“Good. Keep that in mind when you show up to the photo shoot. Bring your A game, and don’t you dare be late.”
She hung up without saying good-bye.
He stared at his phone until the screen dimmed, stomach acid bubbling. Shit. Colette was right. He’d gotten so tangled up in his attraction to Kyle, he’d forgotten how much was riding on this. It was more than just money. It was his future with Murmur Inc. Colette clearly suspected his interest in Kyle wasn’t strictly professional. And why wouldn’t she? Kyle was gorgeous, and Pete was nipping at his heels like a lovesick puppy.
He shook his head. He’d taken two steps forward only to take one back. Porn was supposed to help his confidence, not crush it. Right now, it felt like he was doing everything wrong.
But not anymore. He was going to keep his promise to Colette, no matter what it took.
He made himself get out of bed and take a shower. He stood under the spray until the pelletized water stung his skin, thinking about nothing and everything all at once. Flashes of memories came to him: bright lights, salty sweat, and his reflection in Kyle’s deep brown eyes. He imagined rinsing the thoughts off, letting them swirl down the drain.
His fingers were pruned by the time he got out of the shower. He put on clean clothes, brushed his teeth, and combed his hair. Afterward, he felt marginally better. At least, better enough to not call out of work.
The drive to the Globe was uneventful. Pushing open the glass double doors, he was comforted by the familiar smell of roasted beans. At least one thing in his life hadn’t changed. Sana was in her usual spot behind the counter, teenagers were lounging on the squishy couches, and Joshua was skulking by the refrigerator.
After greeting Sana, Pete busied himself washing dishes: mismatched mugs, blenders, spoons, anything he could get his hands on. For the first hour of his shift, he actually managed to get his mind off things. When the second hour rolled around, however, there was a lull, and he had to hunt for ways to pass the time.
He filled the jugs at the milk station to the brim. Then he removed all the sugar packets from the trays and put them back in so they were facing the same way. He even married the little jars of spices that they kept up at the counter. After finishing, he looked around for his next task. All the customers had drinks and most were on laptops or smartphones, oblivious to him. Sana was flipping through an art magazine, and Joshua was rearranging the alphabetic magnets on the refrigerator to say various rude phrases.
There was nothing left to do. At least, nothing work related. There was one thing he could always do: give himself a fresh bout of cancer. He pulled his cigs out of his pocket, waved at Sana to get her attention, and then held them up. She nodded and went back to reading her magazine.
It was universally understood that if employees wanted to smoke, they needed to do so away from the storefront, which faced a major intersection and had a fair amount of foot traffic. Pete removed his apron and slipped out the side door, which led onto a smaller street. It was still fairly busy—it was impossible to avoid pedestrians in LA—but he was shielded from the view of the cars. He moved a good ten feet away from the door before lighting up.
There weren’t many people walking around, as close as it was to dinnertime, but he made certain to exhale away from anyone who came near. The last thing he needed was some health nut getting on his case. LA was crawling with them, and he’d been lectured more times than he could count.
As if on cue, someone stopped a few feet away from him. “Hey.”
Pete didn’t look up. He made room for the person to pass and dragged on his cigarette.
The person didn’t give up, however. In his periphery, they stepped closer. He tensed, preparing for a rant, but all the person did was repeat, “Hey.”
Wait. He knew that voice. His head jerked to the side.
Sure enough, Kyle was standing next to him, looking abnormally normal in jeans and a black hoodie. He even had a pair of lime-green headphones around his neck from which the faint sound of music emanated. Pete stared at him. Had his brain conjured up Kyle? If only he’d spent the day thinking about piles of money.
“Um, hi,” he eventually said back.
“How are you?”
Pete knew he should respond, but he was too busy staring at Kyle. As accustomed as he was to seeing Kyle in just his underwear, his street clothes were a beguiling treat. Kyle’s dark hair was devoid of gel today and had been ruffled by the brisk wind. He hadn’t shaved, and one of his shoelaces was untied. He should have looked like a mess, but somehow, it suited him. If anyone could make unkempt into a fashion statement, it was Kyle.
Pete’s newfound resolve to keep things professional flew out of his head, along with his ability to form sentences.
“Are you all right?” Kyle asked after a full ten seconds of silence passed. “I know you’re not the most talkative person, but this is a bit much.”
“Oh, sorry,” Pete mumbled. “You took me by surprise.”
“Yeah, same here.” He slid his hands into his pockets, rocking back on his heels.
“Did you follow me here?” Pete blurted out. As soon as the words left him, he wanted to smack himself. Kyle had just said he hadn’t expected to see him. Still, people didn’t simply run into each other in a city of nearly four million.
“No,” Kyle said carefully. “It’s just a coincidence. I wasn’t even supposed to be on this side of town today, but my sister wanted to have lunch. I saw you standing here, so I thought I’d say hi.” He stepped away like he was going to walk past him. “I can go, if you want.”
“No, don’t,” Pete scrambled to say. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to act all paranoid. It’s just, um, a really big coincidence.”
Well, clearly his worries that things might be awkward were completely unfounded. He sighed and threw his cigarette to the ground, stamping it out.
To his surprise, Kyle grinned. “Yeah, us meeting like this is pretty implausible. One might even call it fate.” He waggled his eyebrows.
An unintended laugh burst from Pete. “I guess so.”
Kyle’s characteristic smirk slid onto his face. “Happy to see me?”
“Yeah, I am.” It was true. He felt like a cloud had been hanging over him for days, but now that Kyle was here, it dissipated. “I was worried about you.”
He winced. He hadn’t meant to be quite that honest.
“Ah, let me guess: because of my disappearing act the last time we were together?” Kyle rubbed the back of his neck. He almost looked chagrinned. “Sorry about that. After our shoot, I . . . well, I needed to do some thinking.”
“Thinking? About what?”
“I realized something, and it spooked me. I had to wrap my head around it.”
Pete ran his tongue over his dry lips. “What’d you realize?”
“Am I holding you up from something?” Kyle asked. “Are you meeting someone? I don’t want to keep you.”
“No, I’m not meeting anyone. You are, though. Don’t you need to find your sister?”
“Nah, I have some time. I’m chronically early to things. Being late makes me antsy.”
Pete blinked. “I never would have guessed.”
“Really? Why?” Kyle cocked his head in the feline way Pete had come to associate with him. Initially, he’d thought the motion was affected, just another seduction technique, but it seemed it was a genuine mannerism of his.
“I dunno.” Pete shrugged. “You just don’t seem like the sort of person who gets anxious.”
“How do you know what sort of person I am?” Kyle watched him intently.
Pete held up his hands. “Whoa, man, sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
But Kyle was smirking again. “It’s okay. I’m just teasing you.” His eyes darted briefly down Pete and back up again. “You make me want to do that. I don’t know why.”
Goddamn. One little look, and Kyle could send him reeling.
“So, you have some time,” Pete reiterated, not knowing where
his sentence was going to end up. He struggled with what he wanted to say versus his ability to say it, and ultimately said nothing.
Luckily, Kyle had no such reservations. “Do you want to . . . I don’t know.” He glanced up at the sign hanging above the door to the Globe. “Get coffee? Or something? I can’t stay for long, but it’s a start.”
A start to what? Pete had no idea, but he sure as hell wanted to find out. “Yeah, I’d like that.” In a flash, Pete remembered where he was and what he was doing. “Shit. I can’t.”
Thank God he’d taken his apron off. There was nothing to indicate he worked here. He wasn’t quite ready to reveal his cliché day job just yet. Or possibly ever.
Kyle blinked at him. “If this is your way of playing hard to get, I must say, it’s working.”
“No, no.” Pete waved his hands. “It’s not that. I just forgot I have work later.” And by later, I mean right now.
“You’re filming later?”
“No. I work, um, somewhere else. I have a day job.” Pete mentally rolled his eyes at himself. He sounded about as genuine as the bags the street hawkers sold in Koreatown.
“Ah,” Kyle said. “I guess it can’t be helped, then. Shame.”
“I’m sorry, Kyle.” He looked down at the sidewalk. “I really am.”
For a moment, Kyle didn’t respond. Then he said, “You should call me Evan.”
Pete nudged a pebble with his shoe and tried for a joke. “Is that like a kink of yours or something? Most guys ask me to call them daddy.”
“No, it’s my real name.”
A record skipped in Pete’s head. Slowly, he raised his head and choked out, “What?”
“Evan. My name is Evan.”
Pete stared at him, eyes wide. A thousand questions flooded into his brain so quickly he couldn’t articulate any of them. Instead, he repeated, “What?”
Kyle—Evan shrugged in what Pete assumed was an attempt at casualness, but it came across as defensive. “We’re going to be working together for the next month, so we might as well get to know one another. You know, before we get to know each other in the biblical sense.”
Pete would have laughed under normal circumstances, but he was still too shocked. Atomic bombs were going off in his chest. “But you can’t . . . I mean, you shouldn’t . . . You can’t . . . tell me your name.”
“I’m pretty sure I just did.” His voice was confident, but he wasn’t quite looking Pete in the eye. “It’s really not that serious. Darko is my actual last name, and everyone calls me that. Well, except you.”
“It’s not the same. A first or last name by itself doesn’t mean anything.” Pete touched an exasperated hand to his brow. “I can’t believe you just did that. We barely know each other. Do you tell everyone you work with? Because that’s really not safe.”
“You’re the first person I’ve told, besides Colette obviously. Though for the record, lots of people in my personal life know I’m in porn. I’m not gonna lose any friends or whatever if they find out.”
Pete had a flashbulb memory of when he’d googled Kyle Darko and found his Facebook with a whole slew of siblings listed. Before he could think it through, he blurted out, “I researched you the other day.”
Evan smiled. “Really now? Why?”
“I was curious. I wanted to know more about you.” Apparently, it was honesty hour.
“Interesting.” He looked inexplicably pleased. “What’d you find?”
“A bunch of porn, of course, and your website, and uh, your Facebook.”
“I see. Learn anything good?”
“Yeah, I did.” He ran distracted fingers through his hair. “Are you out to your family?”
“They know I like men.”
“I mean the other out. Porn star out.”
“Yes.” Evan studied him. “Does that surprise you?”
“Of course it does.” He wiped a hand down his mouth. “I can’t even fathom that.”
“Can’t you?” Evan cocked his head to the side. “So, you’d never come out, then?”
“Of course not!”
“But someone you know could stumble upon your videos at any time. Nothing on the internet ever goes away. You’re not worried about that at all?”
“No,” Pete said, sounding more confident than he felt. “It’s a calculated risk, and I’m pretty good at math. There’s way too much porn out there for anyone to accidentally stumble upon anything, and I haven’t been in enough films to ping on anyone’s radar.” By the end of his diatribe, he could no longer tell if he was saying it for Evan’s benefit or his own.
“It only takes one,” Evan countered. “That’s why I elected to skip the whole secret-identity shtick and let it all hang out. Literally.”
A frisson slithered down Pete’s spine, but it wasn’t the usual excitement he felt around Evan. It was more like shards of ice mixed with a generous dose of panic. He couldn’t even think about being out without stirring up memories he’d just as soon bury. “I’m not trying to lecture you, but you should keep Kyle and Evan separate. Do you realize what the wrong person can do with your real name? They could sell it to a tabloid or leak it to the internet. You just placed a lot of trust in me.”
“Was that a mistake?” Evan asked, a hard glint in his dark eyes.
“No, of course not.” Pete tried to look sincere, but he was willing to bet he just looked queasy. “I won’t tell anyone. I promise.” He almost added, After what I went through, I would never, but that would raise questions he had no desire to answer.
“Good. I didn’t think you would.”
“I have to ask, though . . . You don’t expect me to tell you my real name, do you? Because I’m not comfortable with that.”
“No,” Evan said, somewhat sharply. “I didn’t tell you so you’d return the favor. I told you because I wanted to. Is that so hard for you to imagine?”
“Sorry.” Pete took a step back. “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m surprised, is all. You keep throwing me for a loop, and it makes me babble.”
“It’s okay.” His words and his tone didn’t quite match. “I suppose I should get going.” Evan started to walk past him.
With a burst of confidence Pete hadn’t known he had, he grabbed Evan’s arm. “Wait. There’s still one thing I need to know.”
“What’s that?”
“Why me? Of all people to tell, why pick a guy you just met? It can’t just be because we’re going to work together, or you would have told your previous costars. Tell me the real reason.”
Evan’s eyes drifted down Pete’s arm to where Pete’s fingers were gripping his biceps. “I knew you had some fight in you.”
Pete released him and stepped back. “Sorry. I just— I don’t think I can take any more of this back and forth.”
Evan faced him, and Pete suddenly became aware of how closely they were standing. “Back and forth?”
“Yeah,” Pete continued despite himself. “I keep trying to figure you out, but it’s impossible. You’re hot one second and cold the next, and . . . I can’t spend another night thinking about you, wondering if I’ve screwed things up. It’s torture.”
Evan blinked slowly at him, his thick black eyelashes casting long shadows on his cheeks. Then he smiled. “You’ve discovered my evil plan. I want you to spend all your time thinking about me.”
Pete frowned. “Very funny.”
“Who says I’m joking? And for the record, there’s no cold here.” He winked. “I’m always hot.”
With that, he sidestepped Pete and sauntered away. Before he was out of earshot, he called over his shoulder, “See you Friday. I’m looking forward to our photo shoot.”
Pete watched him shrink into the distance for an indeterminate amount of time. It wasn’t until he vanished that the earth released its death grip on him. He stepped back until his shoulders hit brick.
Kyle had raised as many questions as he’d answered, though one thing was now crystal clear: keeping things professional
was going to be a lot harder than Pete had thought.
He headed back inside and found Sana still at the counter, only now she had three empty espresso cups in front of her.
“Oh God,” Pete groaned, “you didn’t.”
“I did!” Sana exclaimed, sticking a long finger in the air. She appeared somewhat deranged, as she always did when she binged on caffeine. “Who was that guy, by the way?”
Pete nearly dropped his apron halfway through putting it back on. “What guy?”
“The one you were talking to outside. I could just barely see you through the window. Was he bothering you?” She rubbed her hands together eagerly. “Was he giving you shit for smoking? If he’s still out there, I’m happy to—”
“He was no one,” Pete interrupted. “Just some guy.”
Sana pouted. “Are you sure? Seemed like you were discussing something serious.”
Pete turned away, hiding his face. “It was nothing, I swear. Don’t worry about it. And for the sake of the general public, no more espresso for you.”
The day of the photo shoot, Pete rose shortly before dawn. Normally, he’d hit snooze at least five times and roll out of bed only when absolutely necessary, but not today. He was too excited. Miraculously, he’d gotten a decent night’s sleep, helped by his earlier conversation with Ky—Evan. When the sun broke over the horizon, he was ready. Jittery, but ready.
He took his time going through his morning hygiene routine. Colette had said the photo shoot would be sex-free, but that didn’t mean he and Evan wouldn’t be getting up close and personal. He took a long shower, shaved his sparse facial hair, and cleaned his mouth so thoroughly he might be able to skip his next dental appointment. His clothing, however, he paid little mind to, since they were going to dress him anyway. He pulled on whatever was clean, threw a hoodie over that for warmth, and tiptoed past the sound of his mom’s gentle snoring. The front door whispered shut behind him.
The drive to Murmur Inc. was uneventful, which was fortunate, considering how preoccupied he was with thoughts of seeing Evan. He shook his head and reminded himself that as soon as he stepped on set, he would have to call him Kyle again. Shit, that was going to get confusing. If he accidentally called him by his real name, it would be disastrous. Colette would skin him for one thing. She took the privacy of her employees more seriously than she took her business, and that was saying something.
Action Page 9
