9
Spencer
Paige is telling me about a creative director who got walked out of a fashion house in Milan with security on either side of him, and I’m nodding along, but the story’s background noise.
“—and nobody’s saying his name, obviously, because the NDA’s the size of a phone book, but everyone in the building knows exactly who it is.” Paige spears a piece of scallop and points it at me before she eats it. “You’re not even a little bit interested in this.”
“I’m interested.”
“You’re doing the thing where your face is interested and your eyes are somewhere in New Jersey.”
Paige edits a magazine that puts models on beaches in coats too heavy for the weather, and she reads people the way I read a defense: fast, casual, never letting on how much she’s actually clocking.
We’ve been doing this for about a year and a half now.
Dinner every few weeks, sometimes more, always ending the same way unless one of us has somewhere else to be.
No calls after midnight unless it’s an emergency.
No meeting each other’s families. It’s the only kind of arrangement I’ve ever been good at, and Paige is good at it too, which is most of why it’s lasted this long.
I know I’m not sleeping with her tonight, though. I knew it on the drive over. There’s no version of tonight that ends with both of us back at her place, or any place, and it’s got nothing to do with Paige. It’s that I don’t feel like it.
I asked Milo to buy me condoms today because I freaked out about what happened in the dressing room and wanted to reestablish some semblance of control. Now I regret it.
“Spencer.” Paige sets her fork down. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Sorry.” I pick up my water glass. “I just have a headache,” I lie.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She studies me another second. “Well.” She leans in, and her mouth curves into a smile. “I happen to know an excellent remedy for headaches. Very hands-on. Comes highly recommended.”
“Yeah?” I try to find the register we usually play this in, but it comes out flat.
Paige’s eyebrows lift, cataloging that too.
My phone buzzes against my thigh.
Milo: this is literally all your fault
I read it twice. Nothing before it, no context. It’s like he’s mid-conversation with me and I’ve missed the first half.
Me: what is
I set the phone face-down on the table and look back up at Paige, who’s watching me do all of this with the patient expression of someone who’s decided to let this play out.
The phone buzzes again before I’ve said a word to her.
Milo: im drunk
I look at that longer than I need to and don’t answer. I put the phone away, pick my fork back up, and ask Paige a question about the Milan story just to prove to both of us I can still hold a conversation.
She answers it. I don’t retain a word.
The phone goes again.
Milo: me and emily are drinking wine. lots of wine
I frown down at the screen before I can stop my face from doing it.
Me: who’s Emily
“Everything okay over there?” Paige asks, and there’s an edge under the mild tone now.
“Yeah. Sorry.” I glance at the phone, then back up. “Little trouble with my PA.”
“On a Saturday night?” One of her eyebrows goes up. “I thought the whole point of hiring somebody was so you got your evenings back. Don’t they know not to bother you during personal time?”
“It’s something I asked him to do,” I lie again.
The phone buzzes.
Milo: emilys a friend. old coworker
I sit with that a second. Emily. The name clicks into place: the waitress at the restaurant where Milo used to work.
So that’s her. Or maybe it isn’t. I don’t actually know how many Emilys exist in Milo’s life, and I’m aware, somewhere in the back of my head, that I’m doing an unreasonable amount of detective work over a first name.
Before I can ask him anything else, the phone goes again.
Milo: ok theres a guy at the bar who keeps eye-fucking me. hes hot. should i go talk to him
My stomach drops, fast and ugly, and I don’t examine it too closely because I already know I won’t like what I find down there.
Me: don’t
I type it, thumb moving faster than my thoughts.
Milo: you can’t tell me what to do
He’s right, and some rational, adult part of my brain that I’m currently ignoring knows it’s not my business.
Me: I can. I’m your boss
I know exactly how it reads. It’s the kind of thing that gets an assistant a lawyer, but I still don’t take it back. Because I cannot stand the idea of Milo hooking up with someone.
“Okay.” Paige sets her napkin on the table. “If you have somewhere else you need to be, we can just reschedule this.”
I look up at her.
There is a version of tonight where I apologize properly, put the phone away, ask her something about her life, and salvage the evening the way a person with manners would. But that version exists in some other universe.
“Yeah,” I say. “That’s probably smart.”
Paige nods, covering her disappointment quickly.
Me: send me the address
“Wow,” she says quietly. “Okay.”
“Paige—”
“No, it’s fine. You clearly need to go handle whatever this is.”
My phone buzzes one more time with an address, a bar name I don’t recognize, somewhere downtown.
“I’m sorry,” I say, and I mean it, even if it doesn’t fix anything.
I raise my hand for the check, and the server appears fast enough that I know he’s been reading this table for the last five minutes, same as everyone else in a thirty-foot radius.
I hand over my card before the bill’s even fully on the table, sign the slip without checking the total, and I’m standing, jacket in hand, while Paige is still sitting there with her water glass, watching me leave like I’ve confirmed something she already suspected.
“Good luck, Spencer,” she says, not unkindly, but not warm either.
“Thanks,” I say, and walk out the door with my phone in one hand and my keys in the other, already moving faster than I have all week.
***
The cap I keep in the glove compartment for occasions like this doesn’t do much.
I know that walking in, the brim pulled low enough that it clips my eyebrows, because I’m six-four and built like a door, and no hat in the world hides that.
I duck through the entrance, scan the room, and find them in about four seconds.
Back booth, corner. Milo’s got his forehead nearly resting on the table, curls flopped forward, and across from him is a woman with dark hair pulled into a messy bun.
I recognize her before I’m within twenty feet: same face I watched doing frantic math with an armful of plates a little over two weeks ago.
I cross the room and slide into the booth next to Milo.
He lifts his head and blinks twice, his eyes glassy, but they land on me and stay there.
“You came,” he says.
“Told you I would.”
Emily’s gaze swings from him to me, and her mouth drops open. Then she laughs, loud, head tipping back against the booth.
“Holy shit.” She points at me with her whole hand. “You weren’t lying. It’s him.”
“Can you keep it down?” I say, glancing toward the bar, where nobody’s looking yet, but that won’t hold for long.
“I’m taking you home,” I tell Milo.
“No way.” He pulls himself a little straighter against the booth like he’s bracing for an argument he’s already decided to win. “Not leaving Em here. She’s just as drunk as I am.”
“I’m extremely drunk,” Emily confirms, nodding with real solemnity.
I look between them and let out a breath through my nose. I’m not leaving without him, and apparently I’m not leaving without her either.
“Fine. We’ll give her a ride.”
Prying them out of the booth takes longer than it should.
Milo braces a hand on the table and misjudges the distance to standing, and I catch his elbow before he can find out the hard way that gravity’s still operational tonight.
Emily’s steadier, but only in the sense that she’s found a rhythm to her sway, weaving gently instead of pitching over outright.
A couple at the bar is watching us now, and so is the guy at the tap, and I keep my head down and my hand under Milo’s arm and walk them both toward the door as fast as unsteady legs will allow.
I don’t know if anyone recognized me. I hope not.
But if they did, there’s nothing to be done about it now, and I’ve got a bigger problem attached to my arm, humming under his breath.
The car’s half a block down, and by the time we reach it my shoulder’s doing double duty as a crutch.
I get the back door open and Emily folds herself in, missing the seat by an inch and correcting, and I lean in to point at the belt.
“Buckle up.”
It takes her three tries, the buckle sliding off the catch twice before it clicks, and then she sits back, satisfied, running a palm back and forth along the leather seat.
“This car is so nice,” she says. “Milo. Milo, this car is so nice.”
“I know, Em.”
I go around and get Milo settled into the passenger seat. His hands can’t find the buckle, fumbling it against his hip before giving up and letting his arm drop. I lean across him and do it myself, and he watches me the whole time from about six inches away.
Then I climb in, start the engine, and pull out onto the street.
“Where do you live?” I ask Emily, and she mumbles an address from the back seat. I repeat it back to make sure I’ve got it before I set the route.
Milo’s staring at the side of my head. I can feel it without turning to check.
“What?” I ask, because when I glance over he’s got his chin dropped and his eyes wounded.
“Are you mad at me?”
“Of course not. You’re drunk. It happens.”
“Not about that.” He hiccups. “About the dressing room. About what I did—”
He catches himself before finishing the sentence.
“I’m not mad at you, sunshine.” The endearment is out before I can catch it.
“Holy shit!” Emily says from the back seat, delighted.
I wince, but I don’t correct it.
“For the record,” Milo says, plowing forward like he didn’t hear either of us, “I wasn’t gonna go up to that guy. I didn’t even want to. I just said it to piss you off.” A pause, his head tipping against the headrest. “I wanted to see if you’d get mad. If you’d care.”
“Milo. Let’s finish this when we get home, alright?”
“Aww,” Emily says from somewhere behind us. “You guys are adorable together.”
“Shut up, Em,” Milo mutters, and he’s still looking at me like he’s waiting for an answer.
Emily’s building turns out to be a walk-up with a buzzer panel missing half its labels. By the time we get inside, a door on the second floor is already swinging open, someone in sweatpants leaning over the railing to squint down at us.
“Em? Is that—” The girl on the landing stops mid-sentence, staring at me.
“This is Spencer,” Emily announces, hooking her arm through mine like we’re old friends. “He’s Milo’s, um.” She squints, working through it. “Boss. Boyfriend boss.”
I don’t say anything, just steer her gently the last few feet toward the stairs, handing her off to the roommate, who’s come down to meet us and takes her weight without question.
“Thanks for getting her home.”
“No problem,” I say, and head back to the car before she can ask anything else.
The rest of the drive passes without a word. I catch Milo out of the corner of my eye, head slumped against the window, curls flattened where his skull’s pressed to the glass, mouth open.
I spend the ride turning his words over, because apparently that’s a thing I do now, replay a drunk man’s sentences at every red light.
I wanted to see if you’d get mad. If you’d care.
It shouldn’t mean what it feels like it means. I know better than most that a man half-lit can’t always be held to his own testimony. Except I also know what my own chest did, hearing it.
I pull into the driveway and cut the engine.
“Hey.” I touch his shoulder. “We’re home.”
He surfaces slowly, blinking at the windshield, and for a second he looks like he doesn’t know where he landed. Then his eyes find me.
“Okay,” he mumbles, reaching for the door handle and missing it before I reach over and pop it for him.
His legs work, mostly, and by the time we’re both upright in the driveway I’ve got an arm looped under his, his weight braced along my side, warm and loose-limbed. He smells like wine and whatever product he uses in his hair, and every few steps his head tips toward my shoulder.
“You’re very tall,” he informs me, somewhere around the front steps.
“I’ve been told.”
“S’annoying. I have to look up at you all the time.” He says it like a complaint, but he’s smiling.
I get him to the door, fish my keys out one-handed since the other arm’s fully occupied holding him upright, and he leans in harder while I work the lock.
The door gives, and I nudge it open with my foot, and that’s when he tips his face up toward my ear, his breath landing warm against my jaw.
“Spencer.” His voice has gone soft and slurred and careful. “I need to tell you something.”
“Yeah?”
“Yesterday, after you left the dressing room, I… finished myself off. With your cum still on my hand.” He stops, and a shiver goes through him. “And I just… I really, really liked it.”