Back to You (7 page)

“No, Donny, wait!” I lunged for his arms, knocking the jeans right out of his hands and wrapped myself around him. He went rigid in my arms, like he didn’t even want me to touch him which made me just that much angrier at myself. “I’m really sorry, okay? I know I’ve been distant and weird since Tyler called, but you know I love you and I do want to do this thing with you. It threw me for a loop when he called but I’ll do better, I promise.”

He relaxed into my touch but his words cut me deep. “I want to believe that you love me, Alex, I really do, but you have to show me that it’s true. You can’t just say the words because you want them to be true and expect the feelings to magically be real. It’s got to come from your heart and not your head.”

I kissed his neck and hugged him tight because he was right. I still hadn’t told him I was
in
love
with him because I wasn’t sure I was, but I didn’t want to be the cause of him hurting any longer so I just repeated my words from before. “I’ll do better, I promise. Come back to bed?”

He sighed dejectedly then slowly crawled back into his place on my bed, but he rolled to face the wall and made no move to touch me. “Good night, Alex,” he said softly and curled himself up into a ball.

I knew he wanted to be left alone, so I pulled the blankets up and turned off the light.
Maybe I just don’t deserve to be happy if all I can do is hurt the people I love.

Tyler

“Was that him again?” I asked Riley sleepily, vaguely aware that it was still the middle of the night.

“Yeah, but I told him to stop calling my boyfriend and go focus on his.” Riley rolled up behind me and kissed my shoulder blade.

“Thanks, Ri.” I took my phone from him and put it back on the nightstand.

We both knew that I wasn’t his boyfriend, not technically, but I think we both got a little kick out of messing with Alex’s head because he’d been messing with mine for weeks. He’d tried to call me back while I was with Riley that first night after his boyfriend had answered the phone but I hadn’t called him back again. I’d bounced back and forth between wanting to answer his calls and wanting to ignore them. It took all the self-control I had, but I never answered. I told myself it was because I didn’t want to hear what he had to say.
Yeah, that’s why you saved his voicemail and still listen to it sometimes, right?

The way I saw it, he only called me when it was late at night, so he was obviously trying to be sneaky and hide it from his boyfriend and I didn’t want any part of that. Plus, I wasn’t afraid to admit to being a little scared to talk to him again. I’d finally gotten to a good place in my life again and I didn’t want him confusing me and fucking it all up. Spending time with Riley had been so much fun and getting to explore all the physical things with him that he’d never experienced before had been even more amazing.

I think that his reaction to being rimmed for the first time had been my absolute favorite. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard anyone use the word
fuck
so many times or nearly as creatively as he had while my tongue was on him. That would probably always be one of my favorite experiences.

The only thing we’d shied away from physically was actual penetration. He’d been very vocal about his desire to never be a bottom because it took far too much trust and he didn’t like to give up total control to anyone and, to be completely honest, I’d never been more relieved in my life. The only person I’d ever allowed inside of me was Alex and I didn’t know if I’d ever allow anyone else to be that for me, but if I ever did decide to, I would have to be in love with the person, and Riley and I were a long way from that.

The next morning when I awoke, Riley was already gone, but that wasn’t unusual. He liked to go running early in the morning before it got too hot and I was usually rushing around to get ready and out the door, so it didn’t leave us with a lot of time for each other anyway. I packed my lunch, grabbed a banana to eat on the way to work and dashed out the door to get to work on time.

I worked for a very well-known landscaping company and had climbed my way up to lead crewman, with four other employees in my crew. Andrew was one of my crewmen, he’d joined shortly after Alex left which was how we’d come to be best friends, but I’d also become really close to Braden, Jaxon, and Emily, the other three members.

I’d started working for the company during the summer when I was seventeen after learning that I had a knack for landscaping in my horticulture class at school. We’d just started a job on a rather large yard in the nicer part of town when someone pulled into the driveway, and Mr. Tall, Dark and Gorgeous exited the vehicle. It was no secret to the guys I worked with that I was gay and I couldn’t help but stare at the boy as he walked up to the door. He flashed me a smile that had made my stomach flop and I was a goner.

He’d come out later and offered to get us some ice water, which I had thought was ridiculously generous of him (probably because I was already enamored with him), and when he brought it back out, he sat down on the steps next to where I was tilling a patch of dirt and started talking to me. “Hey, I’m Alex,” he’d said to me, extending his hand.

I wiped my hand on my jeans, trying to knock the dirt off of it before I took his hand in mine. “Tyler,” I offered. “Do you live here?”

He grinned at me again and my stomach was back to flip flopping. “No, this is my grandparents’ house. It’s pretty incredible though. There’s a swimming pool in the backyard. Have you seen it?”

“No, we were just hired to do the front yard.” I bent back down to continue working in the dirt. “I wish my grandparents had a swimming pool; now that would be really sweet!”

Alex threw his head back and laughed loudly, which caused the other crewmen to look our way and one of them winked and waggled his eyebrows suggestively at me, which made me blush. “Maybe you could come over sometime and go swimming with me; I’m sure Grams and Pop-Pop wouldn’t mind.”

“Seriously?” I remember being stunned that someone as gorgeous as him would want to hang out with me. “That would be awesome!”

“Sure, do you have your phone on you?” I nodded and dug it out of my pocket. He took it from me and programmed in his phone number, pushed a few buttons and his phone beeped in his pocket. “There, now we’ve got each other’s numbers. I’ve got to get inside and help Grams with some stuff but can I call you later?” he’d asked.

I nodded. “I’ll be home after seven.”

“Great.” He handed my phone back and his fingers lingered on mine for a few seconds longer than would normally be acceptable. I wondered if that was his way of telling me something or if I was reading too much into it. “I’ll talk to you then.” He turned to go back in the house and the rest, as they say, is history.

I snapped out of my little flashback as I pulled into my parking spot. We were scheduled to work in the office, doing some research and trying to finish up the plan and design details for the yard we were due to start on at the beginning of the next week.

Andrew arrived shortly after I did and sat down at his desk, which was directly across from mine. We got caught up on where we were in the planning process and when the rest of the crew came in, we spent a decent chunk of the morning making respectable progress on the design before we broke for lunch. Braden and Jaxon left the office to eat but Emily remained behind with Andrew and me.

“I’m so glad we’re not working outside today,” Emily informed us as she pulled her sandwich from her bag. “It’s hotter than a witch’s tit out there.”

“How exactly is it that you know how hot a witch’s tit is, Em?” Andrew quizzed her. Those two were always giving each other shit.

Emily just rolled her eyes, flipped him off and then took a bite of her sandwich.

Andrew turned to me. “So, Ty, turning the big two-three tomorrow, huh? You got any big plans for the day?”

“No big plans that I know of. Riley may possibly come over in the afternoon but until then I’m free.”
Twenty-three.
“Damn, I’m getting old.”

“Yeah, before you know it you’ll be an old geezer shuffling around with a walker,” Emily teased. She was probably ten years older than Andrew and myself but a hard worker and a great asset to our team.

“So, things with you and Riley seem to be coming along nicely.” Andrew was a smug bastard sometimes, the best friend I could ever ask for, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t annoyed with how right he was sometimes.

“Yeah, things are good.” I refused to give him the satisfaction of too many details. “But I have a few things to talk to you about later.”

Emily stood up from her desk and grabbed her purse. “That’s my cue,” she announced. “I’m heading down to the coffee shop for a latté; you boys want anything?”

Andrew shook his head. “Nope, we’re good,” I told her. “Thanks, though.”

She winked at me and walked out the door. Andrew turned to me with his serious face on. “Okay, what’s up?”

Here goes nothing.
I cleared my throat and then dropped the bomb on him.
“Alex has been calling me.”

Andrew’s face was priceless and I’d wished that my camera was ready at that moment. His eyes grew wide, his jaw dropped and he inhaled audibly which was so very overly dramatic of him. I couldn’t help but laugh. “What do you mean Alex has been calling you? How long has this been going on? Does Riley know? Oh, god, Robyn is going to castrate me if you hurt him.” He was rapidly rattling off questions so I put my hand up to halt him so I could answer some of them.

“Stop, Andrew, let me talk for a second, all right?” He nodded and I relayed the whole story to him. I started from when I called Alex the night I took Riley out for the first time and ended with the phone call from the night before.

“So, just to clarify, you haven’t actually spoken to him?”

“No, not yet.”

“What do you mean not yet? You aren’t actually thinking about it, are you?” He was giving me that look, the one that said I was being a dumbass and should really reexamine my thoughts.

“I mean I haven’t yet and I don’t know if I want to or not.” I let out a long, frustrated groan. “It’s all so confusing, Andrew. I mean, Riley is great and I’m having a blast with him but I know that Alex is trying to get a hold of me and I don’t know how long my willpower will last. It takes everything in me not to answer the phone every single time he calls.”

“Oh, for christ’s sake, Tyler. I know it’s been difficult for you, but look at how far you’ve come since you met Riley. You’re actually going out and enjoying yourself. You’re happier, everyone has noticed, and you truly smile again. This is a refreshing change for you and I don’t want to see you spiral down that road again.” He gave me a pointed look. “I honestly think it’s best if you just leave Alex in the past, Ty. You deserve better than that.”

I was tired of people telling me I deserved better than Alex because he was the best thing that’d ever happened to me. I threw my hands up in the air, totally exasperated with the whole situation. “I know what I deserve, Drew; I deserve to be with the person that makes me happy, and regardless of everything that’s happened, Alex is that person. That’s what makes this so damn hard. He’s with someone else, and I want to know why he’s calling me if he has a boyfriend, but if I answer his call, I’ll just end up begging him to come home and I don’t want to be that pathetic person.”

“You’re not pathetic, Tyler. You’re human. I just don’t think I could stand to see you end up like you were after he left all over again. I’m your best friend, man, and I’m only looking out for you.”

“I know that and I honestly appreciate it, bud.” I leaned back in my chair and took a deep breath to try and release the tension that was building. “I really fucking need to get drunk tonight, you game?”

“Oh, I’m definitely game.” He leaned forward and batted his eyelashes at me exaggeratedly. “Pick me up at seven, stud muffin, and don’t even think about getting frisky before I’ve had my first beer.”
Best friend ever!

We laughed and the guys came waltzing back in. That meant lunch time was over and it was back to work for all of us but I couldn’t wait for later that night.
Drunken bliss, here I come.

Alex

I woke up the next morning and rolled over to find that my bed was cold and empty.

I had hoped that the events of the previous night were just products of another bad dream but, unfortunately, the lack of Donny’s warmth and smile in the morning was proof enough that I had indeed hurt him again by doing something incredibly stupid.

Seriously, I should come with a fucking warning label.

I debated on whether to call him right away and apologize once again or give him some space, a little time away from me to collect his thoughts and maybe realize that he’d be better off without me.

The thought of doing either one of those things made my stomach turn, so instead, I dragged my stupid ass out of bed and into the shower to try and clear my head and think things through.

But as I washed up, all I could think about was Tyler and what my continued calling him had done to him. Was I just hurting him more than I already had before? Because that was not my intention at all. I knew that if he was happy with his new boyfriend then I should leave him alone and let him keep moving forward with that Riley guy. The thing was, when I really got down to the heart of the issue, I realized that I didn’t want to let him go. The problem with that was that the longer I went on without him, the more I missed him and the more I wanted him back.