Page 67 of Read My Lips

“Our arrangement has nothing to do with me not wanting it to happen.”

Sweat beaded from my palm onto the padded handle of his case. Any minute now I’d drop it, and break my own toes.

So I set it down, turning to face him again. “No?”

Behind him, one of the black-painted lampposts dotted along the railings gating off the river set him into shade. The heavy square stone base supported ugly, twining fish at the bottom of the metalwork, fresh off a map marked Here be Dragons. How bloody apt.

“No.” Storm clouds circled. “Listen to me.” Simon held my eye, but his mouth twisted, searching for the words.

And then he started signing instead, slower than he’d been speaking, taking his time to reach for the right signs, warping the flow of his sentences. “It used to feel like winning, when I got this job, and I’d finally done enough to have a seat at the table. One that wasn’t conditional on me being only inoffensively Black and only technically deaf. Only acceptably eccentric. And then you turned up, and it felt different.” Static buzzed.

“What?”

“I like you.”

Time stopped. There had to be a but. He cannot have meant it the way I wanted him to. The memory of his signs still hung in the air, his expression tugging at the edges of his features like it wasn’t done with him yet.

Simon stepped towards the river railings, out of the flow of pedestrians, grimacing like the words were painful to find, even signing them. “You’re straightforward – you get it. Get me. You don’t make everything… needlessly complicated.”

Oh what a joke. I was lying through my lying teeth to him about wanting more than a quick fumble. All I wanted in the world was to make him smile and mean it all the way through for once, and I couldn’t even tell him. Because I was the kind of shit who listened to his clearly stated boundaries, and still thought he might want more than sex if I hung around long enough.

“It’s not complicated.” My hands jittered with adrenaline, but I trusted my voice even less than my signs. I could school my face – show him the agreement he wanted to see. I had nothing else to give him.

“It shouldn’t be.” Simon’s nostrils flared. “But it’s always been too much hassle for most people. You get it. You’re easy to be around. So, there. I said it. I like you. But I’m not going back on anything. I don’t date anyone.” So why was he looking at me like he blamed me? “And even if I did, we couldn’t, so it’s a moot point.”

Over his shoulder, muddy river water swirled and shimmered in the sunshine. Everything sparkled. The day was way too bright for all of this confusion. I’d moot his bloody point.

“Explain that to me again, yeah? Because all this – you telling me you like me, getting het up about Mel, strolling along the river holding hands – it’s a bit fucking confusing.”

Simon groaned painfully low. “I know. Okay? That’s why you shouldn’t even be here.”

“Bugger that. You like me. I like you. I want to be here.”

He sagged against the railings, all the complicated thoughts in his head visibly failing to knit together. His fingers smoothed over his hair in a tight little motion, drawing himself together, finding order. “Ben, I’m your boss.”

He said that like it was supposed to be the final answer.

I squared in front of him. Westminster Bridge sloped over his shoulder – a low expanse of undecorated concrete, made even starker compared to the overly decorative fish on the lamppost next to him. “Yeah. I know. And?”

“And there’s an inherent power imbalance between us. I pay you. That’s what. And – as if that wasn’t bad enough – I cannot function at work without you. Did I not spell that out clearly enough?” He shook his head bitterly. “I’m not entirely sure who even has the upper hand here, but it’s a clusterfuck whichever way you look at it. We can’t ever do anything other than mess around. There is so much co-dependence between us we shouldn’t even be doing that.”

Why had I opened my stupid mouth? He was right about clusterfuck.

“Simon?” I signed, flowing through the rhythm of the letters of his name on autopilot, and his eyebrows hitched in question.

Sucking in a rib-achingly huge breath, I held it. I’d spent yesterday way too into faking a sex tape with him. Had merrily bounded into bed with him on a tissue paper thin excuse. Did he seriously think I didn’t want to do any of it again?

“You can do whatever you like with me.”

Simon made a face.

“Look at me.” Borrowing a move from his playbook, I touched his jaw, angling his face towards mine. My thumb fitted into the dimple in his chin like it was always meant to. “I want you to.”

His throat shifted, bobbing as he swallowed and he pushed my hand away. “You don’t get it.”

“I really, really don’t.”

“What if I was into something horrible, and you thought you had to agree or lose your job?” His thumb smoothed along my cheekbone so deliberately it felt like he was holding himself back.