Holding on to Hope (2 page)

Leslie stroked his arm. “Are you sure it wasn’t just a dream? Maybe you imagined it all.” That explanation made more sense.

“It wasn’t a dream, Les,” he snapped at her. “Believe me, I know.”

“How could you know for sure? You don’t even remember a single thing about this mysterious guy that you were with. For all I know, you may still be a fucking virgin.”

“Uh… I know I am not because my ass has been hurting like hell.”

Leslie pursed her lips, and her face hurt more as she tried not to burst out laughing. She had never imagined Brad being on the receiving end when it came to sex. Finally, when she couldn’t contain it any longer, she guffawed aloud, shaking her head at a mortified Brad.

“Les, come on, this is not funny,” he whined and got off the bed. “I am feeling damn helpless here. I know I don’t remember his name, or where he lives, or what he does, or even what he looks like exactly.” Leslie’s laugh transformed into soft giggles before subsiding. She gazed at her best friend as he paced in the room, blabbering. “But it doesn’t mean I am going to give up on finding him again. He was my first, Les. So this can’t be it. There has to be more, right? We have to meet again, and I am not waiting years for the fates to show mercy on me.
I
am going to make it happen, to find what’s in store for me and this guy.”

Leslie stayed silent. She didn’t usually hold back on her honest opinions just because it would hurt the other person. But Brad wasn’t just any person. He was her best friend. They had been pretty tight for five long years, never leaving each other’s side. She knew him inside out. She was perfectly aware of the strong emotions he was experiencing toward this mysterious guy. She knew he wanted to see him again.

But she was afraid her friend was going to end up hurt at the end of this impossible journey. There was a possibility this mysterious guy never even existed, or maybe Brad had slept with someone who expected nothing more from him. In either circumstance, Leslie knew that when Brad learned the real truth, he would be devastated.

“Say something, Les.” Brad stopped moving and looked at her desperately. “I could do with a sensible opinion right now.”

“I don’t know, Brad. I mean,” she stammered. “You don’t know where he lives. Where would you go looking for him?”

“The nightclub,” he said, dropping on his knees in front of her and grinning with increasing excitement. “Maybe the people in that club know him. He could be one of their regulars, right?”

“Or he could have also been a first-timer, like you. You don’t know for sure, Brad.” She watched her friend sulking. Brad got to his feet again and resumed pacing around the room. “Look, even if we go to that nightclub looking for him, what are we gonna say? ‘Hey, we are looking for this guy who maybe comes to your bar regularly. We aren’t sure what he looks like or what his name is, but maybe you can still tell us something about him.’” Leslie shook her head, frowning deeply. “Admit it, you can’t find your guy with so little details known to you.”

“There’s one thing, though.” He turned swiftly to face her. “There is this bronze pendant that keeps popping in my mind every time I think about him. I am pretty sure he was wearing it around his neck all night.”

“So what?” Leslie shrugged. “There must be dozens of men wearing the same kind of pendant….”

“Les, this pendant was kind of unique. It was like a sword with flowers and creeping vines around it. You don’t see anyone wearing that around here, do you? If you ask me, it looked like an ancestral piece. I bet it has caught some attention.”

“Okay,” Leslie doubted this information was going to be helpful for Brad in finding this guy. “But how do you plan on getting yourself into that nightclub again? You are still underage.”

Brad shrugged. “I can ask Ian to come with me.” In the next moment, though, something seemed to click in his mind, and Leslie saw his face lighting up like a Christmas tree. “Ian! He was with me all night. Maybe he saw me leaving with that guy. Come on!”

Leslie uncrossed her legs and jerked forward, watching his hurried movements. “W-wait! What?” She watched him collecting his coat from the hanger and approaching the door.

“We are going to Ian’s right now,” he called over his shoulder as he opened the door.

“For God’s sake, Brad, it’s six thirty in the morning! You can’t go around waking the whole city just to find your boy toy. Sheesh! Grow up!”

Brad stopped and smiled. “I don’t care what time it is. I have to find my man, Les, and I have to find him now.” He said it with such intensity that it tugged at her heartstrings. “And you, my dear Les, are coming along with me.”

“What if I don’t want to?” Leslie whimpered. She was tired, and being part of a search party wasn’t something that she was up for. All she wanted to do was go back to her apartment and sleep with Pat in her bed.

However, her friend gave an evil laugh before turning toward the door. “I will be waiting for you by the car, so hurry up!” he called behind him.

After lots of cursing and muttering death threats at Brad, Leslie followed his lead, still assured that nothing good was going to come out of it. Yet a small part of her heart prayed for a miracle.

I
AN
LIVED
in a nice, rented apartment, a couple of miles away from the NYU campus. It had hardly taken any time for them to reach their destination, finding very little traffic at such an early hour. The city had definitely woken up by then but not by much.

As Brad pulled his old Civic to the curb, Leslie announced, “I think I will stay inside the car.”

“Les.” Brad smiled knowingly. “Come on. He isn’t going to bite you.”

She watched as he removed the car keys before stepping out, and she sighed. “He might as well,” Leslie mumbled under her breath as she got out.

Brad and Ian shared almost all the same classes together in college. That was the reason Leslie had come to know Ian. Until then, she had no idea that there was an Ian Anderson in one of her classes—Economics 101. She would have loved to keep it that way, but Brad used to talk about this guy so much that her mind had started working overtime. She had initially thought there was something going on between those two, and so, Leslie had decided to meet him.

It turned out, however, that it was the biggest mistake of her life.

“Ian!” Brad kept banging on the door. “Open up, man. It’s important.”

Leslie nervously looked around the neighborhood. She feared if this went on for too long, there would be police cars lined up on the street in no time.

Thankfully—or not—the door opened within a few minutes.

“Geez, Parker!” A guy with a familiar face and black Mohawk appeared at the door. His voice sounded groggy, and his dark eyes kept squinting, trying to adjust to the brightness outside.

Leslie almost felt his pain. “What the fuck are you….” He turned his gaze to her, and his eyes flew open wide. His scowling face broke into a huge grin, unknowingly showing off some filthy piece of food stuck between his front teeth. Seeing something like that, Leslie wanted to throw up. “Les, hey! It’s funny. I just had a dream about you.”

“Really?” She kept a polite smile on her face, even though she wanted to punch his face. “What are the odds?”

“It was weird; I mean, you were in my house crying because you broke up with your boyfriend, and I was being there for you, like a good friend.” Leslie could see right through that angelic face he was putting on.

“Damn right it’s weird,” she said before shooting daggers with her eyes at Brad. Her blond-haired friend dug his hands inside his jean pocket as he stood and gazed at her, giving her an apologetic look. It wasn’t his fault. Ian was the one who kept hitting on her, even though he knew she had Pat in her life. He wouldn’t stop trying, no matter what Leslie did to dissuade him, and that was why she couldn’t forgive Brad for getting her into this mess. If it hadn’t been for him, she wouldn’t have ever met this guy.

Ian blatantly came on to her every time their paths crossed. It had to stop. It was this thought that made Leslie realize something rash that she could do to Ian.

Leslie stepped up beside Brad and patted Ian’s bulky arms. His grin widened, ticking her off, but she still didn’t let her smile waver. “My relationship with Pat is going pretty strong so it’s all cool. But hey, it’s really great to see someone worrying about me so much. I’ve always wanted a nice, caring brother like you, Ian.”

Brad had drawn his lips tight together and stared with an amused expression on his face. Ian, on the other hand, seemed utterly mortified.

He cleared his throat several times before he said, “Why don’t you guys come in?” Ian cast his head down before turning and going inside.

Leslie caught Brad looking at her accusingly and shrugged, entering Ian’s house.

His apartment looked quite spacious, with minimal furniture around. Leslie never took Ian to be a neat freak so it surprised her to find everything so organized. A couple of antique paintings hanging on the walls intrigued her. Those looked like they were painted eons ago.

“Would you two like some coffee?” Ian’s question averted her attention. “I think I, for one, need some caffeine in my system.”

She noticed the wrinkles forming on his temples before he thumped his own head with a fist. “Sure.” Leslie gave a nod. She could do with some coffee too.

Brad went to sit on the couch and rubbed his knees. “I’m good,” he told Ian as he gazed around.

Saying that he was
good
was an understatement. However hard he tried to hide it, Leslie could sense his ecstasy; the adrenaline rush that he was experiencing. She knew how badly he wanted to question Ian right now. If he could, Brad would have surely caught hold of that big guy and held him down, demanding answers.

His perky mood cleared one doubt in her mind, though—Brad couldn’t have been totally wasted the previous night. Otherwise, he would have shown at least some signs of a major hangover similar to what Ian was displaying at the moment. But Brad looked perfectly normal. Not to mention, he was up so early in the morning.

That deduction, however, made several other questions in Leslie’s mind pop up.

Ian appeared back in the living room holding two mugs in his hands—one he handed to her with a shy smile before settling down in a chair. “So what’s this about?” he asked, looking between them. Leslie had occupied the space next to Brad on the couch, leaned back, getting comfortable, before taking a sip of her coffee. After all, she didn’t have to do the talking.

“Ian,” Brad started cautiously. “Do you remember when exactly I left the nightclub last night?”

Ian took a sip of his hot drink and furrowed his brows. “Not really. Why?”

“How could you not remember?” he asked with a frown on his face.

“Dude, you didn’t tell me you were leaving. How was I supposed to know? Jon, Bryce, and the others left pretty early, so I figured you took off too.”

Brad sighed. “Well, I met this guy at the club last night….”

“And he finally does it, ladies and gentlemen.” Leslie watched Ian grinning from ear to ear, and she couldn’t help the giggle. “About time, Parker, about fucking time,” he said, raising his coffee mug to him.

“Don’t get too excited. You haven’t even heard the interesting part yet,” Leslie said, nudging her friend playfully. Brad blushed. “This guy he met? Well, he and Brad did do the deed all right, but our friend here doesn’t remember anything else other than that.”

“What do you mean?” Ian looked lost.

“Well, it’s complicated.” Brad made a face, telling him with a bit of hesitation. “I don’t remember who that guy was.”

“Good for you.”

“No, you don’t understand, Ian.” Brad shifted sideways in his seat to properly face the dark-haired guy. “It’s
not
good. It’s anything but good. That guy meant something to me, I am sure of it. Why else would I sleep with him?”

“Uh… because you were kind of horny last night?” Ian chuckled. “I remember how desperate you were to get laid last night. You know, Les, he was flirting with every man in that nightclub. He didn’t even spare the straight ones.”

Leslie could only imagine it, and the scene playing in her mind was hilarious. “Really now?” She asked, looking at Brad amusedly.

She could swear Brad’s face couldn’t have gotten any redder than it already was. “You aren’t listening to me, guys. That guy was special.” He desperately tried to make them understand. “Okay, I admit I was a bit horny. I mean, I am gonna turn twenty-one in a few months, and I still have no one in my life. Valentine’s Day is always a painful reminder of how lonely I am. I always dream of the perfect world or the perfect man to be with, and I began to think that it’s only my fantasy, a pipedream. So I wanted it badly.”

There was a moment of silence in the room. Ian and Leslie exchanged looks. It was the first time she, or even Ian, had seen Brad so vulnerable. Right until then, Leslie thought she knew him quite well, but she was proved wrong. Her friend had a side to him that she was completely unaware of.

As they exchanged looks, both she and Ian silently agreed not to tease him over the matter anymore. “I do remember hitting on every guy at that club, and I do remember many of them flirting back too. But I didn’t go home with any of them. No, I went with this guy. This one guy that took my breath away in an instant, and I gave in to my desires for
him
.”

Leslie gulped down the last sip of her coffee and placed it on the table in front of her. She then took his hand and squeezed it. “I’m sure he was special, Brad.”

“He was.” Brad smiled sadly and faced Ian. Leslie noticed him staring at Brad with some weird intensity. “Ian, was there anyone specific I was talking to? Maybe you saw….”

“I don’t know.” Ian replied, and Brad grunted, falling back on the couch. Leslie watched as Ian sat his mug on the coffee table and leaned forward. “Look, I was partying all night with the ho—with the crowd.” She caught him looking at her from the corner of his eyes, and she rolled her eyes. “There were so many people last night. You were there, Brad. You saw how crowded the fucking dance floor was. To be honest, after you left to get a drink, I didn’t see you at all. And that was quite early in the night.”