3. Aiden
3
AIDEN
H oly shit.
The guy from the ferry stared at me, his face a picture of shock, but there was no way he could have been more shocked than I was.
Holy fucking shit.
What were the chances that the homophobic asshole I’d met on that boat would be the final contestant on A Piece of Cake ?
Actually, no. Fuck that. The more important question was, what the hell was I supposed to do now?
He wasn’t going to say something, was he? I watched as he stared at me, his mouth opening and closing just as it had on the boat, bracing for him to say…well, I wasn’t really sure. Arrest this man for filming himself jacking off on a car ferry?
I flushed, remembering the way he’d looked at me when he’d walked in. It was just my luck that the most gorgeous guy I’d seen in ages would turn out to be a raging homophobe. A raging homophobe I now had to work with for the next eight weeks—assuming either of us lasted that long.
“Ah, Nolan, you made it. Wonderful. Why don’t you have a seat at the end there, next to Aiden?”
Vivian Vasquez, one of the show’s two judges, smiled at the guy from the boat and gestured for him to take the only remaining unoccupied stool—right next to mine, of course. So he had a name—and he actually belonged here if Vivian knew what it was.
His eyebrows drew down in consternation when he looked in my direction. Well, fuck you too, Nolan .
He didn’t move immediately. I held my breath, waiting for him to speak, but he just looked at me. After a moment, Tanner Carmichael, the other judge, cleared his throat impatiently. Finally, Nolan crossed the temporary floor that had been laid down under the tent and took the stool next to mine.
He gave me a look full of misgiving, and I could already feel myself switching from fear to annoyance. What right did he have to judge me? Maybe what I’d been doing yesterday was a little weird, but he’d very clearly enjoyed the show, even if he didn’t want to admit it.
Maybe I was just cranky because I hadn’t gotten my luggage back until four a.m. this morning, but there was no way I was going to apologize or cower in front of him. And I hadn’t finagled my way onto a baking show without having baked so much as a box of brownies only to get sent home before a single episode wrapped.
“What, afraid I’ll get my gay on you?” I whispered.
Nolan sniffed and shifted his stool a couple of inches away from mine.
“Relax, man.” I gave him my most innocent smile. “As long as you don’t tell anyone about what you saw, I see no reason to tell people how much you liked it.”
“Would you shut up?” Nolan hissed out of the corner of his mouth. He nodded towards Vivian, who’d started speaking again. “I’m trying to listen.”
“Sure thing, sweetheart.” I blew him a little kiss before returning my attention to the judges, and Nolan’s face darkened. It was almost a shame the cameras weren’t rolling.
Vivian gave us an overview of how filming would work. The show ran two episodes each week—not quite live, but working around the clock to get each episode out forty-eight hours after it was shot.
Mondays, like today, were for challenge episodes, where all the contestants baked something for the judges to evaluate. We’d also shoot confessional segments in the afternoon. Tuesdays were reserved for editing and filming extra footage. Then the challenge episodes aired on Wednesday evenings, and viewers had twenty-four hours to vote for their favorite bakers.
Results episodes were filmed on Fridays. The voting totals were revealed on camera, and the judges would send one contestant home from the bottom three bakers. Then the remaining contestants would receive the next week’s baking assignment, and we’d be filmed as we researched and practiced our bakes, showing off more of our dazzling personalities. The results episodes aired on Sunday evenings, right before filming began again on Monday.
“It’s a tight schedule,” Tanner said, taking over from Vivian, “but we’re confident that Season 13 is going to be the best season of A Piece of Cake yet. We have a crack team of producers, camera people, editors, techs, you name it, who will be working non-stop to put this all together, but we’ll need your cooperation to make this happen. You never know when we’ll need to film an extra segment or reshoot something, plus there’ll be a fair bit of B-roll shooting at all times. These are going to be long days, and you should consider yourselves on call from now until you head home, got it?”
We all nodded. None of this information was new, but the woman sitting on my other side leaned over and whispered, “I think I might need to find an easier-to-maintain hairstyle.”
I glanced up at her giant blond beehive—like something straight out of the 1960s—and couldn’t help laughing.
“Just trying to be memorable on my first day,” she said with a wink.
“No shame in that,” I told her.
“Now,” Vivian said, “I believe we’ll be sending you out to film your entrance in a minute, but before we do that, let’s go around and introduce ourselves. It makes it so much nicer when we all know each other a bit. So please, tell us your name, your age—if you like—where you’re from, what you do when you’re not baking sixteen hours a day in south Georgia humidity, and what made you want to try out for A Piece of Cake .”
I tried to pay attention as the other contestants spoke, but dammit, it was hard with Nolan sitting right next to me. It didn’t matter how much my brain knew he was a bigoted asshole. All my body knew was that he was tall and lean and smelled incredibly good—green and fresh, like one of those fancy cocktails with a bunch of herbs in it.
I shifted uncomfortably, willing my dick to calm down. I did not get hard for homophobes—a guy had to have some standards.
By the time the introductions worked their way down to me, I was practically vibrating from my desire to get up and do something. And fine, maybe just from desire, plain and simple. My brain was buzzing, and I struggled to pull it into focus as everyone turned to look at me.
“Uh, hey.” I grinned—my brightest, sauciest one, the one I was pretty sure had landed me a spot on the show in the first place. I waved, then grinned again like I was embarrassed by my own enthusiasm.
“I’m Aiden Hastings. I’m twenty-one years old, and I’m from LA, and I’m an actor.” I paused for half a second, biting my lip. “Well, I’m trying to be an actor, but I guess, mostly, I’m a barista. But I love A Piece of Cake . I feel like I’ve been watching this show my whole life, and I just can’t believe I’m finally here. I can’t wait to meet everyone and to get baking.”
Just a cute little gay who was excited to be here but a teensy bit overwhelmed. Snarky but loveable, even if it turned out I was disastrous in the kitchen. Which, to be clear, I definitely would be. But I was counting on my other charms to keep me around.
In all honesty, until a month ago, I’d never seen an episode of the show. But in the weeks before I’d left LA, I’d mainlined every single one of them, to the point where it really did feel like I’d been watching the show forever.
And while the show might be a competition in theory, winning the viewers’ hearts was what really mattered. If I could get enough votes from viewers to stay out of the bottom three each week, I’d be sent on to the next episode, regardless of how competent I was.
The judges might critique the bakers’ techniques and results, but it was clear that what kept viewers tuning in—and voting—were the contestants with the most watchable personalities. And after last year’s controversy, I thought I had a good chance of making it at least halfway. After all, why cast your first openly gay contestant only to send him home in week two?
As long as Nolan kept his mouth shut, I should be fine.
When Vivian turned to him, I made myself smile again. Just a cute little gay who thought his chair-neighbor was attractive and definitely wasn’t worried about what he could reveal about me.
“And Nolan, how about you?” Vivian said.
Nolan smiled, but there was something off about it. It looked too tense, and he was holding himself very still.
“Hey, everyone. I’m Nolan McAllister. I’m twenty-eight, I live in Washington, DC, and I’m a restaurant manager.”
That was it. No added details, no spin, no jokes. It was the shortest introduction anyone had given, and paired with his dark black slacks and crisp white button-down, he gave the impression that he was filming an episode of A Piece of Corporate Accounting .
Vivian stared, like she expected him to say more, but Nolan just looked back at her, that tense smile of his going uncertain at the corners. Finally, she nodded.
“Well, alright then. Let’s get started.”
The crew herded the lot of us out of the tent and through the Wisteria Inn’s grounds to the street in front. They really couldn’t have picked a quainter place to film this season. The building was like something out of a fairytale, all gingerbread shingles and lacey woodwork on its wrap-around porch. Flowers I didn’t have names for grew in a riot, spilling over the white picket fence and attracting a crowd of butterflies and bumblebees.
They filmed the group of us walking back through the grounds and into the tent three times before they were satisfied. Finally, we were allowed to take our places at the workstations that had been assigned to us. Nolan’s, I couldn’t help noticing, was right behind mine.
Then we had to wait while the camera people got into position to film Vivian and Tanner as they explained the first week’s challenge to the viewers—a batch of cookies that was supposed to tell a story about our childhood or home. Not very challenging if you actually knew what you were doing, but I guess it was supposed to be a good introduction to who we were as contestants.
Since the only cookies I associated with my childhood were store-bought ones from the day-old section of the supermarket, ones that tasted like chemicals and made your tongue hurt if you ate too many, I’d just looked up a recipe for chocolate chip cookies online and decided to go with that. I’d hoped it wouldn’t be too hard to get right.
The trouble, of course, was that I’d never actually made them before. That, and I’d never been good with numbers in general. They had a weird habit of swimming around on the page and falling out of my head the second I looked away from the paper.
But I could do this. Somehow. I could.
The recipe told me to start by creaming butter and sugar together. I frowned. I’d never heard cream used as a verb before, except in one very specific context that I highly doubted was the one the recipe-writer had in mind. Maybe I was supposed to add cream to them?
I scanned the counter of my workstation. We’d had to submit our recipes ahead of time so production assistants could prepare our ingredients, and I didn’t see anything that looked like cream. There went hypothesis number one.
I sighed. I’d just have to mix the butter and sugar together and see how that went. Three-quarters of a cup of granulated sugar to start with. I grabbed a measuring cup and poured one, two, three quarter-cups into the bowl and then—fuck. That was a half-cup measure, not a quarter.
With a muted screech, I scooped out two handfuls of white sugar from the bowl, only to realize I’d already closed the lid on the sugar canister. Double fuck. I dumped the sugar into my workstation’s sink, then looked up to find a camera trained on me. The camera guy was cute, too. Blond hair and brown eyes, a little taller than I was.
“Clearly off to a great start,” I said with a sheepish grin. I might be melting down internally, but I had to keep it cute for TV.
I turned back to my recipe as the camera guy drifted towards Nolan’s workstation. I wasn’t really trying to listen, but I couldn’t help overhearing when Nolan said in surprise, “Em? What are you doing here!”
“Freelance work,” the camera guy replied. “I didn’t have too many clients lined up this spring, and it’s not that hard to work a video camera. Figured I’d pick up a little extra money.”
“What about the paper?” Nolan asked, and okay, fine, by this point, I actually was trying to listen, darting glances over my shoulder while trying to look like I was deeply engrossed in my baking.
I couldn’t help it. Nolan knew someone who worked on the show? Someone he was friendly with, judging by his tone? I hadn’t realized he was capable of being friendly.
The camera guy—Em, I guessed his name was—made a face. “It folded. Really abruptly, too. Nora and I showed up for work one day and the building was shuttered. We didn’t even get our last paychecks.”
“Jesus. That’s awful.”
Huh—so Nolan was capable of being friendly and sympathetic. Curiouser and curiouser.
“Tell me about it,” Em agreed. “At least I have my other clients, but Nora got royally screwed. She’s the one who got me on the show, actually. She got herself contracted as a freelance story producer, then pulled me along with her.”
Em pointed at someone standing at the front of the tent, and Nolan looked up. He made eye contact with me for a second before I turned around again. Shit. Knowing him, he’d probably think I was spying on him or something.
I looked back at my recipe. Time to actually start working again. I added in the brown sugar next, then found the two sticks of butter I needed, only to discover they were rock hard. How the hell was I supposed to cream or stir or do anything with them in this state? Growling under my breath, I found a small metal mixing bowl at the far corner of my workstation and dumped the butter into it, then put the bowl in the microwave.
How long did it take to soften butter? A minute? Two? I bit my lip—not even for show this time—and set it for sixty seconds, then walked back to where my recipe lay at the other end of the counter. I’d barely picked it up before I heard a pop and looked at the microwave to see sparks flying.
Triple fuck. That probably wasn’t supposed to happen.
I dashed over and flung the door open, pulling the bowl out and cursing when it burned my fingers. I tossed it into the sink, which sent sugar flying everywhere, and brought my fingers to my mouth to suck on them.
Half the tent was looking at me by then, so I gave them my best giggle and rueful grin, wondering to myself why the hell I’d ever thought I could do this. Even Nolan was watching, but instead of the sympathy I saw on most people’s faces, he just arched a silent eyebrow before turning back to his work.
Fucker.
Of course, that was when Vivian decided to stop by my workstation, with a camerawoman trailing a few feet behind her, recording everything.
I took my fingers out of my mouth and endeavored to look like I had a clue what I was doing. I might be relying on voters to carry me through this thing, but I still wanted the judges to like me.
Tanner and Vivian were both new additions to the show this season. As far as I knew, Tanner didn’t know any more about baking than I did. He was a veteran reality TV host, though, and had worked on other shows on the same network. He was apparently executive producing A Piece of Cake , in addition to being a judge. And, perhaps most importantly, he was out and gay.
Vivian was new to TV, but she’d won awards for her cookbooks and baking. She was short and round and somewhere north of eighty years old, but she carried a long wooden spoon with her, and I’d already seen her rap it sharply against another contestant’s workstation when she thought they weren’t paying enough attention.
“So, Aiden, tell me about your recipe,” Vivian said, her brown eyes keen and sharp.
I put on my best smile. “Well, it’s something my nana used to make for me and my brother when we were really little. I think she just got it off the back of the bag of chocolate chips, but it was never really the recipe that mattered. It was spending time with her and my brother. That was my favorite part.”
Completely fictional, but hopefully, no one would call me on it.
“Ah. And would this be the brother who was a bit of an internet sensation last year?” Vivian asked.
My eyes widened. I hadn’t expected someone her age to even know about the internet, let alone know about the tiny corner of it where my brother had gotten popular. It was actually my fault he’d blown up like that, and Gabe hadn’t been thrilled when he’d first found out.
I blushed. “Yeah, that would be him. Gabe’s the best.”
“Well, maybe we’ll be able to bring him on the show sometime,” Vivian said with a smile. “Or even your grandmother.”
Good luck with that, considering my mom’s mother died before I was born and my dad’s parents hated children.
I gave her a toothy grin. “That’d be awesome.”
“I have to admit,” Vivian said, “it was a bit disconcerting to hear you say you’ve been watching A Piece of Cake your whole life. I can remember the first season coming out, and I can’t believe it was so long ago. Did you come here specifically to make me feel ancient?”
I laughed and gestured to my bowl of still mostly solid butter. “No, actually, I came here specifically to try to blow things up by putting this in my microwave.”
“Yes, I’d noticed that.” Vivian winked. “Why don’t we try transferring that butter to a non-metallic bowl, hmm?” She tapped her spoon on my counter twice, then walked away
“Aye, aye, Captain,” I said with a little salute.
Mental note—no metal in the microwave. I’d have to remember that for later.
Before I could do anything about my butter, though, Tanner swooped in, coming to a stop right between my workstation and Nolan’s. Jesus, were they ever going to let me actually bake? Tanner had a camera with him too, of course—this one was manned by Nolan’s friend, Em.
“So, Aiden, Nolan,” Tanner said, holding his arms out like he was giving some kind of sermon. “How’s it going?”
I frowned, wondering why he was talking to both of us at the same time. I thought they’d be focusing on individual interviews in this first episode. Then I noticed Em turning the camera towards me, and I plastered a smile on my face instead.
“Just peachy.” I added a self-deprecating little laugh.
Nolan didn’t even look up. He just said, “Not bad,” and kept on working.
Now it was Tanner who frowned. I got the impression he wasn’t used to being ignored. But he brightened as he asked his next question.
“And how does it feel for you two, representing the LGBTQ portion of our audience?”
His tone was just as light and airy as it had been for the first question, but my head whipped around in shock. What the hell did he mean by you two ?
Did that mean—it couldn’t mean that—was Nolan…gay? He certainly wasn’t ignoring Tanner anymore. He was looking right at him, and his face was furious.
Shit, I’d just been teasing him before, trying to get a reaction. Was he actually gay and just really, really closeted? Was he straight, and Tanner was trying to rile him up in front of the camera? Or had I misunderstood the question entirely?
Tanner looked at the two of us expectantly. Someone had to say something, and clearly, Nolan wasn’t prepared to.
“Oh, well, you know,” I said, trying to keep my voice bouncy, “I wouldn’t say that I’m representing anybody other than myself. I would never want to presume.” I looked right into the camera and grinned. “But if there are any baby gays out there wondering if there’s a place for them on this show, I hope you know that you, too, could one day set your microwave on fire on TV.”
Just off-camera, I saw Nolan roll his eyes.
“Are you hoping to win the competition?” Tanner asked.
“Well, I’m hoping to win something . Whether it’s the competition, or just the attention of one of those delectable-looking dads a couple of ovens in front of me, I’m not too picky.”
Em made a choking noise. I couldn’t tell if he was horrified or trying not to laugh. Maybe both.
“So you’re not in a relationship, then?” Tanner said, which was a little weird. We’d wandered rather far afield from the topic of baking. But, hey, if the camera was rolling and focused on me, I was going to milk it for all it was worth.
“Hard to believe, right?” I batted my eyelashes at the camera. “So if there are any guys out there who are looking for a boy who sucks at math, but also sucks…other things. Well, feel free to vote for me.”
This time, Em’s chortle was unmistakable. I blew him a kiss. He might be Nolan’s friend, but at least he had a sense of humor.
“So, do you feel like you’re an inspiration to people, then?” Tanner asked.
“What, for my good looks and charm?” I arched an eyebrow. “Or for being on this show?”
“Either one.”
“Well, in that case, absolutely.” I made my voice as dramatic as possible. “Follow your dreams, babies. Love is love and baking is baking, no matter what kinds of holes you like to stick your butter in.”
“Jesus.” The word from Nolan was quiet but unmistakable, and Em swung the camera over to him.
“What about you, Nolan?” Tanner asked.
“What about me?” Nolan was back to focusing on his work, opening a carton of eggs. He didn’t look up.
“Do you feel like you’re an inspiration to anybody?” Tanner pressed. “With America growing more tolerant, even celebratory, of differences—”
“I wasn’t aware that my sexuality was anybody’s business.” Nolan cracked an egg sharply over the edge of his bowl.
“So you don’t want people to know you’re bisexual?” Tanner asked, his voice mild.
Bisexual, not gay. Interesting, if true. Nolan didn’t seem to be denying it.
“Well, I didn’t mention it in my audition package,” Nolan said, pulling another egg from the carton. “So, no. I didn’t think it was relevant. I don’t even know how you found out.”
“I have my ways.” Tanner’s smile grew broader.
“And you really want this conversation shared with millions of viewers, where you admit to stalking and scrutinizing your contestants’ love lives?” Nolan’s back was ramrod straight. He still wasn’t looking up, though.
“Oh, we can edit all sorts of things out in post. And it was hardly stalking. We do background checks on everyone before casting them. Par for the course.” Tanner waved a hand lazily. “I’m just curious—you really don’t think it’s impressive for A Piece of Cake to have two queer men on the show this season? You don’t think that represents progress at all?”
“I don’t think it’s relevant,” Nolan said, annoyance dripping from his voice. “I’m here to bake, not perform some kind of regressive stereotype to make people laugh at me.”
That time he did look up—but not at the camera. He looked right at me. So much for solidarity.
“Interesting.” Tanner’s eyes darted between the two of us. “So do you think some people on this show put too much emphasis on personality? Style over substance?”
“I don’t know anyone on this show well enough to comment.”
“You sure about that?” The words flew out of my mouth before I even realized I was speaking.
Tanner, Nolan, and Em all looked at me. Crap. Well, I might as well keep talking if I was getting more screen time.
“Because it sure sounds like you’re commenting on other people’s behavior without knowing a single thing about them,” I said sweetly.
Nolan’s mouth opened and closed again. By all rights, he should have looked like a guppy doing that, but he didn’t. He was still hot, and that annoyed me almost as much as his words did.
“I would think that another member of the LGBT community would know how harmful it can be to judge people right off the bat, based just on appearances,” I added. “But I guess if that’s how you feel, I can’t do anything to change it.”
With a sad little smile and shrug for the camera, I turned and went back to work. Winning the argument felt good, even if I was the one who’d started it. Nolan had no right to be so judgy.
Unfortunately, my winning streak didn’t extend to my baking, and by the time we had to bring our work up to be judged, all I had to show for myself was a batch of mostly raw cookies that I’d only been able to put in the oven for five minutes before I had to pull them out.
Tanner choked down a piece of one and motioned for someone to bring him a glass of water.
“You might want to check how much salt you added to that,” he said. I winced.
“I really don’t understand how you managed to burn and underbake these at the same time,” Vivian added, flicking a charred, black flake off the edge of her cookie. She shook her head in amazement. “I must confess, I’m disappointed. I’d hoped for more from you, Aiden. Better luck next week.”
“If you make it,” Tanner added.
On that delightful note, we were all dismissed for a quick lunch break. I tried not to let the judges’ comments get to me. They were warranted, for one thing. It’s not like I hadn’t known my cookies sucked.
It might have been a little easier to take if they hadn’t praised Nolan’s chocolate-dipped shortbread quite so much. I’d been able to smell his cookies as soon as he took them out of the oven, and I hated how much they’d made my mouth water.
It was insanely hot in the tent, and we were supposed to shoot some confessional segments that afternoon, so I went back upstairs to grab some deodorant and brush my teeth. My room was on the third floor of the bed and breakfast, at the back of the house, and shared a bathroom with the room next door.
I should have knocked before going in.
After yesterday’s experience, you’d really think I would have learned to be more careful. I should have knocked, but I didn’t. I just opened the door—and found myself face-to-face with a half-naked Nolan, a towel wrapped around his waist.
His nostrils flared, and I froze, halfway in the bathroom, halfway out. It was a strange reversal of yesterday’s encounter, and I didn’t think the similarity was lost on either of us. I opened my mouth to apologize—I might not like the guy, but I could at least show him that some people had manners—but he spoke first.
“Did you need something?” His voice was cold.
Well, fuck saying sorry, if that was the kind of greeting I was going to get.
“My toothbrush,” I said, my tone short. Were the room assignments based on our workstations? Why the hell did I have to share with him ? “And the sink.”
Nolan stood to one side and waved a hand like he was ushering me in.
“Be my guest. Far be it from me to keep the golden boy from looking his best.”
I’m not sure what made me snap, exactly. Was it his tone? His words? Or just the fact that he still smelled unfairly good, even though it was clear from his dry hair that he hadn’t showered yet.
“Okay, what the actual fuck is your problem?” I exploded. “What did I ever do to you?”
Nolan blinked and gave me a look that said I was the one being unreasonable. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I mean this whole stick-up-your-ass, holier-than-thou act you’ve got going on. Your comments about how some of us should worry more about baking and less about being cute for the cameras.”
“That’s not what I said,” he snapped.
“It’s what you meant.”
His eyebrows drew down, and his mouth did that little trying-to-decide-what-to-say thing again. Anger flared in me. He had no right to look that dreamy, no right to have a chest that made me want to lick it, arms I wanted wrapped around me, and a dark little happy trail leading down his waist that made me want to pull that towel right off and worship him.
I shook my head. I needed to focus. We were fighting, not fucking.
“See,” I said. “You’re not even denying it.”
“And you’re not denying that you’re doing a fucking act ,” Nolan retorted. “Doing your whole mouthy, messy twink bit, instead of focusing on what we’re actually on the show to do.”
“I’ll have you know I’m a mouthy, messy twink in real life, asshole. It’s not an act. But even if it were, so what? What’s wrong with wanting people to like me?”
“You mean, other than the fact that you’re playing into harmful stereotypes and using your sexuality as a pick-me device, when there are still people out there who think you and I are perverted criminals?”
“Oh no. No, no, no.” I shook my head. “You don’t get to lecture me about how I come off to other people. At least I’m proud of who I am, and not still hiding in the closet.”
“I’m sorry, the closet ?”
“Well, aren’t you? You didn’t want to talk about it on the show. And I’m sure you wouldn’t want your friend from the ferry to know about you. What would you call that, if not the closet?”
“My friend from the ferry?” Nolan stared at me in confusion. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“I saw you talking to him,” I said. “There’s no point denying it. And I just think it’s kinda rich for you to talk about people who think we’re criminals when your boss, or dad, or whoever the fuck he was told me I was going to hell.”
“I didn’t talk to anyone on the ferry except you and—oh my God, that guy?” Nolan groaned. “I talked to some guy for ten seconds to ask him if he knew when the ferry was coming, and he basically told me to go fuck myself and walked away. Is that who you’re talking about? Because I don’t know him. I’d never seen him before in my life.”
“I—” I broke off, flushing. “Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.” Nolan rolled his eyes. “So maybe think for a moment before you go around accusing people and making baseless assumptions, huh?”
“Oh, fuck you.” Every time I was about to apologize, Nolan found a way to make me change my mind. I took a step towards him, jabbing my finger in his direction. “Listen, I made a mistake there, but you can’t deny that you’ve been nothing but an ass to me since—”
“ I’ve been an ass? You’re the one who acted like I was trying to send you to conversion camp for suggesting it might be inappropriate to jerk off in a public restroom.”
“Oh, hell no. You don’t get to make jokes about conversion camp. No one’s trying to pray your gay away, not when you could just as simply date a woman and never have to admit who you really are.”
I took another step, my finger practically touching his chest now, waiting for Nolan to respond. But he didn’t. He just watched me, his eyes narrowed, his lips parted.
“Are you even bisexual?” I asked, electricity flowing through me. I felt high. “Or is it just something you say to win woke points? I bet that’s it. I bet you wanted the show to dig through your background, bet you planted something for—”
“What the fuck is the matter with you?” Nolan snapped, his hand closing around my finger and holding it in mid-air. It didn’t hurt, and he didn’t do anything else, but a tremor ran through me at his touch. “You know nothing about me. How can you think that’s a normal thing to say to someone?”
“I’m just saying that if you were really bi, maybe you wouldn’t make such an effort to hide it from people. Have you even been with a guy, or was staring at my cock yesterday the closest you’ve ever gotten to—”
Before I could finish my sentence, Nolan’s lips were on mine.