Selfie (15 page)

I looked up, and the sales clerk was addressing me shyly. Pretty girl—strong, African American features with light-brown skin and a wide smile.

“Yeah.” I smiled. “So pleased to meet you.”

“We’re not supposed to fawn all over the Hollywood people,” she said, looking around like she was checking for the manager. “It’s sort of a . . . I don’t know. All the shop people got together, and we had sort of a meeting about it. But . . . you know, I just wanted to say that it’s nice to have you here. I mean, I know the magazines and the tabloids totally lie, but . . . but you just have this reputation of being a good guy. And I was so sorry about your friend.”

“Thank you,” I said, genuinely touched. “That’s really kind.”

She smiled back, and after an awkward pause made the realization that she had something to do. “Oh, can I help you?”

“Yeah,” I said, pointing to the necklace and the chunky earrings that matched. “Uh, that.”

“Oooh—pretty.” She lifted it out of the case. “Girlfriend?”

“Agent,” I said succinctly. “But she’s sort of amazing so—”

“Ah,” the girl—her name badge said
Stevie—
nodded understandingly. “So she gets the best.”

At that moment, Noah walked in, looking official even without his suit and hat. “How we doin’?” he asked, like he hadn’t just been ready to throttle me.

“Got Jilly a present,” I said, like I hadn’t been seesawing between spilling my guts and spilling my tears all day.

He watched as Stevie boxed it up, looking surprised. “That’s really pretty—you are one thoughtful bastard, Connor M . . .” He paused infinitesimally—but I still heard it. “Montgomery,” he said, and his eyes hit mine in realization.

No. Not easy.

“I have my moments,” I said, trying for cocky, and then he stepped forward to make arrangements for pickup and delivery. We left the store, shoulder to shoulder, and my stomach clenched.

God—I just wanted to hold hands with him. I’d had this feeling with Vinnie too, and big bleeding parts of me were suddenly furious that this one stupid simple thing was something I wasn’t going to let myself do. We weren’t even
sleeping
together. But we were friends, and I felt close to him and straight guys didn’t do that.

Believe me, after all these years I had a really firm grasp on what the straight guys didn’t do.

“So,” I said after a moment of wants and needs and thoughts and angst colliding in my head like excited electrons, “how’s the whole delivery thing going to work?”

“I’ll pick everything up tomorrow,” he said, “and bring it by.”

I grimaced. “That doesn’t sound like fun. I thought there was a delivery—”

“Wanted an excuse to stop by,” he admitted simply, and God. Suddenly I didn’t want to bring him in on my little pity party or my repression or my stupid career.

“Noah,” I said gently, “I am so grateful for—”

“We’re not breaking up,” he said, voice mild. “We haven’t gone out. There has not been dating, and you haven’t even told me with your own mouth all the shit I already know. So no. I’m not listening to you when you say ‘Don’t get attached.’ So don’t bother.”

“Fine,” I muttered. “I’m a fucking mess, so why listen to
me
? What would
I
know about how hard it is to crawl down this rabbit hole—I’ve only
lived
here for the last ten to twelve years, right?”

He bumped my shoulder then and grabbed my hand.

I turned at him, mouth agape, but he stared straight ahead. “If anyone asks, you got lost,” he said. “But you and I—not today, maybe not this week, but sometime in the next few months, we’re going to have a talk, a scary-assed talk, where every fucking thing that comes out of your mouth is nothing but the truth, do you hear me?”

Oh God. Someone just told me what to do.

I wanted to cry. I felt like I’d been waiting for someone to tell me what to do for my entire life.

I’m gay—should I tell my parents? Someone tell me what to do!

My parents just kicked me out—should I lie to them and say I was sorry? Should I hang around town and hope they love me again? Should I talk to my sisters and see if they’ll hate me?

Should I hitch a ride to LA so I can go be somebody new? Someone tell me what to do!

I just turned my first trick for food and I feel . . . I feel . . . I feel . . . Oh God, someone tell me what to do!

This guy just took me home and we fucked and it was awesome, but who falls in love after one fuck? Someone tell me what to do!

Jilly says we shouldn’t come out, and Vinnie needs his career too, but I don’t want to live a lie, oh, God, Vinnie, I don’t want to live a lie, Jilly, do we have to live a lie, oh God, someone tell me what to do!

I clung to Noah’s hand like it was a lifeline in a frozen ocean. “You are awfully goddamned old for twenty-five,” I said with dignity. “How’d you get to be so old?”

“I fucked everything that moved in my freshman year.” He nodded judiciously. “That meant I had it out of my system when it was time to grow up.”

I laughed, like he meant me to, and kept hold of his hand. Yeah, I knew straight guys didn’t hold hands with other guys.

Noah knew that too.

The touring bike was sort of a simple thing—upright frame, two gears, kickback brakes.

I loathed it.

I looked at Noah apologetically. “I mean, I know it sounds like a good thing for a tourist,” I apologized, “but I sort of want something kickass.”

Noah rolled his eyes and nodded to the proprietor, a short, scrawny white guy with a blond beard that went down to his waist and blond dreadlocks the same length. “Cheddar, he wants something kickass—maybe a mountain bike, okay?”

Cheddar nodded, because I don’t think he talked, and disappeared for a second, into the back.

He came back with a mountain bike my size, in a lovely seafoam green.

“Ooh,” I said. “I like the color.” I smiled at Noah guilelessly, and he raised an eyebrow.

“Of course you do,” he said, like I’d answered every question he’d ever had about the cosmos. “There is no reason why a perfectly straight guy wouldn’t love a bike in weenie-ass green.”

I rolled eyes at Cheddar. “Ignore him,” I muttered, and then brightened. “Actually, better than that!
Get him one
.”

Cheddar practically hurt my eyes, looking at Noah with a shiny, glowy, positively
diabolical
expression on his face.

“No.” Noah watched in horror as that little figure disappeared behind the counter again. The whole store was bicycles and tires and equipment, all of it neatly stacked and organized, but apparently they had Aladdin’s cave in the back for special nutjobs like me.

“Yes,” I said, excited about what he’d come back with.

Noah shook his head as Cheddar emerged. “No,” he muttered, covering his eyes with his hands.

“Definitely,” Cheddar said, sounding smug.

“
Yes
!” I crowed. I looked in triumph at the pink and white confection. It was actually the same bike I was getting with a different paintjob, and I couldn’t be happier. Even the seat was pink.

“It’s perfect,” I told Cheddar, and he leveled a look of pure bathos at Noah.

“I’m so telling Viv.”

“I hate you.” Noah sounded like he meant it.

“No, you don’t, bro,” Cheddar refuted. “I’m the best boyfriend your sister ever had.”

Noah looked bad-temperedly at the bicycle. “My dad has a gun,” he warned, and Cheddar took that threat so seriously he burst into raucous, chortling laughter—which surprised me, considering I didn’t think he could talk a minute ago.

“Dude!” he choked, as I pulled out my credit card. “Dude! No!” He ran the credit card, still laughing. “Oh my God. Dude! Your dad can’t kill spiders!” He wiped his eyes as the receipt printed out, and nodded at me like I was in on the joke. “Oh my God, that was a good one. You know—Mr. D, he’s like . . . like a
muppet
, he’s so sweet. I’m going to tell him. He’ll probably laugh until pee comes out!”

“Please don’t knock my sister up,” Noah said sourly, and Cheddar straightened and shook his head, completely sober.

“Dude, no. No—Viv, she’s going places. Man, I want her to like me enough to come back, you know?”

Aw. I pleaded with Noah for forgiveness, using my puppy dog eyes alone.

Noah shook his head. “Dude.
Duude
.”

Cheddar beamed at him. “See? Dude, you love me, right? You totally love me.”

“Pink, Cheddar. You got me a pink bike.”

Cheddar and I looked at each other and nodded. “Dude,” I said, adopting Cheddar’s smile.

“Totally,” he said, so serious it hurt.

Noah glared, but his full lips quirked in a smile. “Fine.” He barely managed not to roll his eyes. “Thanks for the bike, Connor. I can—”

“It’s a gift,” I said quickly, not wanting to hear about him expensing something or paying me back. “You’ve . . .” I turned my face away. He’d been irritable and cranky and pushy and demanding.

But he’d also really, really wanted me to not feel like shit.

“You’ve cared,” I said truthfully. “And you didn’t have to. So, you know. Maybe we can ride together.”

Cheddar startled like he’d been shot. “Oh! Dudes! I totally forgot to sell you helmets!” He knocked the helmet
he
was wearing and grinned. “You want they should match the bikes?”

“
Yes
!” I cried out, beating Noah by a mile.

Noah sighed. “No. Please, God—”

Cheddar grinned at me and disappeared into the back again. If he didn’t keep popping out with bicycle equipment, I’d expect he had porn in there or something.

He returned with two helmets and some elbow and kneepads, and we got down to the business of inflating the tires and adjusting the seats and the brakes.

Noah was right—when we left the store, we rode out in style.

We had to swing a wide arc around the commercial part of town because it was mostly paved with cobblestones, which made for shitty riding and a potential danger to the old peanuts and swings, if you know what I mean. The town itself skirted the edge of the sound, and Noah, after making sure I had my eyes on him, swung us down 101, where we kept to the unstable shoulder. It was bumpy, but after about a mile, the bulk of the Global hotel filled our view, and I realized that this was where we’d eaten the day before. I was actually hungry after our little test ride, but Noah shook his head when I asked.

“Let’s go to the coffee shop,” he said seriously. “They’ve got pastries, and you can see why I think Starbucks is bullshit.”

So we swung around, and he took us in a big arch to get us to the car, which was parked in one of the few parking lots in the small commercial area.

The bike rack proved invaluable, and after securing the bikes, we walked back to the shops, and he took me into Stomping Grounds.

The store was separated from the entrance by a partial wall, and we could hear the conversation and banter overhead as we walked up a boarded ramp. On the other side was a corkboard with community happenings—everything from LGBTQ mixers to slam poetry to a singles BBQ to PTA meetings covered that board. There was even a schedule for “open shoots” for the show. I’d been warned with my contract that some of the outside shoots would give the public limited access, and I was expected to meet my people, as it were.

I was looking forward to it now—something about seeing that flier in the coffee shop, meeting Stevie with her careful respect, and meeting Cheddar who was just . . . just fun as hell, made me want to invite this town in.

Fun feeling. If I’d been forced to do the same thing in Hollywood, I would have held my breath and beat my feet against the floor until Jilly took it out of my contract.

The boarded ramp ended up on a landing, and voila! The world’s cutest coffee shop with a view of both the town
and
the sound from the front window.

The place was filled with small tables and couches, most of them occupied. Noah shooed me to one of the tables and said, “I’ll get your order, just sit.”

“But pastries—” Because they were lining the case and they looked awesome.