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“That’s not the same thing. I asked Chad to marry me, but something got in the way—”
“Could it have been all that whoring around you’ve been doing with one new boy after another.”
“At least when I fuck around I come back to Chad who’s waiting for me. You don’t even go home. Months can go by without you seeing Mary Ann. You sleep at the club or you’re at the mansion. What’s up with that?”
“I trust Mary Ann. You know if you neglect Chad, and you’ve been doing that on a regular basis, he might leave you. So you pay him off with a will and a ring. I’m just doing what you’re doing. Paying her off to stay with me, because who wants a man like me and you unless we provide an incentive? Mary Ann’s nights are lonely—”
“That’s if she isn’t fucking anyone, and no I don’t think she’s fucking anyone else, because who in their right mind would fuck her? She’s the coldest fish I’ve ever met. That’s why I’m gay. I don’t have time for all the drama that comes from ‘we can’t fuck tonight, and I’m a virgin and you will have to take it easy.’ I want my sex rough and you can’t get that with a woman. I don’t have time to coddle them and promise them things I know I won’t and can’t do.”
For once Nico made sense, but I had to let Mary Ann know. I owed it to her to tell her the truth. I stared into space hearing Nico, but not as my mind fought against telling Mary Ann and waiting until I was sure about Romeo. I concluded that I wanted to be with him, and Mary Ann should be the first to know.
I’d stalled long enough, and as I drove up to the apartment, I thought it best to tell her about my affair with Romeo. Hell, I didn’t even know what the fuck just happened between us, or the boy’s name. I’d fallen in love with him just like that. What the fuck was I thinking? Nico had ordered me to kill, or have one of my crew kill the only man I’d ever loved or fucked, and I couldn’t do it. I loved him for more reasons than having sex, but that was one of the main reasons. The sex had been incredible.
Stepping out of the Jeep, I handed the valet my keys. “I’m not staying long. Park it near the entrance.” Mary Ann had gotten used to me dropping in for a few minutes, then making an excuse and leaving. I thought she understood more than any of the other women I’d dated, and I was content with our relationship. I could say that I had someone to go home to even if I didn’t go home. I could say that I was straight, in hopes of when it came time for me to take over from Nico, I wouldn’t be talked about behind my back as Nico had been because he slept with men and liked men.
He could have hidden it, but he believed in living his life the way he wanted. I did as well, but I’d never met a man that attracted me the way Romeo had. From the moment I saw him stroll aimlessly into the club, something shot through my body. I saw his face and body, and that fascinated me long before I knew I would want to have sex with him or could. I wasn’t ready because I had this notion I was attracted to woman, even though, thereto, I hadn’t met one that made me want to make love to her.
When I had sex with Romeo, it was hard sex, wanton sex, it was all I thought it would be when I was inside of him. I could smell his scent from body spray. The smell was a mixture of vanilla and caramel. I’d never forget it. I couldn’t get it out of my senses.
After taking the elevator to the twenty-first floor, I opened the door and called out to Mary Ann. The apartment always smelled of paint and oil and she did too. The scent made my head hurt, and maybe that was why I seldom visited her.
Mary Ann was a painter, and artist, and I could find in her studio listening to music while she painted if she wasn’t in the kitchen. I could depend on that every time I dropped in when I wasn’t sleeping at the club, or the mansion that our parents had owned and left to us. After all, they didn’t leave it just to Nico. But he had a way of thinking everything was his.
“Where are you, Mary Ann?” I called out.
“In here,” she said, peeking around the corner, her smock covered in blues and yellows, some of her colors of choice. “I didn’t expect you tonight.” After kissing her on the forehead and pretending I was a husband coming from work, I dropped down in a large chair and watched her change a plain canvas to something beautiful. “What do you think?” She turned the easel slightly for me to see and comment.
“You know I don’t know anything about paintings.”
Yet she always asked, “But didn’t your parents own works of art?”
“Yeah, but that’s not the same thing. You can own something without knowing the first thing about what makes it unique or worth it. They took us to the museum and to galleries to garner an appreciation for works of art. I can tell you, it was a waste of time and money for me and Nico. The only thing he appreciated was the human form if it had a great ass and it was still attached to a man.”
“And what about you?” she asked.
“I’m still trying to figure out what I’m good at, and what makes me happy.” I paused and smiled at her.
“If something or someone makes you happy for the moment, and makes you smile every so often, then it’s worth your time and money to own it.”
I wanted to own Romeo, and for a moment I did because I could decide if he should live or die, and I knew nothing about how he felt or what he liked, or did he love me? I was here, and I was taking a chance by telling Mary Ann what I needed to say how I felt about Romeo. To me it was worth it to come clean about him with everyone, especially now.
“I have a confession to make to you.”
She offered me a closed smile and placed her brush down and picked up another as she smoothed out the colors.
She stopped long enough to say, “Wow. That sounds serious. Shouldn’t you see a priest?” Then she continued working. She didn’t think it was serious, but for me it was the most decisive and somber thing I’ve done lately, besides warning Romeo about Nico.
“It’s not that kind of confession... I... I’m in love with someone else.”
She never turned and because we’d had this type of conversation before, but nothing that would rise to this level, she didn’t take me seriously enough to put down her brush, or rush to commiserate with me.
“That’s not a confession. When we first got together, I told you that I didn’t love you and you admitted that you felt the same way. We’re together because of a need of some kind. So where’s the confession?”
She turned back, and continued painting. I thought it was a bowl of fruit she’d been working on diligently, but since she was an abstract painter, I couldn’t be sure if she was painting me or a bowl of fruit.
“I don’t know how to say this...”
“Just say it. It’s not that we hadn’t agreed when one of us met the right person, we’d part ways. You gave me what I wanted and I gave you stability.”
