Chapter Eleven
Marcello
She’s pretty. Really pretty. Like the kind of pretty I imagine a lot of women pay a lot of money for.
In fact, I think that may be what’s happening here.
Her hair is blonde. Her eyes are bright blue.
Her eyelashes are thick and long and I’m starting to think her eyebrows have been combed more times in preparation for this date than my hair ever has been.
So, yeah. Daisy is attractive. And she’s easy enough to talk to, and yet I’m finding it hard to focus on what she’s saying. I’m finding it hard to think about responses that are better than half-hearted hums of agreement or obvious follow-up questions.
Because I’m thinking about Giles.
I’m thinking about Giles in the shower.
I’m thinking about Giles naked in the shower, his dick hard and thick and not at all unpleasant to look at.
Not that I’ve ever found penises unpleasant to look at.
I would never have considered myself so insecure of my sexuality that I would react badly to looking at other penises.
I’m not the kind of guy who avoids looking at cocks in porn.
I also think I can objectively say whether a dick is attractive or not.
And yet, there was more going on inside me when I saw Giles’ erection as he stood up in the showers.
I was wondering what it would be like to touch it. I was wondering what he would say if I just reached out and squeezed it. I was wondering what he would think if I told him that his dick was an attractive dick, and that was my possibly not-so-objective opinion.
And I’m still thinking about all these things as Daisy continues to relay a story about her day at work. Apparently she and her colleagues got locked in a meeting room after the door jammed and they didn’t get out for hours…
“But it was okay because we had over one hundred and fifty bottles of fruit smoothies and juices. We would have survived.” Her eyes pin on me expectantly.
Oh, she wants me to laugh.
I should laugh.
“Ha!” I bark and it sounds exactly how I didn’t want it to sound. Loud and awkward. Her eyes harden. “Sorry,” I mumble and reach for my bottle of beer to busy hands and mouth.
We’re sitting at an outside table on a busy terrace for one of the bars in Leicester Square.
It wasn’t a very imaginative spot to suggest for a drink, but I wasn’t feeling particularly inspired when Daisy said I could pick where we met.
I just wanted to be close to the Tube in case it all went horribly wrong.
And while there are swarms of tourists and clocked-off workers drinking around us, we have a table of our own and it’s not as noisy as it would be if we were inside.
There’s a cool breeze easing the worst of the afternoon heat but still I’m grateful that I took a shower after the gym.
Oh, fuck, that shower.
Now I’m thinking about Giles’ dick again.
I squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head, trying to shift the visual.
“So, how long have you worked there?” I ask Daisy.
“Oh, about five years now.”
“You must like it,” I comment. See, I can do this.
“Yeah, I said I did,” she tells me with a pointed look.
“Well, I like my work too,” I say. “I think it’s important to enjoy your job.”
“Do you own just the one restaurant?” she asks me taking a sip of her white wine spritzer.
“It’s a café,” I correct her. “And yes, we just have one location. My family own lots of different hospitality businesses though. My grandfather has a restaurant in Sardinia. My uncle owns a pizzeria in Stockwell, and a second cousin has a couple of bars in North London.”
“So it’s really the family business,” she says with a smile that looks forced. “You don’t wish you could do something else?”
Her question lands abruptly, uncomfortably. Or maybe it’s the way it was asked, with eyes blown wide to make them look innocent.
“No, not really. I mean, twenty years ago I would have taken a career as a professional footballer over running a café, but I didn’t quite have the ball handling skills.
At least not on the football pitch.” It’s a lame attempt at a lame joke and I’m not surprised when she doesn’t laugh. But still I’m a little hurt.
Giles would have laughed.
“And do you actually, you know, make all the coffees and sandwiches and stuff?” It’s that loaded tone again.
“Yeah, that’s sort of what working in a café means.”
“Yes, but if you’re the manager, can’t you just leave that to everyone else?”
I blink at her and grip my bottle of beer a little tighter. “I don’t want to leave it to everyone else. I like making coffee. I like chatting to customers. And I make a mean panino.”
“Panino?”
“You’d probably say panini but technically that’s the plural of the word panino, so one panini sandwich is a panino.”
“Oh. Okay,” she says and when she takes another drink her eyes flit around behind me.
“Have you ever done a triathlon?” I ask, sounding as desperate as I feel to save our conversation, while at the same time questioning why I feel this need.
“Err, no.” Daisy looks horrified at even the suggestion.
I smile at her, hoping what my mamma has told me is my best feature can help her find her sense of humour. “I’m training for one right now. Well, I just started training.”
“You’re doing a triathlon?”
“Yes, in early October.”
She leans forward and I take that as a good sign. “Why?”
“Because I want to get fit, and I like a challenge.” I consider telling her about my ADHD but it doesn’t feel like the right time. It doesn’t feel like it would make this conversation improve in any way shape or form.
It was easy to tell Giles about it though. Very easy.
“A friend of mine is helping me train. We go to the gym three times a week and run at the weekend. I’m meeting him to do six kilometres in Hyde Park again tomorrow.”
“I did a five-kilometre race once,” she says and I feel relief that she’s a little bit more engaged, but not excitement, not pleasure. “But I lost a toenail three days afterwards so never ran again. I do pilates now. And walk to and from work.”
“Giles says walking is one of the best ways to exercise,” I say without realising.
“Who's Giles?”
“Oh, he’s my friend I’m training with. He’s a total muscle head. Like stacked. But he’s the nicest guy with it. He doesn’t take himself too seriously.”
“Okay.” Daisy takes another sip from her drink, her eyes travelling again. She’s nearly finished that glass. I should offer to get her another soon, but… But I don’t really want to.
“It’s been really helpful to have someone to train with,” I continue. “To stay motivated. And he took me to this really swanky sports clothes shop and helped me pick out some gear so I don’t look a total idiot working out.”
“Hmm.” She offers me a weak smile.
“That’s why I won’t drink anymore after this.” I lift my bottle up. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to run hungover. I can barely do it on a good day.” I cough. “Do you want another drink?”
She looks at her glass and then at her watch.
She doesn’t even try to make it appear subtle.
I feel my breath hitch as my thoughts quickly go to the many things I can do if this date ends and my evening becomes free.
I can eat dinner with Mamma. I can play some video games and send Kris silly memes I find on the Internet.
I can maybe watch some gay porn to find out what the fuck has been going on with me the last few days.
But then her mouth stretches into a wide grin, a grin that I’m pretty sure is as far from genuine as possible, and she says, “Sure, one more can’t hurt. ”
My heart sinks. And it shouldn’t. I should be pleased. Maybe she’s not totally uninterested. Maybe she just needs to warm up. Maybe she likes the idea of me doing a triathlon, or maybe she doesn’t really look down on me for working in a café.
“Well, I’ll just go and get them then.” I stand and swig back the last of my beer. Once it’s gone I realise that that was my last taste of alcohol for the night, and I’m now going to have to try and think up scintillating conversation topics while drinking a lemonade. My heart sinks further.
It doesn’t take long to get served at the bar inside, considering nearly everyone is enjoying the warm weather on the terrace. As the server tends to my order, I pull my phone out of my pocket. My eyebrows shoot up in surprise when I see a message from Giles, sent not ten minutes ago.
I type back quickly.
A slow smile curls my lips when I see the three dots that tell me he’s typing a response immediately.
I laugh out loud.
I type before I realise how this may put us on dangerous ground, talking about showers.
Giles texts back and that halts my thoughts and my breath. Is he giving me a way out with that comment, or a way in?
“Here you go.” The server places two glasses on the bar in front of me, pulling my attention away from my phone screen.
“Oh, thanks,” I say and I motion with my phone to pay for the drinks.
I’m still not sure what to text back after my bill is settled, but I know I want to say something.
Of course, he’s not flirting with me. He’s Giles, and I’m…
me. And I don’t want to leave him hanging after he’s clearly made a brave attempt to explain away what happened earlier.
There’d been no time to talk after the shower.
I left before he was out of his cubicle and had to rush to meet Daisy.
I text back eventually, knowing deep down it’s the right thing to do. Whatever my feelings about Giles, I would hate for it to ruin our friendship.
Regardless of what I may or may not be feeling about Giles, that doesn’t automatically mean he reciprocates an attraction. In fact, I would think it highly unlikely he is attracted to me considering what he looks like and what the men he normally goes for look like. Like Jeremy.
This is for the best. We can brush whatever happened in the shower under the carpet and go for a run together tomorrow without any awkwardness.
People have penises and penises get erections. That’s how Giles wants to play it and after everything he’s doing for me with the running and the training, I owe him that much.
It’s another generosity from Giles, offering to meet later should things with Daisy go in a certain direction.
But I already know they’re not going there.
I know because I don’t want them to go there.
I’m going to finish this drink, ask her more questions about vegan smoothies and then I’m going home.
Home to Mamma. Home to my bed. Home to maybe, some gay porn.
Home to hopefully have another sex dream about Giles.