Building Us: A Gay Romantic Comedy and Adventure (Marketing Beef Gay Romance Book 2), Page 3

  “I know.”

  Detritus hacked loudly. I ran to let him out before he heaved all over the hall. But Dillon beat him to it and vomited into the bucket by my desk.

  Chapter 4

  Dillon

  Madeline and Pike’s Salem apartment barely accommodated the two of them, let alone Evan and me. They invited us there for a dinner party and to show us pictures of the new house they were buying. Our hefty severance check went to good use.

  By Ev’s alma mater Salem State University and overlooking the water, Madeline and Pike’s one-bedroom apartment bordered the seaside town of Marblehead. The house was one of those eighteenth-century behemoths common throughout Salem. They occupied the third floor with its cramped quarters and low ceilings, which housed servants back in the day.

  I parked my Audi behind Pike’s classic Camaro. Evan peeled a sticker off the bottle of pinot noir we’d bought at the packie—despite living in the area for over a decade now, I still found the term funny for a liquor store.

  “Ready?” I rubbed Evan’s knee after cutting the engine.

  “Can’t wait to see the pictures of our new house.” Evan grinned. Undoubtedly, he’d calculated the percentage our contribution made to their new abode.

  Years ago on a camping trip in Maine, Evan and I befriended Mad’s now-husband Pike. We later introduced them to each other. They hit it off at once, and shortly after, he moved in with her.

  I had a soft spot for Mad and Pike. I despised servitude and never wanted Madeline to feel like she worked for us but rather with us. Ultimately that cost the bulk of our savings.

  Evan had a soft spot for them, too, when not hell-bent on crunching numbers in an Excel spreadsheet. After all, Pike was nice enough to get Conant Marketing one of our first clients—the Blow Brothers, suppliers of portable toilets. Evan and I put together a killer campaign that won them a contract with the State of Maine. After instituting our recommendations, the brothers’ company attracted the attention of a national conglomerate, and they procured millions in an acquisition.

  Fortune. What good is it? I rationalized our newfound poverty as we walked up the driveway to Mad and Pike’s house. The cold air bit through my wool pants and cardigan, and I pulled Evan closer to keep him warm.

  We hadn’t visited their apartment since last summer when we picked them up for Pride. Pike’s boyish good looks and his allegiance to the LGBT community—replete with rainbow garb—had many of our friends wanting his number. Madeline, in her matching T-shirt, laughed it off. The bedrock of their relationship couldn’t be shaken by a bunch of innocent and horny gay men.

  A pong of curry hung in the staircase and grew in intensity as we neared the top.

  “I’m glad I took an antacid.” Behind me, Evan’s footsteps squeaked on the worn treads.

  Ahead of us, the door creaked open. “Guys!” Pike readied for an embrace, and when we reached the landing, he pulled us each into bear hugs. “So good to see you two. Long time.” It’d only been a month since he’d stopped by the office with coffee for all of us. “And guys,” he said, lowering his voice, “canning Madeline was the best thing you could’ve done for her.” He grabbed the rusted knob to the half-opened door. “Truly.”

  “Really?” I didn’t expect gratitude for firing her.

  “She needs the time off.” Pike ushered us in ahead of himself. He wore cutoff jeans and a New England Patriots T-shirt. Despite it being winter, I quickly remembered their apartment’s never-ending heat left them with opened windows all year round. Barefoot, he headed back in. “I’ll let Madeline tell you what’s going on.”

  Pans clanked inside. “Is that my two favorite men?” Her singsong voice came from the other room.

  “No.” I eyed Evan. “We left Deet at home.”

  Evan poked me in the ribs.

  “Ouch.”

  “Mr. McCormick-Deiss.” Pike eyed Evan up and down. “You look quite striking this evening.” Evan really did in his turquoise oxford and khakis that fit him well. It was nice that Pike noticed Evan’s bloated look from only a month ago had receded.

  “Thank you.” Evan blushed.

  Pike tapped him lightly on the shoulder. “If I were a gay man, I might be hopping on your dance card.”

  “Unfortunately”—Evan jokingly batted his eyes—“I’m taken.”

  Their innocent flirtations were nothing new. My onetime jealousy toward them no longer existed. My security with Evan was solid. A normal, wandering eye now and again, on either side, spoke of our humanity, not infidelity—at least that’s how I looked at it. Yet the older I get, having boys check me out bolsters the ego.

  Madeline entered the living area. “Pike, are you toying with my boys again?” She, too, dressed for summer—sandals and a loose-fitting jumper that revealed much cleavage. “You guys look dapper.” She kissed Evan.

  Apparently not dapper enough for Pike to flirt with me. My competitive streak wasn’t limited to work, but I let it go. I sweated in my V-neck. My trousers scratched my legs. Why did I wear this? “Madeline, you look great.” I leaned in for the customary peck on the cheek.

  A desk, an oversized coffee table, and a large love seat occupied most of the room. Curtains billowed from the open window by a floor lamp and the unlit fireplace. A tang of salt air carried in on the breeze.

  “Phew.” Evan fanned himself. “You got the heat on ninety?”

  Pike rolled his eyes. “Please. That old lady on the first floor runs the heat morning, noon, and night—of course, it rises up here.”

  “I forgot how hot it gets in here.” I tugged at my sweater.

  “Come. Make yourself at home.” Madeline gestured open-armed.

  Evan displayed the wine, pulling his best Vanna White.

  “Ah, Pinot Noir,” Mad said, “my favorite.” With her flushed cheeks and hair tied back in a wispy pony tail, she was more casual than at work. It suited her well. Then again, she could wear a burlap sack and still look stunning.

  We lounged on the blanched leather couch while Pike took to the floor and Madeline left to retrieve appetizers from the kitchen. In front of us Architectural Digest, Boston, Money, and Northshore magazines were displayed on a glass-top coffee table. Stained coasters dotted its edges.

  Pike chatted about the influx of work at the custom auto-body shop he managed in Salisbury. Madeline dropped off a tray of cheese wedges, crackers, and olives and borrowed Evan to uncork the wine.

  “Been there seven years now,” Pike continued.

  “Hard to believe.” I scarfed an olive.

  “Figured it’s ’bout time we dip our toes in the real estate market. Get our own home.”

  “Congratulations,” I said, “in Marblehead too. Not bad.” Marblehead’s real estate, while costly, often retained its value, similar to Conant’s.

  “It’s just over the Salem line.” Pike thumbed a hand toward the hearth as if apologetic for the upscale nature of the town. “Right off Lafayette. Near the church.”

  “So it won’t add too much to your commute.” The area’s notoriety for congestion, lack of major thoroughfares, and small, winding roads made it difficult to drive through.

  Pike swatted the air. “Nah. Besides, we’re opening a location in Salem next year. It’ll be my own shop. I’ll be GM.”

  “Nice.”

  Evan and Madeline entered with the wine. Pike rose and retrieved a folding chair for his wife, and she sat. We toasted to their new place. Pike plopped down on the floor again, sitting Indian style.

  “Oh!” Madeline’s chair grated as she scooted backward. “Let me get the listing sheet to show you.”

  “I’ll get it.” Pike crawled over to the desk and returned with a well-worn piece of paper.

  Madeline took it from him and handed it to Evan. “Guys,” she added, “Pike and I would just like to thank you, once again, for your generosity. It’s really been a godsend.”

  Evan reviewed the paper, flipped it over. “Very nice.” Stone-faced, he handed it to me.<
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  I looked at the price. A half-million dollars! I aspirated wine.

  “Are you okay?” Madeline asked.

  I coughed louder. I expected a small condo, and while the house wasn’t huge, the price tag surprised me.

  “We’ve been saving for a while,” Pike said. “And with my promotion, we didn’t even need Madeline’s income to qualify for the mortgage.”

  Madeline’s eyes lobbed between Ev and me. She rubbed her belly. “I’d planned on leaving.”

  “Huh?” Evan asked.

  “We’re pregnant,” they said.

  Madeline revealed more of the small bulge at her midsection. “Coincidentally, I meant to tell you the other day.” She clutched the hand Pike placed on her knee. “We’d planned on me taking time off. You just moved it along a little faster.”

  Chapter 5

  Evan

  Pike waited with me in the downstairs foyer while Dillon ran back up to retrieve the cell he’d left behind—per usual. We’d already said our goodbyes to Madeline. Her voice now filled the stairwell as she let Dillon back in.

  “I’m so glad you guys came over.” Pike wrapped his arms at his chest. His summer wardrobe wasn’t as appropriate in the lower level’s drafty hallway. He bounced slightly on the balls of his naked feet. “We both wanted you to know we still value your friendship, regardless of the circumstances.”

  “I appreciate it, Pike.” I considered tousling his hair in a brotherly sort of way but refrained. “We had a great time.” I tilted my head toward the stairwell as Dillon’s voice echoed from above—ribbing Madeline about her teen infatuation with Vilhelm Strom, which she’d gone on about during dinner.

  Pike snickered and shoved his hands into the pockets of his cutoffs. “It’s hard to believe I’m going to be a dad.”

  “You’ll be a good one.” I knew he would. “I’m so happy for you both.” When I first met Pike, my attraction to him confused me some because he was clearly straight but flirted with me anyway. That innocent crush quickly eroded as my relationship with Dillon blossomed, and we matched Pike and Madeline.

  “Hey, remember the time when I was first started dating Mad, and I picked you up at the Ford dealership? You’d had your truck serviced and needed a ride.” I must’ve grimaced or something, for Pike prompted me further. “You know. We chatted about your financial success.”

  “Oh.” I recalled the conversation, my dispensing investment advice. Look where it got me. “Yeah, yeah. Of course.” Pike’s working-class upbringing coupled with his entrepreneurial streak reminded me of my younger self.

  “You told me never to live beyond my means. To save and invest wisely.”

  “I did? I did!” I didn’t realize the little chat five years ago had meant so much to him.

  He chuckled. “We’ve saved well. And I know you never would’ve given Mad…us…such a generous severance package if you couldn’t afford it.”

  My cheeks pinched from grinning. “Oh…yeah. That.”

  “Times might be tough for the firm, but I believe you both will turn it around in no time.” He placed a hand on my shoulder. “We’re there for you.” We embraced, and he slapped me on the back.

  Dillon thundered down the stairs. “Got it!”

  The door to the first-floor apartment creaked open, and an old lady clutched the lapels of her pink robe as she peered out. “Are you going to be partying all night?” Heat swept out from her place like desert sand in a windstorm.

  “They’re just leaving, Mrs. Perrin.” Pike held me out at the shoulders.

  We flinched when her door slammed.

  Dillon tiptoed down the remaining stairs.

  On the way home, it snowed. Wet, sticky flakes melted on the Audi’s windshield as we wound through the slicked streets of downtown Salem, the Common, Bridge Street Neck, and into Beverly. The late-night deserted roads made for a quicker than the normal drive.

  The car rumbled over the Beverly-Salem bridge.

  “A half-million dollars.” Dillon shook his head. The rearview mirror cast a band of light across his eyes. “I can’t believe they can afford that.”

  “Well, our contribution helped—”

  “Don’t even go there. I feel duped. I’m pissed!” Dillon said.

  “They’re savers. They’d already budgeted for it before we let her go.”

  “True.”

  We swept past the abandoned McDonald’s that was forever going to be renovated into a high-end restaurant, but plans kept falling through.

  We passed the Ford place, and I recalled the time Pike had picked me up and his confession about how much of an inspiration Dill and I were to him. “You guys have your shit together,” he’d said. Not so much now.

  Along Rantoul, the snow turned to rain and pelted the roof.

  “Hail?”

  “Maybe.”

  As if sensing my funk, Dillon reached out and grazed my ring finger with his pinky. “We’ll, get back there. We’re just in a rough patch is all.” Our hands clenched. He lifted them and kissed the back of mine. “Did I tell you I love you today?”

  “You did.” My rote response to those three words—said so often—fell flat. “I love you too.” Worry tripped real love from surfacing.

  When we turned the bend into Conant, lights blinded us. Dillon slammed on the brakes. “Jesus!” We jolted forward, nearly colliding with the van in front of us. A commotion of sorts brewed outside. “What the heck’s going on?”

  “An accident?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Our car crept forward in time with the van. As we neared Hodge Park, it was lit up like broad daylight. Sixteen-wheelers hugged the edge of the playground and hummed like a spacecraft generating power for liftoff. People bandied about in the middle of the field, usually reserved for students of W.G. Hodge to play soccer and lacrosse. An enormous green screen hung in the air and hid the school from view. The van moved on, revealing a wooden sign where the metal one normally stood. It read Maple Forest, Vermont.

  “Vermont? Did we take a wrong turn somewhere?” I asked.

  From a tent midfield, a litany of women paraded wearing petticoats and colorful dresses. Men in top hats soon followed. Behind them, clipboard-carrying people in jeans barked orders I couldn’t hear inside our car.

  “It’s just that movie.” Dillon edged the Audi around an RV double-parked by a handicap spot, and we headed home.

  In the end field, where a soccer net usually stood, a man dressed in a red-checked shirt held the leash to a dog that, on a quick glance as the car picked up speed, looked strikingly similar to Detritus.

  I pivoted in my seat, but the sixteen-wheeler blocked my view. “I thought that was Deet for a minute.”

  “Huh?”

  Chapter 6

  Dillon

  After the Hawthorne debacle, the only work I could wrangle up for us was a pro-bono sales flyer for a nonprofit in Beverly and a few leads. The stillness around the office depressed me.

  Evan pecked away at a spreadsheet. “The budget,” he said without my asking, cluing me in.

  Antsy, Detritus panted and paced about for a walk. With a week of medication behind him, his perk had returned.

  Evan’s blues peered over reading glasses. “Why don’t you take him to the park?” he asked. “I’m going to be a while. The accounts are a disaster.”

  I looked to Deet. “Want to play Frisbee?”

  He whined, and his tail smacked the floor.

  “You two go,” Evan said. “I could use the quiet.”

  “Quiet? This place is like a funeral parlor.” I preferred the phones constantly ringing, Madeline barking orders to keep me in line, and Evan, ever tranquil, leading the ship.

  “It takes a good deal of concentration to do the books, you know.” His finger traced a line along an Excel file on the monitor.

  In the bedroom, I ditched my khakis and oxford—no sense dressing up—for a pair of Levi’s and a hoodie. I grabbed Deet’s leash and the chewed-up Fri
sbee. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours!” I yelled into the office, but Evan had snuck up behind me with a cup of tea in his hand.

  “Kiss.” He pecked my cheek.

  “You sure you don’t want to come?”

  “Budget.”

  “Right.”

  Outside, Detritus jumped into Ev’s Ford. We reserved the Audi for client calls and non-dog trips.

  A 60 degree day in March didn’t come along often. While I was grateful Evan let me off for the afternoon, a lack of self-worth panged my heart. “Deet, we’ll be okay, right?” I drove toward Salem for the Common.

  In the rearview mirror, the dog’s eyes assured me as they always did. He hovered over my shoulder. Foul breath and all, I loved the mutt and scratched the back of his ears. “Thank you for being my friend, Deet.” I talked more intimately to the dog than I did my best friend from college.

  On the Kernwood Bridge, traffic snarled. I lowered the back window. Detritus stuck his head out and sniffed the air, while we made our way through the city—potholed street after potholed street, rows of storefronts not renovated since they were erected midcentury. Victorian homes nestled amid roast-beef sandwich shops and seafood shacks.

  At the Common, film trucks lined the area.

  “Oh great! Vilhelm Strom strikes here now?”

  As we drove past the greenery, Detritus paced the back of the cabin.

  “Don’t worry, buddy. We’re going to stop. Daddy just needs to find someplace to park.” Parking in Salem always proved difficult. While I could’ve taken him to the landlocked playground in Conant, with its convenient lot, I opted for the salty air of Salem.

  When we passed Winter Street, an old VW pulled out of a spot on the east end of Washington Square, and I beat a black sedan to the punch.

  Detritus panted and barked, anticipating the fun to come.

  “Hold on, boy.” I unbuckled my belt and shut off the engine.

  The sedan pulled alongside me and the front passenger window lowered.