Chapter 5
Chapter five
Saturday passed. Then Sunday.
No text from Ellis.
I told myself it didn’t matter. People got busy.
Maybe the family dinner turned into a whole weekend thing.
Maybe his phone died, and he forgot to charge it, the way one of my cousins routinely went off the grid for a week and then surfaced like nothing had happened. Maybe he just wasn’t that interested.
That last one stuck.
Monday morning, I woke up and checked my phone before my eyes even focused. Nothing.
The stone pressed deeper.
I went to the gym, not Foundation Fitness, a different one across town because I didn’t want to risk running into Ellis. The weights sat wrong in my hands. My form slipped. Everything took twice as long and landed half as satisfying.
By Monday night, I’d convinced myself of the truth: Ellis ghosted me.
The nice guy with the hazel eyes had decided I wasn’t worth the follow-through. Fine. Totally fine. I barely knew him. One conversation at the gym, a handful of texts I’d reread maybe four times.
Except it did, and that’s what pissed me off.
I grabbed my phone and texted Calliope.
Jett: Going out tonight. Neon Pulse. You in?
Calliope: It’s Monday.
Jett: Your point?
Calliope: My point is it’s MONDAY and you’re asking to go clubbing. What happened?
Jett: Nothing happened. Can’t a guy just want to have fun?
Calliope: …Ellis ghosted you, didn’t he?
I stared at the screen. Typed and deleted three different responses. Finally settled on:
Jett: I’ll be there at 10. With or without you.
Calliope: With. Obviously. Someone needs to make sure you don’t do anything stupid.
Jett: Too late for that.
Neon Pulse on a Monday looked different from Friday nights. Smaller crowd, more locals, people who came to dance off a rough day rather than celebrate the weekend. The music hit just as hard, though, bass rattling my ribs, lights cutting through the haze.
Calliope met me at the bar. She wore her usual chaos; ripped jeans, an oversized flannel, hair spiked in every direction like she’d stuck her finger in an outlet.
“Okay.” She handed me a drink I didn’t order. Vodka cranberry, heavy on the vodka. “Talk to me.”
“Nothing to talk about.” I downed half of it in one go. “Guy from the gym texted me Friday, went silent, clearly not interested. End of story.”
“It’s been three days, Jett. That’s not ghosting, that’s just… life.”
“Three days is ghosting.”
“Three days is having a busy weekend.” She grabbed my wrist before I could finish the drink. “What are you really doing here?”
“Dancing. Drinking. Living my life.” I pulled away, scanning the crowd. “What I always do.”
“You’re running.”
“I’m having fun.”
“You’re running from feelings about Gym Guy.”
“Ellis. His name’s Ellis, and I don’t have feelings.” The words tasted like lies. “I barely know him.”
“Then why are you here on a Monday night trying to fuck someone else to prove a point?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Turned back to my drink.
“That’s what I thought.” Calliope’s voice softened. “Babe, it’s okay to like someone.”
“I don’t like him. I just thought…” What? He might be different? Maybe this time something could actually stick? “I thought wrong. So now I’m correcting course.”
“By finding a rebound for someone you never even dated?”
“Exactly.”
She sighed. Loud and dramatic, the kind that meant she was giving up on reason and switching to damage control. “Fine. Do what you need to do. But I’m staying close in case you need an extraction.”
“Won’t need one.”
“Famous last words.”
I left her at the bar and went into the crowd. Bodies pressed close. The music was loud enough to drown out anything you didn’t want to hear. This I knew how to do.
A guy caught my eye near the dance floor. Latino, around my height, built thick through the chest and arms. White tank top that showed off full sleeves on both arms, something tribal and intricate. Dark eyes that tracked me as I moved closer.
“Hey.” He grinned, stepping into my space. “You’ve got moves.”
“I try.”
“Trying works for you.”
His hand found my hip, and he pulled me closer. We moved together to the music. His body knew what it was doing, confident and practiced, a rhythm that promised he’d be just as good horizontal.
We danced through two songs, his hands wandering, mine doing the same. He smelled of cologne and sweat. When he pulled me in for a kiss, he tasted like tequila. The cheap kind. The kind they kept in the well. My body knew the whole script.
My brain kept wandering off it. To hazel eyes. The careful smile.
“You want to get out of here?” he murmured against my ear.
“Your place or mine?”
“Mine’s close.”
“Let’s go.”
I texted Calliope on the way out.
Jett: Leaving. Don’t worry about me.
Calliope: Too late. Already worrying. Text me when you get home.
Jett: I’m fine.
Calliope: That’s what you always say.
His apartment was small. Neat. Full of artwork that probably meant something to him.
We made it three steps inside before his mouth found mine; the door shoving closed behind us with the back of his shoulder.
His hands went to my belt before I had my coat off.
The buckle hit the floor with a sound that used to do something for me.
His mouth dropped to my neck. Teeth. Tongue. The scrape of stubble dragging down the hinge of my jaw. Heat kicked through my chest and pooled low in my hips. My cock thickened behind my zipper, the half-trained, half-honest response of a body that had done this in too many apartments to count.
The wall met my back. His thigh shoved between mine. I rolled into it on muscle memory alone, the way my body had been rolling into strangers for years. A routine that used to work.
“Fuck.” His breath came warm against my throat. “You feel good.”
I said something back. Something about his mouth.
I wasn’t really listening to myself. My hands gripped his shoulders, my belt and his belt both gone now, and he palmed me through my jeans with a confidence that should have done it for me.
He found me hard. Found the curved shape of the barbell through the denim and grinned against my collarbone, pleased with the surprise of it.
“Oh,” he murmured. “That’s a present.”
My body responded the way bodies do. Breath faster. Skin tight. Heat showing up where it was supposed to.
But my mind. My mind kept slipping the leash.
We stumbled into his bedroom, clothes hitting the floor in pieces.
My shirt over a lamp. His tank on the rug.
He shoved my jeans down and stopped to look.
Most guys stopped to look. The PA caught the lamplight, the small steel beads bright against the slick at my tip already beading there, and his eyes went wide the way eyes always went wide.
“Jesus Christ,” he breathed. “That’s pretty.”
He shoved me down onto the mattress. Crawled over me. Bit the soft spot under my ear. His own cock was hard against my thigh, long and warm through his briefs, the wet patch already growing at the head. My hand found the back of his neck on autopilot.
I closed my eyes.
Big mistake.
The second I did, I saw someone else. Taller.
Leaner. Dark hair, hazel eyes, and that hesitant smile, the one that made me want to know what he was thinking.
The barbells under his shirt I’d clocked at the gym without meaning to.
The geometric sleeve. How carefully he’d handed me his coffee and asked if I needed a ride home.
Fingers snapped in front of my face. “Hey. You still with me?”
I blinked. I didn’t even remember his name. Marcos. Carlos. Something with an o. He hovered over me, eyebrows raised, his cock bumping mine through the cotton of his briefs without producing any of the friction it should have.
“Yeah. Sorry. Just.” I pulled him down. Kissed him harder. Tried to make this be the thing it was supposed to be. Slide of skin, press of muscle. The choreography I’d done in too many bedrooms to admit.
It worked for maybe thirty seconds.
There was Ellis again. In my head. Wondering what he was doing right now. Whether he’d thought about texting me back. Whether that careful smile meant anything or if I’d imagined the whole connection. Whether the barbells under his shirt were as warm as I’d imagined them being.
“Okay, stop.” He sat back on his heels. His own cock, still hard against the front of his briefs, pinker than mine, flushed the way pale cocks went flushed. “You’re clearly not into this.”
“I am.”
“Dude.” He climbed off me, reaching for his jeans. “You’re like a thousand miles away. It’s cool. Happens.”
“I’m sorry.” And I meant it. This guy deserved better than someone using him to forget someone else. “You’re great. I’m just…”
“In your head about someone else.” He pulled on his shirt. “I get it. Been there.”
Heat crept up my neck, shame sharp and immediate. I sat up, grabbed my clothes. “I should go.”
“Probably.” But he didn’t sound angry. Just resigned. “For what it’s worth, whoever’s got you this twisted up must be pretty special.”
I didn’t answer. Just got dressed, mumbled another apology, and left.
The subway ride back to Bushwick stretched longer than usual. My reflection stared at me from the dark window, stations blurring past. I had no idea what the hell had just happened.
I’d gone out to prove I didn’t need Ellis. That he meant nothing, that I could move on without a second thought.
I’d proven the opposite.
My phone buzzed as I climbed the stairs to my apartment.
Ellis: Hey, I’m so sorry for going radio silent. Family emergency with my dad. Had to stay out on Long Island longer than expected. Just got back to the city. Hope you had a good weekend.
I stopped on the landing, staring at the screen.
He hadn’t ghosted me.
He’d had a reason.
And I’d just tried to sleep with someone else because I couldn’t handle three days of silence.
Jett: No worries. Hope everything’s okay with your dad.
Ellis: He’s fine. Just a scare. Thanks for asking. I know it’s late, but I wanted to let you know I wasn’t ignoring you.
How carefully he phrased that, as if he’d been worried I’d think he’d lost interest, cracked something open in my chest.
Jett: I figured you were busy. No big deal.
Liar.
Ellis: Still want to grab that coffee sometime?
I stood in the stairwell, keys in one hand and phone in the other, and made a decision that terrified me.
Jett: Yeah. I do.
Ellis: Wednesday? There’s a place near the gym I’ve been wanting to try.
Jett: Wednesday works.
Ellis: Great. I’ll text you the details tomorrow. And Jett? I’m really glad you gave me your number.
I climbed the last few stairs to my apartment, let myself in, and collapsed on my couch. The apartment hung emptier than usual.
I’d almost ruined something before it even started.
All because I got scared.
My phone buzzed again. Calliope checking in.
Calliope: You alive?
Jett: Alive. Home. Didn’t do anything too stupid.
Calliope: Define “too stupid.”
Jett: I’m going on a date on Wednesday.
Calliope: WITH ELLIS???
Jett: Yeah.
Calliope: Oh my God. OH MY GOD. I’m calling Sierra right now. This is happening. You’re going on an actual date.
Jett: It’s just coffee.
Calliope: It’s NEVER just coffee. I’m so proud of you I could cry.
Jett: Please don’t.
I smiled despite everything. Despite the failed hookup and the three days of spiraling and the fact that I had no idea what I was doing.
Ellis wanted to see me again. And I wanted to see him.
That should’ve been simple. It wasn’t.