Chapter 31

31

DES

T he intercom buzzes and I glance over at Alex, dark head bent over his phone on the couch. He's been quiet this week: going to work, cooking, then collapsing in front of the TV to watch murder mysteries with me. Crime has become our thing, and I've never had a thing with a guy before.

"Hello?" I say to our doorman.

"Someone is here to see you, Desmond," he says. I can never believe how formal Darius likes to be. "A Mr. Sachs. He says his son Alex Sachs is staying with you?"

Alex's father ?

"Alex!" I hiss. "Alex!" He pulls his earbuds out of his ears. "Your father's here."

His eyes go wide, then he closes them. "Oh, Jesus."

He stands up. "Fuck. Fuck," he says, walking around the living room in a circle. "What am I going to do? You won't want him in here, will you? I could go down and …"

"No," I say. I'm not leaving him to deal with this alone. He hasn't seen anyone in his family for seven days.

"Send him up, Darius," I say into the handset before placing it in its holder by the door. If we're doing this, we're fucking doing it.

Alex's face crumples, a deep groove between his eyebrows. "Why's he here?" he whispers.

"Who knows? But I want to be with you for this," I say, taking his hand in mine and squeezing.

He nods, eyes fixed on the floor. "Okay."

Then the buzzer goes.

I open the door to find a rotund guy with a fuzz of dark, gray-flecked hair surrounding his bald head, a brown belt holding up his taupe pants, and a pair of spectacles balanced on the end of his long nose. And in that moment, I hate the fact that Alex got his nose from his father. He stares past me into the apartment, gaze landing on Alex standing in the middle of the rug in the lounge.

"Alex," he says, voice hoarse as he strides forward. "Son."

Alex backs off as his father holds out his hands as he's heading toward him. I close the door, my eyes drilling into his father's back, which I'd quite like to stick a knife into. I follow him across the floor to where Alex has stopped, skirting around his father to stand beside Alex, folding my arms on my chest. His father still doesn't look at me.

"Why are you backing away from me? My own son," he says, voice breaking.

Heat starts on the back of my neck. Seriously?

Alex's eyes are fixed on his father like he's a dangerous snake, and his eyes narrow when his father says this. "I'm going to pretend you didn't just say that to me."

He sounds so angry, it makes me want to dance across the room.

His dad shakes his head. "You need to come home. I know I lost my temper, but this nonsense …" His eyes flicker in my direction for a beat, but he doesn't make it past my feet. "You belong at home with your mother and me."

"Dad, I'm twenty-four. Living at home these past two years has been a huge mistake, and it allowed you to believe you still have a say in my life. I've let you treat me like a kid, some kid you can control."

His dad just stares at him.

"I've known I was gay since I was thirteen."

His dad winces, and I turn and gawp at Alex. All that uncertainty when I first met him? Wow . God, how far he's come in such a short time. That he can say something like this to his dad. It's amazing, and I want to see him unleashed all over again. He lets himself loose sometimes during sex when he gets growly and pushy and wants to dominate, and I can sit back and let him take control. It's the hottest thing in someone who's normally so reticent, so quiet.

"Alex, you're not gay . You've had girlfriends, lovely girlfriends. We've been looking at potential matches for you." He licks his lips. "In our community. You know how important that is, despite whatever they've been telling you." His eyes flick toward me again, making it to the bottom half of my legs this time.

"Yes, Dad, I've had girlfriends and I felt not one thing for them."

"That's normal, Alex! Just keep working on it. The right one will come along for you."

Alex snorts. "Let me know myself, okay? Don't whitewash my experience. The whole kissing thing with girls …" He shudders. "At least it's not weird now," he mumbles.

A flinch flickers over Alex's dad's face, red starting up on his neck. The admission that he's been doing that with me is probably more than he can take. Then he starts forward with his hand outstretched, and I shift instantly: He's not touching him. His father's eyes snap to my face, and he stops, taking a step backward, hand dropping as I glower at him.

He swallows. "That's perfectly normal, believe me. You've been brainwashed into thinking …"

Alex raises his eyes to the ceiling. "I haven't been brainwashed, Dad. Did you listen to what I said? I've known since I was thirteen ."

"It's all habit. I've been reading up on all this and there's research that says …"

"Oh my God!" Alex says, running his fingers through his hair and pacing away toward the window. "Did you come here to argue with me about whether I am gay or not?"

His father flinches again and studies his hands. "No. No, I did not. I came here to apologize."

"You fucking hit me."

"Don't swear. I was shocked, okay?" His father holds up his palms.

Now my blood really does start to boil. God knows what this is doing to Alex.

" Shocked? And you think it's acceptable to deal with a shock that way? Are you kidding me?"

His father waves his hands about. "Let me finish. Let me finish! I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that."

Alex slumps a bit beside me. Oh fuck, I hope he's not going to forgive the asshole.

"I forgive you," he says, and I want to tear out my hair. I open my mouth for the first time. "But I'm not coming home," Alex continues, and adrenaline surges through me. "Why would I live somewhere where I will be so disrespected? I haven't been happy for a long time, Dad, and I am now. I hope that one day you'll understand that and respect me for the choices I'm making and be pleased for me."

He's happy? Alex has been so quiet since he's been here. I've been worried all week about how miserable he's seemed. I want to jump all over my apartment, swing around the support pillars. The anger that was tightening my skin starts to seep away.

His dad opens his mouth. God forbid he?—

"Now you need to go," Alex says.

"I came here to talk to you, Alex," his father says, a mutinous set to his face. "This is all a load of nonsense. You're a young man who's had his head turned …"

"Can you hear yourself?"

"Do you think it's worth falling out with your family over this?"

Alex sucks in a deep breath. "I understand why you'd say that, Dad, and I even think you might be right, and if it was only one incident then maybe. But I was assaulted by my father who's determined to continue denying something that has been a truth for me for a long time. So, this will turn into a wound that is going to keep on festering. That's how I'm looking at it. I might have forgiven you for hitting me, but I don't want to spend time with people who disrespect who I am and my life choices so badly."

When did he get so wise? I fall in love with him a little bit more, all over again.

His father shakes his head, then looks me in the face for the first time with his eyes narrowed. "You may think you've won this round, but you've manipulated my son and God will surely punish you in this life for that."

Alex steps forward. "Get out. Get out before I'm tempted to hit you . Don't you dare talk to Des like that, he's been nothing but kind to me."

So much for me defending him.

His father scowls at both of us and moves to the door, then he turns and delivers his parting shot as he leaves. "Your mother wants you at the house for dinner on Friday."

Alex is quiet that evening after his father's gone. I love my apartment at this time of night, side lights on, casting crazy shadows up the walls, some coffee lounge music humming in the background or a game on mute that I can watch or not as I'm buzzing around sorting, cleaning, prepping for work. But tonight Alex's silence is eating at me. It's so different from the way I'd be dealing with something like this that it's driving me a little mad. I'd be storming through the place, throwing clothes on the floor, maybe undertaking a little china smashing, before deciding to reorganize a whole cupboard and chucking a load of things out. How do James and Jane survive living together when one of them is in a mood?

I spend over an hour blitzing the bathroom, putting out fresh towels and polishing the glass screen of the shower. Getting the limescale, mold, and dirt out of the grout is a Zen-like experience. After I've made my sixth cup of coffee, I eye up Alex where he's sitting on the couch. He hasn't moved since his father left; he's been staring down at his phone, earbuds in. I look down at the stainless-steel sink and pull out the Mr. Muscle—because what else does any self-respecting gay guy use?—from under the counter, squirt it all around the metal, and start swishing it over with a soft-bristled brush.

"Alex, you're driving me a little insane here," I say loudly, and he turns to look at me, taking his earbuds out, mouth agape. Then he frowns.

"What are you doing?" he asks.

"Cleaning the sink. Why?"

"You've been wearing those rubber gloves for about four hours."

I wave my hands at him and pout. "Are they sexy?"

His mouth tilts up, and some of my tension seeps into the cold stone of the counter.

"Don't you want to process that scene with your father?" I say.

"I am processing it."

"How?"

"What do you mean, how?"

"You've been quiet."

He smiles at me. "Is that a problem?"

I shrug. "If you're okay then … I guess …"

Laughing, he stands, stretching, his shirt riding up to reveal the line of hair on his stomach. Goosebumps travel up my forearms. He pads over and comes around the island, standing right next to me and smiling down at the foam all over the stainless steel.

"You're doing a great job here."

I shrug. "Just keeping busy," I mutter, scrubbing over the sink again. He leans his head on my shoulder, and I still, dropping the brush into the sink and turning to wrap my arms around him.

"You get those wet gloves on my new shirt and there'll be hell to pay," he says.

I laugh and rest my chin on his shoulder, turning my head to kiss his curls.

"I love how open you are, Des. I'm not so good at that, yeah?" he says into my ear.

I nod, swallowing and moving back. "Do you want to talk about it?"

He shrugs. "I'm not sure what there is to say. He's an asshole, but he's also my father. I guess I can't envision cutting them out of my life entirely."

"Are you going to go to your parents' on Friday?"

Pulling back, he rubs a hand over his forehead. "What do you think? I was thinking I'd only go if you came, too. Would you do that? They might not accept it."

I remove the gloves and place them on the counter, maneuvering around him to retrieve the creamer from the fridge, before picking up the coffee pot and waving it at him. He nods, so I grab an extra cup from the cupboard and fill it up. He narrows his eyes at me.

"Okay, okay, I know. It's not an easy question, is it? I'm thinking!" I say, and he grins. "I guess you're right. At some point, you'll want to build bridges with your family. So the issue is when rather than if, and is it better for you, or even your dad, to give that longer to happen? Is he likely to become more entrenched or less?"

Alex purses his lips. "Probably more. He mentioned delving into online research, so I wouldn't be surprised if he's been digging into all sorts of stuff. It's typical of him, really. Being a financial analyst, he tends to be quite rigid. He's never been flexible about anything." He lets out a sigh. "I'm sure he thinks he can reason me out of being gay. The very idea that he views it as some sort of decision rather than the way I am …" His voice trails off as he gazes into his coffee, expression sour. "I just wish he'd accept me for who I am."

"I don't want to be the bearer of bad news, but that could take a long time."

"Yeah, I see that. Maybe it'd be smarter to start with my sisters." He gives a sharp nod. "This Friday is a hard pass then; it'll be a crapshoot." He reaches out and pats my arm. "Thanks, Des."

"What for?"

He laughs. "Making me talk about it rather than stewing. With things like this, I tend to draw back into my shell. I feel better having talked to you."

Even now, everything he says makes me want to swoon.