Page 55 of Say It Again

He blinked. Even if it was terrifying, he couldn’t deny that Aaron was someone worth liking.

“You bitch.” He stood and staggered forward, falling into her arms for a hug. “Thank you.”

DANIEL RESPONDED to Aaron with a single text message:

Come over if you want to talk.

He hadn’t expected Aaron to show up at his house in half an hour, looking handsome as ever. He’d actually hoped to have a few moments to ground himself, but here they were, sitting at Daniel’s kitchenette table, not talking. The silence was getting a bit unnerving, but he was waiting for the perfect words. The ones that would convey how agonized he’d been the past week, how challenging it would be for him to try to date someone like Aaron, and how blistering his anxiety could get if he let it. The words would soon pour from his lips like poetic water down a fall. He took a massive inhale and, with an uneven sigh, said… more nothing.

“So.” Aaron leaned his elbows onto his knees. The silence sounded strange with his deep voice finally breaking it. “You were really angry when you left, so thank you for agreeing to meet with me.”

Daniel gulped. Why did it feel like he was going to have to talk?

“But you mentioned you might want to talk?”

There it was. “Yeah, but that was before I had to do it. Now I’d rather die.”

Aaron’s eyebrows shot up. “You’d rather die than talk to me?”

“Not fully die. Die just enough to get out of this conversation.”

Aaron chewed his lip. “So you don’t want to talk?”

“Sorry. It’s really not about you. It’s about me. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m kind of a fretful person. I fret about stuff.”

Aaron looked like he was suddenly holding back a smile. “I hadn’t noticed.”

“Well, it’s true, and I’m wondering if learning more about what you do—” He stopped to peer around his house as he dropped to a whisper. “—might help to ease some of my fretting around it.”

“Isn’t it just us here?” Aaron whispered back, also gazing around. “I’m not sure we have to whisper.”

“So here goes nothing.” He drummed the table. “How long have you been doing the thing?”

“Eight years.”

“Jesus—sorry.” He squeezed his eyes shut and inhaled. “I didn’t mean to yell. That’s a touch startling, as it’s a slight eternity, but now that I have that fantastic piece of information, we can move on. So these clients of yours, you see them often? How often would you say you see clients?”

“Uh, well, it depends. I have my regulars I might see once a week, then I have others I might only see—”

Daniel flung himself out of the chair to cover Aaron’s mouth with his hand. He shook his head. “No, I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want to know that. Not ready for that.”

Aaron nodded, his eyes a bit startled.

Daniel yanked his hand away and shook it out. “Okay, so what about age? How old are they typically?”

“Age? Again, it depends, but it probably ranges from—”

“No!” Daniel slapped his hand back over Aaron’s mouth, then ripped it away. “I don’t want to know that either. Feels… no. How about, is it always sexual? Do you do other stuff? Dinners or something?”

“Well—”

“Stop! Just stop talking, Aaron. That’s definitely something I don’t want to know.”

Aaron’s expression pinched in confusion.

“Okay, so,” Daniel said, starting to pace, “what about location? Do these guys come to your place? Or do you go to theirs?”

“Usually, they—”

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