“I could say a lot of things about you, Adrian Terrance,” Ben said, as we lay naked in bed. “But one thing is true—God damn, you know how to make a guy come.”

Ben had been here all night. Just now, the sun was beginning to peek up over the horizon.

“I have a feeling anyone in the world could make you come,” I said, reaching over and checking the time on my phone.

“Probably true. But your cock…” he said, his eyes skimming over my body before stopping to stare at my dick, “...it’s a beautiful thing. Keeps me coming back, that’s for sure.”

I had fucked Ben twice last night—once when he first came over, and I bent him over the back of my couch and fucked him hard and fast before we spoke a word to each other, and then again, at three o’clock in the morning, when I woke up to his lips wrapped around my cock. I’d ended up inside him again, and then he’d come all over my freshly-cleaned bedsheets.

I’d have to go to the laundromat again later. I absolutely hated it there, but my apartment was cheap, and the laundromat was better than calling up my parents and begging for more money for a nicer apartment.

So instead, I had the small place and some scrap of independence. And right now, I had a guy in my bed that I had to figure out how to politely usher out.

Ben yawned, stretching his arms up high. I tried not to stare at his abs as he moved.

“What are you planning on doing today?” he asked, blinking out at the sun.

“Well, I’ve got to go to work in an hour. Then probably yoga afterwards,” I said.

“Naturally,” he replied.

“And then it’s the start of the fall crafts festival tonight,” I said, running my hand along my chest absentmindedly. “I’ll probably stop by there, say hi to some of my coworkers. My manager is displaying her crochet pieces.”

“I forgot that was starting today!” Ben said. “God, they have the best apple cider. Can I tag along?”

“Well, I was planning on going on my—”

He held out a hand, signaling me to stop talking. “Let me guess: you were planning on going on your own? As always, Adrian, on his own?” He rolled his eyes as he stood up, tugging on his boxers. It was normal—after we had sex, he’d get up and leave, and I’d go back to my real life.

“Yeah. I’d prefer that, if you don’t mind.”

We’d had this conversation a few times before.

“Thanks for coming over last night, Ben. I’ll see you later.”

I expected him to get dressed and leave as usual. But this time, Ben turned on his heel, holding up a finger. He was pissed.

“You know what? No,” he said, glaring down at me. “I’m tired of it, Adrian. I’m tired of this,” he said, gesturing around my bed. “You act like you need me until bam, you come, and then I feel like you’re disgusted by me or something.”

“Ben, please—”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m not buying it anymore, Adrian. Come to the festival with me. As my date. It’s the least you could do after all this sneaking around and sleeping with me for the last month.”

I said nothing. Ben crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow, not backing down.

“I can’t, Ben,” I said, defeated. “I can’t. I don’t want people from my work knowing that much about my… personal life.”

He held up his hands in an animated shrug. “Personal life?” he asked, incredulous. He let out a bitter laugh as he tugged on his pants. “Just give it up already, Adrian. It’s not that you don’t want them knowing your personal life. It’s that you don’t want them knowing you sleep with me. With men.”

I shook my head, swinging out of bed and heading over to the bathroom. “I’m getting in the shower.”

He followed after me. “You only invite me over late at night. We only eat at dingy little restaurants where you know your coworkers won’t be. You’ve never once introduced me to any of your friends.”

I whirled around to face him. “And I’m not going to, Ben,” I said, my voice sterner than I’d intended. “There. Does that make you happy?”

Despite my harsh tone, my stomach was sinking inside. I knew I was probably hurting Ben, just like I’d hurt so many people before. It was a vicious pattern, and I couldn’t seem to break myself from it.

Ben was just glaring at me. “You call me up at eleven o’clock at night—oh, Ben, my bed is so cold without you in it. Yoga warmed me up, I’m so ready for you. Ben, nothing but your lips around my cock can make this awful day better. And then afterwards, it’s like I’m nothing to you.”

“Stop,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. It was eight in the morning, and I realized I was already wishing for a glass of wine. “Ben, I’m so sorry—”

“I have one question for you,” he said. “Do you ever plan on introducing me to a single person you know?”

I let out a long breath. There were a million things I wished I could say—I wanted to say anything to make sure I wouldn’t hurt him, to make sure that he’d still come over to my house when I needed him most.

But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t lie to him. So I said nothing instead.

He puffed out a bitter laugh, shaking his head as he looked at me. “I feel sorry for you,” he said calmly. “Have fun sleeping alone from now on. I don’t want to see you again.”

“Good,” I called after him, though I already could feel a low, deep ache washing over me as he stormed away, pulling on his shirt.

“Exactly. Good. I feel sorry for any guy who crosses your path.”

The door slammed behind him, and my house fell silent.

A familiar sensation crept over me, one I’d felt time and time again, in situations just like these: I knew, deep down, that Ben had done the right thing.

I wasn’t treating him right. But I didn’t know how to fix that. Because for so long, all I had ever done was hurt the people that I should have cared about most.

I had loved almost every aspect of my life for the past ten years. I loved being in Oregon, I loved the job I had at the vineyard. I loved the community, and my yoga practice, and even the eternally grey weather. I went through my days feeling fine, enjoying my work and coworkers, feeling like finally, I’d arrived at a lifestyle that was totally my own. I didn’t make much money, and I still owed money to my parents, but otherwise, things were better than they’d ever been.

But… something was always missing.

For a long time, I had thought it was a girlfriend that I needed—I dated many women, but everything always seemed to fizzle out after a few weeks or months.

I’d tried taking up hobbies. Pottery, cycling, even fucking archery, trying to find what was missing through some external focus. I found some solace in yoga, and in cooking from the little beat up recipe cards that Grandpop had left me over a decade ago. I loved his notes in the margins—“winner, winner, chicken dinner!”, “the missus loves this one,” “feeds a horde of hungry mouths!”—but cooking for one was always a little depressing.

And in the past couple years, I’d also had a secret habit of cruising for men on hookup apps to have sex with. It was like I wasn’t even in charge of my own mind as I scrolled through page after page of bare torsos, flexed biceps, and abs.

The apps had led me to Samuel. And then to Tim, to Cody, to Francis, and then to Mark. I had hurt them all, in various ways—some of them I had just stopped talking to one day; others, I’d actually had the balls to end things properly. Ben was the most recent guy, but the story was the same: I’d furtively text him when I felt the emptiness start to eat me alive, and he would come and wash it away, erasing all the needy desires that had built up inside me, thick as cobwebs.

I’d fuck him. He’d blow me. We’d be naked all night together in bed, coming and resting and then coming again. And then he’d leave.

Now he’d left for good, too. I couldn’t blame him. Why stay with someone who couldn’t give you all of himself?

But this hurt—this utter certainty that I had just caused Ben pain—was too much to bear. He would probably be fine, and just chalk me up to an asshole hook-up. But I wasn’t fine.

Something had to change. But I just didn’t know how to change myself.

“Fuck,” I muttered as I checked the time on my phone. I was very late for work now, and I couldn’t exactly give them the excuse of I was busy with a guy at my house.

I threw on my jacket and made my way outside. The morning sky was grey, like it usually was in Oregon, and the cool air blew against me as I started down toward the bus stop.

As I sloshed through a bank of muddy grass, my cell phone rang. My boss and coworkers were the only people that ever called me. Six people had been laid off this year, and ever since the downsizing, I’d been called in for more and more overtime. I wasn’t sure it was really helping the company at all, though.

I answered without even looking at the screen.

“Hi, I know I’m a little late, but I’m about to get on the bus,” I said.

“Adrian?” the voice on the other end came.

It was very clearly not my boss.

“...Mom?” I said, crossing the road and narrowly avoiding being splashed by a car. “It’s not a good time to talk right now. I’m late for work, and—”

“Adrian,” she repeated, her tone stern and serious. She didn’t call me very much at all, but when she did, it was typically to lecture me about something. I was a twenty-eight-year-old man, and still, she to cut me to the core.

“What is it? What’s up?”

“What’s up is that you need to come home.”

“I’m visiting at Christmas, like usual,” I said. “I’m just going to stick to my usual schedule this year. It’s harvest season, and we’ve got a lot going on at the vineyard—”

“Adrian, forget about the vineyard,” my mother said, her voice like acid. “This is serious.”

I laughed once. “Serious? The vineyard is my job, and it’s our busiest time of year. I’d say that’s pretty serious, too—”

“Your father and I are retiring.”

I rolled my eyes, even though she couldn’t see me. “Right. Of course. Sure you are. Just like you were going to retire six years ago, then three years ago, and last year, too. You and Dad will never actually retire.”

“We are going to actually retire, next month,” she said. “We already have the date. October twenty-fourth. Your father and I informed management today.”

Suddenly I felt cold.

They had informed management? In the past, through all their claims of imminent retirement, they had never gone that far.

Something in my mother’s voice also sounded more urgent than usual. I stopped dead in my tracks, across the street from the bus stop, just staring out at raindrops falling into a puddle.

I opened my mouth, but found that I couldn’t speak.

“The hotel is going to be yours,” she said, both resignation and delight in her voice. “We’ve been talking about it for a while, but the time has come.”

Shock rolled through me.

My parents had insisted for a long time that I was going to inherit the business, but I never thought in a million years that it would actually happen. I thought that the promise of inheritance had just been a carrot they liked to keep in front of me, enticing me to move back to Mistview Heights—but that they’d never actually follow through. Why would they give it up, anyway? The Terrance Hotel was doing better than ever—in the past ten years, through shrewd investments, my parents had gone from wealthy to bona-fide multi-millionaires.

It would make more sense for my sister Alora to inherit the business, anyway—she desperately wanted to run the hotel, and she’d be far better at it than me. Alora was a ruthless businesswoman with two degrees and experience, and I was just… me.

But my mom wasn’t the type to joke. And it sounded like she was actually going through with this.

“But… why?” I asked, my voice quiet.

“We’re simply too old for the lifestyle,” she said dismissively. “We have our money. We have our place in the community. And quite frankly, there are avenues where our efforts are better placed. Your father and I need to be more engaged with the community, not busy taking care of customers and cleaning staff and hotel events all the time.”

“I… I can’t believe it—”

“We will of course arrange for your move to be paid for. My assistant Mason will be contacting you to iron out the right day for the move next week, and he will let you know about having your belongings shipped here. You should let your… employer know as soon as possible—”

“Move?” I said, anger welling inside me. “Whoa, slow down. What? I’m not moving back.”

She let out one sharp, loud laugh. “Adrian, don’t be silly. Of course you will. You certainly aren’t going to run the Terrance Hotel from the Pacific Northwest. Anyway—as I was saying, Mason is already making the arrangements as we speak.…”

My mom continued on, talking at length about logistics and contracts and responsibilities. But I quickly tuned it out, leaning against a lamp post next to me, staring out into nothing.

Was I really willing to go back home? In an instant I was being forced to take stock of my world in a way I hadn’t in years.

I was in debt. The winery didn’t pay me much to begin with, and it would probably be out of business by the end of the year.

And I was still—ten years later—just the fuck-up son of the family, the black sheep who tried and failed to make a successful life in Oregon. I was single, constantly scraping by, and by all accounts, a failure.

If I went back to Mistview Heights, all I had to do was take over the family business, and in short order, I would be a millionaire.

It made me dizzy just thinking about it.

I had left Mistview for a reason—I didn’t fit in, and I still knew that I wouldn’t be able to permanently. But… what if I could live there for a couple years? That was all it would take to make more than enough money to live on for another decade, at least. Then I could truly be free, for the first time—no more owing money to my parents, no more guilt. No more being the shameful son of the family. And if I had no one else in the city, at least I had Sean—my brother had always been kind to me, even if distance had kept us far apart.

Grandpop had always told me that it took years of hard, terrible work before he was able to open his dream hotel. He’d said so many times that he’d rather have been shoveling shit than working for his horrible bosses in the meatpacking factories of his youth.

But those factories had led him to his life’s dream. I couldn’t let his dream die.

It would be a clean slate. I hadn’t met any women yet who seemed right for me—but I also hadn’t met any guys who were anything but fuck buddies.

If I managed to run the hotel, get out of debt, and finally get married… maybe I’d have some scrap of a chance of seeming respectable in my family’s eyes. And no matter how awful my family was, I wanted that respect. I craved it.

I watched as my bus pulled up across the street, stopped to let people on, and then drove off. I’d missed it, and the next one didn’t come for twenty minutes. But already, it seemed like it didn’t matter.

I tuned back into my mother’s voice. “...Of course, you’ll stay in one of the suites for the first few weeks until you find your own apartment, but that should be no issue. It’ll be better for you, actually, to be close to work. As I said, we can talk at length about it all once you’re back in town.”

“I’ll do it,” I said, firm and confident.

I had made my decision. And no matter how much it felt like swallowing a bitter pill to tell my mom I agreed, I knew it was the right way. It was the only way. For once, instead of hurting everyone around me, I could do something right.

She paused for a moment, letting out a small sound of confusion. “What? Well—of course you’ll do it,” she said, her voice final and matter-of-fact. “Adrian, it’s time you came home.”