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Jeremy stripped out of his jacket and eased into the booth, turning to lean his back against the wall so his bad leg could stretch out straight on the seat. He glanced over at Evan, who sat staring down into his empty glass as if it held the secrets of the universe.
A few months ago, Stephen had mentioned a young gay guy he and Russ had taken in for a while last spring, but Jeremy hadn’t thought about it since. He’d certainly never connected it with the cute guy who had come in to Johnson’s Sporting Goods to buy running shoes. Evan wasn’t a common name, but it wasn’t rare either. And, frankly, as cute as Jeremy thought the guy was, he’d forgotten his name in the months since then. Or at least since his jerk-off fantasy about Evan that had led to vomit-inducing pain.
What are the odds of running into Evan again? Jeremy wondered.
Although, the kid was friends with Russ and Stephen, and Russ was the one who directed him to Jeremy’s store, so maybe, it wasn’t so odd that, in a city of over five million people, they’d meet twice. Jeremy had second-guessed himself at first, wondering if it was wishful thinking, but there was no mistaking the cheekbones. Evan was hard to forget. It had taken Jeremy a while to convince himself to approach Evan, but he’d looked lonely sitting by himself, and the slumped shoulders and anxious glances around the room tugged at him. The loneliness was all-too-familiar, and Jeremy found himself crossing the room on an impulse.
At the moment, Evan’s pale cheeks were still flushed with color, and he worried his lower lip with his teeth. Before he met Evan at the store, Jeremy wasn’t sure he would have pegged Evan as being his type. Then again, when had he ever had a type? He fucked and dated—well, mostly fucked—a variety of guys. Tall, short, older, younger, bears, or twinks, if the attraction was mutual, he’d gone for it.
Of course, that was all before the accident.
But he would give his left nut—well, maybe his left leg since it was such a problem for him anyway—to be in bed with the pretty little gay boy across the table from him who thought he wasn’t anything special. But those days were all over. Still, the kid deserved to know he was desirable.
He downed his drink and placed his hand on Evan’s forearm. Evan looked up at him with wide eyes. “Do you not see it, Evan?”
“See what?”
“How hot you are?”
“Oh, come on. I’m skinny, pale, and shy. I’m not what men want,” Evan whispered.
Against his better judgement, Jeremy lifted his hand and cupped Evan’s jaw. “If I weren’t crippled, you’d be the perfect size for me to throw around in bed. The shyness makes me wonder what fantasies you have hidden behind those pretty eyes.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “And I wonder if you’d blush when I stripped you naked, or if I could get you to loosen up for me. If I got you worked up enough, would you beg me to suck your cock?”
And once again, the blush Jeremy liked so much stained Evan’s cheeks. He tried to turn away but Jeremy kept his grip firm, and Evan’s gaze lowered. His tongue swiped over his lower lip, and Jeremy could see him swallow. “Oh, God,” he whispered, barely audible.
“Jeremy,” he teased, forcing himself to let go of the younger man. He let his hand drop to the table between them, but he couldn’t get the feeling of the soft, soft skin under his thumb to go away. “You don’t need to call me God, just Jeremy.”
Always deflecting with humor, Jeremy chided himself. Shitty coping mechanism, but the only one he had any more. It was easier than admitting how much he resented the fact he couldn’t pick up the pretty little twink across the table and fuck him six ways until Sunday.
Evan managed a fleeting smile, but his gaze returned to the melting ice cubes in his glass.
Jeremy sat back, signaling to the waitress to come over before he looked at Evan again. He sighed heavily and tried to muster up an encouraging smile. Stephen’s comments about what a great—if lonely—kid Evan was piqued Jeremy’s interest. “Trust me, kid, I can’t begin to count the reasons I want you, and I know I’m not the only one. If you put yourself out there, I promise, you’ll find plenty of takers.”
Why the twist in his stomach when he thought about the men who’d be circling Evan like hungry wolves? He wasn’t in any position to do the job, and he should let someone who could be good to Evan have a chance, right? Besides, they hadn’t been talking for more than twenty minutes. It shouldn’t matter. Except, Stephen had told him about Evan losing his job, getting kicked out of his house, and that he had no one else in the city. Jeremy was way too aware of what loneliness was like. Hell, these days, he lived it, too. And Evan’s wide eyes and shy smile tugged at his heartstrings, not to mention the parts further south.
“You really think so?” Evan whispered.
“I know so.” Jeremy’s tone was firm.
Evan opened his mouth but the waitress interrupted. “What can I get you boys?”
“A Coke for me,” Jeremy said.
Evan looked mildly surprised, but he didn’t comment. “Um, Coke for me too. But with rum in it.”
“Can I see your ID?”
Evan dug in his back pocket for a beat-up wallet and showed her his driver’s license. “Oh, and can I get a water, please?”
“Sure thing.” She turned to Jeremy. “That was a straight Coke for you, sir?”
“Nothing straight about me, honey,” he joked, turning to wink at Evan. “But, no, I don’t need anything but the plain Coke, thanks.”
The silence at the table grew heavy and awkward when she was gone. There were so many things Jeremy wanted to say, but he knew most of them would lead Evan on. He didn’t want to give Evan the wrong impression. Of course, he’d already crossed a line, but there was no point in making it worse. According to Dr. Fuller, he was supposed to be focusing on simple human connection, but he’d never been great at making friends. Flirting had always been his first instinct, and he wasn’t sure how to dial it back now that he couldn’t follow through.
Evan toyed with his glass while they waited for the waitress to return. Jeremy shifted in his seat, feeling the ache in his leg intensify the more he sat. The party had begun to wind down, and he could leave anytime, but he found himself strangely reluctant to walk away from Evan.
He glanced across the table at Evan as he bent his head, took the narrow black straw between his lips, and sucked up the water from the melted ice in his glass. Oh, right, that’s why he didn’t want to leave. Pretty boys to flirt with were rare these days.
God, he’d missed it.
The waitress returned and exchanged the empty glasses for full ones, along with Evan’s water. “Anything else I can get you?” she asked.
“No, I think I’m set,” Jeremy said. Evan nodded in agreement, and the waitress left. Jeremy tried to think of something to say as he rubbed his aching leg, debating if he should go home and crash before it got any more painful. He’d aggravated it that morning during his workout, and it seemed to be getting worse. Not to mention the exceptionally busy and stressful day he’d had. Jeremy shouldn’t have come, but he didn’t want Stephen to think he was ungrateful to be invited or ruin their tentative new friendship.
He caught a glimpse of Evan watching him under his thick, long lashes.
“I’m not rubbing off under the table, I swear,” Jeremy joked, lifting his hand from his leg to cradle his drink in both hands. “My leg is fucking killing me.”
“What happened?” Evan froze as if surprised he’d ask the question, and despite himself, Jeremy chuckled. “Never mind, you don’t have to tell me,” he added hastily.
“It’s okay.” He tilted the glass, letting the ice cubes clink together as he considered how to continue. “Full story or the abridged version?”
“Full story,” Evan replied.
“Okay.” He took a deep breath, already regretting the offer to tell Evan the whole story, but he wouldn’t go back on what he promised now. “So, fifteen years ago, Stephen and I were together. I was twenty, in my junior year of college. Stephen and I had been dating for oh ... eight-nine months. Something like that. He talked me into moving in with him. I wasn’t ready for it. I was young and dumb and didn’t know what I had. I thought I still wanted to fuck around. I ... I’d been kind of a manwhore through college.” Now, Jeremy was the one stammering and feeling uncomfortable. Christ, some of the shit he’d done had been beyond stupid and reckless. He couldn’t count the number of men he’d fucked and sucked between sixteen and twenty.
“But Stephen was something special,” he continued. “We met at this Gay-Straight Alliance talk he did at UGA, and I wanted him more than I’d ever wanted anyone else. He was ... amazing. He was in his early thirties but already starting to go gray. Fucking silver fox.” Jeremy took a gulp of his soda. “I swear, he made Anderson Cooper look like chopped liver. Still does.” Jeremy glanced over at the booth where Stephen sat with his arm draped over Russ’ shoulder, talking to Russ’ father and sister. Goddamn. Yep, Stephen still had it. Nearly fifty looked good on him.
“Anyway, you get why I wanted him, right?” Evan nodded vehemently, and Jeremy bit back a chuckle. Yeah, everyone had a similar reaction to Stephen. When they were together, it had made Jeremy proud to be the one in Stephen’s bed. “So I was pretty hot then, and I knew how to talk a guy into the sack. Had Stephen wrapped around my finger like that.” He snapped his fingers, and Evan’s head jerked up. “We had great chemistry. What was supposed to be a one-night stand turned into more though.”
Jeremy nudged his glass with his fingertips. “He was the one who pushed to make it exclusive, then for me to move in. I agreed, but it wasn’t fair to him; I wasn’t ready. I didn’t cheat on him, but I was about this close.” He held his thumb and index finger millimeters apart. “We started fighting a lot. I pushed his buttons, he got annoyed with me, but it all paid off when we were in bed, and it turned into a never-ending cycle.” Jeremy sighed. It was more complicated than he was willing to admit to Evan, though.
He and Stephen had been constantly jockeying for dominance in the bedroom. Jeremy was a bit more versatile than Stephen had been but not always entirely thrilled to be the one bending over. He got off without any problem, but it annoyed him that Stephen had rarely been willing to bottom. Sometimes they stuck to blowjobs because it was easier than fighting about who got to top. It had all been intense though; complicated, but intense. Nothing like the other sexual encounters before he met Stephen. And certainly not like the lackluster few he’d had since.
“My car was a piece of shit, and I felt guilty for wanting out of the relationship, so I wouldn’t let him pay to have it fixed. One night, I went to a study group at the library and flirted with this hot guy. The last memory I have is leaving the library, thinking about him. I guess it was raining on the way home. I don’t know. I don’t remember the truck running the red light, the car it hit, or my brakes failing. I don’t remember anything about the accident. All I know about it, I heard from the police afterward.”
Jeremy felt a weird wave a nausea wash over him, as if his body could remember the pain even though his mind couldn’t.
“You okay?” Evan traced the edge of his jaw with cool, damp fingers, and Jeremy jerked in surprise. He was disappointed when Evan pulled back. Christ, how long had it been since a man he was attracted to had touched him? Too fucking long, Jeremy’s brain helpfully answered.
“It’s ... it’s hard to think about that time,” Jeremy admitted, rubbing his temple. “There are a lot of gaps in my memory, holes I’ll never be able to fill in. I was hospitalized for a while, either unconscious or recovering from surgery. After a while, I was transferred to a facility. Um, I can’t think of the word for it. They do physical therapy and stuff.”
“A rehab facility?” Evan offered.
“Yeah, rehab. It—it wasn’t a good one.”
“What about your family?” Evan asked.
Jeremy’s fist tightened, crumpling the napkin on the table as he felt the familiar hot surge of anger at the thought of what they’d done. “Barbara and Kevin Lewis are no longer a part of my life.” His tone came out clipped, cold, and Evan backed away, retreating into himself.
“Sorry,” Evan whispered, and Jeremy felt guilty for making him think he’d done something wrong.
“No, it’s okay.” He forced himself to take a couple of deep, slow breaths and rubbed his head again. “Not your fault. Look, the people who raised me were bigots, plain and simple. Not religious, but conservative as hell. Middle class wanting to be rich, and they were all about impressing everyone they knew. They didn’t disown me until later, but I almost wish they had. Instead, we had this weird relationship where they paid for my college as long I never mentioned being gay. It was a dirty word in our house. I was out but they pretended—pretended I was strai-straight.” His tongue felt thick all of a sudden, unwieldy.
A small frown crossed Evan’s face as he nodded. “My parents kicked me out when they found out. That’s how I ended up in Atlanta, crashing at Russ and Stephen’s place. They helped me get on my feet. I owe them everything.”
“That doesn’t surprise me. Stephen’s a good ... a good guy, and from what I’ve seen, Russ is too. He’s ... he’s ...” Jeremy’s tongue felt even thicker now, his head sluggish all of a sudden, and he realized he’d had a headache creeping up on him for a while, and the pain had reached critical levels. “Shit,” he spat, and Evan flinched. “Fuck, sorry. I—I ... head-headache,” he ground out, fumbling in his pocket for the little container of pain pills he carried everywhere he went. “Water?”
Evan shoved his water glass across the table and took the pillbox from Jeremy’s shaking fingers. “How many?”
“One ... no, two. Give me two.”
He felt Evan press two small pills into his hand, and he gulped them down with as much of the ice-cold water as he could stand. He rested his elbows on the tabletop and massaged his head. He took several deep, slow breaths, trying to get himself under control. The pills were fast acting, but not fast enough. They never were.
“What else can I do?”
“Nothing. Gotta get out of here and get home. Sleep for about a day and a half. Fine after that,” he said through gritted teeth.
“Can I ... can I help?”
Jeremy’s first instinct was to say no, but the thought of finding his way home alone on public transit exhausted him.
“Yeah, okay.” He lifted his head and saw Evan’s worried face. “I’ll be fine, I promise,” he said gruffly. “Just help me get out of here without Stephen seeing me.”