Derek E-Book

B.G. Thomas

• Herausgeber: Dreamspinner Press
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 103

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

The end of his marriage leaves Derek Newton hurt and confused, but it also grants him the opportunity to embrace who he really is: a gay man. While navigating his new life with the help of friends in the local GLBT community, Derek meets Marshall Kenworthy, a man who embodies all his fantasies. To Derek's surprise, Marshall is as interested as he is, and they make a date. But a failure to communicate leads to a misunderstanding. The party they attend is not what Derek expected—at all—but Marshall, ever the gentleman, makes sure Derek feels comfortable. As they get to know each other, they see how much they have in common. Derek begins to heal and soon realizes he might thrive in this new chapter of his life—and it just might be with Marshall by his side.

Leseprobe

In Loving Memory of Kaththea Spurlock 1/1/49 – 9/16/13

You gave me friendship, love, and a beautiful daughter. I will never forget you.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Andi—as always, what would I do without you?

Chapter One

DEREKNEWTON was twenty-nine when he came out the second time. He hadn’t really planned on it, but to do otherwise at this point was, well, pretty silly. It seemed the sensible thing to do. He was gay after all; he knew that now. If he was honest with himself, he’d always known it. It was why he’d come out the first time. He should never have gotten married to begin with. Not to a woman. Of course, he didn’t have to worry about that anymore, now, did he?

He’d gotten the call on his lunch break…. The divorce was final—no fuss, no muss.

“You’re a free man!” cried the voice on the other end of the line—his lawyer, and a man who looked as if he were older than God. A man he’d seen remarkably few times, considering what he’d brought into existence.

Or removed from existence?

Derek had asked his boss if he could have the rest of the day off, hadn’t even had to lie about the reason (his boss was God’s gift to the working man everywhere), and now he sat at a small table outside his (new) favorite coffee shop—The Shepherd’s Bean—and had a cup of something that was “kochere washed” from Yirgacheffe, Ethiopia. He didn’t know if what the menu said about what he was drinking was true or not—crisp & light-bodied, tropical fruit layers with rooibos (whatever the hell those were) & apple juice—he just knew it was good. His first thought had been to get something with a hell of a lot more kick to it—like about five or six shots of whiskey—but then another part of him, the sensible part, prevailed.

I want to be straight-headed right now, he thought. Straight! He laughed out loud. Wasn’t the fact that he wasn’t straight a big part of what had happened to him and Jen?

But no. That was a part of it certainly. But there was more going on. They’d gotten married for all the wrong reasons—practicalities and “what-the-hells” being two of them, and not good ones either. Their marriage would probably have collapsed if he were as woman-hungry as Toby, the guy who sat in the cubicle next to him at work. Toby was the kind of man who in a different era would have had some cheesecake “girlie” calendar hanging over his desk. Even now the man’s screensaver—one step from a human resources call—was a series of barely bikini-clad women. Derek wasn’t sure how the man got away with it.

Derek blew over his coffee to cool it down and took another sip.

It was a beautiful Indian summer day—just last week Derek’d had to switch his thermostat in his (new) apartment over from air to heat. He’d needed to break out his fall jacket. And today he was sitting under trees ablaze with orange and yellow and red, drinking coffee, staring out into the busy city street, wearing a short-sleeved shirt, his windbreaker left in the car.

He was thinking about his eight years with Jennifer Clauson and how happy their (his) families had been when they’d gotten married. He saw Jen in his head, looking radiant—like a princess bride from a Disney animated movie—in her wedding dress. He remembered the “I dos” and lifting her veil and the kiss and the applause (and feeling a strange discomfort at the crowd’s celebration). For one moment he was on that beach in Cancun, walking hand in hand with her, a moon on the horizon, its silver reflection on the water. He could feel his whole married life ahead of him. Hopes. Dreams. Children, maybe? He could smell the ocean salt in the air. Hear the waves crashing—

But no.

That was the sound of traffic.

He was sitting outside a coffee shop, and he was alone. He knew he should be happy. He and Jen had parted equably enough. Still friends somehow. He had his whole life ahead of him. He was only twenty-nine. Almost thirty.

And then that thought snuck up on him. Again.

His twenties. Gone. Stolen from him.

Wasted….

But had it been a waste?

Had Jen “stolen” the “best” years of his life? Had he thrown them away? Had their years together really been a waste? The thought would surface in his mind over and over again—but it didn’t feel… right. Waste?

Yet didn’t all the articles say that a man’s twenties were his sexual peak? Wasn’t it all supposed to be downhill from here?

And what the hell am I thinking like this for?

How could those years with Jen be a waste? They’d been happy! And it was more than eight really. It was ten years counting the years he’d known her—his best friend—in college.

When I was sleeping with Rod.

The thought sent a surprisingly sharp pain into his heart, like the sudden stab from an ice pick. All this time and thinking of Rod still hurt. That laugh….

“GETA place together? Are you kidding, Derek?”

“But that’s what you said. You said we’d find a place. Live together—”

“We did that. What did you think we’ve been doing since we moved out of the dorm?”

“But I meant a house. Buy a house—”

There had been another snort of laughter. Those dark eyes growing darker. Colder?

“Derek! You didn’t think we were going to getmarriedor something, did you?”

And of course he did. That is what he’d thought. Or dreamed at least. They’d been living in Boston at the time, and Massachusetts was the first state to legalize same-sex marriage, and yes, he had fantasized that they would get married.

“It’s been great, Derek. But come on! Grow up!”

“G-grow up?”

“I want kids, man. Gotta pass on the family name. I’m the only boy. And the way Marilynn has been drooling over me for the last year I know just who to ask—”

“Marilynn Lawrence?”

“Of fucking course Marilynn Lawrence! And maybe you need to start thinking about popping the question to Jen….”

ANDHE had, hadn’t he? Eventually. Married a woman. His best friend. She had been more than happy to accept. He’d always been more than just a friend to Jen.

But now she was as gone as Rod. It hurt too. Hurt as bad as it had with Rod and….

Just as bad?

Derek closed his eyes.

Different. It hurt different.

And now here he was, sitting alone outside a coffee shop and thinking: Failure. I’m a failure.

Twenty-nine and two relationships crumbled and gone. Failed. Failed in love.

Alone. I’m alone.

He opened his eyes, and he did see his life ahead of him. Alone. It seemed to stretch out dark and bleak, like a bombed-out landscape.

“You okay?”

Derek jumped, spilled hot coffee on his hand, and hissed from the pain.

“Damn! I’m sorry.”

Before he could even look up, his hand was being wiped by a small towel, and when he turned to see who it was—

“Is it bad?” she asked. “Do you need ice?”

—he saw a round face surrounded by thick dark brown hair and eyes framed by large, circular black plastic glasses. Concern was written on that face.

“N-no. I don’t think so.” A glance showed his skin wasn’t even pink, and he found himself actually holding up his hand for her to see.

Well, not up. Over. The table was high, his seat a stool rather than a chair, and she was short. Really short. And amused. She was looking at him with raised brows and a tiny smirk curling one side of her mouth. She looked at his hand—then up at him. “Are you wanting me to kiss it better?”

“Huh?” He blinked. “Oh. No. No kiss”—he returned a grin—“needed.”

The other side of her mouth rose. “So you didn’t answer my question.”

Question. His brows came together. About a kiss? Ice?

“If you’re okay.”

He started to assure her that he was fine—looked at his hand again, and yes, no damage done—when she said, “You were sitting there looking like the world had come to an end. It’s a pretty gorgeous day to look so down. I wanted to make sure you were all right.”

The question startled him. He studied the woman standing beside him. She was the barista who often served him, and she had the polo shirt to prove it. Meet Me @ The Bean was stitched in white on coffee brown, arched out over a dancing goat. Under its little prancing hooves was the logo The Shepherd’s Bean.

What struck him was the downright concern he saw, open and honest, on her face.

I don’t even know her name, Derek realized. How could I not know her name? She had served him for, what? Three months or more? Had he ever known it? Surely he had. He made a habit of treating people in the service industry as real people and not like servants.

“Divorce,” he blurted, knowing he needed to say something. Anything.

“Excuse me?” Her brows were arched up again, hands now on her hips.

“It came through today. It’s all over.”

“Ah….” She bit her lower lip. “As in a real divorce? Legal and all? Not a breakup?”

Derek nodded.

“Not that a breakup is any less painful.”

He flashed on Rod. Nodded again and was surprised to feel tears threatening.

“A woman, then?”

“Huh?” Had he missed something?

“I mean, with gay marriage and all I shouldn’t assume anything. Just a few months ago there was a big story in the paper about a Missouri judge granting a lesbian couple a divorce, which I think is so crazy ironic since we’re not allowed to get married in this state in the first pla—”

“We’re?” he interrupted.

“Lesbians,” she replied. “Me. Les-bee-anne. Sorry if that breaks your heart.”

“What?”

“If you were thinking of asking me out.”

He goggled at her. “Ask you out?”

“I mean you’re cute and all, all blond and fuzzy faced. But I like smooth….” She winked.

“I wasn’t going to ask you out.”

“You weren’t?”

Wait. What? He was getting more and more confused by the moment. Lesbian couple? Divorced? “You just got divorced too? That was you?”

She rolled her eyes, sighed, then hoisted herself up onto the stool next to him. Made herself comfortable.

“A lesbian couple got divorced, but I wasn’t one of them. It was in the Chronicle. And I think it’s kind of funny that we can get divorced in Missouri, but we can’t get married. So…. Just because your divorce just went through doesn’t mean I should assume it was with a woman, although that might mean—”

“It was,” he said, cutting her off. “With a woman, I mean. The divorce. A woman. I divorced a woman.” He sighed. “Although technically, she divorced me.”

“And that’s why the big long face?”

Derek paused. Nodded.

“You didn’t want to get divorced?”

“I….” He stopped, mouth still open. Had to think it closed. “I….” He stopped again.

“I? I?” She wiggled her fingers at him, palms up, a “come on” gesture. “You can do it. Tell ol’ Poindexter.”

Poindexter! Of course. That was her name.

And you sure are nosy, aren’t you?

“I was just thinking of the waste,” Derek finally managed.

“Waste?” She dropped her chin into her open palm, rested it on her elbow on the table.

“Eight years. Over.”

“Was it a waste?” Her eyes studied him.

“I… I….”

“You’re doing it again.”

“It’s just that….” Damn. “You know you’re awfully forward, right?”

“Bean says I’m nosey.”

What? Who? “Bean?”

“My boss.”

“His name is Bean?”

“Dean actually. But we call him Bean because, well, you know. The Shepherd’s? And like the only guy who knows more about coffee is God. If God is a guy that is. I like to think he’s a she really.”

Derek shook his head. “I am completely lost.”

She smiled. “You looked lost. Sitting there. Staring into the cosmos. Drinking your cup a joe. But I guess finding out your divorce just went through could knock the wind out of anybody.”

Derek shook his head. Found himself almost laughing. Who was this chick? And how had she happened to him?

“Are you still in love with her? What happened? Did she cheat? Oooooh…. Did you? With a guy?”

Derek’s mouth fell open once more.