Page 74 of Rebound

“I think that’s one of the things you loved first about me,” he teased.

A short silence followed, and Thomas cleared his throat again. “I’ll see you around seven.”

“Okay. Bye.” Ben quickly hung up the phone and turned away from Lara because he knew her well enough to know her eyes were rife with questions.

He’d done his best to pretend that they both hadn’t been on the verge of confessing their love to each other on more than one occasion over the past few weeks, but he hadn’t meant to slip up with his words just then. There were many nights when Ben had stayed up, either alone or long after Thomas had fallen asleep, wondering if it would be safe to admit just how strong his feelings for the other man were.

“One of the things,” Lara said.

“Please don’t.” He grabbed the laptop and made quick work of booking a rental for the weekend of Thomas’s birthday.

“One of the things,” she said again.

Ben keyed in his credit card information, waited for the confirmation email to buzz on his phone, then slammed her laptop closed and shoved it back to her. “It was nothing.”

“Are you in love with him?”

He licked his lips and tried not to look at her.

“That’s answer enough,” she said.

“It’s a bad idea.”

“Why?”

“Are you serious?” he scoffed. “A thousand reasons why. His kids are my age, he’s not even really all the way out, I’m the first guy he’s ever been with. He’s gonna get curious and want to try more, or he’s going to decide he wants to be with women again.”

“Oh, so you’re just like a sampler menu for him?”

“No,” he protested.

“Because that’s what you just said.”

“I’m not. It’s not.” He shoved the stool back and stood, turning away from the glaring and sterile white of Lara’s kitchen. He found himself aching for the muted and dark colors of Thomas’s apartment and the comfort and happiness it brought him. Maybe Thomas was a little farther along the path to knowing himself than Ben gave him credit for. Ben, a man with a basic apartment with box store furniture and white walls, having the audacity to worry about how well Thomas knew himself. Thomas with his plants and his dark paint and his soft white sheets.

All Ben had were curtains.

“Do you want to help me paint?” he asked.

“What?” Lara laughed, caught off-guard.

“I want to paint my apartment.”

“Can you even? Aren’t there rules.”

“I don’t get inspections, and I can paint it back before I move out,” he said.

“What color?”

“Does it matter?” Hs put his wallet and his phone back into his pocket.

“No, because I love you, but I’m still not helping you. My arms are not cut out for that kind of work.”

“You’re the worst.” He kissed the back of her head.

“I basically just planned your boyfriend’s birthday weekend. You should be nicer to me,” she teased.

“I’ll see you later. I do love you even though you drive me mad.”