CHAPTER 15

mateo

I lay in bed on Monday morning, in no mood to get up and face another day at the office. It was becoming harder each day to front up to the firm knowing I'd be there alone. I could hardly pretend that working in an architect's firm was a passion of mine. I did it because I liked working with Dante. But without him there to keep me company it was becoming patently clear how much I didn't like the work.

I sighed as I shifted onto my side, hand tracing the empty sheets of my bed. The side where Jamie had slept on Saturday night in Glen's penthouse.

And that right there was another reason for my current lethargy. I didn't know where Jamie fit inside my brain. I could feel him infiltrating it, taking up more real estate and more of my thoughts and energies. But I still didn't really know how he and I fit . Not like how I knew where Nick fit in my brain because he had taken up residency there on the day I first met him nearly ten years ago and I'd never been able to serve him an eviction notice.

Jamie had seen another side of me this weekend too, one I had managed to keep hidden even from my two best friends. I knew he'd seen it, had even commented on it when I had asked his views on me taking on more modelling clients.

The problem was I think he'd liked me more the way I was in Sydney amongst people who either didn't know me or didn't care about my sexuality one way or the other. I just never knew how to bring that person home with me. I didn't know how to be free and happy and careless with my smiles and laughs or where I directed my attention. It didn't come naturally to me the way it did to someone like Jamie. Someone like Nick.

I just didn't think I was all that likeable .

I'd spent last evening going through the folder of potential clients Glen had given me. I couldn't deny I had been excited about some of them, had even dreamed about working with some of the names and brands that had popped up on the list.

Jamie was supportive of me taking on more modelling work. Not that his opinion mattered at all. I still wasn't sure why I'd asked him for it. But taking on more clients would mean more time away in Sydney, more time away from home. Away from my friends. Away from Nick. Away from Jamie.

But above all else, I just wasn't sure how I could let Dante down. He needed me to help run the firm more so now than ever before. I loved my adopted uncle fiercely and I could never let him or Giulia down.

I sighed deeply and then set the folder down on my nightstand and climbed out of bed. I needed a proper shower and then I needed to get back into the office and give myself some real perspective. It was not just me my decision would impact and I had to keep that in mind.

On Wednesday I cracked. Rob and Nick were working on a building site somewhere deep inland this week and I hadn't heard Rob come home the last two nights. He'd been gone again by the time I woke up in the morning and I was feeling desperate for interaction with another human being. I was an introvert with the best of them at heart but even I couldn't go three full days without speaking to another human being.

I opened my thread with Jamie.

Message

(Today) at 10:05am

ME:

Fancy a coffee?

JAMIE:

I'm working a shift until 2pm

I could do an arvo coffee?

ME:

Can we meet at Cat's Cradle again?

JAMIE:

I'll be there at 2.30.

I placed a love heart over his response, trying to tamp down my excitement at seeing him again. I mean, it wasn't about seeing Jamie per se , more just my desperation to speak to another human being. Sure, Jamie was nice and all, lovely even, but I needed to get out of my head for a bit and really, anyone would have done just as well.

This had always been one of my issues with trailing around after Rob and Nick half my life. Those two could make lifelong friends with random people at the drop of a hat. The entire town knew them both and I had always just been the aloof third wheel who followed them around. I didn't have any of my own friends outside the two of them.

Which might have also helped to explain why I'd held so tightly to Nick's friendship even when my heart was shattering with sadness.

I made it to the café first, just a short ten minute drive up the road at Ives Inlet. Rob and Nick had fixed my car for me over the weekend without it needing a costly fix and I was glad to have my wheels back.

The booth Jamie and I had sat in the first time we'd met here was free so I camped out there and ordered for us both. He arrived just at the same time as the coffees and I felt something squeeze inside me when he stepped into the room, like a breath of fresh air. His brown hair was damp and it looked like he'd just run his fingers through it. He was in those jeans that fit his frame to perfection and a grey t-shirt that squeezed all those lovely muscles.

"Mateo," he smiled, sliding into the booth opposite me.

"Hello," I smiled back. I let him take the moment as his gaze swept across my face and down to the lowriding top I was wearing. I had always loved attracting attention and his was always well worth the effort.

"It was a nice surprise to hear from you," Jamie quipped, that lovely smile on his face as he took a sip of his coffee. "How has your week been?"

I shrugged, noting the way his gaze drifted to my shoulder and then down to my collarbone. "I think I'm struggling a little bit without Dante."

"Any idea how much longer until he's back on his feet?" he asked.

"I don't even know. The doctor still hasn't given him the all clear to return to work so now I'm worried that something is still wrong with him. Is it normal to take this long? It's been weeks now."

"It's not outside the parameters of normal," Jamie mulled. "Usually it's around the six week mark before cardiac patients return to work. And often it's not back to full time."

I sighed. "That's another thing I'm worried about."

"What are you worried about, Mateo? You can talk to me."

"I just … I feel like I'm getting too deeply involved at the firm. I mean, I'm basically running the place at the moment and I don't mind doing that for Dante. I don't want to sound ungrateful. But I …"

"It's not what you want to be doing," he guessed. I nodded, heart yammering in my throat at having said the words out loud. The words I'd been thinking about for the past few weeks, even more so the past few days. Since our weekend in Sydney.

Jamie reached out as though to take my hand before seeming to think better of it and withdrew from me. I knew why he had done that but for one mad minute there I had wanted him to hold my hand, to take it in his larger one and let me know he was there for me. Even if we were in public and only ten minutes from home.

"You're a great friend to Dante," Jamie told me. "But at some point you have to stop living your life for other people and start living for yourself."

"I know," I sighed. "It's just not the time for that right now. The firm would fold if I walked out right now and I can't do that to Dante. I owe him a lot."

"And I would dare say that he owes you a lot too," Jamie pointed out, something I had not allowed myself to think about before. "I don't know Dante all that well but from what you've said about him I would think that he might support you chasing after your hopes and dreams."

"He probably would," I agreed cautiously.

"But it's not just Dante holding you back, is it?" Jamie guessed. How was I so transparent to him? I held my feelings and emotions very close to my chest but Jamie had this way of seeing things I didn't normally let anyone else see.

"No, it's not just Dante."

"Your parents?"

"They have very strong views about a lot of stuff," I reluctantly explained. "They are very traditional when it comes to family and masculinity and gender roles. They've let me know all my life what they think of people who veer outside of those strict parameters."

"And is their opinion that important to you?" he asked gently.

I huffed out a desperate laugh. "That's the crux of it really, isn't it? I've lived my whole life trying to gain their approval and it's so hard won. I'm exhausted. Working for Dante was the one thing they've ever been excited about. Well that and the time I tried dating a woman to please them but you can imagine how well that worked out."

"What do you think would happen if you just told them?" he asked, not in a pushy way but a genuinely curious way.

"What, that I'm gay or that I want to quit working for Dante and take up modelling full time?" I scoffed.

"Both. Either one of those."

"They would call me all sorts of effeminate names for wanting to be a model, none that I will repeat in public. And then they would likely cut me off from them and kick me out of the family if I told them I was gay."

"Really? You think they'd act so extreme?" he asked.

"I know they would," I told him. Because I'd heard them say the words many times, never directly aimed at me because I had lived my life so carefully I was sure they couldn't have known about me. But I knew their views on the gay community. They had never been quiet about them either.

"That's a really tough spot to be in," Jamie mulled, his face contemplative. "But can I say something to you, Mateo?" I nodded and he pressed on. "You are worthy of being loved for who you are. I know that probably just sounds like a line out of a therapy manual but it is very true and something I think you need to hear. The people who love you will do so based on who you are, not who you pretend to be. Don't be afraid of who you are. Because who you are is actually pretty great."

My throat closed over as Jamie spoke, his words so kind and coming from a place of such authenticity that I could feel my eyes start to prickle. He let me be for the moment as I tried to wrestle my emotions back under control and take on board some of the words he'd said. I'd heard them all before of course but it was an impossibly hard thing to take on board when you'd been told all your life that people like me were wrong in the head and even in their very makeup.

"Do you have to go back to the office today?" Jamie asked, his voice soft and gentle.

I looked up at him, seeing the way he was looking at me with so much gentleness and kindness that I felt like I might cry all over again.

"Why? What do you have in mind?" I asked, trying to mask my feelings with a suggestive grin.

"Not that," he laughed. "I just wondered if you wanted to come back to my place and hang for a bit? We could go for a walk on the beach, get some take away and eat at my place. Up to you."

"Really?" I asked. I hadn't expected an offer like that from him. I also knew that I was feeling raw enough to want to take him up on it, that I really was that desperate for human company that I would go take a walk on a beach with him even without the offer of sex in the mix. Who even was I?

"You are more than just your body, Mateo," Jamie said. He wore a grin on his face but he was also serious enough to let me know he meant those words. It was just, I didn't know if I could believe him. I'd never been more than a hot body or a pretty face to anyone, well, maybe with the exception of Nick. And Jamie.

"Okay," I agreed, feeling the sides of my face lift in a smile. "Let me just shoot Dante a text that I'm taking the afternoon off. I don't want him to rock up at the office like he did last time we went back to your apartment."

"Really?" Jamie laughed.

"Oh yeah. That was a fun grilling about where I was and who I was meeting. Although I'm pretty sure if I mention I'm meeting with you he'll tell me to take the entire week off. You have a bit of a fan club back home."

"Do I? Well that's certainly nice to know," he grinned.

"You know, sometimes I think Dante knows about me," I said as I punched out the text.

"And do you think he is okay with who you are?"

"I get the impression he would stand by me, yeah," I said.

"Well then. Dante might be a good place for you to start, Mateo," Jamie told me, rising to his feet and waiting for me to do the same.