Page 30 of My Three Roommates

My voice trails off. I don’t want to tell him we’re sleeping together.

My mind’s spinning with how to even begin to try and describe what we all have going on when Kenna and Brad arrive back. The thick tension is easy to pick up on.

Brad glances between my brother and I. “Hey, Eric. Haven’t seen you in a long time. How’s it going?”

He claps Eric on the back like he usually would. I had a slight hope that Brad’s presence could help to diffuse the situation. No such luck.

“What’s going on is that this guy was kissing my brother. On the lips.”

Brad shoots me an uncertain glance. I know he doesn’t want to reveal too much. We all agreed we’d keep our foursome relationship under wraps. Now here we are, out in public where I thought no one we knew would see us. So of course my brother shows up.

“Did he now? So, what brings you to this part of town, Eric?” Brad asks. “Weren’t you living on the west side?”

“Still am.” Eric’s eyes never leave Cody. I’m afraid he’s going to attack him.

Cody’s not taking this seriously at all. He’s smirking at Eric as if he’s barely able to keep from taunting him. This could get ugly.

“I’m on a project nearby. We all come here after work,” Eric says. “I should be asking what you’re doing here, Tanner. Because for some reason, it looked to me like you weren’t pushing this guy off of you. As if you were letting him do what he did.”

“Eric.” I want to keep this situation from escalating, but I’m not sure how to pull that off. “This is Cody. He’s a good friend of Kenna’s.”

Eric turns to Kenna and his glare softens a little bit. Since Brad and I have been friends for so long, he knows her too.

“Really, Kenna? I wouldn’t have thought you’d be friends with one of these guys.”

“One of what guys?” Cody stands up, straightening his full six foot two frame. He’s taller than Eric, although that wouldn’t stop my brother from starting a fight with him. “Do you have a problem with gay guys?”

I’m glad he’s not picking this moment to get into the finer points of bisexuality. That could make things worse, what with my brother about to kill him.

“Eric, I’m not gay.” I glance at Cody to see if he understands why I’m saying that, but all I can see is some anger of his own rising up. “Although Cody and I are involved.”

I’m sure as hell not going to mention Brad and Kenna, because that’s a whole other conversation that does not need to happen right now. If ever.

“What do you mean involved?” Eric asks me, his mouth twisting up with revulsion.

The last thing I want to tell him is that we’re sleeping together. From the look on Cody’s face, that’s exactly what he’s about to reveal. So I start talking just to keep him from making this worse.

“We’re seeing each other,” I simplify.

“You. And a guy,” Eric says slowly. “That’s a bad joke, man. That’s fucked up.”

Brad jumps in. “It’s not. I never figured you for being someone who has a problem with gay guys, Eric. You always seemed to be more on the side of live and let live.”

“You knew about this and you let it happen?”

“It’s okay, Eric.” Brad reaches out to touch him on the shoulder and my brother dodges his grasp. “There’s nothing bad happening here.”

Eric has always looked up to Brad. I was hoping that would help him get through to Eric, but it’s not.

“I don’t care about gays,” he says unconvincingly. “I just don’t want some fucking guy grabbing my brother. Or being ’involved’ with him, whatever the hell that means.”

“Why not?” Cody asks. “What’s wrong with that?”

“It’s fucked up,” Eric says. “It’s disgusting.”

“Eric, I wish you guys had met differently than this. This is brand new and I don’t think you should be judging us,” I say as neutrally as I can.

“Oh yeah? I don’t think you should be kissing a guy in public,” Eric says.

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