I'm Not Your Mentor - 10. Chapter 10: Dating Problems

10. Mentoring is beneficial for the mentor

A mentoring program is NOT operated solely for the benefit of the mentee. Mentors benefit from the experience—whether from seeing things from another's point of view, learning to clearly and succinctly explain processes and ideas, or just the satisfaction of helping someone advance. The mentor’s role is essential, but it's also a learning one.

— Employee Handbook: Mentoring

 

After talking to Pete briefly about Jonah, Pete made a hasty exit and I stayed in my office and hid. I spent a lot of time wondering what to do next about Jonah, and I didn’t like any of the choices. Could I ask Jonah to find another job? Was that something I could even suggest? Or did I just ignore the problem and muscle through it? Maybe no one else would find out, and it would be okay? But Karen and Peter already knew, and though I trusted them, who else might they tell? Especially now that Jonah was involved in a pressing business issue?

To distract myself from those thoughts, I went through my email. I usually have hundreds of unread emails that I’ve skipped over. Now seemed as good a time as any to go through them.

An email from my friend Chase caught my attention. I’d known Chase for over ten years, and I’d reported to him at a previous company. In many ways, he had acted as a mentor to me. Every six months or so, we’d exchange emails, and about once a year, we’d have dinner and catch up. Chase’s latest email talked about a new role he had taken on as an advisor to a startup. He added that he was no longer working full time and even thinking about retirement. Chase also suggested we have dinner sometime soon, and I responded enthusiastically.

And then, I went through the rest of my emails. There was already a long chain of emails about the possible data breach and what needed to be done. I set about trying to douse some of the flames.

 

At five o’clock, an emergency meeting was held in the largest conference room on the 4th floor. That’s how you knew how important it was; only a few people can book that room. It had become clear that many people had opinions about what should be done and how it should be handled. I’d hoped to keep the numbers in the meeting down to a manageable level. Still, even with my efforts, we’d had to invite representatives from IS, IS Security, Corporate Communications, Compliance, Legal, and HR. I’d also given the CEO a heads up on the issue and invited him, but he’d said he couldn’t make it, but to keep him in the loop. I was relieved he couldn’t come, as I wasn’t sure what might be revealed.

It was a big crowd—probably too large—but that’s what happens with these things. Several senior people were present, which suggested how serious everyone thought it was. I felt it was serious too, but I thought it was too soon to start a full-blown panic until we knew more about what had happened. We should at least give ourselves a couple of days to understand the problem. Still, not everyone agreed with that way of doing things, so that was why we were having this hasty meeting at 5 in the afternoon.

Much to my surprise, Jonah was sitting at one of the chairs lined up against the side wall. The over-flow seating. Notably, Edmund, his supervisor, wasn’t in the meeting. I wasn’t sure what that might mean.

I started the meeting by outlining the problem and then passed it off to Cole, who described what happened in almost mind-numbing detail. Someone asked who had discovered the mistake, and there was a moment of awkward silence before Jonah slowly raised his hand.

A little haltingly, Jonah began to explain how he’d found the problem with one of the databases, and then had found it in three others on the same system.

“And did you tell anyone?” asked Mark from Compliance.

“Ah, yeah,” Jonah nodded. “I told my supervisor.”

“And what did he do?” Mark continued, obviously looking around for the person, but seeing no one volunteer responsibility.

Jonah glanced at Cole, who nodded at him to continue.

“He told me he deleted the files,” said Jonah.

It was like you could hear everyone taking in a deep breath in shock.

“Did you think that was okay?” Mark challenged, and I wanted to slap Mark down. This wasn’t Jonah’s fault, and it felt like Mark was blaming the messenger.

“Ah, he said he’d take care of it,” said Jonah defensively, and I could tell he was embarrassed.

“But you didn’t take your concerns to anyone else?” Mark persisted.

“I uh…” Jonah glanced at me.

“If he told his manager…” Erin Hayes, the General Counsel, began, but I interrupted her.

“He told me,” I said, and everyone looked at me in surprise. “I’m his mentor,” I added. “Jonah was uncomfortable about what had happened and told me he was concerned. He wasn’t sure if it was okay. I wasn’t sure what had happened, but knew I needed to investigate it. That’s why I started asking questions about the security of the databases this morning.”

No one asked Jonah any more questions, and I was uneasy about that. Were they wondering why I was mentoring a kid that had been with the company for only a couple of months? At least they weren’t interrogating Jonah—I guess I should have been relieved?

The meeting dragged on for more than an hour as we discussed what we needed to do. It was decided we needed to hire a consultant to help with identifying what happened. If for appearances sake as much as whether we had the resources to fully investigate the problem. Pete said he’d already spoken to two different companies and expected to choose one tomorrow morning. Compliance and Legal were going to work on what we needed to do to notify the government. We'd also need to contact anyone whose data might have been revealed. But that would only happen once we knew if any data had been jeopardized. Corporate Communications was going to put together a press release. However, that too would have to wait until we knew what had actually happened.

The meeting ended, and everyone disappeared into the night. I had wanted to speak to Jonah, but he left with Cole, and I had to trust that he would turn up at home later.

 

“So he told you during a mentoring session?” Karen asked me, a broad smile on her face.

The two of us had stayed behind, talking about a couple of unrelated issues. And then Karen had glanced around, checking that everyone had left, before asking me that question.

“I definitely see myself as his mentor when we are talking about work,” I said primly.

Karen raised one eyebrow, but keeping it professional, she didn’t say anything else like, ‘did you have your clothes on?’ It was only later that I remembered that yes, we had both been clothed when he’d told me. Admittedly I had my arms around him in a rather un-mentoring fashion. We’d also spent the rest of the evening in bed together naked, but that was beside the point.

Karen simply nodded, and we exchanged a few more pleasantries before she left to go home. She said nothing about moving Jonah. I guessed that suggestion would come later.

I ended up going back to my office and spending another hour talking with Pete discussing who to hire. Peter said he would take care of the PO in the morning. Fortunately, the estimated cost was under what I could approve. I sent an email to purchasing letting them know it would be approved and needed to be expedited.

Pete didn’t mention anything about my relationship with Jonah. Yet, I felt like he kept wanting to, and would keep stopping himself. I didn’t want to talk about it either—not at the moment—so I didn’t bring it up.

And once that was all taken care of, I went home, wondering if Jonah would be there.

 

 

“Have you told anyone we’re dating?” Jonah demanded as I entered the house. He was waiting nervously for me at the door when I got home, and that was the first thing he asked before I was even in the door.

“Good to see you too,” I said, hugging him and giving him a quick kiss, but he ignored it.

“Have you?” he persisted.

“Karen in HR already knew. I told you that,” I said defensively. “I also told Peter today,” I said, and when Jonah frowned, I added, “I felt I had to.”

Jonah stood staring at me for a moment, and then he nodded slowly, chewing his lip.

“I told her, too,” he finally said. “Is there going to be a problem?” Jonah asked.

I thought about it. I still wasn’t sure. I didn’t think it should be, but I couldn’t be sure.

“Could be,” I said, just because I didn’t want to have him upset with me if I was wrong. I had no idea what might happen over the next few days, or what these revelations would cause.

“For you?” he asked.

“You mean, about the database failure?” I asked him.

“No, about us dating.”

I sighed. I wasn’t sure how to answer that. I guess I had always assumed that the worst-case scenario was that Jonah would be dismissed, and I’d be a bit embarrassed, but that would be about it. But maybe that too was being optimistic.

“I don’t know,” I said truthfully. “It’s hard to know. I think if it gets out, then yes, unfortunately, it could cause a problem.”

“Why?”

“People will think there’s favoritism. I think especially because you’re junior to me.”

“And gay?” he prompted.

And because we’re gay? Yes, that could make things worse.

“I dunno. It probably doesn’t help,” I said.

Jonah nodded again, and then he shrugged. “What do you want to have for dinner?” he asked, changing the subject faster than I expected.

“I have some chicken. I was thinking of Chicken Korma. You like that?” I offered.

“Sure,” he shrugged. The enthusiasm was muted, but I don’t think either of us could get up much excitement for anything.

“Great,” I said, trying to inject some enthusiasm into the evening. “You can make the rice.”

 

 

The following week I met Chase for dinner. When I told Jonah I was having dinner with a friend, Jonah said he would meet up with his friend Noah.

The restaurant Chase had chosen was on Moody Street in Waltham. We generally met in Waltham as it was approximately halfway between my place in Lexington and his in Newton.

Chase is in his late fifties, and six years ago, I’d attended his second marriage. He married a woman twenty years his junior. A few weeks before the marriage, we’d had dinner, just to catch up, and I hadn’t asked, but he’d told me that he had no intention of having more kids. He already had two kids from his first marriage. The youngest was just starting college, and in his words, he was glad to have them out of his hair.

I was sure he loved his children, but I understood that he’d gone through that experience once and didn’t want to repeat it. Chase assured me at the time that he’d told his bride-to-be, and she had been quite okay with that.

Now he had a five-year-old and four-year-old twins, and he seemed as proud of them as any parent. If anything, he talked about them more than he ever had about his older children.

I never brought up what he’d told me prior to the marriage, and he’d never explained what had changed to push him into fatherhood again. Had he changed his mind? Had his wife convinced him, or had she become ‘accidentally’ pregnant? Part of me was dying to know, but I never had the nerve to ask him, and he never offered.

My curiosity about children was just that, curiosity. What I really wanted to pick Chase’s brains about was what it was like living with someone much younger than yourself? What were the problems and pitfalls? I wondered if there might be a support group that met to discuss cultural references they didn’t understand, and where to get viagra at discount prices?

Not that I needed viagra at the moment.

When I arrived at the restaurant, Chase was already seated, and there were the usual few minutes of general conversation about traffic, parking, and the weather as I settled myself and scanned the menu. We ordered, and then Chase told me about the new car he’d just bought—a Honda Pilot. He explained that they needed something large to drag the kids and their friends around in.

“How are things with you?” he then asked.

“Oh, pretty good,” I said. “I’m dating someone.”

Chase had never seemed squeamish about discussing my relationships. We certainly didn’t go into them at any length, but he used to inquire about John, and he already knew that I had broken up with John. That had been the topic of our last dinner together. So when Chase asked me how things were, I was comfortable talking a bit about Jonah.

“How’s that going?” Chase asked, it was more a continuing of the conversation than an interrogation.

“It’s going well, I hope. He’s basically living with me,” I said.

“Oh,” said Chase, and I had clearly surprised him. “How long have you known him?” he asked, and now he really seamed curious.

“Ah, a couple of months?” I said, feeling myself redden just a little.

“And you’re already living together?” said Chase. “Going to get married?” he asked, smiling broadly, and then he winked at me.

I hadn’t even thought about getting married. The idea hadn’t entered my head.

“Uh, I don’t…we haven’t even thought about that,” I said, rattled.

Chase grinned again.

“You’re living together. That’s the next step, isn’t it?” he asked.

“Uh yeah,” I agreed. But this wasn’t what I’d wanted to talk about. “Actually,” I began. ”Jonah’s a bit younger than me…”

“Yeah?”

“Like twelve years younger.”

I could see Chase doing the math in his head, but he didn’t say anything, he just nodded.

“Can I ask you a question?” I said.

Chase looked interested; as if he was wondering what question he might be able to answer that would help me.

“Sure.”

“I’m kind of…” I tried to think of the right word to use. Freaked out seemed too incendiary. “Concerned that the age difference is going to be a problem. I wondered if you had any thoughts…”

“Oh,” he said, and Chase sat there for a moment, obviously thinking. But instead of answering the question, he asked me another one.

“Well, how’s the relationship at the moment?”

“What do you mean?”

“How is it? Ah…are things good?”

“It’s good,” I said, unsure if I was supposed to talk about sex. I assumed that wasn’t what Chase was asking, but for a moment, I was unsure.

“Yeah, but is it balanced? Do you see a future?”

“Balanced?” I queried.

Chase toyed with his pasta.

“Well, you’ve only been together a couple of months, so…you know, sometimes the early days of a relationship are pretty much just the newness and the excitement and the…” and he trailed off. In my head, I supplied the word ‘sex.’

Yeah, that sort of described it. There was a lot of newness and excitement. And a lot of sex.

“Is there something there to continue the relationship after—or if—that starts to fade away?” he concluded.

I took that to mean; was there anything other than sex to the relationship? I thought there was. We did things together, and even the things we didn’t do together, we liked to do with each other. Whether it was work that we needed to do at home, or playing video games, we were nearly always around one another.

“Yeah…I think so,” I said, pretty sure, but now I was busily analyzing the details of our relationship.

Chase nodded.

“What about children?” he asked.

“Children?” I asked, almost shocked.

“Do you think you’d want to have children?”

“Uh,” I didn’t know how to answer that. Growing up, I’d always imagined having a family, because that seemed to be the thing people did. Still, I hadn’t thought about having a family once I’d gotten to my twenties, came out, and lived as a gay man. I’d never talked about children with a partner.

“We haven’t talked about it,” I said slowly, not wanting to admit it had never occurred to me. Maybe the fact that I never thought about it was the answer?

Chase nodded, but he didn’t add anything, leaving me a bit in the dark. Yet, since he’d asked, I figured it gave me a chance to ask something that I had wondered about.

“How did you feel about having more?” I asked, trying not to sound to curious.

Chase gave me a look that suggested I’d hit the nail on the head.

“‘Well, to be honest, I hadn’t felt the need to have more, and I thought it might be nice to, you know, just be us,” and he pursed his lips and then took a sip of his wine, while I waited impatiently.

“But then?” I prodded.

“A change of heart?” he said simply, and smiled and took another sip of his wine.

“A change of heart?”

Chase stopped drinking and grinned.

“That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it,” he said.

“Okay.”

Chase put down the glass, glanced around, and then took a deep breath.

“I think,” he continued, “in a relationship, there’s a lot of things you can negotiate on; what movie to see, what car to buy, where to live. But if one of you wants children and the other doesn’t, that’s sort of the unstoppable force meeting the immovable object.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“So we had Harry, and you know, on the one hand, kids really stress and challenge a relationship, because they become the focus of it. But I love the kids so much.”

“Huh,” I nodded,

“But you probably don’t want to have kids,” he said hurriedly.

I don’t? Or do I?

“I don’t know,” I said, truthfully.

Suddenly all I was thinking about was, did I want kids? Did Jonah want kids? I couldn’t imagine that he did. He’d never mentioned anything about it, but then we’d never talked about it. We’d only been together a few months—should we be talking about it?

Thankfully, the conversation drifted to other things, and I didn’t have to dwell too much on these thoughts.

 

When I got home, the house was empty, and I was disappointed that Jonah wasn’t home. I watched some TV, but finally decided to call it a night. I guessed that Jonah would be out late with his friend Noah, and for a moment, I had visions of Jonah meeting some guy at a bar and going home with him. I had to bury that thought quickly.

“You awake?” I heard Jonah whisper.

I opened my eyes and glanced at my watch on the night table. It was just after one.

“I am now,” I said.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s okay,” I said, rolling over to face him. Jonah climbed in and slid up to me, and I took him in my arms and kissed him on the lips. He tasted of toothpaste.

“You have a good time?” he asked me.

“Yeah. It was good to catch up with Chase. What about you? What did you and Noah do?”

“We mostly hung out at his place. Noah is kind of down, His boyfriend is a bit of an ass.”

“Oh,” I said.

Jonah shrugged. “He’ll get over it,” he said.

I kissed Jonah again. I wanted to ask Jonah if he wanted to have kids and whether he could imagine getting married. But I wasn’t sure how to bring it up without things getting serious. But now wasn’t the time for either discussion. I was half asleep, and besides, it was nice to just lie here and hold him. It worried me that I might actually ask Jonah to marry me if we started talking about it, and I had to think some more about that.

 

A few days later, Jonah was working on the kitchen table, while I was tidying up the kitchen. I wondered if I should ask him if he wanted to use my office, but I liked him working in the kitchen. At least then, he was around.

“How are things at work?” I asked him casually.

“Okay,” he shrugged.

“No one giving you trouble?”

“Nah,” he shook his head. “I think words gone around that you’re my mentor, so everyone is scared of me,” and he grinned.

“Uh, huh,” I said.

Jonah nodded thoughtfully, then added. “The consultant seems to think no one broke into the system, despite the fact it wasn’t buttoned down.”

For a moment I wondered if he was intentionally trying to change the subject.

“Yeah?” I said, surprised that Jonah knew this. “How’d you hear that?” I’d only that afternoon heard the unofficial word that this was the case. It was still going to be a few days before the consultants would be willing to sign off on it, and we’d make an official announcement.

Jonah looked slightly embarrassed.

“I was helping the guy doing most of the work, and I got friendly with him. He told me that was what they’d found.”

I nodded.

“Well, that’s good then,” I said.

“Edmund is happy,” Jonah said cryptically.

“I bet,” I agreed. Edmund was the manager that had erased the files and told Jonah to forget about it.

Jonah sat there for a long moment, and I wondered what he was thinking. Then I realized that he was waiting for me to say something, but I wasn’t sure what.

“Are they going to fire him?” Jonah finally asked.

Oh. So that was what he wanted to know.

“I don’t know,” I said honestly.

Jonah screwed up his face in puzzlement.

“Really?” he said, clearly suspicious.

“It’s not my call,” I said truthfully.

“But you could do…something…” he trailed off.

“No,” I said, “No, I can’t ‘do’ something.”

“Why not? It’s your division,” and he genuinely seemed puzzled. Either that or frustrated—maybe a mixture of both.

“Jonah, do you…if we fire him, and he finds out we’re dating, he could turn around and sue us for wrongful termination.”

“That’s stupid,” said Jonah. “He’s an asshole that…firing him is totally appropriate.”

“You and I know that, but a jury might not see it that way.”

“That’s just…so he gets away with it?”

Pete and I had already had a couple of cryptic conversations about what to do. In the end, I’d bowed out of the discussions because it wouldn’t look right if I was involved. But Pete knew about my relationship, and I knew that had tilted the decision.

I realized that I hadn’t answered Jonah’s question.

“I think they are going to put a warning in his file,” I said finally.

“Figures,” Jonah grumbled.

“Figures?”

“He’ll get away with it,” said Jonah, and he seemed angry.

“He’s not getting away with anything. Anyway, don’t worry about him.”

“He’s an asshole.”

“Is he?”

“Yeah,” said Jonah snappishly, and then he seemed to reconsider his answer. “I didn’t tell you that,” Jonah added quickly.

“I’ll try not to remember that then,” I grinned.

Jonah stared at his computer screen for a moment or two.

“So should we go public?” he asked softly.

“Public? Not unless someone broke into our systems.”

Jonah looked puzzled for a moment. “No,” he finally said. “With our relationship. In the company.”

“Ah, oh,” I said, understanding. But what to say? I went with the first thing I thought of. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. At least at the moment.”

Jonah frowned.

“We’re just going to keep it a secret forever?”

“Ah, no,” I laughed. “Not forever. But I don’t know, maybe things will look very different after it’s been a while,” I said truthfully.

“What? Like you get sick of me?” he said, and I wasn’t sure if he was serious or joking.

“I won’t get sick of you,” I teased him, reaching out and squeezing his shoulder. “What are you working on?” I asked, changing the subject. I didn’t like where this was going.

“Oh, it’s a proof of concept for Pharmacy,” said Jonah, clearly brightening.

“What do they want?”

“They want a better analysis tool for their data.”

“Oh, okay. How’s it going?”

Jonah screwed up his face. “Not well. I don’t think we can do what they want, well, not without about three man-years of software development, and we don’t have the resources for that. I guess no one wants to get the resources.”

“Huh,” I said. In my head, I was thinking maybe I should get involved, and then I very quickly realized that I shouldn’t.

“You didn’t hear this from me either,” Jonah added quickly.

“I won’t tell anyone,” I said, holding my hand up with my fingers crossed, and Jonah smiled.

He shrugged.

“They’re going to go outside to get something. They’re putting together a…” and he paused for a moment. “R…what’s it called when they ask people people to quote…”

“RFP?” I offered.

“Yeah, that.”

“They have? Oh, so why are you working on it?”

Jonah shrugged again.

“Just playing, it’s an interesting puzzle,” he said.

“Your manager has you working on this?” I asked, genuinely puzzled.

Jonah shook his head.

“I’m doing it on my own time,” he said.

I took a second to digest that.

“Wait? So this isn’t actual work?”

“Well, its…” Jonah began, but I interrupted him teasingly.

“You mean I’ve been waiting patiently for a blow job, and you’ve not actually been doing work you have to do?” I asked. I was joking with him. If he wanted to work on a puzzle, it was fine with me, but I liked to tease him now and again.

Jonah grinned. “You’ve hardly been waiting patiently,” he said impishly.

“Well, I’m hard,” I said, and he giggled. And then he closed the computer and turned towards me.

“I suppose I should do something about that,” he said, grinning.

I leaned forward and kissed him.

“No. If you want to work on that, it’s okay. My erection and I can wait…” and I glanced at the time. “At least another half hour. But that’s it, cause then there has to be some bed action, cause I want to sex you up, and we also need to get some sleep. We can’t be ‘up’ all night.”

“You got any more erection jokes?” Jonah asked me.

“I don’t know. Do I have your attentionn yet?” I asked, dragging out the word attention.

“Half an hour,” Jonah promised.

I kissed him again.

“I’m holding you to that.”

 

It was early Wednesday evening, and I’d actually made an effort to get home early so we could barbecue and swim and hang out. I’d spent a lot of time lately thinking about our relationship. About what I wanted from it, and what I hoped it might become.

I wasn’t sure, but I felt guilty that I had taken John for granted, and I was determined not to do that with Jonah. And if you’re going to make a change, you have to embrace and make it part of the routine. It doesn’t work to just say, ‘I’m going to be more present as things happen.’

Jonah was already swimming when I got home; he liked to swim after work, and when he saw me, he got out of the pool and came over and gave me a big wet hug. I was glad I’d changed after getting home, before going to find him.

I hugged him and put my hands on his butt.

“How was your day?” I asked him.

“Okay,” he said. “Yours?”

“It’s getting better,” I said, squeezing his ass through the swimsuit's wet cloth. We were in the kitchen, so not completely exposed, but it was still possible for the neighbors to see us.

“You should wear this all the time,” I said.

Jonah nodded.

“Might provoke questions at work,” he said mischievously.

“Probably.”

The doorbell rang, and we both started.

“Who’s that?” Jonah asked.

“No idea,” I said since the only person that turned up at my place unannounced was currently in my arms. “I’ll go see.”

“Okay,” he said.

I went to the door and opened it.

It was John.

“Uh, hi,” I said.

“Hey,” said John.

I waited a moment, expecting him to say something, but he just stood there.

“What’s up?” I asked him, conscious that I was wearing a swimsuit and a t-shirt.

“Uh, oh, this and that,” he said, appearing flustered. “How about you?” he asked.

This was very un-John-like behavior. Usually, John had an opinion, and he stated it immediately.

“Should I start the barbecue?” I heard Jonah call, and I turned to see him walking down the hall towards us. Jonah was wearing a towel wrapped around his waist, one hip bone exposed, suggesting he had taken off his swimsuit. I was pretty sure the wardrobe was intentional. To me, he looked like a walking wet dream, and he probably knew that.

“Ah, sure, if you want?” I said to him.

Jonah came up to me, put his arms around me, and practically molded himself to the side of my body.

“Are you going to be long?” he asked me, completely ignoring John.

“Probably not,” I said, and I looked up at John, who had a quizzical expression on his face. I looked back at Jonah. “Ah, why don’t you get dressed? I should be done in a minute.”

“Okay,” he smiled flirtatiously at me.

And then, without acknowledging John, Jonah turned around. As he did so, he pulled off the towel and handed it to me like I was his servant, and I watched Jonah walk butt naked back down the hall to the kitchen.

He did have a lovely ass. When he walked, it looked like…

I suddenly remembered that John was standing at my door, probably looking at the same ass. I turned back to face John, feeling more than a little foolish, and John had a very ‘not amused’ expression on his face.

We stood there for a few seconds, neither of us saying anything.

“You wanted to talk?” I finally asked him, dropping the wet towel on the ground because I didn’t know what else to do with it—and I felt foolish standing there holding it.

“Is he living with you?” John blurted out.

I stood there for a moment, trying to think how best to respond to that question. It occurred to me that Jonah was. It also occurred to me that I wasn’t going to tell John that, even if the idea of rubbing his face in it did appeal to me. My immediate thought was to tell him it was none of his business, but I knew that would have no sway with John.

“Did you want something?” I asked, instead.

One eyebrow raised, and I waited for his rejoinder.

“How old is he? Fifteen?”

“Funny. He’s twenty-four,” I said, not altogether feeling like that made a big difference to what I assumed was John's point.

“So that’s what…you’re half again his age?” he asked. John was always good with numbers.

I was getting sick of this.

“Anyway, how’s your…I’ve forgotten his name,” I asked.

“Steven.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “How’s your Steven?” I asked, not really caring.

“We aren’t together anymore.”

The bluntness of the answer threw me.

“You’re not?”

“I had to fire him.”

“You…What?!”

“He was stealing from the cash register.”

“Oh,” I said. Should I express sympathy? Secretly I wanted to laugh in his face, but that wasn’t very nice.

I still wanted to.

“Yeah…anyway…” said John.

“How’s the car?” I interrupted. I was running out of small talk, and I wasn’t really interested in any other talk with John.

“Oh,” said John, glancing back over his shoulder at the Jeep. “It’s going well. But I’m thinking of trading it in. Get something smaller.”

I nodded.

“Are you going to be long?” Jonah called out.

I turned, and Jonah was walking toward us again. He’d obviously run up the back stairs and changed as quickly as he could. He was wearing a pair of my sweatpants, rolled up at the ankles, and a t-shirt of mine. The t-shirt was different, but otherwise, it was the same outfit Jonah had worn the first time he’d slept over at the house. The baggy clothes made him look like a mischievous elf, and I felt like it was another message.

He had plenty of clothes of his own here.

Jonah walked up and hugged himself to my side again and just stood there, staring at John.

“I don’t…was there something you wanted?” I said to John, conscious that Jonah might start dry humping me in a minute if I didn’t get John moving.

“No. It’s fine,” said John, and then he paused, looking around. “Have you repainted?” he asked.

I had repainted the place, and I’d moved things around and replaced some furniture after he’d moved out. It was part of my effort to rid myself of his memory, and anyway, we had different tastes. He tended to like Vermont farmhouse stuff, while I preferred a more modern aesthetic. John had slowly been trying to convert the house into something he desired, and when he moved out, I had gotten rid of everything I didn’t like.

“Yeah, just cleaned it up a bit,” I said. No sense in getting into details, though I could tell John wasn’t impressed. But then, what did he expect? Was I going to keep the place the way he’d made it? Like some memorial to him?

“Did your little friend help pick out the colors?” John asked, and when he said ‘little friend,’ he glanced at Jonah as if Jonah was beneath him.

I’d repainted the house months before I’d met Jonah, but that was none of John’s business. Now I was annoyed, but before I could say anything, Jonah replied.

“I just picked out the color of the ceiling in the bedroom. I spend most of my time on my back in there,” said Jonah.

John didn’t seem to know what to say to that.

I tried not to laugh.

I squeezed Jonah gently, and he made a guttural groaning noise, which didn’t help at all.

“Well, I have to get going,” said John.

“Oh, sorry you can’t stay,” said Jonah, his voice indicating he didn’t mean it at all.

John glanced at Jonah, then he looked at me, and I wondered what would come out of his mouth, but John simply turned and walked out.

I looked down at Jonah, and he gave me an innocent smile.

“That wasn’t nice,” I said, not really meaning it, and Jonah rolled his eyes.

“That wasn’t nice,” he mimicked.

“Stay here for one minute,” I said, kissing him quickly. And then I walked out onto the front steps.

“Hey! John!” I called.

John stopped and turned.

“What did you want?” I asked him.

“Nothing,” he said. “I hope you enjoy your twinkie,” and he got into my Jeep and drove away.

“Well, fuck you,” I mumbled under my breath. I had tried so hard not to get mad at John when he’d told me he didn’t think he wanted to be in a relationship anymore. Followed by the admission that he had been sleeping with someone else.

I had felt guilty. That I hadn’t been around more. That I hadn’t worked harder at the relationship. That I hadn’t done…something.

And besides, what was the point of getting angry and fighting? So I’d tried to be the adult about it. I’d let him take the car. Even some furniture that we’d bought together.

We’d never married, though we’d been living together for a couple of years. All in all, I probably got away lightly.

Anyway, it was behind me now.

I turned around and walked back into the house, closing the door behind me, still wondering why John could be so bitchy to me.

Not that the reception I received inside was any warmer. Jonah was standing where I’d left him, his arms crossed, looking a mixture of angry and hurt.

“What did he want?” Jonah demanded.

 

To be continued...