Page 22 of Sucker Love (Sugar Pill Duet #1)

LUCA

I fetch the moussaka from the oven. It’s still warm and crispy when I plate it up for Noel, along with a generous glass of wine. “Hope you like it,” I tell him as I set it on the table before him.

“What is it?”

“Moussaka. Mostly eggplant and lamb.” I sit down across from him. Amelia parks herself beneath the table in case scraps are in the offing, laying across my feet. “My yiayia always made it for special occasions. The recipe’s hers. Not that I’m nearly as talented in the kitchen as she was.”

“It looks like lasagna.” He takes an experimental bite, and I can tell he’s ready to hate it by the way he scrunches his nose and his hand creeps towards the wine glass. Once it hits his tongue, though, he brightens instead, forking another piece. “Oh shit, it’s good. ”

Thank fuck . Tonight’s been enough of a roller coaster. “Thanks. ”

“I don’t think I’ve ever had Greek food before,” he says after swallowing. “Well, other than souvlaki. If that counts.”

“Sure it counts,” I say. “We eat it over there.”

“You’ve been to Greece?” Noel sounds impressed.

“I went a couple times as a kid. I’d like to go again but...” I shrug. “Money. My family’s got more of it than I do.”

“That’s cool.” He stabs his food. It’s disappearing quickly, which is a private thrill. I’ve already noticed he’s not a big eater in general and it’s good to see him dig into something I made just for him. “I’ve never been anywhere.”

“Like overseas?”

“Like anywhere ,” he reiterates. “As a kid or an adult, unless you count me and my friends going to Six Flags a couple years back. My life’s been just here. In and around Boston. Always.”

I frown and set my chin on my hand. “Your family never took you on trips as a kid? Not camping or skiing anything like that?”

“Nope.”

There’s a sort of finality to his tone that implies heavily I should back off from this particular subject.

And I do, though I think there’s a story in there somewhere.

What kind of parents never take their children on some sort of adventure?

Maybe it’s my personal bias speaking, because aside from the two trips out of the country, my parents would take me to Cape Cod, to Martha’s Vineyard, and to Killington and White Mountains for skiing.

It didn’t have to be far . Just somewhere.

I leave it alone, though. I drink my wine and eat my moussaka—not to brag, but I do think I’ve outdone myself—and watch Noel enjoy his meal. He catches my eye over the wine glass as he sets it down. He blurts out, “Why did you do all this, anyway?”

“Huh?”

“The—” He gestures towards his bedroom. “The elaborate sex. The food. Everything. Why?”

I blink at him and lower my fork. “Is there something wrong with all that?”

“No, no,” he says hastily. “I don’t know. I mean, it just seems like a lot of work.”

Now I’m really confused. “Isn’t the point of our arrangement to explore the kink thing?”

“Well yeah, but?—”

“What’s the issue? So I had to buy a candle. Part of the gift.” I shrug and return to my food. “I mean, it’s not that big of a deal, right? This sort of thing requires some set up. And you liked it, and I liked it...I don’t see a problem. Do you?”

He’s looking at his plate. “But the food, too. All of this must’ve taken you hours.”

“A couple.”

“It’s just...” He struggles to grope for whatever words he’s looking for. I watch him gnaw on his bottom lip and want to tell him to stop before he shreds it and makes himself bleed. “I don’t know. I have no idea what I’m trying to say. ”

I study his face for a moment. It’s gone drawn and pensive again, the way it did before when he was busy upsetting himself, fleeing from inevitable hormone crash instead of letting me baby him through it.

“Noel, I promise you’re not a burden. None of this was any trouble at all. I enjoyed it a lot.”

“Doing all this?” He’s dubious. “For me? You hardly know me. We’re strangers .”

I can’t comprehend why he’s trying to be difficult right now. Some strange attempt to sabotage what should be a perfectly nice night. For him! Was I like this at twenty-three?

I was engaged at twenty-three.

That is actual insanity. Looking at Noel, it is too young. Way too young. I cannot imagine this kid in a place where he is ready to settle down in a marriage to someone. It’s hard to even imagine myself being ready. And look at that—I wasn’t. Hardly a surprise now.

Aloud I say, “Noel, I want to make you feel good because I like you as a person, even if we haven’t known each other very long.

I enjoy being with you and I enjoy what we do together.

” As I say it, I realize it is true. I do like him.

I enjoy spending this time with him beyond the sex.

Enjoy our conversations and his artistry and his oddly fierce independence that wars with his desire to submit.

“And I needed an excuse to make moussaka,” I add for levity’s sake, in case that confession was too intimate. “It all worked out.”

He sits with that for a few minutes, I guess. He goes back to eating his food without further complaint, and so do I. “So you’d say we’re friends,” he pipes up at length.

“Sure, we’re friends.”

His lips curl up at the corners, suddenly mischievous. “Then can I ask you a favor?”

I assume whatever he has in mind is one depraved act or another. I am, however, game. “Shoot,” I say playfully, returning his cocky grin.

“I want to draw you.” Before I answer, he adds, “Naked.”

“Oh. Um.” The request draws me up short. My eyebrows twitch as I process his request. “What the hell for?”

“Because I’m an artist,” he says dryly. “And I do art. Why else?”

“Why me, though? I mean—is it for an assignment? Or what?”

“Or what. ”

“Noel, come on. Is this going in your portfolio or something? Are people going to see it?”

“Do you care if they do?” he asks curiously. “Genuinely.”

There it is, that strange shame—the feeling that I’m doing something wrong, that this conversation is incorrect, inconceivable.

That someone will come in and see. My face feels hot as I lean across the table.

“Yes, I care if complete strangers see me naked . And don’t say that it’s just a drawing.

I’ve seen your work. I know that shit is gonna be a one-to-one likeness of me. ”

He’s smiling again, biting his lip. “I won’t show it to anyone,” he says. “It’s just for me. For practice.”

“Get real. What practice do you need?”

“Everyone needs practice.” He flicks his hand at me. “Life drawing classes cost money and the hot guy who lives in my house is free.”

“Thanks,” I say dryly.

He’s looking at me with those soft doe eyes of his, adorable and beseeching. He’s still all soft and fuzzy around the edges after sex, lips puffy. He hasn’t regained his sharp and jagged edges just yet. It is so hard to say no to that face. “Will you think about it, at least?” he asks me.

I gulp the rest of my wine and mutter that I will.

We finish dinner and toss the dishes in the sink, where they will be someone’s job in the morning.

And then we go to sleep in my bed, because neither of us can be bothered to change the sheets on his tonight.

Amelia joins us shortly after, curling up by our feet.

Noel burrows himself against my side and I do have to admit—he fits there quite perfectly.

And I am more than a little infatuated, I think. With him.

The weekend passes by all too soon. The days when I get to see the most of Noel.

Even though I work both days, it’s not until eleven, so I get him to myself in the morning.

Even if it’s not sex—and we haven’t had any more of that, both of us sort of holding back after the events of Friday night—it’s just his nearness I generally enjoy.

Waking up to him getting out of bed, very quietly, and I reel him back in for a quick kiss before he blushes and mumbles that he has things to do.

Laundry. Dishes. So of course, I get up to help him with both, even though he protests.

And that night after I get home from work he’s made me dinner, which I find so cute and strangely touching.

It’s nothing terribly fancy—instant ramen with a fried egg and pork added to it—but it tastes good and it’s thoughtful.

Afterwards we sit on the couch together and watch one TV show or another while he interrogates me on the ins and outs of tattooing, of what it feels like and what I’d give him if I had to pick, and I just keep telling him he’s good enough to design his own because he is.

Which makes him pout and fuss and dig his toes into my thigh where I sit at the end of the couch, but I just give him a benign smile.

He doesn’t spend that night in my bed, though. Or Sunday, either. His bed has fresh linens by then so I guess he doesn’t have an excuse to.

And I guess I don’t have an excuse to go to him, either. Because I don’t know what excuse I could give to get in with him and hold him close and kiss him, just kiss him , only kiss him, until we both drift off to sleep. In the moment, that’s what I want. In the moment, it isn’t about the sex.

The sex is what we agreed on, though. So.

I have Monday off, and I dig my wedding ring out from my things and jam it back on my finger before I drive over to Watertown at lunchtime.

It’s where my father still lives, on the same street and in the same house I grew up in: a three-bedroom bungalow with tan shingles and a mahogany front porch, fronted by a perfectly manicured lawn and landscaping.

I can’t remember if I’ve ever seen a single weed amongst the mulched flowerbeds once in my life, or a shrub with a single branch out of place.

My dad’s always done all the gardening himself.