Can and Can’t
Zac was embarrassed by how long it took him to come to the obvious conclusion. Of course the easiest way to see Jordan again was to go back to the club where they had met. Drew had been surprised when Zac approached him about going out again the next weekend, but he’d eventually agreed it. Drew was less pushy than Shaun, so Zac figured it was safest to ask him. He wouldn’t make such a big deal out of it. And luckily for Zac, neither of them seemed to have any memory of the stranger Zac had met the weekend before.
“Alright,” Drew said, slamming his shot glass down on the bar. “You sure you’ll be okay on your own?”
“Yeah,” Zac replied. His own shot was still burning his throat, but he needed the extra dose of courage it gave him. “Go on, I bet that girl’s here again—what did you say her name was? Julie?”
“Julianna,” Drew corrected, giving Zac a sheepish smile.
That was the other reason why Zac had chosen Drew to come back to the club with him. Drew was still smitten with the girl he had, shockingly, picked up the weekend before. All Zac needed to do was convince Drew to text her and see if she was coming out again—she was—and he had both a friend to accompany him and something to distract Drew while he searched for Jordan.
The problem was, Zac really didn’t know how to begin. If Jordan was a regular, then perhaps the bartender knew him. Zac didn’t really relish the idea of asking the bartender if he’d seen a really hot dude in a dress, though. Instead, Zac decided just to sit at the bar, getting progressively less sober, and hope that Jordan eventually materialized.
When he finally did, Zac could have sworn that the actual air in the bar changed. There was an almost tangible electric charge to it, a tingle running up Zac’s back before he even saw Jordan. He turned his head and his suspicions were confirmed. A tall, thin figure had just walked through the door, headed for the bar, and even though his memory was tainted by alcohol, Zac recognized him immediately. This time, he wore a skin tight blue dress but his lips were just as cherry red as Zac remembered and his eyes sparkled under a heavy coat of glitter.
“Fancy seeing you again,” Jordan said as he closed the space between them. Although he smiled pleasantly enough, Zac wasn’t entirely sure that Jordan was so happy to see him again.
“You—you remember me,” Zac said dumbly.
“Of course I do,” Jordan replied. “I hope you don’t think I’m that much of a slut, although I suppose I can where you’d get that impression.”
Zac shook his head. “No, I didn’t mean—it’s just, well, the whole night is a bit hazy for me. I didn’t know how much you would remember.”
Jordan’s eyes darkened a bit, Zac thought, but he couldn’t be sure. The heavily painted lids obscured them as Jordan lowered his head for a moment. Finally, he lifted it again, his smile much smaller than it had been. “I wasn’t quite as far gone as you were. My memory is good. Very good.”
“And you were very good,” Zac replied, surprising himself both with his words and the husky tone his voice took on. Was he flirting? He was flirting. He sat his whiskey down on the bar, deciding perhaps he’d had enough.
“Zac,” Jordan said, reaching out to rest his hand gently on Zac’s arm. “What we did… it was fun. I’m not trying to deny that. I meant what I said in the note I left you. I do truly hope that you had a good time and you aren’t over thinking what it means for you. I know it was… a first for you.”
“It was,” Zac agreed. “But you didn’t… you didn’t leave a number or any way for me to contact you again. So how could you say you wanted to do it again but not give me some way to find you?”
“Well, you found me, didn’t you?” Jordan asked, a flirty smirk gracing his lips for a fraction of a second before his face darkened again. “I meant everything else I said, but… honestly, a big part of me was trying to let you down gently. Give you an out if you didn’t want to see me again. You were drunk. Shitfaced, really. Who knew if you would even feel the same way when sober?”
“But I did.” Zac was starting to feel pathetic. Was he the only one here who felt anything? He’d had too much to drink again, he supposed, because he couldn’t make sense of this at all.
“I’m sure you did,” Jordan replied, finally pulling his hand back from Zac’s arm. “But here you are, drunk again. Are you truly sure you felt the same way, if you had to be drunk to see me again?”
Zac shook his head. “I didn’t mean… it’s not like that. I mean, yeah, I was nervous. So I had a few drinks. That’s not a crime, is it?”
“I just wouldn’t feel right if I let you jump into something that, while your body may be saying it wants, your mind isn’t so sure about. And that’s the message I’m getting from you here.”
“I don’t understand. Are you… you really saying that you don’t want…” Zac trailed off. He sounded pathetic, begging this guy to be with him.
Jordan gave him a sad smile. “I just think you need to put some more thought into what you’re doing here. That’s all. If this is really what you want… well, we’ll see how that changes things. But for right now, I’m not sure this is best for either of us.”
Zac could do little more than stare at Jordan and shake his head. Any sort of intelligent argument against what Jordan had said was beyond him.
“Now,” Jordan said, painting on a well-rehearsed fake smile. “I’m going to go make my rounds. But it was good to see you again. I mean that. Truly.”
“Yeah,” Zac replied weakly as he watched Jordan walk away. “Good to see you again, too.”
He couldn’t watch Jordan walk away. Instead, he turned back to the bar and downed the rest of his whiskey. Then ordered another. Maybe Jordan had a point about how much he was drinking. But it wasn’t to change his mind, was it? It was just for the courage to do something that was brand new to him. It didn’t mean that he didn’t feel the same way sober. It just didn’t.
But how could he convince Jordan of that?
Zac ordered one more beer, but it didn’t help to clear his head. He didn’t think anything could, except perhaps some real answers from Jordan. Some closure. He realized that was what he yearned for from Carly, too, and while he knew it wasn’t fair to pin all of that frustration on this new stranger, right then he couldn’t help himself. It just wasn’t fair for Jordan to blow him off without giving Zac a chance to understand what he felt.
With that thought in mind, he hopped off his bar stool and stumbled around the bar until he saw the now familiar blonde curls standing by the front door, chatting with the bouncer.
“Jordan,” Zac said. “Can you not—can we just talk? About this… about us…”
The bouncer raised an eyebrow at Zac and flashed Jordan a questioning look. Jordan just shook his head, as if to assure him that there was nothing to worry about. With a small sigh, he took Zac’s hand and said, “Okay. But let’s go outside. You look like you need some fresh air.”
Zac nodded and let himself be pulled outside by Jordan, shamelessly staring at his ass as they went. It was straining against the material of the dress, perfectly round and just feminine enough to pass. And Zac just wanted to touch it, to touch all of Jordan, to feel his confusingly feminine and masculine body pressed up against his.
“Well?” Jordan asked, finally coming to a stop several yards away from the club’s door where no one else was around to eavesdrop on their conversation. “Did you have… something else to say?”
Zac tried to compose himself and gather his thoughts, but the fog of alcohol made it difficult. Finally, he dove right in. “It’s just, I guess… well… how can I figure out what I really want if you won’t see me again? I know how I think I feel about you, I know what we did, but I don’t know… all I know is I want you again. I want more. I want to know if this is really what I want, and it’s not about whether I’m gay or straight or whatever. It’s about you. So how can I figure it out without you?”
“Oh, Zac,” Jordan replied, reaching out to brush his cheek. “It is about me, though. You’re right. And I can’t… I don’t know how to make you understand, but I can’t do that for you. I can’t be with you again. It’s not about you, anything you are or anything you did. It’s about me, and if I told you more than that… well, you wouldn’t like me very much.”
“How can you know that until you’ve told me whatever it is?” Zac asked.
“You just have to trust me on this. It would change everything, and not for the better. Just please… trust me on this.”
Zac shook his head. “Trust me. I know we’ve just met, but why can’t you trust that I’m a good enough person not to hate you for whatever you think is so awful?”
“I can’t,” Jordan replied, the word catching in his throat a little. “I can’t, Zac. Because there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that if you got to know me just a little bit more, you would hate me forever. I can’t risk that. That’s why I wanted to leave it where it was. Just one good night that you hopefully wouldn’t dwell on forever. I’m so sorry that… that, I don’t know, you got more attached than that. I didn’t anticipate that you would seek me out again.”
“I don’t understand,” Zac said.
“No, you don’t,” Jordan replied. “That’s the point. And I hope you don’t understand. I know it doesn’t make any sense, but I promise, I’m doing this for your sake.”
Zac knew he was pouting, but he didn’t care. “For once in my life, it would really be nice if people would let me make my own decisions and believe that I’m capable of knowing what I want.”
“I’m so sorry.” Jordan stepped in closer and placed both of his hands on Zac’s cheeks. “I wish that I could fix that for you. I really do. And I wish I could help you to understand why it has to be this way, but all I can do is promise you that it does. If I could… if I could make it different, believe me, I would.”
“Will I ever understand? Someday?” Zac asked, finding himself strangely on the verge of tears. He hadn’t cried since the day he found Carly with Byron; in spite of his pathetic, melancholy personality, he really wasn’t a crier.
Jordan shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe. But for now, we have to leave it here. We have to.”
Before Zac could protest again, Jordan turned and walked away. There wasn’t as much sway in his hips as usual, and it made Zac wonder just how much this was hurting him. Zac wasn’t even sure why it hurt him so much to have someone he barely knew walk away from him and tell him it was over. He supposed he was just tired of having his heart broken, tired of being told what he could and couldn’t have.
And, apparently, he couldn’t have Jordan.