Embracing the Tension Ch. 08

"I'm just saying."

"Saying what? That I'm not good enough to cut it in New York?" He knew that wasn't what Ryan meant. He knew that Ryan only had the best of intensions. But the thought of actually leaving New York, the realization that it could be something he wanted, was so foreign and terrifying that it felt easier to lash out against it than try to accept it.

"We've been over this before." Erik knew he should stop before he said something he couldn't take back. But the words were just flowing now, and he didn't have much control over them. "New York is where my work is; it's where all the connections are. How am I supposed to have a career if I just leave?"

Ryan's grip tightening on the wheel until his knuckles were white, and Erik felt the distance grow between them as Ryan threw his walls up. And yet, he went on.

"Yeah, New York's a hard city to live in, everyone knows that. But I know how to live there, I've been living there for years now, and I've been fine. Maybe things are shit right now, but that's just how it is. If I just give up and leave now, I'll never make it anywhere in life."

Every word he spoke brought his deepest fears into sharp focus. Fears of not measuring up, of failing. Fears of being another statistic of someone who came to the big city with stars in his eyes only to go home broken because he couldn't cut it, because New York was a merciless meat grinder that liked to pull people in and spit them back out as a shadow of their former selves.

"Is that what you think about me?" Ryan asked the question quietly, with a tightly restrained voice, tension lining his arms, his shoulders, the way he held his head.

Was that how he thought about Ryan? That Ryan had given up because he wasn't strong enough? Maybe. Because wasn't that the only reason why someone would want to leave New York? "No."

The scowl Ryan threw in his direction made it clear that he didn't believe Erik's denial. Erik barely believed it himself. "No, your situation wasn't the same."

"How wasn't it the same?"

How was it that he always had a million things to say, but when it mattered the most, all his words escaped him. "Because it wasn't."

Ryan's scowl deepened.

"Ryan—"

He held a hand up. "Save it."

Shit. He'd fucked up, badly. And he didn't know how to fix it. Because all those accusations that he had hurled at himself, he could just have easily used them on Ryan... and he would have believed them, partly, almost. Except seeing Ryan in Toronto and the way he was more himself here than he was in New York negated every one of Erik's ideas about why he couldn't leave the big city. The rational part of his brain understood all of this, but embracing that reality for himself was a step he couldn't bring himself to take.

"Ryan..." he tried again after several moments of tense silence. "Look, I just meant that—"

"I know what you meant." Ryan cut him off and changed lanes to pull off the highway. He made a couple of turns on the small rural roads and pulled into a gas station. When he got out to work the pump, he slammed the door behind him hard enough to rock the car back and forth on its tires.

Erik muttered a "Fuck" as he sighed and leaned his head back. He couldn't have thought of a worse way to end their perfect weekend. And it was all his fault.

The rest of the car ride was unbearably awkward. Erik tried to apologize again, but Ryan just grunted and turned on the radio. When they pulled into an empty parking space in front of Ryan's house, Erik couldn't wait to scramble out of the car.

He took a deep lungful of winter air, letting its biting cold chase away the angry gnawing feeling in his chest. He had to make things right, and he had the rest of the evening to do it. Because there was no way he was getting on that plane to New York if Ryan was still upset with him.

Ryan already had the trunk open and was piling their stuff on the sidewalk. Erik grabbed a couple of bags and carried them to the house, but before he got to the door, it flew open and a little ball of energy came hurtling down the little walkway. Erik dropped the bags and crouched down just in time to catch Chloe as she flung herself into his arm.

"Uncle Erik!" She screamed into his ear.

He winced. "Hey, Clo."

Her arms had snaked around his neck, and she clung tightly, draping herself over his shoulder. Erik hugged her back; her small frame in his long arms felt fragile, precious. The soft wisps of her hair in his face still had that innocent, baby smell. If he could come home to this every day, he would be the happiest man alive. That realization was nothing short of terrifying, and his heart lurched in his chest with a strength of yearning that he hadn't thought was possible. He risked squeezing her a little tighter, and Chloe reciprocated by squeezing him back. He was done for. The little girl had stolen his heart—whatever was left that hadn't already been claimed by Ryan.

"Clo, you don't even have a coat on." Ryan cleared his throat. "Go back inside and let me and Uncle Erik finish bringing things in."

Erik reluctantly let Chloe out of his arms. "You go inside, Clo. We'll be right in."

"Okay!" And with the same energy with which she had bounded out of the house, Chloe raced back inside.

Erik stayed crouched low, watching as she disappeared into the house, and waited a moment before standing up again. Ryan watched him with lips pressed thin and a furrow in his brow. It wasn't a look of anger, but Erik couldn't quite place the emotion he read in Ryan's eyes.

"Look, Ryan." He took a step closer and thanked the stars that Ryan didn't back away. "I'm really sorry about what I said earlier in the car. It was stupid, and I didn't mean it."

Whatever tension that lingered in Ryan's body melted away and, with it, the vice that had been clamped around Erik's chest. Ryan's eyes drifted shut, and it was some seconds before he opened them again, a look of sadness in them.

"I know you're sorry," he said softly. "But I also know you meant what you said."

An objection was right on the tip of Erik's tongue, stopped only by Ryan's fingers pressing on his lips. "I know you meant it, because that's what I used to think, too. I've been there before, remember? I know the kind of lies that New York feeds people." Ryan's hand fell away. "Come on. Let's get this stuff inside."

They spent the rest of the evening with Chloe and her parents—first a light dinner and then they nursed mugs of hot cocoa for dessert. Chloe peppered them with questions about the cottage, which Erik was more than happy to answer. And then she dragged Ryan off to play make-believe with her stuffed animals.

"I'm glad you guys had a good time at the cottage," Rachel said as they sat at the dining room table watching Ryan and Chloe speak to each other with distorted, stuffed-animal voices.

"Thanks again for letting us use the place," Erik replied.

"Somebody need to keep tabs on the place during the winter. Better Ryan than us." Tom waved it off.

"He really likes you, you know." Rachel looked straight at Erik, and he blinked blankly as his brain caught on to what she was saying. "I think he loves you."

Tom sneaked a glance at his wife from under his lashes and then trained his eyes resolutely into his mug of cocoa. Erik wasn't about to get any help from there.

"Well?"

If Rachel was expecting a certain response from him, Erik wasn't really sure which was the right one. "Um, well, I think I love him, too." Best to go with the truth, he supposed.

She narrowed her eyes. "You think?"

Erik swallowed under her piercing gaze. "I know," he whispered, the admission stealing his breath away.

Rachel nodded, her brows still knotted. "So, what are you going to do about it?"

"Uh, do about it?" Was she expecting him to propose and make an honest man out of Ryan?

"Jesus, Rachel," Tom muttered under his breath, which earned him a backhanded slap on the arm.

"Ryan's not going back to New York, you know." The look she pinned him with made Erik want to crawl into a dark hole and hide.

"Oh, uh, the thought never crossed my mind." And that was the truth. He had never once considered asking Ryan to move back to New York. Just the memory of what Ryan had been like in his last days before leaving was reason enough to rule that out as an option completely. Which left...

Erik couldn't quite meet Rachel's penetrating gaze. He knew what she was thinking. He knew that she knew what he was thinking, too. Please don't say it. Please don't say it.

"So that means you're moving here?"

Fuck. She had to go and say it. He tried to smile; he really did. But he could feel the strain in his cheeks as he forced them to move. "We haven't really gotten to that point yet."

She narrowed her eyes at him again. She didn't believe a word of what he said. To be honest, Erik didn't either.

"Hey, guys."

Erik jumped at Ryan's voice next to him and the hand that landed softly on his shoulder. He had been so engrossed in Rachel's interrogation that he hadn't noticed Ryan approaching or Chloe scurrying to climb onto Tom's lap. He wondered how much of their conversation Ryan had overheard.

"I'm beat. And you've got an early flight to catch tomorrow." Ryan gave his shoulder a light squeeze. "Let's go upstairs?"

"Yeah." Erik didn't need another excuse to escape Rachel. They said their goodbyes and slipped away.

Erik tried to assess Ryan's mood as they got ready for bed. He was quiet, but then Ryan was always quiet. Otherwise, he seemed normal.

They moved around the bathroom together as if they'd been doing it for years, as if they were following some ingrained choreography that felt familiar and comfortable and warm.

The intimacy of sharing the space with Ryan as they took care of their basic hygiene added to the complex mix of emotions Erik had been carrying around all weekend: a deep satisfaction, a sense of belonging, of letting go of all pretenses and just being himself. A longing for this to be a part of his routine, to end every day with the two of them putzing around the bathroom in their boxers and t-shirts. And then crawling into bed, snuggling together like magnets clicking into place. He just didn't know how he could turn that dream into a reality.

"How much of Rachel's questioning did you hear?" Erik asked as they lay spooned in the bed, Ryan's chest flush against his back, Ryan's arm slung across his chest, and Ryan's breath light on his neck.

For a second Erik thought Ryan might have fallen asleep until Ryan spoke in a soft voice. "Enough of it."

Erik swallowed around a lump in his throat. Fuck. He didn't know what to say, where they should go from here, how to make things right for them.

Ryan pressed a kiss onto the back of his neck. Then a quiet confession: "I love you, too."

The lump in his throat grew, and his heart felt like it was going to burst out of his chest. Erik swallowed a strangled sound and dragged in a lungful of air. Then he shifted around in the bed until he faced Ryan, held Ryan's face between his hands, Ryan's beard tickling his palms. He leaned their foreheads together, noses aligned, before whispering, "I love you, too. So much." He took a shaky breath. "It's the only thing that makes sense in my life right now, the only thing I can hold on to; it's the only thing that's solid. Oh, god, I love you so much."

Ryan's arms tightened around him, and Ryan's lips cut off the words that still flowed from his mouth. With a groan, Erik kissed back and used his heavier weight to roll them over until he was pressing Ryan into the mattress. A moan escaped from Ryan's throat, and he shifted his legs so that Erik settled neatly between his thighs.

Erik was heady with desire for Ryan, all the blood in his body pooling in his dick as Ryan's legs wrapped around his waist. Sex with Ryan had always been an out-of-this-world experience, but now that they had declared their love for each other, it felt like a whole other level of mind-blowing.

There was no more nagging little voices of doubt, just losing himself in the freedom their love created. He lost himself in the trails of fire Ryan drew across his skin, in the hardness of Ryan's body underneath him. He needed to be inside Ryan, to consummate the love they shared.

Erik rubbed his cheek against Ryan's beard, savoring the soft abrasion that sent tingles across his body. He kissed his way up Ryan's jaw until he latched onto Ryan's earlobe and tugged.

Ryan arched up into him, accompanied by a breathy "fuck." Strong fingers dug into his back, and legs tightened around his waist.

"Erik, please."

He loved it when Ryan begged with that ragged voice; he loved how raw his name sounded on Ryan's lips. His cock pulsed where it lay next to Ryan's.

"Please, Erik. I need you." Ryan trembled with those words and Erik knew exactly how he felt; he felt the same way.

They shed their clothes and Erik leaned over to grab supplies from Ryan's nightstand. After a weekend of fucking, Ryan didn't need much prep, but Erik made sure to work his fingers in until Ryan was nice and loose, regardless. He loved watching his fingers disappear between Ryan's ass cheeks, feeling the muscles of Ryan's sphincter tighten and then loosen. It was an act so intimate, he felt privileged to be given the honor. Love soared in his heart for this man.

When Erik entered Ryan, he made sure it was slow, wanting to hold on to this moment for as long as possible. He watched every inch of his dick as it was swallowed up into Ryan's heat. By the time he was fully sheathed, they were both trembling, covered in a sheen of sweat.

Erik glanced up at Ryan and the look he saw on Ryan's face simply stole his breath away. The love he saw there, it was more than anything he could have wished for, it was sweeter than air, than water, than any of the basic necessities of life. Erik was sure he could survive on that love alone.

He leaned down to seal their connection with a kiss. Their tongues wrestling as their limbs pulled them closer to each other. The slow pace he set didn't last for long. Soon he was slamming into Ryan as hard as he could, driven on by a love so strong it was overwhelming, a need to be one with this beautiful man.

Ryan made those desperate, whimpering noises, calling out his name, pleading with him for something that Ryan couldn't put into words. He loved it all: how their bodies moved together like they had been handcrafted for each other, engineered to dance, to push and pull against each other until they were hurtling toward a climax that would ruin them.

It did ruin them. He heard Ryan shouting in his ear just as his vision whited out. It took several moments before Erik came around and could get his bearings. He laid on top of Ryan—his weight must have been crushing. He tried to roll off, but Ryan held him in place. It took some maneuvering, but Erik managed to get rid of the condom and toss it into the conveniently placed garbage bin next to the bed.

Then he snuggled down into Ryan's arms. He didn't know what tomorrow would hold. But for tonight, all was right with his world.