Page 26 of Show Me How to Heal
The truth was, I hadn’t wanted to destroy the thing evolving between us.
Moritz groaned. “You’re kidding me, right?”
“Uhm.. no?”
“You took a job because you want to fuck the boss? Couldn’t you just have… I don’t know… propositioned him like a normal guy?”
“I did. Well, I didn’t proposition him, but Ididbuy him a drink, and I flirted with him. Then he propositionedme,and we fucked.”
Moritz sucked in a harsh breath. “Wait a minute…You fucked your future boss?”
“I mean… yeah. And I washed his hair.” As soon as the words had left my mouth, I realized how weird they sounded. Even though it hadn’t been weird; at most, it had been weirdly perfect.
“You…” He stopped, took a deep breath, swallowed, and took a breath again. I knew exactly what Moritz looked like in this moment, though I couldn’t see him. But I’d seen enough videos of myself looking absolutely baffled and incredulous — thanks a lot, internet — to know that Moritz had his eyes wide open, mouth gaping, and an empty expression that made him look a little like a fish. Yes, there were memes out there. “I don’t even know what to say right now. You washed this guy’s hair? Is that code for something else? Is it a kinky thing?”
“Oh, it could definitely become a kink of mine,” I said jokingly, though I wasn’t sure if it wasn’t partially true. “His hair is gorgeous. It’s down to his ass and super silky and shiny and stuff.”
“Okay… who are you? What happened to my brother? Wait… marijuana is legal in the US, right? Are you stoned?”
“No.” Was weed legal in Colorado? I knew it was legal in some states, but since I’d never tried weed, I hadn’t even thought about looking that up.
I could. Look it up, that was. Or smoke it. It’s not like I had drug tests to pass any longer.
“You sure? Did you buy any brownies?”
I laughed. “No, I didn’t eat any brownies. I eat the usual stuff.”
“You mean a shit ton of protein?”
“Yeah… Anyways, that’s not the point! Stop distracting me!”
“I’m distracting you? You’re telling me all kinds of weird things!”
“If you’d just let me explain, it wouldn’t be weird at all!” I shouted before letting out an exasperated sigh. Why had I wanted to talk things through with Moritz again?
Right, because I needed someone to talk to who knew me, and since we’d once been one fertilized egg and we shared our DNA, I guess Moritz was the person who knew me best.
“Excuse…”
“Moritz!”
He sighed dramatically. “Fine. I’ll be quiet. Tell me what’s going on.”
“Okay.” I inhaled. “The short version is I was out with some friends… or acquaintances I guess, or people I just met. There was this guy I’d seen right when he entered the bar, and I immediately felt something. When he was sitting at the bar alone, I took my chance, tried flirting with him, and we ended up going to his house and hooking up. I spent the night, we talked, then we showered together. He’s a soap maker and washes his hair with soap, so I washed his hair for him, he did the same for me, and then we talked.
“I’d already told him a little about being injured on the job the night before because, I mean, I couldn’t have told him the whole sob story about me being a football player, you know? I’m trying to stay under the radar. So I tried being vague without outright lying. Well, he thought I was probably in financial trouble, and I… okay, in the end I lied. I didn’t know what else to do. So, I lied. And well, he’s looking for an employee to man his soap shop in town and get the orders from his online shop ready for shipping, and he… he asked me if that was something I could see myself doing. I tried to back out of it, but he insisted, and I… well, I didn’t want to disappoint him, and I wanted to spend more time with him because he’s blunt and funny and beautiful and a genuinely good person, so I said yes.” I tried catching my breath. Everything had just burst out of me in a big wave of word-vomit. It was relieving to talk to someone about it.
“Lukas?”
“Yeah?”
“You’re an idiot,” Moritz said. “A thirty-year-old idiot who has a crush on someone for the first time in his life, which is why I’m not gonna chastise you for how stupid you’re being.”
“Okay?”
“I’m not done,” he said. “But I’m going to give you some advice, okay?”
“Sure.”
