by Quin Perin
Sam, acrobatic possibly due to his long legs, hopped the edge of the desk and wedged his tall, thin body between Donovan and his task. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but you have to lighten up if we’re going to do this.”
“Do … this?”
“You’re going through a shitty divorce and want to explore your options. Okay, explore all over me.”
“Again. Why?”
“Mm, well …” He tilted his head back and forth. “I like a challenge. And honestly? Our fights turn me on. I was definitely rocking wood when you left my office Monday.”
Donovan blushed at the remembrance of his similar state.
It would have been so easy to say no, pretend nothing had ever happened, and pretend Donovan’s life was going to be okay. But what had Sam said earlier? Depression was easy. Trying to live again was hard, and nothing felt as lively as Sam Shelby.
“No one at work can know,” Donovan said.
“No shit, Sherlock. Think I was born yesterday?” He bopped Donovan on the nose. “Race you home.”
Back at Donovan’s apartment, Sam didn’t wait for an invitation. As soon as Donovan unlocked the door, Sam walked inside, dropped his messenger bag in the foyer, and kicked off his shoes. He even shimmied out of his ugly yellow jacket—which wasn’t so ugly, actually, because Sam was wearing it.
Donovan could admit that now. All the ridiculous clothes—the colorful sweaters and decorative socks—all those things Donovan used to judge actually suited Sam right down to his toes. He just looked right in wacky colors. If Donovan was honest, Sam looked right all the time … surprisingly, even while craning his head left and right, studying all the empty spaces in Donovan’s once cozy home.
“Did a thief steal all your shit?”
“Divorce,” Donovan said. He still remembered the day Anna called and asked him to leave the house. She and her architect boyfriend had been coming over to get her stuff. When he’d come home, he’d stared at the empty places where his wife’s favorite pictures used to be, the empty space in their closet, and felt nothing.
“Oh,” Sam said. “Right.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and continued his ocular investigation. “Holy shit, is that a Michael Halliday?” He scurried to the premiere piece of art in Donovan’s house, a square abstract canvas, perfectly lit and situated between two wide windows that currently looked out onto a black evening sky.
Halliday had gone to Ohio State, too, just like Donovan, although of an earlier era. Donovan had met the artist just once, but they’d talked painting. They shared a similar abstract vision. Once he could afford it, buying a Halliday had been the very first big purchase he’d made for the apartment he shared with his wife.
“Anna hated it,” he said quietly.
“Who’s … Oh, Anna. Well, she was a fucking idiot.”
Donovan chuckled.
Sam turned around and grabbed Donovan’s wrist before pulling him toward the sofa. With strength not foreshadowed by Sam’s skinny arms, he shoved Donovan onto the couch and started to straddle his lap—but Donovan stopped him with hands on his hips.
“Slow,” he said.
Sam sighed but sat next to him instead of right in his lap. He leaned forward and kissed under the edge of Donovan’s jaw. “I do love a clean shave.”
Which reminded Donovan … “Hey, wait, don’t you have a boyfriend?”
“Huh?”
“Beard guy.” The guy who’d been with Sam the first time Donovan saw him in The 216.
“Beard guy?” Sam paused. “Oh, beard guy.” Laughed. “That wasn’t my boyfriend. That was just a friend.”
“He seemed awfully … friendly.”
“Okay, fine, he’s a fuck buddy, but we’re not exclusive.” Sam moved in to kiss Donovan’s mouth, but Donovan backed away.
“How many fuck buddies do you have?”
Sam groaned and slumped back against the sofa. “Does it matter?”
“I don’t know. I guess not. You said you’re bisexual, so that means you sleep with girls, also?”
Sam nodded. “They prefer to be called women, but yes.”
Donovan put his hand on Sam’s thigh and rubbed the knobby edges of his knee. “So do you have a female fuck buddy right now, too?”
Sam smirked. “Maybe. What’s it to ya?”
“Do they all know about each other?”
“I’m telling you, aren’t I?”
“We might be on the same couch, Sam, but we live in very different worlds.”
Apparently done with that conversation, Sam sat up and folded his long legs beneath him until he knelt in front of Donovan on the couch. He took Donovan’s face in his hands, and although Donovan expected a kiss—was ready for one—Sam studied him instead. “Did you know that you have a perfectly symmetrical face?”
He leaned into the warmth of Sam’s palms. “That’s impossible.”
“Rare but not impossible. I’ve drawn you six times now, and every time, you’re perfectly symmetrical, and I don’t fuck up.” He tongued the inside of his cheek and lowered his eyebrows.
Donovan blushed under the continued scrutiny. “What are you doing?”
“Seeing what I’ve missed. I’ve never been this close to you before. See, I knew it. Your right eye is a little bit lighter than your left.”
“Wait. You’ve drawn me six times?” He remembered the one from Sam’s desk but just the one.
Sam moved Donovan’s head back and forth, and Donovan let him. “Sure. You have excellent cheekbones.”
“Look who’s talking.”
“You don’t need to butter me up, Donovan. I know I’m hot.” He bit his own bottom lip before clicking his tongue. “Goddamn it.”
“What?”
“You have a freckle on your upper lip, and it’s not in any of my drawings. I never noticed it before.”
Donovan didn’t know where to put his hands, so he put them on Sam’s bent knees. “I saw the one drawing on your desk. I looked miserable. Do I always look like that?”
“Do you know that you hate your job?”
“Excuse me?”
“You hate your job.”
“I do not.”
“Yeah, you do.” Finally, Sam leaned forward and kissed him. This completely insane thing he did with his tongue made Donovan forget everything else—even the manila envelope he’d left in his desk at work.
A week later, Donovan walked into the offices of Stoker and Steele whistling. Monica raised an eyebrow when he walked by her desk. She followed him into his office, her heels clicking behind him, before asking, “Are you high?”
“Not unless the barista slipped something magical in my coffee.” He winked, and Monica backed against his office door as if he had fangs.
“Donovan. What the hell?” She adjusted her thick, black cat-eye glasses.
He sifted through memos on his desk. “Something wrong?”
“You tell me. You’ve been acting like Mr. Rogers’ tall, handsome cousin lately.”
He laughed and sat down. “Just in a good mood is all.”
“Well, cut it out. It’s creepy.” She finally approached, apparently deciding he wasn’t going to murder her. “You have a meeting with Sam Shelby this morning. Be nice. I like him. He’s funny.”
He was a lot more than funny, which Donovan had thoroughly investigated. Well, not quite thoroughly. The past few nights had been spent on Donovan’s couch, making out with Sam. Although Donovan was intimately familiar with Sam’s mouth, he still didn’t know what to do with his hands—except dig them into Sam’s thick hair. He’d cupped his lower back a couple times, but anything below the waist was still uncharted territory, and Sam still wasn’t allowed to climb onto Donovan’s lap, no matter what he said.
“I love how big you are.”
“We’re the same height.”
“Yeah, but you’re, like, twice my size. You could pin me down and do whatever you wanted. I’d let you.”
Yes, he knew Sam’s mouth—and it was filthy.<
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The rest of Sam was pretty much a mystery, although Donovan now knew that Sam was a fan more of surrealism than abstract art. He loved noir cinema, the artist Rene Magritte, and pizza with pineapple. And he was smart—so fucking smart. He’d been a triple major at Cleveland State: design, art history, and marketing, with a minor in classics.
Monica, still standing in his office, knocked her knuckles on the edge of his desk. “Hello?”
“Yeah, meeting with Sam. Okay. Now, stop annoying me.”
“There’s the Donovan we all know and love.” She sashayed away, the door clicking shut behind her.
He had about twenty minutes before Sam would barrel into his office, talking a mile a minute. They’d so far kept up the icy exterior at work—which wasn’t difficult. Sam was disrespectful at work, and although that was fun on Donovan’s couch, it pissed him off in a professional setting.
Donovan clicked the mouse to wake his computer and startled when, as expected, someone barreled into his office—but it was too early … and the person barreling inside was not Sam Shelby but Donovan’s wife.
“Anna.” He almost knocked the chair over when he stood.
She was still beautiful—with her impeccable makeup and long, golden hair loose around her shoulders—and yet somehow lacking. Her hazel eyes were not Sam’s bright blue, and her shining hair had nothing on dark brown devil-may-care curls.
He was so busy missing the feel of Sam’s spine under his fingers that he forgot to listen until Anna said, “Are you even listening?”
“Sorry. I’m sorry.” He rounded his desk, and there it was: the familiar scent of her floral perfume. Donovan had always loved that scent, but now, all he could think about was cedar and spice. “Anna, I—”
“Save it.” She held up her hand, still covered in a creamy leather glove. “Why the hell haven’t you signed the paperwork, Donovan?”
The fucking paperwork. Jesus, he hadn’t even opened the law office envelope. Making out with Sam Shelby had erased his past, or so he thought. Legally, he was still very much married to a woman who’d had an affair and fallen in love with someone else.
“Shit,” he said just as the office door swung open behind them.
Sam was already talking as he walked inside, head buried in his phone. “Hey, I got back some of the proofs on the—” He stopped abruptly when he noticed Anna. “Ah, sorry. I, uh, Monica … I think she’s getting coffee, so I just came in, and … um. Hello?”
Anna’s face morphed into her famed professional grin. “Sam Shelby. I just read about that award you won. Impressive stuff.” She took off her gloves to shake his hand. “I’m Anna Cooper.”
“Anna … oh.” He glanced at Donovan. “Right. Hi.”
“Sam, get out.”
“But, I was—”
“Out!” Donovan shouted.
Sam blinked and retreated faster than a storm-spun ocean wave.
Anna glared. “You didn’t have to yell at the kid.”
“He’s not a kid,” Donovan snapped.
“No, he’s an incredibly talented graphic designer who half the city would like to steal. Christ, do you always treat him like that?”
“None of your damn business.” He turned his back on her and took refuge behind his desk. “I’ll send the paperwork to my lawyer immediately and sign once everything is approved.”
“Approved?” She smacked his desk and loomed over it. “We spent hours in law offices talking through all the details. Just sign the paperwork, Donovan.”
“I want to make sure I’m getting what I deserve. After all, you cheated on me. You walked out on me.”
“Because you’d become this thing!” She flung her hands at him. “I don’t even recognize you. Do you remember ever being happy? Do you remember laughing?” She sobbed once before struggling to swallow her pain. “I loved you so much for so long, and then you …” She shook her head and pulled on her gloves. “You became this miserable son of a bitch. I feel bad for Monica and Sam Shelby and everyone else in your life because they still have to put up with you, but I’m finished. Sign the paperwork, and I never want to see you again.”
She left him with his silence, although the ghosts of her words lingered like cobwebs in corners. He wondered if they always would.
Sam wanted to be pinned down? Well, Donovan would pin him down.
Two hours after leaving work, Donovan found himself—as usual—making out with Sam on his couch. Unusually, however, they were lying down while making out. Donovan knelt between Sam’s wide-open thighs and kissed the younger man. Hard. He pulled on Sam’s shaggy hair. He practically clawed at his coworker until Sam turned his head away and said, “Hey, easy.”
Donovan didn’t listen, kept kissing.
Sam shoved at his shoulders. “Donovan, fuck, man, hey!”
In response, Donovan sucked Sam’s bottom lip into his mouth and let it go. “I thought you would like it rough.”
“I love it rough, but you’re angry. There’s a goddamn difference.”
Donovan leaned away long enough to take off his suit coat and throw it across the room before diving back at Sam’s mouth. He’d never wanted to outright devour the guy before, but right then, he wanted to do more than devour. He wanted to destroy. He gripped Sam’s hair, tugged until Sam’s head jerked back, and plunged for his lips—which was when Sam rammed the base of his palm right into Donovan’s sternum.
The air whooshed from Donovan’s lungs, right before Sam gave a staunch push. They both went flying and ended up on the floor, Donovan on his back with Sam kneeling across his hips. “Cut it the fuck out!” he shouted while Donovan tried to breathe. “You’re acting out because your wife showed up at the office, but that’s got nothing to do with me. It’s not my fault. Jesus.” He ran both hands through his hair and cussed some more. “Did you sign the paperwork?”
Donovan, now recovered, leaned up on his elbows. “Yes, I signed the paperwork! Not that it’s any of your business.”
“It’s my business if the direct result is you trying to choke me with your tongue.”
“Christ, fighting with you really is a turn on.”
Sam paused. “Right?” He leaned down and kissed Donovan with heat the temperature of the sun. Within moments, they were a tangle of limbs wrapped together on the cold, wooden floor of Donovan’s condo.
Sam tasted like afternoon coffee. He smelled delicious, as usual—that hint of cedar mixed with a fresh-scented hair product and laundry detergent. His skinny waist felt excellent in Donovan’s huge hands—hands that apparently had a mind of their own because, before he even made a conscious thought, his hands were on Sam’s ass.
Sam moaned into his mouth and rocked his hips forward, which was when Donovan felt the poke of something hard against his abdomen and froze. He stopped kissing Sam. He stopped moving altogether. For a moment, he even forgot to breathe.
Sam huffed hot breath against his face. “Um, so that’s my dick.”
Donovan let go of him and flopped onto his back. He panted at the ceiling and didn’t look at Sam.
“Right.” Sam stood and pulled at his clothes, rearranging his oversized gray sweater into a semblance of order. “Gay-for-you,” he muttered, shuffling around the room, collecting his messenger bag and coat. “Bullshit. What the fuck was I thinking?”
Donovan said nothing and stayed on the floor, staring at the ceiling.
Sam didn’t say goodbye when he left, but he did slam the door behind him.
Donovan eventually remembered how to move. He stood up slowly and loosened his tie. He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, damp with Sam’s spit but not chafed because seemingly the only thing Sam Shelby wasn’t good at was facial hair.
In a lust and heartbreak haze, he wandered down the long hallway to his secret room. As soon as he opened the door, he smelled the comforting scent of oils. He flipped on the light to reveal easels, half-finished paintings. The silence was not so ominous back here. Instead, the room felt as though
it’d been waiting.
Without thought, he stood in front of a painting he never thought he would finish, covered in loud splotches of reds and blues, meaningless shapes that had meaning once upon a time. He picked up a pencil and started sketching in a corner as yet untouched. He sketched and sketched and then painted until he eventually fell asleep on the floor.
Unprofessional. So they’d had a stupid fight. That was no reason for Sam to call in sick the following day.
“I guess he sounded terrible on the phone,” Monica said.
As if it would be difficult for Sam to change his already raspy (sexy) voice into a pathetic mewl. Nope, the guy was definitely lying. If anyone should have called in sick, it was Donovan, who’d spent a fitful night on the floor of his studio—who currently had a bit of a scratchy throat, thank you, and who was in no mood to deal with a very tall child’s temper tantrum.
Donovan was just angry enough to do something ridiculous. He went to HR and threatened his way into getting Sam’s address. Of course they lived in the same building, but Donovan had never been to Sam’s place. He found out he lived two floors down.
As soon as the clock struck five, Donovan sprinted from his office and speed-walked through the chilly wind of downtown Cleveland. Inside The 216, the elevator took too long, so he cussed at it. When it finally dinged open on Sam’s floor, he tried not to literally stomp, but it was a losing battle. Sam wanted to hide? Well, Donovan wouldn’t let him. He pounded on Sam’s door and waited. After ten seconds of waiting, he pounded again.
“Sam, open the fucking door!”
The door unlocked and … opened … to reveal Sam in sweat pants with a huge comforter over his head and draped over his shoulders. He peered through a tiny opening in the fabric and sniffed. “Why are you here?” Then, an alarming cough made his shoulders hunch forward. He weaved and almost fell until Donovan put a hand on his arm to steady him.
“Oh, my God, you’re really sick.” Donovan stepped inside and closed the door behind him as Sam stumbled across the floor in socks and face-planted onto the couch.