The karaoke lounge is exactly what you’d expect for a Tuesday night in the city—neon bleeding across sticky tables, the smell of spilled beer and cheap air freshener, laughter bouncing off walls covered in framed photos of people who probably regretted their song choices the next morning. I’m wedged into a booth between Stephen and a girl named Sarah whose name I learned approximately three minutes ago and will forget by the time we leave. Stephen’s hand is on my shoulder, warm and familiar, the way it’s been since we were fourteen and he decided I was his person.
“You doing shots with us or what?” Stephen asks, already waving down a server before I can answer.
“Someone’s got to get you home in one piece,” I say, forcing a smile that doesn’t reach my eyes.
Across the table, Will shifts in his seat, and I can feel it like a physical touch even though we’re not touching. That’s the thing about Will—his presence has always had weight, substance, even when he’s perfectly still. He’s Stephen’s older brother by exactly eleven months, which has always been a source of family amusement. We’re the same age, twenty-seven, but sometimes I feel like Will has lived twice as many years as I have.
“Alex doesn’t do shots,” Will says, not looking at me but speaking directly to me anyway. “He’s a beer man. Always has been.”
The server arrives with four tequila shots and a beer for me. Stephen clinks glasses with everyone, then turns to me. “Live a little, man. One shot won’t kill you.”
I pick up my beer instead. “I’ll live longer than you.”
Will’s mouth curves into something that’s almost a smile. “Some of us are already dead inside.”
Sarah laughs like that’s witty rather than just true. I risk a glance at Will and immediately regret it. He’s wearing that dark green Henley that brings out the gold in his eyes, the one that fits his shoulders just right. His hair is longer than it was a year ago, curling slightly at the nape of his neck. I remember exactly how it felt between my fingers.
“So who’s going first?” Stephen asks, already pushing the karaoke binder toward the center of the table. “I call dibs on ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ because it’s a classic and you people need to respect the classics.”
Sarah reaches for the binder. “I’ve got a killer rendition of ‘I Will Always Love You’ that’s going to make you weep.”
As they debate the merits of power ballads versus rock anthems, I keep my eyes on my beer bottle, tracing the condensation with my thumb. I can feel Will watching me. I’ve been feeling him watch me for an hour now, ever since he showed up to Stephen’s place while we were pregaming and I had to pretend that my entire nervous system wasn’t screaming at the proximity of him.
“Alex should go,” Will says, and my head snaps up before I can stop it. “He’s got a great voice.”
“I do not,” I say too quickly.
Stephen laughs. “He’s being modest. Alex sings in the shower like he’s auditioning for The Voice. It’s impressive.”
“I’m not singing,” I say, trying to sound firm rather than panicked. “I’m here for moral support and to make sure Stephen doesn’t embarrass himself too badly.”
“What about you, Will?” Sarah asks, flipping through the song list. “What’s your go-to?”
Will shrugs, but his eyes find mine again. “Depends on the mood. Depends on the audience.”
There’s something in his tone, something that feels like a question only I can hear. I take a long swallow of beer, cold against my suddenly dry throat.
“Let’s make this interesting,” Stephen says, already three sheets to the wind despite having just arrived. “We draw names. Whoever gets picked has to sing. No excuses.”
He tears a napkin into four pieces and scribbles our names. Sarah draws first, then Stephen, then me. I unfold my napkin—blank. Relief washes through me so intensely I feel light-headed.
That leaves Will.
“Well, brother,” Stephen says, grinning as he slides the last napkin across the table. “Looks like you’re up.”
Will doesn’t even look at the napkin. He just nods slowly, like he expected this. Like he planned this.
“Fine,” he says, and his eyes meet mine across the table.
Stephen and Sarah are already debating whether Will should do something upbeat or emotional, but all I can hear is the blood rushing in my ears. Look away. As if I’ve been able to look away from him for a single second in the past year.
Will walks to the sign-up sheet at the front of the lounge, his back straight, his movements unhurried. He’s always had that quality—controlled, deliberate, like every motion has been considered and approved in advance. I hate that I find it reassuring. I hate that I find anything about him reassuring.
“Another round?” Stephen asks, already flagging down the server again.
“I’m good,” I say, though my bottle is nearly empty.
“Lightweight,” Sarah teases, and I manage a smile that doesn’t crack my face in half.
Will returns to the table, slides in next to Stephen, opposite me. Close enough that I can see the tiny scar above his left eyebrow from when he fell off his bike at twelve and I held his hand while Stephen’s mom cleaned the wound. I’ve been cataloging Will’s scars for fifteen years. That’s the problem with loving someone your entire adult life—you accumulate data.
“So what’s your poison?” Stephen asks. “Something to make the ladies swoon?”
Will’s eyes flick to mine. “Something honest.”
The karaoke host calls his name ten minutes later. Will stands, adjusts his Henley, and walks to the small stage under the flickering lights. The room quiets expectantly. I pick up my beer bottle, realize it’s empty, set it down again.
“This is for anyone who’s ever had to pretend something didn’t matter when it was the only thing that mattered,” Will says into the microphone, and my stomach drops.
The opening notes start, and I recognize the song immediately. Sam Smith. “Stay With Me.”
I tell myself it’s a coincidence. It’s a popular song. It means nothing.
But then Will starts singing, and I know.
His voice is exactly as I remember it from that night—rough around the edges, smooth in the middle, the kind of voice that feels like a hand wrapping around your heart. He’s singing for the room, for the strangers scattered across tables, for his brother and Sarah and the bartender wiping glasses behind the bar.
Then the chorus begins, and his eyes find mine across the dimly lit lounge.
“Guess it’s true, I’m not good at a one-night stand,” he sings, and I can’t breathe. “But I still need love ‘cause I’m just a man.”
The room fades away. The sticky tables, the neon glow, the laughter—it all dissolves into static. There’s only Will on stage, his voice wrapping around words he’s never said to me, words I’ve never let myself say to him.
“These nights never seem to go to plan,” he continues, and I know he’s remembering too. The rain against the windows of my apartment, the way we couldn’t stop touching, the desperation of it, like we were starving and had finally found food.
“I don’t want you to leave,” he sings, and his eyes don’t waver from mine. “Won’t you stay with me?”
Stephen whoops and applauds. Sarah whistles. Someone in the back starts filming with their phone. I have to smile, have to clap, have to pretend that this isn’t happening, that my entire world isn’t being rearranged in three minutes and forty-two seconds.
Will keeps singing, his voice breaking slightly on “won’t you stay with me,” and I know it’s real. All of it. The year of silence, the careful distance, the pretending—that was the performance. This is the truth.
The song ends. The lounge erupts in applause. Will bows slightly, thanks the room, and walks back to our table like he just sang about the weather or sports or anything other than the atomic bomb he just dropped in the middle of my life.
“Damn, brother,” Stephen says, clapping him on the back. “Where did that come from?”
Will shrugs, sliding into the booth. “Felt inspired.”
As he settles in, his shoulder brushes mine. Just for a second, just enough contact to make electricity shoot through my entire body. I try to shift away without being obvious, but then he leans closer, his voice low enough that only I can hear.
“I tried to keep our promise.”
I freeze, my hand tightening around my empty beer bottle.
“It didn’t take.”
I can’t look at him. I can’t move. I can barely breathe.
“Two minutes,” he whispers, his breath warm against my ear. “Outside.”
Stephen is already ordering another round. Sarah is scrolling through the song book, looking for her next number. No one notices the seismic shift, the way the ground has just opened up beneath my feet.
I stand, my movements stiff, unnatural.
“You good?” Stephen asks, his brow furrowed slightly.
I nod, can’t trust myself to speak.
“Fine,” I say, the lie tasting like ash in my mouth. “Just need some air.”
I walk away from the table, my legs barely supporting me. The lounge feels longer than it did when we arrived, the tables farther apart, the exit impossibly distant. I can feel Will’s eyes on my back the entire way.
Outside, the city air hits me like a slap. The parking lot is harshly lit, rows of cars stretching into the distance. I lean against the brick wall of the building, my heart hammering against my ribs, my hands shaking so badly I have to stuff them in my pockets.
My phone buzzes. Stephen: where’d you go?
I ignore it. The risk isn’t just being seen—it’s being understood. If Stephen figures this out, everything changes. Our friendship, his relationship with his brother, the delicate ecosystem we’ve all been living in for a year.
Footsteps approach. I don’t have to turn around to know it’s Will. I’d know his walk anywhere, the slight unevenness from when he broke his ankle playing soccer in college.
“There you are,” he says, and there’s something in his voice—relief, maybe, or surprise.
“Here I am,” I say, still facing the wall.
“Alex.”
I turn then, and the sight of him hits me like a physical blow. He’s closer than I expected, his face illuminated by the harsh parking lot lights, his expression unreadable.
“This was a mistake,” I say, but the words have no conviction. “We can’t—”
“One year,” he interrupts. “One year of pretending that night didn’t happen. One year of watching you across dinner tables and holiday parties and acting like I don’t remember exactly how you sound when you’re about to cum.”
My breath catches. “Will—”
“I tried,” he says, and his voice breaks slightly. “I really tried to keep our promise. But every time I look at you, I remember. And I’m tired of pretending I don’t.”
My phone buzzes again. Stephen: u good?
Will’s eyes drop to my pocket. “Stephen?”
“He’s worried,” I say, feeling guilty and angry and desperate all at once. “He’s going to come looking for me.”
“Let him.” Will steps closer. “I’m done hiding from him.”
I shake my head. “You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I?” Will’s hand comes up to cup my face, his thumb stroking my jawline. “I’ve been in love with you since we were nineteen, Alex. I thought that night would fix it or break it, but it just made it worse. It made it real.”
I close my eyes, leaning into his touch despite myself. “We promised.”
“I know what we promised,” he says softly. “But promises like that—they’re not about protecting other people. They’re about protecting ourselves from what we really want.”
I open my eyes. “And what do you want?”
“You,” he says simply. “I’ve always wanted you.”
My phone buzzes again, but this time I don’t even register the vibration. All I can feel is the warmth of Will’s hand on my face, the intensity of his gaze, the year of want crashing over me like a wave.
“Come with me,” he says, taking my hand. “Just for a minute.”
I let him lead me across the parking lot to his Suburban, the beep of the unlock sounding unnaturally loud in the night. He opens the back door, gestures for me to get in.
“Here?” I ask, hesitating. “Someone could see.”
“Then let them see,” he says, and there’s something defiant in his tone, something that reminds me of the Will I knew before we learned to be careful with each other.
I climb in, sliding across the leather seats. He follows, closing the door behind us. The interior light fades, plunging us into near darkness, save for the ambient glow of the parking lot lights filtering through the tinted windows.
For a moment, we just sit there in silence, the space between us charged with everything unsaid for a year. I can hear the distant sound of traffic, the muffled laughter from inside the lounge, the frantic beating of my own heart.
“Alex,” Will says, his voice low and rough. “I need to know something.”
I turn to face him, our knees brushing in the cramped space. “Anything.”
“Did that night mean as much to you as it meant to me?”
The question hangs between us, fragile and dangerous. I could lie—I could say it was a mistake, a moment of weakness, something we both regret. I could preserve the careful distance we’ve maintained for a year.
But I’m tired of lying. I’m tired of pretending.
“It was the best night of my life,” I whisper, the admission feeling like a surrender. “I’ve thought about it every single day since.”
Will’s breath catches. “Then why—”
“Because I was scared,” I admit. “Because you’re my best friend’s brother and I didn’t know how to navigate that. I didn’t know what it would mean for us, for Stephen, for everything.”
“Anything would be better than this,” he says, his hand finding mine in the darkness. “This silence. This pretending. It’s killing me.”
My phone lights up again with Stephen’s name, and this time Will sees it. He stills for a beat, his thumb tracing circles on the back of my hand.
“He’s going to hate me,” I say, the fear real and immediate.
“No,” Will says, his voice firm. “He won’t. He loves you. And he loves me. He’ll be surprised, maybe, and it might take some time, but he won’t hate you.”
I want to believe him. I do believe him, mostly. But the fear is still there, the fear of disrupting the delicate balance of our lives, of losing Stephen, of losing the comfortable familiarity we’ve all settled into.
“I can’t lose you,” I say, and the vulnerability of the admission makes my voice shake. “Either of you.”
“You won’t,” Will promises, shifting closer. “We’ll figure it out together.”
His other hand comes up to cup my face, his fingers threading through my hair. “But first—I need to kiss you.”
I don’t answer with words. I lean in, closing the distance between us, and then his lips are on mine and it’s exactly as I remember and nothing like I remember. It’s hungry and desperate and full of a year of restraint breaking all at once.
The kiss deepens, our mouths opening to each other, our tongues tangling. I can taste the beer he’s been drinking, something else that’s uniquely Will. His hand tightens in my hair, holding me in place like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he lets go.
I break away, gasping for air. “We can’t—not here.”
“Then where?” he asks, his lips finding my jaw, my neck, that spot behind my ear that makes me shudder. “Because I’m not waiting another year. I’m not waiting another night.”
My hands find the hem of his Henley, pulling it up, my fingers tracing the familiar lines of his stomach, the trail of hair leading downward. He makes a sound low in his throat, something between a groan and a laugh.
“Still have that spot, huh?” I murmur against his skin.
“Shut up,” he says, but there’s no heat in it. I pull his shirt over his head, tossing it onto the front seat. The parking lot lights catch the planes of his chest, the muscles I remember from a hundred summer afternoons at the community pool.
His hands are at my waist, pulling my shirt up, his fingers warm against my skin. “I’ve thought about this,” he says, his voice husky. “About touching you like this again.”
My shirt joins his on the front seat. The air in the car is warm, charged with electricity. I can feel the thrum of my own blood, the urgency building between us.
“Will,” I breathe, and then I can’t say anything more because his mouth is on mine again, his hands exploring my chest, my back, the curve of my spine.
We shift in the cramped space, a tangle of limbs and awkward angles until I’m straddling him, my knees pressed into the leather seats on either side of his thighs. The new position brings us flush against each other, and I can feel how hard he is through his jeans, can feel the answering ache in my own body.
“Alex,” he gasps as I grind against him, the friction delicious, almost unbearable. “God, Alex.”
My hands are in his hair again, pulling just enough to make him groan. “I want you,” I say against his mouth. “I’ve always wanted you.”
He stills, his hands gripping my hips. “Are you sure? Because once we start—”
“I’m sure,” I interrupt. “I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
His eyes search mine in the dim light. “No going back.”
“No going back,” I agree, and then I’m kissing him again, pouring all the year of longing into it, all the nights I’ve lain awake remembering the taste of his skin, the sound of his voice, the way he looked at me like I was the only person in the world.
His hands move to the button of my jeans, fumbling slightly in his haste. I help him, my fingers brushing against his. My jeans and boxers are pushed down, pooling around my knees, and then his hands are on me, stroking me from root to tip, his thumb swiping over the head, spreading the moisture there.
“Will,” I gasp, my hips bucking into his touch. “Please.”
“Please what?” he murmurs, his mouth finding my nipple, his tongue flicking against the sensitive nub.
“Please fuck me,” I say, the words ragged, desperate. “Right now.”
He groans against my skin. “Alex—”
“Now, Will.”
He shifts beneath me, his own jeans and boxers pushed down just enough. I fumble in my pocket for my wallet, for the condom I’ve carried for a year like some kind of sick joke, but his hand stops me.
“No,” he says, his voice firm. “Not this time.”
“But—”
“I want to feel you,” he says, his eyes locking with mine. “All of you. Is that okay?”
I nod, my throat too tight to speak. He reaches into the glove compartment, pulling out a small bottle of lube. The sight of it—prepared, waiting—sends a jolt through me. He planned this. He hoped for this.
His fingers are slick and cool against my hole, circling slowly before pressing inside. I gasp at the intrusion, my body tensing automatically.
“Relax,” he murmurs, his free hand stroking my back. “Let me in.”
