Chapter 16
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
MONDAY
I came to, clinging to the edge of the mattress like a man-sized limpet, desperate to avoid body contact, and my stomach’s cavernous growl echoed into the floral infinity of the wallpaper.
We’d gone another round and a half in the darkness, and the tiny little hairs on my body were tight and crusty with the remnants of our cum. In no universe did cuddling up to Simon, post-multiple-hand job equate to no-strings mutual-sexual-gratification type behaviour.
In my sleep, I’d Twistered my arm underneath myself to avoid even the suggestion of it, and my right hand sat there, cold and uncomfortably numb. Moving was going to hurt.
In another reality I’d be boa-constrictoring around him, purring like a cat sat on top of a hot pipe, high on catnip. But it’d be dead awkward when we hadn’t even done pillow talk.
Services offered: BSL interpretation; casual sex.
Oh crap. What had I done?
On the other half of the bed, the steady ocean waves of Simon’s snuffled breathing stopped. The mattress creaked under him.
“Morning.”
His gravelly half-asleep voice should come with floating skull and crossbone emojis. He could bury me like pirate treasure and he didn’t even know it.
Body heat prickled against my upper arm where we weren’t quite touching, my nerve endings pinging at his closeness, and my lazy morning wood got a lot less lazy. Fan-bloody-tastic.
Teeth gritted, I ignored it, pushing up, into a would-be-impressive plank-style stealth action-roll manoeuvre, worthy of one of those British Army recruitment ads, complete with silent, neck-bulging, teeth-gritted scream.
Under torture would I let that out.
“Morning.” Signing was safer than speaking. Just a throwaway jump of my balloon hand from one shoulder to another. No big deal. No sentimental romanticising here. What a joke. Good sex was had. All the orgasms. Five stars no-strings fun. Come again soon.
As if he’d ever let me.
It wasn’t like he’d stared into my eyes and read my entire soul as I splurged all over his fist.
Blood-flow daggered back through my veins and I pumped my hand through the sick burn of heat, nostrils flaring with every breath. I did not whimper. Blubbing like a kid with a skinned knee was not on the agenda. Not today thank you.
Necessary filtering: squinting through my eyelashes to make everything blurry. Close up, the view of him rumpled against the sheets could blind me.
The bed creaked again as he stood up. “I’m going to go and see about some coffee. Stay put.”
Oh, he was perfection in human form. What had I even been worrying about?
“Now I know I love you.” I sighed happily, sinking down into the pillows – the dictionary definition of contentment.
“Sorry, what was that?” Simon’s smile vanquished itself, eyes sharpening with suspicion.
I froze, halfway levered up on my elbow. Why was he staring at me like I’d told him I wanted to put a ferret down his trousers? Like how I imagine someone would look if I told them I wanted to put a ferret down their trousers. Not that I had a ferret. Or wanted one.
Oh raging inferno of shame. A slow-motion tsunami of my own making crashed right over me. Did he think—?
“I-uh..?”
Negative chill. That’s what I had. Icecap-melting winter highs.
Had I seriously just told a guy who’d made me vow I only wanted sex I loved him? Blood whooshed so loud in my ears the rest of the room receded to nothingness.
What had he said last night? Like a holiday. No strings. Just sex. Well, love confessions were a pretty big bloody string, Pinnochio. Even if they were coffee adjacent.
“I erm—”
His eyes narrowed, zoned in on my lips like he was trying to retrofit an explanation. Words I did not have crumpled into a bloated, croaking whisper. Maybe he’d forget I said anything at all if I eyeballed him for a solid lifetime of silence.
Then he raised two fingers in a slightly diagonal V, knuckles towards me, eyes still glazed with confused horror. “You want two?”
Spots danced in my vision a nanosecond before oxygen rushed back into my lungs. “Yes!” I swallowed hard enough to hurt, nodding frenetically. “Yes. Coffee is exactly what I’m talking about.”
I’ll-have-two, I-love-you. The mouth-shape was close enough. When it came to lip reading, context was king. Thank fuck Simon was only entertaining one kind of reality.
Pretending to repeat myself, I layered a shaky rendition of Sign Supported English onto the disaster.
“Now I know I’ll have... two.” I cleared my throat, grinning inanely. “Thanks.”
My hand felt wooden, drawing down away from my face.
A stitch of a frown tugged his eyebrows together. Maybe I could telepathy him into believing I would never, ever even dream of confessing inappropriate feelings after having sworn it was totally casual.
Oh fuck. An innocent man would have laughed it off.
“Look, Ben”—he hadn’t bought it— “I’m not sure I should have let you do this.”
My smile smashed to a thousand pieces on the floor. Knuckles stiff, I signed anyway. He didn’t have his hearing aids in. I had to.
“Don’t be wet, I’m the one who—”
Simon grimaced so fiercely I cut myself off. Fuck.
“Listen, we need to go into the office this morning.”
“Yeah, and?”
Simon let out an exasperated sigh, taking my hand exceptionally carefully.
“And we have to work together. Do you realise how much I need you for that?”
The defeated, worn out scrunch of his nose underlined how much of a romantic declaration it wasn’t. He didn’t do them. No danger of my beating heart stilling. How bloody inconvenient I wasn’t totally disposable.
I gritted my teeth. “I do actually.”
But he wasn’t listening. Simon Azie thought he knew it all. His Serious Face locked in, and he carried right on talking like I hadn’t said a thing.
“Which is why we specifically talked about this.”
“Hang on, did we?”
“We agreed it wasn’t going to mean anything.” The muscle in his jaw rippled. “I can’t do my job without you. Never mind navigating this catastrophe.”
“Who said you needed to?” I tried to touch his arm, but he drew back. The gap of air was gutting.
Panic flared in his eyes. But I’d never seen him worry about anything. Why was this setting him off?
“Before you, it was a rotating door of barely qualified idiots. I cannot go back to working like that.”
“I know.” I got it; I did. Companies hired anyone with a Level One BSL certificate if you gave them half a chance.
“Do you?” He shook his head. “You changed everything. If you have feelings…” His clear dislike of the word drummed into my chest. No denying he’d really understood me now.
Simon grimaced. “God, I should never have put this on the table. I’m such a shit.
I knew it wasn’t a good idea, you’re clearly—”
“Hang on a minute!” Somehow I forced a laugh out of my throat. “Calm down. I was thinking about the coffee. You’re not that magic in the sack, mate.”
I couldn’t look at him. My sinuses were burning. It didn’t matter. None of this mattered. “Honestly.” I was such a liar. “We had a good time, it doesn’t mean anything else. I know that.”
Through the curtains, the sun shone. Blue sky. White puffy clouds. But I felt cold. Freak-out o’clock because his reliable translation tool might feel taken for granted and walk? Reality check, right there. Anyone with self-respect would leg it.
“You do?” Confusion hardened Simon’s face. Fuck, he hadn’t expected me to say that. “So, you’re not going to hand in your notice because you feel taken advantage of?”
This was why I should have quit years ago and found another client. Why I should have walked away the minute I started waking up thinking about him. I was supposed to feel taken advantage of, not like I’d won the bloody lottery.
“Jesus, Simon.” I pulled my boxers on, refusing to look at him in case he read the disappointment from me.
“Please don’t hand in your notice.” Genuine concern rounded his eyes, and my gut twisted.
“I’m not going to hand in anything!” I wanted to tell him I wasn’t going anywhere as long as he wanted me. But he wouldn’t like that at all, would he? That’d be far too complicated. “You’re not the only person in the universe who can screw around for fun, you know.”
Simon eyeballed me for a long moment. With a tight nod, he stepped back towards the door. “Glad to hear it.”
But he paused, one hand on the door frame, frowning down at the carpet. When he looked up again, his measured smile was back in place.
“Shower’s down the hall. I’ll use the other one. See you downstairs when you’re ready.”
“Great.” If this was what he wanted, why didn’t he look happy?
“Excellent.”
No, it bloody wasn’t. But he didn’t owe me feelings because I had them. He’d told me exactly how this was going to be. I didn’t get to be disappointed now.
Time to wake up, Ben Cooper. Me and Simon Azie were never, ever happening for real.
Simon waved me into the breakfast room from the other side of a round table made of a warm golden wood I could definitively say was not knotty pine.
Breakfast room felt like the right name for it – set up like a posh hotel, with too much cutlery and juice glasses and legitimate saucers under the mugs. Tucked neatly into the curve of the bay window, the table glowed in the sunshine streaming cheerfully through the glass.
This wasn’t real life. Not mine anyway.
No sign of the powder blue suit. Simon had magicked up a rusty brown tweed jacket – fitted to his shoulders with millimetre precision – while I was failing to drown myself in the shower, or suffocate myself with a pillow covered in gardenias.
It had to come from Richard’s wardrobe. It didn’t have a single crease on it.
I scraped out a chair at right angles to Simon’s so we weren’t sitting at opposite ends like a pair of total nobs. A rack of cold toast stood in the middle of the table, because this was not a toast-your-own white-sliced kind of set-up. I stretched over to take a bit.
Simon hid behind his phone, scrolling emails.