“You can prove it by being honest,” Ben said. “I can tell something is off, but I don’t know what.”
Thomas’s face blanked, and he slid to the edge of the bed. He kept himself covered until he’d gotten his clothes off the floor and managed to get into his underwear and his pants. Ben watched silently, opting to put a shirt on when Thomas stood. Ben’s first reflex was to touch Thomas, and he hated that. Thomas with his smooth skin and the hints of gray that salted his otherwise dark hair. He was handsome and he was a great lay, but he was messy and Ben didn’tdomessy anymore.
Not after Cody.
Ben sighed and jerked his head toward the doorway. “Let’s go sit down at the table or something.”
Thomas followed him down the hallway to the dining room, taking a seat at the table and folding his hands together in front of him like he was waiting for a lecture. Ben carried on into the kitchen, coming back with two glasses and a half-drank bottle of Chardonnay. He poured them both a glass and sat down opposite Thomas and waited for him to speak the truth.
“I’m not seeing anyone,” Thomas said softly. He flattened one of his palms against the table and traced the tip of his pointer finger up and down each digit.
“So you said.”
Thomas took a tentative swallow of his wine and mouthed something at his lap, but there was no sound to the words. He did it again and again, and then, “Can you excuse me? I have to use the restroom.”
Ben pointed down the hallway and Thomas stood so fast, the chair almost clattered to the floor when he pushed it away. He watched Thomas go, sipping at his wine and trying to come up with what could possibly be so scary to admit that Thomas found himself unable to say the words.
The toilet didn’t flush and the sink didn’t run, but the bathroom door opened and Thomas returned with such purpose that Ben almost didn’t recognize him.
“You’re the first man I’ve ever been with,” Thomas blurted as he sank back into the chair. And Ben had to admit that of all the things he’d expected to come out of Thomas’s mouth, that wasn’t one of them.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“You’re the first man I’ve ever been with.” Thomas frowned and looked down at his lap. “My wife and I are divorcing, and lately, recently, I was thinking that maybe I was interested in men. I think I’ve always known, but I was married and… so I just…”
“Thomas, calm down.”
Thomas’s shoulders heaved for how hard he was breathing, and at Ben’s words, he caught himself and the motion slowed, growing less intense. Ben waited until Thomas’s face turned back to its normal color before cautiously taking a drink of his wine. The admission caught him off-guard, but there was no shame in it and he didn’t want Thomas to misinterpret any of his reactions as being negative, because they weren’t. There wasn’t anything wrong or shameful with what Thomas had confessed.
“I can go,” Thomas offered.
“Did you want to go?”
“Not really.”
“Then why would you say that?” he asked.
“This is a lot,” Thomas said. “This has made things very not casual.”
“We’re not getting married. This doesn’t really change anything,” he lied.
It changed a lot of things.
“You were my first,” Thomas said.
“Am I your last?”
“I hope not.”
Ben leaned back and slumped in his seat, letting out a long and tired breath. This definitely wasn’t what he’d signed up for when he’d let Thomas come over, but he wasn’t sure he hated it. There was something powerful about being someone’s first. Ben could teach Thomas to fuck the way thatheliked, and it was childish, but there was a part of him that really liked the idea of Thomas making another man come one day doing things that Ben had taught him to do. Admittedly, he also didn’t hate the idea of Thomas doing those things to makehimcome, but they’d agreed.
Besides, knowing what he knew about Thomas now, there wouldn’t ever be anything between them other than this same kind of casual intimacy. Ben was still reeling from the breakup with Cody, and Thomas had a lifetime of repressed sexuality to unpack an explore.
“Do you want me to treat you differently?” Ben asked.
“Not really.” Thomas reached for his wine, pulling the glass toward him without lifting it off the table. “Maybe some explanations of things sometimes, but you already kind of do that.”
Ben’s cheeks burned. “There’s a difference between talking dirty and offering up a how-to guide.”
