Page 20 of Cool for the Summer

“I spent six months at a LGBTQ+ nonprofit. But I wasn’t actually that good at it. I’m not a big fan of conflict. Or getting myself to an office on time. I always had law school in my back pocket. Figured I could go and figure out what kind of lawyer I wanted to be later.”

“So you’re thinking about law school?” I lift my beer, but it’s empty.

“Been there, done that,” Beck says acerbically. “Washed out after a year and a half. That’s the thing I actually thought would stick—but I was wrong. I think I have job ADHD.”

I’m beginning to understand what Beck meant by being at loose ends. “Hence the couch surfing—you don’t have a home base?”

“Nope,” he says, sounding unconcerned, but there’s a slight shadow in his eyes. “Law school was in Boston, and I have a lot of friends there, but the winters are rough.”

“Why don’t you go back to Texas?”

Beck sighs. “Texas is fine—to visit. It’s a big state, but it’s not big enough to hold both me and my parents.”

“You don’t get along?” I lucked out with parents who were just as supportive when I came out as when I said I wanted to try acting, but I have plenty of friends who aren’t as fortunate.

“My parents are very…traditional. My dad is a strapping six-foot-tall straight man who married his college sweetheart. It never occurred to him that his son wouldn’t be just like him.”

I grimace. It’s a common story, but it still makes me ache a little for Beck.

“Growing up, I was on the scrawny side. My parents always told me I’d have a growth spurt and catch up to Dad. Never happened. They also told me I’d meet a nice girl and get married someday. So that shows you how much vision my folks have. They wanted—theyexpected—a six-foot Texas boy who played football and married a sweet country girl. They got a five-foot-eight gay son who likes to bake and dropped out of law school.”

“That’s tough.” My heart goes out to the kid who’s clearly still inside Beck. East Coast college must have been a much-needed escape.

“Thank god for Jack, honestly,” Beck says. “Our dads are brothers and they’re really close. Jack coming out made it so much easier for me to finally tell my parents. And Jack’s parents are super sweet.”

“So what’s your relationship like now?”

“Well, it’s not like we never talk. I’m still my mom’s baby. But they’ve got their life and I’ve got mine.”

I wonder what life Beck has exactly. No job, no ambition, no place to live. Just a car and a temporary place to lay his head for the next two months.

Still, the kid seems happy enough. His life might not fit a traditional pattern, but he certainly has plenty of enthusiasm for the small things.

After dinner, I hold up my end of our bargain and do the dishes, then run Cleo around the backyard until we’re both panting and tired. While I’ve been out with the dog, Beck’s filled a kitchen counter with mysterious tiny bottles and bags of flour and at least two kinds of sugar.

I wash my hands while he consults the recipe on his phone for his first attempt at molasses cookies to rival my Aunt Sharleen’s.

We move around each other easily, quietly, coexisting in a peaceful way I’ve never experienced in any of my other co-living situations. To me, a roommate means someone who detracts from my peace, whose very existence causes stress and the unsettled feeling of not being able to relax in my own home.

But living with Beck isn’t like that. Not so far, anyway.

I sit at the kitchen island and doomscroll on my phone while he measures good smelling things into the bowl of the mixer he’d triumphantly found in one of the many cupboards and plugged in next to the coffee maker. The beat of some French bistro-esque jazz comes over the speakers and provides an acoustic backdrop that I don’t feel the need to break by talking. The kitchen slowly warms as the oven pings, ready to be filled with the first tray of brown mounds of dough.

I look up from my screen when Beck lets out a borderline obscene sound. The blond baker licks something off his thumb and moans again.

I shift in my seat, suddenly uncomfortable at the sight of Beck with his thumb in his mouth, making noises that send the wrong signal to my downstairs brain. I look away from him to the dough-covered mixer paddle and speak up. “Can I try some?”

“I don’t know—will it mess with your taste buds? I want you to give me an honest assessment when they come out of the oven.”

“Okay. I can be patient.” I casually adjust my shorts underneath the counter and go back to my phone, only half paying attention to the article I’m reading. Beck puts the first batch of cookies in the oven and soon an even stronger scent of mingled spices fills the kitchen.

I pretend to read, but out of the corner of my eye, I’m really watching Beck efficiently clean up. He puts the ingredients back into the pantry, hums a little as he wipes down the counters. He finds a metal rack and sets it up just in time for the first batch of cookies to emerge from the oven.

“They smell amazing,” I say, eyeing cookies the size of my palm.

“Give them a minute to cool,” he says, sliding another tray into the oven.

“I bet milk would be great with these.”

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