Chapter 4 Charlie #2
Slowly Andrew lowers himself to the dirty floor, onto the leaves and grass that have blown in through the wide open double doors as he sits cross-legged beside Charlie. Taking a deep breath, Charlie rolls onto his side, pillowing his head in Andrew’s lap.
“You don’t get it,” Charlie whispers. “You’re not—” but he breaks off, unsure how to say it without being a dick.
“I’m not creative,” Andrew finishes. “It’s okay to say it. I’m not offended. I’m not like you. I never have been. You’ve always had a little something extra no one else had.”
Breathing deeply, Charlie closes his eyes. Sometimes he doesn’t like being different from Andrew.
“Maybe if I lost all my creativity, I could get a job with you.”
“Charlie, you wouldn’t last a week in an office job.”
“I know,” Charlie moans pathetically. “Seriously. I’m not cut out for a 9-5, Annie. I don’t want a steady, reliable job like you do. Can you imagine doing something where everything is the same every single day? Every. Day.”
“Yes, I can,” Andrew replies. “It’s fantastic. Wake up at five thirty. Coffee on the balcony at five thirty-five. Shower at six. In the office by eight. Lunch at eleven on the dot and home by four thirty every day even with traffic. Leaves me plenty of time to come over and bug you.”
“Predictable fucker,” Charlie sighs. “I think I’d kill myself if my days were like that. No offense.”
“No worries,” Andrew intones in that neutral voice he’s so good at. “Saying no offense absolutely makes everything that precedes not offensive.”
“Sarcastic fucker.”
“Two fuckers already. Pretty soon, I’ll just be fucker.”
“Nah, I gotta save that for Jason,” Charlie grins, thinking about how easy his younger brother is to fuck with. Like his youngest brother Alec, he’s got a heart of gold, but Jason is as oblivious as he is kind which makes him fun to fuck with.
“Speaking of Jason,” Andrew starts. “You should come with me to see him later. Get out of the house. You haven’t left all week.”
“I don’t want to go anywhere or see anyone,” Charlie grumbles flopping onto his stomach. He turns his head to the side, leaving his cheek resting on Andrew’s thigh.
“You need a change of scenery. You’ve been bitchy all week and—”
“I’m not bitchy,” Charlie interrupts.
“You put the B in bitch this week,” Andrew calmly replies.
Charlie opens his mouth intent to argue then promptly closes it thinking about the last week. He’s snapped at Andrew at least half a dozen times. “Ah shit, I’ve been an asshole.”
“Have been would imply it’s a past state.”
“Fucker,” Charlie grumbles, sitting upright so he can glare at Andrew who is smiling.
“Don’t bother apologizing,” Andrew says. “I’m used to you.”
The fight goes out of Charlie in one heavy exhale of breath. “You shouldn’t be used to people treating you shitty because they’re cranky. I’m sorry. I just get so out of sorts when this happens and I feel—”
“Wrong.”
“Yeah.” Charlie exhales, some of his nervous energy fizzling away. “Wrong.”
“I have gossip.”
“Gossip?” Charlie perks up, criss-crossing his legs and leaning on his elbows. “About who?”
“Jason.”
“Please don’t tell me he’s got a new girlfriend. I’ll walk into oncoming traffic if I have to pretend to like one more of the type of woman he brings home. He has the worst fucking taste in women. He—what is that look on your face? What aren’t you telling me?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Andrew tries. He stretches out his legs, brushing a bit of grass off his pants. “Why is there so much nature in here? Wasn’t the point of building a studio to protect you from the elements?”
“I like nature,” Charlie replies, shoving his bare feet in Andrew’s lap just to be annoying. He might be in his thirties but the shot of dopamine he gets any time he can annoy Andrew never fails to make him smile.
“You’d fit right in living in some kind of hippie nudist colony,” Andrew says, shoving Charlie’s feet away.
“I would, but then you wouldn’t come visit me, so fuck that,” Charlie says, leaning backwards on his hands and plopping his feet in Andrew’s lap a second time. Andrew grimaces, flicking his foot before knocking it to the ground.
“If you put your ugly ass feet in my lap one more time, I’m not going to dry clean whatever shirt you ruined this week.”
“Who says I ruined a shirt?”
“Did you?” Andrew asks. “I meant to ask you before but I forgot because every time I called or came over someone was a cranky asshole.”
“Yeah, yeah, I was an asshole and yes, my silk shirt is covered in cat hair and needs the dry cleaner and yes, I can’t live without your help. Happy?”
“Very,” Andrew says, actually looking happy. Not all of Andrew’s smiles have reached his eyes lately, and it does Charlie good to see him looking genuinely pleased, even at his expense. “I’ll be happier if you come with me to Denise’s.”
“I thought you were going to meet Jason,” Charlie says, unsure why his younger brother would need to see Denise, who is not only Andrew’s personal tailor but his friend and also a woman who only tolerates Charlie because of Andrew.
He and Denise have a love-hate relationship where Denise hates him and Charlie loves the attention.
He also loves how much Denise adores his twin, which naturally means he wants to be around as much as possible.
“We are going to meet Jason. At Denise’s. I pulled in a favor.”
“What kind of favor? Why does Jason need to see Denise? Did his massive thighs split his suit?”
“Just a favor,” Andrew answers dismissively. “And Jason doesn’t need to see Denise, his new friend does.”
“New friend?” Charlie sits up straighter. “Jason doesn’t make new friends. Unless you count the sample people at Costco.”
“Well, he made a new friend, and this friend needs a suit to chaperone the homecoming dance with Jason next weekend.”
Charlie whistles. “That must be some big favor you called in.”
“I’ve got it handled,” Andrew says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “The point is Jason and Emerson—”
“What exactly do you mean Jason and Emerson?” Charlie questions, picking up on something more.
“You are the nosiest asshole I’ve ever met,” Andrew snorts. “Did you know that?”
“Yes, I did. You should get me a shirt that says ‘nosy asshole and proud of it.’”
“The horrible thing is you’d probably wear it.”
Charlie pretends to mull the idea over, but there’s really no question, and the answer is easy. “Damn right I’d wear it.”
“Guess you know what you’re getting for Christmas this year.”
“Perfect,” Charlie grins, hoping the shirt is tie-dye. Quickly he rises, holding his hand out when Andrew doesn’t immediately copy him. “Well, are you coming?”
“Coming where?”
“With me inside the house. I need to shower and change if we’re going to meet Jason’s new friend. You need to tell me everything.”
“I don’t know much,” Andrew says.
“Tell me everything,” Charlie counters, wrapping his arm around Andrew’s shoulder to guide him toward the house.
Focusing on his little brother’s personal life is exactly the kind of distraction Charlie needs to avoid thinking about his own life.
“Jason Matias King.”
“What?” Jason blinks, and it’s all Charlie can do not to laugh.
Jason might be thirty and the size of a house, but Charlie is always going to think of him as his awkward baby brother, especially at times like right now where he’s clearly so far out of his emotional depth and blind to what’s really going on.
He cannot believe Jason’s friend is a redhead. A fucking redhead.
“This explains everything,” Andrew utters.
“It really does,” Charlie agrees. A fucking redhead. Leave it to Jason to find a gay redhead for his first man crush.
“Explains what?” Jason tries, head cocked to the side, not unlike a confused puppy.
Emerson, Charlie’s friend, looks as confused as Jason, and it’s possibly one of the most adorable and ridiculous things Charlie has ever witnessed.
“He’s a redhead,” Charlie and Andrew answer at the same time.
Charlie smirks, delighted Andrew is on the same wavelength.
On the drive here, Andrew had, in fact, spilled everything he knew about Emerson, but true to his earlier words, it was close to nothing.
A new, and now close, friend who Jason is desperate to protect and help get a suit for homecoming.
What Andrew had failed to mention, because Jason failed to mention it, was that Emerson is a redhead, which explains everything.
Honestly Charlie should have put a stipulation in their bet about Jason’s sexuality regarding redheads. Dammit.
With slow movements, Emerson inches his way into Jason’s personal space, his shoulder pressed against Jason’s body and his eyes turning toward him as he reaches up to fidget with a lock of his hair.
There’s something soft about Emerson, and he’s undeniably beautiful with his lanky, elf-like features and dark red hair.
Most noticeable of all is the way his supposedly straight brother is orbiting around Emerson and looking at him in a way that no straight man ever would.
“Don’t be an asshole and talk about people like they’re not here, dude.” Jason looks like he’s ready to punch Charlie, and while his not-so-little brother has a few inches and at least eighty pounds on Charlie, it’s not the threat itself but the implications of it that have his mouth ready to run.
Jason likes Emerson. Even if Andrew hadn’t given him enough context on the way over to raise suspicions, seeing them together for less than five minutes confirms it.
There is no mistaking the way they look at each other, but in typical Jason fashion, he doesn’t seem like he has any idea.
Luckily for his brother, Charlie excels in butting in where he doesn’t belong and garnering emotional reactions from people.
“My apologies,” Charlie says with a smile. “I was rendered temporarily speechless by your friend's beauty.”