Eleven Ben #2
Ben couldn’t imagine playing kickball with Justin.
“Yeah.” Arya glanced around. “Where are you parked?”
“I walked.”
“You live close by?”
“Yeah. Got a little rental house a couple blocks away.”
“Nice. I’m that way.” Arya gestured up one of the paved paths that wound beneath a cluster of cherry blossom trees getting ready to bloom. “I better…”
“Yeah.”
Except Arya was headed the same way Ben needed to go. He waffled for a second, anxiety coiling in his stomach, but what was he worried about? They’d agreed to keep things professional. And he couldn’t just stand around in the park like a weirdo. He needed to get home.
So he fell into step next to Arya.
“This is me, too.”
Arya chuckled softly. They walked in silence for a moment. Then he blurted out, “This isn’t weird for you, is it?”
Of course it was weird, but Ben wasn’t going to admit that. “No. Is it weird for you?”
“Nope. The Lions are for everyone, even asshole exes and one-night stands.”
The little knot of nerves in Ben’s chest eased a bit. “What about asshole one-night stands?”
“I said I was sorry,” Arya muttered.
Ben wanted to dig the knife in deeper, but Arya was right, he had apologized. And they had to work together for the next few months. Better if they could be cordial at least.
“You’re right. Sorry.”
“It’s cool.” Arya paused, looking down the path. Two youngish guys were jogging toward them, both jacked in the way Ben associated with steroids. And they were talking, loudly.
“She had the biggest tits you’ve ever seen, bro,” one said.
“Yeah? How about her ass?” the second asked.
“You could bounce a quarter, dude.” The first mimed flinging a coin. “I’m telling you, the bitch was hot.”
Ben frowned and caught Arya’s lip curling in distaste, too.
Straight guys could be so gross.
The guys were taking the whole path and showed no sign of falling into line, so Arya sidestepped onto the grass, and Ben joined him.
They watched as the bros jogged by, now talking about the relative vaginal tightness of women they’d slept with.
Ben rolled his eyes and was about to mutter something to Arya when he caught it: The guy on the left was wearing jean shorts, and a bright orange handkerchief hung from his right cheek pocket.
Ho. Ly. Shit.
Laughter bubbled up from Ben’s stomach, but he clamped his lips shut to hold it in.
He jumped as Arya grasped his bicep, fingers digging in hard, not to hurt but to stay standing. Ben’s knees softened as he shook from holding his laughter in.
Then he made the mistake of meeting Arya’s eyes, sparkling with barely contained glee.
Arya broke first, letting out a belly laugh and bending over, only held up by his grip on Ben’s arm, but Ben snorted, the dam burst, and he started laughing, too. His knees gave out and he collapsed onto the grass, taking Arya with him, laughing and rolling around on the ground.
“What the fuck,” Arya managed to gasp between breaths, and that just made Ben laugh harder.
“Do you think he knows?” Ben choked out, wiping tears from his eyes. It had been a while since he saw the hanky code at use in the wild.
“God, I kind of hope not! What does orange stand for?”
“Let me check,” Ben managed between gasps of laughter. He rolled onto his right side so he could extricate his phone from his left pocket and did a little googling. Then he cackled again. “Oh god.”
“What?” Arya hiccupped.
“Okay, left cheek means giving, right cheek means receiving,” Ben said, scrolling down. “And orange is for anything goes.”
“Anything goes!” Arya crooned, doing a decent Ethel Merman impression.
Ben fell into another fit of laughter, flopping onto the grass.
The blades dug into the bare skin of his back, tickling him, and that just made him laugh harder.
That seemed to set Arya off, because Arya flopped over, too, brushing Ben’s shoulder with his own.
They lay there, laughing at the sky, Ben clutching his stomach, Arya covering his face.
At last, Arya’s cackling subsided to a low chuckle. He sighed and turned to look at Ben. Ben looked back at him.
Something passed between them then. Something that hooked itself behind Ben’s ribs. Something that made his shoulders unclench.
He’d felt it that night—their only night. That being with Arya was as easy as playing a major scale.
It was getting harder and harder to hold on to his anger.
Arya’s eyes softened.
“I’m glad you stuck it out,” he said.
“What?”
“Practice. I figured you’d take one look at me and leave.”
“I thought about it,” Ben admitted.
He needed this, though. He needed queer friends. Friends outside of work. He needed community.
“But I forgive you.”
Arya’s eyes crinkled up in a smile. “Good. Friends?”
Okay, friends was pushing it.
Maybe.
Except as Ben lay there, the sun on his skin, the grass beneath him, exhausted from kickball and laughing so hard his ribs hurt, maybe friends wasn’t such a stretch.
“Yeah. Friends.”
When Ben got home, the most perfect creature in the universe was waiting for him.
“Simon, Simon, I missed you!” he said, kneeling to pet his dog.
Ten percent pitbull, ten percent staffy, ten percent boxer, ten percent mutt, and a thousand percent love, Simon was an eighty-pound wrecking ball with shiny brown fur, floppy ears, the sappiest brown eyes, and the goofiest grin.
She’d already been named Simon when he adopted her from her foster mom during his first weekend in KC; best anyone could tell, her first owners had named her without checking her gender.
Not that Ben subscribed to gender essentialism, in humans or in dogs, but he did get curious looks sometimes. Then again, it was a great conversation starter.
Simon was so excited for Ben to be home she couldn’t sit still: Her butt was wiggling so hard she kept pulling herself away from his hands, then huffing in frustration that he’d stopped petting her.
Finally, after some smooches to the top of her head, she calmed just enough to run into the kitchen toward the back door to indicate she needed out.
“You wanna go for a walk instead?”
Simon nearly did a barrel roll as she changed direction and ran back to the front door. She skidded to a stop just before colliding with it and sat perfectly still, waiting for her harness.
“What am I going to do with you?” Ben sighed.
He loved her so much.
Once she was harnessed up, Ben led her down the street. He was still getting to know his neighborhood. So far he’d found a Catholic school, the Toy and Miniature Museum (who knew they even had those?), the UMKC campus, and a beautiful boulevard to stroll down, as long as it wasn’t rush hour.
Kansas City’s rush hour had nothing on San Francisco’s, but still, some people didn’t check crosswalks for pedestrians before turning, and he had no intention of spending his time in Kansas City as a pancake.
Ben turned their steps back toward home, Simon looking over her shoulder at him every so often as she walked a pace or two ahead of him.
She never yanked on the leash, not even when she saw other dogs or squirrels.
Her foster mom didn’t know how she’d ended up abandoned, given how well trained and well behaved she seemed to be.
Regardless, it had been love at first sight: As soon as Ben met her, Simon had come over, flopped her head into his lap, and gazed up at him with all the adoration in the universe.
He’d signed the adoption papers ten minutes later.
(He still had to wait a day or two to actually take her home, but still.)
He hadn’t been able to keep pets in his old apartment in San Francisco, but he’d grown up with dogs at the vineyard, and he missed having one. So he’d started looking for rescues even before he finished unpacking.
He wondered if he was allowed to bring pets to kickball.
Ben pulled out his phone to text Arya—he had his number now, thanks to the PhilBall—but before he could even unlock it, it buzzed.
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” he said to himself (and Simon). The universe had to be fucking with him.
It was Justin.
Ben’s stomach sank into the vicinity of his toes as the messages came in, one after the other.
Justin
Hey
Sorry to spring this on you
I’m in Kansas City
Can we meet up?