“Head out. I’ll grab us each another beer.”
“Okay.” Hutch picked up my plate too and headed for the door. He smoothly opened the slider despite having his hands full, and I couldn’t help watching him do it. I didn’t think there was anything Hutch wasn’t good at, but while that truth didn’t go to his head, he liked to pretend it did. In fact, I’d bet he didn’t see it, that he always thought he could do better—nothing ever being enough, probably because it wasn’t for his father.
I joined him on the balcony, where we sat across from each other at the small table. He’d already set my plate by me and his in front of himself. Our drinks joined them, and I nodded toward his food. “You first.”
“Is this something only one of us can do at a time?” he teased.
“Shut up and take a bite, smart-ass.”
“So, so bossy. What are we going to do with you?” Hutch replied, but he rolled pasta up on his fork and took a bite…then moaned…and I ignored the way my dick perked up at the sound. “Goddamn. We did good, Ry.”
I smiled at the name. I wasn’t even sure Hutch realized it had fallen from his lips. He hadn’t called me that even when we were kids.
“I knew we would,” I told him.
“Yeah. Me too.”
Then we both dug into our meal, trying to pretend that was all we’d been talking about.
“How did you end up becoming a mechanic?” he asked a few minutes later.
“I always loved cars. My dad didn’t know much about them, but my uncle did—Uncle Jonah, you remember him?” He lived in Orlando and used to come visit sometimes.
“Yeah, I remember. You guys used to go spend a week with him in the summer too.”
“Yep—Jonah and his partner, Alec.”
“Oh shit. I thought that was his roommate?”
“Yeah, we did too for the longest time. When I came out, Jonah did too, in support. Hell, I can’t imagine living the life they did, keeping their relationship hidden. Alec’s family still doesn’t know. They’re homophobes.”
“Shit. I’m sorry.”
“The world is a shitty place sometimes, but yeah, I used to always work on cars with Uncle Jonah. I fucking love it, but it wasn’t Dad’s thing, ya know? And it was never questioned that Kins and I would work for the company our parents created—just like it was with you and Mads.” Neither Hutch nor I had ended up doing that, though.
“Imagine my father’s disappointment when I went into medicine. The nerve!”
He tried to play it off as though it didn’t bother him, but I knew it did. “You don’t deserve that…the way your father makes you feel. I’ve seen it our whole lives; even before you told me as my doc on the app. He puts pressure on your shoulders that has no business being there. You should feel nothing but pride in who you are and the things you’ve accomplished. He’s not angry that you’re a physician, just that you didn’t do what he wanted, or how he wanted you to do it. Grant has always liked control. He’s that way with Mads, and he tries to do the same with you, only you don’t let him, so he makes you feel bad about your choices. Because he wants you to be a mirror image of him the way he is of his father.”
For a moment, Hutch just sat there staring at me with an expression I couldn’t read. I couldn’t help wondering if I’d gone too far. Hell, it was his father I was talking about. “I’m sor—”
“Thank you,” Hutch cut me off.
“Of course.” I nodded. “You’re a good man. I’ll tell you every damn day until you believe it.”
He looked away then, and I knew I had gone too far, that my words had hit a nerve in Hutch that hurt him because this was us and we were impossible.
He rubbed a hand over his forehead, massaged his eyes, then sat up straighter, as if he was putting his facade back into place. “So, the mechanic thing?”
I wasn’t surprised at the change of subject.
“I just… When everything went down and I moved to LA, I decided I was done being someone I wasn’t, holding back and not living my life to its fullest. Maybe that sounds crazy—that being a mechanic came out of that—but…”
“It doesn’t. Sound crazy, I mean. You love it, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then things are the way they’re supposed to be.”
“Are things the way they’re supposed to be with you? I know you decided to be a physician partly because of Mads, but is it everything you wanted it to be?” Mads and I had still been together when Hutch was in med school and announced he wasn’t going into oncology. Grant had lost his mind. I’d been so confused by it, why it mattered so much to him.