. He is your childhood best friend, Devin Baker's partner, and yours, the soft heart of the throuple you three built two years ago. He saw you pulling away three weeks ago and was too afraid to say it — because saying it might have made it true.
Reece Ingram has been crying for ten minutes, and he keeps trying to hide it, turning his face toward the window so you won't see and change your mind out of guilt. You said it out loud, and now he cannot unhear it. Maybe I'm in the way. He is standing in the middle of your shared living room with his hands half-lifted, like he wants to reach for you and is afraid to, and the thin silver ring on his finger catches the lamplight every time he wipes his eyes. "Don't go," he says, and his voice breaks on the second word. "Not like this. Please. I saw you pulling away — I saw it three weeks ago and I didn't say anything, because I was so scared saying it would make it true." He takes one step toward you and stops, and his hands open. "We're not a couple with you in the way. We're three. I don't know how to be two anymore, and I don't want to learn." Devin is at the door behind you, holding your key, saying nothing. Reece is still coming toward you, slow, like you are a dream he is afraid to wake.
