Page 49 of Sam & Justin
A little bell chimed when I opened the door. The front room had a few small couches and a table of magazines. It was completely empty. There was a reception desk with a computer, but there was no one waiting behind it. There was a door just beyond the desk, propped open. I could see Sam sitting in there from where I was standing.
He looked just as hot as the last time I’d seen him, even if the black button down looked a little too formal for the boy I’d known in high school and the man I’d reconnected with at the reunion. He glanced up, and the moment he saw me, he gave me a smile that lit up his little office area.
“You made it.”
Neither the phone nor my memory had done his voice justice. It hadn’t captured the low gravelly tone. It had diluted the bit of twang that flavored every syllable. His voice brought the butterflies back to life and transformed them into a tornado of wings and nerves. The effect he had on me should be studied by science, and I was so glad I hadn’t decided to skip the trip to King’s Bay.
“I told you I’d be here,” I answered as I drank in the sight of the man in front of me. I decided it was probably best to leave out the fact that I’d contemplated canceling.
He stood up, and my eyes followed the lean lines of his body. He was hotter than I remembered too, so much hotter in personthan he’d been on the small screen of my phone. I’d been willing to take that as a substitute for the real thing, but there was no comparison. I tracked his every move as he rounded the desk. He grabbed a jacket from the back of his chair. It wasn’t a blazer like I’d expect in an office setting. Instead, it was a black leather number I recognized.
“Is that the same one you had in high school?”
I took the crooked grin as his answer. He’d somehow held onto the same jacket since we were kids. I didn’t even keep the same jacket from one season to another. The moment the colors started to fade or the hems started to fray, I put them in the donation bin. Justin’s leather jacket had seen better days, but somehow, it made it look better. Something told me it had to do with the attitude of the man wearing it. Even with all the ways he’d changed, he could pull off weathered clothes.
I never could.
I waited for Sam to get all of his things together, and a few minutes later, we were leaving his office. I followed him to his apartment, and the whole time I wondered if I should have kissed him in his office. It would have been better than standing there, staring at him like I’d never seen an attractive man before. I had acted like a complete idiot, and it wasn’t a feeling I was accustomed to. I’d always prided myself on my intelligence, but it was not on display in that office.
But then, he could have kissed me too.
Not for the first time, I wondered if this was possibly a mistake. Maybe what we’d shared at the reunion was supposed to be a flash in the pan. Maybe we were meant to let out those high school feelings, get answers to questions I’d never even asked back then. Except I knew that wasn’t true. Fate came with choices, and I’d chosen him. I chose him again by coming here.
Besides, it was too late to turn back now. If this weekend was a disaster, then I could just go back to Gomillion and block his number. If I hadn’t gone, I’d live with the regret for the rest of my life. I knew that. The knowledge helped lighten the weight of my anxiety. It was just in time too, because Sam turned into the parking lot of a squat four story brick building. It was nice, with little balconies jutting out from sliding doors.
I parked between Sam and a black sedan. The moment I turned off the car, Sam was opening the back door and grabbing my duffel bag. “I can carry that,” I pointed out, grinning ear to ear at his consideration. I couldn’t remember the last time someone had carried my bag for me. It seemed like such a gentlemanly thing to do. It fit the man I’d come to know since the reunion.
He didn’t say anything. He just started for the building. He paused at the door and waited for me to catch up. I followed him through a nondescript foyer and up the stairs to the third floor. There were four doors, all painted the same shade of dark gray. Three of the four doors had decorations on them: two wreaths and one strange wooden dinosaur holding a hot pink heart. Three of the doors had doormats in front of them. (The one in front of the dinosaur door was hot pink, an almost exact match to the heart.) We stopped in front of the one door without a mat or anything hanging from it.
Sam caught my look and shrugged. “Not really my style. The fuck do I need a doormat for?”
“To wipe your feet?”
“Anything sticking onto my shoes after three flights of stairs isn’t gonna be too bothered by a doormat.”
He had a point.
He unlocked the door and pushed it open. I followed him inside. I didn’t have a chance to take a look around. The moment the door shut behind us, I heard the sound of my bag hitting the ground, and his lips were on mine. He kissed me so hard that I stumbled backward into the door. His tongue invaded my mouth, and I opened to grant him better access. It was one of those kisses that I could feel down to my toes. I lost myself in the taste of his lips and the feeling of his lean body pressed against mine. I could feel his cock growing harder against my thigh, and all doubts were gone.
Coming here was the right choice. When he pulled back from the kiss, I was panting.
“I’ve been thinking about that since I left Gomillion,” he drawled, his voice thick with lust. I couldn’t speak right away, so I had to get by with just a nod. I was still leaning against the door as he started walking deeper into the apartment. He tossed me that crooked smirk of his over his shoulder. “You planning on staying at the door all weekend, or you wanna actually come in?”
I drew in a deep breath and followed after him. His apartment was small, but it was nice. The living room had built-in shelves, and I could see the leather couch where he watched my favorite show with me on the phone. The shelves were lined with books. The boy I knew barely read, but the man he’d become had a collection. I itched to look at the titles, but I’d have all weekend. He pointed out the small kitchen with white cabinets and appliances and a few dirty dishes sitting on the counter. Then he led me through the door on the other side of the living room, right into his bedroom.
I’d seen his room on our video calls. Or at the very least, I’d seen the king size bed with the leather and wood headboard. The last time we talked, his sheets were dark gray. Today, they were a rich green that reminded me of the woods around my parents’ house. “You changed the sheets?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
“I’m not a complete heathen,” he teased as he put my bag down in a corner. “Change my sheets every week.”
The fact that this single statement made me swoon said something about the quality of men I usually hung out with. I’d even gone on a few dates with one guy who had snowmen sheets in the middle of summer. Something told me he’d put them on when snowmen would have been seasonally appropriate.
Sam finished the tour of his small apartment by showing me where the bathroom was. After the tour, he sat on the bed while I unpacked my weekend bag. Hanging my clothes in his closet and putting my shower supplies next to his felt good in a way I couldn’t describe. Talking to him while I got everything together felt even better.
We spent the night on his couch. He ordered pizza from some local place, and we cuddled up watching our show. He was just as into it as I was, and I found myself watching his reaction to everything instead of paying attention to the show. Every time he caught me, we ended up missing a few minutes of the plot, because we started making out like high schoolers. I didn’t stop smiling all night.
We spent the next day exploring King’s Bay.
We started our day at the beach. We spent the morning soaking up the warm weather, barefoot on a blanket. We built sand castles, and when it got too hot, we cooled off in the water. We talked all morning, and all of the doubts I’d had on the drive over disappeared completely. We went to a small deli for lunch, and Sam fought me over which one of us got to pay. He ended up winning that fight, but I didn’t mind. After lunch, he showed me around the main drag. It was mostly little shops. There were a few antique stores and others that were dedicated to selling knickknacks. I ended up buying a little cat made of seashells at one of the more touristy shops.