Page 33 of Up In Flames
“Come on, thunder cloud, let’s go for lunch.”
Looking up from the document I absolutely hadn’t been paying attention to, I furrowed my brow. “Thunder cloud?”
“Yeah. You’re sitting there like a gloomy little storm cloud. Let’s go for a nice long lunch.” Hal tucked his hands into his pockets. “Come on. Simon already gave us the afternoon.”
Flipping my document shut, I shoved it back in the file and dropped it into my desk drawer. “Oh, he did, did he?”
It wasn’t a big surprise. Simon was a good guy, the kind of boss who cared about his employees. He always made sure I had time off for my therapy appointments. Sometimes I attended them from the office via a video call, but if we were doing a deeper dive, I generally went in to see her.
“Come on. We’ll walk down the block and grab a table at the pub. We don’t have to drink, but they have the best burgers.”
“I swear you’ve never met a burger you didn’t like.” I patted my pockets to make sure I had my phone. I could come back after lunch and get my laptop and stuff. Simon had given us the afternoon, but that didn’t mean I had to take it. Not necessarily.
“Burgers are life.” Hal patted his stomach. He was slightly round. The kind of physique one got from having a desk job. Halwas me in fifteen years. I hoped Will liked a bit of squish around the middle.
And there I was, marrying us off when neither one of us were out, and I was a fucking head case. After my encounter with Will, my life-changing, universe-shattering, toe-curling, best-sex-ever encounter, I’d done a bit of soul searching. I was definitely not straight. I wasn’t gay either. Bisexual seemed the most likely candidate.
I liked women who were shorter than me, who had great legs and infectious laughter. Hair color mattered less than personality, but I loved a brunette. Apparently for men, I liked firefighters who were a little taller than I was and strong enough to lift me and fuck me against a wall and—I had to stop thinking about that before I popped a boner.
Hal didn’t talk until we were sitting in the pub. Both of us ordered sodas and bacon cheese burgers with fries. Mayo for him, gravy for me.
“So what’s got you in such a mood today? We haven’t seen you this gloomy since you first started. Everything okay?”
“Did Simon tell you about the accident I was in?”
His eyebrows rose up and met his hairline. “No. When was this? Are you okay?”
“Sorry, I should’ve been more clear. It was months ago. Before I started working for Simon.”
Over lunch, I filled Hal in on the details of the accident. The night out. The drinks. The crash. And Will.
“We started hanging out. First at that fundraiser, but pretty often after that too.”
“I’m glad you made a friend. No offense, but you could use a few more.”
Instead of arguing with him, I dunked one of my fries into the gravy. “And if I wanted him to be more than a friend?”
Hal leaned closer. “Then you want him to be more than a friend. There’s nothing wrong with that. Is that why you’re so upset? Because you’re attracted to him or because you worry what people might think?”
“Neither, actually. I mean… I’ve never been attracted to another guy before, so it’s kind of thrown me to find out that I’m bisexual.” The confession took a weight off my chest. I took a deep breath and said it again, more for my benefit than Hal’s. “I’m bisexual. Wow, that’s…”
“It’s okay is what it is. So you’re all gloomy because you’re having an identity crisis?”
“Well, no, actually. I’m gloomy because I want to drive places, but I can’t. Like, physically can’t. I can barely get the keys in the ignition. I can’t even start the car, let alone take it anywhere.”
Telling Hal that I wanted to take Will out on a date would out Will. But my motivation didn’t matter to Hal. Only the end result.
“So you want to drive again, but you’re having some kind of mental block?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, what if I could take you somewhere that you could drive without worrying about shit like traffic?”
“You think that would help?”
“I think that if you’re worried about driving after being in an accident, that it’s not driving that scares you, it’s getting in another accident. And I think that if you got behind the wheel where there was virtually no way to get in an accident, it might give you the confidence boost you need to get behind the wheel in other scenarios.”
“And where is this mystical land with no traffic?”
