trying and failing to find my way in life, they’d found each other, connected, dated, gotten engaged, gotten married, and built a life together. By the time I’d found out either of them existed, they were two decades into living the dream together. They could invite me in for some of the sweaty, kinky scenes I’d been itching for and they apparently needed, but there wasn’t room for me except in their bed.
That was a depressing thought. The only way I could have a man this perfect was when he and his husband needed to bring in an extra. It was like scoring a one-time guest spot on the judging panel for one of those TV competitions—I could take part, but at the end of the episode, I was shown the door.
On the other hand, was I even in the kind of headspace required to pull off a relationship? I was up to my ass in grief and unresolved issues with my dad, not to mention trying to figure out who the hell I was and what the hell I was doing with my life. I was absolutely not boyfriend material right now.
Occasional playtime submissive material? Um, yeah, I could swing that.
So I tried to hold on to that thought—that I was what Aaron and Will needed and they were what I needed—instead of getting depressed over the idea that I was only worthy of being a warm body in someone’s bed.
And it helped.
A little.
I finished my coffee and rinsed out the cup. Then I looked around the open plan kitchen and living room. I didn’t have concrete plans to see Aaron and Will again yet, so I might as well do something with today instead of fantasizing about some alternate universe where they both fell madly in love with me (yeah, that would be the day). And fortunately for me, I had plenty to do to keep me busy. I had my work cut out for me with this stupid house—it would be a long time before I entered a state of “there’s nothing to do.”
Maybe the living room. It was a bit more palatable now that I’d taken Dad’s climbing gear up to his bedroom so it was out of sight.
The room itself was blinding white, especially with the sun pouring in through the giant windows. Once I removed all his dark, oversized furniture, it would probably be even brighter. Ugh.
An accent wall might tone that down. A nice dark red or cobalt blue. Ooh, cobalt blue. That would be pretty.
My gaze drifted to the biggest wall in the room, and I instantly decided that would be the accent wall. Not out of any aesthetic preference like its angle in relation to the windows or whatever. No, it was because that would give me an excuse to take every last thing off that stupid wall and paint over every inch that had ever made my teeth grind.
Because while Dad had art and awards and photos in every other room in the house, the biggest wall in the living room was devoted to my three siblings and me. There was a large framed portrait of each of us—Daniel and Lisa when they’d each graduated medical school, Maryann when she’d completed her doctorate, and me when I’d finished pre-med. They all wore the distinctive cap and gown of someone receiving a doctoral degree, while my dumb ass was smiling like a dork in the generic undergrad attire. I didn’t even have honor cords or anything like that—just the black cap and gown and the single tassel.
Below and around their portraits, more evidence of their success—wedding photos, baby pictures of my nieces and nephews, my siblings receiving prestigious awards.
Mine still had newspaper clippings from my stints in wrestling and track. In high school. Yeah, it was cool that my dad had put up the article about me winning the state championships in two separate track events two years in a row, but were those really the only noteworthy things I’d done with my life? In the fourteen years since I’d graduated high school, I hadn’t done anything worth a spot on Dad’s wall of fame?
Fuck. No. I hadn’t. I’d spent seven years walking in shoes that didn’t fit, and I’d spent the seven years since then trying to find a pair that did. The last thing I needed right now was a constant reminder of how I’d failed to measure up to my siblings, never mind my father. How was I