Chapter Two
“That was the one who got away, huh?” Eliot asked the moment Sam’s footsteps were out of earshot.
Ben sat back down at his desk, keeping his expression as neutral as he could
That was a harder task than it would have been ten minutes ago, before he knew Sam was back in town. “If I answer this question, will you drop it?”
“Almost certainly not. Besides, you just answered it anyway,” Eliot pointed out.
Ben sighed. On the one hand, he liked having someone smart and capable to work with. On the other hand, sometimes Eliot was a little too sharp for his own good.
Or, rather, for Ben’s own good. Eliot knew him well enough to see right through him these days.
“Well, it was,” Ben said. There was no point in lying, and while he knew Eliot would actually drop it if he was asked, Ben needed to process what had just happened.
Sam had blown back into his life like a goddamn tornado and hadn’t even stayed long enough to say a proper hello. Confusing didn’t even begin to cover it.
Had he just been checking to see if Ben was still alive? Did he want to talk to him, or not?
Ben was starting to feel as though he’d said the wrong thing, though he didn’t think he’d said enough for any of it to be wrong.
Maybe Sam had freaked out over Eliot, though he couldn’t imagine why anyone would do that. Eliot made non-threatening into an artform.
“He’s cute,” Eliot said. “I’m very into the whole sun-bleached hair and deep tan thing.”
Ben smiled wryly. “I have met Danny,” he responded. Danny was nothing like Sam, not really, but there were a few superficial similarities between them.
Samhadlooked good. Healthy and brighter than he had done the last time Ben had seen him. Or at least, brighter than the memory of him was.
Memory was a strange beast.
“So do you think this means you two might…” Eliot trailed off, apparently afraid to make the suggestion out loud.
“You sound like a kid whose parents are getting a divorce,” Ben said. “You met the guy for ten seconds.”
“But I know he’s important to you. I know he’s important because you never talk about him except when you’re tired or you’ve been drinking.”
Ben opened his mouth to respond to that, but nothing came to mind. He was guilty on both counts, and Sam was important to him. There was no point in arguing over it.
“He’s not gonna be interested after all this time. He’s got a life of his own now,” Ben said, more to remind himself than to inform Eliot.
Sam was bound to have a life of his own. He had an established career, and he’d always quietly wanted to settle down with a partner, so he would have by now. If he was coming to see Ben, it was just to get in touch with an old friend.
There was no room for them to get back what they’d had. The ocean of crap between them had been much, much wider than the Atlantic.
If Sam had wanted to come back to Ben, he could have done it anytime. Ben still lived in the same apartment Sam had helped him move into years ago. He’d never exactly been hard to find.
“If you really thought that, you wouldn’t be nearly as disappointed as you are,” Eliot said.
“Wishful thinking,” Ben murmured. He didn’t want to think Sam was gone. He’d spent a lot of time telling himself he really was coming back, any second.
The first time he’d told someone he was bi, Ben had almost expected to see Sam the next day. As though he would have heard the soft confession across the ocean and swooped in, now that Ben was finally ready to be with him.
When it didn’t happen, Ben should have accepted that it was never going to.
He hadn’t, though. Not really. Seeing Sam standing in his office was the culmination of a thousand fantasies, and in every single one of them he was the kind of man who had the balls to say he’d been in love with him, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever stopped, and he was sorry.
And more importantly, that he was ready and willing to beg for forgiveness if Sam was willing to give him another shot.
