“Yes. Very,” he confirmed.
“Both of them?”
He nodded. “Dad more than Mom, but she isn’t exactly stopping him from doing what he’s doing with me.”
I frowned. “What exactly is that?”
A sigh escaped him. “When I was in high school, I got a scholarship to Columbia. My grades were good, but I got in with a football scholarship. I turned it down because of my father’s wealth. Why should I take that position when someone who really needed it could use the financial help?
“But after that, with my MBA, I’m not eligible for any financial aid because of their means. He knows all that, but he still isn’t trying to help me. If anything, he’s using it to pressure me into caving.” His lips twisted. “But I know him too well.”
‘What did you do?” I asked. “Because you had to do something. There’s no way you could afford to be living with what the internship pays.”
He dipped his chin. “Three years into my degree, I knew I was gay. I also knew my father’s stance on homosexuality because he’d been bitching about it for years. Our preacher was very homophobic.”
“Is it weird that I’ve never known any homophobic Swedes?”
“There’s always one bad apple,” he said dryly. “And maybe he wasn’t, but after Google bought his company, he kind of went crazy for a while. Mom and Dad never said anything but I think he started doing stuff he shouldn’t.”
“Drinking and doing drugs?”
“Drinking, for sure. He’s an alcoholic. As for the drugs, I think so too.” His brow furrowed. “Maybe he even used some prostitutes—I remember an argument that made me think that. Anyway, he went off the rails, and Mom threatened to divorce his ass if he didn’t make amends. For whatever reason, we switched churches. We went from moderate Lutherans to Pentecostal Christian.” He rolled his eyes. “Things changed overnight.”
“Couldn’t make much more of an extremist switch,” I consoled with a grimace.
“It was a nightmare. But it made me realize that I could never be open about who I am. What I am.” He bit that plump bottom lip of his. “It hurt, but I thought I could do it. Then, Chelsea, my ex-girlfriend, applied to NYU, and I thought I’d try for Columbia. Why not, right? Spread my wings in some ways even if it wasn’t that. She didn’t get in, but I did. She thought I’d stay close by with her because we were engaged—”
“You were engaged?” I burst out, stunned by that admission.
He shot me a wary look. “Yeah. I’d had some BJs from an ex, but other than that, I was still a virgin. Chelsea wouldn’t put out without a promise ring, and I had to know if I could do it with her, so I pre-proposed.”
“Christ,” I rasped. “Was she from your church?”
“It was a fuck up,” he conceded with a sigh, the truth in his eyes. “And I have a lot of regrets. But the one thing I don’t have on my conscience is marrying her, getting her pregnant, making a family together, and then cheating on her. Something like this... you can’t bottle it in. It’s who you are. It’s who I am.”
“I get that,” I said softly, but because I was curious, I prodded, “Did you break up before you came to New York?”
“No. She was pissed at me, but I was adamant about going, and we stayed ‘together’ for a year. I was waiting on her to break up, and it worked. Thank God. She said I was more distant emotionally than geographically.” He smiled. “I always liked Chelsea. Just as a friend and not a lover.”
I cleared my throat. “What happened then?”
“I had two years of freedom. And I enjoyed it. I banged every girl I could, but nothing... Shit, it was like nothing fit. Like I didn’t fit in my skin. That penultimate year, I came to terms with why and I made a plan.” He pursed his lips. “I knew Dad would cut me off. He weaponized his wallet a long time ago. When I did as I was told, I got money, so I made sure everything was copacetic, gave him no reasons to cut me off that year or to question my spending.
“My grades were en pointe, and even though I was raising hell, they didn’t know that. Some months, I was withdrawing fifty grand from the bank account he let me use.”
“You were squirreling it away?” I guessed.
“Yeah. Because I knew, when the time came, that would disappear and I had plans. I wanted my MBA and then I could do whatever the hell I wanted on my own terms. I bought so many suits for ‘business’ that he had to wonder if I was going into the tailoring industry, but then I resold them. Friends wanted to buy shit, so I’d grab it on my card and they’d pay me cash.”
Curiosity had me asking, “How much did you save up before you came out?”
“Nearly seven hundred grand.”
I had to laugh. “Jesus.”
His eyes twinkled, and this time it had nothing to do with a fever. “I know I went crazy—”
“No, it’s an expensive town, and your MBA will eat up over a third of that. Never mind living expenses.
“It’s just shitty that you knew you had to do that.”
He shrugged. “At least I was prepared. He thought I’d take my MBA somewhere closer to home, expected me to make it up to Chelsea who hadn’t married, you know?
“When I saw where he was taking it last summer...” He shook his head. “I would have liked to save up some more funds, but I knew I had to end things fast before I was drugged, hogtied, and hauled to the wedding. Chelsea was sniffing around, she threatened to tell my father about us having fucked before marriage—”
I could feel the lingering traces of his panic in his words. “She threatened you?”
“She wanted to marry me.” His mouth twisted. “I’m a good catch in Cali.”
“And you’re not here?” was my wry retort. “I’m not the only one who doesn’t see the woods for the trees, Micah.”
He grunted. “I’ve talked enough. My throat’s already raw. You talk now.”
Because he’d been so open, I murmured, “You want to know about my family?” His nod had me clucking my tongue. “Mother is beyond eccentric. It must be killing her to be stuck in Cumbria. She’s had a routine that I don’t think she’s changed in thirty years.”
“What kind of routine?”
“She started off in Camden Market every day, went to the same market stalls. Then, she ended up at what we call a greasy spoon, where she ate her breakfast. She spent most of the day there if she didn’t have other engagements, before she drifted to Claridges for afternoon tea.”
He frowned at me through discomfort-dazed eyes, which had me wondering if he’d remember any of this conversation tomorrow. “Why?”
“She likes her food. Plus she reckons herself to be a poet.” I pulled a face. “She’s terrible.”
“Is she published?”
I snorted. “What do you think? She’s quite capable of making Father’s life hell.”
“Does she write under a pen name?”
“Oh, yes. She likes to think she’s unassuming.”
“And she isn’t?”