Just What the Truth Is (3 page)

“I grew up in LA, and when I moved away, I swore I’d never have to deal with traffic again,” Micah said. “My drive is about fifteen minutes during rush hour, less than ten if I’m driving in early or going home late.”

“Oh, now you’re just being cruel and rubbing my face in it. I’ll just have to spend this evening’s commute thinking of creative payback ideas.” I tried to sound menacing, but I think I probably fell a little short. I’m not really the scary type.

Micah just laughed. “Alright, pretty boy. Give it your best shot.”

D
INNER
turned out to be really fun.

We talked about work.

Micah had a few different cases going, but the one taking most of his time had a trial date scheduled for September. I had a few purchase and sale transactions and some corporate formations on my desk.

“The thing I like about corporate work is that we’re all striving for the same goal. I mean, I still have to deal with opposing counsel, and we’re each trying to get the best terms we can for our clients. But at the end of the day, we both want to get the deal done, so we have a strong incentive to play nice and make things work,” I explained.

“It’s not always like that with litigation,” he said. “People play a lot of games. They try to stretch things out and waste the other guy’s time and money. Take when I moved to the firm, for example. One asshole opposing counsel tried to file a motion to remove me from the Jones case saying there was suddenly some conflict, even though we cleared conflicts checks before I came over. It was a total bullshit delay tactic because the trial date’s coming up and he thinks if he strings it out further, my guy will settle.”

I didn’t understand half of that because litigation was completely outside the scope of what I did, but I got the general idea. “So what’d you do? You’re still working on the case, right?”

He grabbed some naan, tore off a piece, and popped it in his mouth. “Oh, hell yeah, I’m still on it. I just wrote opposing counsel back and told him to go fuck himself, fuck his mom, fuck his dog, and fuck his mom’s dog.”

I raised my eyebrows in surprise. “That worked?”

He smirked. “Well, I phrased it more delicately, but the message was the same. And, yeah, it worked. I can be extremely persuasive.”

Yeah, I bet. I had a feeling Micah Trains could persuade me to do just about anything. It wouldn’t take much, really, just him asking in that sexy-as-hell raspy voice. Damn it, there I went again. My mind was completely out of control.

We talked about family.

Micah had a younger sister who lived in LA, along with his parents. My parents and younger brother all lived in Emile City.

“Are you close with your family?” I asked him.

“Absolutely. I get out there to visit them at least every couple of months or my mother starts calling and leaving progressively more annoying voicemails.” He made a funny face and started talking in a high, nasally voice. “Micah, this is your mother, Deborah Stern Trains, calling. I thought I should use my full name in case you’ve forgotten. After all, I know how busy you are and how many different people you talk to every day. I don’t mean to bother you, but I thought you should know that your nephew misses you. I’ve tried telling him that his uncle is a very important man and very important men don’t always have time to call their families, even their only nephew who thinks they hung the moon. But he’s only five, so he doesn’t understand. Don’t worry. I’ll keep explaining it to him.”

I was laughing so hard by the time he was done with the impression that I had to wipe tears away from the corners of my eyes. “You’re exaggerating!” I gasped out.

He shook his head. “I wish. That was practically verbatim. And that’s if I don’t call for a week. If I go any longer, she’ll call again and lay it on even thicker.”

He cleared his throat and did the impression voice again. “Micah, this is your mother calling. Again. I just want to let you know that my telephone number hasn’t changed and I still live in the same place. I know you must be worried about that because I can’t sleep at night for worrying about you. Your father keeps telling me to take an Ambien, but you know how upset my stomach gets when I take pharmaceuticals. Don’t worry, I’m used to not getting much sleep. When I was pregnant with you, you kept me up all night. But just in case my body can’t take it anymore now that I’m old, please make sure your father doesn’t break the bank on the funeral. I’m not the Queen of England. Hopefully, you’ll make time to come to my funeral, but I’ll understand if you’re too busy. I’ll talk to your father now, so he’ll understand too. We miss you. You can call anytime you’re free. I’ll stop whatever I’m doing, because I know how valuable your time is and that mine isn’t as important.”

We talked about religion.

He was Jewish and belonged to a small synagogue that he really liked. I was raised in a nondenominational Christian church, but I only went when my parents asked me to join them.

“I don’t really know what I believe or if I believe anything.” I shrugged. “I don’t really give it much thought, I guess.”

“It’s really more of a cultural thing than a God thing for me,” he explained. “It’s important to me to carry on the traditions. I like the ritual of it, you know? I like knowing that my grandparents and their grandparents all read those same prayers and celebrated those same holidays, and that my niece and nephew and future generations will do the same thing. Whether or not there’s a higher power out there, being part of that tradition makes me feel like I’m part of something bigger than myself.”

We talked about hobbies.

I was right about his work ethic. It sounded like Micah worked exceptionally long hours. When he had free time, he liked to hike and bike. I told him about the men’s baseball league I played with, my fantasy baseball league, and my obsession with Emile City’s Major League Baseball team, the Glory.

“So are you a Glory season ticket holder?” he asked.

I shook my head and gulped down some water. The tikka masala was seriously spicy. “I wish. I can’t afford to buy an entire season, not that I’d have the time to go to eighty-one games even if I could. And getting into a share with good seats is almost impossible. Once someone gets a lock on those, he has to move away or die before he’ll give them up.”

“Yeah, that’s true. Their luck needs to turn around soon, though, or that might change. If the Glory are gonna win a game, those boys need to learn how to close it out.”

W
HEN
the bill came, I reached for my wallet, but Micah waved me off, put his credit card on the tray, and handed it to the waiter.

“You don’t have to do that, Micah. We can split it.”

“Nope. I invited you to dinner, so it’s my treat.”

His voice was softer than it had been all night. He was smiling, and there was something in his eyes that tugged at my chest. I had the strangest feeling at that moment that I was on a date instead of having a casual dinner with a work colleague.

I knew it wasn’t true. I knew that wasn’t how Micah saw the evening. But my deranged mind couldn’t stop itself from running on that track, and I hated myself for it.

Chapter Three

I
WAS
quiet as we walked back to the firm’s parking garage after dinner.

Why did my brain have to misinterpret everything? Why couldn’t I spend time with a man I found attractive without having to twist the evening into something dirty and wrong? And how could I make myself stop finding Micah, or any other man, attractive?

“Do you have any exciting plans for the weekend?” Micah asked, interrupting my mental anguish.

I forced myself to keep my voice even as I answered. The last thing I needed was for the hotshot new lawyer in the office to realize that I was just a step or two away from a complete breakdown. “Not really. I’ll probably get some work done and go visit my parents tomorrow. Sunday, I’m parking my butt in front of the TV and watching the Glory game. I hope it’ll be exciting and not another heartbreaker in the last couple of innings.”

I left out the date I had planned with my girlfriend the following evening. It seemed wrong, for some reason, to talk to Micah about her. Not that it mattered, because if my track record stayed consistent, Jill and I would break up within a week. And a month after that, I would need to buy a new tube of toothpaste.

Micah was parked right by the parking garage entrance. When we got to his car, he paused and turned to me. We were suddenly standing so close together that I could feel his breath on my face and his heat radiating against my skin. And just like that, I felt my dick thickening and lengthening in my pants.

I had to get out of there before Micah realized how he affected me. I turned on my heel and started speed walking toward the stairs, talking to Micah over my shoulder as I went. “Thanks for dinner, Micah. I’ll see you on Monday.”

I was walking so fast that I had already reached the stairwell door by the time he was able to answer.

“Hey, Ben.”

I stopped and took a deep breath before I turned around. At that distance and with the dim light in the garage, he wouldn’t be able to see my arousal.

When I was facing him, he kept talking. “I had a great time tonight. Thanks for agreeing to go out with me.”

I couldn’t say anything in response. My mind was, once again, misinterpreting every word and trying to convince me that I had just gone on a date with the sexiest, smartest, funniest man I had ever met. I raised my hand in a silent goodbye and walked into the stairwell.

T
HE
next evening, I was getting ready for my date with Jill when my phone beeped, telling me I had received a text. I wasn’t surprised or disappointed when I picked it up and read the message from Jill: “
Ben, I don’t think it’s working out. I hope we can stay friends. I’ll see you around.
”

You might think it was rude of her to break up with me via text, but we had been together less than two weeks. Besides, I preferred the text to having an in-person conversation. At least now I didn’t have to suffer through the date with a smile on my face, wondering the entire time how I could get out of spending the night at her place.

I thought about calling my friends to see what they were doing that night, but what would be the point? We would probably end up hitting the bars and picking up women. I was so damn tired of juggling everything, of constantly trying to be
that
guy. You know the one—the good son, the fun friend, the desirable boyfriend. The guy my parents and everyone else expected me to be. Frankly, I was just plain tired.

And I couldn’t stop thinking about Micah Trains. He had been unexpectedly funny at dinner the previous night. I had known from his reputation that the man was intelligent and cutthroat. But I hadn’t expected him to be so nice, to seemingly adore his family and talk in a funny voice in the middle of a restaurant doing impressions of his mother, to ask me questions about myself and patiently listen to the answers as if he really cared to know those kinds of details about my life.

Plus, there was the chemistry. Yes, it was one-sided. I didn’t lie to myself and pretend otherwise. But it was still there. The constant feeling of warmth in my belly when I was with him. The way the tea lights on the table made his blue eyes sparkle whenever he looked at me, which was almost constantly. The time we both reached for the naan and our hands touched—I swear it was like a spark started in my fingers and slithered through my body until it settled in my groin, creating an instant erection.

I sat down on my couch and, just for a moment, dropped my defenses and shut out the guilt that seemed to be my constant companion. I let myself think about Micah Trains. I thought about his smile and the way he walked. I thought about his funny stories and the times when his voice seemed to get almost tender as he spoke to me. I thought about how close our bodies had been at the end of the night.

I shivered and sighed. It felt so incredibly good to enjoy someone that much, to really want someone. The feelings were so strong, so intense, that I didn’t know how I would be able to avoid them. No, it was more than that. I didn’t
want
to avoid them. I wanted to be able to feel that way. It was so much better than the constant anxiety and self-directed anger that made me feel sick inside most days.

I thought about what would happen if I let myself feel that way all the time, if I stopped trying to be the guy my parents needed me to be.
My parents
. It would ruin my mother if I said I was…. I couldn’t even let myself think the word.

No, it was enough with Noah. It had always been enough with Noah. My brother had such a large presence that even though he was almost four years younger, he had dominated the house. My parents had been so busy throughout our childhood trying to keep Noah calm and safe, and just generally in control, that there hadn’t been any room for me to be anything other than perfect.

Then, when Noah told us about his relationship with Clark, things went from bad to worse. At first, my parents blamed me for bringing Clark into our lives. He was my friend, after all.