Fifteen Shades of Gay (For Pay) (4 page)

When I woke up, Cormac wasn’t in bed with me. He was across the room….

Yes. Beside the torchiere lamp, an armchair was reclined, footrest out, a sheet cast to one side. And unlike Andrew, Cormac had been fully dressed, missing only jacket and tie.

But that doesn’t mean nothing happened. He might have touched me. He might have….

Unbidden, Andrew imagined the scene: Cormac beside him, unzipping his trousers and pressing Andrew’s hand against his erection. Andrew gagged, putting his head between his knees, but there was nothing left in his stomach to come up.

Stop it. That didn’t happen
, he told himself, angry and ashamed.
You’re the one who got drunk with a stranger. You’re the one who passed out on the job. Wasserman’s foot will be so far up your ass, you won’t need the FDNY to remove it, you’ll need major surgery.

He was still berating himself when the room door opened. Cormac smiled, waving a familiar blue packet at Andrew. “Let me dissolve this in water for you.”

Andrew thought about throwing on his clothes while Cormac prepared the Alka-Seltzer, but he wasn’t sure he could walk to the closet without dry-heaving. Instead he pulled the stiff, boldly-patterned hotel comforter up to his chin and tried to wait with good grace.

“Oh, don’t look like that. The world hasn’t ended,” Cormac said when he saw Andrew’s face. Stealing the writing desk’s chair, he pulled it close to the bed and passed over a plastic cup. “Drink up and feel better.”

Andrew forced himself to drink the fizzy solution. It tasted like orange soda, which was repulsive, but better than the taste of vomit. And to his relief, his stomach seemed to accept it. Handing the cup back to Cormac, he spoke with all the dignity he could muster.

“I’ll call Mr. Wasserman first thing tomorrow morning. Tell him I ruined your date. He’ll refund your money and make it up to you, I promise.”

Cormac raised his eyebrows. “Who says my date was ruined?”

“I do.” To his horror, Andrew realized he was close to tears. “I’m a lightweight when it comes to hard liquor. I don’t know why I drank so much.”

“Because you were nervous. Acting is all very well, but when you’re with someone who isn’t part of the production—who takes everything seriously—it has to be nerve-wracking.”

Andrew went cold. “I spilled my guts, didn’t I?”

“You told me all about your first girlfriend, the time you thought you got Fiona pregnant, your hookup with the lovely Monica and….” The side of Cormac’s mouth quirked up. That politician’s smile again, never touching his eyes. “Your fear of gay men in general.”

“I’m sorry,” Andrew muttered, looking at the garish hotel bedspread, at anything but Cormac’s finely-boned, handsome face. “Whatever I said, you didn’t deserve it.”

“You didn’t say anything offensive.” Cormac’s tone was gentle. “Just that when your dad came out of the closet, it hurt you. Especially since he left your mom for—what was his name?”

“Mr. Branson. My English teacher. My favorite teacher, before all that. I never had a clue. Not till the whole school knew.” Andrew sighed. “Such a big change in my life did a number on my head. My dad and I have never really gotten along since, though we try to pretend around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Did I… say anything more?”

Cormac shook his head.

“Really?”

“Well.” Cormac’s cool political smile widened, threatening to become genuine at any moment. “You did say one other thing worth noting.”

Andrew braced himself. For years he’d despised his father, not only for leaving his mother for a man, but for doing it in a way his hometown would never forget. “What?”

“You said you were tired of being afraid of gay men.” Cormac rose, lips still curved up on one side. Retrieving his suit jacket, he dug in the pocket and returned with mobile phone in hand. “You said you needed a gay male friend to help you over your phobia. And you wanted me to be that friend.” Activating the phone, he opened his digital contacts list for Andrew to see. There onscreen was Andrew’s picture, a boozy, heavy-lidded self portrait, above ANDREW REYNOLDS, 212-555-1426.

“I put myself in your phone?”

“Yup. Then you put yourself in my bed. If you mentioned that five hundred dollar bonus once, you mentioned it a dozen times. Just before you passed out, you seemed determined to earn it.”

“Oh, crap.” Andrew felt his cheeks flaming. Now he was too embarrassed to cry, although puking up the Alka-Seltzer was still a distinct possibility.

“I think you were just trying to confront your fears,” Cormac added, returning the phone to his jacket pocket. “You were definitely too far gone for me to take you up on your offer. That’s why I slept on the recliner.”

“You’re a good guy,” Andrew muttered, meaning it with all his heart.

“I’m not a pervert or a rapist, if that’s what you mean.”

Andrew’s head came up. “I didn’t use those words,” he said, startled.

Cormac blinked. “No. No, that’s… my own baggage. Look. All I want to say is, I had a good time. I’m sorry I got you drunk. Go back to sleep and I’ll call you a cab in the morning. My pleasure.” Rising, he started back toward the recliner.

“Cormac. Come on. The bed is huge. Plenty of room for both of us.” As Andrew patted the ample space beside him, he realized he was completely sincere. He’d spent most of his teenage years disgusted by Hugh Branson and the few other gay men on his radar. When his father had come out, Andrew had processed the news as a betrayal, even a death. But Cormac was just Cormac. A regular guy when it came to food, sports, and booze. A decent man when it came to an unconscious date in his bed. And that was the acid test of male decency, wasn’t it?

Cormac hesitated. When he finally sat on the bed, he lowered his weight so incrementally, the mattress barely sank in. “I won’t touch you.”

“God, I wouldn’t touch me, either.” Andrew laughed. “I’m sure I stink. And even if I didn’t… I know you’re not like that, Cormac. I trust you. Hell….” He grinned. “I like you.”

Cormac stared at him, his finely-boned face as hard and impassive as a statue of Julius Caesar. There was something ancient about the man, not Victorian or Elizabethan but older, old as civilization. Andrew, who often felt the world was too new and overwhelming for him to taste more than a raindrop in a single fleeting lifetime, suffered a twinge of admiration. Something in Cormac had been created to endure.

“You
like
me?” Cormac’s mouth quirked into that politician’s smile. “Praise indeed.”

“Get in bed,” Andrew said, striving for precisely the correct ‘
We’re all straight here
’ tone. When Cormac seemed on the verge of lying down still fully dressed, Andrew added, “And get comfortable.”

Cormac unzipped. The sound was curiously magnified to Andrew’s ears. He shivered, trying not to remember what he’d witnessed at age fourteen. That had been a long time ago….

Folding his trousers, Cormac placed them atop the bureau. Unbuttoning his shirt and removing his cufflinks, he folded the shirt with equal neatness, placing the cufflinks on top. Clad in a white undershirt and plain white boxers, he stretched out on the bed. Unable to stop himself, Andrew noted the bulge down Cormac’s right thigh. It hardly looked any smaller now than it had while hard.

Andrew fought to keep his face bland. Was he disgusted by other men or secretly aroused? If Cormac removed the boxers, if he needed to sleep commando to relax, would Andrew be repulsed or curious?

I’d want to see him. Just a quick look
, Andrew realized, no longer drunk but too worn down by illness and confession to resist the truth.
Maybe what they’d said in junior high is true. I’m a closet case, just like my dad.

Chapter 3

Things looked better in the morning. Cormac, who had an early flight to catch, not only insisted on sending Andrew home by taxi but bought them grande lattes while they waited. Unable to repay the man any other way, Andrew regaled Cormac with stories of his most disastrous auditions while they waited for their respective cabs.

“…so I walk onstage, look down in the third row, and there he is. Rex Caan himself, complete with red vest and little red bowtie, just like his photo,” Andrew said. “Almost crapped my pants. But I knew the role. I’d lived the role, breathed the role, incorporated the role into my very being. I took a deep breath. And just as I started to deliver the first line, Rex said, ‘Too much. Next.’”

“What?” Cormac’s latte stopped halfway to his mouth. “But you hadn’t even spoken yet. What did ‘too much’ mean?”

“That’s just it. I had no clue. So I figured I had nothing to lose. Instead of saying ‘thank you’ and shuffling off like a good little actor, I said, ‘Excuse me, Mr. Caan. But what do you mean, too much?’” Andrew paused, enjoying the gleam in Cormac’s eyes. Maybe he couldn’t get a theater job to save his life, but he sure as hell knew how to tell a story. Cormac’s expression was proof enough of that.

“So Rex Caan looked at me like I really had crapped my pants. Dropped a steaming load right on the stage. And he said….” Andrew adopted the theater legend’s crisp Royal Shakespeare Society manner. “‘Too much hair, too many teeth, too many muscles, too young, and quite likely too stupid.
Next
!’”

Laughing, Cormac shook his head in sympathy. “You make politics sound less like a blood sport and more like a day at the beach. I couldn’t live with that kind of constant rejection. I’d rather dig a ditch.”

The first of two taxis slid up, idling just beyond the hotel’s valet stand. Smiling, Cormac led Andrew to it and started to open the door for him. Then he stiffened, withdrawing his hand and glancing quickly from side to side.

“You’re pretty deep in the closet, huh?” Andrew whispered.

Cormac sighed. “So deep, there are folks inside who have no idea I’m there. Story of my life. Mr. Invisible.”

“How can a politician be invisible?”

“Hey, mac! That other cab’s about to ram my tailpipe,” the cabbie bawled at Andrew. He looked like he hailed from another part of the world, yet sounded like Brooklyn, born and bred. “Get in or give over.”

“Thanks for the cab. And the coffee. Have a good flight to—wherever,” Andrew called as Cormac paid the driver. But the cab sped away from the curb before he could even close his passenger door properly, much less wave goodbye.

* * *

Andrew went directly to Marie’s, letting himself in with his key and creeping into her bedroom. She was asleep, yet didn’t look peaceful. She grimaced in slumber, as if unconsciousness was no relief from the waking world. Still, Andrew was glad to see his sister at rest. Exiting as quietly as he entered, he took the train back to his own place. He was finishing breakfast—stale pretzels—and perusing the digital want ads on his prehistoric laptop when Wasserman called.

“Where are you?”

“Home,” Andrew said automatically, before realizing that when it came to tactically superior answers, “Beirut” might have been smarter.

“Get your ass down here. Don’t force me to make a house call.” Wasserman disconnected.

* * *

Andrew almost didn’t go. When he finally turned up at Wasserman’s office, which looked even seamier on the inside than the outside, the receptionist had disappeared for lunch and Wasserman occupied her desk. A tall, spray-tanned blond paced in front of it, face turning orange the angrier he got.

“…because of one time, just one time, then you’re a bastard,” the blond cried. “I’ve told you, he’s not easy to keep happy. He’s an international diplomat or something. I miss one date because I had traffic court and you blow me off? Fire me?” His laugh sounded slightly hysterical. “You’ll lose
him
for good.”

“I doubt it,” Wasserman growled. Of indeterminate age and formidable weight, he was deeply tanned year-round, arms covered in a curling black pelt. Only the top of his head was shiny and bare. A salt-and-pepper beard and moustache perpetually obscured his lips, adding to the effect of a boulder that spoke. “See that little piss ant? He made your ‘international diplomat’ so happy, the client asked to always have Andrew from here on out. Client even said he’d rearrange his flight dates if necessary.”

The blond spun around to examine Andrew, frozen in the doorway as if his ears had stopped working.

“Him? Cormac wants
him
?”

“Never any accounting for taste, is there?” Wasserman held up a sealed envelope marred with what looked like thumbprints. “Here’s what you’re owed. Take it and get out.”

“But if you’ll just call Cormac… if you’ll tell him it was a one-time problem, that I’m still available—”

“Get out!” Wasserman stood up. He was hardly any taller out of the chair—five-four at most, if Andrew was any judge—but the blond shrank back as if Godzilla had come up from the depths.

“Don’t smirk at me,” the blond said to Andrew as he pushed past, envelope in hand. “You’ll wreck it. Cormac will want me back, wait and see.”

“Was I smirking?” Andrew asked Wasserman, too dazed to get anything else out. Not only had Cormac decided not to complain, he’d asked for Andrew on a recurring basis? Offered to change his travel schedule to accommodate the request?