Chapter Nine
Good Day Sunshine
River left Jem at his apartment door with a lingering kiss and waited for him to go inside before he floated his way down the elevator and back out to the car.
“Good night?” Norm, his driver, asked as he got back in. River typically left the privacy divider down when it was just him, unless he had to change or make a phone call.
He laughed a little, unsure how to answer the question. Good night? Yes and no. Yes, because he was starting to suspect any night with Jem would be a good one. No, because River was ass over tits for this guy he was paying to spend time with him. “It was… something,” he said after a moment.
It was everything. Having Jem tucked under his arm, whispering with him, being stupid catty assholes together. Laughing and giggling and dancing and then kissing, Jem going pliant at his touch.
It didn’t escape his notice that everyone he knew had predicted this outcome—even Jem had spotted the setup, though maybe he hadn’t seen it for what it was when he pointed out Jem was a lot closer to River’s celebrity-crush type than any of the men he’d dated for real.
Amanda had set him up with someone he was basically doomed to fall for and she must have done it on purpose; she never did anything by accident.
River didn’t know whether to fire her or give her a raise. Maybe he’d wait to see how everything played out.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket.
His publicist had texted; she’d already seen pictures of River and Jem at the premiere and was predictably enthralled. River made a mental note to never let her hear Jem talk shit about someone’s style, because she’d ask River to muzzle him in public.
But River barely glanced at the photo she had forwarded. He’d had the real thing in his arms just moments before, and he was focused on getting that to happen again.
Fyi, he texted Amanda, I know this was a setup and I’m withholding judgment until I have more information.
Unsurprisingly, Amanda was awake. I don’t know what you’re talking about. She followed this with the nail-painting emoji.
Bitch, River thought fondly. Whatever. Do you think tomorrow is too soon to see him again?
This time he got the emoji of two men holding hands. He interpreted that as yes but do it anyway.
He gave himself until the middle of Sunday morning to think better of it, but at eleven he was lying on his back on the bed with his guitar in his arms, writing silly love songs that would never see the airwaves because they were too embarrassing, so honestly he might as well go for it.
He set the guitar on its stand, rolled to his feet, and slinked into the library, where he took a photo of Jem’s Taylor Swift album sitting on top of his record player.
He sent that and a quick text—Listening party?
—and then lay facedown on the couch and screamed into a pillow like a teenager with a crush.
River was forty years old. He was a goddamn rock star. He had a Grammy!
He had also spent his adult life kinda-sorta on purpose dating men he’d never fall in love with so he couldn’t get hurt. This whole thing where he was trying to get a guy he genuinely liked to go from his sugar baby to the love of his life was new and stressful.
But it was also fun. River liked the butterflies in his stomach. He’d always been a daydreamer. Those daydreams had just gotten a little more specific lately, was all.
His phone buzzed on the coffee table.
River raised his head long enough to look at it, put his face back into the pillow, and screamed again before picking it up.
My car is still dead, remember?
He shot to his feet so fast he almost tripped over himself. I’m omw, he texted, then stubbed his toe on the coffee table before he could hit Send and spent twenty seconds hopping around on one foot and gritting his teeth through the pain.
Clearly multitasking was a thing that was not going to happen—or shouldn’t happen, for River’s own safety—when he was talking to Jem. He sent the message, shot the finger at the offending coffee table, and went to find his shoes.
Jem was waiting outside his apartment in the late winter sunshine when River pulled up. He was wearing jeans and a polo accessorized with the watch River had given him, which made the possessive little asshole of River’s id feral with glee.
Jem slid into the passenger seat with a smile. “Hey.”
Dear diary, River thought. Today Jem smiled at me and I almost hit a fire hydrant. “Hey.”
He reached down to put the car back in gear just as Jem’s smile went a little saucy. “What, no present today?”
The question hit River low in the stomach, where it bloomed into a surge of lust. “I’ll make it up to you next time,” he promised, and then made himself pay attention to the road so he didn’t get them both killed.
That autopilot was probably the reason his mouth asked the generic, polite, extremely dumb question, “You sleep well last night?”
Oh Lord, he was definitely going to crash. Maybe he should hire Norm for the day too.
“Mmm,” Jem agreed. River could feel his gaze on the side of his face when he asked, “You?”
River had gone home last night and left a trail of clothes through the house on his way to the shower, turned the water as hot as it would go, and jerked himself off leaning against the tiled wall, remembering Jem’s needy little moans, the sound River’s hand made on his cock, and the way he’d looked in the mirror, red-faced and glassy-eyed and desperate.
He cleared his throat. “Eventually.”
He was a little too aware of Jem shifting in his seat. “So, uh. No big plans today?”
“This is it.” Look at the road, River. “The glamorous life of a professional musician.”
“One day you’re attending the world’s most bizarre film premiere, the next you’re hanging out at home listening to records?”
Something about the way he put that…. “Why do I feel like I invited you over to show you my etchings?”
“Didn’t you?”
River didn’t. Of course he wanted to take Jem to bed.
But he wanted to do that with the understanding that it was because they liked each other and not because Jem was getting paid.
River had spent his entire life writing lyrics, but if there was a way to word that conversation that didn’t involve either the absolute terror of pure emotional honesty or the extreme probability of sudden onset foot-in-mouth disease, he hadn’t figured it out yet.
“I think I invited you over to show you Taylor Swift’s etchings, actually.”
“Fair enough.”
Back at his place, River shooed Jem toward the library while he procured drinks. He came back to find Jem examining the record player, turning the album over in his hands.
“It’s not going to bite you.”
Jem raised his head. “Unlike its owner?”
For the first time, River noticed the mouth-shaped bruise in the hollow of Jem’s throat. Nope. He snapped his eyes back to Jem’s face. “You can muzzle me if you want.”
“I think I can trust you to behave.” He gestured at the record player. “You gonna show me how this works? I can tell just by looking that it’s expensive.”
“Yeah, yeah. Step aside, young grasshopper.”
River had grown up in the era of streaming music and illegal downloads, burned CDs and even stuff taped off the radio.
But he also grew up in a weird cult that frowned on all kinds of material possessions, and so his mother didn’t buy him an mp3 player or a Discman or a stereo or any of that.
But she had kept his dad’s old turntable and records, and River cut his teeth on those.
And now, of course, vinyl was back in vogue. Probably because it really did sound better.
He put the record down and flicked the table on, but before he dropped the needle in the track, he turned around and pointed. “Sit there.”
Blank-faced, Jem moved to the spot on the couch River had indicated. “You’re so bossy.”
Well, yes. “Slander,” River lied, hauling Jem’s feet onto the couch. “When I had this room built, I had them set the speakers so that that’s the best place to listen from. If you’re going to do something, do it right.”
Jem’s eyes caught on his, and… yeah. River realized how that sounded.
Jem flushed that pretty pink and raised his hands in surrender. “Okay. I get it. Wow me.”
For that, River would have to take his pants off, so… not today. He kept that thought to himself and dropped the needle.
River hadn’t been lying when he said he enjoyed Taylor Swift’s music. But today he hardly heard it; he was watching Jem take it in, the way the lines of his body relaxed under the mellow guitar and gentle melody.
Oh, River was in trouble if he was paying more attention to Jem than the music. But he couldn’t help it.
They didn’t talk. Jem had his eyes closed, but he wasn’t sleeping: River could see him holding his breath waiting for the bridge to drop, the quick deflation of his chest when a lyric hit a soft spot, the way he walked his fingers along his sternum like they were playing the bass line.
River had made music his life, but he rarely had the chance to watch someone appreciate it like this.
He wanted, with a sudden urgency, to write music that made Jem feel like this—like he had to lie down to listen, to devote his full attention, to absorb it.
He wanted Jem to take his music into himself.
The album played for just over an hour. It felt like an eternity; it felt like ten minutes.
When it ended, Jem sat up, shaking his head, eyes bright and wild, and said, “Okay, you win.”
Obviously River won; he already had Jem in his house.
But—oh, he meant with the record player. He blinked himself out of his trance. “You’re welcome.”
Jem tilted his head. “What’s the matter?”
An impossible question. River flexed his fingers. “What do you mean?”
Now he quirked a smile. “I mean you look like my educational assistant when she was trying to quit smoking. You’re fidgety.”
River was always fidgety.
“More than usual, I mean,” Jem amended.
“Just… got the urge to write music, is all, but I don’t want to abandon you—”
“River.”