Free With or Without You by Brian Farrey

dream.
    I throw my arm around his neck. “Erik … that’s … God, I’m so happy for you!”
    His confidence remains elusive but he’s all grins now. “I can’t believe it. This is exactly what I want to do. They made me a really good offer—no, an incredible offer. I’ll be going to school at night, working with some of the most brilliant HIV researchers in the world during the day …”
    I glance again at the ticket and can actually feel my brain click. The departure date is August 12. The choice of date is no accident. That’s the day we decided was our anniversary. Though we’d been dating since June last year, we officially became a couple on August 12. That was when we talked and agreed:
    • we were seeing each other exclusively;
    • we were working toward a committed relationship;
    • if Guy A so much as looked at another man, Guy B had the right to gut Guy A with a spork.
    When he first told me that he was going for the interview, he must have seen I was worried, because he assured me that he probably didn’t have a chance in hell of getting in and he was really only going for the interview experience. He made it sound like an impossible possibility, so we never discussed a future that involved California. But he knew what I was thinking before he got on that plane: What happens to us if you get in?
    I’m holding the answer in my hand.

reckoning
    “Come with me, Evan.”
    Four words. I can’t even reply with one.
    He talks faster than I ever thought he was capable. “Here’s how I figure it: We pack a moving truck on the eleventh. Tyler’s agreed to drive it out to California for us. We fly out on the twelfth. Meet up with Tyler on the thirteenth. He flies home and …”
    Erik stops. My eyes haven’t left the ticket and anyone who knows me knows that stunned silence does not bode well. He starts over, slower. “School’s over. You’re eighteen. You can do whatever you want. You were planning on leaving Madison anyway, right? Just make a small course correction.”
    Absolute zero begins to overcome the rapture and I try not to panic.
    “I … There’s Chicago. I was going … Chicago. School.” I hate it when language leaves me.
    Erik places his strong hands firmly on my shoulders and squeezes. “Evan, I might be way off base here. But I always got the impression that Chicago was never really … your heart’s desire. It was just something you felt you had to do after high school. You were going there because that’s where Davis was going.”
    I can count on one hand the number of times Erik has mentioned Davis in the year we’ve been together. Now, Davis has come up twice in as many days. Something I’ve been dreading is coming. A reckoning.
    I shrug. “No. Well, yes, Davis is going too. But they have a really great art school.”
    Erik squeezes my shoulders again, playfully. “But is it a school you’ve got your heart set on?” He takes the envelope and pulls out more papers—college brochures. “I did a bit of research while I was in California, picked up a little information. There are some really great art schools in San Diego. Some of them, that’s all they teach. All art, all the time.”
    I glance at the brochures. When Davis and I talked college, I only knew that my heart wanted out. Something new, beyond Madison. Chicago became the most convenient route to take. But without realizing it, the last eleven months created an alternate course. I’d give anything for a compass right now.
    Erik misreads my hesitation. He tosses the brochuresaside and holds my head in his hands, lining up our eyes so all I see is deep, penetrating brown. “Or you can say ‘screw school.’ No one is forcing you to do that. You can get a job. You can paint. God, there’s so much you can do. Right now, I don’t even care what that is as long as it’s something you feel strongly about. Just … please do it with me.”
    Crying will give him all the wrong messages. Crying will say, Don’t