Chapter 23 - LEO
Iknow I’m not alone. Just like I knew I wasn’t alone in the workshop.
It begins the way it always does, with an internal pressure.
Not the sound of footsteps, but something subtler, like the air behind me has learned my name and taps me on the shoulder in warning.
But I won’t call him out on it. Let him have this one thing for himself.
To be honest I don’t mind it, there is something quite fulfilling about someone wanting to know everything about you, enough that they will follow you to learn more.
Actually, that sounds wrong, doesn't it? I should be angry, I should feel like he has invaded my privacy, but I can’t summon that feeling.
As I walk home, the street is wet and smelly from the heavy downpour earlier. Neon bleeds from a laundromat window, staining the sidewalk a sickly blue. In the distance a train screams, the metal grinding into the dark. An orchestra of music that drowns out your thoughts.
I keep walking and don’t turn around, because I know Ethan is there. I can feel him all around me. It should scare me and make me want to run for the hills, but it doesn’t.
Deciding to play my own game with him, I increase my pace. I sense him the way animals sense storms, the way they sense a predator about to pounce. With no thought or care I cross the street without reason.
He crosses with me, and now his footsteps are audible. Cars pass by, horns blare in the distance, lights flicker across the street. For half a second I consider looking. I don’t.
Something intimate coils in my chest at the idea of meeting his eyes like this, out in the open, unprotected and vulnerable. I imagine the way he would look at me, demonic but calm, too wound up not to kiss me. To own me.
I swallow hard as my building appears ahead. I’m so close to home now, to victory. Or so I thought as two strong hands grab my shoulders and slam me into a wall just inside the entrance of a dark alley. My cock is so hard. This is the hottest foreplay I’ve ever experienced.
I look into his manic face. He thinks he’s won, but it was my game. I wanted this.
“You could sense me, couldn’t you?” he says as he presses me into the brick wall with his entire body. My hands grab onto his hips, trying to steady myself just as the first drops of rain start to fall.
“And now you dance to the beat of my drum, dickhead,” I say before I allow myself to kiss him like it was the first time.
His hands grasp at my hair, tilting my head back so he can kiss me as deeply as possible.
Our tongues massage together in long, languid movements.
The rain mixes with our saliva, creating the most erotic sensation as our mouths battle for more.
Slippery and wet. Intoxicating. Our hard dicks firmly press together through the fabric of our pants, needing contact more than ever.
I can’t get enough. And I allow myself this moment to admit it.
I don’t know how long we kiss, but Ethan breaks away first and watches me, his eyes moving from my mouth to my face. He’s soaking wet from the rain just as I am. This is the most intimate moment we have shared, completely spontaneous and real, where I let myself want it. Want him.
“You taste good,” he says, low and deep in my ear before pushing away. After one final look, he leaves the alley and walks away into the night, leaving me in a state of horniness that only he can satiate. Maybe that wasn’t the best idea after all.
Leaving a trail of water in the corridor leading to my apartment, I open the door, desperate to get inside and dry off, but when I open the door, the light nearly blinds me. Sarah has every single light on in the apartment, making it painful to the eyes.
She sits at the small kitchen table, coat on, purse open beside her like she is getting ready to leave. Judging by the tapping foot on the leg of the table, she is pissed off. The noise of the tapping grates on my ears.
“You’re late,” she says, her voice sharp enough to cut metal.
“I texted you.”
“You said you’d be back by nine.”
“It’s nine-twenty.”
“Oh, forgive me,” she says with a wry laugh. Here we go again.
I close the door behind me slowly and watch as something in her face tightens as she studies me, looking at my wet clothes, trying to read my mind.
“You look strange.”
“I got caught in the rain and I’m tired.”
“You always are, lately.”
I set my keys down on the entrance table and drop my bag to the floor, and wait for her next installment. Then she gestures to the piece of paper on the table, I walk over and scan it to see the bank statement where the money Ethan paid was deposited.
“How long do you think this will last?” she asks.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not good enough.”
“If we’re smart, and not reckless with the spending, and invest it like I’ve suggested, it could last years.”
She pushes back her chair, the sound screams against the floor as she stands and begins to pace.
“We need to be smarter.”
“With what?”
“Decisions! We need to move, and there is stuff we need to buy and replace,” she begins, but I stop her.
“We need to be sensible and plan ahead. Not spending it on designer clothes and shoes, Sarah. Spending it all on a home is reckless, we can enjoy the money, but we don’t need to be greedy. We don’t need a big place. ”
“You just don’t want to move up. You’d be happy staying in this hellhole,” she interrupts.
I rub my face, exhausted by these constant fights about money.
“Listen, I’m grateful we just have a roof over our head, but spending it all to impress others is dumb. We will still end up with no money. If we get a modest place, I get my workshop and you continue working too until I have a steady stream of money, then we can reconsider.”
“You’re not having that fucking workshop, Leo.”
I grind my teeth, this is a living nightmare.
“We agreed, Sarah, and since I last checked, we are supposed to decide together, not dictate what to spend the money on.”
“You just want to keep me down, scared I will outgrow you.”
“Do you hear yourself? Do you know how arrogant you sound right now?”
“Yeah, well I think I’ve risked enough to be able to have some control over this. I’m the injured party here,” she yells and I see red.
“Injured party? You were fine with it! In fact, you were the fucking one encouraging it along, pimping me out like it was nothing, so don’t play the damn victim now, just because you want your own way, Sarah.”
“I was being smart. If it wasn’t for me, we wouldn’t have the fucking money.”
“Correction — if it wasn’t for Ethan being obsessed with ME you would having no fucking money.”
“Yeah, he wanted you,” she says, snarling with bitterness.
“Oh my god, you’re still pissed he didn’t choose you? I’m right, aren’t I?” I can’t believe I didn’t notice. She’s jealous.
“You know nothing, Leo.”
“You wanted to go to that dinner because you wanted his attention. The money has always been the appeal, hasn’t it?”
“That doesn’t mean —”
“You were disappointed it wasn’t you he asked.”
Silence drops as the truth hits home, and there is nowhere to hide from it. It’s ugly and shatters the curtain it hid behind all this time.
“Don’t turn this around on me, Leo. You enjoyed it.”
The accusation strikes harder than it should, but at the time, I didn’t want to do it.
“You liked being chosen,” she continues. “You liked him wanting you.”
“That’s not true, I didn’t want to go through with it, but you both kept pushing and you promised it wouldn’t affect us.”
“If that’s what you want to tell yourself, but you certainly enjoyed it when it was happening. I could tell after,” she says as her gaze sharpens.
“You’re not exactly subtle, Leo.”
My hands curl into fists.
“You pushed me into this.”
“I encouraged you to be a man for once and make the right decision.”
“By selling my body? Yeah, such a big man decision.”
“Are you telling me you didn’t like it?”
The room feels smaller, and it becomes harder to breathe.
“Maybe this is just who you are, Leo. Maybe you finally found an excuse.”
“An excuse for what?”
“For being gay,” she says like its a nasty accusation. I stare at her, completely stunned. Who the hell is this person?
“What?”
“Oh don’t act shocked,” she snaps. “All those years hiding in workshops. Never wanting to touch me. Never wanting anything —”
“That’s not fair to blame all that shit on me. You’re the one who turned cold in bed. Do you honestly think being spoken to and scolded like a child every day makes me feel wanted? Turns me on?”
“Ethan turns you on. You went back to him.”
“I had to, he was messing with my head, messing with us.”
“You wanted him.”
I shake my head. “You’re rewriting things.”
“Did he touch you?”
I don’t answer, letting the silence speak instead.
“How much did he pay you this time? Are you his full-time whore?”
“Say what you want but this is all about him not wanting you. You have done nothing but flirt and try to get a foot in with any rich man you’ve come across,” I say, and her cheeks flush because we both know that’s the truth.
“Don’t you dare.”
“You were jealous it wasn’t you.”
She slaps the table.
“You think I’d sleep with him?”
I can’t stop the ironic laugh that leaves me. “Yes. I know you were willing.”
“Yeah, well I was trying to save us.”
“By offering me up instead? And now you hate me for it.”
“You disgust me, Leo,” she says and I finally feel released from whatever this relationship was. This isn’t just about Ethan. I disgust her and disappoint her. Not the rich man out there closing deals like she wants. I don’t know her anymore, and I don’t want to. It’s over.
“We’re done, Sarah,” I say, and she doesn’t respond. She doesn’t look sad or happy. Whether she wants to admit it or not, we were over a long time ago.
She grabs her coat and bag and storms out of the apartment. I sink into the kitchen chair and hold my head in my hands, frustrated it had to get nasty, toxic. I look at the bank statement and consider our options going forward.
“What have I done?” I ask myself, questioning all the decisions we’ve made since Ethan put the offer on the table. The question dissolves into the room, unanswered.
But somewhere in the city —
I know he will be victorious as this was the outcome he wanted all along.