Fic: Deal
“Fine. Fine. You win. I’ll ask, okay? If we can make it, we’ll be there.”
Eric hung up the phone and stared at it menacingly. It rarely bore good news anymore.
Sam had suggested once that it would be better if he chose the ripping-off-a-band-aid approach to coming out-- that it would cause less discomfort in the long run than peeling back the layers one centimeter at a time. But when Eric hadn’t responded due to the fact that his immediate exhale had refused to be followed by an inhale, Sam had let the matter drop.
Sam was good about letting him take things slowly. It was probably a smart move on his part, because even though Eric had agreed to take the unexpected plunge and enter into an actual relationship, he still felt a cold knot of fear in his stomach whenever he was forced to confront that decision. So far, he’d only told his sister and the neighbor across the street, although he suspected Mildred had shared the news with the rest of the neighborhood as well. As much as that unnerved him, he figured it was a necessary evil if he wanted Sam to live with him.
That was one of the few things he was sure about, surprisingly. He’d never guessed that underneath his lone wolf exterior was a closet domestic type, but once Sam had worked his way into his life, he’d become a fixture Eric didn’t want live without. In the beginning he’d tried his best to make it all about sex-the word relationship wasn’t even in his vocabulary-but Sam had slowly and persistently shown him the benefits of friendship, trust, and, eventually, love. Faced with the ultimatum of losing Sam or at least starting to come out, he’d reluctantly agreed to take the first steps towards a new, more honest life.
And as a reward, for all intents and purposes Sam had moved in. He’d kept his condo, though, which he visited often in order to take care of his plants and to “tidy up”-not that Eric was sure how it got dirty without him living there, but tidying up seemed like a very Sam thing to do. The rest of their time they spent together, basking in the glow of the post-I-love-you phase, even though Eric had only managed to utter the words once. They’d been sexually intimate since the beginning, but Eric soon found there was a new and amazingly satisfying layer to lovemaking when it actually involved love. It was too early yet to say they’d found the perfect stride-Sam was prone to the slow-and-steady, tenderness-and-foreplay approach while Eric still had a tendency to lean towards more urgent couplings-but Sam claimed he was going to teach him the value of patience sooner or later, and Eric was starting to suspect he might just be right about that. He certainly had no objections to the learning process.
There was, however, a far less enjoyable reality in choosing to live his life with a man.
“Who was that?" Sam asked as he came into the room.
He’d been in the kitchen, preparing some sort of chicken marinade. Eric still couldn’t quite understand why Sam often insisted on preparing for dinner half a day before the actual meal, but he’d accepted it, just as Sam had accepted the fact that his idea of dinner generally involved beer, bread, and peanut butter and jelly. For a while Sam had tried to cajole him into joint grocery store trips so he could give him an idea of how to put together ingredients for entrees, but as Eric had a firm notion grocery shopping was not something two men should be doing together, he’d given up on that fairly quickly.
Sam crossed his arms and continued to wait expectantly for a response to his question, and for a moment Eric considered lying. But Sam was strangely honest and value-driven for a lawyer, and it didn’t seem right to betray his trust.
“My sister,” he responded with a frown.
“Bad news?” Sam pressed, sitting down next to him and squeezing his arm gently.
Eric trained his eyes on a spot on the carpet. “She wants us to come over this weekend . . . she’s having some sort of dinner party with friends.”
Sam brightened immediately. “Really? That sounds nice. I’d like to get to know her better. I can already tell I’m going to like her."
Eric’s frown deepened. “I don’t like dinner parties.”
Sam nodded; the revelation was probably not much of a surprise to him. “Her husband moved out, right? She probably needs the support of friends and family right now,” he suggested, evidently deciding on a different tactic to get his way.
“I know you want to go, Sam. You don’t have to coat it in concern for my sister,” Eric said with a roll of his eyes.
“And I know there’s more behind you not wanting to go than just not liking dinner parties,” Sam countered quietly.
Eric turned to meet Sam in the eye, his tone half-defiant and half-apologetic. “Do you need this, Sam? Because if you need it I’ll do it for you, but I can’t tell you I’m going to like it . . . and I don’t really know how I’m going to feel about being there with you.”
“All I’m asking is that you try. The more you get out there, the easier it will get. You want it to get easier, don’t you?”
Eric sighed and took Sam’s hand, patting it gently. “Yes, Sam. I want it to get easier. I want to be with you, I told you that. It’s just this is all new . . . and it’s hard for me.”
“I know,” Sam agreed, scooting closer so he could kiss Eric and gather him tightly into an embrace, which Eric instinctively tried to pull out of. Sam ignored it and held on a second longer before letting him go. “But we’ll get through it together.”
*
The two-hour trip started out well enough. They exchanged sibling stories from their childhood, as Sam had quite a few funny ones about the trouble a young Billy had gotten himself into. Eric’s stories of Joan weren’t nearly as entertaining; she was fairly straight-laced and had always had a lot of maternal instinct, probably brought on by the necessity of filling the void left by their mother. But as they pulled up in front of Joan’s house around 5 o’clock Eric realized the conversation had died off, and after he’d parked and turned off the engine he was still gripping the steering wheel tightly enough to turn his knuckles white.
“Eric?” Sam said softly.
Eric sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. “Let’s get out of here. This is going to be lame. A bunch of bitter divorced and single women, sitting around, probably cursing men . . . Let’s go somewhere else. I know some nice restaurants up here. I’ll take you anywhere you want to go.”
“You know that’s not going to work,” Sam said firmly, but his voice was still gentle. “She’s your sister. We’re going to have to spend time with her eventually.”
“I know that, but we can do it without a bunch of women sitting around watching us, can’t we? Some other time?”
“We’re already here. Come on, let’s just go in, have a few drinks. You’ll see, it’s not going to be a big deal. What does it matter if a bunch of women know you’re gay?”
“I know some of these people, Sam. They’ll know I’ve been . . . lying . . . all this time.”
“No one is going to hold it against you. It’s completely understandable.” Sam ventured a hand out and rested it along Eric’s leg. “Come on, let’s go.”
But Eric gripped the steering wheel even tighter, unable to summon the ability to move. He’d always tried to appear strong, confident, sure of himself . . .and that certainly wasn’t how he felt at this moment. He doubted anyone would believe he was a strong, confident individual again once they knew he’d been too scared to be himself for most of his life. And now he was about to offer himself and all his weaknesses up for judgment from a room full of near-strangers. The thought repulsed him.
“Please let’s just get out of here. I’ll tell her . . . I’ll tell her I was sick. Please, Sam. We’ll come back another time.” His breath grew shallow and when he glanced in the rearview mirror he saw his complexion was a mix of pale white and splotchy red. “Sam . . .”
“Breathe,” Sam commanded, placing his hand along Eric’s back and pressing down. “You’re going to give yourself a panic attack. Just put your head down and breathe.”
Eric obeyed, lowering his head to his knees as Sam stroked his back. “Breathe,” Sam coaxed.
After a moment his gasps became less frantic and he lifted his head back up, feeling like a monumental idiot and wanting to do anything to hide from his embarrassment. Even Sam, who he trusted more than anyone, shouldn’t see him like this.
Sam put his hand on Eric’s chest and rubbed it slowly. “Better?”
Eric nodded.
“Then let’s go inside. No one is there right now besides your sister anyways, and she’s already met me.”
Eric’s lashes fluttered over his eyes a few times and he finally released his grip of the steering wheel to take one of Sam’s hands. “This isn’t about you, Sam. You’re . . . you’re . . . great. This is . . . my problem, I guess.”
“I know,” Sam said, smiling and squeezing his hand. “But it’s nice to hear you say it anyways. Come on, let’s go.”
*
Eric felt stiff in his sister’s embrace, but then again, that was nothing new. Sam, however, seemed to welcome the arms around him much more warmly.
“Sam,” Joan said, the pleasure ringing through her voice. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to meet you again.”
Sam grinned widely, his eyes sparking like they already shared an inside joke. “It’s good to meet you again, too.”
Eric felt his mood growing more sour. He could just see where this was going-- the two of them were likely to become the best of friends.
“Why don’t you guys have seat in the living room? I’ll bring out some drinks in a second. I have a casserole in the oven yet that I have to keep an eye on."
Eric pushed past them for the comfort of the couch and Sam followed after a smile and a nod. He didn’t sit down next to Eric but instead stood in the middle of the room, studying the photographs on display. There were a few square and rectangle-shaped spots on the wall where the paint was a slightly different hue, indicating that some portraits were probably being purged- those of her and her husband no doubt-although there were still family ones that included her bright-eyed toddler. He was away with his father, which Eric didn’t mind at all, since kids-- even his sister’s kid-- usually rubbed him the wrong way.
“He’s cute,” Sam remarked, gesturing to the requisite baby-in-a-bathtub picture. “He looks a lot like your sister.”
“Mhmm,” was all Eric managed to say. He was busy running his hands over the length of his jeans and hoping Joan would show up with that alcohol soon.
“Want to give me a hand with the drinks, Sam?” Joan called out from the kitchen as she passed by the adjoining entranceway. Sam hurried away, and Eric was torn between relief at the peace his departure offered and worry at how quickly he’d left, as if he was longing for a chance to escape from Eric’s melancholy.
Left alone, it turned out Eric had only more time to assess his discomfort. The guests coming to the party were nice people, even if Eric had never been all that social. He’d met them at various holiday gatherings, and most of them had been at Joan’s wedding a few years back. Thinking of the wedding reminded him that he’d been forced to dance with the incessantly-single Mel, a friend of Joan’s from college, and he recalled how thickly she’d attempted to lay on her charms. He could just imagine the giant “Ohhh,” that must have escaped her lips when Joan shared the news. That is, if Joan had shared the news.
Sam came back into the living room with two beers and a despicably broad grin. Whatever he and Joan had talked about in the kitchen had evidently made his day.
He handed a beer off and Eric took it quickly, swallowing a good portion of it down in one tilt before cradling it against his lap.
“Relax,” Sam said, sitting next to him and rubbing his arm gently. “Your sister is great, and I think she likes me.”
Eric let out a short chuckle. “Yeah, you’re probably her dream come true.”
“Not yours?” Sam nudged him with his shoulder. Eric knew he was only teasing; Sam rarely went the sappy route with him-he already knew Eric was not that kind of guy.
A smile tugged at Eric’s lips anyway and he turned to face Sam, who seemed overjoyed at the improvement in his humor. Sam leaned forward, pressing in for a kiss just as Joan passed by the entranceway with the casserole dish in her arms to set on a cooling rack.
She didn’t turn to look at them, but all the same, Eric bolted upright, barely managing to grab the beer before it toppled to the floor. “What the fuck, Sam,” he hissed. “Don’t do that.”
Sam bit his lip. “It’s just your sister,” he pleaded.
Eric looked down at him and shook his head. “Just . . . just give me my space right now,” he spat out, and walked away.
***
Eric headed for the bathroom where he splashed cold water on his face, biting back the disgust that had curled up in his stomach the moment he’d caught sight of Joan while Sam was only an inch away from his lips.
The thought of her seeing him like that made his skin feel strangely hot and cold at the same time. Why it did that, however, he wasn’t quite sure. Obviously, Joan knew. Joan knew and was perfectly okay with it; more okay than he was, probably. But still he couldn’t stop the bodily response that was telling him in no uncertain terms that he did not want Sam to touch him like that in front of other people, whether they knew about him or not. Knowing was one thing, but being assaulted with visible proof was another. And it was just one more chance to be judged.
He trailed into the kitchen and threw away his now empty beer, skirting around Joan as she tossed a salad to retrieve another from the fridge.
“I’m glad you came. And I’m glad you brought Sam,” Joan said, glancing over at him. A tomato escaped the bowl and she bent to retrieve it. “I hope you’re treating him better now. He seems like a really nice person. Don’t screw things up.”
“Thanks Joan,” Eric responded. “You have such a high opinion of me.”
“I’m just saying.” Joan rolled her eyes as she grated some cheese on top of the salad. “Keep him happy. Or he may walk. I speak from experience.”
“Yeah, well, I can think of much better ways to be making him happy right now than hanging out with a bunch of my sister’s friends.” The words were out of Eric’s mouth before he had a chance to analyze them, but once spoken they immediately conjured up images he did not want Joan to be picturing. His hid his blush with a hand over his face as he rubbed at his eyes.
Joan continued with her food preparation without batting an eyelash. “Alright, Eric. No need to get testy. Just trying to help.”
Eric downed another beer, leaning against the kitchen counter. “So did you tell them?” he asked tentatively.
She paused as she drew out some glasses from a cabinet. “I told them you were bringing a date.”
Eric rolled his eyes. “Right, a date. A man, Joan. Did you tell them I was bringing a man? That would be the key factor.”
Joan busied herself with gathering the ingredients for a margarita. “I told them you’re gay, yes.”
Eric puffed out his cheeks in a sigh. “And?”
“And? No one cares. I mean, they were a little surprised I guess, but really no one cares. Except for knowing you’re off the market.”
Eric was silent for a while as he processed the information. No one cared. So why did he? He wasn’t sure, but he just did. He almost thought about mentioning this to Joan, seeing what acerbic advice she’d have to help him get over himself, but he was too afraid she’d suggest he see a therapist, and that he just couldn’t bear.
“Maybe you should get back to your date,” Joan said, and Eric looked up to see she had already mixed a pitcher of margarita and salted the glasses.
“Don’t call him that,” Eric grumbled, reaching for a third beer. He knew he should be pacing himself, but he couldn’t really think of anything else to be doing at the moment.
“Oh? Well I guess you did say you asked him to move in. You want me to call him boyfriend? Or partner?”
“Jesus Christ.” Eric spit a bit of the beer out as he interrupted her. “Partner? That makes it sound like we’re married. And we’re not ever going to get married. The man’s already turned my life upside-down-- I have to put my foot down somewhere.”
Joan’s eyes shot up above Eric’s head with alarm, and Eric followed them to see Sam standing by the entranceway to the kitchen with a wary, uncomfortable smile on his face that revealed exactly how much of that conversation he’d overheard.
Cursing inwardly, Eric made a move toward him. “Sam . . .” he started.
The doorbell rang.
“Oh, good, people are here,” Joan said a little too brightly, and she ushered both of them with her towards the front door.
*
The rest of the evening was as dull as Eric had suspected it would be, except for the awkward moments of being chastised by Mel for making her “waste her time on him.” The girls seemed more interested in assessing Joan’s well-being after the split, which Joan took in her unflappable stride, stating that her son was the obvious reward for the whole marriage experience. Other than that the attention mostly focused on Sam, who everyone happily fawned over. He sent just enough smiles and amused glances over Eric’s way to make it seem like he wasn’t overly upset by Eric’s earlier outburst. Perhaps he was just used to rolling with the punches by now, and while Eric thought that should have pleased him, he found something about the notion upsetting.
They talked a little about Joan and the girls’ unabashed flirting on the ride back, but once they were home a stifling silence descended upon them. Eric wasn't sure if Sam was annoyed at how he’d been treated, or if he’d finally come to his senses and realized Eric was just not relationship material. Either way, it was too awkward for him to confront so he avoided Sam as they completed their nighttime rituals, hoping things would look less dreary in the morning.
Once the lights were off, though, Eric was only all too aware of how far away Sam was from him on the bed, and he didn’t like that feeling of distance-physical or otherwise. He knew his emotions for Sam now were entirely incongruous to what he’d been feeling earlier, making him even more ashamed of his behavior.
“Sorry,” he muttered, mostly to the ceiling.
“I know,” Sam said.
“No one would blame you if you walked now,” he continued. “Is that why you’re keeping your condo?”
Sam rolled over to face him. “It’s just the logical thing to do. I know I want to live with you, but I’d be naïve to assume anything before we’ve really given it a chance.”
Eric nodded, his chest tightening with the unspoken things may not work out behind Sam’s words. Because if things didn’t work out, it would be entirely his fault.
“But you are going to give it a chance? Even after how I acted tonight?” he asked, frustrated with how damn needy he sounded.
Sam smiled at him and inched his way over to lay a hand against his chest. “Do you love me?” he asked.
“Come on, Sam. I already told you I did. You’re not going to make me say it all the time, are you?”
Sam’s grin only widened. “Okay then. And I love you,” he continued with a somewhat haughty tone and raised eyebrows that seemed to taunt Eric. See how easily I can say it? “And I’m not going to throw that away just because you can’t kiss me in front of your sister. There’s plenty of people, gay or straight, who don’t like public displays of affection. It’s not that big a deal.”
It seemed like everything Eric was worried about these days was “not that big a deal.”
“But since you brought it up,” Sam persisted, piercing some of the calm Eric had started to feel. “I would like you to make me a promise.”
“A promise?”
“Yeah. How about this. I’ll give your space out there, for as long as you need it. I’m not saying I want to go back to being completely secretive, but I can buy you not wanting to be affectionate out in the open. Just as long as you promise me that when we’re home you won’t push me away. This house, this room . . . this is ours, okay? Just promise me you won’t put up any walls between us here.”
Sam’s hand was trailing down Eric’s torso by then, and when he was done speaking he slid it along his inner thigh and up inside his boxers.
“Sam,” Eric groaned, too distracted to really listen to what he was saying.
“Is it a deal?” Sam flicked his hand deeper and brushed his fingers over Eric’s dick playfully.
“Sam,” Eric pleaded again.
“Alright, I’ll ask you later,” Sam said mischievously before Eric pulled him forward so they could press their bodies up against each other. “When you can think straight. Or not think straight, as the case may be.”
He laughed at his own silly humor as Eric rolled him over and pounced.
*
Sam was true to his word. An hour later, as Eric lay against his chest in what was quickly and embarrassingly becoming his favorite place to doze off, Sam stroked his hair gently and whispered, “So, is it a deal?”
Eric tilted his head up to search Sam’s eyes, trying to judge how serious he was about this so-called deal, and found them earnest and maybe just the slightest bit nervous. Sam wasn’t exactly smiling but the edges of his lips tugged upwards as he if hoped he’d have cause to do so soon.
When he’d first met Sam, Eric hadn’t thought that all of the man’s features could be considered classically attractive. Now, though, every bit of him seemed perfect, and he was starting to have a sneaking suspicion that seeing Sam’s beautiful smile was one of his main reasons for getting up in the morning. It still boggled his mind that Sam seemed so in love with him-- he was under no illusions as to how difficult he could be-- but he wasn’t stupid enough to look a gift such as that in the mouth. At least, not without making that mouth smile.
“Yeah, it’s a deal.”
******
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