by Peter Styles
Nothing new appeared.
Puzzled, he glanced over at the time and realized just how late it was. Everyone else in most of NYC was ending their work day, or had already done so. Things were winding down, and he realized for the first time how quiet the office had grown. There weren’t even any voices filtering up from the lower levels, and he couldn’t hear the busy shuffling of his employees moving around outside his door. Gone was the scent of coffee, and gone was the day. The light from outside had mellowed even since the last time he checked, no longer afternoon but heading fully into evening.
He checked his phone. Nothing from Jeremiah. Not yet, anyway. However, now that he was aware of the late hour he could start preparing for when he got that text, so he spent a few minutes returning his belongings to their proper places. As he shut down his computer, his pocket buzzed. He didn’t need to look, but he did. Of course it was Jeremiah.
Time to go then. I want to be there and waiting.
He stepped outside of his office and locked it behind him and was surprised to still see his secretary sitting at her own desk. “Susan? Time to go home.”
“In a minute,” she said. “I’m in the middle of something important.”
He had never known Susan to be late for anything, and that included leaving. Confused, he moved around behind her to look at her screen. As expected, it was turned off.
“You’re right,” he said. “That looks incredibly important. Don’t let me interrupt it.”
He moved off again, but slowly, so that when she looked up at him he was still within sight. “Boss?”
“Yeah?” he said, turning back around. He had known she wanted to talk. Of course she did. People usually did. “What is it?”
“Can I talk to you for a moment?”
“You already are,” he replied. All thoughts of his upcoming date were out of his mind as he moved to come stand back beside her desk, leaning one hip on the sturdy furniture. “And we’re both off company time, so you can hit me with whatever you want.”
His secretary sighed and just looked down at her hands. “I guess that’s good since it has nothing to do with business. My boyfriend just dumped me through email about an hour ago. Can you believe it? An email. While I’m at work. The bastard.”
Chris winced. “That’s rough, Sue. I’m sorry.”
“It’s not like I didn’t see it coming, but… it’s like he doesn’t want me to work on my career! He says I love working more than I love him.” Her hands fisted in her lap. “It didn’t use to be true, but…”
As much as the employees of his company were family, Chris didn’t touch them. He never knew when someone would cross the line, or think that he had; this was a different sort of circumstance, and so now he lay one hand on Susan’s shoulder and patted it. “So, by being a jerk, he saved you a lot of heartbreak down the road. It’s rough now but later on, you’ll find someone much better who cheers for you instead of keeping you on the sidelines.”
“Is that a sports analogy?” Susan raised one eyebrow.
“It was the best I could think of,” he admitted. They both laughed softly. It was something of an in-joke that he had banned anything sports-related in the building due to the fact that his rival, Markus Worth, had played football.
“Chris, why has no woman snatched you up yet?”
He glanced around the office but found no escape from the question. “I guess that’d be because I still think girls are icky.”
“You’re… oh. Sorry. I didn’t mean to assume.”
He smiled a little. “It doesn’t bother me. I still appreciate the thought. And just to let you know, I’m kind of in the same boat as you. I didn’t really think I had time for anything personal, but I just met someone and… They’re special. One of the ones worth waiting for, I think. I just have to figure out how to balance everything.”
Susan looked amused now. “I knew there had to be a reason you were leaving so early. Well, I manage your schedule so… if you ever need any changes, let me know.”
“I will. Thank you. Are you going to be okay?”
“I think I will. And I think you’re right. Have a good night, boss.”
“You too. Maybe think about going home though.”
He left her giggling and went over to the stairs, leaping down them two at a time because he had no patience for the elevator. He didn’t regret stopping to talk to Susan at all—he hoped someone would do the same for him if he was in that situation—but he was very aware now that he had to hurry or else risk getting caught up in traffic.
Traffic wasn’t terrible, but he did end up arriving at the college campus a little late. The traffic there was considerably worse than out on the streets, which was saying something. He stayed patient, though. All these college students improving their lives and looking forward to the future, he supposed he could spare an extra minute or two letting them pull out in front of him.
He followed the signs and found the building where Jeremiah had said he would be. And he really was there, looking like a ghost where he stood in the shadows just outside the edge of the street light. Dusk pressed at the far corners of the sky, creating a mellow play of light and shadow that accented Jeremiah’s features. The other man was beautiful.
In fact, he was more beautiful than he had been the past two times Chris saw him and the reason was simple: this was Jeremiah’s element. Light glinted off of a pair of reading glasses perched on the bridge of his nose. He wore a t-shirt and jeans that were rumpled, accentuating the whole sleepy-eyed, sexy, academic look. With his dark, messy hair all fluffed up, as if he’d only just woken up…
He was downright dreamy.
Chris parked the car and waved through the window. Jeremiah didn’t return it, although he did hurry to open the door and climb inside.
“Sorry I’m late,” Chris said. “I had to talk to my secretary.”
Jeremiah fumbled with his seat belt. “I thought you weren’t going to talk business with me?”
“I’m not.” Chris shifted out of park and drove off around the bend to rejoin the main road that went around the campus and its parking lots. “It wasn’t business between us.”
“But you’re the boss.”
“So?” Chris shrugged. “What’s the point of having a company and working toward something if the connections you make along the way are only skin deep? I want my employees to make connections. I want my managers to become friends, and I want my interns to go back to school and tell their friends all about us. I want my clients to realize that this is more than just a partnership. It’s a family.”
Jeremiah had gone very quiet as Chris spoke, but now he lifted his head and looked hard at him. Chris couldn’t really turn to look at the other, not while he was driving, so he settled for just raising his eyebrows and basking in the warmth of that gaze. “What is it?”
“You sound really passionate about all this. More than just a normal boss would, I mean. Isn’t it just business to you?”
“It should be,” Chris grunted. He spit the words out as if they were venom. He hated their taste. “At least, that’s what a lot of people would say. However, I’ve learned that, for a whole hell of a lot of people, work is all they’ve got. And work is always going to be work. It isn’t a party. But… where is the harm in giving people something else in their lives? If they need it. Or even if they don’t. We’re a family, and I don’t hire people who I wouldn’t want to be in my family.”
“You’re a noble person,” Jeremiah said, quietly. His voice was full of admiration, which touched Chris to his very core. He felt warm, deep in his stomach, and almost hot in other certain places. “I mean that. It’s hard to find people like that anymore. And I think… I have to apologize. I’m sorry, Chris.”’
The warmth he felt suddenly relocated and became ice crawling down his spine, chilling him. That sentence never had a good meaning. “What are you apologizing for?”
His hands were tight on the steering wheel. He didn’t even know wh
ere he was driving anymore, or where he had wanted to head in the first place.
“I had you pegged pretty wrongly when we first met.”
“Oh?” While that seemed serious, it wasn’t at all what he’d been afraid of. He relaxed, slumping down a little. “How is that?”
“I’d kind of heard some things about you from other people that were pretty rude. And, I realize now, pretty wrong. So, I’m sorry. You’re a terrific guy.”
A terrific guy.
“I’m aware of my reputation,” he said. “People thinking I have some big secret that lets me get the upper hand, right? And then they take out the rest of their frustrations on me by saying I’m causing whatever else is wrong with them. I’m just starting to think that the biggest problem people have is just not taking responsibility for themselves. And my big secret? I care. That’s all.” And sometimes, he knew, he cared too much about all the wrong things. His big secret seemed to him to be a big weakness, sometimes.
“Well, I’m glad that you care!” Jeremiah burst out. “I’m glad I was wrong about you, and I’m glad that I met you! You’re not who I thought and that’s a good thing, for once. You make me feel comfortable.”
Chris said nothing, because words seemed so insignificant in response to that sort of praise. His heart swelled in his chest, and he hoped Jeremiah would appreciate the silence for what it was. Only after a few minutes of aimless driving did he realize he still had no idea where he was headed.
“Did you have somewhere in particular you wanted to get pizza from?” he asked.
“Can I actually get a raincheck on that pizza?” Jeremiah looked down at his hands. “And the very next restaurant you see is fine with me. I don’t care. I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
Chris spotted a neon sign in the distance and headed for it, squinting to make out what the wording might be. “You should bring a snack bar or something in your bag, Jeremiah. It’s not good for your brain to be hungry all day.”
“Well, it hasn’t been all day…”
“But it’s been long enough. If you won’t get yourself something to keep in your bag, I guess I’ll just have to do it.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
Chris pulled into the parking lot of the restaurant he had seen from afar, which he could now see was called La Casa. “I don’t have to do a lot of things,” he retorted. “But I do it anyway because I care. And also because I can.”
“Yes, boss,” Jeremiah said, sarcastically.
They both got out of the car and headed inside the restaurant. A short, compact Latino man greeted them. “How many?”
“Only us two.”
The host led them over to a booth in the corner. “A server will be along shortly. Thank you for choosing to dine with us at such a late hour.”
Chris hid his amusement at the practiced words. They were delivered in the painstaking manner of someone who clearly had a firm grasp on English and wanted to prove it. The deliberate squashing of the accent only seemed to accentuate it. It wouldn’t be nice to point that out though. He was saved from having to do so by Jeremiah leaning toward him and whispering, “Did you see his moustache?”
“I didn’t,” Chris whispered back.
“It was straight out of a 70s gangster film!”
Chris chuckled and they settled in, looking over the menu while being served drinks and the customary chips and salsa. Jeremiah set into those with a vengeance. Chris watched the shape of his mouth, his full lips reddened slightly by the heat of the sauce. Then, to his surprise, Jeremiah picked up a bottle of hot sauce that sat at the edge of the table and patted a liberal amount into the salsa bowl.
“You like it hot? I’m surprised.”
Jeremiah looked up with his mouth full of protruding chip corners, and Chris laughed again.
When their server returned, he ordered the first thing he saw. He had only been pretending to read the menu, instead choosing to watch Jeremiah peruse the pages. The other man ordered a Mexican pizza, and their orders were placed and delivered again in a timely fashion. And no wonder, since they were the only customers.
“This looks really good,” Jeremiah said, looking down at his “pizza” with his eyes glowing and full of hunger.
After inspecting his own meal, Chris was obliged to agree. He had a flattened chicken breast smothered in red sauce and beans, served with a side of rice and tortillas. Even though he was the one who had eaten lunch, he felt his stomach give a heavy lurch and water filled his mouth.
“What’s that?”
Chris followed Jeremiah’s pointing finger to a square piece of cornbread perched on the very edge of his place. “A little extra, I guess. It looks like cornbread.”
“But it’s… shiny.” Jeremiah said, through a mouthful of his pizza, a smudge of refried beans at the corner of his mouth. Chris was momentarily fascinated by it, resisting the urge to reach out with his thumb and wipe the smudge away. He might accidentally twitch at the end of it, brushing his touch against the other man’s soft lower lip. And then Jeremiah’s tongue flicked out, and Chris felt the heat from earlier return even stronger than before. His groin ached, and he moved his legs closer together to try and fight against the hardening of his dick, as if he might be at risk of being discovered.
“Chris? You okay?”
He snapped back to himself instantly, with a little shudder. “Sorry. It’s been a long day.”
And I think I might be losing control. My feelings are growing way too fast.
Desperate for something else to focus on, he brought his eyes back to the little square of cornbread. Jeremiah was right. It was shiny, strangely sticky-looking. Covered in honey, maybe?
He reached down and picked it up, surprised at how absolutely heavy it was and not sticky at all. “Huh. It feels kind of greasy.”
Curiosity got the best of him and he brought it up to his mouth to take a nibble. A rich, incredibly sweet taste flooded across his tongue. It tasted like cornbread, if cornbread had decided to be cake for a day.
“Wow. That’s intense.”
“Really?” Jeremiah grinned and leaned forward over his dinner plate. “Let me try.”
“Here.” Chris held out the piece of cornbread, politely offering a corner that he hadn’t bitten from.
Jeremiah’s dark eyes slid up to his, and Chris wondered if he’d never been fed by another person before. It was such an ordinary thing to do, wasn’t it? If someone was interested in a bite of the food someone else had on their plate, it was completely normal to stab it with your fork and offer it over. How had he never experienced this before?
There was a first time for everything though. He watched as a look of determination—maybe more than the situation called for—crossed the other man’s face. His mouth opened, lips parting softly to take the edge of the offering in his mouth. Chris laughed, incredulous, as a look of wonder and delight spread across his companion’s face.
“It’s better than sex!”
Then Jeremiah snapped back and put his hand over his mouth with his eyes wide. Realization of what he had said set in and he lifted up his other hand now.
Chris reached out and pulled his hands down, laying them again on the table. He couldn’t help smiling. His face hurt from smiling so much, reminding him of how rarely he was genuinely amused. “Well, if you like it so much, you can have it.”
Jeremiah accepted it, but the look on his face was one of wariness and shock, as if he didn’t quite trust himself.
Don’t do this, honey. Don’t ruin this for both of us. Stay opened up.
Unfortunately, Jeremiah remained closed off for the rest of their dinner date. Chris didn’t press him. Clearly, a line had been crossed here and he would have to be sensitive to it in the future.
With dinner finished, they headed back out to the car. Chris opened the door for his companion, watching as he slid inside before walking back around to his own side. “Do you want to do anything else tonight?”
Silence, and th
en a shake of the head. “Thank you for dinner but I’m pretty tired. I have some work I need to do when I get home too, before I can sleep.”
“Of course.”
The drive back to the college was somehow longer than before. Chris just focused on navigating, since he wasn’t used to this area.
“I’m parked over there.” Jeremiah pointed.
Would you like it if I thought it’s so endearing that you point like a little kid?
Chris pulled up beside Jeremiah’s vehicle, which was in a spot way back in the shadows of the corner where trees were planted nearby. There was writing on the side of the vehicle but he didn’t care enough to see what it actually said.
“Thank you again,” Jeremiah said and got out of the car.
I can let you go. Or I can push my limits here. I feel it. Do you?
Before he could stop himself, he turned off the engine and stepped out of the car. Jeremiah turned back toward him, confusion and a bit of fright on his face. “What are you doing?”
Chris reached out and snagged onto the other’s shoulders, leaning forward and pressing their lips together hard. Jeremiah tasted of sweet cornbread and tension, and his lips were so soft. Where they touched, it burned. It tingled on his lips and burned deep down in the core of his stomach and lower still. With a gasp, he pulled away from Jeremiah and threw himself back into the car. He didn’t look. He didn’t dare breathe or think. He just needed to get away as fast as possible, before he could regret what he had done.
Oh, but he was already regretting it. And even as he peeled away as fast as he could with his foot jammed down on the pedal, he couldn’t help but to look in the rearview mirror. He knew he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t stop himself.
Jeremiah stood in the place where Chris left him, glued to the spot. As Chris watched, one hand gently lifted up to touch his lips.
Feeling his burning desire pressing against his inner thigh, Chris shuddered and looked back out at the road. All he could hope was that it had been the right thing to do. The other was certainly stunned… but was it a good sort of stunned?