I Got You | A Gay Romance: A Boyfriend for Rent Book | Gay For You (27 page)

"No, go ahead. Say what you need to say and I'll say what I need to say."

Was he really ready for what Jake had to say? Was he really ready to hear about all Jake had been through, living on his own cause he couldn’t get the support he needed from his father after his mother died? Was he really ready to hear how hard it was to watch other sons connecting with their fathers, playing ball with their fathers, laughing with their fathers and he didn’t have one who understood him? Jake didn’t think so, it was too late anyway. This was hard and embarrassing for his dad too. They lived in a small town, a town his father had been in most of his life and to have people look at him like he was dirt just because of something his sons did, couldn’t have been easy.

"Dad, I didn’t mean for it to happen. I meant to just take some lessons from him and then one thing lead to another and ... I can’t help the way I feel about him," Jake said biting his thumbnail.

“I don’t like it,” his father clenched his jaw, obviously disturbed. His dad never was a man of many words, but Jake needed more.

Jake groaned. “Well, lucky it’s not your life.”

His father shifted gears. He rarely raised his voice, but he was becoming agitated. “You ever think about how this might affect us any?”

Oh, so now he was the victim? What about what Jake had been through the last few months, or for his whole life? Jake rolled down the window as the heat was sucking the life out of him. Jake cut him off.

“Did you ever think about how it affected me that you were never around when I needed you?”

“What do you mean, never around? I was on the road working, trying to provide for this family. And when I was home, I was home.”

Why was it his generation of men thought all they needed to do to be a good father was show up after a long day of work and lock themselves into a room? Being a father to Jake was more than spending thirty seconds pumping his mother’s legs up in the air and putting food on the table. Being a father to him meant helping his children become the adults they were meant to be, not forcing their vision on their own children. He sighed. His dad just didn’t get it. “You were home dad, but you were in the garage working. You never made any effort to connect with me. You hardly paid attention to me. You treated me like—"

“I didn’t know how to deal with ... someone like you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Really?
What was so shameful about having a gay son? It’s not like he was swinging from chandeliers. He’d been very respectful of his family’s beliefs and their reasons for privacy. Jake went out of his way and bent over backwards just to accommodate their comfort level, even if it meant feeling like he was trapped in a box with no way out.

“My dad, he ... he taught me the best way a man can show his love for his family is by providing and you can’t say for a second that you didn’t get everything you needed.”

“Not everything, I needed a father.”

His father cleared his throat, staring straight ahead. The words obviously hurt and Jake almost regretted saying them, but he needed to get it off his chest. Then again, his father had never spoken to him about his relationship with his own father before. He never talked about his past at all, come to think of it. Jake had so many questions about him, and why he came out the way he had, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask, not yet, not today.

“Benjamin, he ... did he say anything about me?”

Say anything? If he was so interested in how Benjamin felt about him, why hadn’t he made any real effort to reach out to him? Instead, he’d let the man suffer, thinking he had a father out there that had abandoned him and hadn’t loved him enough to give a fuck.

“Like how you should get father of the year award for being there for him too?”

The words stung. He could tell by the way his father’s face twitched. He hadn’t meant to be so hurtful. He knew tough as he was, his dad had feelings, maybe deep and profound feelings and no real way of letting them out. And yet, Jake couldn’t help the way he felt.

“What happened between him and his mother was complicated. I was young, I was stupid, but I did try to reach out to him, to be the father he deserved. She got a restraining order against me and ... by the time that expired, it was just too late.”

“Save it, dad. Tell him. It’s too late now.” He didn’t want to hear it. He didn’t have time to be family counselor or therapist. If he felt so bad about it, he should have dealt with it back then. Instead, he selfishly did what was right for him and his children had to suffer the consequences.

“It’s never too late. Not when you love somebody.”

The words were simple but profound, and they weighed on Jake’s heart.

His father cleared his throat, switching lanes on the road. “Now, I knew you were different growing up. Sensitive and I tried to toughen you up, prepare you for the world out there. I just didn’t know you were ... the way you are.”

Jake rolled his eyes. What was so difficult about saying the word? He respected his father’s traditional beliefs, but sometimes he just wanted to tell people like that to get with the times, that they weren’t living in the stone ages anymore. “You mean, gay? You can say it, dad. It’s not going to make you turn into a pillar of salt.”

His dad chuckled and for a moment, some of the tension left.

“Gay, then. I know I haven’t always been the most supportive with your decisions about your life—"

“Decisions?”
Ignorant bastard.
Jake hated when people said that. Did he mean that being gay was a choice? Just when he thought that they were making progress, he had to say something like that. Sure he wanted to be picked on for being different. He wanted to be beat up and denied the same basic rights that every human being on earth should have. ‘Decisions’, yes, that’s what he’d made. Maybe he was overreacting. Maybe he meant the years of rebellion he’d given his dad growing up. Having a wild son after losing his wife couldn’t have been easy.

His dad slowed down on the road as he went over a speed bump. “Now, hear me out. I’m not the way I was before. I’ve had to take a hard look at myself, my own demons and figure out why I was so angry and I guess it’s because I saw a lot of myself in you.”

“What do you mean?” Jake asked. He was confused. His dad rarely opened up to him, not even when his mother passed away, a time when he really needed him to.

He sighed as they drove into town and his father tapped his thumbs on the steering wheel. Whatever it was he wanted to say was difficult. “I guess what I’m trying to say is—"

Honk!

"Dangnabbit!" his dad said, squealing to a stop as a man ran across the street in front of him.

He yelled out the window. "What the hell, Earl?"

"Watch where you're going?" the redneck yelled, shaking his fist. His dad shook his head, parallel-parking in the empty space in front of them.

"Fucking prick," his dad mumbled. "Let's go."

Jake got out of the car. His dad would never change. He waited for his dad to come over to his side when Earl yelled, "I see you got your faggot son with you."

Jake froze and his blood rushed out of his face. He was embarrassed as the manifestation of his choices to be with Benjamin now affected his family. He didn’t want them to have to suffer because he chose love.

"What'd you say?" his dad asked, lowering his voice, his jaw clenching.

The drunk walked right up to him and repeated, "I said, I see you have your faggot—"

But his dad didn't let him say one more word before he gave the redneck an uppercut to the jaw, knocking the prick out cold.

"Nobody calls my son a faggot," his dad said, spitting on the sidewalk. Jake couldn’t have felt more proud of his father in that moment than he had his entire life.

CHAPTER 45

It'd been weeks since he'd seen or heard from Benjamin and though he knew he broke the man's heart, he kind of hoped he'd at least call. He told himself that Benjamin had made his decision just as he had, but the thought of never seeing his boyfriend again destroyed him more than he wanted to admit.

His father arranged for a limo for the two of them, which surprised Jake. Having his father's blessing was more than heartwarming, it went a long way at repairing their once stilted non-existent relationship.

On the limo ride there, he should have been happy. It was his first time in one after all. Its smooth black leather seats, cocktails lined up, and even the club lights above the car's roof, all gave it that elegant touch. They were going to have a good time whether their classmates liked it or not.

"Fuck them," Alberto had said, stepping into the limo before the driver shut the door. "They want something to talk about, let's give them something to talk about."

Jake had to laugh. His best friend hadn't lost his wit or his balls and as Alberto reached across to squeeze his hand, he squeezed it back.

"Thank you for everything you did," Jake told him. They’d come a long way and he couldn’t believe they were here as he looked out of the limo’s tinted windows.

"What do you mean?"

Jake tried to breath through it, keep the tears from coming, but it was hard. It was what he wanted to say to him for months. "For sacrificing your life. For doing for me, what I couldn't do for you."

"Girl, are you kidding? You're my best friend. I wouldn't have it any other way." Alberto handed him a few tissues from inside his jacket. "Don't ruin your tux."

Jake laughed.

"Jake, I
—
there's something I've been meaning to tell you. I—" Alberto started to say before he was interrupted by the driver.

"We're here. Do you want me to pull up to the front?" he asked.

"Yes, please," Jake told him, looking out the window at the front entrance where the ball was taking place. People filtered in, dressed to the nine, each of them stared at the limo, trying to see what movie star might be coming out.

Alberto reached into his fashionista bag under the seat and pulled out a bright pink feather boa.

"What are you doing?" Jake laughed.

"Bitch, if we're going to do it, we're going to do it." And with that, he wrapped it around his neck, and pulled out a spray can of glitter and sprayed his hair.

Alberto was back. He grabbed his faux Louis Vuitton bag and pushed the door open and walked around the front to open Jake's door before the driver could. He slipped on a giant pair of glam Chanel sunglasses and Jake had to laugh. People stared as they stepped out of the car. Alberto sashayed as if he were on a runway, diva all the way.

“Work it,” Jake said. The onlookers mumbled in disapproval.

"Keep staring, bitches," Alberto told them and Jake offered his arm. They gasped at the audacity of his confidence and a smile spread across Jake’s face.

The moment was priceless. He only wished Benjamin was here to see it. He would have laughed. The thought of how alone he was without the man he loved, hit him hard. Being with his best friend was one thing, but it just wasn’t a replacement for being with the man who he’d come to realize was his soulmate.

"What was it you wanted to tell me before in the car?" Jake asked.

Alberto took his sunglasses off and slipped them in his pocket. He took a deep breath. "After. I'll tell you all about it after."

"Okay," Jake said. Whatever it was it seemed important, but he didn't want to push it. He just wanted to escape, have a good time for the two of them to-

"Jakey!!" That voice, that scent of cigarettes, whiskey and Old Spice.
Fuck.

They turned around to see the man with his friends behind him. Jake could see his friend visibly shaking and Jake stepped in front of Alberto to protect him. He thought he’d be prepared to deal with him if he saw him, but now that he was right in front of them, it felt like deja-vu all over again.

"Not here. Not now."

"Oh, we'll deal with this here and now. I thought I made it clear, I didn't want to see your face on campus again."

"And I thought I made it clear, I don't care."

"Let's just go," Alberto said, nudging on his sleeve.

"No," Jake said. "We’ll settle this once and for all. Go inside the auditorium. I'll let you know when I'm done."

"Jake—"

"Now, Alberto. Now." His voice was firm and unwavering. Jake's eyes squared off with Steve's. His hands forming into fists, but he didn’t approach Steve until Alberto was out of view.

A cocky smile spread across Steve’s face as he towered over Jake. “You’ve got some big balls, I’ll give you that.”

Jake locked eyes with him. “You’ve got no idea.”

Steve cackled as a crowd started to form. “Are you sure you want to do this right here? Don’t you have some gay parade to go to?”

His friends snickered.

“You know, I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment, Steve. You humiliated me and you humiliated my friend. You made our lives a living hell. I visualized in my mind knocking you the fuck out. I thought you were mean, I thought you were scary, I thought you hated me. But you know what I see now? A sad, insecure boy who picks on people smaller than them cause they dare to be themselves, but you don’t even have the guts to. I wanted to beat the shit out of you for almost killing my friend, and don’t get me wrong, I still do, but you know what? I know now that you probably had a shitty upbringing. Your dad probably treated you as shitty as you treated us. That doesn’t just make me angry, that makes me sad for you. So, I’m going to let this one go. I’m going to be graduating soon. I’m going to be moving on with my life, me and my best friend, and you’ll still be here wallowing in a cesspool of insecurity. Good luck, Steve.”