Page 55 of Comforting the Grump

One thing I loved about Marnin was that he was always honest, even when it wasn’t necessarily what someone wanted to hear. It would’ve been easy for him to sweep my concerns underthe rug and placate me with some well-meaning clichés, but he didn’t.

He scratched his beard. “Your best bet would be to talk to someone who knows you, someone who will look at more than your bank account. Your experience, vision, and passion would be the main selling points then.”

I blinked back the sudden moisture in my eyes, touched by his words and the unwavering belief behind them. “You really think so?”

“Have you ever known me to lie?”

I chuckled because he’d affirmed what I’d been thinking mere moments before. “Sorry, forgot for a moment who I was talking to. So thank you.”

As expected, he waved my thanks away. The man was so wonderfully predictable in that sense.

“How about you?” I asked.

“What do you mean?”

“What’s your dream? Or is your job your true passion?”

He snorted. “It’s a job. A job I’m really good at and love, but still a job. I’m not the type for dreams like that.”

“No? You never had one, not even as a kid?”

“Growing up, my only goal was to get the hell out of Forestville and never look back.”

“You hated it that much?”

“I don’t think you could ever understand, and that’s not criticism. To you, Forestville represents an idyllic childhood. For me, it was nothing but survival, wondering every day if I would make it out of there one day. My situation was… I have too many bad memories of that town.”

He was right. I had no idea what that was like. “I can’t even imagine. But…”

I hesitated. Should I bring this up? Was it fair of me when I knew so little about what his home life had been like otherthan the few details Marnin had told me? Auden had never said a word about it, and neither had my father—not that I had expected them to. Those two were vaults, storing the secrets of god knew how many people for all eternity.

“What?” Marnin asked, sighing. “You might as well come out and say it.”

“I wasn’t sure if it would be my place.”

“As if I have ever cared about that.”

“True. Well, I wondered if the bad memories are all you see when you think back on Forestville. Because it seems to me you have plenty of good ones too, like with my brother and the Banner twins.”

Marnin’s eyes softened. “I have amazing memories of all of them. Did you know I lost my virginity to Tiago? Well, my gay virginity, anyway. We were each other’s firsts.”

My eyes widened. “You slept with Tiago Banner? Oh my god, he’s so fucking hot he makes me speechless. Every time I run into him, I stammer like a fool.”

Marnin laughed, a wonderfully happy and free sound. “I’ll have to tell him that sometime. He’ll be mortified, especially now that he’s retired from modeling.”

“Don’t you dare breathe a word. I could never face him again if he knew.”

“Damn, spoilsport. Way to take my fun away. But anyway, yeah, we slept together a few more times after that. We were both single, and the sparks between us were always there, so why not?”

Indeed, why not. That was so classic Marnin. “You must’ve been bummed when he found his true love in Cas.”

Marnin rolled his eyes. “True love? What is this,Dawson’s Creek?”

“Dawson’s Creek?” I snort-laughed. “You’re showing your age there, Gen Xer.”

“Fuck you very much, Millennial.”

“But seriously, that must’ve sucked for you when Tiago found Cas.”

---