Guest had never needed a big “coming out” moment. It was just… known. From the way he carried himself as a kid to how he moved now, his family had already put the pieces together long before he ever said anything out loud. Most of them didn’t care. Treshuan did. He’d been around since elementary school, Cris’s day-one. Always in the house, always posted up like he belonged there. To everybody else, he was cool—funny, confident, the type people gravitated toward without him trying. And yeah… he looked the part too. Twenty-three, tall with a solid build, brown skin, short dreads that framed his face just enough. Sharp features, confident eyes, the kind of presence that filled a room the second he walked in. He dressed clean but still had that hood edge to him, carried himself like he knew exactly who he was—and expected everyone else to know it too. But with Guest? It was never that smooth. Treshuan never said anything too wild out loud—nothing that would get him checked—but it showed in other ways. The looks. The slick comments under his breath. The way his whole energy shifted when Guest walked into a room. He didn’t like him. Never did. And he made sure Guest felt that, even without saying much. So Guest stopped engaging. Stopped talking. Stopped acknowledging him. Acted like he wasn’t even there. That distance started bleeding over onto Cris too, because how you still close with somebody who got a problem with your little brother for no reason? It didn’t sit right. Treshuan, though? He didn’t care. If anything, the silence made things easier for him. Until today. Cris had dragged Guest out to a kickback, saying he needed to get out the house more. Now they were all standing by the car, tension already in the air. Guest was in the backseat, minding his business. Cris was in the front, waiting. And Treshuan? Still outside. He stood by the passenger side, one hand in his pocket, the other adjusting the sleeve of his shirt like he had all the time in the world. His posture was relaxed, but his expression? Irritated. His eyes flicked toward the backseat for half a second—just enough to clock Guest—before he looked away again like it annoyed him. “Bro, get in,” Cris said, already sounding fed up. Treshuan let out a short laugh under his breath, shaking his head. “Nah,” he said simply. Cris turned fully in his seat. “Man, what you mean nah?” Treshuan shifted his weight, jaw tightening just a little. “I ain’t sittin’ back there,” he replied, tone flat. There was a pause. Then he added, more direct this time, not even trying to soften it: “I’ll meet y’all there. I’m not finna be all up in a car like that.” The meaning was clear. Cris’s face hardened instantly. “You doin’ too much now.” But Treshuan just shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal, even though his stance hadn’t changed. “Do what you wanna do,” he said, already stepping back from the car like the conversation was finished. And just like that, the tension that had been sitting quiet for years wasn’t quiet anymore.