Hot Sauce by Scott Pomfret & Scott Whittier

Author:Scott Pomfret & Scott Whittier [POMFRET, SCOTT]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780446564847
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2009-09-26T00:00:00+00:00

12

In the morning, as Brad expected, the phone rang. The caller ID showed that it was Troy on his cell phone. Brad let it ring a long time. One after another, the shrill chimes peeled through his otherwise silent apartment.

Brad was standing with his back to the mirror. He was looking at the empty bed. He was trying to get used to it. He was telling himself this was not so bad. That the expanse of white sheets was not some form of global ice cap. Or a new ice age.

Then he reached out for the portable and clicked the “talk” button.

Troy pretended nothing had happened, even though they had never before spent an evening together but the night apart. Not once. Troy acted as if Brad’s snagging a taxi home in the middle of the party was something they had planned.

“How was the rest of the party?” Brad asked. He tried to make his tone as icy as possible, to match Troy’s affected nonchalance.

“Fine. I think Caroline was pleased that you left, because she did not have to pretend the party was about anyone but her anymore.”

Brad managed to bite his tongue. And he found he had nothing more to say. The phrase that went through his head came straight from his grandmother: “If you don’t have anything nice to say about someone, don’t say anything at all.”

An awkward silence froze the line. It was like getting caught with a distant acquaintance in a checkout line or an elevator. He would have welcomed an “I miss you” or an apology, but both seemed out of reach. Something palpable and thick cast a pall over their conversation.

Troy would never admit he was wrong, Brad thought. Troy might never even think he was wrong. Troy was too used to pleasing people and getting his own way.

As if to confirm it, Troy said, “Well, I guess I’ll let you go now.”

Brad snorted.

“You do that,” he said. And when he put down the portable, he waved his extended fingers at it like a pair of magic wands.

“Jerk,” he snarled. The word felt awkward and insincere in his mouth. Dirty and inappropriate. He said it again to see if it felt better. It didn’t. It was not the word he wanted to use for Troy. Not the tender sounds that came out of him without bidding, without thought, for the man he most loved in the world.

Pulled this way and that by anger and hurt, his stomach rebelled. It was a tight, empty knot.

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