He's Not My Type

13

They're barely even around the corner when Christian drops his skateboard and tugs Elijah into a tight hug.
"Fuck, H, I'm sorry." Christian rubs Elijah's back and it makes him feel like crying. "You didn't deserve that."
Embarrassed, Elijah bites his lip and tries to pull away, but Christian keeps his arms wrapped around him, not letting him go far.
"I mean," Elijah says. "She was a little out of line."
"A little?"
Elijah glances down. The setting sun is casting shadows over the cracks in the pavement.
"She kind of gets like that when she has a couple of drinks, though. And she never really stops at a couple. So, there's that." Elijah's shoulders slump down. "But she's Nick's friend. And she's a lecturer with him in sociology. So, she would know. It's not like it wasn't true."
"Darling-"
"I mean, not the parts about you, they weren't true-" Elijah stops himself. The parts about Christian were sort of true. But having his own thoughts about Christian said out loud like that makes them seem offensive in a way Elijah never meant them. So, instead, he says: "That is why Nick broke up with me, though."
Christian cups Elijah's cheek in his hand, forcing him to meet his intense blue eyes. "He's a fucking idiot, then. You know that, right?"
"We just wanted different things," Elijah says weakly.


"I can't do this anymore."
Shawn blinks at him from across the kitchen table. "Sorry?"
"We just want different things." Elijah tugs his blanket tighter over his shoulders, shifting on his chair.
Since running into Ed and Caroline the night before, the irrational spark of hope Leigh-Anne had given Elijah has turned to a sinking feeling churning in his stomach.
It was clear that Elijah's suspicions were right about how he and Christian looked when they were together. More than that, though, it was a needed reminder of why he and Christian wouldn't work out any more than he and Nick had.
"We want - what? Why do you and I want different things?" Shawn asks. "Do you not want to help me anymore? It's okay if you need time for your own subjects, you know. You already helped me a lot this week."
"What? No." Elijah frowns. Shawn isn't the best at keeping up sometimes. "Not you and me. Me and Christian."
"Why are you talking about Christian?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"Because you were in the middle of quizzing me on 18th century Western European monarchies?"
Elijah glances down at the notes laid out in front of him, all tiny letters and neat bullet points and meticulously straight underlines.
"And, also, because I thought you had ended things with him?" Shawn says.
Elijah raises his head. "Why would you think that?"
"Because you kept saying you didn't like him and that you were going to?"
"I never said I didn't like Christian," Elijah snaps. "He's the best."
"Okay," Shawn says slowly. "I really don't know what we're talking about then."
Elijah wonders, not for the first time, if being a bit slow on the uptake is a Canadian thing. "You should meet Christian, then you'd understand. He's so sweet and generous and talented and he's so much fun." He looks off into the kitchen wistfully. "He deserves someone who thinks he's the best. I wish..." He trails off, then shakes his head. "I'm going to end it. I have to end it."
"Okay?"
"I am," Elijah repeats firmly. "And Pieter doesn't need to know anything about this conversation, does he, now, Shawn?"