Page 59 of Where There's Smoke

“Really?”

Nodding, Jesse ran a hand through his hair. “I made sure people saw me drinking, partying, having one-night stands with women. Dating women, fucking women, being with women.”

“But why?”

He swallowed, and when he met my eyes, I couldn’t decide if he looked sad or exhausted. Maybe both. “Because as long as they were hung up on all the partying I did, and they were occupied with all the girls I was seeing, then they didn’t notice when I quietly drove to the next town to look for guys.”

“And no one recognized you in the other town?”

“Oh, they did. Do you know how hard it is to have an anonymous one-night stand when everyone everywhere knows your fucking name and face? I was scared to death because there’s only so much ‘oh, I get that all the time’ I could use before people figured out IamJesse Cameron. No one ever did, not that I’m aware of, but it scared me.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah. And the thing is, whenever I slept with a guy, I was always on top. Not because I was inclined to be, I just had it in my head that I needed to be in control. One hundred percent in control of everything.” He exhaled slowly and closed his eyes. “Like, if I compromised that control for even a second, inanyway, something would get out. People would know.” He shook his head. “Doesn’t make sense in hindsight, but I was so scared of someone finding out, I wasn’t terribly rational about it.”

“It doesn’t matter if it’s rational. I think every gay man’s been afraid of someone finding out. I know I’ve been there, and I’ve only ever had to hide it from my parents. Not the public. Or a spouse, for that matter.”

Jesse winced. “Yeah. Be thankful for that.”

“I am,” I said softly. “Speaking of spouses, I’m just…curious.” I ran my hand up and down his arm. “How did things end between you and Simone? I mean, how did she take it, I guess?”

“It was kind of weird how it happened.” He moved a little closer to me and rested a hand on my hip. “Wasn’t exactly how I’d envisioned telling her.”

“How so?”

“We were, well, in bed.” His cheeks darkened, and he swallowed hard. “By that point, I’d been thinking for a long time about telling her, trying to find the right time and wondering how the hell to word it. And I hadn’t been able to bring myself to turn her away, you know, in bed, because going through the motions was just easier.” He went quiet, his eyes losing focus. “Anyway. I guess she…I don’t know, she picked up on something. Like she realized Iwasjust going through the motions. So she stops, right in the middle of everything, and she looks me in the eye and asks if there’s someone else.”

I blinked. “She thought you were cheating?”

Jesse nodded. “Yeah, and I was horrified. I’d never cheat on someone. I just, I didn’t know how to respond to that. So she said she knew something was going on, something was obviously wrong, and would I just tell her now and be done with it rather than acting like everything was okay.” He moistened his lips, and his voice fell to a whisper. “So I told her.”

“What did she say?”

“She just stared at me for a minute. I mean, we’re literally naked in bed, had just been having sex, and suddenly…I’m gay. I can’t even imagine what went through her head, but it was damn sure the most surreal moment of my life.” He shifted his gaze away from me and chewed his lower lip. His eyebrows knitted together like this entire train of thought physically hurt him. “And all I could think was how she was going to hate me, and why didn’t I tell her a long time ago instead of hurting her like this. But then she asked me how long I’d known, why I hadn’t told her, all of that. She wasn’t angry or defensive, just kind of stunned, I guess.”

“Can’t say I blame her.”

“Neither can I. Anyway, we got dressed and spent the rest of the night swimming in a bottle of I don’t remember what. The next morning we talked it over, and, I mean, there really was only one conclusion we could come to. But then Simone brought up the fact that I’d been talking about running for office, and how would this affect things, and…” He exhaled hard and made a sharp gesture with one hand. “We got advice from Roger, and now here we are.” He looked up, and when our eyes met, he added with a soft laugh, “He’ll be pissed if he finds out I’mhere, though.”

“Yeah. God forbid he finds out either of us are here.”

“Does he even know you’re gay?”

“Oohno. Not Roger.” I absently ran my fingertips along Jesse’s jaw. “I’ve always been pretty ambiguous with all my candidates about my personal life. Never put up any kind of smoke screen or anything, just didn’t say anything about it and politely declined whenever someone tried to hook me up with their niece or whoever.”

“Smart move,” he muttered.

“Out of curiosity, when did you realize you were gay? Before or after you were married?”

“I’ve known I was gay since…shit, I don’t remember not being into men. It just took a while to figure out I wasn’t into women.” He laughed humorlessly. “Apparently my little meticulously calculated charade fooled me as much as anyone else.”

“But what about Simone?”

He ran his fingers through his damp hair again. “I connected with her in a way I never had with anyone else before. I thought, I guess, that meant I was in love with her. But I think we just understood each other. With her, it was the closest I’d ever come tonothaving to fake it, and not just sexually.”

“What do you mean?”

“I guess, she and I were both just…lost. We were both screwed up in the head, didn’t know what the fuck we were doing or where we were going. We had our careers on pretty solid paths, but we both came from fucked-up families, we both had the media breathing down our neck over every little move we made, and at least when we were together, we could ignore all that for a while. We could just talk and interact like a couple of normal people without judging each other for all the less than normal shit. And even after the cracks started showing, we still had that. Hell, we still do now. We’re great friends and always will be, there was just that oneminordetail that made being married…not work.”

---