Page 1 of So Worth More
One - Andy
Water streamed down my body, rinsing away sweat from an intense workout. Feeling a draft, I paused washing, turned my head and caught the sound of the shower curtain being pulled aside. I heard the rustle of clothing before I was roughly turned around and pushed against the tiled wall. A familiar mouth firmly covered mine.Half-heartedly, I tried to pull away, to push Will back, but the heavier man didn’t budge.
“Not here,” I panted against Will’s neck even as I pushed my lower body against his, desperate for the feel of him, noticing how hard he was. “We almost got banned last time,” I whispered. Outside of the stall, I could hear the sounds of other people showering off their own workouts on both sides of us. Will pulled back a couple of inches and smirked, his brown eyes alight with mischief while he ran his hands down my back and roughly grabbed at my ass.
“Worth it, though. How about we skip drinks with the guys and head back to yours?” he growled out, his voice doing nothing for my paper-thin control. Will crowded in close again. He dipped his head, water running over his dark hair, and started tracing kisses along my collarbone in the way that he knew drove me crazy. Drawing them up over my neck, all the while thrusting his cock against mine. Despite knowing we could get caught, and that this was a terrible idea, I could feel my orgasm approaching. His kisses paused as he said against my jaw, voice tight with desire, “I need you in a bed. Now.”
The alarm blaring from my phone was never welcome, but even less so this morning after that dream. Although it wasn’t really a dream but more of an amalgamation of every time I’d been with Will over the last four months. The temptation to just pull the covers over my head and take a sick day was so strong.
Friday had really done a number on me, it seemed. After each encounter I swore it would be the last. That I deserved better than being Will’s fuck-toy. Realistically, I knew that I didn’t mean anything more to Will than a convenient form of stress relief. This was par for the course for me. We weren’t friends. We didn’t communicate outside of work and the gym, and it was really starting to get to me. I felt cheap, especially after the way I’d been treated over the weekend. You’d think I’d be used to the way guys treated me by now. Like I was either disposable or they owned me. There was no in between.
I’d thought Will might be different, but no. Sure, he’d been clear about what we were, but there were so many blurred lines and unspoken rules to what we were doing. Breaking one had serious consequences, mainly for me, since they were Will’s rules, not mine. Except each time he hurt me I knew it was my fault because I was letting him and somehow I always forgave him and got sucked back in. It was emotionally exhausting, and I needed to stop the cycle before I really got hurt. Again.
The erection I’d woken with had softened when I recalled the look in Will’s eyes the last time I’d caught him looking at me before he fled from my apartment. He’d actually knocked into the furniture in a rare show of clumsiness in his haste to leave.
Letting out a sigh, resigned to actually getting out of bed and facing the music, I rolled out of my rumpled bed and headed across the studio apartment to the tiny bathroom to shower. The water pressure sucked compared to that of the gym and Will’s apartment, not that I should be having showers at a hookup’s place, I reminded myself with an eye roll. A message that I’d gotten clearly the one and only time I’d accidentally fallen asleep at Will’s and had to deal with the fallout. Groaning, frustrated that my thoughts were still stuck on him, I rested my head against the damp off-white tiles and gave myself a talking to. Will was a bad habit, an addiction, and one I needed to give up for my sanity.
While I got ready for work, I continued to brace myself for the day. Mondays were the worst with Will. He was always colder than usual after a weekend’s closeness, and Friday’s fuck-up pretty much ensured that this week was going to be extra weird. Touching Will in front of the other guys at the bar we frequented after our workouts shouldn’t have meant anything in normal circles, but I’d seen the knowing glances that Pete, Henry, and Brad had shared. I could still feel Will tense up under my hand when he’d noticed them and remembered my feeling of apprehension. Not that I was scared of Will. Yes, he was a few inches bigger than my five nine, and quite a bit broader in the shoulders and chest, but I didn’t think that he would physically hurt me. Except that night Will had been rougher than normal, though I didn’t mind a little rough handling. He’d been less playful and more about his own pleasure, escaping out the door before the cum had cooled on the sheets. Not that he usually lingered long after,and he certainly didn’t cuddle,I thought with a frown. Why did I let him treat me like dirt? Was great sex worth feeling like shit after? Was my self-worth really so low?
I scoffed at my thoughts as I grabbed a clean, pale blue shirt from my closet and started to dress for work, grabbing a pair of navy pants and matching tie as well. While this place was small and outdated, it was cheap and a convenient distance from the office so I could walk when the weather was good. It also benefited from decent storage space and had everything I really needed. It was probably the place I’d lived at the longest since my mom’s house. The apartment had become my safe haven and it had to have been kismet that I’d found it. There weren’t so many places that were close to work and within my limited budget before my promotion. I’d been gutted when there was a time when I thought I might have to move. Especially after working so hard to make it a home.
My king-sized bed was against one wall in the corner of the apartment. My flat screen TV, a promotion splurge, was on the opposite wall with a cheap worn coffee table and blue couch in front of it. Abigail, my twin, had seen the state of the couch I’d found at a Goodwill one time she had visited and freaked out, refusing to sit on it. Days later she had reappeared with a stack of fabric and her beloved sewing machine, and covered it with a cheery handmade blue throw that managed to compliment the original blue fabric of the couch, and then had made some silver cushions. This was after she had made me steam clean the thing. My lips lifted in a smile at the thought of my sister and her bossy ways.
After negotiating a reduction in my monthly rent in exchange for us improving the place, Abby had made it her mission to make it less of a “hovel”, as she called it. The small kitchen had been given a face-lift when she’d found these stickers that looked like wood to cover the cabinets and then installed new handles, somehow making the cabinets look new. Together, we had refinished the counter-top, which had been a production and a half that involved us falling out briefly, and me storming out of my own apartment to go to a bar to have a few shots before coming home to apologize with a bottle of wine for my put-upon twin.
On a vacation from work, being unable to afford to go anywhere, I’d hired a carpet cleaner from the local grocery store and washed the faded brown carpet three times before admitting defeat on some of the stains. The landlord wouldn’t replace the carpet, much to Abby’s disdain, so she had found me a silver and blue rug that hid the worst of the marks. Then she’d given up her time to help me repaint the place a light gray. She’d said, “Andy, you may live in a dump, but it just needs some work and some love.” I’d never admit that she was right. I loved the place it had become. It wasn’t much, but it was home.
Finishing dressing, I crossed to the tiny kitchen and pushed the button on my baby. The coffee machine had been a real splurge, but I had just finished a huge project in the months before Will’s arrival in the office, and the bonus had covered it. It was a real treat, since my budget could be a little tight. A Black Friday deal helped with the eye-watering cost, and the rest of that much deserved check had gone into my savings. Mom had always taught us to have a back-up plan.
Pouring a large mug and doctoring it to my taste with vanilla flavored creamer, I pondered breakfast choices instead of the day ahead. Too much focus on that and I’d lose my appetite, and a busy Monday on an empty stomach was a bad idea. As I drank my coffee and made some toast, I checked the weather report on my phone; the chance of rain was too high, so I decided to take the car.
Finishing up with plenty of time before I actually had to be at work left too much time to think and had my anxiety building.Fuck it, just go in early and get started on something,I thought to myself. Snatching up my faux leather messenger bag (a gift from a previous client) from the floor next to the couch and my keys from the blue glass bowl on the console table next to the door (thank you Abs), I headed out to the parking garage. Getting into my boring older model silver sedan (hello cheap and cheerful!), I took a couple of seconds to hook my phone up to the stereo and found my power play list full of, frankly, some cheesy pop, and attempted to get with the program.
Will - bad, distance - good. No more hooking up. No more games.Yeah right!the voice in the back of my head scoffed. Sometimes that voice sounded suspiciously like Will.
***
Determined that this Monday would not be full of hollow promises like the Mondays that preceded it since Will had joined the company, I vowed to stay firm and not give into our messed up dynamic. Usually I’d be firm with myself all weekend, the same as all the weekends before it. Normally I would get ready to go into the office, and I’d attempt to put whatever plan I’d hastily drawn up that particular weekend into action. I would be determined. Except I was hurt this week; Will had acted like a dick. Admittedly the dream had thrown me a little with a reminder of our explosive chemistry, a glimpse of how good it was with Will, but that blip was over, I attempted to assure myself. Yet I wasn’t sure I could hold myself to all those promises I’d made.
Even as I parked, I was already giving into the temptation to play the same silly games with Will. Unable to resist poking the bear. I found myself smiling as I snagged the space assigned for the project manager that’d been allotted before there was a need for two teams and two managers. The idea was to take turns using the space, but every day was a fight over it. My seniority from being with the company for the last seven years apparently meant nothing to Will, who deemed himself more important than me somehow, as he’d brought some big name clients to Parker’s Advertising and PR with him.
Usually there was also the mad dash to the elevator if we arrived at the same time, neither of us undignified enough to make a run for it, but moving quickly across the garage, making sure the elevator doors closed on a furious face because of course we couldn’t share the elevator!What would people think?I thought, rolling my eyes. There was no need this morning for my signature smirk when the doors invariably closed on Will. Being that bit smaller had its perks for sure - I was fast.
The rest of the usual routine was taking the last of the coffee in the pot and reorganizing the perfectly configured (to Will’s preference, of course) shared desk. Not today though, I wasn’t falling into bad habits. Generally, it was a case of doing anything to get a rise out of my desk mate. Childish, I know, but it was my way of leveling the playing field. It annoyed me that I was already failing just by picking the parking space instead of parking literally anywhere else. So after pouring my cup, I set up a new pot so there’d be fresh coffee for Will. I let out a small sigh.
Often I found myself wondering what would happen if one of us didn’t play the game. Would that be enough to change things up? Could we build an actual friendship? We had plenty in common on the surface. We just liked to piss each other off. It was like foreplay drawn out over the week, seeing who would slip first.
For someone who had their life together as much as I seemed to on the outside, inside sure felt like a mess. I honestly hated playing these games, but Will couldn’t give me anything real even if that was what I truly wanted from him. We appeared to be stuck in this cycle.
Sitting back in my chair sipping coffee, I noticed Will approach, face like a thundercloud as he took a seat at our shared desk with a bitter sigh even though he held a fresh coffee from the pot I’d made.
Looking away, I felt a prickle of guilt flow through me, which also kinda pissed me off. But I’d vowed to stop trying to wind Will up. So what if I’d gotten the parking space today? He could have it tomorrow. I hadn’t done anything else, having realized that it wasn’t too late to change things up since Will had been later getting in than me.So far so good, I thought, aside from the wave of tension from Will. I went to speak to him but noticing his glower, I decided against it. I’d let him stew a bit; maybe he’d notice I wasn’t bringing anything up and things would be okay.As if,my inner voice mocked.
As project managers, we may have shared desk space to “collaborate” but we each ran our own team of preferred artists and copy editors, only pulling together on rare projects that required it. This meant for large parts of the day we could be away from the desk overseeing projects. Much easier for avoiding the usual arguments or baiting.
Ignoring Will, I got up to put my empty mug in the break room and check on Jenny, Clara, and her wife, Suneya in the art circle. Largely, Will’s team ran different hours to mine, with my own team preferring to start their day earlier so they could work in the quiet of the office at any of the projects they were working on and have an early finish. Will’s team usually started at least an hour after mine with Will only starting that bit earlier to do admin, the same things that I often found myself doing at home. Normally this was great and meant the office was quiet. Today though, it made it uncomfortable.
The air was filled with tension and I could see that Clara, the de facto leader of the group, wanted to ask what was going on. Looking at her with a serious expression, I gave her a subtle shake of my head and quickly glanced at Will, who had turned his back on them.
