A few minutes later, he came back into the bedroom, dressed and looking exhausted.
“How do you feel?”he said.
“Can you get me a another pill?And a bag of ice?Wrap it in a towel.”
While he was getting that, I tried to sit up properly, because I’d slid down the bed overnight.Moving made the pain a lot worse.He came back with a bag of ice, and I pressed it against my ribs.My chest felt cold and contracted.
“I’ve got to go to work,” he said.
I panicked.“Can you call in sick?I don’t want to be alone.”
“Sorry.It’s the last day of filming, and they can’t replace me.I’ll try to get home early.I’ll keep my phone on me.Call me if you need me.Or is there someone I can call to stay with you?”
“No.”Ben or Bexley would have come, but what if they came over, and he came home while they were here and opened the door with his key?I hadn’t told them about him, because I didn’t know what to tell them.I was still trying to figure things out myself.
He left the room and came back with a pitcher of water and a glass, and he set them on my bedside table.Then he leaned in and kissed me on the forehead.Not in a patronizing or sexy way, but tenderly.The expression on his face crushed me.
“What was that for?”I said.
“Dunno.For being a brave little soldier?”
Now,thatwas patronizing.“Fuck off.”
“Will do,” he said, and he did.
I had a bad day.The two trips I made to the bathroom exhausted me.I tried to sleep, but the pain kept me awake.The ice pack melted, and the ibuprofen wore off before he came home, and I was too wiped to get up again.
I was so happy when I heard his key in the door.He got me my pills and a new ice pack, and he reheated yesterday’s pizza, and we watched a movie on my laptop in the bedroom.When I told him I wanted some Coke, he went out and bought me some, even though it was late, and he must have been tired from work.
It was also his last day filming his commercial.Instead of going for auditions, he stayed home to look after me for the next week.After that, I could sit up for long enough to work on my laptop from home, but only for a few hours a day.I had to tell Bexley and Ben what had happened because I couldn’t make our rehearsal nights, and until my ribs healed, I couldn’t stand up to play keyboards.Bexley wanted to come over, but I told him I wasn’t up for it, because I still wasn’t ready to tell him about Eddie.Which was how messed up this situation was.
After a week, he started looking for work, and I started making dinner for us again.We finished building my model and started painting it.He was amazing at that, so I let him do the detail work.Once it dried, I hung it from a hook in the ceiling above our bed.
I felt so comfortable with him now.When we watched TV, I’d put my arm along the back of the couch behind him, almost touching him.Other times, I’d brush against him in the kitchen.When we were working on the model, if our knees touched under the table, I didn’t pull away, and neither did he.But he never tried to touch me.He didn’t seem angry with me.He was great—better than great, the way he’d looked after me when I was healing and cleaned the apartment when it was too much for me.It was six weeks before I could bend over or straighten up without pain.But even after I healed, he gave me so much space I wondered if he was afraid I’d break if he touched me wrong.We were acting like friends.
Was he my best friend now?It felt that way.When Bexley suggested we have a movie night at my place, I said let’s go out to see a movie instead.And I didn’t invite Eddie.He didn’t seem to mind.He didn’t mind when I went out for rehearsals or gigs with the band either.Had he told his friends about me?Whathad he told them?Was he turning down nights out with them to be with me?Or did he go out with his friends on nights I went out?I didn’t know, and I didn’t ask.Things were so peaceful, I didn’t want to disturb the balance.
Then, one Thursday in early September while he was out late looking for work, I got this urge to watch his movie again.He hadn’t hidden it; it was sitting on top of my DVDs, and, well, I wanted to watch it, so I did.And maybe I stopped it a few times to get a better look at some of the places they’d filmed and, okay, to get a better look at him.We lived together, and I could look at him whenever I wanted, but this way, I could stare at him without feeling guilty or self-conscious.Then I got to that sex scene in the warehouse.I just wanted to see him in that context, excited and hungry.He’d never looked at me like that.
I wondered if he’d fooled around with Edgar before or after they’d filmed that scene.I watched it a few times looking for tells, and then I heard his key in the door, and I panicked and hit pause instead of stop.
He came in.“Hey,” he said.And then he saw the TV.
“Uh,” I said.“I was...watching your...movie....Sorry.”Real smooth, Porter.
And he laughed.
I should have been relieved he wasn’t mad at me.Instead, I was angry.
“What’s so funny?”
“You froze the frame on my ass,” he said.And he sat on the couch right beside me.
I fumbled the remote and turned off the TV.“I wasn’t checking out your ass.”
I’d totally been checking out his ass.
“Hey, whatever turns your crank,” he said.
