Heartbeat Repeating - E.M. Lindsey Page 0,29
the table. His eyes stray back to the TV where he’d been watching the clock tick down on baking contestants’ cookie towers, and when he looks at the message on the screen, his heart gives a single, painful thud against his chest.
Alejandro: I’ve never seen you eat chocolate.
Avery’s entire body freezes. He doesn’t breathe, he doesn’t move, he doesn’t think his organs function for that one, lingering second. Then his hands shake, and he blinks and wonders if it’s some wrong text because it feels like he’s slipping into the middle of a conversation he didn’t know he was having.
And it’s an oddly intimate thing to say, really, which means Alejandro is talking to someone else, sharing intimate details about likes and dislikes. His throat feels tight, and he half considers ignoring it because it would only be more humiliating to answer and have Alejandro apologize for communicating with him unnecessarily.
Alejandro: I know you’re not allergic. But I was just wondering if you hate it.
Avery’s fingers tap on the back of the phone, the clicking sound of his nails echoing in his ears, and he thinks maybe…God, maybe…
If it is for him, it’s the first text not demanding he show up somewhere in some specific outfit for some allotted amount of time during his day or night.
Avery: I don’t hate it.
Alejandro: Why do you never eat it?
Fuck. He’d answered, and he didn’t correct him, which meant…
Avery: I do eat it. It’s not like you and I hang out long enough for you to observe my eating habits.
Alejandro: You nearly always order crème brûlée or pears with brie and honey. Quatre has a chocolate lava cake on their menu, but you never choose that.
Avery: Am I like…in trouble for not ordering chocolate?
Three dots appear, then stop. Then appear, then stop. Avery has a feeling maybe he’s broken him or something because the screen just stills, and nothing happens…and eventually it blacks out. He half considers giving the poor man a straight answer, but he doesn’t know why the fuck Alejandro is suddenly up his ass about chocolate. Unless there’s some event where the entire menu is like fudge or something, but even then it’s unlike the man to give a shit about what Avery likes.
And frankly, he wouldn’t say no to anywhere Alejandro wanted to take him, and his sugar daddy has to know that by now. An event would mean being with him, and he’d eat liver and onions if it meant being seen in public together.
Which is so damn sad.
Lying back, he reaches for the remote and pauses the show then closes his eyes because his heart is still beating like he’s run a race, and he doesn’t need the anxiety attack right now. It’s bad enough when he has to show up and perform for Alejandro’s impossible to understand needs, but this is throwing a wrench into the carefully cultivated routine that Avery’s finally comfortable in.
How dare he. That fucker.
Pushing up, he leaves his phone on the sofa to stamp down the almost hysterical urge to keep checking it, because that’s just madness. Instead, he locks himself in his bathroom and starts the shower just for something to do.
He finds himself straining to hear past the door for a second, like maybe his phone was going to start ringing, and he curses at himself as he strips down and climbs under the spray.
His shower is the best thing about the apartment. He’d complained about the tacky color scheme once, on a date when he was sure Alejandro had entirely tuned him out. Then he came home one afternoon and found a construction crew ripping everything apart, and a magazine laying on the table with a note telling him to pick out a new lay-out for the renovation.
He’d been furious about it because Alejandro had promised that the space was his to do with what he pleased. It was his apartment, even after all this ended—and fuck, he could afford his own remodel if he wanted it. But the man refused to take his calls and then canceled their Thursday date so by the time Avery saw him a week later, his anger had simmered down into vague irritation.
In the end, it was hard to stay mad. The bathroom turned out better than he could have dreamt up himself, which was entirely Alejandro’s fault for being rich his entire life and being raised on taste. But his breath had caught in his throat the day it was finished, and