Page 45 of Finance Bros
“Speaking of which, you haven’t traveled in a few weeks. Is everything okay with your job?”
He sighs, tossing a glance at himself in the mirror. “I justwanted a little break. The traveling was a lot, but fashion weeks will start up again soon, and I’ll get back into it.”
“Burned out?”
“It’s lonely,” he says.
“Yeah, I get that.”
“I know you do.” He slides off the counter and winds his way past me and out of the bathroom to take a look around the apartment. I trail a few steps behind him as he flips lights on and off in different combinations, examining the way it changes the space. We leave my bedroom and head over to Deacon’s weight set up.
“Why the fuck do you come to the gym?” Calyx asks.
He’s got a point. Deacon has almost everything I use at the gym besides TRX straps. “This is all my roommate’s.”
“What does he do?”
“Tech stuff. I think he’s like a software developer. He’s also training for an Iron Man.” There. Everything I know about Deacon in a few simple sentences.
“Where is he tonight?”
“I don’t know. We don’t talk much.”
“How long have you lived here?” Calyx asks, dragging his fingertips over the bench press.
“I moved in right before Memorial Day.”
He gives me a disappointed look. I shrug it off.
“Grab the cat,” he says. “We’ll keep it simple with a bicep curl.”
He adjusts some lighting while I remove my shirt and retrieve a sleeping Bud from my pillow. The amount of hair he leaves behind is just—ridiculous. I blow some off my mouth while I’m selecting a weight.
“It’s gotta be at least twenty-five pounds,” Calyx says. “Oh, hold on—I have a thought.”
He stages me with a light coating of olive oil everywherebut my face. He even runs wet fingers through my hair to make it look like I’ve been sweating. Once I’m where he wants me, I talk about gold, and because he’s not done with me yet, and the ideas are popping for him, we film a few more clips in different locations with wardrobe changes and less oil where I discuss everything from stock futures, the bond market, and how to create your own 401K if you’re not in a job with benefits.
Calyx directs me all the way through. “Growlier. Give me the bedroom eyes—that’s it—you got it. Pet the cat longer.”
The process leaves Bud greasy, but I have fun. All Calyx wants in return when I offer to pay him is a mini photo shoot of his own. He does his own makeup and directs himself, but I take the pictures and send him all the shots. The best one is of him wrapped in a bed sheet sitting in the bay window.
In it, he’s the perfect, enchanting combination of feminine and masculine—or not masculine, but boyish. It makes me wonder what kind of man he’ll wind up with. I picture him with someone older, I think. Someone who’ll spoil him stupid and worship at his feet.
He leaves around midnight, and before I go to bed, I send the video of me doing biceps curls via a TikTok message to Bailey and Malcolm, just so they’re aware I’m doing something. Once I get a thumbs up from Bailey, I post it.
As I’m about to drop off to sleep after a shower, I get a text.
Malcolm
Are you wearing makeup?
My mouth twists. This whole night, I’ve managed not to think about him. Not the way he spoke to me or the way he held me. Not the way I nearly broke down in tears from the pain in my chest and the restraint it took not to press my mouth to his neck. Not the way I’d very nearly told him that nothing hadchanged for me, and that was the answer to the question as to why he needed to let me go.
I think about it for a while, about whether to respond or not, and finally, I answer the question.
Me
I was
