Page 59 of Believe in Caloosa Springs

TIAN:I’m standing in line at the diner!

ME:So…?

TIAN:I’m not whipping my cock out in the middle of this line. These old people in here would fkn faint.

ME:There’s a public bathroom at the diner.

TIAN:You are the biggest PERV on the planet!

I smiled and shook my head.

ME:You made me this way…

I set my phone down on the small counter and took a long pull from my water bottle as Jake walked into the trim-room. I nodded by way of greeting as I finished the rest of the water and set the empty bottle aside.

“Sup?” Jake kept his gaze lowered towards the ground as he approached the table and grabbed a fresh pair of gloves. “Looks like we’re about finished with this one, huh?” Jake gestured to the mainly empty rows that had been filled with budding plants just a day or so ago. We had made good time harvesting this lot.

“Yeah… Ty said the next lot won’t be ready ‘til at least Friday, so it’s lookin’ like we have a few easy days ahead of us.”

Jake nodded, and began fidgeting with the trimmers he’d picked up in his hands.

“How’s Christian?”

I was a little taken aback by his question. After his apology last week, we had gotten to the point where we greeted each other in passing—a mutual respect, if nothing else. But I had not been prepared for him to get friendly enough to ask about my boyfriend.

“He’s really good. He’s in the process of acquiring us chai lattes.”

I watched as Jake bit his lip to stop a grin. “Oh. I don't think I’ve ever had one. Are they good?”

“No, not really,” I replied flatly. “But he gets so excited about them that I just roll with it.”

Jake laughed. “That sounds like having a girlfriend.”

I could tell he wastrying…trying for what, I wasn’t sure. “Um, I’m honestly not sure. I’ve never had a girlfriend.”

Jake looked up for the first time since he’d entered the room, and his eyes widened a bit.

“Really?” He set the trimmers back down on the table. “You’ve never been with a girl?”

“No. I’ve never had the slightest desire to date, or have sex with, a female.”

“Oh. Okay, so you’ve always just…known?”

“Pretty much. Growing up in a strict religious household where the expectation is to pair up and get married young made puberty really confusing, but once I had access to the internet, it was easy to figure out. Not easy to come to terms with, but, yeah. It wasn’t really a question in my mind.”

“My family isn’t religious, per se,” he told me. “They are just very… traditional.”

“Where are you from?” I asked, realizing that I had no idea.

“Oklahoma.”

“Utah isn’t much better, I’d imagine.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

I nodded, still kind of baffled that we were engaged in this long (and personal) a conversation.

“If you had been seeing guys your whole life, and then, suddenly, you met a girl who made you question everything you thought you knew about yourself, what would you do?”

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