We had been hooking up for a few weeks now, always going to my apartment after work. There we would get to know each other better. At first it was purely physical, but now I couldn’t imagine my space without him. Cuddling on the couch, cooking dinner side-by-side. The little things that really built a relationship. We were doing all of them.
Wednesday morning, I missed seeing him because I was in a board meeting. I hated board meetings, even more so now that I didn’t get a chance to see Taylor. It was nearly two o’clock, and I hadn’t seen him in his mailroom office at all.
“He’s out sick today,” Sawyer said as he put a cup of coffee on my desk.
“Who?” I said, though I knew exactly who he was referring to.
“Your boy, Taylor. You think you’re discreet, but you’re really not. You’ve stared out that window more than you’ve looked at your laptop today.”
“Discreet like you and Mark were?” I rolled my eyes, behavior unbecoming of an executive in front of his employee, but I didn’t care. Taylor wasn’t here and he was sick? I hated that.
“Okay, so maybe you’re slightly more discreet than that, but still, it’s a little obvious that there is something going on between you two.”
“Let’s circle back to that ‘out sick.’ Is Taylor all right?” How come he knew Taylor was sick, but I didn’t?
“Yeah, he called in sick this morning. Head cold, I think. He sounded stuffed up yesterday. You didn’t notice?”
Yesterday, I hadn’t been able to entice him over to my place. We didn’t necessarily get together every night, but it was pretty close. He stopped short of staying over; many nights he would leave my place late at night, and I would order him an Uber. I wished he would just stay with me. Perhaps never leave my place. I could lock him up like Grysten had to with Tobias before Tobias realized that resistance was futile.
I didn’t like the idea of Taylor being alone while he was sick.
Mark came in then, smiling like the adoring goofus that he was at his fiancé. He tended to hand-deliver paperwork to me or others on this floor simply so he could see Sawyer. Mark handed me a folder as if he was doing me a favor, while really, he could have emailed whatever was in the folder.
“The stats you were looking for earlier. Sorry I didn’t have them this morning.”
“No worries. Your admin staff is slacking over on your side, probably because you left all the good ones here.”
Mark laughed good-naturedly. “Hell no. My staff is excellent. Though yours is pretty great, too.” He had barely spared me a glance; instead, he stared at Sawyer. Much like Sawyer had accused me of staring at Taylor.
“Also, you’re biased,” I said.
“Perhaps.” He winked at Sawyer. “I’ve got two of my people out with this head cold thing that seems to be going around. That’s why I didn’t have the report ready for you.”
“And Taylor’s out with it too,” Sawyer said. “Everybody better brush up on their vitamins. Gregory just came back to work after having it. He said it really knocked him on his ass. He was happy his husband was home to take care of him.”
“According to Evan, he was a big ol’ baby the whole time,” Mark said.
“Aww.” Sawyer pouted. “Would you take care of me if I were sick?”
Mark shook his head. “No. You’re the worst when you’re sick. I’d run away from you. In fact, if you get sick, you can go stay at your old apartment with Taylor.”
“Rude,” Sawyer said.
“I think I’ll work from home for the rest of the afternoon,” I said. “You don’t need me here for anything, right?” I didn’t care what their response was, I was already packing up my laptop and was halfway to the door.
Sawyer gave me a pointed look. “No, I don’t. But why do I have a feeling that your idea of working from home might be you working from my old apartment?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
“You and the mailroom guy? Taylor? Jeez, man, you’re like four times his size,” Mark said.
Sawyer shot him a look.
Mark threw his hands in the air in a “what” gesture. “You were thinking it.”
“You guys are going to get us reported to HR. We’re all going to be out of a job,” Sawyer said, as if he wasn’t encouraging me to go after Taylor in the first place. “Seriously, though, man, there is a policy against that.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m aware. Taylor is aware. It’s just—don’t worry about it,” I said. “Unless, of course, you’re going to report us?” I looked between the two of them.
