Page 3 of Riley

I’m sorry, Eric. Maybe something happened, do you want me to reach out and ask?

I considered her words as I pulled out of the parking lot.

The last thing I wanted was to appear desperate, even to Julie. If some asshole couldn’t be bothered to show up, why should I beg for his attention?

But a part of me wanted to believe that maybe there was a good reason. Maybe something came up at work, or maybe they had to rescue a fucking cat from a tree or some shit. Anything.

But I was already over the situation, and I wanted to move on. I wanted to forget about being overlooked yet again, because I didn’t want to go down the road of self-loathing.

What I wanted to do was to get a drink and maybe find some hot piece of ass to take home and numb the pain of rejection for a little while.

Just for the night, anyway, since apparently that’s all I was capable of landing.

No, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it, Jules. Thanks anyway.

I tossed the phone on the passenger seat, not even bothering to check her response as I sped toward M’s Place.

CHAPTER 2

Riley

I hated Fridays.For starters, every Friday was school spirit day, and no matter what the season, there was always a pep rally or a game, and catching up on the end of the week reports and tests while trying to balance curriculum planning for the following week was exhausting.

But today, I felt worse than normal because I’d fucked up entirely and forgot about the blind date Julie—my brother’s fiancée’s bridesmaid and a long-time friend of mine—had tried to set me up on.

To be fair, I’d fully intended on showing up, but when my principal showed up five minutes before I was ready to head out with a stack of paperwork for me regarding my annual school art trip to DC in a few months, I knew I was done for.

My job always came first because my job, my students were my life.

Because I had no life of my own, not really. Sure, I hung out with my brother and his friends, my coworkers sometimes, but I wasn’t anyone’s first choice.

Because all my friends are either married or engaged.

I’d never had time for romance, and now, here I was an eternally single art teacher in his late thirties who couldn’t even tell his bossnowhen I had a fucking date.

But I wasn’t fast enough, because my blind date—who was supposed to be wearing a purple blazer—was nowhere to be found in the otherwise dead cafe, when I’d arrived. I needed a drink, and in this town there really was only one watering hole to go to that was openly queer friendly and actually had decent drinks.

M’s Place was packed, as always. Normally, I despised crowds in tiny spaces, and M’s Place was definitely a small space. Maxine somehow managed to squeeze a postage stamp size stage in between the bar and an alcove that was some hodge-podge mashup of pool, arcade games, and one of those weird antique Love Magnet Meter games from the fifties in between the thirty high top tables and ten booths, while making the place open and friendly and not claustrophobic. Which was a damn miracle.

It was probably fate that I’d run into my brother and his wedding party at the bar. Though knowing Giselle, she was fixing to make this a weekly shindig.

I sipped my beer as Julie nudged me.

“What happened with your blind date earlier?” she asked.

I sighed, running a hand through my hair. “I got held up at work, actually. Principal Weatherly dropped off a shit ton of papers regarding the trip and?—”

“Shit, you missed it?” she asked, biting her lip.

“I mean, I went, but... he was gone. Can’t say I blame him, you know. I was like, forty minutes late.”

Julie pursed her lips. I shrugged in defeat.

Just as I opened my mouth, I saw Grayson—my future in-law—and his new boyfriend, Henry—Giselle’s friend and bridesmaid Mia’s brother—strolling into the bar arm in arm like they owned the damn place.

We’d all spent last weekend together in the mountains, but both Grayson and Henry didn’t seem too keen on socializing with me. Well, I guess technically, looking back on the weekend, it made sense now, but at the time it felt like I just wasn’t cool enough to join their little club.

To be honest, I’d always been like that. An outsider. My brother was always the popular one, and I was just the social outcast who preferred history books to keggers in the woods.

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