“I mean, he’s under contract, so—”
“So you’re going to let a man who’s been having sex with you behind the cameras get engaged to a woman on national television? And then what?” Ryan pushes. “Are you and Charlie going to continue dating in secret while he goes on talk shows with his new fiancée? Are you going to go in the closet for this dude? Are you going to live right off camera in Charlie Winshaw’s life forever?”
“I don’t know!” Dev takes three deep breaths, holding each one in for three seconds. Everything is spinning. It’s a humid night, suffocating. He hasn’t thought about any of this yet, and he doesn’t want to troubleshoot his future with Ryan Parker of all people.
But if he thinks about it, if he considers it for even one second, he knows. He would do it. He would live off camera in Charlie’s life if Charlie would let him. If Charlie wanted him, he would do just about anything for that little house in Venice Beach, including hiding away there like a gay Rapunzel, waiting for the moments when Charlie could come to him in secret.
He’s always known how this story ends, because it has ended the same way for thirty-six seasons. Dev doesn’t get the happily ever after, but he would settle for less if it meant being with Charlie. Because the alternative—losing Charlie—is going to destroy him.
“Charlie and I—we know we don’t have a future,” he tells Ryan when the silence stretches too tight between them.
“But you said you love him,” Ryan says quietly. He reaches out for Dev’s hand and gives it a squeeze—a squeeze that reminds Dev he and Ryan were friends once, before everything else. “Is this why you were depressed? In Germany?”
“I’m going to get back into therapy when we’re back in LA.” The words come quick. Automatic.
“Yeah. I’ve heard that one before.”
He wants to tell Ryan it’s different this time. Who he was with Ryan isn’t who he is with Charlie; Charlie isn’t Ryan, and when Dev pulls away, Charlie reaches, and when Dev slips under, Charlie stays.
But Charlie can only stay for ten more days, so what’s the point of explaining?
“Are you going to tell Skylar?”
Ryan snorts and drops Dev’s hand. “Skylar already knows.”
“She doesn’t. She can’t.”
“She definitely does, and she definitely can. She’s not an idiot, and you’re not subtle.”
“But…” Dev is spinning again. Or maybe the entire world is spinning? Either way, he needs to sit down in the dirt. The earth is so warm and his body is so weak, he sinks. “If Skylar knew, she would fire me. I’ve destroyed the season.”
“You really didn’t. This show is about the drama, and Charlie’s delivered that.”
“This show is about love,” Dev counters.
Ryan shakes his head. “D, love is the unintentional by-product of this show.”
Dev pulls his legs against his chest and buries his face in his knees.
“Skylar doesn’t care if you’re sleeping with Charlie,” Ryan says calmly from above him, “so long as Charlie delivers her the hetero fairy tale the network demands. And thanks to your amazing job as Charlie’s handler, they’re going to get it. But you—you deserve better than being someone’s dirty secret, Dev.”
Dev drums out the Morse code for “calm” against his shins and tries to remember how to breathe. Tries to remind himself he survived losing Ryan, once. He can survive losing Charlie, too. Even if those two things don’t feel equivalent on a humid night in Macon, Georgia.
“Besides,” Ryan says before he turns back to the house, “it’s not Skylar you should worry about. It’s Maureen.”