Straight From the Heart

by Sam Burns

  “Awww,” Elsi pouted. “No fair. Alex has had more than us.”

  It was true. Alex had consumed more alcohol over the course of the evening than he usually did in a month.

  He didn’t regret his choice to leave, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t sorry about his mother’s decision. His friends couldn’t be blamed for their low opinion of her, but again, they didn’t know her. He would always wish he could keep both his family and the life he wanted.

  Maybe she’d be able to forgive him one day.

  In the end, he knew he’d made the right decision. He might spend an evening drowning his sorrows, but focusing on things he couldn’t change was a waste of his time. If majoring in philosophy had taught him just one thing, it was that a man defined himself by how he chose to spend his time. Alex wasn’t going to waste his brooding and wishing for the impossible. He had too much good in his life to bother with that.

  He grinned and held his glass up in the parody of a toast. “Darn right I’ve had more than them. It’s my party and I’ll get trashed if I want to.”

  “Get trashed if I want to, trashed if I want to,” Jenna echoed, singing to the tune of Lesley Gore’s, “It’s My Party.”

  Elsi burst into giggles and bent over the table. “Oh my gosh you guys, Alex’s mom can afford more than I can actually drink. Can we maybe save the rest for another night?”

  “That . . . might be for the best,” Jenna agreed, running her fingers through Elsi’s dark curly hair. “I think I might be done for the night too, yeah?”

  Jake nodded and motioned to the waitress, then looked at Alex. “You good to go, man, or do you want some more?”

  Standing up without warning, Alex almost tipped his mug across the table, and took a moment to reorient himself. “Yeah, I think I’m good. Too much more and I go past nicely toasted and wake up with my head in a toilet. I’m gonna run to the bathroom before we go, though.”

  “Don’t fall in!” Jenna called after him as he headed for the back of the bar.

  The bathroom door was locked, so he leaned against the opposite wall to wait. A draft coming from somewhere caught his attention. Alex looked around until he saw the back door, which had been propped open with a grungy block of wood. The scent of cigarette smoke drifted in, so he assumed it was an employee out for a smoke break.

  He wandered over to the door and poked his head out. The breeze off the lake was cool and gentle, despite the fact that it was mid-November. He had always loved the lake air that flowed into the city during the milder months, and the feel of it on his cheeks was refreshing. He let his eyes close and leaned his head against the door frame.

  When a hand wrapped around his wrist and jerked suddenly, Alex almost tumbled into its owner. The guy was huge, or at least he seemed that way to Alex’s alcohol-muddled brain. He was menacing in all black, a hoodie pulled up to cover his face.

  “Gimme your wallet,” the guy hissed.

  Alex just blinked stupidly at him for a moment before the words penetrated the fog in his brain. Wait. Was he being mugged?

  There was a bright flash between them, and it drew his attention. A small blade in the other man’s hand had caught the light of a street lamp. It seemed to sway menacingly before him, but he thought he was the one swaying, and the knife was stationary. Also, there was a reason that was important. Knife. Mugging. Shit.

  “I, uh, I left it at the table, dude,” Alex offered weakly. “I don’t have any money on me.”

  “Don’t give me that shit, you stupid, drunk fuck, just give me the money.” The guy was trying to keep his voice quiet, but it was tinged with annoyance as much as menace.

  Alex put up his hands in a placating gesture. “Whoa, dude, stay cool. No need to be dropping f-bombs. I told you, I don’t have any money. I mean, I may have thirty-seven cents, I don’t think I gave that to the waitress . . .”

  He reached for his front pocket, but the guy shoved the knife up toward his face. “Don’t even fucking think it.”

  “Um, okay. But?” Alex tried to reason the demands out. He suspected that his drunkenness wasn’t the only problem. “You want my money, but you don’t want me to put my hands in my pockets? I don’t think it works that way, dude.”

  “Don’t call me dude, you little—”

  “Problem?” a deep voice asked from behind Alex, and he swore he could feel the presence that came with it all along the length of his back. Again, that was probably the alcohol.

  The mugger backed away a step and his hood tipped up a few inches. He was looking at whomever had come up behind. The guy behind him was so close that Alex could feel the body heat radiating off him, and he wasn’t sure whether to be reassured or nervous about having someone so close, given the situation.

  Instead of either rational response, something reared up in the pit of his stomach and took notice in a way that his body rarely did. It was a little like that feeling when a roller coaster had reached the apex of its climb, and was just starting to fall. He recognized it for what it was, despite a relative lack of experience. He’d never much had time for dating anyone, but apparently the combination of booze, freedom, and a huge warm body at his back did something for him.

  The guy in the hoodie took another step back, then spun around and ran for it. No one stopped him, and Alex was conflicted about that. Muggers were bad, but he didn’t really want his savior chasing a mugger who had a knife. This was assuming the guy was helping and not just planning to mug Alex himself. But that was silly—Alex still had no money.

  He didn’t move intentionally, but his head fell back against the man behind him when he swayed. Looking up, he got half a view of short, dark hair and a strong, stubbled jaw, as well as a whiff of something woodsy as an aftershave. His body was sold.

  “You okay?” the man asked, laying a steadying hand on Alex’s right arm. “I think that jackass had a knife.”

  “He totally did,” Alex agreed, “but he didn’t stab me or anything. I think he might have been confused. He wanted my wallet, but he didn’t want me to put my hand in my pocket.”

  There was a hint of a smile on the other man’s half-visible face, and Alex felt him nod. “Muggers can be a twitchy lot. You probably scared him with your terrifying drunk-off-my-ass act.”

  His voice was deep and smooth, as quiet as the mugger’s, but without the nefarious intention. It was as though that was just his natural speaking volume, and Alex found it charming. He smiled. “This is so weird. I swear, I didn’t even know I was gay.”

  After the words came out, it occurred to him that they might not be well-taken. The gay agenda had come a long way in the modern age and all, but . . . . Was that the right term? The gay agenda? He needed to remember not to drink so much. It was definitely getting in the way of what could be a major personal revelation.

  The man laughed, though. Alex’s revelations didn’t seem to bother him. Or the gay agenda, or whatever. “Did you know you were straight?”

  Alex took a moment to think about that. “I dunno. Girls are pretty.”

  The guy wrapped his arm more firmly around Alex, and steered him around until he was facing toward the bar again. “Fair enough. And boys?”

  “Boys can be pretty. If, you know, if they want.” Alex nodded along with his words. He’d taken gender studies.

  “Maybe you’re an equal opportunity kind of drunk, then,” the man said, smiling down at him.

  He was even prettier with the rest of his face showing. His eyes were some light shade of blue or green that Alex couldn’t make out in the low light, and the half smirk on his face gave him a roguish look.

  “You’re as pretty as a girl,” Alex offered, and even as drunk as he was, he thought maybe that wasn’t the best way to put it. “Handsome, I mean.”

  “I’m as handsome as a girl?” the guy asked, his smile only growing.

  Alex narrowed his eyes. “Give a drunk guy a break, dude. I’ve never tried to flirt with a, um, a person, before.”

  The guy loo
ked genuinely surprised. “Any person?”

  Shaking his head, Alex took a step back toward the guy. “Nope. No time for flirting. Am I like, really bad at it?”

  “Yeah,” the guy said, his smile turning into a full-blown grin. “But that’s probably just because you’re drunk.”

  “But you’re still here,” Alex pointed out, and pushed his finger into the guy’s chest for emphasis.

  The guy seemed to think about that for a minute before answering. “Maybe I’m easy.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, man, ‘cause I’m gonna hold you to that.” He lifted his right hand and ran it along the guy’s stubbled jaw. “I wonder if I’m easy. I’m kind of thinking yes.”

  Alex’s phone buzzed in his pocket, and he pulled it out to check without a conscious thought. It was a text from Jenna.

  U fall in?

  He considered for a moment, looking at his phone and then up at the hot guy who had saved him from being mugged.

  Go way. Found hot guy. Gettin laid.

  He managed to compose a text without too many typos, though his mother would still be horribly disappointed with the grammar, let alone the content. He sent the text and then put his phone on silent and slipped it back into his pocket.

  “So, where were we?” he asked, leaning up against the guy.

  “Somewhere around you being easy, I think,” the guy answered. “We kind of skipped some important parts, though.”

  Alex made a derisive noise and waved his free left hand, almost smacking the wall with it. “Can’t be that important. Don’t tell me you’re like, a flowers and cheesy, romantic movies kind of guy?”

  The guy seemed to consider that for a moment. “You know, I’ve never been asked that before. I don’t think I’d have a problem with flowers though, and I like cheesy romantic movies. But I was thinking something a little more basic.”

  “Dinner?” Alex asked. He hoped not. He was pretty sure his stomach couldn’t take it.

  The guy’s eyes sparkled with laughter. “How about your name?”

  “Oh,” Alex said. “Ooooooooooh. That’s a good one.”

  The guy nodded. “Could be important. Especially if you’re easy.”

  Alex cocked his head curiously.

  “I should know whose name to scream, right?” He put on a mock serious look at that, but Alex could still see the amusement that was threatening to turn into outright laughter.

  Alex decided that laughing could wait. The vivid image of the guy, bare-chested and covered in a thin sheen of sweat, panting Alex’s name over and over inspired something, but it sure wasn’t laughter.

  “Alex,” he breathed, leaning up to press his face close to the other man’s. There were only a few inches’ height difference between them, despite the disparity between Alex’s wiry frame and the guy’s muscular one. “Alex Sage.”

  The guy allowed Alex to pull him close. “What about you?”

  Alex reared back a few inches. “That is me. I’m Alex.”

  “I meant do you want a name for me?” the guy asked. “Or would you rather I just be ‘that guy I jumped on in a bar’?”

  “Oooooh. A name,” Alex said, nodding. “Definitely a name.”

  The guy let him press their faces so close that they were sharing air, running his lips softly against Alex’s for a moment in a horrible, amazing tease.

  “Call me Liam.”

  Alex’s mouth was dry, and tasted a little like the awful kombucha his sophomore year dorm mate made once. It wasn’t a taste he ever really wanted to remember.

  The daylight sneaking in through his closed eyelids was too bright, and he was pretty sure that his whole head was going to crack if he opened them. He remembered the previous night with surprising clarity. He didn’t drink that much often, but when he did, it rarely came with such crisp memories of all the stupid things he’d done.

  The freedom party. The mugging that wasn’t. The hot guy—Liam—that he basically propositioned in the back hallway of Richter’s. Blowing off Jenna for the aforementioned hot guy.

  Alex frowned without opening his eyes. It kind of got fuzzy after that. Hitting on Liam, and then what? He had a queasy feeling that if he opened his eyes, he’d find himself naked in Liam’s bed.

  Not that the image bothered him in and of itself. Hell, it was actually kind of, um, hello sailor. Morning wood rarely came with such a compelling picture.

  No, the problem was that he didn’t remember what happened after the bar. He didn’t really want the first time he had sex to be lost in a fog of booze and stale adrenaline. He really wanted a 3D full-frontal memory of sex with Liam.

  He forced his eyes open and took in the cheap popcorn ceiling. It could be Jake and Jenna’s living room, but it didn’t feel like he was lying on a couch. It was definitely a bed, and one with pretty nice sheets if he wasn’t mistaken. They felt soft.

  Turning his head, he found the motion shockingly painless. That was confusing. He’d been totally drunk. He should at least have a headache. On the other hand, turning his head gave him a beautiful view of Liam’s sleeping face in the early morning light.

  No one was better looking in brighter light so maybe Alex was imagining it, but Liam looked perfect like that. Square jaw slack, pillow pulled up tight against his face, and dark eyelashes fluttering against his cheeks, Liam looked like something from an art photography exhibit, or maybe a cologne advertisement.

  Dammit.

  Drunk Alex got a piece of that, and sober Alex didn’t even get to remember it. Not fair.

  He turned his head again to look for the edge of the bed, and slid toward it. There was an empty sports drink bottle sitting on the nightstand next to a bottle of painkillers. The lack of a headache began to make sense, at least. He had managed to hydrate and take something preemptive for the hangover. Liam must have thought of it, because Alex hadn’t been in any shape to remember.

  As he tried to make sense of what little he did remember, the scenes painted an odd picture. Liam had picked a drunken Alex up at a bar and had sex with him, then taken care of him before putting him to bed? That didn’t seem right. Also, Alex was wearing boxers.

  Sitting up, he looked down at himself. Yep, his own boxers and not a borrowed pair.

  Glancing around the room, he spotted his jeans and t-shirt folded neatly on a chair, and his sneakers sitting beneath it. He hadn’t done that. He wasn’t that neat with his things while at home alone and sober, let alone drunk and trying to have sex. Maybe he didn’t have prior experience with how he acted while trying to have sex, but he was pretty sure it would be messier than that.

  He turned back to look at Liam and found his eyes open. In the soft light, he could see that they were a pale sort of green, and they looked freaking adorable while he was sleepy and smiling. “Hey,” Liam said, his voice throaty in the morning.

  “Hey,” he answered, and bit his lip.

  Liam shook his head a little and reached up to cup Alex’s face. “No need for that.”

  Alex frowned. “No need to be worried that I made an ass of myself, or sucked at sex, or—something else horrible that I don’t remember?”

  Liam braced himself on his right arm and pushed up. The sheets slipped a little, and Alex got a glimpse of black briefs. He allowed himself a moment to appreciate how good they looked before he considered further. They were both semi-clothed.

  “We didn’t have sex,” Alex said in a rush of breath.

  Liam’s eyes sparkled, and he looked like he was about to laugh. “You don’t have to sound quite so happy about it.”

  He let himself fall forward into the other man’s chest, relieved and a little ashamed of just how much. “I really didn’t want to have forgotten.”

  Liam ran a hand up his back and through his hair, a casual gesture that made Alex shiver. “Okay,” Liam conceded. “I’d rather we didn’t have sex, than I was so forgettable that you don’t remember.”

  “So you just brought me home and put me to bed?”
Alex asked. It seemed the obvious solution, but still didn’t quite make sense.

  Liam gave his shoulder a small shove, but not enough to dislodge him. “What else was I going to do? Have sex with a drunk guy? What kind of person does that?”

  Alex couldn’t keep the smile off his face. “Um, more people than I’d like to think. But I’m glad you’re not one of them.”

  “If I’m going to sleep with you,” Liam said, leaning into Alex’s personal bubble. “You’re going to be sober. And you’re going to remember every minute of it.”

  Their lips brushed, and it made Alex’s spine tingle. He wanted to jump right into take two: sober morning sex, but he had to get to practice. He probably also needed to reassure his friends that he hadn’t been kidnapped or something horrible.

  Still, a kiss couldn’t hurt.

  He let himself lean into Liam, pressing their lips more firmly together. Liam’s hand slid up his back again, to cup the back of his head and lay him against the pillows. He teased Alex’s lips with his tongue, but pulled back after just a second, returning to just light pressure.

  Their eyes met for a long moment, their lips still barely touching, before Liam pulled away completely. Alex let his head fall back against the pillows. “You’re joking right now,” he huffed.

  Liam let the hand behind Alex’s neck trail around his face, then down his chest. “Unfortunately, no. I’ve got to get to work, and I suspect you’ve got your own stuff to do.”

  Alex nodded and sighed in a deeply put-upon manner. “I’m totally willing to blow off practice for sex, though.”

  “No, you’re not,” Liam said, shaking his head.

  Alex gave him a false pout. “How do you know? I might be willing to blow off practice for sex.”

  “You’ve never done it before today,” Liam pointed out, using his annoying powers of deduction, and how did he know that anyway? “Besides, I don’t want a quickie before we both have to go do our things. I want the whole night. The whole day. Hours of time with you.”

  Alex’s lips fell apart in shock. A blush spread across his cheeks as he realized he was considering it. He could blow off practice just once. But he supposed Liam had to get to work, and wasn’t willing to skip it just for sex. It was a tragedy of the highest degree. Alex wondered how much it’d take to convince him to stay.