by E M Lindsey
“Faux leather,” Sage corrected. “Kat would kill me otherwise.”
Will laughed. “Fair enough. Faux leather. You could totally pull it off.”
Sage felt himself blushing, and he looked away. “I’ve been seriously thinking about it. I kind of always wanted one growing up, but my dad wouldn’t have been caught dead having sons who associated with biker culture.” He couldn’t help the sneering tone in his voice, and he squeezed his eyes shut at the thought of his old man. “I think a lot of the things I do are a fuck you to him—which seems stupid when I say it out loud. I don’t think he has any idea about half the shit I get up to. And if he did, don’t think he’d care.”
“If it makes you feel better,” Will said, his voice carrying over the slight breeze, “there’s no harm in it. As long as it’s stuff that makes you happy.”
Sage found himself smiling, leaning his head against Will’s temple. “I’m glad we did this.”
“Me too, but I’m sorry I ruined your drinking night,” Will replied.
Sage turned to look at him, catching his gaze and not letting go. “You didn’t ruin anything. This is a lot better than getting wasted and watching my friends make idiots of themselves. I love them, but they’re a bit much sometimes.”
Will huffed a laugh and shook his head. “I know that feeling. I’m not close with a lot of people anymore, but most of my friends in college were like that. Loved them anyway, but it got exhausting.” He pressed his hip closer to Sage’s and looked up at the blanket of stars. “Can I ask you something?”
“Shoot,” Sage replied.
“You’re just a really great guy, and very good looking. Why uh…why aren’t you dating anyone?”
Sage felt the question hit him like a physical blow, and part of him wanted to just open up and tell Will everything. The other, more frightened part of himself wasn’t ready to say it aloud just yet. Whenever he did, whenever he told the truth, all anyone ever saw after that was pity, and he couldn’t stand the thought of that coming from Will.
“I have a complicated past, and I have trouble meeting people. Or well, I have trouble sticking around people,” he clarified with a half laugh. “It’s getting easier though.” He trailed off, not ready to elaborate, but Will seemed to understand.
He smiled again and shifted, so he was nearly tucked up under Sage’s arm. “I get it.”
They let the silence carry through the rest of the night, and only when Will had to pick up Molly, did they agree to head back.
Chapter Eleven
Hanging out became something of a routine for them, and Will found himself craving those nights with Sage. Molly didn’t always head over to Kat and Tony’s house—most of the time she chose to stay with a girl from her class who lived right up the street, and Will was happy to indulge because it meant Molly was feeling secure enough to start making close friends. It had been an issue in therapy, the way she’d shut out a lot of her peers, and the therapist encouraged Will to expand his social life as a way of encouraging Molly to expand hers.
Will needed very little excuse to spend more time with Sage, who seemed just as eager to go on evening hikes, or take a ride on the bike to the top of the hill. Sometimes they did dinner, and occasionally Sage did want to unwind at Ruby’s with a couple of beers, but Will truly didn’t mind indulging him from time to time.
Sage still spent hours a week helping Molly with her math, but now there was something apart from that. Now, Will found himself getting closer, feeling deeper. Sage seemed reluctant to cross any lines with him, but as the weeks turned into months, the lines started to blur a bit.
Sometimes they’d cook at Will’s place, and Sage would brush against him, or take him by the hip as he reached for a jar of spice. Sometimes their hands would touch on the top of the table, and neither one of them rushed to pull away. It felt like they were moving toward something, and Will was exercising as much patience as he could to get there.
He’d long since stopped denying what he wanted, and he was just hoping Sage would catch up with him.
“I need like a big-ass burrito tonight,” Sage told him. “Do you mind if we get food? I need to eat every single one of my feelings.”
Will chuckled as he wiped his hands on a towel. “That sounds good. I haven’t had much today—just kind of picked at the discards from baking. I could use a good meal.”
“Is Molls coming with?” Sage asked.
By this point, Will knew Sage would be content either way. It was obvious Sage cared about the girl, and not just as some means of getting into Will’s pants. In fact, Will might have even encouraged it considering how slow Sage moved, though he knew the guy had been through something and he didn’t want to push him.
“She’s heading to her friend’s house,” Will told him, pulling his apron off and nodding to Aaron who was setting up the afternoon pastries. “She’s sleeping over since it’s Friday, so I don’t have to rush home.”
“Perfect,” Sage said. He glanced down at his jeans which were covered in ink stains and sighed. “I should change though. I feel kind of nasty. You want to come with?”
Will had never been invited to Sage’s place before. It had seemed a little sacrosanct and he hadn’t wanted to ask, but he couldn’t help his curiosity about how the other man lived. “Sure. Let me just grab my keys and we can take off.”
“Meet you out back,” Sage told him, then headed out the front door.
Will used every trick in the book to calm his heart rate, wondering if maybe this was the night. Maybe Sage felt ready, maybe he wanted Will enough to push past his barriers. If anything, Will hoped maybe Sage would at least talk about his past—enough so that Will knew what he was working with and if there was even a chance for them to be more than just friends. He didn’t want to have false hope, but he wanted to feel like wherever they ended up, he’d be on solid ground.
Just as he reached his office, his phone began to ring. The number on the screen wasn’t familiar, and knowing Molly was with a friend, he immediately answered. “Hello?”
“Damn, is this what it takes for you to answer my calls?” came the familiar voice Will thought he’d been finally rid of.
He paused with his hand outstretched, reaching for the back door, and felt his entire body go tense. “You need to stop calling me, Joe. I thought I made it obvious we were through.”
“What, by ghosting?” Joe demanded. “How the fuck is that obvious?”
“Fine,” Will breathed out as he felt his anxiety ratchet up, “you’re right. I’ll make it very clear. We’re through. I don’t want to date you, I don’t want to see you. I have enough going on in my life without your crap in it, okay? Enough.”
“Fuck you, you fucking—”
He didn’t get the last bit out. Will jammed his finger on the screen, ending the call, and he shoved his phone into his pocket. It rang almost immediately, and he squeezed his eyes shut, hating that he couldn’t just turn it off for the night.
He was all-but shaking as he walked up to Sage’s car, and the other man immediately noticed, crossing the distance between them and resting his huge hands on Will’s shoulders. “What happened?”
Before Will could answer, his phone started ringing again, and he closed his eyes against the sound. “I…look, maybe it’s better if we do this another night.”
Sage just squeezed him a little tighter. “How about you talk to me first, and then we can figure it out. I don’t think—”
He was cut off by another round of calls, and Will felt his stomach clench. “It’s my ex. I had his number blocked, but he got a new one—or a burner or something—and now he won’t stop.”
“And you can’t turn it off,” Sage said with realization in his tone. “Because of Molly.”
Will swallowed thickly and nodded. “Yeah. And I know if I block him, he’ll just get another one.”
Worrying his bottom lip, Sage finally pulled away and jammed his hand into his pocket. “Here,” he said, shoving his phone at Will, “text
her friend’s parents and tell them that there’s something wrong with your phone and if they need to reach you, they can do it here. Then you can turn that shit off and you can forget about your ex for a little bit.”
Will looked at him. “That’s sweet of you, but that’s not going to stop him.”
“I get that, but you can’t go through this all night, Will. Let me help. At least for a little while.” He reached for him again, gently curling his hand around Will’s bicep. “Molly’s safe, your ex doesn’t know where you are right now, and I’m here. It’s okay to do this.”
Licking his lips, he stared at Sage’s phone resting against his palm, and as Joe began yet another round of calls, he made the decision. It only took a few minutes to get replies from both parents, and when he turned his phone off, his entire body sagged with relief.
“Good?” Sage asked with a tiny smile.
Will chuckled. “Yeah.” He tried to hand the phone back, but Sage reached out and curled Will’s fingers back around it. “Keep it for the night. No one ever calls me unless it’s an emergency, and I’ll be with you.”
I’ll be with you. The words echoed in his head, and Will let himself feel the warmth of them. He didn’t reply, but he did follow Sage to his car, and felt like a weight had been lifted off him as they pulled onto the main street and drove in the opposite direction of Will’s house.
Sage lived in a cute little duplex that looked older than the town itself. It had four units, a chain-link fence covered in vines, and a canopy of trees which were clearly never trimmed. There was an otherworldly feel about it, and Will found himself immediately in love with the place.
Sage led the way down the little path to his front door, jamming his key into the lock. The door stuck a little as he tried to push his way inside, but eventually he got it open, and Will stepped in after him. The first thing he noticed was how full it was. There were shelves upon shelves overflowing with books, more furniture than the living room should rightfully hold, and every bit of wall space was covered in either photographs or paintings which Will assumed had been done by Sage’s brother.
Sage gave a little awkward shuffle of his feet as Will glanced around, and he cleared his throat. “It’s…a lot, I know. I have a lot of crap.”
“It’s not what I expected,” Will had to admit. Sage seemed like such a utilitarian sort of guy, and he expected the place to be post-modern plain and minimalist. This looked like someone’s eccentric aunt who made patchwork skirts and grew homemade herbs.
“I uh…yeah, it’s kind of a thing I have,” Sage told him. “My therapist says it’s a way of overcompensating from the time I spent on the streets.” He reached out and fingered what looked like the end of a homemade afghan. “I used to be really bad with food. Before I moved here, I would kind of hoard it, then end up giving away tons of it to the food bank at the end of the month. I’ve worked through a lot of it, but the habits are kind of hard to break.”
“I like it,” Will told him. When Sage cast him a skeptical look, Will shook his head and took a step closer to him. “Seriously, it’s not what I expected, but that’s what I love about it. It doesn’t seem like it’s you at first, but give it a minute, and I can see you in every single corner of this space. It’s great.”
Sage’s cheeks went faintly pink and he ducked his head. “Thanks. Uh…maybe one day next week you and Molls can come over for pizza. I can show you my studio and stuff.”
“I’d really like that,” Will told him softly, and felt a rush of warmth when Sage reached out and touched his fingers for a brief caress.
Sage pulled himself away abruptly, startling Will. “I should uh…I’m gonna go change.” He gave a firm nod, then hurried down the small hallway and into his room.
When the door shut, Will found himself wandering to the walls covered in photos, and he was able to immediately recognize all the people from the tattoo shop. Even the ones he hadn’t met yet were obvious from their ink—the group of them in a large van, at the beach, in hiking gear. As he looked further, the photos started to change. Sage was in some of them, looking younger and more fresh-faced. A few of them had an unfamiliar guy, and the way Sage stood with him said there was an intimacy that went beyond friendship.
He was attractive, nearly a foot shorter than Sage with rich black hair and sharp blue eyes. The most striking thing was the fact that Sage had almost no ink on his body—a few pieces here or there, and all amateurish, unlike the works of art he had now. Will found himself almost desperate to ask, but it was obvious when the man stopped appearing in newer photos, he was gone.
Will couldn’t help but wonder if it was a bad break-up. Maybe Sage wasn’t over it. Maybe that was why he was so gun-shy when it came to asking for more. He heard the bedroom door open, and he took several steps back, pretending like he was looking at Sage’s math textbook collection instead of the photos. Sage gave him a funny look, but he brushed it aside and approached with a small grin.
“So,” Will said, nudging him, “burritos?”
Sage grinned. “Hell yes. And a marg. I need a few sips of tequila to deal with this day.”
Will frowned as he followed Sage back out of the apartment and caught his elbow just as they approached the fence. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Sage sighed, rubbing at his face. “It’s…it’s kind of stupid.”
“I doubt it,” Will said. “Plus, you just witnessed my emotional freak-out over my ex, so trust me, I’m in no place to judge.”
Sage chuckled as they got in the car, and he didn’t say anything until they were back on the road. “It’s just my dad.” His grip on the wheel went white-knuckle, and he blew out a puff of air. “He’s dying.”
“Oh,” Will breathed out. “I’m…”
“Yeah, no, don’t say sorry,” Sage insisted, taking a corner a little sharper than he should have. “He’s a nasty old bastard and he deserves worse than to go out from liver failure. My brother’s been dealing with his care, and I think my dad said something tonight to really fuck him up. I only saw Derek for a minute, but he looked really bad.”
Will shook his head. “I’m so sorry. He deserves better.”
“Yeah, he fucking does,” Sage insisted. They pulled into the restaurant parking lot and Will was relieved to see it wasn’t overly busy just yet. Switching the car off, he sat there for a long minute, staring out the windshield. “I wish I could do something. And it’s my fault Derek’s going through this.”
Will frowned. “What? How could it be your fault?”
Sage dragged both hands down his face with a groan. “Because when the hospice called us to tell us that there wasn’t anything else they could do for my dad, I told Derek I wanted no part of it. And he…he fucking agreed that I should stay out of it. But that old man tortured Derek for our entire childhood, and now Derek’s spending the old man’s remaining years reliving the shit we ran from. All because I was too much of a coward to help shoulder the burden.”
“Look,” Will said, measuring his tone carefully, “I don’t know your brother well, but I don’t think he’d offer if he wasn’t strong enough to handle it.”
Sage’s mouth curved into a smile, but there was a bitterness to it. “You’re not wrong. He’s one of the strongest people I’ve ever met, and I don’t think this is going to break him. I just can’t help but feel like this was some test from the universe, and I failed.”
“I think the universe has more important things to worry about than testing people,” Will said carefully.
Sage gave him a side-eye, then threw his head back and laughed. “Fuck. You know, you’re probably right.”
Will couldn’t help his own grin, and he reached for the door handle. “Come on. Let’s get a burrito and some tequila in you. I think you’ll feel better after that.”
“I hope to god you’re right, man,” Sage said, but he was grinning more freely as he followed Will inside.
Chapter Twelve
Sage contemplated ordering that
tequila, but as they took their table and he watched the dim light play over Will’s soft features, he ordered a water instead. Yes, the burn of alcohol and the faint buzz always made everything feel less pressing, but he didn’t want to dull his senses. Not now, not when he was finally letting himself feel for the first time in so damn long.
He got a look from Will when he skipped the margarita, but the moment passed, and they ordered their meals. The conversation flowed as naturally as it ever had, the two of them laughing, talking shit, making fun of themselves. It felt like he’d known Will for all of his life, and he struggled to recall a time where he didn’t have that bright smile and soft eyes in his periphery.
The food went down easily, and just as the server cleared everything away, Sage leaned in close. “Do you want to get out of here? We can grab the bike and go for a ride.”
Will licked his lips, then nodded, tipping his head in to mirror him. The gesture was intimate—more intimate than Sage was expecting, but neither of them pulled back. “Yeah. Let’s get out of here for a while.”
Sage’s palms and fingers tingled, a desperate desire to reach up and cup Will’s cheek, to draw him in for a kiss. He was so far gone, so deep in wanting, he didn’t know how to find his way back out again. Hell, he didn’t want to. Their gazes were locked, just inches apart, and Sage bit down on his bottom lip. His stomach erupted into butterflies when he saw the way Will’s pupils dilated, and his lips burned with the desire to close the distance between them.
“Sage,” Will murmured.
Sage’s hand crept over, just the very tips of his fingers touching the edge of Will’s arm. “Should I, uh…get the bike?” He wanted to kiss him, badly, but he also didn’t want his first kiss since Ted to be in a restaurant with old guac on their breath. Even if it would be perfect, even if it would be so them, he wanted to make it special.
Will swallowed thickly, then nodded. He was the first to pull back, and Sage recognized that a significant moment had just passed them by. He felt a rush of paranoia, like maybe he’d let go of something good and he’d never get the chance again, but he couldn’t let himself think like that.