Unforgotten (Forgiven)

and the conflict of attraction had confused the fuck out of me before I’d figured out I was bi. By then, my dear brother and his one true love had escaped our hometown in different directions, leaving me and Gus behind. Not friends, just two boys loosely connected by family drama and heartache. We hadn’t spoken since the night we’d shared that drunken kiss.
And now I was moving into his house.
Awkward.
I rode the last six miles to Rushmere with my heart in my throat. For his part, Grey slept, perfectly content in his khaki plastic nest, and I envied him more than I’d ever envied anything. I hadn’t closed my eyes since I’d fled the yard, and now I was two minutes from the family reunion from hell, plus facing up to my rejuvenated hots for my new roomie.
Rushmere was one of those towns with a bit of everything, rich and poor, nature and industry. The woodland that surrounded it was beautiful. I’d missed it—the scent, the sounds, the forest ground beneath my bare feet. My dad had taught me to climb trees in the mighty oak glade, and count frog spawn in the lake, while my grandpa had weaved natural fences from the undergrowth. They were both long dead, though, and it was hard not to believe they’d taken a part of me with them.
Luke too.
Dammit, why did the prospect of seeing him scare me so much? It wasn’t as if it had been years, not anymore. I’d met him for breakfast three months ago, eggs, bacon, and Worcestershire sauce fried mushrooms. Fuck, I was hungry. Maybe that explained the chaos in my stomach as I pedalled my approach to Gus Amour’s house. Unless he’d moved, of course. In the terse texts I’d exchanged with Luke since our strained phone call that morning, I’d forgotten to ask.
The house loomed into view. Neat and well kept, it was nothing like the ramshackle mess it had been when I’d left Rushmere all those years ago. The boy—man, definitely man—had been busy.
I parked the bike by the red brick garage and checked on Grey. Still asleep, little fucker. Perhaps if he’d been awake I could’ve stalled knocking on the green front door.
“So you really do have a cat.”
I spun around. Luke was behind me, arms folded across his chest, a natural scowl on his face that matched how I felt. “Of course I have a cat. You think I’d make that up?”
“I don’t know what you’d do. You never tell me anything that makes any sense.”
True that. Mainly because I only got the hankering to call my big brother when I was down on my luck, or I’d had a skinful. At the arse crack of dawn this morning, he’d been blessed enough to get both, though our conversation had been more lucid than many we’d had in the past. I didn’t get that fucked-up anymore. I’d promised him. “Did, uh, Gus say it was okay for me to bring him? The cat, I mean.”
“It’s fine. You know Gus. Dude’s so laid-back I’m surprised he doesn’t fall over.”
“I don’t know Gus. I haven’t seen him for five years.”
Luke’s silence was deafening. He eyed me the way only he could, his stare blankety blank, and yet so penetrating, I half expected it to drill holes in the wall behind me.
“What?” I snapped.
He shrugged and fished a set of keys from his back pocket. “Nothing. Stop your glaring and bring that rat bag inside.”
I bristled. “Who are you calling a rat bag?”
Prick. He could call me whatever he liked, and after my sleepless night and grand adventure, I wasn’t looking so hot, but there was nothing rat bag about my fucking cat. Grey had long silver fur and wide blue eyes. If I hadn’t been drunk as a skunk when I’d named him, I might’ve called him Gandalf.
Luke let out an impatient breath. “Bring your cat and come in, okay? I want to get you settled before Gus comes home and has to deal with your shit.”
“My shit?”
“Just come inside.”
I shot Luke the glower he deserved, then turned my back on him to peel Grey out of his makeshift bed. Little brat barely noticed, and buried himself in my tatty denim jacket, leaving me to face Luke again without his support.
Luke unlocked Gus’s front door and waved me inside. The hallway was white walls and posh engineered wood. There was a cupboard built into the space under the stairs. Luke jerked his head at it. “Put your shoes in there.”
Great. Apparently Gus had absorbed my brother’s obsession with the clean and tidy. This was going to be fun...not. But my fears were allayed when, shoeless, I followed Luke into the kitchen and found it to be as homey and lived-in as any normal household that didn’t cater to my brother’s anal-retentive habits. Clean dishes were stacked on the draining board, empty beer cans lined up by the back door. A drawer was half open and stuffed with shopping bags. For a brief moment, I felt right at home, then I remembered it wasn’t my home, cos I didn’t have one, and I didn’t fucking want one. I hadn’t stayed in the same place longer than six months since I’d left Rushmere, and I didn’t plan on changing that anytime soon.
I checked the windows were shut, then set Grey on the floor. He unwound himself from sleep and stretched with a lazy arch of his back.
I had a pouch of Felix in my pocket. Intuitive as ever about anything that wasn’t human emotion, Luke opened a cupboard and handed me a cereal bowl. “Wash it when he’s done.”
“Fuck off.”
I fed Grey. He ate two mouthfuls, then wandered off to explore. I let him go, trusting that he wouldn’t piss anywhere till I’d fashioned him a makeshift litter tray out of something. With that in mind, I peered out of the back window at the garden. It was long and narrow, with a shed at