Summer Milestone

We Saved Eachother

Chapter 29

~ZACK~

"Friends? I thought you said you couldn't trust me anymore and therefore we couldn't be friends," I remind him.

"I take it back, man. After you saved my life, I realized that I couldn't be mad at you anymore..."

"We saved each other," I mumble under my breath.

"Yeah... and when I think about never seeing you again once this summer's over, once this trip's over, it fills me with so much dread and I hate the idea of ending our twelve-year friendship like this..."

"Me too," I whisper, barely audible to him, but I think he can still hear me.

"Especially when it was in part my fault that this all started..."

Pretty sure I know where he's going with this. "We don't have to talk about it," I tell him, knowing how uncomfortable this conversation makes the both of us.

"I can't keep running away from it..."

I already know what he's going to tell me so I just let him go for it and don't say a word.

"That night at the hotel..." His voice goes lower as he continues to speak, as if out of shame. "... I actually wanted you to kiss me... didn't think you'd actually do it though," he chuckles at that last bit.

"Me neither," I mutter back. "I wish I hadn't... then we wouldn't be in this shit-pile."

"Why'd you do it then?"

That's a good question. I think the obvious answer is because I had a crush on you... maybe. Though I am not going to verbally admit that to him. "I don't know. Why did you want me to kiss you to begin with? I'm a guy. That's so weird."

"Because... I love you..." he confesses and my heart skips a beat for an inexplicable reason, despite the fact that he's said that to me before. This time, however, is different. "... more than I should... ya know, you're my best friend. I never thought I'd fall in love with my best guy friend. I guess that makes me gay or whatever. I didn't want everyone to think of me as fag so that's why I rejected you that night. But after everything that's happened since then, I kinda wish that I hadn't."

"Same," I mumble modestly. "I feel the same way about you, man. I really wanted to kiss you that night and I felt like you wanted me to as well. I was shocked and... kinda embarrassed when you got up and acted like you didn't know what I was doing."

"I'm sorry, man. I was so insecure. Especially about kissin' another guy."

"We both were. I guess I can't blame you. I still think it's weird that we wanted to kiss each other. We're both guys, it's not normal for two guys to be attracted to each other."

"I know, right? It's crazy. Maybe it's because we've known each other for so long and have grown closer to each other than we have to anyone else," he speculates but I think we both know the obvious answer to why we're attracted to each other.

"Yeah, but I've seen with other guy friends, they just treat each other like brothers. They never... suddenly develop gay feelings for each other... why are we different?" The answer is right in front of me, but I dread admitting it to myself because I never once saw my life mapped out like that.

He just shrugs. "I don't know... I just know that, of all my girlfriends I've had, none of them have ever made me feel the way that you do."

I slightly chuckle, "That's so gay."

"There was always something that you had that they didn't."

"A penis?" I joke, inciting the both of us to break out into simultaneous laughter.

"No, it's not about sex," he assures, even though I find that questionable when I look back at some of the times I remember questioning whether he was gay or not.

"You sure about that? Cuz I remember you checkin' out my bare ass that night at the hotel..."

His face turns red and he still tries to deny checking out my butt, just waiting for me to turn around so he could see my junk that night. And that wasn't the only incident like that that I recall.

"And then there was that time the summer after tenth grade when we went skinny-dipping with those other kids," I remember that incident solely because it was the one time I ever went swimming with Josh, despite my fear of swimming. From what I recall, the water wasn't very tall, but nonetheless, it was probably one of the stupidest things I'd done that summer considering I didn't even know how to swim. I blame peer-pressure and my stupid 16-year-old self for giving into it.

"I barely even remember that," he says modestly.

"I remember you couldn't take your eyes off me. It was like you didn't want to miss whenever I emerged from the water all naked and shit." Damn, I think I'm starting to make him A LOT more uncomfortable now. Probably went too far by telling him that.

"Didn't think you noticed," he mutters shamefully.

"It was the first time I started having suspicions about you."

"Yeah, well I remember you... you kept holding onto my arm almost the entire time, it was kinda weird."

"Yeah, because I was afraid of slipping on the rocks and either drowning or busting my head open. Not because of whatever you were thinking," I roll my eyes in annoyance over his ignorance.

"The water wasn't even deep enough for you to drown! You were just using that as an excuse to touch me."

"Dude, I wasn't even into you back then." Wasn't I, though?

"Horseshit!"

"Look, can we just forget it? It doesn't even matter how we felt about each other back then. It was two years ago. Things have changed since then."

"Yeah, I guess," he agrees. "Though I can't agree that too much has changed since then," he adds suggestively, obviously referring to how we're still attracted to each other. The only thing that has actually changed since then is that we can finally admit it to ourselves and to each other.

We stare at each other for some time, as if wanting to kiss. That, of course, does not happen seeing as kissing is kinda what got us into this mess in the first place and I don't think it's worth the risk of losing our friendship over again. I know things have changed now but I don't think either one of us is ready for that. We were always better off as friends anyway.