The Wolf at Bay (Big Bad Wolf)

“I don’t need you,” Cooper repeated, whispering into Park’s sweaty hair now. “But I want you. All the time.”

That’s something they didn’t warn you about getting older, seeing your parents age too, seeing them as people, sad and afraid and haunted by their own mistakes.

You never even mentioned it. Like it didn’t exist. Like it didn’t even cross your mind that I could be gay or bi or anything else. How was I to know it was okay? I never heard it from you. It wasn’t my job to tell you. It was yours to make me feel like I didn’t have to hide it from you

.

“Put that back down. I said seduced by a stranger, not deduced by Freud. Teenage Cooper had some shit to work out, okay?”

Cooper’s heart raced. Fuck hayrides, the thrill of a good argument was burning through his veins. Vaguely he knew he should stop, turn back before he broke something irreparable. But the moment he stopped feeling angry, the hurt would set in.