Page 46 of Love At First Fright

But Ellis couldn’t sleep, not yet. The sex might have stymied his anxieties for a moment, but they’d already returned with a vengeance.

So he got back to work in the secret room, being as quiet as possible as he assembled the desk for Rosemary and unwrapped the beanbag chair from its packaging.

Rosemary had told him it was the most comfortable chair to write in, and he’d scoured the internet to find one he thought might fit the bill.

The hours fell away as Ellis prepared the room for Rosemary. At one point he sat down, resting against a newly built bookshelf. He was just going to shut his eyes for a moment, he wasn’t really tired.

When he woke up, the sky outside was purpling with dawn. Fuck. His whole body ached from sleeping on the floor. At least the room was done.

Ellis looked at his handiwork. He didn’t want to over-decorate, so Rosemary could put her own spin on things, but he’d put up a row of fairy lights along the shelves to give it a cosy feel.

He hoped this would be enough to make her stay.

To make her want him, when he told her everything about himself.

Ellis went and made himself a coffee in the kitchen, letting Fig out into the dew-frosted garden to run out some energy.

Half an hour later, just before nine, Rosemary came downstairs.

She was wearing mismatched socks, her long ginger plait all messed from sleep, and she was wearing one of his T-shirts from the previous day.

Ellis thought, as she stumbled half asleep into the kitchen, that Rosemary had never looked more beautiful.

“Coffee?” he asked.

“Please,” she croaked. “I woke up and you weren’t in bed.”

“I’m sorry. I had some work to finish.”

She took him in, the rumpled clothes, the flecks of paint on his jogging bottoms, the dark circles likely under his eyes, and asked, “On the secret room?”

He nodded. They drank their coffee, and Ellis had to force himself to stop being antsy. Juliet’s words played over and over in his head. He made his decision: he was going to tell Rosemary the truth.

When she’d finished her coffee, he took her by the hand.

“Close your eyes.”

“Are we going to the secret room that’s definitely not a sex dungeon?”

He huffed a laugh. “We are.”

Ellis stood behind Rosemary and guided her to the room, pushing it open. He flicked on the lights.

“Open your eyes.”

He felt the gasp, the sudden rise of her shoulders, her hands clapped to her mouth.

“ Ellis. What is this?”

“It’s for you. I know you’re stressed about the deadline, and you said you missed having your office space, so I thought you should have one.”

She swiped tears from her face and turned to face him. “You did all of this for me?”

Ellis wrapped his arms around Rosemary, tilting her chin up to face him, brushing away her tears with his thumb. “I would do anything for you.”

“I love it. So much.” She sniffled, going up on her tiptoes to kiss him. Christ, he loved this woman. “But I’m only here for a month,” Rosemary added. Ellis felt the smile fall from his face.

“Maybe I’m hoping you’ll stay,” he said. “I had a long time to think yesterday. I read Juliet’s journal.”

“You did?”

He nodded. “She wrote something new, you know? And it made me realise something.” Ellis sucked in a breath. “I haven’t been honest with you.”

Rosemary pulled back to look at him. “Okay. Is this about the fake dating thing?”

“In a way.” He paused. The words were in his head, but getting them to form on his lips was hard. Rosemary sat down on her beanbag chair.

“Take your time.” She gave him a soft, pensive look. “I’m not going anywhere.”

There is nothing like eternity to make you realise how precious time really is.

This was the woman he loved. And he was tired of holding back.

“I’m bi,” Ellis said. “I’m attracted to men and women and, well…every gender, really.”

The idea of coming out had felt insurmountable, but he’d just done it. As easy as breathing. And Rosemary wasn’t crying, wasn’t shouting, or running away. In fact, she was smiling and walking towards him.

“I didn’t guess. I normally have a pretty good radar for these things, but with you I had no idea.” She grinned. “Do you think we noticed the gay in each other then?”

“What?” Ellis’s brain short-circuited.

“I’m bi, too.”

“You are?”

“Mm-hmm.” Rosemary looped her arms around his neck and pulled Ellis flush with her. “Thank you for telling me, and trusting me. I’m guessing you’re not out, then?”

Ellis shook his head. “Early in my career, I was more ‘out’ than now. I dated some guys, a couple of non-binary people, but Brody got wind of it. I think one of them actually tried to sell the news to the press and that’s how Brody found out.

Something about ‘new Hollywood star likes dominating cock’…

tasteless bullshit. It was right around the time of my big break in the first Soldier of Justice movie, so I had to be the big macho masculine Hollywood star.

I couldn’t be bi, it would have ruined my career before it even started.

” Ellis became aware as he talked that he was rehashing the phrases Brody had said to him all those years ago, even if he wasn’t sure he believed them anymore.

He became aware that Rosemary was turning red, her eyebrows scrunching into a deep frown.

“And so I let Brody keep the news out of the press and I went back in the closet. After that, I had to be careful. Publicly, I just dated women. A few hookups here and there over the years, but…that’s it.”

“Ellis.” Rosemary spoke very slowly. “I’m going to kill him. I mean it this time. Murder. Where does he live, give me his address, I have a crime to commit.”

He chuckled, but there was no heart in it.

“Why aren’t you more angry at him, Ellis? This asshole forcibly kept you in the closet for decades…and why? So he could keep making more of a commission?”

“I know that’s why he did it. But it’s not like I didn’t play my own part. I could have come out if I really wanted to, but I saw what it was like.

“You’ve no idea, love, how bad it was in those slimy Hollywood circles. When you’re still climbing up that fame ladder you can’t afford to just do your own thing and be above it all. No, you have to be at the parties. The premieres. The after-parties.”

He’d been so young and foolish, falling for the glamour of it all. All those late nights, the pumping music, forcing himself to fit a mould and drowning himself in drink when the ache became too much.

“I heard the way they all talked about those who had come out. They said fucking nasty shit. Even other actors, like Lance, who was so famous you’d think he was untouchable.

When Lance and Arthur got together, the stuff they said would have made you feel sick.

And then you’d start to notice it in the casting choices.

Suddenly, the actress who came out as lesbian was only getting cast in a few roles, none of them as lead or romantic interest. Always a side character.

And if it was a guy that came out? Then he was pigeonholed as either the gay best friend—that’s if he was short and petite enough—or…

if you look like me, you get written off altogether.

You can’t look like me and also be queer, it doesn’t compute to them.

Through every big action flick, every personal training session, they made me into this über-straight man that other straight men want to be like. I hated it.”

“Why did you stay?”

Why indeed? Had it all been worth it, those decades of loneliness, of hiding himself? All for what, the money, the fame? How had he let it go on this long?

“I loved the work. The acting—I still do. I wanted to get my parents out of their tiny flat and into a big house, and to pay for Annie to complete her PhD. Over time, the good outweighed the bad. And then, once I was famous enough, I didn’t have to do all the schmoozing, and aside from a fake dating scenario from Brody here and there, I could keep to myself.

Before I knew it, fifteen years had gone past and I was still in the closet. ”

For a time, neither of them spoke, taking it all in.

Rosemary leant her head against his chest, listening as Ellis’s heartbeat slowed to a more regular rhythm.

He didn’t realise how bound up he’d been about all of it, how long it had been since he’d told anyone all about it. He kissed the top of her head.

“Do you think you want to come out? More publicly, I mean?” Rosemary asked.

If Ellis had been asked that question only an hour ago, he’d have said a vehement “no.” But now, with Rosemary in his arms, the idea of the world knowing who he was felt a touch less daunting.

“Maybe. I think I could, with time.”