Paul didn’t say anything. He let the silence prompt Ace to continue.
“He was beautiful. He was wonderful when we were alone. I couldn’t believe my luck when he turned my way that first night. He was everything I could have hoped for.”
Paul stomach turned in disappointment. He wanted to be everything for Ace, but what if he was still hung up on an ex?
“But he was also a Southern Baptist who loved his momma, and he’s never ever going to come out of the closet.” Paul saw pain flash across Ace’s face, and it made his chest hurt. “It took me more than two years of hoping and disappointment to figure that out.”
“You loved him,” Paul said sadly.
Ace frowned. “I don’t know if you can call it love when you’re the only one in it. But I thought I did. Love him, that is. It felt like love.”
“But he didn’t?”
“If he loved me, he wouldn’t have treated me that way,” Ace said with a note of bitterness.
A bolt of anger shot through Paul. “What did he do to you?”
“It wasn’t like he abused me or anything,” Ace said. “Nothing dramatic like that. He was the perfect boyfriend in private then pretended he didn’t know me when we saw each other in public.”
Just like I did, Paul thought, deep guilt replacing his anger.
“I never got to meet his family, never brought his mom a Christmas present, never sat with him in a candlelit restaurant.” Ace barked out a harsh laugh. “Here I am lecturing you on what makes a proper gay date-date, and I haven’t had one in, well, almost forever.” He turned to look at Paul. “You’re already doing better than him, you know.”
Paul felt hope rise in him. “How so?”
“Cameron would never have taken me to a ballgame. Never. And buying me cotton candy? Forget it.” Ace slumped back into the couch cushions and closed his eyes.
Relief lapped at Paul’s heart, but he didn’t want to make any assumptions. “So, where does this leave me with you?” He was still genuinely worried that Ace would tell him goodbye once and for all. And Paul wouldn’t blame him in the slightest, not after Ace had been burned by Paul’s Atlanta twin.
Ace sighed deeply. “I’m trying very hard not to get hurt again.” He tentatively reached over to take Paul’s hand in his. “But I can’t stay away from you, Paul. You’ve gotten in.”
Paul let out the breath he’d been holding. “I love it in there. It feels like home in there.”
Ace blinked sleepily at him. “Take me to bed, Paul.”
And Paul did. He led Ace by the hand to his bedroom upstairs and slowly, reverently peeled the clothes from Ace’s body and then his own.
They weren’t rushed, weren’t frantic and desperate. This wasn’t a time to conquer; it was a time to savor and feast. Paul forced himself to slow down, to taste every inch and memorize the lines and delicious paths of his lover’s body.
And when the teasing finally became too much, Paul gave in to the pulsing ache of his body and pressed slowly inside Ace.
It felt so right, so complete he had to bite his cheek to stop himself from confessing his love at that moment. Ace wasn’t the only one here who needed to protect his heart.
Afterward, they lay together in that post-orgasmic coma, their breaths pulled rough and wet from their lungs. Paul kept his hands always touching Ace somewhere, his skin like a steadying anchor.
“So,” Ace said breathlessly. “Do I need to head home now? Escape before the sun rises?”
Paul tugged Ace close and tipped his head up so he could look into his eyes.
“I don’t think you know,” Paul rasped, “you can’t possibly know, how much I’d give up, what I’d do, what I’m willing to sacrifice, just to be with you like this. To be able to touch you like this. To feel this way. God, the things you do to me.”
In response, Ace curled closer, tucking his head against Paul’s neck, and breathed deeply.
This is worth it, Paul thought. He didn’t know how it was all going to fall out, but if the reward was even just one more night like this, it would be worth it.
*****
It turned into many more nights like that one over the next month. It was a month of increasingly bold baby steps and the requisite stumbles a month of hopeful gestures and of sweeter and hotter sex.
Friends and family took a back seat for a while as Ace and Paul learned how to be together. It wasn’t just that they couldn’t stop touching each other though that certainly was the case. It was more basic than that, and so much more complex. They had to learn how to be friends and lovers at the same time. How to negotiate their needs and wants.
And it all happened in those damn baby steps.
But at least they were steps small steps out of that closet. Steps like Paul’s clothes mixing into Ace’s laundry. Or simply the fact that they spent all their time at Ace’s house, the place Paul fled from on that first morning after. Ace could smell Paul all over the house, and that more than any remodeling project was making his house feel like home.
It took a couple of weeks for Lola to give Paul full approval, and it took multiple bribes, of course. But then one Sunday afternoon as they were sprawled on the sofa and fruitlessly trying to stave off a nap, Lola leapt up onto Ace’s hip and purposefully crawled over his body to get to Paul.
“Yeah, that’s fair,” Ace grumbled. “Took me months to win Lola over, and you get snuggles within two weeks.”
Paul grinned that wide, melting grin at him as he stroked Lola’s back. “Your cat’s a good judge of character,” he said.
Lola settled in next to Ace’s head, which was resting on Paul’s thighs, and Ace’s ears were filled with the sound of contented purring.
Yeah, I’m with ya, babe, Ace thought. ‘That’s what he makes me do, too.
The only other outsider they allowed in to this cocoon was the one who simply muscled her way in: Holly. Ace wished he could have split himself equally in two half of him could continue spending all his free time with Paul, while the other half could weave Holly into his other friendships.
He spared a moment of guilt when he thought of how severely he was neglecting his friendship with Erik. But the moment dissolved as soon as he heard Paul slip into a snore-filled nap.
Holly was able to sneak away from Steven for a visit to Lawrence to meet Ace’s house the next Thursday. Once inside the door, she took everything in with big eyes and instantly pronounced herself in love.
“Do you think I could convince Steven to go with that shade of purple for the bedroom?” she asked excitedly, analyzing the dining room walls with a calculating eye.
Ace looked at Paul for confirmation, and then they said in unison, “No.”
“Speaking of the man,” Ace said, “what did you tell Steven about tonight?”