Chapter 16 #2
“Yeah. Thanks, Matt. He’s now going.” Jonah gave Edward a pointed look, his lips pressed in a firm line.
Edward scoffed and shook his head. “Wow. Security? Really? Don’t be like this, Jonah, come with me and get a drink and let’s
talk about this.”
“Actually,” Bastien said, stepping between them. “I think I heard him tell you to leave him alone. In what universe does that
translate to going to get a drink?”
Edward looked between them and raised an eyebrow before a strange look of recognition passed across his features. “Oh. So,
it’s him, is it?”
“What?” Jonah asked.
“You’re with him?” Edward waved a nonchalant hand toward Bastien. “Well, I hope you’re happy. But it’s fucking hypocritical
of you to get angry with me when clearly something’s been going on with you two for months.”
Jonah opened his mouth and closed it again several times, doing his best impression of a goldfish before answering. “Fuck
off, Edward.”
Bastien raised his middle finger as Edward looked at him. His bravery was something Jonah could only marvel at, though it
might have come from having the six-foot-five Matt standing behind him. Edward seemed pensive, as if he wanted to say more
but thought against it. Jonah watched as he walked away, a churning feeling in the pit of his stomach. Matt placed a sturdy
hand on his shoulder.
“Hey, mate, you okay?” he asked.
“Fine,” Jonah whispered.
“Come on,” Bastien said. “Come stay at mine tonight. Don’t go home alone, in case that creep decides to haunt your house or
something.” He winked at Matt. “My hero,” he cooed. “Thanks, babe.” Matt shot him a grin then went back over to the stage
door.
“You don’t have to take me back to yours,” Jonah said.
“It’s fine. Casey is away for work, so we can put on face masks and watch Funny Girl.”
“It’s two and a half hours long, Bastien.”
“Best we hurry back then, huh?” Bash smiled at him and linked his arm with Jonah’s, directing him toward the tube. “I kinda
need the company too. I’ve had a shit day.”
Jonah allowed himself to be led down Shaftesbury Avenue, Bastien’s words clear despite the noise and hundreds of people congregating
along the streets.
“You have?”
“Yeah,” Bastien said, his eyes ahead, focused. “Casey has been offered a job in New York.”
Jonah stopped abruptly, the people walking behind him barging into his back then grumbling as they stepped around him. Bastien
looked at him, brows furrowing. “New York?” Jonah asked.
“Yeah. He’s asked me to go with him. Actually, he asked me a couple of things last night.”
Shaftesbury Avenue seemed to fall into slow motion. The only things in focus were Jonah and Bastien as they stood looking
at each other on the road that led down to Chinatown, the huge red lanterns glowing in the night sky.
“What else did he ask you?”
“He proposed.”
“Bastien!” Jonah exclaimed, unable to keep the wide smile from taking over his face. “What did you say?”
“I said I needed to think about it.” He took Jonah’s hand into his to urge him forward, and the street catapulted back into
blazing color and motion. “And he left for work this morning and we didn’t talk about it and now he’s away for three days.”
“You don’t want to marry him?” They rounded the corner and headed along the road leading to the tube station. “You’ve been
together forever.”
“It’s not the marrying him I’m not sure about. It’s New York.” Bastien groaned, then stopped, more people tutting and muttering
as they blocked the path yet again. “I’m so sorry, I’ve just realized I haven’t asked how things went in Cornwall.”
“What? It was fine. Don’t apologize, you’ve clearly got a lot going on right now.” Jonah watched as Bastien wiped a hand across his eyes, tears just beginning to fall. “Come on,” Jonah said. “I think Barbra Streisand will make everything better.”
“She will, won’t she?” Bastien laughed with a sniff. “I love you, you know that, right?”
“Don’t get sappy on me,” Jonah warned. “Or I will cry, too, and then we will just be two weirdos crying instead of going home.”
Bastien nodded. “Right. Okay, I hate you.”
“That’s more like it.”
Bastien choked on a mouthful of ice cream. He pounded his fist against his chest, then grabbed the glass of wine beside him
and used it to wash the cold dessert down his throat.
“Don’t say something like that when I’m eating, you bloody psychopath,” he whined, throwing a cushion from the sofa at Jonah’s
head.
Jonah batted it away with a smile. “It’s not my fault you’ve been shoveling ice cream into your mouth for the past twenty
minutes. I couldn’t hold it in anymore.”
“Dexter Ellis kissed you?!” He dumped the tub of ice cream onto the coffee table and shuffled closer to Jonah. “Tell me everything.”
“We kind of kissed each other.”
“But you hate him.”
“I don’t hate him.”
“He hates you.”
Jonah rolled his eyes. “Apparently not. And he texted me when I was in Cornwall and was super flirty and asked me to meet
him for a drink on Thursday. But he’s since canceled, and I think he’s just messing with me.”
“I knew he liked you,” Bastien said, a smug grin plastered on his face as Barbra sang on the TV. “Omari said the same thing.
It’s a simple case of a boy pulling girls’ pigtails in the playground because he likes them.”
“But that’s shitty, isn’t it?” Jonah asked. “Being mean because you like someone? And I don’t think that’s the case at all.”
“No?” Bastien hummed. “What do you think it is, then?”
“I think he genuinely disliked me, then . . . something changed, and he’d established this weird relationship with me and didn’t know what to do to get past it.
And even then, he’s not really done anything overtly unkind.
Unwanted feedback, sure, and the lip biting, who knows if he meant to do that? ”
“He was going to trip you at the Oliviers.”
“Well, yeah, but that was before he knew me.”
“So? What now, then? Are you going to rearrange the drinks?”
“I haven’t replied to him yet.”
Bastien kicked Jonah’s foot with an annoyed gasp. “Then do it. I’m going to call Casey, and you can text Dexter, deal?”
Jonah shook his head and finished his glass of wine. “Nope. No deal. You know what you’re going to say to Casey, I don’t know
what to say to Dexter.”
“Tell him you want to suck his dick.”
“Bastien!”
“What?!” Bastien chuckled. “Don’t you?”
“Even if I did, I’m not texting him that.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want to look desperate.”
Bastien sighed and stood from his position on the sofa. “It’s not desperate,” he said, wandering over to the kitchen to put
the ice cream back into the freezer. “But maybe just send something flirty without being overly obvious about what you want
to do.”
“So, you get to tell Casey you want to marry him and you’re going to have a shining career on Broadway in New York with him,
and I have to send an embarrassing message that shows how sexually starved I am?”
“Exactly that.” Bastien dropped the spoon into the sink. “You sure you don’t want to share the bed with me tonight? You’re
happy out here?”
Jonah patted the duvet Bastien gave him earlier and grinned. “I’m fine.”
“Okay.” Bastien turned off the TV and yawned. “Well. We can regroup in the morning. I’m gonna make that call, then get my
beauty rest. I’m already regretting the wine and ice cream. Omari will smell it on me. I forgot it’s double show day tomorrow.”
Jonah whined in response. “Don’t remind me.”
Bastien leaned down to kiss him on the cheek. “Sleep well. And text your archrival, yeah? Something sexy.”
“Yes sir.” Jonah saluted to him as Bastien shook his head fondly and left the room.
He’d stayed at Bastien’s before, usually when they were blindingly drunk and thought it would be a good idea to continue the
party after the bars were closed, only to get to Bastien’s and fall asleep while microwaving frozen meals. The last time they
did it, Jonah woke to find a half-eaten ball of mozzarella in his hand, the thing squashed and smelling like it died. Now,
though, he had the warmth of a couple of glasses of wine to relax him but his mind was clear, and as he heard Bastien’s muffled
voice from the bedroom a sense of contentment washed over him knowing how amazing his friend’s life was about to become.
His own life, however, left a lot to be desired.
He looked at Dexter’s last text and scowled at the screen for a while, still in disbelief at the shortness of the message
and the lack of a kiss. Perhaps Dexter no longer wanted to pursue him, or maybe he was trying to remain professional . . .
or maybe he really was just fucking with Jonah just to be cruel.
Jonah: Shame. Want to rearrange? x
He locked his phone after taking in the time. Dexter would be asleep, and even though he told himself over and over again
Dexter wouldn’t reply, he fell asleep with his phone in his hand waiting for it to vibrate.