Daniel
“Hey,Jules. Me again. I, uh, texted you earlier. Just wanted to make sure everything was okay with Theo and Sam.” I lowered my voice. “And to make sure you were still coming out here tonight. Don’t make me hunt you down, baby. Remember, I know you’re ticklish. Call me back.” I hung up and tossed the phone on the kitchen counter with a clatter, pushing away the nagging sense of worry at the back of mymind.
Sabrina wandered in from the living room. She’d shed her high heels, but was still wearing a tailored suit that probably cost as much as a month’s rent for someone here inO’Leary.
She looked about the same as ever, but the incongruity of seeing her here in O’Leary was off-putting. I remembered Julian at Thanksgiving, worrying about his worlds colliding, and all of a sudden, I realized exactly how he felt. The Daniel I’d been the last time I saw Sabrina wasn’t the man I was now. This place had changed me. Julian had changedme.
“Everything okay?” Sabrina nodded at thephone.
“Yeah. I think so.” I opened a cabinet at random and found coffee mugs, so I decided to brew a pot of coffee for lack of anything else todo.
“You know, I’d like to believe you’re distracted because you’re so happy to see me,” Sabrina said. “Or because you’re anxiously awaiting my opinion on the chapters you just let me read. Or because you’re overwhelmed with delight at the fact that Copperlane is offering you a deal, sight unseen, that could make both of us a tidy amount ofmoney.”
“Iamhappy to see you. And Iamdelighted by the offer. After everything that happened last year, it’s amazing.” Almost too good to betrue.
“I seem to recall telling you last year, before you entered your own personal witness protection program, that it would all be fine. Patience, I told you. These things happen, I told you.” She leaned both forearms onto the counter next to the stove, sliding into my field ofvision.
I flashed her a small smile before turning the burner on under the coffee pot. “I do remember that.Vaguely.”
“But you insisted that you were done with writing. Your muses had all deserted you. Didn’t even have the urge to pen a short story, as Irecall.”
I scowled.Muses. I’d never talked about muses in mylife.
“Ididn’thave the urge. Untilrecently.”
“Mmm hmm.” She turned to lean her ass against the counter, folding her arms over her chest in a way that showcased her cleavage. I noticed—I mean, how could I help but notice? But it was a distant hum of awareness. Not even a fraction of what I felt when Julian was in the room, even before we’d added benefits to ourfriendship.
“So what changed?” she asked, and it took me a second to realize that she was asking about the writing, not my sexualfantasies.
“I did,” I said without thinking, but it wastrue.
“Right.” I could feel the weight of her stare as I took down coffee mugs and rifled through the fridge for milk. “Speaking of changes. Are we gonna talk about the cute gay elephant in theroom?”
“You think I’m cute?” I said innocently. “I’mtouched.”
“I meant your boyfriend, though I suppose it could go for either of you. I’m all for love is love, honey, but since when do you play for thatteam?”
I shrugged. “Since now.” SinceJulian.
“And how long after he found out about your bestselling books and your trust fund did he manage to convince you that you weregay?”
I threw my head back and laughed. “Are youserious?”
She shook her head. “Look at it from my perspective. You feel like a failure, you wind up depressed. Instead of going into therapy like a normal person, you decide to take a sabbatical or whatever the hell all this is.” She circled a hand in the air, likeall thiscould indicate the ancient kitchen, the rough cabin with its menagerie of pets, the woods surrounding us, little O’Leary, or all of the above. “You won’t return calls or texts, so I have to drag my ass out here to confirm you’re still alive, and then I find you’ve been indoctrinated into some kind of country cult, where the members won’t even confirm they know you, and some dude you’ve known for less than a year has conned you into rethinking your sexual orientation and now he won’t even answer your texts.” She nodded at the phone on the counter. “What the hell am I supposed tothink?”
“Have you ever thought of writing fiction yourself?” I asked. “You kind of have a knack forit.”
She tilted her head to the side and stared atme.
“You want to know what made me decide to start writing again? Jules did. Not because he conned me into it, but because he inspired me. As afriend. For a year, I didn’t even want tolookat my laptop, because all I could see when I did was failure. He helped me remember why I loved writing in the first place. And he sure as hell didn’t brainwash me into falling for him.” I smirked. “I did that all bymyself.”
Sabrina looked thoughtful, but she stayed quiet, so Icontinued.
“You know when I told Julian about my books?Two weeks ago. Maybe a little less.” She narrowed her eyes, but I nodded firmly. “It’s true. I came here as no one, Sabrina. As some dude named Daniel, with no family or friends or connections, no trust fund. I was an asshole to everyone I met—I didn’t want friends or connections. I was sick of people. Hell, I was fucking sickofmyself.”
“And Julian worked this miracle?” she asked skeptically. “You don’t need therapy, you just needed the love of a goodman?”
I felt my face heat. “I could probably still use therapy. But yes. Having a good man like Julian in my life definitely helped. And frankly, so did this place. I don’t think I could have changed anything in the city. Hell, IknowI couldn’t. I needed a perspective shift. I needed to realize that the shit I was so worried about—being successful, having a multitude of friends, getting my parents’ approval—that’s not all I’m good for. A couple of flops don’t make a failed career, and a failed career doesn’t make a failed life,” Iparaphrased.
