“That’s cute, you think that’s all you’re gonna get away with saying.” Jorge taps the table. “Let’s have it.”
Mitch sighs, eyes still on his cards. “She and I grew up together, went to the same school all the way through high school, then lost touch once I joined the Navy. We bumped into each other at a reunion years ago, introduced each other to our spouses, parted then on friendly terms. I don’t know who started it first, but we started sending Christmas cards, kept in touch that way. When she heard Janie had passed, she sent a very nice note. It took me a while to write back to everyone who’d sent their condolences, and ever since then, we’ve been writing to each other. And that’s all I’m saying tonight.”
Lou hoots as Jorge makes kissy sounds. Itsuki clasps Mitch’s hand and says, “How romantic.”
Jim stares at Mitch, looking deeply betrayed. “What happened to the Brotherhood of Wild and Winsome Widowers!”
I snort. “What a moniker.”
Mitch shrugs. “The times, they are a changin’。”
“Great song,” Oliver says as he sorts his cards. Quietly, he starts humming the Bob Dylan tune like he doesn’t even know he’s doing it.
Jim turns toward Oliver, eyes gleaming hungrily. “Do we have a music lover on our hands? One who actually appreciates real music? Not the crap kids these days listen to—the only exception being my queens, Adele and Kelly Clarkson, because damn, can those women sing.”
Oliver smiles his way. “Ah, don’t be too hard on modern music. There’s lots of good stuff out there. But…” He scrubs the back of his neck. His nervous tic, I’ve recently figured out. I nearly have to sit on my hand so I don’t cup his neck, soothe him the way that I did in the locker room before he gave his first pregame pep talk.
What is wrong with me?
“Yeah,” Oliver finally says. “I like music. All kinds. Plenty of oldies—no offense.”
“None taken,” Lou says, leaning in. “How oldies we talking?”
“Gershwin, Ella, Armstrong, Sinatra,” Oliver tells him. “Big band’s a great time. My little sister got me into it when she was obsessed with learning how to swing dance and wanted a partner to practice with, so that’s got a soft spot in my heart.”
My stomach knots. He has another sister. Not just the older one who comes to the complex with his niece. And I give a shit that I didn’t know this. God, this is bad—no, ridiculous. I don’t care if he has one sister or ten. I don’t.
If I tell myself this is enough, it will get through my thick skull.
“I think there’s something to love about every music era,” Oliver’s telling the group as I tune back in. “It reflects what was happening at that time culturally, psychosocially. Music speaks to human experience and speaks for it. When we appreciate that, we appreciate so many people’s perspectives on life. Know what I mean?”
Jim stands, throwing down his cards. “That’s it, Ollie. C’mon.”
Oliver glances up warily at Jim. “Um. Where?”
“See that TV?” Jim says, pointing in my living room.
Oliver glances that way. “Well, yes, I do, Jim.”
“That TV,” he says. “Has a karaoke station hookup.”
“Oh, Christ,” I mutter. “No, James. No karaoke.”
“Hush, you,” Mitch chides as he scoots out his chair and ambles into the living room. The TV powers on. Mitch and Jim argue over the remote as they click through the programs to connect with the karaoke machine that I caved and bought last year when it became obvious Jim was going to serenade us, with or without a microphone in his hand and background music playing, so might as well indulge the man.
Oliver turns toward me, our knees bumping. The memory of when our knees last bumped, when his leg slid against mine on my bed, swallows up every other thought. I’m foolishly staring at his mouth, remembering how fucking good it felt to drag that bottom lip between my teeth when he says, “I can conveniently receive a very urgent phone call and make my exit if you want.”
“Ollie!” Jim calls. “Let’s go! I got Sinatra cued up. You and me, kid, we’re gonna bring down the house.”
I glance among the group. Jorge and Itsuki have started doing the foxtrot as the opening bars of “Fly Me to the Moon” fill the speakers. Lou’s on his hands and knees in front of the entertainment center, griping about how Jim plugged in the microphone wrong.
“Unfortunately,” I tell Oliver, “when it comes to these pains in my ass, I am a giant, pathetic pushover. Better give them what they want and join them.”
A smile breaks on Oliver’s face. “This is your last chance to kick me out before things become very obnoxious.”
I bite back a smile and settle into my chair, arms folded. “Go on, then. Do your worst.”
16
GAVIN
Playlist: “Fly Me to the Moon,” Imaginary Future
Lou’s Chevy lumbers down the road on a cheery trio of honks, hands waving out the windows.
“Thank God.” I slam the door behind me and scrub my face.
When my hands drop, the view makes my heart trip, then lurch. Oliver, framed in the archway from my living room to the open-concept kitchen and dining area. He shimmies his way around the table while gathering plates, glasses, seltzer cans, and snack bowls. I recognize some of the same absurd moves he pulled at the hotel to try to dispel the awkwardness after the Great Bedsheet Catastrophe, as he circles the table and hums “Fly Me to the Moon.”
I stare at him, fighting a smile as I remember him with Jim, those two serenading each other.
Oliver glances up and sees me, then nearly drops his armful. “Shoot.” He saves it at the last minute.
I push off the door, forcing my expression into its usual blank inscrutability.
“You don’t have to do that,” I tell him, gathering what’s left on the table. “I’ll clean up.”
“I don’t mind.” He turns and sets everything carefully in the sink.
I stare at him as he stands with his back to me, running water, squirting soap onto the sponge. It’s infuriating that it’s such a simple moment that holds the weight of the world inside it.
What I’ve feared and fought since the moment I first saw him is here, in front of me, as real as the heart beating in my chest, beating faster and faster, as I watch him.
This infuriating, aggravating, irksome man matters to me.
He more than “matters” to you, a dangerous, no-good voice whispers in my head. I silence it, bury it.
I can’t let matters become more. Not when a lifetime exists between us, not when soon this team, this game, will be lost to me and it will be his whole world.
Better to keep what I feel to myself. To protect him. To protect us both.
But God, if I could just savor him one more time before I shut away this aching desire once and for all—
No. I shouldn’t. It’s not right to ask him for that, when lust and resentment tangle in my chest as I stare at him. It would be wrong to prey upon the impulsivity of what I’ll concede seems to be a mutual, very intense attraction. It would be wrong to spin him around and pin him against the sink and kiss him slow and deep until we’re both dizzy and desperate, until hands wandered and the bedroom right down the hall lured us like a siren, toward destruction.