Twenty-Two

GREG

How did Greg let his ex talk him into going out in SoHo?

There's a chance it was the way Stryker paid for Greg's cappuccino earlier without so much as a comment. Or the way Stryker actually listened when Greg told him about the happy hours he's been hosting and detailed the various cocktails he's created over the last few months.

"You made all those by yourself?" Stryker asked, sounding almost...impressed.

"I can't take all the credit," Greg says, even if he's trying to shove Julien through a trapdoor in his mind.

There has been no word from Julien since he got out of Greg's car yesterday. No I landed safely text. No I got to the hotel text. No I miss you text.

Which leads Greg to believe that Julien had meant what he said, and Greg needs to find peace with that.

After tonight, that is.

Because he's in no state to get back to midtown and behind the wheel of his car. Not that that's the top thing on his mind right now. His mind, which is bathing in drink thanks to Stryker's prepurchased bottles and heavy pours, is zeroed in on the club's music, which shakes the floor. Greg moves his body luxuriously under the strobing lights.

Anika, a budding stylist and friend from his past life, dances across from him. She's wearing a cropped and ribbed tank top, high-waisted black jeans. Her cat's-eye makeup is bold, daring any man who isn't her boyfriend, Josh, to approach with caution. The brown skin of her arms is dabbed with glitter that sparkles hypnotically each time the light hits at the right angle.

Josh dances behind her, both hands hooked onto her waistline. He's tall, white, and has curly golden hair that he's slicked back. A gold chain bounces around his neck as the two of them let the beat take over. Josh is a fledgling actor—kind of a family business, his dad was a sitcom star in the eighties—and he's got a couple popular jobs on his résumé, but nobody here bothers him.

That is one thing Greg misses about New York City life. The anonymity. How he can be in the loudest, most crowded room and be able to dance like a freak without anyone caring. Least of all Anika and Josh, who are now making out with an unmatched vigor. Even with the TikTok fame, Greg never had to contend with attention he didn't want—except from grabby guys at LGBTQ clubs who thought that just because Greg flaunted his body online and in person, he was a piece of meat open for manhandling.

While he could do without the Handsy Hanks, Greg concedes that his life thus far in the Lehigh Valley has been lived under a microscope. Not a closely observed one, per se, but in a smaller environment, he senses his place on the petri dish more acutely. The staff at Martin's Place is small. His social circle is small. In some ways, this makes the blows, especially emotional ones, much bigger.

Over at the booth, Stryker is pretending not to bop his head too rigorously to the music because that would be gauche. That much, at least, hasn't changed. Stryker doesn't dance. Not in the way Julien "doesn't" dance. It's not a lack of confidence or rhythm. It's a lack of desire, a reservation of energy. Stryker manspreads in his booth, above the crowd, sipping and smoldering and not engaging with anyone on the other side of the velvet rope.

Greg forgot how good it felt to be on that side of said velvet rope. The confidence floods your body until you're tingling all over. Though, once again, that could be the drink.

Greg hasn't taken his antidepressant. One, because he didn't think he'd be in New York City this late (and it is late), so he didn't bring it with him. Two, because he decided an hour or so ago that he would get absolutely shit-faced. He will be telling his therapist about neither of these decisions.

He contemplates how hurt he was when his relationship with Stryker ended, but he wasn't devastated. Somehow, Julien's silence since the airport has Greg hovering slightly north of that emotion, an emotion he desperately doesn't want to feel.

Jeez. Devastation and desperation? That's a wicked combination he hasn't felt since he arrived at the academy, and even then, their rigorous schedule and studies didn't allow him time to wallow in either.

He bets Julien is thriving out in Texas, learning and laughing it up with his classmates. There's no reason for Greg to be here marinating. Their pact was not a promise of more. He knew that. Just like he knows he can have more nights out like this one—sweaty and free and forgetful—if he takes the new position. He'll have the money to do it and people like Anika, Josh, and Stryker to do it with.

When the song ends, Josh excuses himself to go to the bathroom. Anika takes Greg's hand and snakes back to Stryker's booth. On the way, Anika pushes up onto her tiptoes and whisper-shouts, "Happy homecoming, Greg! I've missed you!"

"I've missed you, too!" he whisper-shouts back.

"Please tell me you've returned for good! Life has been a snooze since you left." Her posh British accent is extra pronounced on the word snooze. Anika was born in the UK, moved to the States for college, and then never left. Greg met her at a photo shoot he was doing for some online magazine. She was there styling influencers for the corresponding pictures. Greg found her instantly likable and glamorous. She's the one who introduced him to Stryker.

"I'm not sure yet," Greg says, legs wobbly, voice wobblier. "I'm considering a job offer here, but..." He trails off. It's not like Anika has kept in contact over the last six months. Aside from the occasional TikTok or IG comment, she's mostly been MIA from his inbox.

"Take it," she says almost too quickly. "Come back to civilization. Come back to your friends." Anika's top talent is persuasion. She convinced him to wear a tiny tank top and a silky, patterned kerchief in that first photo shoot. Nothing about Greg said silky patterned kerchief, but she maintained that it would pull together the simplistic yet classic look, and when Greg saw the final proofs, he had to admit that she'd been right. Is she right again now?

"I just moved away," he says. She leans in closer to him, clearly having a hard time hearing him over the music. "I don't know if I should come back so quickly. I'd have to find a new place overnight. You know how the rental market is out here."

"Oh, right. You're a renter," she says. It's snarky, but it's not meant to be mean. Greg knows her well enough to realize that, even if he wishes he were lucky enough to have inherited wealth and a grandparent who left him real estate in their will. "I'm sure Josh and I can help you find something quick. Anything is better than living in your cousin's guest room, right?"

Greg isn't so sure he can answer in the affirmative. He really likes Rufus. He likes having a roommate. He likes when Jessica comes over with free food and they talk for hours. He even enjoys learning about video games and DJ equipment and fun facts about the blood-brain barrier.

Quickly, Greg recalls the downside of New York City's anonymity: the loneliness. There was always a coldness to living alone in his one bedroom, they-all-look-alike-in-the-building apartment. While his room in Rufus's house is small, the paint is chipping, and the floors are creaky, the place never feels empty.

Though maybe that's because Julien is often there, filling up his bedroom with stories and passion and the smell of sex. If he returns and Julien ends their arrangement, aces his advanced sommelier exam, and leaves for greener pastures in a year, that loneliness is only going to befriend Greg again in a new place.

Fuck. What if he's not meant to have a home in any physical sense? Maybe he'll be a transient, and if that's the case, it won't matter if he packs up his life once again. It'll be good practice.

"I guess that's true," Greg finally concedes to Anika. Moving back to a bustling epicenter will undoubtedly reintroduce him to a faster pace. Perhaps he needs that.

"Of course, it's true." Anika's eyes wander over to Stryker. "It's not just me. He missed you, too."

"He could've called and said so."

"Stryker doesn't even call his parents."

"Hell, he could've texted and said so."

Anika gives Greg the most disapproving look ever. "Stryker is a knob when it comes to his emotions. You were with him for months. You know this about him. If he's a dick, it's because he's hurting, and when you left, he was on dick mode three thousand. Basically impossible to be around."

"You're not painting a great picture here," Greg says as she tugs them toward a quieter corner of the club. He feels Stryker's eyes on the back of his head.

"I lived through it. I'm painting an accurate picture." Anika shakes her head. "I've known Stryker since he was a freshman in college. I've never seen him that broken up. Honestly, since you've been gone, he's been...different?"

"Different, how?" Greg asks, even though he's suspecting he saw some of these differences earlier today at the café.

"Like he went slowly from dick mode three thousand to kind mode one hundred." Anika stops him before he can comment. "I know one hundred is not great, but for him? That's trying."

Opposites-attract is a true feature of Greg's universe. There's no other way to explain his immediate attraction to Julien—the hard edge, the challenge of it all. The difference, though, is that underneath Julien's grumpiness is a soft man who hardened against the world. Could he say the same for Stryker?

There's a possibility that the time Greg spent away from New York, the time he used to woo Julien and establish a thriving happy hour, was needed for him to return and draw back Stryker's shiny, previously impenetrable armor. Wouldn't that be nice? That the bordering-on-devastation he feels right now over being textless could be part of a larger growth arc he needs to find happiness with someone else. Someone he already knew.

"You're right," Greg says.

"Of course I'm right. Now let's get back." Anika has him by the hand again.

"Nobody dances like you, Greg Harlow." Stryker runs his tongue across the front of his perfect white teeth when they return.

Greg's eyes flick down to Stryker's full mouth. Stryker always reminded him of an actor in a luxury car commercial. Someone both rehearsed and handsome beyond compare. He's got slightly wavy hair that's always tamed, wide eyes that somehow never betray him, and a dimple in his left cheek that Greg used to enjoy running his finger along when they kissed.

Even drunk, Greg knows he shouldn't be thinking about what kissing Stryker was like. But his mind is already an unwilling passenger on a rocket to outer space.

In the beginning, kissing Stryker was like lighting a match and allowing it to burn until it touched your fingertips. Dangerous. Exciting. Toward the middle of their relationship, kissing Stryker was like throwing that match into a pile of kindling and sitting beside it on a cold winter's night. By the end, kissing Stryker was like being the match itself. Greg had to set himself on fire just to get Stryker's attention.

Greg was lucky he hadn't turned to ash before the relationship ended. Out of that luck was born resilience. Resilience that allowed him to move across state lines, accept a post at a place he'd never heard of, and rebuild his finances and his confidence.

It's not like Stryker killed somebody. He'd been mean. Everyone is mean sometimes. Hell, Julien was mean frequently.

No, that's not quite true. Julien was guarded, blunt, not mean. Often reacting to a world not built for him and his beautifully neurodiverse mind. There's a difference. But that's not the point.

The point is: people can change. Nobody is just one thing, one trait.

Julien showed him that.

Greg decides to take Stryker's compliment and, in turn, take the seat next to him in the booth.

"Thank you," Greg says, slapping on a smile. "I still have some moves left."

"Saving them for something?" Stryker asks.

"Someone."

"Who?"

"You, maybe?" Greg's hopefulness tumbles out in the question.

Stryker raises an eyebrow, pours Greg another drink. "Hmm. Smooth words there. I might be able to be swayed."

Anika guffaws. "Was that a pun, Stryker Storm?"

Stryker blushes. Greg doesn't think he's ever seen Stryker properly blush. Maybe because he's always wearing a lot of makeup, but still. It's sweet. Greg slugs back his drink, smiles to himself.

Maybe Frank Sinatra had been speaking for him when he sang, I want to be a part of it.

New York, New York is looking more and more like Greg's address once again.