Going Up! (5 page)

Then he turned and time zoomed him away to be lost in the crowd, and,
dammit,
Zach didn’t even have a chance to tell him that he had an event that night to attend for his family, and that he couldn’t get out of it.

He made a stop on his way home anyway, and on his way down, while dressed in his tux and everything, he stopped at the fourteenth floor. He hesitated before knocking on the door, but while he was standing there a couple came up behind him.

They were young—Sean’s age—and dressed casually. The young man had nice jeans and a dress-up shirt, and the young woman wore a pretty summer dress in lime and turquoise. Her hair was platinum blonde, and if she hadn’t been wearing bright-green contacts, he never would have recognized her as Sean’s roommate.

“Uhm, Wendy?” he said hesitantly, and her eyes widened in recognition.

“Yeah, uhm…. Yeah. You’re the guy—the one from the elevator Sean’s obsessed with. What can I do for you?”

Zach fought off the urge to dance—obsessed with? Really? Because Zach planned his entire
day
around thirty seconds in the elevator. “Here—uhm, Sean invited me, but I didn’t have a chance to tell him I couldn’t make it.” He thrust the two six-packs of expensive microbrew beer at Wendy and her date, and gave a nervous little head bob. “Tell him it sounds like fun though!”

And with that he turned and fled for the elevator.

He’d just gotten in and the doors were starting to close when he heard his name. Sean was running for the elevator full tilt, and Zach put his arm against the doors and let him in.

They closed behind Sean who laughed slightly and moved to the back of the elevator to lean against the mirror with Zach. He was wearing jeans and a dress shirt in black and red. It looked
horrible
with his complexion, and Zach thought that Sean should get his friend Wendy to help him with his clothes.

“You couldn’t make it,” Sean said, sounding breathless and disappointed.

“I’m overdressed anyway,” Zach pointed out.

“It was such a good gesture.” Sean pouted. “You couldn’t blow off one fundraiser?”

“Not this one,” Zach said, turning his head sideways and smiling at Sean from under his lashes. “It’s the one that might get me evicted.”

“I’d hate for you to get evicted,” Sean said, but he was looking at Zach, his blue eyes wide and hopeful, and his voice lacked conviction. “I’d never see you again.”

“You know, there’s these things called cell—”

Ding!

Neither of them moved.

“You keep wearing tuxedos and going places without me,” Sean complained, and now he sounded breathless for a whole other reason.

“I hate tuxedos.” They were standing so close. Sean must have downed a beer or two, but his breath wasn’t unpleasant—just hoppy. He smelled a little sweaty so he’d probably been dancing—Zach would bet Sean was an atrocious dancer, because he moved like he was made of elbows, but Zach still wanted to see it happen.

“Then change into jeans and come to my party,” Sean begged plaintively.

This time Zach leaned into the kiss, and their lips met softly for a minute. He pulled away. “Someday,” he said softly, “I’m going to take you to one of these. I’ll buy you a tuxedo, and pick out your tie. I’ll escort you in and we can dance.”

Sean’s laugh was almost more sober than Zach’s dreamy voice. “I’d settle for having you come to my flat for a beer.”

“That too.”

“Are you guys getting out?”

Zach pulled himself back to the present and sighed. “I will see you around,” he said softly, and Sean shook his head.

“God, I hope so.”

He walked out and the irritated father, bemused mother, and baby in a stroller all crowded in.

The door closed behind him.

Ding!

G
OLDEN
G
ATE
Park at night, even in the summer, was cold. He’d forgotten his scarf in his tizzy about the beer, and the breeze blowing through the amphitheater could have frozen the nads off an ice wizard. After the cellist performed (and Zach hoped they found a way to heat her and to keep her instrument from reacting to the salt air, because
dayum,
whose idea was this?) Zach found one of the gas-powered heat lamps. He huddled under it, wished heartily for Leah’s tipsy company, nursed his gratis mug of coffee (in a new insulated mug with his father’s face on it, no less!) and waited for the obligatory fly-by.

It took a half-an-hour for his parents to work their way around the reception and get to him. He almost hated it worse when his mother was there—her smile seemed genuine, but he was never really sure with her.

“Zach, darling—why didn’t you sit with us?” she asked, taking his hands in hers and going in to kiss his cheek. Her dress was a sort of sequined taffeta, and it whispered loudly when she leaned. She turned at the last moment so that the flash of the camera could blind them both and Zach turned back to her and tried to make his five minutes count.

“Because I got here late,” he said truthfully. Only by a few moments, really, but he hadn’t wanted to put his parents out. “I had to talk to a friend before I left. You’ve been unavailable for brunch.”

“I’m sorry, darling,” his mother said, moueing sweetly for the camera. “The last few months have been a whirlwind—it looks like your father actually has a shot this time!”

“Which is why I wanted to talk to you,” Zach said, and suddenly his father wanted in the conversation.

“Why—are you finally interested in helping with the campaign?” He shook his son’s hand and smiled as the camera went off. It was like they didn’t even have to think about it—every reaction went with a pose. Well, let’s see what pose they chose for this.

“No, actually. I, uhm, I wanted to talk to you about something personal, but you never got back to me, so I thought I’d warn you in case it hit the news, which it might do since you didn’t want to talk to me personally.”

Uh-oh. That got his parents’ attention. “Mr. Crosby, could you leave us a moment?”

Gordon Driscoll dismissed his aide, and the man—short, balding, fortyish and invisible—ushered the photographer away as he went.

“What have you done?” his mother asked, her matronly smile all but gone.

“Nothing. But I’d really like to go out on a date, and given that I’m gay, and with you two, it’s actually a meet-the-press moment.”

There was a sudden moment of shock, and Zach hopped up and down on his toes. Suddenly he wished he’d brought Leah, because she would have been
so
proud of that.

“You’re not gay,” his father told him dismissively.

“Yes, yes I am.”

“But you date women!” his mother protested.

“Name one!”

They both stopped, mouths slightly open, eyes wide.

“But—but your father’s campaign….” his mother sputtered. “How could you do this to him!”

“I can’t wait for your campaign to clear so I can get laid!” Zach snapped, and he was loud enough for most of the beautiful people in the expensive clothes to turn around to see what the fuss was about.

“What do you want from us?” his father asked coldly. “You come here, in a public venue and—”

Okay. Well, at least Zach knew what to expect. “All I want to know,” he said, interrupting, “is if I need to move either my residence or my business. And I need to know if my employees lose their discount if they rent from one of your properties.
They
need to know, as soon as possible, so there’s that too. Have your lawyers contact me. But tell them to watch their language, because if you try to make this about the gay, I’ll fight and I’ll fight ugly.”

And with that he bowed slightly and turned around and walked away.

“Y
OU
DID
what
?”

He grimaced at Leah, and scrubbed his face with his hands. Leah was scanning the papers that had just been delivered complete with vellum envelope and gold seal, and he knew what they said, because the lawyers had called him on a Sunday and told him what they said. While his father
couldn’t
evict him or change his rent or even refuse to renew his lease for the apartment, the same did not go for the business address, and Zach was going to have to spend his next month frantically tracking down a new building that his firm could afford, and then moving four years of accrued stuff from one building to the other.

“I outed myself to my family?” Zach said, wrinkling his nose. “I’m sorry?”

Leah tapped a foot encased in a frighteningly bright-fuchsia-and-gold pump, and scraped her fingers through her lime-colored hair. “Wow.
Wow.
I mean, I thought you were kidding. I mean—I mean, you go to those benefits, and everyone’s so pretty, and there’s champagne in a fucking fountain—I had no idea!”

Zach shrugged, telling himself it didn’t hurt. It couldn’t hurt. Why would it hurt? If he had to be penciled into his parents’ schedule to out himself, odds were good they weren’t close.

“Well, you know. I guess the train really was a fair assessment of them,” he said, and tried not to let his voice shake. “But, I’m sorry it had to be
here.
Here is all of you guys. At least if it was just me, I could find my own damned apartment.” His apartment really was huge, he thought dismally. He could use a smaller apartment.

“Why don’t you move?” Leah asked, and Zach gave her a weak smile, unsupported by his heart.

“I like the view.”

She sighed and moved close enough to pat his cheek. “Well, good. Because I think you just went to a whole lot of time and expense to make that view your personal property, baby. And Jenn’s gonna be pissed, because she was enjoying the hell out of Frisbee too.”

Zach’s smile grew sounder, even if it was still crooked. “You know,” he said meditatively, “I haven’t been to Monterey since I was a kid. Before dad started running for office, we had a cottage off of Pebble Beach. I really loved it there. Maybe, we get this done, you, me, Jenn, we drive down to Monterey and spend a weekend. Watch whales, play on the beach—just, you know.”

“Get out of the city and go somewhere fun?” Leah said, and because they were in his office—his nice, big, important looking office with the dark-paneled wood and the cream-colored carpeting—she could give him a brief peck on the cheek. He was getting used to that from her. He was getting used to having friends. He was even getting used to the idea that Sean might want to see him sometime out of the elevator.

“Yeah,” he said with dignity. “Go be somewhere outside the box.”

“Good,” she said. “I think you’ve been in that box for way too long.”

He wasn’t sure how he would have made it through the next two months without her.

The first month sucked hard enough—he had to find the new space, make a bid, secure the loan, all while servicing his clients, whom he absolutely
couldn’t
let down. How could he look at the teacher with four kids who’d had her schedule completely rearranged when she was on pregnancy leave and tell her that she wasn’t important enough to fight for? How about the gay teacher who’d been let go midsemester because a student had walked in on him during his prep period while he was talking on the phone to his husband about who was going to pick the dog up from the veterinarian, and who suddenly found himself charged with unprofessional conduct for exposing his personal life? What about the strict old battleax whose students had decided to sabotage her career by refusing to take her STAR tests, simply because she refused to be bought?

Zach had grown up with privilege, but he’d never had anyone to fight for him. Now, as he fought for his business in a way he didn’t know he’d ever had the guts to, he realized how proud he was to fight for people who didn’t get enough as it was.

And, in the middle of this, he had to tell his staff why they were moving.

Since more than one of his employees was not only from the LGBT community, but
actively
in the community, he was pretty sure nobody at the firm was going to shun the boss for being gay.

But explaining that Daddy was just that much of a douche bag was humiliating.

Oddly enough, Leah helped with that too—but probably not in any way she’d planned.

On the first day of unpaid overtime, when the whole office was in packing the least-necessary stuff and preparing to move it, he called them all in to explain why exactly they’d lost their lease on the pricey commercial building they occupied now, and why they were moving to something a lot less opulent—and for some of them, a lot farther away.

“I’ve heard the rumors,” he said apologetically, because Leah had been the one to pass the rumors up to him. “You’re worried about mismanagement; you’re worried about missing funds. The truth is, we were in this building on the sufferance of my father—I’m Gordon Driscoll’s kid, and he owns the building. I just came out to my parents—”

The smattering of applause surprised him, but he managed to bow through his blush anyway.

“—and their response was to revoke my business lease. Fortunately, the language around your discounts for those of you who are renting from a Driscoll property is not affected—believe me, that was the first thing I looked for, since I rent from him too.” Polite laughter, and some exchanged glances of relief. “Anyway—I’m sorry my personal life—”

“What personal life?” Edward, the first lawyer he’d ever hired, said from the back. Edward was a nice guy, with long Midwestern features, dark hair, and blue eyes, who was also wild for his college professor boyfriend, and had a way of being kind when clients were more hysterical than helpful.

“Well, yeah, that was sort of the point,” Zach said, and the laughter, again, was helpful. “Anyway—”

And that was when he saw the cash changing hands, most of it ending up with Leah.

“You had a pool on me?” he asked, amused. “You had inside information!”

Leah smirked. They were all in jeans today, but hers were lime green. Her T-shirt was fuchsia. “Yeah, but the pool started before you and me got tight.
And
I waited until you came out to the office yourself to collect, so karmically, I’m good.” He grinned at her, loving all of her color and vibrancy. When he thought of his life earlier this year, it had been all charcoal gray, like his suits, but color and motion—that was attractive. It’s why he loved… uhm….