13. Harrison

“Harry! Where have you been?” Duckie calls from across the room when I get to training. It was a close call with traffic and dropping Arlo off at Gordon’s. Knowing Gordon was here and the house was empty made it even harder to walk away, but I made it.

“Awww, did you miss me?” I ask, and he holds up his hands in front of his chest, making a heart shape with his fingers.

“Always! You know I love you most!”

“Hey, he’s the enemy, remember, mate,” Tim Sage says, wrapping an arm around Duckie’s shoulder and leading him over to the rest of the Funky Monkeys changing into their uniforms.

I clock Gordon waving me over and jog that way.

“Everything good with Arlo?” he asks, and my cheeks are immediately warm. Shit, hold it together, man.

“Yeah, it went great. I swear he’ll be flying solo in no time.”

“It’s nice of you to do this for him. I would have taken him, but with the business taking off, I’ve been slammed.”

Gordon spends any time not training, playing, or making content either hosting massive parties or planning them for other people. His event company started more as a joke between him and his friends, but when Sierra Cort attended as a plus one and liked what he’d done, she hired him to help plan her birthday party in LA, and he started getting inquiries from some of the biggest names out there.

“No worries, I had nothing better to do,” I say, trying to sound easy, but my voice picks up a little in a weird way, and he frowns.

“Seriously, man. I know Arlo can be a lot. If it’s too much, just say the word, and we’ll hire a driver to take him.”

“No. I’m good. Really. And he’s not a lot, he’s…sweet.” Shit. “Umm, he’s a sweet kid. It’s nice to be needed.”

Dennis enters the room, clapping his hands.

“Well, your debut was a success, but now the real work begins. The teams you’re joining helped create this game and they won’t stand for slacking off, so training starts now, and every weekday until the season kicks off, understand?”

“You got it,” I say as the others in the room agree and nod, too.

“Right, FM to the left, AC to the right, let’s see what you remember from last year. Game one choreography. Let’s do this.”

We move to one of the conference rooms and run through the moves as a videographer takes shots from different angles to splice together into a promo online. All of us are rusty, and it takes way too many attempts before we’ve even got it halfway in time with each other.

“Tomorrow is on the field, we’ll have warm-ups, training, then rehearsals with the other teams, and some more promo. Get some rest fellas, this is only the start,” Dennis says, shaking his head and leaving the room. I collapse onto the ground exhausted and sweaty.

Gordon kicks my leg.

“Did you do nothing during the break? How are you this wrecked?”

“I did…cardio.” I laugh as he grabs my arm and helps me to stand.

“Dude, you’re no spring chicken anymore. Come to my place in the mornings so we can work out together.”

“I’ll pass.”

“Afraid you can’t keep up?”

I lift my arms and flex. “I’m pretty sure it would be you struggling to keep up with me. Have you even lifted a single weight recently with all the party planning you’ve been doing?”

“That gear is heavy. Okay, tonight, after poker, we have a lift-off.”

“Who’s jerking who off?” Alan asks, walking over.

“Not a jerk-off, a lift-off. Get your mind out of the gutter.” I laugh.

“Please, your mind lives there. Ready to lose tonight?” Alan asks, and I shake my head.

“You’ll be the one losing, then what will Tommy say when you come home broke…again?”

“Tommy doesn’t control what I spend my money on…anymore.”

“So he knows you’re coming to Gordon’s for poker tonight?”

“Hell no. We broke up.”

“Sorry. Are you okay?” I ask. Fuck, I”m a total dick. Sure, none of us particularly liked Tommy. He was super possessive and controlling, but Alan liked him and that was what mattered most.

“I’m good. Or I will be. I’m staying with my sister until I find a place of my own.”

“Kelly, right?”

“Yeah, she was more than happy to take me in. In fact, she showed up with a trailer an hour after I told her we had broken up. She had me moved out in a day. I should have seen the red flags earlier with Tommy, but I guess you overlook them when you think you’re in love.”

“Why do you think I stayed single all those years?”

His eyebrows rise as his lips pick up in a cheeky smirk.

“Do you mean you’re not single now?”

Shit. “Umm, no. I mean, like all the years up to and including now.”

“Sure,” he says, patting me on the shoulder and heading back to the locker room.

I follow him in, and we shower and change, and if I wasn’t so excited to see Arlo, I would have totally skipped out on poker. The session really did a number on me, and my knees are killing.

“You can all just hand your money over now boys, because I came to win,” I say, strolling into Gordon’s house. The guys are already seated around the large poker table he’s had set up in the living room. Alan Beaker, Benny G, Arthur Green, Phillip Marks, and Stevie Peterson. Relief floods my chest when I don’t see Ryan here.

“Dude, how’s the little one?” I ask Stevie, taking the seat open between him and Arthur.

“She’s good, finally sleeping through the night, if you can call a six-hour block through the night, and we do. Don’t burst our bubble, please.”

I laugh. “No worries, six hours is basically what sleep I get.”

“The hookups keeping you up?” Phillip asks, shuffling the deck.

Gordon pipes in. “Harry here says he’s given up on all that,” he states, almost like he doesn’t believe it.

The guys don’t look convinced either.

“It’s true. I deleted all the apps and haven’t been out to any clubs in weeks.”

“I hope it wasn’t our ribbing, because you know we love you, man,” Alan says, and I shake my head.

“I just got over it. I’m getting older. It’s time I found someone to settle down with, I think.”

“That’s great,” Benny says with a huge grin on his face. “You know I have this cousin, he’s a wrestler.”

I laugh. “I’m good, thanks.”

“But he’s a wrestler,” he says, again, widening his eyes like that will make a difference the second time he says it.

“Still good, but thanks.”

“Well, if you’re offering to set a guy up, Benny, feel free to pass along my number. Oh and, Harry, if you meet someone, find out if they have a brother, or a cousin, or a friend they can hook me up with,” Alan says, stacking and unstacking his chips in front of him.

“What happened with Tommy, anyway?” I ask.

“Same thing that happens to every other guy I date. They meet Gramps, then it’s all over after that. Maybe I should introduce first dates to him. If they survive a dinner with Gramps and Precious then they might actually be worth my time.”

“He’s a character,” I say, knowing full well exactly what Gramps is like. Alan”s grandfather and his cat Precious, live in the apartment building beside my place. His living room window actually lines up pretty well with my bedroom one, too, and he’s not exactly shy about voicing his disdain for my frequent male visitors. I should probably get some curtains, but where’s the fun in that?

A clatter sounds from the kitchen and all our attention moves to Arlo who’s already kneeling and picking up the pieces of the plate he just dropped.

Gordon and I both jump up.

“You okay?” he asks Arlo, moving his chair back.

“I’ll help,” I say without thinking and move toward the kitchen.

“You okay?” I whisper to Arlo as I help collect the pieces. He nods and a pink blush rises to his cheeks.

“You all remember my brother, Arlo,” Gordon says. “He’s staying with me while his wrist heals.”

“You did the book, right?” Alan asks as he deals the cards out.

“Oh, I have a copy,” Gordon says, jumping from his chair and going to the coffee table. He holds it proudly against his chest cover out for them all to see. “How awesome is it that I’m in a book?”

“I’m in it, too,” I say, and he waves a hand my way.

“Supporting character, not the lead.”

Arlo’s hand brushes against mine as we reach for pieces, and it sends a shiver through me. I wish so bad this didn’t have to be a secret. I want to grab him and kiss him and scream from the top of my lungs how amazing he is and how lucky I am that he wants to be with me. But Gordon would totally punch me in the face.

The guys all pass around the book while I finish helping Arlo with the plate.

“Do you play?” I ask him, and he shakes his head.

“I played a little online in college but I’m not really—”

“Come on, we’ll teach you. There’s room for one more, right, boys?” I ask, pulling him over to the table and grabbing an extra chair on the way before they can answer. “Shift down fellas,” I say, standing behind my seat so that I can be sure he’s next to me.

They shuffle around the table, and Arlo sits nervously beside me.

“So you get two cards. The goal of the game is to get the best five-card hand using the cards in your hand and the cards in the middle. Don’t show anyone what your two cards are though.” I explain the general guidelines to him as the boys finish up the hand they started without us, and then they deal Arlo and me in, too.

“Did Gordon tell you about Ryan?” Benny asks, and Phillip chuckles.

“The kid’s got it bad. Maybe he’s looking for something… what’d you call it, serious?” Phillip adds.

I shift in my seat. “I’d never date a player. Too messy if shit goes wrong.”

“That didn’t stop you and that OG hooking up at the mixer last year.” Benny laughs.

What is this, load on Harrison night? Arlo doesn’t need to hear this shit.

“I didn’t know he was a player, and it wasn’t really a hookup.”

“It looked that way to us,” Benny says, and I want to throw my chips at them and tell them to shut up. “Where is Ryan, anyway? I thought he said he was coming?”

Gordon shakes his head. “He said something came up and he couldn”t make it.”

Stevie throws a few chips into the middle of the table. “I think it’s great you are done with the whole short-term thing, Harry. Get yourself a nice guy, maybe someone older who’s ready to settle down and have a few kids.”

“I don’t think he has to be older to want to settle down.”

“No, but the younger guys you were hooking up with are still in that free stage of their lives, right? Arlo, you’re young. Tell Harry here, guys your age aren’t looking for anything serious, long-term, right?”

“Ahhh,” Arlo begins, but Gordon interjects.

“Arlo’s not interested in anything serious. Our younger brother Noah isn’t either. I think you’re right, Stevie. Harry here needs to look out for an older guy.”

Younger guys can be interested in serious relationships, too. Arlo is a few years younger than me. Okay, more than a few. He’s like seven years younger, but that’s not a crazy age difference, right?

“Are two threes good?” Arlo asks and attention moves from me to him.

“You don’t tell people what you have.” Gordon laughs.

“And yes, with a three on the table, two threes are good.” Alan sighs, tossing in his hand. The rest of them fold, too, and before he slides the chips toward him, Arlo flips his six and nine over, and the guys all laugh.

“Your brother’s a better bluffer than you, Gordie,” Benny jokes, and I hope that all talk about Ryan, the OG guy from last year, and my poor past choices are over.

I sit out the next hand and grab another drink from the kitchen. Gordon joins me.

“Be careful around Arlo,” he whispers, and my chest goes tight.

“Umm, I don’t know what…”

“He has a history of getting too attached to the wrong people. Did I tell you about his ex?”

I shake my head.

“He convinced himself this guy was the one and almost lost everything he’d worked for. He’s still just a kid, really.”

“He’s not, though,” I say, and Gordon frowns.

“Trust me, he is. He doesn’t understand how the world works, or even how to look after himself properly. Just look what happened last time he was on his own. He smashed his wrist and then ended up in the ER all over again just trying to cook for himself. I’m hoping he’ll agree to stay here longer, at least until I’m sure he can actually look after himself.”

“You get that he’s a grown-ass man, right?” I say a little too loud, but the guys don’t look our way.

“You get that he’s my brother, and he and Noah are the only family I have, right?”

“You have me, too.”

He smiles and wraps an arm over my shoulder.

“Until you run away with Ryan.” He laughs, and Arlo glances over his shoulder.

“There is zero chance of that, trust me.”

“Okay, but when those balls start turning blue, you might reconsider your new ways.”

“For a guy who claims to be straight, you spend a lot of time worrying about my balls,” I say loud enough for the table to hear.

Benny laughs. “Gordon Gets Bananad. It could be a sexy spin-off movie adaptation, like Star Whores or The Wizard of Jizz. You could target a whole new market, Arlo.”

We laugh and make our way back to the table.

I reach under the table and give Arlo’s knee a little squeeze and the smile it brings to his lips sends a flurry through my chest. I don’t care what Gordon thinks. Arlo isn’t some naive kid he has to protect from the world, and I am not trying to take anything from him. I just want to be with him.

I keep my hand on his thigh, edging it up higher and higher, careful not to draw attention from anyone at the table, especially Gordon. It’s kind of fun being sneaky, knowing that I can touch him, well, his leg anyway, right here in front of them and they have no clue. I don’t go for the full grope, because gross, not under a table and not in the same room with his brother. But I get close enough that he shifts in his seat.

Tonight is going to be fun.