Like he’s ready to hear the answer even if he doesn’t like it.I look at Hayden, unsure. Gay sex My boots crunch lightly on the gravel, but even the sounds of nature feel muted under the weight of everything we haven’t said.“So,” Brendan says, and I hear the shift in his tone before the words even hit. I don’t smile back, but the corner of my mouth twitches. I pull Hayden away from our campsite, threading us through a patch of dense trees just beyond where the other sites are scattered. “You good?”Brendan doesn’t answer right away, just looks toward the trailhead and exhales. One of the guys turns toward me, smiling behind a silver beard.“Morning,” he says.“Hey,” I repeat, a little more confidently. We haven’t been honest, and his hurt at being excluded from this new dynamic is palpable. “Might as well,” he mutters. After the weekend? “So no, I don’t regret it. The ground is uneven, cluttered with roots and rocks, but it feels private back here, shadowed and tucked away from the main trail and anything else.I spread the throw blanket out on a relatively flat patch of dirt and needles, and Hayden smirks at me like I’m some genius. He stops a few feet away, arms crossed.No one speaks
