How could he do that?
He had to get away.
He was running through the forest. For a moment he thought he heard Huck's footsteps after him, but maybe that was just in his head and maybe he just wished that's what would've happened.
Tom ran home. His eyes stung so badly. Their words sifted slowly through his mind until everything that had happened had finally surfaced and Tom could actually think through things.
And the only thing that Tom could think was how could this happen?
He could hardly see, and tears came to his eyes and stayed there, pooling, cold compared to the heat in his face and the acid in his legs and arms and breath. He couldn't breathe.
He reached his front door. Pulled it open like a storm and closed it behind himself, and maybe it slammed and maybe it was silent, because he couldn't tell and he was too far in his thoughts. How could this happen? What had he done?
Tom ran up the stairs to his room, and the steps creaked under his feet and all he could hear were his own breaths. Everything he did was a mistake. How could he say that? Any of it? How could he fight with his best friend?
Tom closed the door to his room and he fell onto his bed, face in the sheets. His tears were dry and salty and absorbing into the fabric so Tom could hardly even tell if he was crying or not. Except for the tenseness and the wrinkling tiredness in his eyebrows and eyes, and the aching pull in his whole body. And Tom knew he was sobbing, and he just had to be as quiet as he could, now, hiding it.
What had he done? Tom loved him. And they had kissed. Huck had kissed him.
How could he do that?
Why couldn't he just take Tom's word-- why did he have to know so much about Tom when Tom could hardly understand the looks on Huck's face, or Huck's thoughtsâlet alone his own? He was so transparent, and Huck was like a wall.
Tom couldn't do this. He just... How could Huck do that? Kiss him as if it would change anything? But it did. It changed everything-- Huck liked him back, and it wasn't in his head, and he wasn't alone-- but then still changed nothing. He still had to be with Becky. It's what Tom wanted, wasn't it? It's at least what he should do.
How could it get so complicated?
How could this happen?
In his mind, Tom was only half-there.