Page 45 of Hot Mess Express
“I know where the coatrack is.” He brushes past me. Whenhe hangs the jacket, he does so with startling delicacy, like it’s gone from being total trash he fished out of a dumpster to a national treasure. “Why’d you go n’ tell me all a’ that about your brother? So annoying,” he mutters under his breath, then heads on further into the house, stumbling slightly.
The truth is, I didn’t get up from the church floor right away.
I just lay there with Anthony sleeping like a rock, his face half on my chest, half on my arm, lips hanging open, as I reeled from that intense, body-groping kiss I was not expecting. After realizing he had fallen into the deep kind of sleep, I tried slipping my arm out from under him, but the moment I started moving, he grunted and curled his fingers into my shirt.
Clinging to me.
Tightly.
That made me grow still, then lie back again, surrendering my body to him as he resumed his deep slumber. I stared up at the ceiling and the bright fluorescent bulb that decided to magically work again.
And my thoughts, strangely, became pretty damned singular.
Just me. Anthony’s breath. Our bodies. Nothing else existed.
Nothing else touched me.
As if the calmness I’d come here to this town seeking found me right then, in that dim church annex, in the most unlikely of places, with the most unlikely of company.
Maybe it makes perfect sense, that the source of my agitation would also contain the solution.
I guess his fingers relaxed once his unconscious body decided I wasn’t trying to abandon his side anymore. I gave up trying to get out from under him for a while. I even closed my own eyes at one point, wondering if what I needed was some sleep, too.
But how could I sleep after what just happened?
All I could think about was his lips on mine. His hands on my body, groping my dick. And how he was hard as steel, humping my leg like a damned dog, for however many seconds that feverish, aggressive kissing lasted.
Was he trying to tell me something?
Did he even realize he was doing it?
It was about an hour later that Anthony sniffed loudly, then rolled off my arm and cuddled himself. I took the chance and got to my feet. But watching Anthony on the floor, neck bent, mouth agape, I knew he was gonna wake up with a bad crick in his neck and probably a sore back, too.
Some kind of compassionate demon must have possessed me right then, because I bent down, scooped him into my arms (it was surprisingly easy) and carried the guy to a pew at the back of the main chapel. With nothing cushy in sight, I took off my denim jacket, rolled it up, and tucked it under his head for a pillow. He didn’t even so much as flinch the whole time, asleep like the dead.
I decided right then that he likely wouldn’t even remember what he did. The kiss might as well have not happened. He’ll deny it even if I was bold enough to ask him about it.
Maybe I should just forget about the kiss, too.
On my way out of the church, I realized I couldn’t leave the annex the way it was. Anthony would wake up later to find his big fluorescent nightmare still there, it’d stress him out, and then where would he be? Right back in the hell he was falling asleep in. So I took to the lights, did the work myself, put away the ladder, and sorted his tools.
I doubt he noticed any of that.
Or maybe he did, resents that I helped out, and that’s why he’s all full of attitude right now, marching into the house hotheaded.
Or hedoesremember the kiss.
And he’s kicking himself for doing it at all.
Or outright denying it just like I thought he might, pretending it never happened.
Pete is the first to notice our new guest, cutting himself off midsentence to shout, “Hey, our waiter from the restaurant! Tony, right? What’re you doing here? Joining us for dinner?”
Anthony comes up and shakes his hand. “It’s Anthony.”
“Nope, sorry, once I throw a nickname out, it’s stuck for life. Just ask Bridge over there.”
Anthony appears not to want to ask me a thing. “Then Tony it is, fine with me. I’ve had worse nicknames.”
