BRANDON SLEPT horribly, but after the third cup of coffee, he was ready to face the day. He’d spent half the night imagining what it would be like to have Travis at his side just like the hetero couples on every other Restoration show. Maybe they’d start each episode talking to the camera about the house they’d chosen to work on, with their arms around each other. Or would they assess new houses together, Travis faithfully tallying up the expenses as they discovered each new issue with the cameras following them? They’d go shopping together, finding ways to compromise on their tastes to finish the houses in the ways they liked. It would be perfect.
Although Travis did have a point. They’d barely started dating. Putting the kind of pressure a whole television show’s production team would exert on them to be happy would be almost as bad as the stress they’d felt keeping their relationship a secret.
If Travis said no, he’d be in his right, and Brandon would understand. But Brandon still hoped he’d say yes. They could figure out how to make it work. They could move into the Argyle Road house together. But if he said no, well, Brandon would just have to tell Virginia that. Maybe there could be a compromise, where Brandon and Travis could be a couple around the crew but off-camera.
Well, the hypothetical happy future was all in Brandon’s dreams. The reality was more stark. Or, rather, reality was six strong men carrying a large slab of quartz into the kitchen and making Brandon doubt his design—it should have been marble, even if that would have been quite a bit more expensive—and laying it where the counter should go. Three of those men worked together to push the slab into place.
“Gorgeous,” said Mike. “I like this quartz. I’ve never seen it quite this color before.”
“Found it in this place in Red Hook,” said Brandon. “I’ll give you their info later.”
“Cool. I never think to look in Brooklyn. I usually source material from Jersey. Less sales tax.” Mike winked.
“Oh. Good to know.”
“You fellas gonna yak all morning?” said Travis, his Queens accent a little more prominent than usual, probably because he was irritated. “We’ve still got the bathrooms to do.”
“On it,” said Mike, heading back out into the yard, where all the stone had been cut and was sitting, waiting to be carried inside and installed.
Brandon wanted to grab Travis and ask if he’d made any decisions, but he was conscious of the cameras, so he kept his hands to himself and followed the crew outside.
They spent the day finishing the counters and installing sinks and double-checking the plumbing. Ismael finished laying the tile on the floor in the kitchen and dining room. Brandon put up the wallpaper on the feature wall in the living room. At the end of the day, Brandon, Travis, Ismael, and Erik met in the living room.
“So,” Travis said, his clipboard out. “The last remaining tasks are the kitchen backsplash, installing the kitchen appliances—those are supposed to be delivered on Monday when Brandon and I are at the other house, just a heads-up—finishing the tile in the master bathroom, installing the flooring on the second floor—Brandon still has to make a decision about that—and then the staircase and the fireplace. The night crew is working on those last two tonight.” Travis pointed to the fireplace. “We picked out some nice slate tiles to go from floor to ceiling, and a reclaimed wood mantel that has gone missing.”
“It’s in the shed out back,” said Ismael. “I’ll grab it and bring it in before I go home.”
“Cool. Anyone know of anything I left off the list?”
“Day crew is all exterior tomorrow,” said Ismael. “It’s supposed to be sunny, so I figured we’d paint. And the roofers are supposed to be here around eleven.”
“Okay. Brandon, any thoughts on the floor upstairs?”
“Hardwood,” Brandon said. He’d decided that if this was going to be his house, he’d want hardwood upstairs, not carpet.
“Fine. We have enough here? Do we need to order more?”
“There should be enough. I bought it before I knew about the roof. The money’s already spent.” Brandon rubbed his forehead, trying not to think about all the money he’d spent. “I’ll come by Monday to do the backsplash tile and help install the appliances. We’re supposed to meet with Jessica Benton, but I think I can be more useful over here while Travis does the inspection of the other property.”
Travis nodded. “Fine. Okay. Anything else?” When no one said anything, Travis dropped his pen into an empty pocket of his tool belt. “Well, we’re in the homestretch. See you all tomorrow.”
Erik had already packed up for the day, so he waved and left. Ismael walked outside to grab his own stuff. Brandon turned to Travis, who was writing something on his clipboard. “You have enough time to think?”
“No.” Travis kept writing without looking up. “And if you force me to decide right now, I don’t think you would like my answer.”
“Can we talk about it?”
Finally Travis stopped what he was doing and looked at Brandon. “I guess.”
“My place, or….”
“Yeah. Let me just get my stuff.”
TRAVIS HADN’T slept the night before. It turned out that when one spent nearly every night for a month with a man as large as Brandon Chase, one’s bed actually felt absurdly empty without him in it.
And now here he was, eating pad thai at Brandon’s kitchen island, trying to formulate a response to the question Brandon hadn’t yet asked.
“I don’t know what your experience has been,” Brandon said, “and I don’t have a ton of relationship experience, but I’ve found that in the past, I’ve kept quiet about some things as kind of a self-defense measure. You never know what the other person is thinking, you know? You don’t want to say ‘I love you’ if you don’t think that it’s going to be returned.”
Travis jerked his head up.
“To be clear,” Brandon said, “I’m not saying that to you, just using it as an example.”
The statement still didn’t sit well with Travis. “Have you wanted to say it in the past? To other guys, I mean.”
“Uh, well. Once. I dated an interior designer when I was in my early twenties. I’m not sure if that was really love, but the thought popped into my head a few times that I should tell him I loved him. But I didn’t think he returned the sentiment. It turned out I was right, because he dumped me not long after that. But my point is, you know, in past relationships, I’ve held back.”
Travis realized he was jealous that some man in Brandon’s past had held on to his affections, even if just for a short time. Travis wanted that affection. Love he didn’t know about just yet, but he was certainly very fond of Brandon.
And he was still talking. “But I’ve been very honest with you so far. And I think that if you and I are going to make a decision, we need to just put everything on the table. We can’t worry about if the other person approves or not. So let’s just be honest. I think that’s the only way we’ll get anywhere.”
Travis nodded. That was fair. He still hadn’t made anything like a decision, and he hated that he’d been put in this position. He wondered if they could go back to pretending they weren’t a couple in public, if that was even what he wanted.
“I’ll start, I guess,” Brandon said. “I know we’ve just started ‘dating,’ if that’s what this is.” He gestured at the food on the table with his chopsticks. “And I understand all of the arguments against going public as a couple. Are we in love? I don’t know. Could we get there? I think so, yeah. And honestly? I think doing the show together, with you, would be a hell of a lot of fun. I want to go public with our relationship because I’m tired of hiding. So I’m all in. If you say no, I’ll understand and we’ll work something out, but I want you to know that I really want for us to be a couple and do the show as cohosts.”
Travis sat with that for a moment, stirring noodles around with his chopsticks. “I wish I had your confidence. But I don’t feel like we’re ready for all that. And honestly, being in the spotlight scares the hell out of me. I just want to fix houses. I don’t mind being on TV, but I don’t want to be famous. I took this job because I figured I’d hang out in the background and get some publicity for my solo business.”
“You know that will happen anyway, right?”
“What?”
Brandon rolled his eyes. “You’ll become famous, to a point. People will recognize you on the streets. Did you ever see that interior design show that was on the Restoration Channel when it first launched? Room Swap it was called. It was on more than a decade ago. It was that show where the neighbors swapped houses and decorated a room?”
“I didn’t watch it, but I vaguely remember it.”
“Well, that show was a massive hit. And do you know who the breakout star was? Not any of the designers. Not the host, whom no one has seen since the show went off the air. It was the foxy carpenter who got his own show on network television. And he does commercials and stuff now. That guy is famous.”
Travis didn’t like the sound of that. “I guess.”
“Let me tell you something, Trav. You are incredibly sexy. I know you’re a nice guy underneath all the muscles and tattoos and stubble, but you’re gruff and direct enough that the women watching at home will think you’re a bad boy. That shit sells. The viewers will love you. Teenage girls will put posters of you in their bedrooms.”
Travis guffawed. What was even happening right now? “No. That would never happen.”
“I want to put posters of you in my bedroom. You in just a T-shirt and those tight jeans you wear all the time, with the tool belt on your hips? Anyone attracted to men would have to be dead inside not to respond to that. Trust me when I tell you that you may not want the spotlight, but it will find you.”
“But I don’t have a tenth of your charm. You’re a good host because you’re not just handsome, you’re also charismatic. You seem comfortable in front of a camera. Your teeth are white.”
“My teeth are white?”
“You’ve got that… polish, I don’t know.” Travis took a deep breath. The idea that he might grab some attention despite not wanting it… that didn’t sit well with him. He supposed he should have known better, and it was his own fault for agreeing to be on a television show. He knew he’d be on TV, but he figured he’d be one of those public figures that people sometimes recognized on the streets but couldn’t place. In his previous apartment, he’d lived down the block from an actress who played a judge on Law & Order, and he always said hello when he passed her on the street because he thought they knew each other, but then it turned out that he only recognized her from watching reruns when he couldn’t sleep. He imagined he’d be that level of famous.
But here Brandon was telling him it was all out of his hands.
“I just don’t know,” Travis said. “And this has nothing to do with us or how I feel about you. I’m second-guessing the show and being publicly out on it.”
“You’re not in the closet.”
“No, and I don’t give a shit who knows, but I’m not Mike and Sandy. I keep it separate from my professional life. I don’t put little rainbows on my company T-shirts.”
“I did notice that. In fact, I almost asked. Are they a couple?”
“No. Old Army buddies, but they’re both married to other men.”
Brandon tilted his head. “Huh. I mean, Sandy I kind of guessed because he flirts with me whenever I’m around, but Mike didn’t ping my gaydar. He said he had a daughter, so I just assumed.”
“His daughter is adopted.”
“Ah. Well, it’s not important.”
“No, not to what we’re discussing.”
“So what are you saying?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know how to make this decision. It’s not even the being out thing. Again, I don’t care. It’s more that I’d be in a relationship with you in public. That’s the part I can’t get past. I want to be able to tell you ‘yes, let’s do it,’ but I don’t feel confident that we can pull it off. And I’m worried that being so public will put weight on us that we don’t know how to hold up. I care about you, I can see us staying together for the long haul, but through this? I just don’t know.”
“I have to give Virginia an answer.”
Travis nodded. “But by Monday, right? So we have the weekend to think about it?”
“Yes. But do you think more time will really help?”
Travis thought about how empty his bed had felt the night before. “Maybe?” He sighed. “It’s not fair.”
“I know.”
Brandon picked up a piece of pineapple with his chopsticks. Travis was surprised he could eat. Travis’s stomach felt like it was inside out.
“Can I sleep on it, at least?” Travis said.
“Sure. And please know that I’m not trying to pressure you to decide one way or the other. If you want to tell Virginia to shove it and go back to pretending we’re not together when the cameras are on, I can pitch that to Virginia. We can be open at the house, but not when the cameras are rolling. Does that feel like a reasonable compromise?”
“I mean, that’s what would make me the most comfortable. We can revisit this in a month or so, depending on how filming is going, but I keep picturing us going public and there being too much pressure for us to stay together and be happy. I may not have a wealth of relationship experience, but I know things aren’t rosy all the time, even when you’re in love.”
“I know. And I appreciate your honesty.”
“I’ll decide by Monday morning, I promise.”
Brandon nodded. “I’d like to cohost the show with you because it would be fun. I’m not so much looking forward to the attention I’ll get when it inevitably comes out that I’m gay. Part of me thinks it’s better to just come out and control the narrative rather than waiting for someone to find out, but another part of me wants to kick the can down the road.”
“No good answers here.”
“No.” Brandon smiled ruefully. He reached across the table and took Travis’s hand.
Travis wove his fingers with Brandon’s. He picked up their joined hands and kissed Brandon’s knuckles.
Could they do this? Travis didn’t know. But he was willing to try.