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While we were digging into it, I gave Alastair Nigel’s message.
“Some guy was looking for you.”
Alastair had just shoveled a forkful of cheesy spaghetti into his mouth. He had to chew and swallow before he could inquire further. He wiped some stray tomato sauce from his lips.
“What?”
“Some guy came to the door, looking for you. Nigel? British?Gorgeous?”
Alastair’s eyes flew wide and so did his smile. “No way! Nigel’s back? That’s amazing!”
I narrowed my eyes, the green-eyed monster rearing its head, no matter how determined I was to be cool about this.
“Is it?”
“Yes, it fucking is. Nigel’s wonderful!”
Maybe Nigel hadn’t been a sexual conquest, then.
“And anincrediblefuck as well, but I won’t get into that.”
I dropped my fork and almost choked.
“What?” I asked.
Alastair laughed, his gaze on my angry face.
“Well…we used to hook up, you know.” He cleared his throat and sobered. “Occasionally.”
“Howoccasionally?”
Alastair’s expression went from happy to cautious. “Well…he’s never in town for long…so when he was here we’d…”
I leaned back in my chair and folded my arms over my chest. “Do go on.”
“Never mind. That’s all in the past.”
“Unless,” I said, trying to keep my voice modulated, “he’s expecting to hook up with you again, now that he’sbackin town?” Anxiety swirled in my gut.
“Toby,” Alastair said.
“It’s fine. If you want to, I mean. God, who wouldn’t?” I said, sliding my chair out and standing up. “I’m tired. Good night.”
I was being a big, insecure baby, but I couldn’t fucking help it. Nigel was so much better looking than I was, probably kinky as fuck and anadult, whereas I still felt like a kid half the time. I was getting my shit together, maybe, but I wasn’t actually adulting yet—or it didn’t feel like I was.
I almost slammed the door, but decided that that would be going too far, especially considering the adulting thing. If I was going to be a grown up, I probably shouldn’t be running away in a huff from my kinky boyfriend, but at least I could refrain from making it obvious. I shut the door with a quiet click and threw myself face down on the bed, hiding my head in the pillows.
I mean, who the fuck wanted to be an adult, anyway?
I waited for Alastair to come upstairs to make sure I was okay. But after twenty minutes I realized that wasn’t going to happen, which I supposed was totally fair, except it pissed me off. He was all into playing around with our age gap when we were being kinky, but when it really mattered, he wasn’t going to buy into my need for a guiding hand?
Well, fuck it.
I didn’t know how to go downstairs. I mean, I didn’t know how to gather my self-dignity—what was left of it—and reintroduce myself into Alastair’s space. Well,ourspace. Should I go down there and apologize for acting like a ten-year-old child?
I swallowed my pride and opened my door, then padded downstairs in my sock feet. Alastair was sitting on the couch watching TV. Usually he loaded the dishwasher when I cooked dinner, but the kitchen was still full of dirty dishes, and that triggered atonof resentful energy tied to my relationship with my mom, and everything I’d planned to say in a moment of maturity flew out of the window.
I stomped into the kitchen and started to clean up in a way that couldn’t be ignored. I’d never have dared to act this way at my mom’s, because she would have shoved more dishes in my face, but maybe this whole thing was the result of feeling safe. Anyway, I was still mad and jealous andpissed, and I didn’t know how to deal with those emotions other than to bang dirty pots and pans around.
