Page 47 of Wilde Shorts
There was silence for several beats. I knew he was dying to ask where I was working, but he probably realized it would be crossing a boundary I’d set the other night.
“Do you want to ride with me to the city?” he asked instead.
I thought of him dropping me off in front of the gay club. The mental image in my head included sirens and explosives… maybe an arrest warrant or two.
“No, thanks. I’ll be fine.”
“Stevie…” He sighed. “Are you sure I can’t help you with some money? You can consider it a loan if you want to. I just?—”
“We haven’t been going out long enough for that, Evan,” I said. “And you know it.”
“No, I don’t know it. I want to help ease your burdens. Please let me help you, sweetheart.”
His voice was low and tempting, but I stayed strong. “Maybe later. After we’ve been together a while. Right now I just can’t, okay?”
Evan paused. “All right. I won’t push. Will you come home to my house after you’re done?”
I was too busy smiling to myself to answer right away.
“Or at least text me to tell me you made it home safely,” he said more softly. “Please.”
“I’ll come to your place. I’d like that,” I admitted. “I miss you, Chief.”
“I miss you too, beautiful.”
I bounced through the rest of my afternoon and evening with an extra spring in my step. Despite the continued absence of my mother, I felt like maybe things were going to be okay. At least I wasn’t alone anymore. I had Evan Paige on my side, and he wanted to be a part of my life. It was the first time besides becoming friends with Sassy Wilde that I’d truly no longer felt alone.
Tonight I was finally going to get to work behind the bar, which meant I’d be able to tell Evan I was working as a barback in hopes of being a bartender soon, and it wouldn’t be a lie.
As soon as I could get ahead of the game financially, I’d have to look for a job that paid better than my hourly rate at Sugar Britches. As much as working at the bakery was my biggest selfish indulgence, I had to finally admit it didn’t pay enough to help make up for my mom’s job changes. I couldn’t imagine telling Nico I could no longer work for him. The very idea of leaving all the people and the place that felt like home to me made me nauseous. But I wouldn’t think about it yet. One thing at a time.
After dropping Willow off with Dina, I returned home and pulled on a sexy pair of skinny jeans and a tight, hot-pink tank that saidPower Bottoms For Jesuson it. I had to admit to feeling a bit extra smug wearing it now that I was a legitimate bottom. A bottom in practice, not just imagination.
Hell, I was like thekingof bottoms now. I’d had sex—bottoming, obvs—a sum total of one time. But that one time had been epic. And I’d bossed him around, hadn’t I? I’d told him things likemoreand… ah…moreagain. And I’d commanded him to jimmy my prostate too. So, yeah.Hellyeah. I was a power bottom. Iownedthe title of power bottom.
I sauntered out of my apartment and straight into a pack of dudeswith low-hanging jeans and white tank tops looking shifty next to a tricked-out Honda Civic hatchback with undercarriage lighting.
“’Sup,” I said with a nod as I headed toward my Ford sedan, praying like hell those gangsters weren’t going to peg me as gay. When I got into the car, I looked down at my lavender skinny jeans with artful slashes up and down the thighs and my super-gay tank and laughed my fucking ass off.
Sure, Stevie. You totally pass as straight. Straight out of a pride parade.
Sometimes I wondered if maybe growing up, I’d taken the whole “Be Yourself” thing a little too far. My mom had gone through a phase of playing Sara Bareilles’s song “Brave” on repeat for like ten weeks straight a few years ago. And before that, I’d been given a beat-up copy of a colorful book by a daycare teacher that told a story of a colorful patchwork elephant who didn’t match all the gray ones. It was the only book that had ever been mine and not borrowed from the library or shared with my brother. I’d read it a million times. Maybe I’d read it so much, I’d turned into Elmer the Patchwork Elephant and the dudes in the apartment parking lot were the regular gray ones.
How sad for them.
Katy Perry’s “Firework” was playing on the radio when I turned on the car. I rolled my windows down despite the February air, cranked up the volume just as she sang, “You’re original, cannot be replaced,” and sang my fool head off as I drove out of the lot.
I was in such a fantastic mood when I arrived at Feathers, even discovering I had to dance that night didn’t bring me down.
Until I saw Chief Fucking Paige sitting in the front row and panicked.
18
EVAN
I wasin a pissy mood when I met up with the guys. Everyone gave me hell for being in a funk, so I tried to fake it despite doing a terrible job of it.
“Seriously, Paige,” one of my old coworkers said with a frown. “What the hell’s wrong with you tonight? I thought you were cool with going to a club.”