Upside Down(66)
“So?” he said, throwing his keys and wallet on his table. “Angus, huh? What are the chances?”
“I know! How freaking freaky is that?” I replied. “Do you really think… do they…?” I sighed. “I worry about him. He’s just a teddy bear who some people might take advantage of. And he’s not stupid. I mean, he sees the best in people and he has a heart of gold and I’d hate to see him get hurt. I think he’s really falling for them, and I have no idea about the dynamics of throuples, but I—”
Hennessy put his finger to my lips, then replaced them with a soft kiss. “Michael and Vee are two of the best people I know. They’re kind and decent, and there’s probably not a better couple suited for Angus. Michael told me weeks ago about the loving two people thing, long before we knew it was Angus. And if Michael says he loves someone, it’s with all his heart. He and Veronica are devoted to each other, and if they’ve introduced a third person, then I can only imagine they’ll be equally devoted to him.”
“I hope so.”
Hennessy pulled me in for a hug that I could literally feel balming my soul. “It’s been a weird day, huh?”
“So weird,” I said. I pulled back and looked up into his eyes. “And I’m sorry. I really need you to know that. I should have stayed and talked to you, but I panicked and basically ran away. I was an idiot.”
“You’re not an idiot,” he murmured. “You’re still navigating where you are with your asexuality, and that can take ages. There’s no right or wrong.”
“Not talking to you was wrong,” I replied. “Leaving you without an explanation was wrong.”
He made a face that kinda said he agreed with me. “It could have saved us both a lot of heartache.”
I nodded. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”
He gave me a kiss. “I forgive you.”
“When I thought maybe I wasn’t asexual, I panicked. You’ve said before that you don’t want to date anyone who wasn’t, and I thought I’d blown it. My stupid dick liked the attention, or something, I don’t even know.”
He snorted. “I don’t think your dick is stupid.”
“Well, I can tell you, it’s no Einstein either,” I replied, and he chuckled. “But I don’t want to have sex. I really don’t—it makes me uncomfortable even thinking about it, to be honest. I want to be able to cuddle and kiss on the couch while we watch Deep Space Nine without my dick getting any ideas.”
Hennessy kissed me again, this time with smiling lips. “That sounds perfect to me. And if your Einstein gets any bright ideas, we can cool it a bit. Or go into the bathroom and get rid of it.”
I gasped, horrified. “I’ll pass on that.”
“Would that be a hard pass?”
I gave him a playful shove. “Really? Dick jokes?”
“Yes. Dick jokes. I’m asexual, not dead. We’re allowed to joke about these things. And we’re allowed to talk about sex. And we’re allowed to get hard-ons, as inconvenient as they sometimes are. We can’t change being human.”
I pulled him against me, fitting right into that groove of his body like perfect puzzle pieces, and sighed. We stayed like that for a while, just holding each other, breathing each other in. Now for my moment of truth. “In the meeting tonight, I asked if you hated me for being such an idiot, and you said you couldn’t hate me because you loved me. And that was the single most romantic moment of my life, and it’s a gift I will never take for granted. I promise you that. And Hennessy?”
He pulled back so he could see my eyes. “Yeah?”
“I love you too. I think I loved you from the beginning. When I found out you were reading Flowers for Algernon. That was like bam! Cupid fucking shot me. And you know, at first, I thought coming to terms with being asexual would turn my world upside down. But I was wrong. It kind of set it the right way up.”
His eyes were a little glassy, but his smile was brilliant. “I love you too.” He cupped my face and he drew me in for a kiss. “And you knew who Daniel Keyes was. And bam! Cupid shot me too.”
“He’s such a motherfucker.”
Hennessy laughed and pulled me to the couch, where we fell into a heap of legs and arms and cuddles and kisses and two episodes of Deep Space Nine, until I fell asleep in his arms.
The Next Weekend
Hennessy
“Do I look okay?” Jordan asked. He was breathing hard, a little pale, and this was his fourth outfit change.
“You look fine.”
He grimaced and made a weird strangled sound, then disappeared back into his room. We were heading into Michael and Vee’s place for dinner. Angus was already there, having left a few hours ago.
When I’d gone into work on Monday, I’d held my phone out to Michael, showing him a selfie we’d taken the day before. “Me, that’s Jordan, and this guy…”
Michael sighed, turned, and shut my door, then sat on my desk. He took my phone and stared at the photo on the screen, a smile pulling at his lips. “We used to play around with a third person when we were in college,” he said absently, still staring at Angus. “It was a lot of fun, and the sex was always amazing, but it was only ever me and Vee. We were rock solid. We still are. Then we got engaged and we stopped inviting people in, if you know what I mean. We just didn’t think it was something married couples did, you know? It was weird. And we didn’t for a long time. Years. But then on New Year’s, we were out at a bar downtown and Vee went off to dance, and she met this guy. She said he had a smile that could light up the room and his laugh…” Michael grinned as he spoke, still holding my phone, his eyes trained on Angus. “God, his laugh. And you know, she wasn’t wrong. She never is.”