Chapter Eight

Jeff woke up the next morning to the sound of his alarm. He had a slight headache and his mouth was dry and the cheap sheets were scratchy against his skin. He pinched his eyes tighter together and rolled over in search of the source of the infernal screeching noise. This would have been a great plan if his phone was plugged into the charger by his nightstand where he usually left it, and if there wasn’t a hulking naked man in the bed with him, blocking his way.

Jeff’s eyes shot open and he saw that he was half draped over none other than local hot dad, Luke Davis. Jeff stiffened as what had transpired between them last night came back to him little by little. His first terrified instinct was to pull away from the other man and run away as fast as he could, but then Luke reached up and wrapped his arms around Jeff’s torso, pulling him down so that they were pressed chest to chest. Jeff let out a startled squeak against Luke’s shoulder.

“Wha’s tha noise?” Luke asked, stifling a yawn.

Jeff lifted his head and glanced down at the floor beside them.

“My alarm,” he answered hoarsely.

Jeff pushed himself off Luke’s rock-solid pecs and the older man reluctantly let go of him. Jeff followed the sound of his alarm until he found his discarded pants on the floor beside the bed. He dug into the pocket for his phone and silenced it. He didn’t want to, he felt far too exposed now in the brightness of day, but he turned around to face Luke who was sitting up in bed now, legs draped over the side. He stretched his arms out over his head and cracked each of his elbows one by one. Jeff forced himself to look no lower than Luke’s belly button.

He couldn’t believe it happened. He’d actually done it. He’d crossed a line. He’d slept with a student’s father. A student in whom he’d taken a particular interest, too. He felt guilty and ashamed, but looking down at Luke’s brown-green eyes, he couldn’t really bring himself to regret it.

“So,” Luke said, sounding fluid and casual.

“So,” Jeff repeated back, sounding somewhat like a strangled canary.

Luke frowned, making Jeff want to burn the world down, but he couldn’t, because he was the cause of said frown. Maybe he could burn himself, but that sounded far less appealing seeing as his emo phase had ended in late 2003.

Jeff cleared his throat.

“I, uh, I have to start getting ready for work.”

He hated the forced disinterest in his voice and the slight wince it invoked in Luke, but this was the way it had to be. He didn’t want to acknowledge what had happened between them. Acknowledging it would only lead to more questions that he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answers to. At least this way he could think of it as a passionate one-night stand. These things tended to happen in those instances. If he thought of it that way maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much if, or let’s be honest, when Luke realized that he’d made a mistake and he wasn’t interested in Jeff after all.

“Right,” Luke said, standing up and gathering his clothes off the floor. “Do you have an extra phone charger? I should call and check on Cam.”

The mention of Cam sent thetendrils of guilt even deeper into Jeff’s subconscious. How was he supposed to keep tutoring him? Heck, how was he going to face the kid ever again? God. He’d really made a mess out of everything, just as he always did.

Why can’t my love life ever be easy? He complained internally.

Only, last night had felt easy. Luke’s calm energy and breezy attitude meshed so well with Jeff’s high-strung perfectionism. And the way Luke looked now, all sexy and sleep-rumpled...it was enough to make Jeff’s heart skip a beat. Two beats even. Any more skipped beats and he’d be admitted to the hospital for cardiac arrest.

“Yeah,” he croaked and reached into the nightstand to get it for him. Luke thanked him and pressed a soft kiss to Jeff’s temple before heading out into the living room, leaving Jeff to stew in his own inner turmoil. Jeff rubbed the spot that Luke’s lips had just touched, feeling like he’d been branded and made his way over to his closet. He got dressed as quickly as he could and tried not to dwell on it. Out in the living room, he could hear the muffled sounds of Luke talking on the phone. Luke sounded as calm and easygoing as ever, as if there was nothing unusual about today at all. This further cemented Jeff’s assertion that this was just a onetime thing.

Jeff shook his head and disappeared into the bathroom to brush his teeth and shave. He also popped two aspirins while he was at it. He knew he should probably step into the shower, but he didn’t know if he could handle all that noise right now. Not until he’d eaten and chugged an entire liter of water. That idea squashed, he ran his fingers halfheartedly through his hair in an attempt to fluff it up, applied cologne and extra deodorant and deemed his appearance good enough.

Back out in the living room, Luke was still finishing his conversation with Cam. He was perched on the arm of the couch because that was as far as the phone charger would allow him to go. The sight of it, and the easy and loving way he talked to his son brought a reluctant smile to Jeff’s face. Luke looked up just in time to catch the tail end of the look. Jeff turned away embarrassed and made a beeline for the kitchen where he started a pot of coffee and poured them each a huge glass of water. He downed his in one go and then brought the other one over to Luke, who took it in his hands gratefully with a mouthed “thank you.”

“Okay,” he was saying into the phone. “I’m glad you had fun. I might get home a little bit late tonight, but I’ll definitely make it in time for dinner. What do you want?”

There was a brief pause as Cam said something on the other line. Luke’s face softened in a way that made Jeff’s heart give an uncomfortable squeeze.

“You got it, kid,” he said. “Love you.”

Jeff could just make out the muffled sounds of Cam saying, “I love you too, Dad.” For some reason it made him want to cry. He could sense that feeling of shared loss that was making the two of them cling to each other and express their love so easily. And here Jeff was worming his way in between that bond like a homewrecker.

Luke hung up the phone and turned the whole weight of his gaze onto Jeff.

“How do you take your coffee?” he asked Luke. The apartment was so small that he barely even had to raise his voice to be heard.

“Black,” Luke answered. “And maybe just a little bit of sugar.”

Jeff dug out his only two mugs, one with bright and colorful cartoon characters on it that he’d picked up from a theme park and another that said “World’s Best Teacher.” The latter had been a gag Christmas gift from his sister, but the joke was on her because he actually used it almost every day. Why would he go out and buy a regular mug when he already had one at home that worked perfectly fine?

Jeff stirred in a heaping spoonful of sugar and a generous amount of cream into the teacher mug and just a light dusting of sugar into the other. Very carefully he walked the hot liquid back into the living room and sat down next to Luke on the couch; he’d graduated from the arm of the couch to the furthest right cushion now and was bouncing his legs up and down like one of Jeff’s anxious students with ADHD. The two of them drank their coffee side by side without saying a word.

Jeff was paying extra special attention to the tiny brown stain on the opposite wall so that he wouldn’t think about how close they were sitting or about how if he wanted, he could reach out and place his hand over Luke’s knee and rest his head on his shoulder. And he absolutely, under no circumstances, was going to think about what he looked like under all of those clothes or how his arms had felt wrapped around his waist…

Yeah. He was definitely not thinking about that.

Then Luke shifted ever so slightly, causing their thighs to brush against each other for just a moment. Jeff could feel his chest constricting. He desperately wanted to know what the other man was thinking, but he wasn’t going to ask. He didn’t deserve to know.

“What time do you have to leave?” Luke asked.

Jeff dug out his phone which had somehow held its charge all day yesterday and through the night, and checked the time.

“In like, forty-five minutes,” he answered.

Luke nodded solemnly.

“I guess we should go get our vehicles then.”

Jeff nodded. Honestly, he’d completely forgotten that his truck wasn’t sitting in its usual spot outside. That was going to add at least fifteen minutes to his commute. So much for breakfast. He was going to have to make it through the day hungry and heartbroken. It was going to be hell.

Jeff gathered his things, threw a tie around his neck, and stuffed his pockets with granola bars while Luke called for a car. The two of them went outside and stood awkwardly at the bottom of the steps while they waited for their ride to arrive. At one point one of Jeff’s neighbors, he thought her name was Rita or something like it, came out in her robe and slippers and side-eyed them both warily.

Rita and Manny had sort of been friends. They weren’t going to “give each other kidneys” or anything, but they liked to congregate on her balcony and share cigarettes and cheap gossip with each other from time to time. She probably resented Jeff for kicking Manny out of the apartment, even though it was none of her damn business. Thankfully, Rita only glared at them for a few seconds before stamping out her cancer stick and sauntering off in the direction of the mail room.

“What’s her problem?” Luke asked.

Jeff shrugged, not really wanting to explain and squinted against the early morning sun. He regretted not digging out some sunglasses. Luckily their driver showed up before that could happen. Jeff immediately climbed into the front seat so that he wouldn’t have to sit next to Luke in the back, but he could feel Luke’s eyes boring into him from behind the whole ride long.

The driver, an older lady, dropped them off with only a mild amount of derision, which Jeff appreciated since she was dropping them off at a bar they clearly didn’t work at, at 7:30 in the morning. Theirs were not the only cars in the parking lot, but close to it. Jeff started walking toward his truck and Luke followed closely behind. In the end, neither of them really knew what to say, so they shared a brief awkward hug and then separated. Jeff examined his truck, happy to see that the windshield was intact and the tires had not been slashed. He climbed in, started it up, and sat there with his head rested on top of the steering wheel long after Luke had gotten into his SUV and driven away.