Page 3 of The Leaving Kind

Thankfully, he wasn’t completely naked. Tight black briefs covered his junk, worn under an insubstantial robe of purple with swirls of teal, blue, and green, as though peacock feathers had been woven together to form a material. The way the sun sparked through the fabric, it might be silk.

Okay, then.

The other man stepped forward, as though to offer a hand.

Mr. Ness screamed again and made a very definite gesture, using a single sweep of the hand. Even over the grumble of the engine, Cam heard his words.

“Get out! Go. And never come back.”

This was not how it was supposed to happen. But when had his fantasy life ever lined up with reality?

Victor drew in a breath and tried to hold it this time. To not let it go like the last one, the echo of which still battered his ears. Or maybe his ears were ringing. His head felt a bit like a gong, and the universe—or reality, the snarky bitch—had one of those little hammers. Blood pounded across his temples and over the back of his skull, down his neck, and into his chest. When he placed a hand there, his fingers curled across bare skin.

Victor looked down. Oh, dear Lord. This was not what he was supposed to be wearing.

He recalled one imagined scenario in which he’d open the door to Tholo the Betrayer while wearing an outfit that said either I don’t care or I’ve moved on. He did not recall that outfit being a pair of briefs.

The breath he’d been holding leaked out, and the sound emerging from his lips was suspiciously thin. Employing the hand at his chest like a bellows, Victor pushed the rest of the air out of his lungs. Drew in a new breath and, what the heck, he’d throw in another screech. He’d already lost his dignity. Had perhaps left most of it at the bottom of a wine bottle last night.

“And another thing!” He stooped to pick up one of Tholo’s award statues.

“Victor, no!” Tholo held his hands out in a placating gesture. “Please don’t.”

Victor cocked his arm back. “Why not?” He sucked in more air. His head throbbed; his lungs convulsed. “You broke my heart. It seems only fitting I should break yours.” These cheesy statues were what turned the cogs in Tholo’s chest. Victor knew that. Had known that ever since the first one landed on the trophy shelf Tholo had screwed into the wall the day he moved in. A beveled length of faux hardwood. Into the beautiful, quite authentic hardwood paneling to the side of the fireplace.

Tholo stepped closer, hands still outstretched. “Victor. Vic. Let me take it. I’ll take all of them.”

Victor let the statue drop into Tholo’s hands. He then swooped to pick up a second and tossed it underhand toward his very much ex-lover. Tholo caught that one but had a hard time catching the next. And in between the clink of each award landing in Tholo’s full hands, Victor got shrill again, because why not? It would be a lot harder to remain silent at this point, and he was done with hard.

Done with pretending to be the adult in this relationship. The cool, calm, and collected one. The man who lived a perfectly arranged life, with everything he had ever wanted. The soft-spoken and gentle artist who saved his temper for the studio.

He was done with being gentle. With politeness. With pretending he liked sex the way Tholo liked sex. When had their dynamic become stuck in so deep a groove, and why had he let it slip down there in the first place?

Why couldn’t Tholo worship him for once?

Because you’re not a little statue engraved with his name, Victor.

Humph.

Victor picked up the shelf, the one he’d ripped out of the wall—oh, his poor hardwood paneling—and braced it over one upraised knee, prepared to snap it in half.

“Victor! Oh my God!”

Tholo nearly dropped the awards in his rush to stop the destruction.

Victor whacked the board down and cried out as it smashed into his knee. “Goddamn it!” He raised the shelf again and brought it down only to have it thud into the other side of his knee. A shockwave of pain rolled through his leg. His toes tingled. His head continued to throb.

And his mouth––so dry. Spit clung to the corner of his lips.

Hauling his arm back, Victor searched for somewhere to throw the shelf, a surface that would guarantee its destruction, and noticed a pickup truck idling in the drive. The driver’s side window was rolled down, with one tanned arm folded over the sill. Above, an equally tanned face framed by windblown brown hair.

The contrast between the mysterious stranger in his driveway and the beautiful man now easing the shelf out of his numb fingers was startling.

“Thank you,” Tholo breathed as Victor let go of the shelf.

The wash of air against Victor’s cheek made him shiver. He glanced at his former lover, at the man who hadn’t so much broken his heart as let him carry on believing they could last.

His thoughts flashed toward the magazine resting on his kitchen table, the one where Tholo was framed by inset pictures of two different partners—one young and stupidly attractive, the other quite obviously older, with every wrinkle rendered in high contrast, his pale cap of hair more silver than blond. Out With the Old, in With the New the headline read.

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