NERVOUS. AS. FUCK!
I had been to war, but I had been trained for that. When you’re in the field, your training takes over and it saves your life. There was no training for this, no how-to manual. I was flying by the seat of my pants, about to jump out of a plane without a parachute.
Metaphorically, of course.
Ryan and Lucas were at the dining room table eating their own dinner while I was getting ready. I knew my brother, and he was doing everything in his control to bite back a laugh. The last thing I needed was to be made the butt of a bad joke from my brother. His son, however, didn’t seem to have the same tact.
“Lookin’ to get lucky?”
I wheeled around to face him, and Ryan’s composure broke, letting out a snort. I turned to him and said, “Can’t you control your son?”
“He was easier to control before you moved in.”
“So, his mouth is my fault?” I was irritated, and they clearly thought my irritation was ripe for the picking.
Lucas snorted as well. Like father, like son, I guess.
Snagging my wallet, keys, and phone from the kitchen counter, I stuffed them into my pockets and made a mad dash for the door.
“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” That came from Ryan.
“Eat a dick,” I snapped, then remembered Lucas was in the room. Maybe Ryan was right and I was corrupting poor, innocent Lucas.
“So that is on the menu, then. And, yeah, I wouldn’t do that, so…” Ryan couldn’t keep the grin off his face.
I flipped him off as I closed the door, muffling the sound of their uproarious laughter.
Truth be told, I honestly wasn’t that put out by the jabs. If it meant putting a smile on their faces, I would gladly be their target any day of the week. Anything to relieve the stress we had all been under those past few weeks.
Ryan was doing his best to hold himself together. I could hear him at night, after Lucas was asleep and I was sequestered in my room. He would pace from his room and out into the rest of the condo. He barely slept. The bags under his eyes needed handles so that he could carry them. He was short tempered with me. I knew when we argued that it wasn’t about me, it was about the disease. I was an easy target, something tangible that he could fight. I was fine being the metaphorical punching bag if it helped him keep his sanity. You can’t yell at a disease and expect to get anywhere.
Strange as it may sound, the bright spots had been my text conversations with David. They had become a welcome distraction from all the stress I was feeling. I didn’t normally open up to people, and I got the sense that he didn’t either. My hope in sending the initial text was to make inroads with him, to open the lines of communication. There are those people that find it easier to talk when they’re not face-to-face with the person they’re talking to. You don’t have to worry about making eye contact or physical gestures. There’s a certain amount of safety and comfort when chatting with someone from behind a keyboard, or, in this case, a phone screen. It was for that very reason that I knew he had to be nervous. Hell, I was too. Would I do or say something wrong? Did I look okay? Would I laugh at something, thinking it was a joke when he was actually being serious?
His texts seemed more…open, I guess the right word would be. He never talked about family, although he knew about my brother and nephew. He barely talked about his job or the people he worked with. But beyond that, the sky seemed to be the limit. My hope was to change that.
I was curious as to why he chose to have me meet him at the comic shop. I assumed it was because I knew where it was. I would have been just as happy picking him up at home. Maybe he’d let me drop him off there.
I pulled into the parking lot behind the building that housed the comic shop, and saw a lone figure standing under the light on the back of the building. As I pulled closer to him, my breath caught in my throat.
He looked…beautiful. Now, I know that’s not a particularly masculine thing to say about another dude, but he did. I’m not sure if it was because of the glow of the parking lot light, or the baby-blue shirt he was wearing, or if it was simply because it was him, or all of it in some weird combination.
I pulled up beside him and jumped out of my car.
He looked as nervous as I felt, barely making any eye contact. “Hi,” he said.
“Hi,” I said, trying to throw him my best disarming grin. I was afraid it may not have come out that way. Probably more along the line of friendly stalker. “Hungry?”
At that, he did grin. “Starving.”
My fingers itched to touch him. I had to stuff them into my pockets just to keep them under control. “Good. Me too. How does Mancy’s sound?”
He eyes went wide as saucers. “We can’t go there,” he almost shouted.
I was confused. Did he know someone there that he didn’t want to see? Had he run out on a bill? “Why not?”
“Adam, do you have any idea how expensive it is?”
I did. I had researched restaurants close to where I was picking him up after our last text exchange, and had purposely selected that one. I wanted to treat him to something special. He worked in a comic shop and rode a bus to the grocery store, for God’s sake. I knew there would be no way in hell he’d be able to afford a restaurant of that caliber under normal circumstances. I wanted to be the one to give it to him. Damned if I could figure out why. “It’s okay. My treat.”
“I can’t let you.”
I had fully expected his protest. “Let me. I want to. I can’t do anything for Ryan and Lucas. Let me do this for you.”
Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say. He crossed his arms over his chest and narrowed his eyes at me. “I’m not a fucking charity case.”
I threw my hand up. “Whoa, whoa. No, I know you’re not. That came out wrong. I don’t think of you that way.”
“Oh? And how do you think of me?” Still defensive. And we hadn’t even made it out of his parking lot yet.
Taking a deep breath, I said, “As someone I’d like to get to know better. If you’ll let me.”
His stance seemed to soften. He’d dropped his arms to his sides, at least. “Fine. But I take care of the tip, understood?”
At that point, I knew that it would be foolish to argue. I had bruised his ego enough apparently, I would have to at least give him that. “Fine.”
I don’t know why I did it, but I ran and opened the passenger’s side door for him, then instantly regretted it. Would he think I was being chivalrous or condescending? Not that I thought of him as feminine. He was very masculine, as near as I could tell. I wanted to be considerate. Then I feared I was laying it on too thick, so I raced around to the driver’s side and slid behind the wheel. He stood outside of the truck for a moment, as if he were still trying to figure out if this was a good idea. My seatbelt was clasped across my lap by the time he got in and had closed the door.
The restaurant was only a few blocks from the comic shop, so it didn’t take us long to get there. That area of town was old, most of it being built in the early 1900s when brick and mortar were the primary construction tools. The restaurant itself was housed in a building constructed in 1907, but the exterior looked completely refurbished with a fresh coat of paint and giant sign stenciled onto the side proudly proclaiming its date of establishment in 1921.
In all the years I had lived in Toledo, I had never been to Mancy’s. David was right, it did have a reputation for being rather pricey. Perhaps that was the reason my parents never brought my brother and me. Who would want to spend that kind of money on a meal with two screaming little boys? Plus, it wasn’t like we were loaded as a family. I knew my parents had to scrimp and save for everything. That kind of frivolity wasn’t necessary.
This, however, was a special occasion as far as I was concerned. I wanted to treat David to something special, so money was no object to me.
Walking into the restaurant truly took my breath away. I instantly felt underdressed. I cast a glance toward David, and I could see the discomfort on his face. He stood there with one arm across his chest holding his other elbow, as if he were shielding himself. I immediately regretted the idea. The last thing I wanted to do was to make him uncomfortable. I wanted our night to be easygoing, free of drama, not tense. I mentally kicked myself in the ass.
The maître d’ approached us, and I could feel David tense. “How many in your party?” he said.
“Can you give us a sec?” I gently grabbed David’s arm and pulled him to the side. “You okay?”
He wouldn’t look at me, but said, “Yeah.”
I knew he was lying. “Let’s go somewhere else.”
He tilted his head up slightly, raising his eyes so they were just visible. “But you wanted to come here.”
“No, I wanted to bring you here. I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable, and I’m sorry.”
After a moment, he said, “Are you sure?”
I grinned. “Absolutely.”
He visibly relaxed and gave me a lopsided grin. “Okay.”
I turned back to the maître d’, apologized, and we left.
We didn’t speak as we headed to the truck. As soon as we got in, I turned to him and said, “I’m sorry.”
His brow furrowed. “For what? The restaurant?”
“Yeah. I should have known better.”
“You’ve already apologized. It wasn’t necessary the first time, and it’s still not.”
“Maybe. I just want you to understand that I didn’t…” I trailed off, not knowing how to say what I wanted to say.
David saved me. “I understand. I’m just not used to something like that. I’ve never been to something like that.”
“Me neither. Um, maybe we can go next time.”
“Next time? We haven’t even had a this time yet.” He seemed nervous, but he smiled. “How do you even know there will be a next time?”
I returned his grin. “I have faith.” And his grin widened. “So, where to? You pick.”
He seemed to mull it over for a moment, then said, “I’m good with Burger King, honestly.”
I chuckled. “Burger King it is. I’m not familiar with this side of town, so you’ll have to be my navigator.”
Waving his hand toward the window, he said, “Drive on.”
I threw the truck into gear, and we were off.
Once at the restaurant, we placed our order and David found us a booth in the back corner, away from the other guests while I waited for our order to be filled.
Carrying the tray to our booth, I set it down and slid in opposite to him.
“Thank you, ” he almost whispered, and I got the sense he wasn’t talking just about the food.
“For?”
He glanced around at the restaurant. “This. I just felt…underdressed, out of place.”
“No, I get it. I really do. To be perfectly honest, I felt the same way”
That seemed to alleviate his discomfort. He bit into his burger, and we fell into a comfortable silence while we ate.
“How’s Ryan holding up?” he asked, popping a fry into his mouth.
“Okay, considering.”
“It’s a nice thing you’re doing, you know.”
I was confused. “What is?”
“Giving them space, time to be together before tomorrow.”
“I’m doing what I can, but it’s not much.”
“I think it’s more than you realize. You’ve been there for the both of them for the last couple of weeks. Even if it was only to listen to one of them bitch, or to be bitched at, you’ve been there. Sometimes, that unconditional support is all that’s needed to get you through.”
My face heated. The praise coming from him was unexpected and seemed sincere, but it was tinged with a sense of regret and heartache. On some deeper level, I understood that he wasn’t just talking about me, but himself as well. Not for the first time, I wondered what he had been through to make him so reserved.
Conversation came easier after that. We talked about the comic shop, his boss, Owen, the other guy that worked there, Greg, and the girl with pink hair named Trish. I realized that while I had been back stateside for a few months, I hadn’t really taken the time to get out and meet anyone. Not that I had really wanted to. Meeting new people meant that some of them may not have agreed with my previous career choice.
Which was precisely when David asked, “So, once this is all over, what do you want to do?”
“Do?” Was he talking about the date/non-date, or was he talking about a job?
“Yeah, what do you want to do when you grow up?” One corner of his lips curled up, and I could tell he was joking.
I decided to play along. “Grow up, huh? So, are you saying I’m not an adult?”
That time I got a full smile. “Well, you did bring me to Burger King our first time out, so…”
As he spoke, there was a lightness to his demeanor that I didn’t think he allowed himself to show. I found myself wanting more of that from him, and didn’t really care that I was the butt of his little joke.
“I hadn’t given it much thought, to be perfectly honest. I’ve never been one to set career goals. That was always Ryan’s way. Everything he did had to have structure and I was the fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants brother. Whatever happened, happened. Hell, joining the military was a spur of the moment thing.”
He seemed to think about that for a moment. “What did you do while you were in?”
“Machinist.”
He tilted his head, silently asking the question he didn’t want to ask.
“I fixed shit.”
He chuckled. “So, you like to work with your hands.”
I waggled my eyebrows. “I sure do.”
His cheeks bloomed pink, and he looked down at the empty tray, tensing. I immediately regretted saying it. “I’m sorry.” I kept getting myself into situations where I had to apologize to him, and it was becoming frustrating.
“Don’t be.”
“I hope I didn’t offend you. Sometimes I don’t know when to keep my fucking mouth shut.”
“No, you didn’t, but…”
“But what?”
He sighed and glanced around the restaurant. Leaning closer to me, he lowered his voice as he said, “It sounded like…well…you were hitting on me.”
My stomach did a little flip. “What if I was?”
His lip curled into a small smile. “Are you…um…”
“Gay?”
He nodded.
“I am. I hope that’s not a problem.”
Relaxing, he said, “No. No problem at all. I’m—”
“Gay too,” I finished for him, and he sighed, throwing a wide grin across his face.
“Yeah.”
“Good.”
“I’ve…well, I’ve never come out to anyone before.”
“So, I was your first?” As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew what kind of double entendre that was, and silently prayed he didn’t take it as anything other than non-sexual.
I think he did, because he laughed, full and throaty, and his smile finally reached his eyes, lancing straight through me to sink into my bones. I wanted that smile, exactly like that, forever.
“You are,” he finally said.
Throwing caution to the wind, I said, “Then I’m honored to have popped your coming-out cherry.”
And there was that laugh and smile again.
He cleared his throat and sighed. “Now that that’s out of the way, where were we?”
“Discussing my career path, or lack thereof, in the middle of Burger King.”
“Right. So, what about an auto mechanic?”
“Seriously? I mean, yeah, they can make good money. Cars always need to be fixed. But, it’s not like that career is a relationship magnet. There’s a perception out there that mechanics are dumb as rocks. No one wants to say, ‘My boyfriend is a grease monkey.’”
“I could,” he said, pulling his left arm up and resting his head in his hand.
In that moment, two things happened simultaneously. First, my heart did a little flip because, if I didn’t know any better, I’d swear he wasn’t talking about just anyone, he was talking about me. Second, his shirt sleeve slid down just a little, and I saw the scar that started at just below the wrist and ran in a straight line to disappear below the sleeve. I couldn’t tell how long it was, but it looked rather sizable.
I understood why he always wore long-sleeved shirts. Anger bloomed in my gut. I wanted to break whoever had made him feel as if he had needed to take such drastic action.
I quickly diverted my eyes from the scar and prayed he hadn’t noticed. He hadn’t told me about it, but, realistically, how do you bring up a subject like that in a text message?
Getting my head back into the conversation, I said, “Is that what you want? A relationship?”
Instinctively, I knew that it was way too soon in this…whatever we were doing, to have a conversation about potential relationships. But that was where the tide of the conversation had gone, so I figured I’d stay in the boat.
“Honestly?”
“Yeah, honestly,” I said, and my heart froze.
His eyebrows knit together, as if he was carefully weighing his words. “I don’t know. I mean, I guess, someday. It would be nice to have one, to have someone. But people can be mean and hateful. They don’t—”
“Don’t stay.”
He looked at me, tilting his head, and his eyes bored into my soul. I had hit the nail on the proverbial head, and I could see it. The scar that I had told the story. Someone had hurt him deeply, and he carried the evidence, both on his arm as well as in how he interacted with people. Yeah, someone was going to get broken, and I was going to be the one to do it, for whatever they had done to him.
“Yeah.” He sighed.
“Listen. Relationships can be hard, I get that. Never been in one myself, at least nothing that I would consider long-term. Hell, even when I was in them, I knew they wouldn’t last. But I also knew I had to at least try regardless of the potential outcome. Yeah, there are some dicks out there that want nothing more than to get their rocks off. But some want the real deal. Some want to date, fall in love, get married, have the white picket fence with a dog and the two-point-five kids.”
Was I coming across too strong? Maybe. The conversation had gone in a direction that I never saw coming. But I feared being shut out after it seemed like his walls were coming down.
“Is that what you want?”
My breath caught, and I couldn’t figure out why. “Yeah. It is.”
“So, what is this?” he said waving his arms with flare at the restaurant.
“Um, it’s a Burger King.”
“No, jackass,” he grinned, “this. Us. Is this a date?”
I tried to keep the smile off my face, but to be perfectly honest, I don’t know if I was successful. “Would you want it to be?”
He chewed his bottom lip, thinking it through, and whispered, “Yeah, I would.”
“Me too.” And, just like that, I felt as if I had been set free. I felt like I was going to float away on the next strong breeze, if that were possible in the middle of a Burger King. I was giddy. Some of the questions I didn’t even know I had about him had been answered. But I also knew that I had been given an enormous amount of trust and responsibility. He didn’t open up easily, or to anyone, and I felt honored that he felt he could with me.
I thought back to the scar I had inadvertently seen and wondered what other kinds of scars he had, and I didn’t mean just physical. Something had to have happened to force him into a shell. I silently vowed then and there, in the middle of Burger King, on our first official date, that I wouldn’t add to his damaged heart.
After our burgers and fries were eaten, I stood and gathered the trays of trash to throw them away. “Where to?”
He chewed his lip again, thinking. “Did Lucas like the book you got him?”
“Yeah, he did. In fact, he finished it.”
“Wanna get him the second one?”
“There’s more?”
David rolled his eyes at me as if I had said the dumbest thing in the world. Believe me, I didn’t take offense. When it came to comics, I knew next to nothing. I left all of that up to Ryan, Lucas, and now David.
“Of course there’s more. We have most of them at the shop. And that’s under my apartment.”
His voice trailed off as if he hadn’t meant to disclose that last piece of information. I couldn’t begrudge him, though. I mean, would I really want someone I barely knew knowing where I lived so they could stalk the shit out of me? Well, maybe. It would depend on who it was.
“We can head there. If you wouldn’t mind. I mean, you’re there all the time. Are you sure you’d want to go in on your off time?”
“It’ll be fine. Should just be Trish and Greg there anyway, shouldn’t be too busy.”
We loaded into the truck and backtracked toward the shop.
Pulling into the parking lot behind the comic shop’s building, David pointed up at a lit window. “That one’s mine.” Then, as an afterthought, he added, “That’s weird. I thought I turned off all the lights.”
I didn’t think anything of the comment, I regularly left a room without turning the light off.
We walked around to the front of the building, and David led me through the door. The perky girl that rang me up a couple of weeks earlier was back behind the register; her hair was blue that time. I pulled on David’s arm, and leaned in close, whispering, “Does she dye her hair those funky colors regularly?”
He snorted, “Yeah. You should have seen her at Fourth of July. She had red, white, and blue stripes.”
“Well, how very patriotic of her.”
We made our way to the back of the store, under the Spider-Man dangling from the ceiling. David pulled a volume from the shelf and handed it to me. “Here’s number two. You should know, there’s eleven of these and a whole bunch of other titles in the same format.”
I know my eyes went wide because he laughed. “Eleven?”
“Oh yeah, then there’s ‘Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man,’ and ‘Web of Spider-Man.’ Don’t even get me started on the Avengers or X-Men books.”
As he spoke, he got more animated, comfortable in his surroundings. “What have I gotten myself into?”
He smiled. “I guess I should have warned you when you came in the first time. They’re like Pringles. You can’t get just one.” Then, he laughed at his own joke.
Yeah, my David is a funny one.
My.
Damn, that thought sounded nice.
I allowed him to lead me back to the register. Perky, blue-haired Trish eyeballed both of us, her gaze full of mirth. Please don’t embarrass him, please don’t embarrass him.
Thankfully, she didn’t. She rang up the book, took my credit card, bagged it, and handed me the bag, all without a word. But she never took her eyes off David, and the look she gave clearly said, “We’ll talk later.”
He seemed oblivious to her, or maybe he was ignoring her, I couldn’t be sure. Then he led me from the store, and back to the parking lot.
At the bottom of the stairs leading to his door, he turned and said, “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I mean, for tonight. I had…fun.”
Feeling brave, I reached out and cupped his cheek with the palm of my hand. My breath hitched at the physical contact. He seemed to lean into my touch, closing his eyes and losing himself in the moment. My thumb traced his chin, creating lazy circles on his skin, and I said, “I know what you meant. I did too.”
His eyes opened, and from the dim light cast by the street light, I would almost swear I saw desire reflected back at me from within the blue pools of his eyes. While I certainly wouldn’t have minded, our night had been full of what I knew to be firsts for him. I didn’t want to rush him. I didn’t want to scare him. And I didn’t want him to do something that he might regret later. I reached a compromise with myself that I hoped would satisfy what I saw in his eyes. “May I?”
“May you what?” he asked, almost breathless.
“May I kiss you?”
I felt his lips twist against the palm of my hand. “Well, aren’t you a gentleman.”
I smiled as well. “I try.”
I leaned into him, keeping my approach slow, giving him time to pull away if he wanted, and tilted my head for a better angle.
He didn’t budge.
At the first contact of our lips, I brought my other hand up, and gently cupped his face. I felt his breath leave him in a gentle sigh, and he took hold of my waist. The current that passed between us was raw and powerful, coursing through my body from every point of physical contact I had with him, and I felt that circuit complete again.
Losing myself in that feeling, I slid my tongue across his lips, silently begging for entrance. After the briefest of seconds, he relented, and I gently skimmed his tongue with mine, giving him permission to explore. His hands slid from my waist and up my back, landing on my shoulder blades, and he pulled me to him, holding me in place. My right hand traced the curve of his neck, palming it from behind, and used my thumb to trace a line against the skin, back and forth, back and forth.
My tongue caressed the roof of his mouth and the backs of his teeth, slowly memorizing every detail I could. The way he breathed. The way he smelled. The way his hands gently caressed my back. The tiny whimpers that he made with the back of this throat.
I allowed my tongue to retrace its steps, slowly backing out of his mouth, and, to my surprise and utter enjoyment, his followed. Where I tried to be gentle, he was almost feral, claiming, like I had opened the floodgates to a dam that was filled to bursting.
I allowed him complete control, I needed him to explore as much of my body as he was comfortable with. I understood that, while it was most definitely not a first for me, it may have been a first for him. I wanted him to have the maximum amount of enjoyment as possible.
Finally, we broke apart, chests heaving trying to catch our collective breath. My erection stood painfully within the confines of my pants, and I hoped he hadn’t felt it. If he had, he gave no indication. Instead, a dopey grin spread across his face, and he let out a breathy, “Wow!”
I grinned back, placing both arms on his shoulders and lacing my fingers together at his neck. “Yeah. Wow,” was all I could manage.
I allowed him to resettle. Hell, I needed to. I also needed to get home to take care of some “personal business,” but I couldn’t tell him that. Instead, I said, “You sounded unsure earlier about the possibility of a next time. Now?”
He licked his lip, and said, “I would very much like that.”
“I would too.” I beamed. He grinned back at me, and I swear he lit up that parking lot.
We stood like that for a moment, my arms on his shoulders, his hands on my back, and simply drank each other in.
Finally, I said, “I should go. Want me to walk you up?”
He blinked as if breaking himself out of the spell. “No, I’m good. Go see how Ryan and Lucas are.”
“Okay.” I leaned in again and kissed him, that one softer, hoping to reinforce my want to be with him. I had to break contact, though. I knew I could stay like that forever if I didn’t.
He dropped his hands from my back, and I immediately missed the gentle pressure. I took his hands in mine, and kissed each palm. “I will talk to you soon.”
He smiled but said nothing as he turned and climbed the steps to his apartment. I waited until he had unlocked the door and opened it. He turned and gave a slight wave, and then gently closed the door.