I shrugged and scrolled aimlessly through the file I’d been half focused on. “It’s fine. I’m busy.”
The door closed again, and I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting, but in the past Maurice would’ve badgered me to tell him what I wanted or simply made a choice himself. I didn’t get another visit from him, even though I could hear him going about his work.
He didn’t say goodbye before he left.
There was no point in returning to the hotel that night because it was clearly not the repository of fantastic memories I’d hoped. No, now it was a mausoleum. After I showered and changed into casual clothes, I paced around the upstairs of my home and ended up in the library, where Maurice had run from me the night he’d dropped off my phone. It made me stumble when I thought about that evening, and I stopped to stare out a window at the flowers lining a walking trail near the edge of the lawn. He had a history of running from me; although, I hadn’t thought too much about it at the time. Why had he done it then? Why did he leave the hotel?
I groaned and scrubbed my hands over my face. I had to talk to him and work wasn’t the place to do it. I stared all around and paced along the perimeter of the room, touching the warm leather spines of books until I came to the only reasonable conclusion: I had to go to his house and speak with him. This wasn’t a phone conversation; it required being able to see his face.
Maurice’s address was in my phone under his contact information, but I’d never been there. No time like the present. I held my breath a lot on the treacherous drive and stopped when my vision got spotty. It was difficult to see through the steady rain. His home was a good ways out in the country, and the road wasn’t as clear of debris as the one to mine. I had to drive around branches and other roadblocks, and I made the decision to ford a small stream that was going across both lanes, even though that was something they always warned you not to do on the news: never cross flowing water.
I had to get where I was going and the stream wasn’t that wide, so I took the risk.
When I reached Maurice’s driveway the headlights swept across a cheerful yellow shotgun house with bright teal shutters and trim. His blue Infinity was parked near the front in a gravel driveway. There were no lights on at all, and I figured that meant the power was still down out here away from the city. I went to the door, and it took me a couple of minutes to work up the courage to knock. My knuckles hurt, I rapped the wood so hard.
Inside there was athud. “Gosh darn it!”
The amusement that flickered to life in my chest died again as I thought about everything I wanted to say to Maurice when I was looking into his eyes. The door opened and he stood there with a large red flashlight in his hand, blinking in confusion. The beam had me squinting and cast his face in shadow.
“Hello.”
His mouth fell open and he gaped. A moth flittered closer to him, and before I could say anything he inhaled, then proceeded to cough up a lung. I slapped his shoulder, then his back, until he was breathing normally again, and he grimaced as he glanced up at me.
“Uh, hi. Come inside. What are you doing? It’s still raining! Why did you come out here? I’m not sure it was safe. I probably shouldn’t have made the trip myself. Are you okay?”
“I’m okay.” I felt both guilty and awful as I slipped inside, and he closed the door behind me. I had a horrible flashback to being a teenager and getting made fun of by kids at school for existing, then going home and getting berated by my father. I knew Maurice was probably concerned for my safety, but the rant rankled.
“The roads are terrible,” he said, as if I hadn’t heard him.
“Why did you leave our hotel room without a word?”
He took a few steps back and cradled the flashlight in both hands, then pointed the beam toward the floor so I couldn’t see much of his face. “You aren’t going to want people at work to know you’re with me. It seemed like the smartest thing to do.”
“Says who? You could’ve at least discussed it with me.”
He handed me the flashlight before walking across the room, then sat down on a love seat that matched the shutters outside. “Please, make yourself at home.”
“I’m fine,” I snapped.
He crossed his arms and closed his eyes. “Matthew, my ex, wouldn’t go out with me. He.... He liked fucking me, but I embarrassed him. He never said as much, but anytime I suggested going out he would find a reason to say no. Every once in a while he would go to a bar with me, but only if there was a group of us. He never touched me while we were outside the house. At first I thought he was nervous about strangers knowing we were gay, which can sometimes cause problems, and it took me a while to work out he didn’t want people realizing the guy he was out with wasme. We lived together and that had to be enough.”
Anger boiled in my gut. “And you think I would feel this way, too? Did I do anything to give you that idea?”
He sighed, and his shoulders curled forward until he was nearly in a ball. “It doesn’t matter how you feel. A lot of folks expect to see a different kind of man with you, and at work there are people who will be angry to see you with any guy at all. It could cause issues with clients, and in probably ten other ways I haven’t thought about, all because I want to sleep with you.”
I nodded and my mind spun. My fingers hurt from gripping the flashlight too hard. “That isn’t why you left.”
He scowled and glanced up. “It is.”
“Bullshit. What’s the real reason?”
Silence dragged out between us.
“Well?” I demanded.
“That is the main reason, but....” He smacked his hands down at his sides. “You look good. You look different from me.”
“I love the way you look!” I ran the beam of light over him, and he threw up a hand to shield his eyes. “Why are you putting other people’s opinions on me?”
