Page 6 of Except You

No wonder Magnus cut us off. We’re fucking losers.

I sip my hot chocolate again, my mind miles away, just as Beau leans forward a bit and swipes at the corner of my mouth with the pad of his thumb.

“Sorry, just a bit of whipped cream there.”

And that’s that. Not a word about dick in my mouth or cum. God, I’m such an asshole. Making all these dumb assumptions and realizing that none of them are true.

It’s a bit of a mindfuck coming to this realization, one that leaves my brain in a bit of a fog. I think that I’m gonna need at least a week or two to process everything I’ve learned tonight. But it seems neither of us wants it to be over yet because neither of us is getting up to leave.

“Okay, first question,” he says, sticking his thumb in his mouth casually. “What’s your last name?”

I hesitate, not wanting to give it to him, for some reason, but doing it anyways.

“Morris.”

“Ah, well mine is Middlebrooks.”

“Hm. Beau Middlebrooks. That’s a nice name.”

It’s a dumb thing to say. Seems I have no filter and no brain in this moment.

“Thank you. It was a pain in the ass to spell growing up, but I got used to it really fast. And you have a nice name too. Max Morris, do you have any other siblings besides the one you wronged?”

“Yeah, two other brothers. Matt and Mitch. Magnus is the one who’s gay and who hates me.”

“Oh, all the M’s.” He grins at me, completely glossing over what I said. “Well, I have two sisters. Birdie and Bella.”

“Jesus, the B’s and the M’s,” I say with a smile, and he grins back at me.

“Seems our parents weren’t that original.”

“Nope. Seems they weren’t.”

“How old are you?” he asks.

“Thirty, you?”

“Twenty-six.”

“You’re young,” I say, and Beau waggles his eyebrows.

“I may be, but my frontal lobe is fully developed, and I can rent a car, so you have no leg to stand on in this argument.”

I huff a laugh at him. “Yeah, alright. You win.”

“Hm, that was easy. How about another fun question? Family pets?”

I shrug and take another sip of my drink. “We had dogs growing up, but I don’t have one now.”

Beau looks at me pensively for a moment. “Yeah, I don’t have any at the moment either, but my parents have a whole slew of them. All kinds. And let me tell you, they really tried to stick with the B theme when naming them all. Most of them have names I can’t even remember.”

“Oh god,” I say with a laugh, imagining it.

“Tell me about it. It’s ridiculous, but they’re great people. Just a little weird.”

“Weird is the best kind,” I say and then choke on my next words. “My brother, Magnus, is weird and…” My sentence trails off. I clear my throat, trying like hell not to cry in the middle of this coffeehouse with this stranger. “…I miss him.”

“Oh, Max. I’m sure you do.”

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