Page 32 of The Trouble With Spells
After about ten seconds of silence, I whispered, “Yeah, I did.”
“I…umm,” Michael hedged.
“Didn’t know I existed?” I helpfully supplied.
“Kind of,” he admitted, sounding upset. “I mean, I sorta remembered you.”
“I’m not used to sleeping with anyone,” I said, to change the topic off of unrequited crushes. Sean had been the first guy that had ever slept in my bed, for sleep. But this, what was happening between Michael and me, plus the circumstances that had brought us here, were not the same as Sean and me being cuddly.
Michael’s warm breath ghosted over the shell of my ear, and my entire body shivered. “You think I am? My unwillingness to even let someone sleep in my bed is what got me into this mess in the first place.”
Frowning, I turned my head a little, to try to see his face. “Yeah, so what exactly did happen?” Because the events leading up to his arrival were a bit murky.
Michael was quiet for so long, I finally whispered, “You don’t have to tell me. It’s not my business.”
He shook his head, and I felt the movement rather than saw it. Then his quiet voice broke the stillness. “Have you ever had a moment where you realized you might not be the person you thought you were?”
Staring at the outline of my dresser in the dark, I tried to decipher what he was asking. “I don’t think so.”
His chest rose and fell against my back, his fingers trailing up and down my arm, and in that moment Michael seemed vulnerable. It dawned on me that I had probably seen a side of Michael today that he didn’t show to many people.
I had gotten to see the real Michael.
Not the high school hotshot, good at everything he did, the guy everyone wanted to be friends with. Not the rising star of a prosecuting attorney who could do no wrong. Not the man who lived in a penthouse condo, and who was out at clubs every night, picking up some stranger to take home and fuck, before sending him on his way.
No, the Michael I had spent the day with had been a little scared, but also funny and sweet. Unguarded.
“All my life I thought I was this nice guy,” his voice was barely above a whisper, “but I don’t think I really was. I don’t think I was a nice guy at all. And I don’t really know what to do with that realization.”
Turning in his arms brought our faces together, but also our cocks. The slight friction of our dicks rubbing against each other had mine semi-hard in an embarrassing amount of time. Ignoring it for the time being, I stared into Michael’s eyes, the moonlight cutting a swath across his jawline.
“The guy I spent the day with was pretty nice,” I traced a finger over the scrunched up spot furrowed between his brows, trying to smooth it out.
He gave me a shaky half smile that was so not him. Michael was the poster child for swaggering alpha male. He was cool and confident with a James Dean vibe that I had always been envious of. “Where’s this coming from?”
He swallowed hard, and when he tilted his head and a moonbeam caught his eyes, they were glistening. “I think I…I really thought I was this good guy, you know? Like I helped people, and I put the bad guys behind bars, and I was fucking untouchable. And unstoppable. But I think maybe I was just a cocky, arrogant prick who was just lucky. Or maybe spoiled? Because when I lost that first case, it was like someone yanked the rug right out from under me. And I’m ashamed to admit I did not handle it well. At all.”
Not sure what to say to that–did I agree with him or tell him what he wanted to hear to make him feel better?–I just stayed quiet and listened. If Michael wanted–needed–to talk, and he wanted to talk tome, I was going to hear him.
“Derek found me basically having a temper tantrum in the men’s room of the courthouse, and told me that despite what I thought in my own head, I was actually as mortal as everyone else, and sometimes you don’t win.”
“Ouch.” Wincing at his friend’s harsh truth, I knew Macy and I talked to each other the same way. Hell, Daphne and I did, too. Friends who could tell you the God’s honest truth were hard to come by, and good to have.
“And instead of hearing him tell me that people found me arrogant, and that losing one case wasn’t the end of the world as I knew it, I blamed it on a non-existent curse or spell, or whatever. Like I couldn’t even accept responsibility for losing.”
“I never said it didn’t exist,” I pointed out. “It’s very real. Just not that strong, and unless the witch who cast it was into some black magic, it wouldn’t be the cause of all the bad things that had happened to you. I can tell you with certainty that it’s not black magic. Not even a born witch. Just a weekend wannabe with access to the internet.” Grinning and trying to lighten the mood, I added, “Now this binding spell? That’s from a real witch. Top notch spell caster, that guy.”
Michael snort laughed, his arms tightening around me, and pulling us even closer. My cock twitched in my briefs, very interested, but I ignored him. This was definitely not the time.
“I don’t know, I’m not unhappy with the turn of events. There are worse things I can think of than being bound to you, Callum.”
Nodding, I buried my face in the warm skin of his chest, hiding from the emotions his words bubbled up inside me. Taking a deep breath, I basked in the spicy, musky scent that was Michael.
“But even the bad luck spell, or whatever it is, was my own assholey doing. I went to the clubs at least once a week, picked up some faceless, don’t-tell-me-your-name-because-I-don’t-care twink to take back to my place, fuck, and then would tell them they needed to leave. Because I couldn’t deal with sleeping next to any of them. Didn’t want to wake up in the morning and have to face them. For no other reason than I was a selfish asshole who didn’t want to share the covers or spend a restless night trying to get comfortable with a stranger next to me. I’m probably really lucky the worst thing that has ever happened was some pissed off guy put a spell on me to have a bad day.”
“I’m a stranger, and you seem fine sleeping next to me,” I felt the need to point out, because at one point Michael had fallen asleep, his soft, quiet snores breaking up the silence of the room. Until all my restless tossing about had disturbed him.
As far as the other stuff Michael had just confessed, I wasn’t sure how to respond.I was stuck in that weird limbo place of wondering if I should try to make him feel better or tell him truthfully what I thought about any of it. Since I liked having his arms around me, and I liked the way our cocks felt anytime one of us moved, causing a slide of friction, and we were literally bound together for almost two weeks, I thought it better to say nothing.
