Phoenix
Trying to choose a movie for someone other than himself was a nearly-impossible task. Ace had said he didn’t care what they watched, with the exception of horror, but that still left every other category. Was he more of an action or comedy man? Did he like romances? No, most guys didn’t like romances unless they were made to watch them. Phoenix didn’t know why. They had good storylines, sometimes.
Stacks of DVD cases piled up around him as he sat in his living room. Lucy lounged just outside the pile, looking at him with what Phoenix was fairly sure was concern. There were too many variables. At least when couples went to the movie theater, they only had a limited option to choose from. Maybe that was the secret. But how to narrow them down? Popularity seemed like a good indicator.
Over the next half hour, he meticulously picked three movies from each category—sci-fi, fantasy, romance, action, thriller, and comedy. He was almost positive that Ace wouldn’t want to watch a documentary, and it wasn’t like he had that many to choose from anyway.
The doorbell rang, and Phoenix jolted. It was either Ace or the pizza guy. He stood up and looked out the window, spotting a grey Fusion with a delivery car topper. Pizza, then. Grabbing the tip money from the end table, he walked over to the door and opened it before the guy could ring the doorbell. He was young—high school aged—and Phoenix hoped the boy was having a better high school experience than his own.
Taking the pizza boxes, Phoenix handed over the money and smiled, then retreated back into the house. Only once he had closed the door behind him did he allow himself to relax. After a moment, he crossed the living room and walked into the kitchen, setting the boxes down on the stove. He busied himself, grabbing plates from the cabinet, and had just filled glasses with ice when the door opened.
“Phoenix?” Ace called.
“In here!”
A moment later, Ace walked in, carrying a bouquet of orange flowers. Phoenix blinked. Had he forgotten something? Ace wasn’t one of those people who celebrated milestones in months, was he? And if he was, had it been a month? Two months? No one had done any official asking out, so were they even counting yet?
“Did I forget?” he asked finally.
“Forget what?”
“I don’t know. You have flowers.”
Ace laughed and walked over to pull him in for a hug. Phoenix flinched as the flowers hit his head, but then a moment later, they broke apart.
“You didn’t forget anything. I just wanted to bring you something nice.”
He relaxed as Ace opened a cabinet, no doubt looking for something to put them in. At least he hadn’t messed up.
“Thank you. Here. You’ll never find what you’re looking for.”
He walked past Ace into the laundry room, where a box sat next to the washer. When he’d moved out, his mother had sent him with a box of things she swore he would need, and he swore he wouldn’t. As a compromise, he had taken the box. It had sat in his laundry room for nearly five years, untouched.
Pulling out a vase, he back into the kitchen and filled it with water. Ace dropped the flowers in, and Phoenix set it in the middle of his dining table. He had to admit it made the place look brighter.
“They look really nice,” he said with a smile.
Ace walked over and wrapped his arm around Phoenix’s waist. “I’m glad you like them. There wasn’t a great selection, but I wanted to get something for you. And for my parents.”
Phoenix frowned. “Your parents?”
“Yeah. I went up to see them today. Second time since I got back. The first was when I had just moved home. It looked so bare up there, and I thought it would be nice to get something for them, and then I saw the fresh flowers and wanted to get them for you.”
“Oh. Well, thank you. The pizza just got here, so it shouldn’t be cold.”
“I know,” Ace said. “I saw the delivery guy as I was pulling in. What’d you get?”
“One cheese, one meat, breadsticks, and lots of garlic butter.”
It had been nerve-wracking, trying to decide what kind of pizza to order, but he figured that Ace wasn’t vegetarian, and most people liked meat pizza. If he didn’t, then Ace could have some of the cheese. And if he didn’t like either of those options, there were always the breadsticks.
“Perfect. I love meat,” Ace said with a grin.
Phoenix was fairly sure there was some kind of sexual meaning there, so he smiled back and walked over to the stove. They filled their plates and glasses, then walked over to the table. Phoenix had considered them eating in the living room, but the table looked so pretty now that it was a shame not to eat there.
“I didn’t know what kind of movie you wanted to watch, so I got a selection to choose from.”
“I told you, I’m—”
“Not picky. I know. That isn’t very helpful when you’re trying to pick out a movie and you have no idea what the other person likes. So I picked the top three movies I had for six different categories.”
“Sounds logical,” Ace said, nodding. “We can choose which one we want to watch after dinner.”
He took a bite of pizza and hummed. Speedy’s always made the best pizza.
“You know, when we were talking about a first date, you mentioned dinner and a movie was a horrible date idea,” Ace said. “Because of the talking during a movie.”
Phoenix shrugged. “Well, yeah. If you go to a movie theater, you can’t talk there, or they’ll kick you out. Besides, most of these movies are ones we’ll have seen anyway, and I don’t count this as a date.”
“You don’t?”
“Not really. Dates are more… formal. This is different. It’s nice, don’t get me wrong. And I like it a lot better than a date. But it isn’t a date.”
Ace chuckled. “If you say so.”
After they finished dinner, Ace helped clean up. They put the rest of the pizza in the fridge, and Phoenix led them into the living room to choose a movie. Ace hovered in the doorway, his hands in his pockets.
“Is everything okay?” Phoenix asked. He had the distinct feeling it wasn’t.
“I don’t want to keep secrets from you.” Ace crossed the room and sat down on the couch, so Phoenix took his spot in his chair. “You mean too much to me to do that. I got a job offer.”
It felt as though someone had poured a bucket of ice water on him. He knew he shouldn’t have been surprised. When they had first met, Ace had been adamant that this was temporary. He wouldn’t be staying in Wilmingson forever—or even very long. The first chance he got to leave, he would take it.
But Phoenix hadn’t expected it to be so soon. Or to care so much.
“Where?” The word scraped the back of his throat.
“New York City.”
Of course. Ace was the kind of person who loved big cities. It was why he had moved to one. Two, really. He’d moved to Washington D.C. and then Boston after graduate school. Wilmingson would be much too small for him.
Phoenix had hoped being here might have changed his mind. That he would have found it easier to live in Wilmingson now that he had a job and was making friends. Now that he had Phoenix. Clearly that wasn’t the case.
“Are you going to take it?” he asked finally.
“I don’t know. There’s a part of me thinking of course I should take it. This is what I’ve been working toward my entire career. It’s an associate section editor job. If I stayed with the paper, I could end up as section editor, and then if things go right, managing editor.”
Managing editor for a big-name newspaper in New York City. It was the perfect career opportunity for Ace. There was no reason why he shouldn’t take it. Ace would move up to New York, have his perfect job, and he would find someone else. Someone who didn’t obsess over what pizza to order or worry about going into town. Someone better for him.
“What’s holding you back? It’s what you wanted.”
Wasn’t it?
“Well…” Ace rubbed the back of his neck. “It isn’t the only job offer I have.”
Because it wasn’t bad enough he had one offer.
“What’s the other?” Phoenix asked.
“Editor-in-chief of the Wilmingson Herald.”
Phoenix blinked. “That’s Bud’s job.”
“I know. He’s retiring. He hasn’t told anyone else, so don’t spread it around, but he wanted me to have the job.”
It was a lot to take in. Two very different jobs that Ace was considering. The obvious choice was New York. That job would give Ace everything he wanted. Sure, editor-in-chief was a better job title, but the paper was smaller. His name wouldn’t be seen by hundreds of thousands of people every day. If Phoenix were in his shoes, he knew which way he would decide.
He took a deep breath and tried to smile, although he was fairly sure he failed at it. “It’s okay,” he said, his voice wavering. His chest ached. “You have to do what’s best for you. We knew this wasn’t going to be permanent.”
“It could be. I could take the job at the Herald.”
“Why would you? You could have everything you wanted—”
“But I want you.”
Phoenix wasn’t expecting those words to come out of Ace’s mouth. He knew that he quite possibly loved Ace, but to think Ace might feel the same way was nearly unimaginable. Still, he couldn’t allow Ace to hold himself back from what he really wanted on his account.
“I know you do,” Phoenix said. “But I can’t move with you. And I don’t want you to stay here for me. You deserve…”
God, he deserved so much better.
“Don’t,” Ace said softly. “Don’t do that to yourself. I deserve you. And that isn’t a bad thing.”
He stood and walked over to Phoenix’s chair and knelt in front of it, taking Phoenix’s hands. “I want to be with you so much it hurts. None of my other relationships compare to what I have with you. It’s something I don’t want to give up so easily.”
“But that’s the choice, isn’t it? You give up the job you’ve worked your entire life for, or you give me up. There are other men, Ace.”
“I don’t want them.”
Phoenix sighed. He wasn’t going to convince him tonight. If anything, they would just get into an argument, and that would be pointless. As much as it crushed him to think about Ace leaving, Phoenix knew it was the right decision. Ace would see it sooner or later.
“We have a movie to watch,” he said, his voice hoarse.
Tears pricked his eyes, and he pulled his hands from Ace’s to wipe them roughly. Later, when Ace was gone, he would let himself break. But for now, he wanted to enjoy him while there was still time.