Too Stupid to Live(Romancelandia) (18 page)

At 3 a.m. Friday morning, he lay in bed wearing his comfort jeans with the newly redecorated pocket, his Snoopy security shirt, and his Batman Underoos, staring at his cell phone in the dim and lonely glow of the digital clock on his nightstand.

I’m truly, inarguably pathetic
.

It might be time to call in the shock troops. But Nik would be in bed asleep already.

In bed, beside his boyfriend. His gorgeous, manly, in-love-with-him boyfriend. Probably wrapped in his possessive arms.

Sam sighed.
At least Jurgen doesn’t have much chest hair
. Nik couldn’t have
everything
Sam ever wanted, after all.

On Friday morning, Ian found himself hard-pressed to say
anything
to his therapist. Janet’s pleasant expression wore thin on the edges as he stalled. “Is this the use you want to be making of your time with me?” she asked him after a particularly long silence.

Ian slumped. “Not really.”

“Is there something you don’t want to talk about?”

“Yes,” he muttered, crossing his arms on his chest.

“I’m not going to make you talk about it, but we might want to talk about
something
.” Her knuckles were going white where she clasped her hands in her lap.

That was satisfying. He smirked, just the corners of his mouth. “I don’t want to talk about anything.”

“That’s your choice, Ian.”

“I saw that guy again.”

Janet raised an interested eyebrow, but said nothing.

“I told him I just wanted sex.”

“Ah.”

“What does that mean?” Ian snapped.

“It means, ‘I see.’” He studied her suspiciously. Was she biting the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling? He wouldn’t put it above her. “I’m not judging you.”

Strangely, he believed her. His shoulders relaxed. “I’m not supposed to do that anymore,” he said. “Just hook up with guys.”

Janet looked completely serious for once. “You said you didn’t want to anymore, yes. Is this helping you to develop a personal connection to someone?”

“No.” Damn, he sounded like a sulky teenager.

“Have you thought about giving up on this man and looking—”

“I want
him
,” Ian interrupted.
Hell
. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the chair. “Okay . . . I got in the car with my buddy from college, Tierney. He’s got this fucking car, you know what I mean?” How could she possibly know what he meant? “It’s all about him being a chick magnet. He’s fostering the image of himself as a player.”

“And he’s not?” Janet asked. She would let him go on in this nonsensical direction only so long, he knew from experience.

Ian opened his eyes. “I don’t know if he is anymore. He used to be, you know? It’s why we were friends in the first place, because I was just like him. But I had something to prove.” He lifted his head slightly, to see if she got it.

“You wanted to prove you weren’t gay?”

Ian didn’t know if that was all there had been to it, but for now he shrugged. “I guess. So, I was watching Tierney pull this shit on Sunday, looking like a fucking idiot. He just looked
old
, you know?”

Janet opened her mouth, then paused. “No, I don’t know what you mean.”

Ian sat up and planted his elbows on his knees. “He looked like a lonely, thirty-something jackass trying to prove he’s still young and hot and all he needs out of life is sex.”

Janet nodded, although Ian had no clue if she got what he said.
He
didn’t get it. “I used to be that guy, and I’m looking at him and wondering if I’m still that guy. I mean, what the fuck do I know about personal relationships? My mom died when I was barely a teenager, and after that, my dad was a neglectful asshole, and I’ve just told the guy I was supposed to be
connecting
with that all I want is more sex.”

“Is that really all you want?”

“No!” Ian shot out of his chair and turned to the window. “But I don’t know if I know how to do anything else.” Shit, he’d said that out loud. He could feel the blood drain from his head.

Janet was silent until he got his breathing under control and turned to her, barely able to meet her eyes.

“Ian, what you were before doesn’t have to define what you are now, or what you will be in the future.”

He fisted one hand on his hip. “What the fuck does that
mean
?”

Janet watched him calmly. “It means you aren’t that guy now, but you have to continue to choose not to be him again.”

Ian dropped back into his chair and sighed. “Hell,” he muttered.

“That’ll be one hundred fifty dollars, please.”

“Ha. Ha.” But then he ruined his mad-on by laughing.

Friday night.

Date night, or so he’d always heard. Sam had a date with a glass of wine and the phone. He took a sip of the first and eyed the second, working up to calling Nik. Not that Nik would be anything less than sympathetic, but Sam couldn’t help feeling like a failed, pathetic fool. And then there was the issue of Jurgen overhearing everything and thinking, “I told him so.”

It sucked that Jurgen didn’t have a GPS friend-spying app on his phone. Sam had stalked—that is,
monitored
—Nik’s whereabouts all day with that app to determine where he was and when might be a good time to call him. He checked his phone one more time. Nik was at home. Chances were Jurgen was there too, but . . . yeah. He chugged the rest of his wine and reached for the phone.

The doorbell rang.

Sam’s fingers froze in midair. Who would ring his doorbell? No one rang his doorbell, his friends all knocked. He scoffed at his irrational hope that it was Ian and dropped his hand to think. It was Friday night, so the only people likely to ring his doorbell were . . .
Proselytizers
.

Hmm, hide or answer, pretending to be a mentally unstable Satan worshipper? Both options had their charms. The doorbell rang again, and Sam found himself walking toward his entryway, trying to screw his face into an off-balance expression.

But when he opened the door, no religious zealots awaited him there. Just Ian.

“Hey,” he said when Sam didn’t say anything.

“Hey,” Sam said steadily in spite of his galloping heart.

Ian ran a hand through his hair. “Um, do you want to . . .” He trailed off, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, staring at Sam’s hand on the knob.

“You never called me.”

“I was hoping you wouldn’t notice that,” Ian mumbled. He cleared his throat. “Sam, would you go out to dinner with me tonight? Please?” he added when Sam just stared.

“I guess . . . I have my own parameter.”

Ian finally looked up at him, eyes widening.

“When you say you’ll call me, you actually will.”

Ian nodded quickly. “Okay.”

“Let me change and we can go.”

Sam obviously felt confused, and probably nervous. That seemed all right to Ian, because he himself definitely was feeling confused and maybe a little bit . . . agitated. He didn’t really know what to do here. How much emotional connection was too much? How much of this stuff indicated more feeling than he really had for Sam?

By the way, how
do
you feel about Sam
?

He nearly groaned. Now was so not the time to try to figure that out, not while they were waiting for his name to be called at this restaurant Andy had recommended. She’d said her brother Dalton’s “more upscale” dates took him here. Ian could totally see some forty-year-old guy taking Andy’s twenty-something brother to wine and dine here, thinking he’d get a superlative blowjob for his trouble and all the dough he dropped at dinner.

Not that Ian actually thought that way about Dalton, but this place had that vibe.

Jesus, why had he thought this was a good idea? So he sort of needed to make up for not calling when he’d actually meant to and really did want to see Sam again. But this place? White tablecloths and reservations and freaking candlelit tables? What did Sam think it meant? Ian’s chest started to tighten up.

He shifted in his chair, trying to get more comfortable in the over-lit waiting area. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sam picking at his fingernails. He put his hand over Sam’s to get him to stop. Sam flinched when he touched him, his head hitting the back of his chair. A snort of laughter escaped Ian before he could smother it, and when he looked at Sam he could see his cheeks going from too pale to too pink.

“Are you nervous?” Ian asked. Thank fuck he wasn’t the only one.

Sam shook his head
no
, still looking at his hands. Then he slowly started nodding
yes
.

“Why?”

Sam glanced at him, then looked away. “No one’s ever taken me on a date like this.”

“No one’s ever taken you on a date?” His voice rose, and Sam’s cheeks flushed darker.

“Of course I’ve been on dates,” he hissed. “Just not to a place with white tablecloths and candlelight, that’s all. And we’re wearing
jeans
.”

“Hell, most of the guys here are wearing jeans. The only people dressed up are the waiters.” And the chicken hawks. Ian had intended to bluff his way through this, but if Sam could be honest, so could he. “I’ve never taken a date to a place like this.” He’d barely had
any
dates, with guys at least.

The look on Sam’s face was worth every honest syllable. “You haven’t?” he asked. “I’m it?”

Oh Jesus, now Ian felt himself blushing. He cleared his throat but met Sam’s eyes. “Yeah. You’re it.” Sam ducked his head again, looking still pink and maybe embarrassed, but for a different reason, Ian hoped.

Or wait, did he?
Hell
.

They were seated before Sam spoke again. “So, you’ve never been here before?”

Ian studied his menu, seeing nothing. “Nope.”

Unfortunately, Sam continued his line of questioning. Ian tried not to squirm. “How did you find it?”

Ian sighed and put down his menu. “I asked Andy—my assistant, remember?” Sam nodded. “I asked her if there was a place in town where I could take you and not be, um, conspicuous.”

“Conspicuous,” Sam repeated flatly.

Hell, had he fucked up somehow? “Yeah. Stick out, you know.”

“I know what it means.” He didn’t snap it out, so maybe Ian hadn’t screwed up. “How would your assistant know where two guys might want to go on a date?”

Ian picked up his menu again, but couldn’t really concentrate on it yet. “Her little brother’s gay. She said some of his dates have taken him here.”

When he peeked over the top of his menu, he could see Sam’s mouth forming a silent “oh” while he looked around curiously. Ian smiled to himself and finally managed to read his menu.

“They have coquilles Saint Jacques,” he said, surprised.

“Scallops? You like scallops?” Sam looked at him strangely.

“Yeah.”

Sam kept staring at him. “You know, you aren’t really what you seemed at first,” he finally said. “I thought you’d be this working-class guy who drinks beer and watches ESPN2 hoping women’s gymnastics is on. But you’re into guys and you can say coquilles Saint Jacques with a quasi-French accent.”

Ian smirked. “I like beer and gymnastics, but I’m hoping the men’s team is competing.”