Chapter Two
Mikey
My roommate, Aaron, returned to the apartment from his jog, making more noise than if he’d brought with him a carriage of screaming babies.
He dropped a bag that contained two coffees onto the counter before kicking off his sneakers, each smacking against the pantry door.
Aaron dragged one of the kitchen stools across the tiled floor instead of lifting it, which was one of the sounds that made my nerves feel like they were being stretched and pinched.
“Frappuccino.” He pointed at the cup he’d brought for me. “Ming says hi.”
His reference was to the cute barista who Aaron had concluded had a romantic interest in me.
“Thanks,” I said, grabbing a seat next to him at the counter and taking a sip of the drink.
“Tell her you’re gay, already,” he said, shaking his head. “You suck for leading her on.” He leaned his face close to mine with a chastising grin, making me pull my head back.
“I’m not leading her on. I’m just nice to her.”
“Yeah, well, she’s picturing you sending her love notes in envelopes sealed with your special sauce, dude. Time to clear things up,” he countered, snickering at his own nasty humor.
It was true that whenever I had gone to the coffee shop, Ming had seemed to pay me extra attention and share a pretty smile.
At first, I thought she had been compensating for my typically polite, somewhat bashful demeanor.
But Aaron had noticed her behavior, too, and he was certain she was interested in me.
Maybe because unlike the many big, strapping builds that so many of the younger White Pines mountain men seemed to have, I was as short, dark-haired, and fair-skinned as Ming.
“What if she isn’t interested like that? I’m just going to announce that I’m gay after she hands me my coffee? She’d be like, ‘why should I care?’” I shook my head as I envisioned the scenario. “I think I’ll refrain from publicly humiliating myself.”
Aaron chuckled. “If you don’t like to embarrass yourself in public, why did you wear a Shawn Mendes T-shirt to a Killers concert?”
I had accompanied Aaron to see the group when they’d played in Burlington a month earlier, and my roommate hadn’t let me forget about my choice of clothing since.
“I got a compliment from one of the other people in the audience,” I reminded him.
“Bro, she was ten,” Aaron replied before gulping more of his coffee. I watched him, thinking how lucky he was to be so handsome and sexy. He could play a surfer dude in a beach-themed movie…one where all the girls hyperventilated when they saw him in a bathing suit jogging in slow motion.
When he had first shown up at my doorstep in response to my ad seeking an apartment roommate, my reaction was to refuse immediately.
I feared I’d be tempted to stare at someone so hot once they were living in my space.
But Aaron had been so affable, and he had been struggling to find a place he could afford.
Like me, he was a recent Burlington College graduate from out-of-state.
We had both decided to stay in Vermont when we’d landed jobs at the local tech firm.
It was another reason I had been reluctant to turn him away.
Doing so would have made for an awkward situation if I later ran into him at the office complex.
Therefore, I had agreed to put him on the lease.
The ad I had placed clearly disclosed I was a gay man, so he couldn’t become angry with me if I shot an appreciative glance his way now and then.
“That girl at the concert never told us her age,” I reminded Aaron.
Aaron smirked. “Yeah, I added a couple of years to what I think she really was to make you feel better.”
I flushed but laughed. His put-downs were never cruel.
They were said to make me chuckle, not feel bad.
He was always about having a good time. That was where he and I were different.
His extroverted personality had attracted many friends in the area who invited him to parties, played sports with him, or hung out in our living room watching television.
I, on the other hand, found excuses to decline his invites to tag along.
I preferred to read a book in my room. The Killers concert had been an exception because I loved their music.
Aaron wasn’t as big of a fan, but he had been intent on getting me out of the house and having fun.
He was a sweetheart in so many ways. There were times the night of the show that had felt like a date, as Aaron had gone out of his way to make everything about the experience perfect.
Even when I had left him to use the restroom, he had purchased a hat with The Killers logo for me from one of the merchandise booths.
It hadn’t been the first time I’d had to remind myself the guy was off limits and that I couldn’t behave like a swooning schoolgirl.
“Hey, guess what I saw this morning on my jog?” Aaron prodded.
“Is that rhetorical?” I wondered.
He snickered. “What do you think? I don’t want to sit here all day while you reply with one dumb thing after another.
When I passed by Central Diner, there was a sign in the window.
Looks like the guy you’ve been crushing on will be doing that dating program like everyone in White Pines has been hoping. ”
Cliff Walker. The one man in the area that I knew to be gay, available, and who had recently moved into my brain and continued to live there rent-free.
I had witnessed him speak at a fundraising event for the local library, and that had been it.
His striking good looks, muscular build, deep voice, and commanding presence had me entertaining thoughts that had nothing to do with browsing the aisles for a book to borrow.
Now, whenever I saw him around town, I watched him like a pathetic groupie.
Aaron had been with me one of those times, noticed my distraction and the focus of my gaze, then tormented me about it since.
“Oh? Uh, he said yes, then,” I stammered, stating the obvious. “Yeah, folks in White Pines must be happy about that.”
Aaron made a disgustingly loud slurp through his straw, draining the last of his iced coffee and intaking air as well. He was as cute as a Labrador puppy, where even annoying habits were easy to overlook.
“Sure,” he replied before leaning into my space again and intentionally tormenting me with a loud belch in my ear. I backed away from him with a scowl.
“Stop it!”
He ignored me. “You realize this means your man will be coming off the market.”
I let loose a guffaw. My man. Cliff Walker wouldn’t even notice my existence if I climbed into bed with him.
That brought the image to mind, though, forcing me to refocus.
“Yeah, like I would ever have a chance with him anyway. Maybe seeing him hook up with someone else will be good. I can stop thinking about him.” I turned my head to look at Aaron, and he was observing my expressions.
He didn’t often discuss topics of substance, but he was no dummy.
Besides his excellent grades from school and an engineering role at the firm, he could read a room—and me—better than anyone I knew.
That was as discomforting as it was occasionally helpful.
“It’s easier to lose out than put yourself out there, huh?” he questioned.
“What? I… I’m just being realistic,” I protested. “I’m not in his league.”
Aaron rolled his eyes. “Here we go.”
“What?” I pushed.
His face became serious. “I hate that you think so little of yourself. You have a lot to offer, man.”
I snickered. “Right.”
“Yeah, right,” he said, disregarding my sarcasm. “Come on. Are you going to make me give you my pep speech again? You know, the one where I tell you that you’re intelligent, nice, and yes…cute. Bro, a guy doesn’t need to be into dudes to see you’d be great for someone. Even for your dream guy.”
I looked away. “You’re looking through a ‘friendship lens,’ not from the perspective of someone who wants to…you know.”
“Is that your way of trying to manipulate me into sleeping with you? Making me feel like it’s the only way to prove my point?” He snickered, so I knew he wasn’t serious.
I felt compelled to protest all the same. “No!”
“There are lots of women who don’t see you through a ‘friendship lens’—big surprise since you have no friends but me.” I frowned at that. “Yet they check you out. I’ve seen them do it. Of course, they don’t realize that you’d puke all over them if they took their clothes off.”
My jaw dropped. “That’s so not true. Just because I’m gay doesn’t mean I think women look gross. Honestly, I’m surprised that I’m not attracted to them sexually, because they’re much prettier than men.”
“Must be a dick thing,” he mused, shrugging. “Maybe your parents let you suck your thumb too long as a kid.”
“What?” I shook my head in exasperation.
“Anyway, do you remember that time you and I went to Liam’s Lounge to play pool, and those two chicks were flirting with us?”
“Yeah.” I grinned, remembering that evening well.
Aaron had been aroused by the two women.
He had asked me to help pique their interest in him, and I was happy to oblige since it meant endearing me further with him.
Aaron and I had walked to their table and turned on the charm—or, at least, Aaron had.
I recall just laughing like a lunatic at his jokes.
After about an hour, Aaron had let slip that I was his gay roommate, which removed what little interest they might have had in me.
The women had gushed about how cool and enlightened Aaron was to have ‘homosexual friends,’ which helped him finagle a threesome later in his bedroom.
Although he hadn’t cared for the women’s personalities, it hadn’t stopped Aaron from thanking me for a week.
“Until they found out you were gay, they were just as into you as they were me,” Aaron stated.
“Wow. You must have been more wasted than I realized.” I shook my head, wondering how he had misread the situation.
“I wasn’t. You’re just clueless. The point of this trip down memory lane is that you behaved with confidence that night because you weren’t worried about where things would lead. But it showed you can carry some swagger—do that the next time you see that Cliff Walker dude.”
“But in this case, I would worry about where things led. No, correction—I know where they’d lead. Embarrassment. If I tried to attract Cliff Walker’s attention, it would be a disaster.” I sighed. “It doesn’t matter now anyway, does it? He’s going to meet someone on that show.”
One of Aaron’s eyebrows lifted. “And if you stop being so self-defeatist, that someone could be you. Folks around town were saying that if Walker agreed to take the role, the producers would start their search for prospective suitors right after. You could apply.”
“Aaron, come on. Seriously? They’re going to be looking for… I don’t know. Beefcake.”
Aaron jiggled the ice in his cup. Another annoying habit, if it were anyone else. “Says who? And you go to the gym with me. I’ve seen you in a tank and shorts. You’ve got muscle.”
“Not like Cliff Walker muscle,” I countered. “He’s…”
“Your wet dream, yeah, I know,” Aaron finished, though that wasn’t what I was going to say. “Maybe you’d be his if you got yourself in front of him. What do you have to lose by trying out for the show?”
“My dignity,” I replied.
Aaron shrugged. “Eh. You’d never see the producers again. At least you’d know you gave it a shot.”
I shook my head. “You have all this self-assurance because you look like…you. I’m not you.”
Aaron grabbed my shoulder. “From now on, start saying to yourself that you’re a catch. Maybe you’ll start to believe it.”
“And be out of touch with reality?” I joked.
“I’m going to spill the rest of your coffee over your head,” he warned. “Think about interviewing for a part on the show. You’ll have something that no other applicant will have.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
He smiled. “You’ll be the only local. That’s an angle that might appeal to the producers. But most important, you’d have me.”
“You? What are you talking about?”
Aaron assumed a cocky expression. “Best damn personal coach in White Pines. Plus, I know a thing or two about getting someone interested.”
“In you,” I pointed out.
He frowned. “In you, too, if you give me a chance. I would have succeeded by now if there were any other gay men around who weren’t already hooked up. So, Cliff Walker is the target and fortunately, one of the parties is already on board. I just need to help you get him to the same place.”
“You’re crazy.” I appreciated his support, though.
“And you’re a chicken. Don’t come crying to me if you make no effort, then see your cock whisperer hook up with some other dude.”
I wiped a hand over my face, thinking about how Aaron would never let me forget it if I didn’t apply. “Geez. I’ll think about it, okay?”
Aaron smiled before sucking noisily on his straw again. “Coffee-flavored water,” he explained. “Still tasty.”