Empty Net by Avon Gale Page A

moods rolled off Isaac like water off stone, liked that for once someone wasn’t letting him get away with his terrible attitude. Isaac apparently expected better of him. And when Laurent gave it to him, Isaac was proud. And Isaac was so good at kissing.
    It just means he’s going to hate you when you fuck this up. He’s the best person you’ve ever met. Why do you think you’re anything near good enough for him?
    Laurent grabbed his phone and thought about texting Isaac and telling him to fuck off, that he wasn’t going out to dinner with some fag, or whatever mean thing he could say so Isaac would want nothing to do with him. But the thought of using that word suddenly made Laurent intensely angry. At himself, for all the times he’d ever said it.
    He never meant it as anything other than a way to rile someone up or hurt them or make them back off, but he realized that wasn’t how other people used it. People like his father. They meant it as an insult. They thought people like Isaac were somehow less because of who they loved.
    People like Laurent. Because the evidence was pretty strong that he too was gay or bisexual. Maybe his father had always known, and that was just one more thing he wanted to take away from Laurent, like he took away hockey.
    Laurent always had a hard time standing up to his father, but if he canceled his date because he was afraid he wasn’t good enough for Isaac, then his father would win. Again.
    No.
    Laurent put his phone in the back pocket of his jeans, ran a comb through his hair, and stared at himself in the mirror. Isaac thought he was hot, and Laurent was glad. He noticed his own good looks with detached objectivity, aware that people found him attractive. He’d heard people say how it was a good thing he looked like his mom, because his father was a great goalie but not the least bit attractive. And he knew that was also a sore spot with Denis, as if he might have liked his son if he hadn’t dared to be born with the same good looks that had drawn Denis to Laurent’s mother.
    His phone buzzed, and there was a text from Isaac.
    Want to come down?
    Laurent stood up, grabbed his keys and his wallet, and left.
    He was surprised to see Mrs. Bowen at the bottom of the stairs. Her hair was in curlers, and she was wearing a housecoat like it was bedtime. She probably had eaten dinner at four thirty.
    “You look nice,” she said and gave him a sly smile. “Do you have a date?”
    “Yes,” Laurent said, surprising himself. But he remembered that hot plate, and how she let him move in without a deposit when no one else would.
    She winked. “With the young man in the Jeep? He looks nervous. That’s good. Keep ’em on their toes,” she said. And then before Laurent could even think of what to say, she said, “Have fun and don’t let him drink and drive.”
    She disappeared into her apartment and left Laurent staring in shock at her door.
    One more assumption he’d made that he clearly shouldn’t have—that Mrs. Bowen would care he was dating a guy just because she was old. Laurent gave a shake of his head and went outside.
    Isaac wasn’t nervous. Ever. Laurent opened the passenger-side door.
    “Hey.”
    “Hi,” Isaac said, and his eyes lingered appreciatively in a way that Laurent didn’t mind as he climbed in the Jeep. He’d never been glad to be attractive before, but it was nice that something about him was pleasing and didn’t involve as much work as it took to change his attitude.
    Though Laurent was in the car with Isaac often enough, including earlier that day, he wondered if he was supposed to say something date-like and had no idea what that would be.
    Well. If Isaac wanted someone good at dating, he wouldn’t have asked Laurent out.
    Even Isaac was quiet as he drove, but Laurent was used to silence and didn’t mind. He covertly studied Isaac as best he could, which wasn’t much, given how dark it was outside. He was also wearing jeans and what looked like a