After Ben Read online

  Theo knew he was between a rock and a hard place. He could complain, or resist the cost cutting that would almost certainly lead to more job losses. For the first time since his own idealistic student days, he considered the human cost of business.

  Fuck, he sounded like that newbie on the forum.

  Running a hand through his thick hair, tugging it a little, he shook his head to clear it. This wasn’t a time for childlike wishing that life would be fair. Life wasn’t fair; it never had been. He, of all people, understood that all too well.

  They left the office late, both glad to be the last to vacate their floor, certain that their faces would have given them away if the cubicles they passed had been occupied. Theo drove Maggie home and sat outside her neat white-painted house discussing the best way to move forward.

  “There isn’t a best way, Theo. There just isn’t.” Sighing, Maggie clutched her purse and unfastened her seatbelt before turning back to him. “Please don’t forget to eat, and try to get some sleep. The rest of this week isn’t going to be easy.” She squeezed his fingers, then stepped out of the car, scooping up her youngest daughter as she toddled down the driveway toward her. Maggie’s husband watched from the front door, looking concerned as he studied his wife’s face. He held the door wide open for her, then nodded a farewell to Theo.

  Waving good-bye, Theo headed home. How he came to park in the small lot behind the gym he had absolutely no idea. Maybe his subconscious was telling him to tire himself out with a longer run than he had managed that morning. Maybe he was hoping to get distracted from the unavoidable decisions he had to make by a pair of bright blue eyes, and a smile that was warm and welcoming. Perhaps having someone to talk to, someone to share his load with who didn’t work in his field, was what he needed right then.

  Sitting in the lot for a moment longer, he recalled Maggie’s well-meaning words, “Don’t forget to eat.”

  Theo rested his head on the steering wheel.

  How many times had Ben said the same words in Italian when Theo had been knee-deep in learning the corporate ropes, right out of grad school? He’d squint at Theo when he staggered home late, needing help to get in the front door, then feed him his dinner—bite by delicious bite—as he grumbled over tax laws.

  Theo drove home alone.

  Later, after making the first difficult sweep through the staff files, picking out the most likely to lose their positions, he sat in bed, completely exhausted, with a bowl of cereal he absolutely did not want to eat. Logging on to the forum for five minutes’ distraction from real life, he stumbled into what read like a civil war.

  The newbie had been busy.

  It had taken Morgan only twenty-four hours to split the membership. Maybe he’d been staging reconnaissance for a while, unnoticed. For all Theo knew, Morgan could have been trolling the day before, looking for logical fallacies and other weaknesses in the members’ arguments. There was no fucking way he could have divided the membership so quickly and neatly without being keenly intellectual. Theo laughed to himself, then looked around the bedroom guiltily, feeling ridiculous. After sitting up straighter and pulling the laptop closer, he shoveled down his slightly soggy Cheerios while clicking links.

  Oh, yes. Morgan was very clever.

  He’d taken apart the main forum players’ arguments by tracking back their own comments. Theo guessed that everyone contradicted themselves from time to time, but it was casually amusing to see other people’s dirty washing hanging out in public. Besides, the points Morgan had made the prior evening hadn’t been wrong, just naïve, perhaps.

  The way he’d taken the discussions apart today was the work of an evil genius.

  Theo couldn’t resist. After a completely shitty day, he felt like sticking one to The Man. Joining a discussion on free trade, he supported Morgan’s argument, something he would never have done without the dose of corporate reality he’d had that afternoon, and then sat back, waiting for his virtual spanking. He moved from topic to topic—from the economy to the new tax code to a local politician caught with his pants down—playing the devil’s advocate.

  Theo sat in his bed, pink cheeked, wide awake, and smiling.

  As the evening passed, his in-box was flooded with messages asking if he’d suffered a stroke or if his account had been hacked. Snorting to himself, he let loose on a thread about shareholder responsibility, then went to the kitchen and fought with the coffeemaker that he’d never managed to master, preferring to leave domestic shit to Ben. Sliding back into bed with some microwave popcorn and strong coffee, Theo settled down for some more fun.

  When he saw a private message from the newbie, he grinned.

  MORGAN: Thanks for playing.

  They chatted back and forth for the next few hours via the forum’s messaging service, never sharing more than a sentence or two, but always poking fun at each other’s posts. The more Theo read, the more impressed he was.

  What he’d taken for Morgan’s idealism just the day before, he now saw through a more focused lens. The responsibility for firing colleagues weighed so heavily on Theo’s shoulders that when he considered the senior partners’ bonuses and the company jet, it all seemed morally bankrupt. It felt good to see Morgan running amok on the forum with opinions that challenged the status quo. And it felt even better to run with him for a few hours, virtually flipping the bird.

  When he finally signed off, promising his few forum friends that normal service would resume the next evening, he saw another private message pop up.

  MORGAN: Missing you already.

  Shutting the laptop down quickly, Theo stared at the ceiling, fingers heading for Ben’s pillow. Sighing, turning stubbornly away, he whispered, “Mi manchi già,” just like Ben had when Theo left each morning. I miss you already.

  Sleep took a while to come. Then, when he woke before his alarm, face buried in Ben’s pillow, the day ahead seemed far too much like hard work.

  EARBUDS were no defense against Peter.

  Theo ran, attempting to keep focused, trying not to let anything or anyone distract him. Peter ran beside Theo, keeping pace easily, upping his speed or incline when Theo did, slowing to the same gentle jog for the last half mile, smiling the whole time. He pointed at his own ears, indicating that Theo should remove his earbuds as he wiped down his treadmill, then resumed their conversation from the previous day.

  Peter herded Theo over to the mirrored weights area and selected some of the smaller free weights.

  “So many people don’t realize that working on their back and shoulders will improve their running performance.” He demonstrated a technique, then passed the weights to Theo. “No, keep your elbows tucked in. Yes, like that. Better.” He walked around Theo, tapping at his shoulders when they rose too high, nudging his elbow when he overcompensated for the weight instead of letting his muscles take the strain.

  When he rested both palms lightly on Theo’s shoulders toward the end of a set of harder reps, Theo’s face in the mirror reflected his discomfort—panic?—at the physical contact. Instead of moving away, Peter stepped closer. Theo watched in the mirror as Peter’s lips thinned, pressed together tightly for a moment, leaving his face suddenly looking more mature. They were definitely close in age. Only Peter’s smiles made him seem more youthful.

  Standing perfectly still, Theo watched as Peter’s reflection carefully placed his palms against Theo’s elbows. Even though he saw it happen, he still jumped a little at the contact, then closed his eyes. Peter’s voice sounded very close to his ear. “Anyone watching will think we’re discussing form, but you do need to open your eyes.” Theo shook his head. “Okay. So, is it me touching you that freaks you out, or is it just being touched by men in general?”

  Theo shook his head again. He didn’t need his eyes open to know that Peter was smiling when he next spoke.

  “I’m going to go with my instincts, Theo. I think it’s me, and that’s cool. But it would be good to have someone to work out with.”

  Ope
ning his eyes, Theo shook his head for the third time before replying. “It’s not you, and it’s not ‘men’.” He rolled his eyes and tried to smile, looking vaguely crazy instead. “I like men.” Peter barked out a laugh, and then Theo finally, genuinely smiled. “I mean—” he started.

  “I know what you meant to say. I noticed that you don’t spend much time checking out the gym bunnies.” He winked, taking the free weights from Theo. “But it’s cool. We’re cool. Just spot me from time to time, okay?”

  “I can do that.” Theo watched the easy bend and flex of Peter’s defined arms. He was in great shape, not too built, but solid. As Peter finished his second set, Theo took a breath, then reached out, pressing down lightly on the other man’s shoulders, reminding Peter to keep his form.

  In the mirror, Peter smiled at him. Open, warm, interested—definitely interested—but patient.

  Theo tried to smile in return.

  Progress, maybe.

  Later, at work, Maggie spread out staff files across one of the larger conference room tables. She powered up her laptop and started reading out the number of years of service, severance pay amounts, and associated criteria that the company used to decide layoffs.

  Twenty files remained after the first cut.

  Next, they worked on their own plan. Maggie recalled who had babies at home, who had a disabled spouse, who had issues with depression.

  Theo paged through a file. “This is a fucking nightmare. It’s the opposite of a scientific process. How do we know that Mitch doesn’t have extra financial commitments? How do we know that getting canned won’t be the end of the world to him?” He slammed the file back onto the table, sending sheets of paper flying.

  “We don’t. You don’t. You can’t know. But that’s why they pay you the big bucks.” She smiled sadly at her boss. “You just have to make the decision. You’ve already taken as many factors into account as you can, probably more than any other manager here has.”

  It didn’t matter that Maggie was right. It was still a burden that Theo found almost too heavy to carry. Much as he found those same staff files almost too heavy as he carried them up to his apartment that night. He was weighed down, awkward and clumsy as he fumbled for his keys.

  Theo leaned his nose against the buzzer just a split second before he remembered.

  There was no one at home to answer.

  Chapter 2

  BY THURSDAY night, Theo was done with the layoff selection process, and Maggie had meticulously compiled packets ready for the termination interviews scheduled for the following afternoon. It had been a difficult week. Maggie reported that tension levels were high throughout the whole company. He could only imagine what the staff in his own department were thinking after he had shut himself away for days, where normally he operated an open door policy.

  Shutting down his PC at just after six in the evening, Theo realized his hands were shaking as he fumbled his mouse for the second time.

  When did he last eat?

  He vaguely remembered Maggie bringing him a sandwich much earlier that afternoon. When he walked back to the larger meeting room they’d used as their base, he spied it, along with a bottle of now-tepid water sitting in a puddle of condensation exactly where she had left it. Even his extreme hunger couldn’t make a tuna salad sandwich which had been left sitting out for the afternoon seem appetizing. Its dried-out bread and wilted lettuce were completely unappealing.

  Theo felt tired. Bone tired. He leaned back, then surveyed the empty outer office, imagining it with fewer desks. Grabbing his laptop bag from his own office, he got halfway across the room when muffled cursing caught his attention. One of the cleaners was on his knees under an accounts assistant’s—Christina’s—desk. He jumped, banging his head, after Theo asked if he was okay.

  “Sorry, I thought you all had finished up for the night.” The cleaner held out a dusting rag, shrugging. “I dropped it behind the desk. Chick keeps her whole life in here.”

  For the first time in years, Theo looked really closely at the deeply personal world that Christina brought with her to work. She had so many pictures pinned to her cubicle walls: posed family group shots, candid ones of her children—Madison was getting so big; he remembered when she was born—as well as a slightly out of focus photo of an office Christmas party. Theo carefully unpinned that one with trembling hands as the other man shuffled past him.

  Toward the left of the shot, Theo saw himself smiling broadly. Ben leaned into him, kissing his ear, hand pressed against Theo’s chest—a perfect moment, caught by accident. He sank to the floor, swallowing hard, recalling that evening. He remembered all of the work events they had attended. He’d worked for the company since finishing grad school, in this same old building, before the top dogs relocated to a brand-new top-floor empire in the heart of the city.

  Being out had never been an issue professionally, as far as Theo was aware, anyhow. Ben had come to every single office party since Theo’s first company picnic, when he had been around twenty-six. Fuck. That was a whole lifetime ago. They had celebrated Ben’s thirty-fifth birthday that morning, so had arrived tipsy and handsy and obviously in love. There hadn’t seemed a whole lot of point in hiding after that.

  Besides, Ben was fun and friendly. He always remembered spouses’ names and asked after their kids way before Theo started to see that shit as important, or even interesting. Ben was smooth, while Theo was still learning the social graces, and he made corporate events look easy. Hell, he loved them, circling dates on their kitchen planner months in advance, then planning shopping trips for the perfect suit, or an elegant new tie.

  Ben didn’t need much incentive to shop, especially for Theo. He dressed him, and it was such an obvious pleasure that for more years than he liked to remember, Theo hadn’t needed to think at all about clothes. Ben said that he didn’t mind being a stereotype, just as long as he was a hot, well-dressed stereotype on the arm of an even hotter one. Besides, Theo’s workmates had come to expect fashion advice from Ben, while Theo stood by and listened, still clueless.

  His colleagues’ familiar acceptance was part of what made this whole termination deal so hard to handle. Theo had let people go before—it was part of the cycle of business—but since the company had been restructured, the atmosphere had changed. It didn’t matter that he had known his team for years. It didn’t matter that some of them were like family—closer than family, even. And it didn’t seem to matter that his department was cost effective.

  Fucking management consultants.

  Carefully pinning the photo back in its spot, Theo touched Ben’s image lightly, just with the tip of one finger. It was ridiculous how much he still missed him.

  When he found himself at home later, empty-handed for once, Theo went on autopilot. While the shower warmed up, he put a meal for one in the microwave, then stripped out of his suit. It was only when he started to wash his hair that the deep ache in his shoulders really made its presence felt. He’d have to tell Peter that he was feeling it tomorrow.

  Peter.

  Hot water sluiced down his body, warming the ache out of his back and arms. Theo closed his eyes and pictured Peter working through his reps in the weight room. He took each set very seriously, as focused on the last rep as on the first. He had stamina. Theo caught himself idly wondering what his abs looked like, then soaped himself quickly, trying to think about nothing at all.

  He burned his tongue on his dinner, hands shaking with hunger as he ate far too quickly standing at the kitchen counter. Suddenly exhausted again, dreading the morning, he went straight to bed with his laptop, a tub of ice cream, and two spoons.

  All week he’d lost hours on the forum, finding the company and conversation a welcome distraction in the middle of the night. This week, instead of reading avidly, then contributing a little now and then, he took part in pretty much every discussion. Perhaps that was due to the encouragement of the newbie, who had taken to leaving him private messages while Theo was off-line.r />
  Tonight was no different from the past few evenings.

  MORGAN: I cannot read the political forum. They are all fucking idiots.

  Scrubbing his hand over his face, Theo clicked and read, then clicked and read some more.

  THEO: I’m shaking my head on your behalf.

  Honestly, he was starting to think there was legitimately something wrong with him. He used to be able to give and take, ignoring discussions that were patently uninformed. All week long he’d found himself unable to resist opening threads started by opinionated forum main players, already knowing exactly what he would find. Morgan had absolutely no fear. He told people they were wrong, and now that he had everyone’s attention, he told them why in painful, excruciating detail.

  It wasn’t until Theo opened a thread about something completely unrelated to his work, where top-level decisions in sports were criticized, that he lost his cool. Before he knew it, he typed an essay on the cowardice of corporate hotshots leaving ordinary managers to be the bad guy, while they hid out in their penthouse offices.

  He might have ranted.

  His private message box pinged.

  MORGAN: I think I love you.

  Theo didn’t reply. He sat in his too-big bed, in his empty, beautifully furnished apartment, dreading going to sleep and dreading waking up in equal parts, just like he had for a year. He took absolutely no pleasure in any of it—work, the forum, anything. Pushing the laptop to one side, he dug into the tub of softening ice cream, glaring broodingly at the spare spoon.

  When Morgan sent another message, asking what exactly he was doing anyway, Theo pulled the laptop closer. Surely there wasn’t anything better than being right when so many idiots were wrong, Morgan insisted. So perhaps Theo should stop doing whatever he was wasting Morgan’s valuable time on, and get back to the cause.

  Theo apologized for taking a therapeutic ice-cream break.

  MORGAN: You are SUCH a girl.

  Snorting, Theo disagreed, then went back to reading for a while. They passed some time amicably sniping at each other until Theo eventually relaxed enough to sleep.