Accidentally Yours

by Jerry Cole

  “Accidentally Yours”

  An M/M Gay Romance

  Jerry Cole

  © 2020

  Jerry Cole

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This book is intended for Adults (ages 18+) only. The contents may be offensive to some readers. It may contain graphic language, explicit sexual content, and adult situations. May contain scenes of unprotected sex. Please do not read this book if you are offended by content as mentioned above or if you are under the age of 18.

  Please educate yourself on safe sex practices before making potentially life-changing decisions about sex in real life. If you’re not sure where to start, see here: http://www.jerrycoleauthor.com/safe-sex-resources/.

  This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner & are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Products or brand names mentioned are trademarks of their respective holders or companies. The cover uses licensed images & are shown for illustrative purposes only. Any person(s) that may be depicted on the cover are simply models.

  Edition v1.00 (2020.02.19)

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  Special thanks to the following volunteer readers who helped with proofreading: C Mitchell, Jim Rich, RB, JayBee, Naomi W., and those who assisted but wished to be anonymous. Thank you so much for your support.

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  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter One

  When the phone rang, I was on my way back home. I’d forced myself to leave the house for the first time in three days. Friendly needed some exercise and I needed Thai food. I could’ve used an app to have a dog walker come by and have my food delivered, but it was late and I doubted that anybody who would be available to walk my dog this late at night would be the kind of person I’d want to hand my dog over to. Friendly isn’t just a beloved pet, after all. She is a certified service dog. Without her, even this short trip to the Thai takeaway down the block would have been impossible.

  So, instead of ordering an emergency dog walker and explaining to her or him that I can’t walk my own dog because being out at night sends me into a panic attack, I put on my shoes and went myself. Honestly, I was just tired of being scared. Walking to the store to pick up dinner doesn’t sound like a huge milestone for most people, but it was my first victory over my anxiety in quite a few days. And when you have chronic stress disorders, every day is made up of little victories. So, my victory was not having to tell anybody else that I can’t leave the house because I’m afraid I’ll have a panic attack.

  One of the joys of my anxiety is that the fear of people finding out I have anxiety makes me more anxious. I have actual nightmares about being “discovered” by some fans and ending up on the floor, curled in the fetal position, shivering and sweating while they watch.

  It’s much worse than it sounds, believe me.

  When I heard the phone ringing, I assumed it was Joanne, my best friend and ardent fan. She’s always checking up on me, more so lately. She’d booked my very first book signing and we were both nervous about how I would handle it. I answered without looking at the screen.

  “Dean! It’s Josh. Listen, man, my phone is dying and I need your help. Okay, please just come get me, I’m at the Oyster Bar. I’m hurt pretty bad. I’ll explain everything once you get here, just please don’t say anything to—” Click.

  The line went dead in my hand. I looked at the screen, blinking a strange number, and then down at Friendly who, as always, had a “down for whatever” face. Friendly is my ride or die bitch. In my head, she has a voice of her own, and sometimes (perhaps because I was short on real friends) I had entire conversations with her.

  “Somebody’s in trouble. I think we should help,” I said.

  “So, what are we waiting for,” she said, in my head.

  “Maybe we should just call the cops. I know where he is and I have a name.”

  “If it was that simple, he would’ve called the cops himself.”

  “The Oyster Bar isn’t far from here. If we move fast, we can get there before my food gets cold. Then we can check it out and see what to do next.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nodded.

  “I wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight thinking that I could’ve helped somebody in real trouble and I didn’t because I was scared. We can do this, right? Come on, girl. Let’s go.”

  We walked quickly. The Oyster Bar was just a few blocks away. Despite its name, it was really just a little dive bar at the end of a block of row houses. In fact, I wouldn’t eat anything they served there. It got its name on account of the big blue neon oyster in the window. Because of its location, it was an easy spot to observe from afar.

  We stood across the street, watching people pass by. Several minutes passed before I decided that there most likely wasn’t a massacre in progress inside and I should probably go inside and ask for Josh. And that’s exactly what I did. I walked right over to the bartender, who looked exactly like you would imagine a bartender in a place called the Oyster Bar would look, and asked for Josh.

  Well not so much asked as whispered in a soft and quivering voice.

  “Speak up, I don’t hear so good,” barked the bartender.

  “Um, have you seen Josh? A guy named Josh?”

  “Josh? Don’t know him. You must be looking for that guy that came in a little while ago. He looked pretty banged up. Don’t know if he’s Josh though.”

  “Oh,” I felt my anxiety build. “Where is he?”

  “He went to the bathroom a few minutes ago, he hasn’t come out yet. I was gonna go and check on him if he took much longer. The last thing I need is a stiff in the john. The health inspector is already breathing down my neck.”

  I made my way to the bathroom.

  “Hey, you can’t bring your dog in here!”

  “She’s a service dog, it’s fine,” I yelled over my shoulder. I really should’ve put her vest on before I left the house. On the other hand, I hadn’t planned on making a surprise rescue of a random stranger who called my phone.

 
; When I opened the bathroom door, the first thing I noticed was the smell. There was the usual smell of, well, bathroom...followed by something more metallic. Something that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end and my teeth clench.

  Blood.

  I forced my feet to move forward. I knew I had to move toward the smell, despite the fact that every instinct was telling me to turn and run. I was sweating and Friendly was doing her very best to block me but I couldn’t let her do her job this time. I needed to keep moving forward.

  She whimpered in frustration and I stopped and looked at her desperate expression. Somehow, seeing her worried about my well-being made my panic easier to handle. If I focused on keeping her calm, I could push my own panic down just a little.

  “I know, girl, but we need to find Josh,” I said.

  As soon as I said his name he moaned. I made my way to the last stall and found him sitting on the toilet. He looked like he’d been beaten to hell. His lip was busted, and there was a pretty nasty gash above his eye. His shirt was covered in blood, and I was too scared to see if it was from other wounds or just the one on his head. Head wounds bleed profusely, even if they aren’t serious. But what bothered me most was the fact that he wasn’t fully conscious.

  Of course, it could’ve been because he was drunk. This was a bar after all. It wouldn’t be unheard of for a patron to have a few too many and then stumble in the bathroom and injure themselves. But this didn’t seem like that was the case. He was hurt, and it looked like somebody had hurt him on purpose.

  After years in the foster care system, I was pretty good at distinguishing accidents from “accidents”.

  “Umm, Josh?”

  He groaned again. I took out my phone and waved it at him, like an idiot.

  “You called me. I’m not Dean. My name is…well, I’m not Dean. You are pretty banged up here, man. Why don’t I call you an ambulance?”

  Josh opened one, slightly less swollen eye. Or maybe he opened them both but the other was swollen shut. Either way, he made some attempt to get a good look at the stranger who was flashing the darkened screen of an old smartphone at him.

  Friendly whimpered at my side, frustrated by my refusal to back away from a situation that was obviously upsetting me, and perhaps feeling a little sorry for the guy covered in blood. I wasn’t sure. She wasn’t feeling particularly chatty.

  Josh shook his head, or at least rolled it from side to side several times and groaned again.

  “Listen, there is nothing I can do for you here,” I squeaked out, my anxiety making my voice high pitched and nasally. “But I’m sure that the police…”

  A tear escaped his eyes and I felt a sense of dread fall over me. There was something about this whole situation that felt frighteningly familiar to me. I felt sick to my stomach and instantly regretted not minding my own damned business. But now that I was here there was no way I could run away. I had to help. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t.

  I walked over and crouched down close to Josh, ignoring the smell of piss and blood. I stared at the bruised knuckles on his hand for a long minute before I finally took it and squeezed it as hard as I dared.

  “Listen, you don’t have to tell anybody what happened until you are ready. But you have to get some medical help. I don’t have the skills to help you and this isn’t the best place for it anyway. How about I call you an ambulance and I promise to wait right here with you until they get you out of here safely? Okay? I promise I won’t leave until they come.”

  Friendly walked over and gently licked his fingertips even though she wasn’t supposed to. He turned one hazel brown eye to look at her and blinked.

  “We’ll both stay.”

  He nodded gently and I made the call. I tried to stay calm and tell the dispatcher where I was, but I think I sounded like a panicky woman in the end. I didn’t let go of Josh’s hand but after a few minutes, my panic got the best of me. When the paramedics arrived, I was sitting, one hand clutching Josh’s, my knees were drawn up to my chest, taking a deep lungful of air, Friendly pressed against my body in a futile effort to comfort me. I’m sure my complete unraveling made what was already a pretty gruesome scene look that much more dramatic.

  “Is this your boyfriend?”

  I shook my head but didn’t let go of his hand. I’d made a promise. I would stay with him until he felt safe. I might not have been able to form whole sentences but I could at least keep my word.

  “What’s his name?”

  “Josh,” I forced the word out of my paralyzed throat. His name was Josh and he wasn’t my friend but he needed my help. As a second set of paramedics came over to assess my situation, I couldn’t help but wonder what kind up fucked up luck he had to need the help of a complete loser like me.

  As they put him on a gurney and rolled away, he looked over at me with his one good eye and I thought I saw something warm in it. If he wasn’t so badly beaten, he might have smiled at me, or at least said thank you. If I wasn’t hyperventilating and on the verge of tears, I might have smiled back.

  Several hours later Friendly and I caught a cab back home and I barricaded myself in the safety of my apartment. Luckily, reheated Thai food is still delicious.

  “Home again, home again. Next time I decide to get brave, remind me about this,” I said, throwing the deadbolt on my front door.

  “That was an adventure. I’m proud of you. You managed to keep going forward even though you were ready to piss your pants.”

  Friendly rested her head on my knee.

  “I hope he’s all right.”

  “You did everything you could. Let it go.”

  “Yeah. It’s none of my business.”

  Chapter Two

  I swore never to answer phone calls from numbers I didn’t recognize again. But when it rang the number looked vaguely familiar. I’d been getting a lot of calls recently from numbers that weren’t in my contacts. I was still really bad at adding and updating new numbers. I was expecting a call back from my optometrist anyway, and so, like a fool, I answered it.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello. Is this...I’m sorry I’m not sure how to pronounce your name. It’s E-A-N? Lewis?”

  “That’s me, who is this?”

  “Ugh, you might not remember me. My name is Josh. Josh Green. We met a few weeks back in a bar. This is kind of awkward.”

  Not remember him!? He was at the center of the single most terrifying and proud moment I’ve had in years. I’d been wondering what happened to him, if he recovered fully, how the hell did he end up there in the first place?

  “Y-yeah, of course, I remember you. It’s not every day I find a guy injured in a bathroom.”

  “Yeah, well it wasn’t my finest moment either,” he sounded embarrassed. Boy did I understand that feeling?

  “How are you? You were pretty banged up the last time I saw you.”

  “I’m fine. Nothing that won’t heal with time. Actually, the reason why I called you was to thank you for your help.”

  Apprehension prickled along the back of my neck.

  “How did you get my number, anyway?”

  “I got your name from the incident report. And yours was the last number I dialed that night. I took a chance and turns out it was you after all,” he sounded proud of himself, like a little kid.

  “Good job, Super Sleuth,” I cringed as soon as the words escaped my mouth. Super Sleuths was one of my favorite shows as a kid. Watching it with my mom is one of my favorite memories of her. The outburst was a reflex, though I wasn’t sure that Josh would get the reference.

  “Ha! Cute. Anyway, I’d like to invite you out for a meal or drink. I just want to shake your hand, man. You saved me and you really didn’t have to.”

  “I did, didn’t I?”

  “Brave and modest as well, I think we should get along great. So, do you have any free time in the next week or so?”

  Free time? I didn’t want to sound desperate and say “yes, al
l of my time is free because I’m two next-day deliveries away from being officially declared a shut-in and I work from home”. So instead, I said, “I think so, what’s good for you?”

  “Weekends are best. How about Saturday brunch?”

  “Brunch?”

  “Is that okay?”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been to brunch. I’ve heard of it but I can’t recall ever being invited.”

  “Oh well, you’ll love it. It’s all of your favorite breakfast foods, the ones you wish were breakfast foods but aren’t, and it’s okay to drink alcohol.”

  “So like pancakes and mojitos?”

  “Exactly!”

  I found myself smiling. He seemed to be genuinely excited about brunch with a stranger. And, maybe, I was a little excited too. It had been a while since I’d been invited anywhere. And, talking to Josh wasn’t as anxiety-inducing as other conversations with strangers had been.

  “Sounds great? Where do we go for brunch, exactly?”

  “Where do you live?”

  Red flags again, but I decided to take a chance. I didn’t have to give him my address, right? I could just tell him which neighborhood.

  “I don’t live far from the Oyster Bar.”

  “Oh,” the hesitation in his voice felt like a rejection.

  “It’s okay if you don’t want to come out this way. I once had a traumatic event behind the Panda House at the zoo. I haven’t been able to bring myself to get within a mile of that place since then.”

  “It’s okay. I can’t live in fear, right? I have to confront it sooner or later. Maybe it will look different in the light of day.”

  I shook my head. I was living proof that you could, in fact, live your life in fear and that confronting it could be crippling. But he didn’t need to hear that, and he certainly didn’t want to end up like me. Nobody did. So, I tried cracking a joke.