Chapter 6
six
Alex got out of the taxi as soon as it rolled to a stop.
As he stepped out, he also adjusted his erection, which had been pressing painfully against his pants for the last ten minutes.
What was it about Isard that set him off?
He seemed to be drunk on the guy. This wasn’t his plan at all.
Isard was a client, the sort of client Alex wanted to attract—the rich kind.
He didn’t want to get involved emotionally, sexually, or in any other way with him that wasn’t a strict coach-client relationship. It wasn’t part of his plan.
He strode toward the restrooms, desperate to be away from the taxi’s asphyxiating atmosphere.
How would they cope? Hours still lay ahead of them on this journey, plus another three weeks of close contact, where Alex was supposed to be teaching Isard martial arts.
He needed to cool things down fast. In less than a day he’d virtually jumped on his client.
Entering the restroom, his bladder bursting, he walked to the far urinal and began to pee.
As he was staring at the wall in front of him, someone else entered and began to pee a few places over.
He knew, out of the corner of his eye, it was Isard, but ignored him.
This couldn’t go on like it was. What had possessed him to start stroking Isard’s hand, as if they were a couple of virgins on their first date?
Then another figure entered the restroom and began to use one of the urinals separating them.
The driver. For that he was thankful. It meant he could resist the temptation to look over at Isard, which might have sparked off who knows what?
He finished pissing and went to wash his hands.
And there in the mirror, he came face to face with him, his large soulful eyes seeking out his own.
They held their gaze until the driver turned from the urinals and came to wash his hands.
Then they kept themselves occupied with washing and drying their hands, until the driver, leaving, said:
“OK, time for a coffee. See you back at the car in twenty minutes.”
If he noticed anything strange about their laborious and fastidious hand-washing, he didn’t let on. When they were alone, Alex said:
“We can’t do this. You’re a client—”
But Isard had already stepped close, and sealed off his objection with a kiss.
His lips were soft and warm. Both their tongues almost immediately found each other, and his hands slid around Isard’s slim body, holding his delicate physique as if his body might crumple between his arms. Isard’s hands were on his shoulders, pulling him close, so their cocks, straining through the thin nylon of their tracksuits, mashed together.
As they kissed, Alex’s hands explored Isard’s body, his shoulder blades so thin they felt almost sculptural.
His slim back, long graceful arms, and the soft curve of his ass felt like the limbs of some skittish wild creature, a gazelle or antelope, he’d trapped in his snare.
Isard’s hands wandered over his body too, marveling at the rounded mounds of his gym-worked muscles, his stomach’s firm tightness, the heavy bulk of thighs and buttocks.
Alex’s hands found Isard’s face, and his fingers explored the almost invisible stubble on his throat and jaw, that blue shadow that smelt of pine and damp earth, before sinking into the short dark locks of his wavy hair, and tracing the fine line of his eyebrows.
Footsteps approached, and they sprang apart, panting.
“Coffee,” growled Alex.
Isard nodded and they left the restroom, adjusting their clothes.
Alex had weighed the option of dragging Isard into a cubicle, but you didn’t do that with a film star, did you?
Even one who wasn’t yet famous. And it could possibly have had a horribly messy ending from a PR angle.
Plus, this thing that had taken hold of them, whatever it was, he didn’t want to dirty it with just grabbing some cheap sex.
He wanted to do this right. Isard was someone who deserved better, deserving to be made love to in every sense of the word, not just used for tawdry sex.
As they walked toward the highway café, a good yard of space between them, Alex pondered how that word had popped into his thoughts, uninvited and undesired.
Love. This was definitely not that. Neither of them had a use for that, and it didn’t figure in either of their business plans.
So, he resolved, in the café, they needed to talk about this, and agree to put a stop to it.
The highway café was one of those older joints that are now being replaced by sterile self-service facilities throughout Spain.
But this one still felt like an old-fashioned highway café, with a row of brown-painted alcoves along one wall opposite the bar, lined with cracked, red-leather benches.
The tables were round with red-and-white checked tablecloths covered by a thick pane of glass for easy cleaning.
An ashtray and posy of plastic flowers decorated each one.
They slipped into a booth, and when the waitress came for their order, Alex ordered a cafè amb llet, a milky coffee, and Isard a soft drink.
“So…” Alex began. “We… This… needs to stop.”
“What?” Isard asked.
Was he being obtuse?
“This. You’re an actor, you’ve got a reputation to—”
“Are you about to savage my reputation?”
“No, of course not.”
“Well, then.”
“But you’re my client. We’re going to be working closely together… for weeks. We’ll be…”
“What are you afraid of?” Isard asked.
“I’m not afraid of anything!” Alex lashed out almost angrily. “But can’t you see? We’ll be—”
“Are we hurting anyone?”
“No.”
“So?”
There was silence while Alex stared at the plastic flowers. God, they were ugly. He could feel Isard’s eyes on him.
“Hey,” Isard said, reaching out to cover Alex’s hand with his own. “We’re both adults, we’ll be responsible… and discreet, if you’re embarrassed…”
“No, not that!” Alex looked up to meet Isard’s gaze. “Believe me, I’m not embarrassed, no way, not at all!” He grabbed Isard’s hand and clenched it in both of his own. “It’s just… this is… I didn’t expect this to happen at all. I’m not sure how to deal with this.”
Isard observed him for a long moment.
“Just breathe,” he finally said. “Breathe and accept the new into your life as a welcome thing.”
“Hey, I’m the one who’s supposed to be the Zen spiritual teacher,” Alex joked, but neither of them laughed.
They sat there in silence for a while, hands interlocked.
“But what is this?” Alex finally croaked. “What’s happening to us?”
Isard just looked at him and smiled. “Have you never been… Haven’t you ever had… someone who…”
“Like a boyfriend?”
“Or girlfriend.”
“Yeah, sure. Loads.”
“Loads?”
“Several.”
“How many? Boys or girls?”
“Ah, three… I mean two real ones, I suppose. Both girls.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve never done anything with a guy, Alex?”
“Yeah, sure, just not… I’ve just never had a… I mean I’ve only had girlfriends. Mainly at high school.”
“So what we did, kissing a guy, you’ve never done that?”
“What is this, the Spanish Inquisition?” He swallowed, and went on in a lower voice. “Yeah, I’ve done that, just never like that. It… blew my mind.”
“Don’t you want to do it again?”
“Totally.”
Alex’s head was in a whirl. He’d gone from feeling that he was the confident one of the two of them to suddenly feeling like Isard had the upper hand, that he was the mature one and Alex the child. He took a sip of his coffee, but it had gone cold.
“So, what… what have you done?” he asked, hoping to turn the tables again.
Isard leaned back, looked up at the roof for a few moments, and then back down, meeting Alex’s eyes.
“I fell in love for the first time when I was seventeen. álvaro, a kid in my youth theater group. He was gorgeous, like a tall blond angel with a mullet cut. But straight. I fell really hard, thought the world was going to end. For a few weeks I carried an actual physical pain around in my chest. I thought I was going to die, convinced it was a heart attack or something. Mom even took me to the doctor. It was him who told Mom what was wrong with me.”
“The doctor?” Alex hooted. “You actually got diagnosed with a broken heart?”
Alex was laughing hard now, and it was infectious. Isard started chuckling.
“Yeah, I got diagnosed: love-sick. I felt like an idiot afterward. Dad was ribbing me for months.”
“You told him? He knows you’re…”
“Mum told him. Yeah, all my parents know I’m gay. They’re fine with it. That was my coming out.”
Alex found that phrasing, “all my parents”, weird, but all he said was “Wow, that actually sounds cool,”
“Are you not out to your parents?”
“I’m not even out to myself. I mean I don’t know if I’m…”
“Gay. C’mon, say it, Alex.”
“I’m bisexual, I think.”
“Yeah, right.”
“It’s true!”
“OK, I’m not doubting you.”
“It sounds like you are.”
“I’m just wondering if you’re being totally honest with yourself.”
Alex stared at Isard, and was about to answer angrily when the driver appeared before their table.
“Hey, are you guys coming? I’ve been waiting at the car for five minutes already. If we don’t go now, we won’t reach Barcelona before midnight.”
That broke the atmosphere. Isard rushed to pay their bill, and then the two boys followed the driver shamefacedly out to the taxi.