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He wanted to date, but he couldn’t stand the thought of tying himself to just anyone—and the demands he’d have to make on his partner to keep his independence and free time seemed cruel and unfair.
He was…nothing.
At least, he felt like nothing.
It was far too easy to paste on a smile and be the chill, easygoing friend because that mask was simple. Even if the weight of it was starting to become too heavy. There was just no real solution to his problem. Not unless he woke up one morning an entirely different person.
What he needed and what he could expect someone to offer him were polar opposites in the world of romance and love.
He was on his second turn around the path when Wren became aware of a person next to him. He’d relied on his hearing for so many years that he still hadn’t quite honed his ability to feel the presence of other people the way Caleb could do, and he was still a little too startled when someone appeared out of nowhere.
He did his best to compose himself as he glanced over, and his heart sank when he saw it was the younger guy with the Lab mix. The guy was smiling, his head slightly tipped down, so Wren had absolutely no hope of trying to read his lips as he spoke.
Wren let him go on for a bit, and then he waved his hand in the man’s periphery and did the universal sign for deaf—touching his ear and shaking his head.
The guy’s eyes widened, his steps faltering, and Wren mirrored him without really thinking about it.
“Sign?” the guy asked with stiff hands.
Wren’s brows shot up. “Yes. You sign?”
The guy bit his lip when he answered. “Learning. YouTube.”
Wren wanted to roll his eyes since the most viral ASL accounts on YouTube tended to be seventeen-year-old kids who were in ASL club in high school. Wren could generally make out what they were saying, but he had to work twice as hard for it.
Still, he wasn’t really wired to be rude, so he offered the guy a smile. “Great. I’m Wren.” He spelled his name very slowly.
The guy’s lips curved over each letter, and then he signed, “Bird?”
Wren laughed and shrugged. “Parents.”
The guy grinned back at him. “Mark.” He signed a T instead of an R, but Wren was pretty sure the guy’s name wasn’t Matk—though he could be wrong. “Your dog. Name-what?”
Wren resigned himself to stilted conversation all because his people-pleasing compulsions were high that night, and he stuck his fingers in his mouth, whistling for Mouse, who immediately stopped sniffing the base of a tree and trotted over.
Mark turned his head, and Wren assumed he called for his own dog because the pale pup that had been keeping a polite distance from Mouse walked over, still hesitant.
“SHY,” Mark spelled.
Wren waved him off as he gave Mouse the command to sit. A small part of him wanted to just start voicing to make at least half the conversation easier, but he wasn’t in the mood. He wasn’t in the mood for any of it, in fact.
But it was what it was. He introduced Mouse, then watched as Mark attempted to spell Chip, and he gave both dogs a few scratches before they took off again. Wren rolled his shoulders and gestured toward the path, hoping Mark would get that he just wanted alone time, but he wasn’t so lucky.
Mark kept in step with him, typing on his phone, which Wren knew was a message for him. ‘Sorry I don’t know more in ASL.’
Wren waved him off, then tapped his thumb on his chest and gave his fingers a gentle wiggle. “It’s fine.”
Mark tilted his head to the side, then typed again. ‘Maybe you and I could get together sometime and work on my signs.’
Wren’s stomach gave a swoop, but for all the wrong reasons. The suggestion didn’t piss him off the way it might have before, because nothing irritated him more than random strangers suggesting Wren give them free lessons in a language he most definitely wasn’t qualified to teach. But right now, it only made him think of Percy, and his heart was so occupied with the confusion over what it wanted from the ridiculously hot English guy that he had no space for anything else.
Wren made a grabby gesture for the phone and typed back, ‘That sounds great, but I have no free time. I’m one of the owners at BrewBiz.’
Mark’s brows shot up as he read the message. ‘Maybe I’ll stop in this week and see you. You could have coffee with me on your break.’
Wren grimaced and shook his head. ‘Definitely against company policy.’
‘You’re the owner,’ Mark texted, giving Wren a wink when he looked up from reading the message. ‘You don’t want to make an exception this one time?’
