Nick. He loved to go home. Loved seeing his family and his friends, showing Greg where he grew up. Loved the way his skin felt lying in the hot Texan sun, as it burned away the memories of boxes, of explosions, of dead bodies. Everything that was wrong with the world was left in Las Vegas with the twinkling lights and the awful weather. Having Greg there was just a bonus, having his skin underneath his fingertips as they lazed on the back deck of Nick's elaborate ranch. It was a tried and true cliché, but he couldn't imagine anywhere else he'd rather be. Nick loved going back to Texas because it was where he felt he belonged. Nick was Texas through and through, and Texas was home.
But Greg. He never went home. Ever. Not because it was too far away. It was San Francisco for god’s sake, not Alaska. But Greg never went home because it just wasn't something that was ever on the cards. He knew when he was 13 and he read that one book that changed his life. That was the moment when he knew that once he was out of there he wasn't looking back. And since he'd been gone from that bedroom, from that street, from that city, he hasn't looked back. Not for anything or anyone he left behind. He desperately wanted to explain it to Nick, to tell him everything that he hid so deep inside his psyche that he wasn't even sure he could reach it anymore. But sometimes lying is just an easier alternative to the truth you know would kill you, or even worse, would kill him. And the last thing Greg ever wanted was to hurt Nick. Putting a highway and a ten thousand story brick wall between him and his past was his solution. Even when Nick begged Greg to show him where he grew up and the places he used to inhabit, Greg blatantly refused. Of course Greg had his reasons. But trying to decipher his reasoning for never going home was like trying to sift rocks. It was always the same line. No questions asked, no questions answered. When it was asked of him why they couldn't go to San Francisco, he whispered quietly.
"You can't go home again."
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