Page 77 of Back to You

Ethan looked at Brandon. “Oh …”

“You should come,” Brandon said. “It’s not at a college bar for once.”

“College bars, huh? Bet you love that.”

“I hated them when I was in college, they haven’t gotten better with age.”

“It’s at McNally’s over on Third. We start at 8,” Marcus said. “Hopefully I’ll see you there!” He ducked back into the kitchen.

“I don’t know what he’s doing back there,” Brandon said. “Other than being the least subtle person alive.”

“It’s nice of him. How have you been, Brandon?”

“Pretty good. Just work, volunteering, whatnot.”

“How’s the volunteering going?”

“Good. They have a whole room dedicated to kittens. It’s like my personal heaven.” He grabbed his phone and walked over to show Ethan some pictures.

“Oh my God, they’re so fuzzy!” Ethan flipped through the pictures on Brandon’s phone until he stumbled across a selfie with two kittens perched on Brandon’s broad shoulders. “Oh my God.”

“What?” Brandon looked at the phone. “Oh yeah, I took that for Michelle.”

“Never thought I’d see the day when Brandon Michener was taking selfies,” Ethan teased.

“It’s not a selfie, I was just a prop for the kittens.”

Ethan chuckled. “Hey, send me …” he trailed off.

“What?”

“I started to say ‘send me that one’ like back when we were together.”

Brandon looked down at his phone, clearly not knowing what to say.

“Anyway. I better get going so I can shower before work.”

“Sure. It was good to see you.”

Brandon walked Ethan to the door and unlocked it to let him out. Ethan caught a whiff of sugar and cinnamon and cologne, a combination that spelled Brandon in his heart. He tried to covertly take a deep breath of him as he walked out the door.

“Bye Brandon.”

“Bye.”

Ethan walked home, remembering Marcus’s invitation. “Friday at 8. I can do that,” he murmured.

When he got to the office, he glanced at his phone and found a new text. When he opened it, he saw the picture of Brandon and the kittens. He smiled and set it as his wallpaper.

***

Brandon protected his table with a menacing scowl. He’d gotten a couple of dirty looks, but gave precisely zero fucks.

He’d had people ask him if they could have the other chair at his table, but he said no. He chose not to think about why.

He also ignored the few interested looks he was getting.

This was a much larger crowd than he’d been expecting. He reminded himself to mess with Marcus about the band being more popular with the over-30 set than with the college kids they usually played for.

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