I was utterly and truly in love with him. I couldn’t imagine my life without him in it. And I needed him to know that.
All I could do was hope he loved me too.
Part Five: Love
Taylor
Standing outside Putney Bridge Tube station while it poured it with rain was not how I’d envisioned spending my Friday afternoon.
Luckily, I had both a large umbrella, courtesy of Simon, and an awning to stand under. That meant I was relatively dry, but considering I was just recovering from a bad cold, I wasn’t sure standing out in the freezing November rain was healthy. If I got sick again, I was one thousand percent blaming Connor.
Connor was my childhood best friend, who I’d met when I was twelve and we’d been forced to sit next to each other by our new high school maths teacher. We’d spent the first six weeks ignoring each other and then eventually bonded over a shared dislike of the band McFly, when all the girls in our class had been fawning over them. We’d been thick as thieves ever since, and our friendship had survived everything from family illnesses to bad breakups and Connor’s fake tan and glitter lip gloss period. Although to be fair to him, we’d been teenagers in Essex in the early 2000s. I was one of the only people in our class who hadn’t gone through being various shades of orange.
Thankfully, Connor’s make-up skills had improved a fuck-ton since then.
My phone flashed in my hand and a message from the man in question popped up on the screen, telling me his train was just pulling into the station. I smiled at the number of little sparkling hearts that followed his words. I hadn’t seen Connor since the summer when he’d come down to London for Pride, and I’d missed him.
He was easy to spot as he walked through the crowd. He was petite and looked like he’d just stepped off a runway in dark skinny jeans, knee-high heeled boots, a cream sweater, and a loose, black wool coat. His make-up was flawless as usual, and I wondered how he managed to look like a million bucks after spending three hours on a packed train while I looked like a sweaty mess after just ten minutes.
“Taylor!” Connor launched himself at me, wrapping himself around my waist and giving me an enormous hug, squeezing me so tightly I thought I was going to pass out. For someone so slim and petite, I was pretty convinced Connor could flaw me in a single punch if he wanted. He could probably take Simon too.
“Hey, babe! It’s good to see you again,” I said, once he’d let go and allowed air to return to my lungs. Connor flashed me a warm, cheeky smile.
“I know. However have you survived without me?”
“Drinking mostly.”
“I missed you too.” Connor laughed, kissing me lightly on the cheek.
“That better not leave a mark.” The days when Connor had worn sticky lip glosses had been the bane of my existence. My cheeks had been permanently covered in glittery pink goo that refused to be wiped off.
“Please, I use better products than that,” Connor said, then he smiled deviously. “Why? Got someone in your life who wouldn’t want you being kissed?”
“No,” I said, but even I heard the catch in my voice. Dammit! I’d already asked Simon if we could keep the whole whatever we were doing away from Connor because he could be ridiculously nosey when he wanted to be, and I didn’t want to spend my whole night being given the third degree. I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t told Connor about what we were doing, since I’d never been shy about my sex life before. It was probably because it involved Simon, and he deserved better.
There was also the fact I didn’t even know what to call our arrangement anymore. It was abundantly clear we’d moved on from just hooking up, but we’d never actually talked about what we were doing. We’d spent the whole week sharing a bed for Christ’s sake. And not in a sexy way either. I mean, we still had sex, but we also cuddled while we slept. Simon made such a good little spoon and it was amazing waking up with him in my arms, his beautiful ass pressed against me.
“You have!” Connor exclaimed gleefully. “Who is it?”
“Seriously, it’s nothing.” I turned to head out of the station, flicking up my umbrella. Connor watched me with a calculating look before producing his own umbrella and adjusting the bags on his shoulder. I held out my hand and Connor sighed, handing one over. We’d had this argument several times in the past, and I always won.
“You’d be mad if you dropped your shoes,” I said, hefting the bag of Pleasers on my shoulder. How a single pair of dance shoes could be worth nearly a hundred pounds still baffled me, and that was before you started looking at the boots Connor owned. “How many pairs did you bring this time?”
“Only three,” Connor said, following me out into the rain. “Because I don’t know which ones are going to work best.”
Connor was a dancer and taught everything from ballet to pole dance, although he largely preferred the dancing part to the teaching part. He’d come to London because one of his favourite pole dancers was over from America to teach a two-day workshop at a local studio. Connor had managed to bag one of the highly coveted places and then promptly rang me up to tell me he was coming to stay.
We chatted happily as we walked down the road, casually avoiding the puddles as we filled each other in on any details about our lives we might have missed. That was the thing I loved most about Connor—no matter how long we were apart, we just picked right back up where we’d left off as if no time had passed.
“You know,” Connor said as we approached the
