“I’m going soon or I won’t have time to get back to my place and get ready for work, but I want to talk to you later. It’s important. Are you listening to me?”
Tierney nodded.
“Will you meet me this evening? After work? We can go to Klunhausen’s again.”
“Okay.” If he just agreed, this would end sooner. The torture of the little people—Lilliputians? Was that right?—was looking pretty mild right now. He bet the inmates would make those spear-wielding freaks look like Smurfs with butter knives by the end of the day.
“What time do you want to meet?”
“Uh, I don’t have my schedule. How about I let you know?”
“Okay.” But Dalton didn’t move. Tierney could feel his breath on the back of his arm. “Will you be all right if I go?”
“No worries, man. I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time.”
Dalton took a deep breath and sighed it out. “Text me,” he said, then the bed rocked as he moved off of it. It made Tierney a little seasick, and it would help if he uncovered his eyes, but he didn’t want to see Dalton again. Ever. “Or call,” Dalton added.
Yeah, he didn’t want to do that either.
“Bye,” the dude said from the doorway. But he didn’t walk away. Tierney could feel him just standing there, waiting.
Christ. “Bye.”
Finally Dalton left. Now Tierney could enjoy his misery alone.
It’s best that way. He never failed at meeting his own expectations, as long as he kept them low enough.
Dalton wasn’t surprised when Tierney never called, texted, or dropped by the office, but he had a large stake in being annoyed. Mostly with himself, as the memory of what had gone down Thursday insisted on replaying in his head over and over.
I shouldn’t have stayed.
Except he’d felt too guilty not to stay. Besides, he’d said he would. A half hour after Tierney had told him to go, Dalton had tiptoed down the hall to peek into the man’s bedroom, wondering if maybe he really should leave. Then he’d seen the empty bottle of bourbon on the nightstand. Earlier, when Tierney had left the living room, it had been half-full.
Dalton didn’t know what Tierney’s tolerance was, but if he drank that much bourbon at once, he’d be worried about alcohol poisoning. Sleeping next to the man had seemed like the safest thing to do at the time.
By Sunday afternoon, on his way to meet Sam for lunch, it seemed like the stupidest thing to do. Sleeping next to someone always created intimacy. Dalton shook his head, disrupting that mental train and turning onto Simpson Avenue, slowing enough to look for a parking spot. Why had he thought driving would distract him from overanalyzing the situation?
If he could, he’d go back and not drink the bourbon at Tierney’s place. Do everything right up until that point, but after that, he’d change things. Because he’d taken advantage of a guy he knew had issues, led him on, when he had no intention of following through beyond that blowjob.
Did he?
Did it matter? Tierney’s in love with Ian.
Plus Dalton had sworn off needy, closeted men. Not just for his own benefit, but theirs too. Someone like him wasn’t good for guys like that. His attraction to those types of men could be blamed on his parents’ rejection, but Dalton had a suspicion there was more to it, something more basic in his makeup that made damaged men seem desirable. Something that made him a little bit damaged. And how could two damaged men equal one healthy relationship?
Finding a spot, he turned on his blinker and started backing in, which was the opportunity his punitive self had been waiting for. I wanted him to choke on it. How nice of that thought to come along and torment him again. As if he hadn’t beaten himself up enough over making Tierney gag on his dick?
Maybe it would be easier if he didn’t know why he’d had that urge, but Dalton totally knew where it had come from. It was the part of him that was frustrated with Tierney but that instinctively liked him in spite of all the drawbacks. That part of him wanted the man to live the way he truly could. That part of him wanted things to be different, so he could see what might unfold between them.
But he couldn’t make Tierney show his real self to the world, and he couldn’t be with Tierney the way he was. Friendship was the most he could hope for at the moment.
Sigh. He had to have this worked out before he saw Tierney again, at Ian’s meeting on Tuesday. By then, maybe he could convince himself to let the man live his life as he saw fit, rather than trying to shove his own standards down the guy’s throat.
While his thoughts were consumed by Tierney, he’d resolved not to discuss what had happened with Sam. Instead, after meeting his friend, sitting down at their table, and ordering, he outdid himself dredging up other topics.
“You’re moving into your own place?” Sam asked after Dalton had offered up his first conversational gambit. He seemed surprised, but he only pointed his fry at Dalton for a second before turning it toward his mouth and taking a bite. So only mild surprise. Dalton was becoming fluent in Sam’s use of food as a sort of body language enhancer. French fries were the most common aid, probably because he could just pick up a new one when he finished off its predecessor.
Dalton swallowed his mouthful of chicken Caesar salad. “I found a great place last week near work, and they let me know yesterday that I could have it.”
“I have a place to myself,” Sam said. “I was in a huge house with a bunch of roommates and I was so sick of them. They didn’t really miss me when I left, I don’t think.” He shrugged and smiled. “But I pretty much live alone in name only now.”
Dalton had to be imagining that Sam was drawing hearts in his pool of ketchup. “Same situation for me. Huge house and my roommates won’t miss me either.” All four of them were guys he was social with, but he wouldn’t say they were close friends, except Vance. Really, their only unifying factor was that they were all gay.
“So why’s this place you found so perfect?” Sam asked, waving a french fry in the air.
“It’s got huge windows,” Dalton began. “On an upper story, the fourth, so the view is good. I mean, it’s just of the street and some of the skyline, but it’s not a parking lot or a cinderblock wall. The neighborhood isn’t great, but it’s becoming gentrified.”
“Revitalized,” Sam corrected with the blessing of his burger.
Dalton nodded. “The owners just restored the building and put in wood floors—straight-grain fir, so it hints at being Danish modern. Plus the walls are smooth finish and white. Do you know how hard it is to get a contractor to do that? The orange-peel texture is so much quicker to apply, but flat-out fugly.”