"I hope this damn thing doesn't hurt your back. It's not exactly new." Annie looked with concern at the old brown plaid couch.
"It'll be fine," Steve said. He dropped his blue duffle bag on the floor and wrapped his arms around her. "Seriously Sis, thank you so much for letting me stay with you. I really needed to get out of that small town and into the city, where things happen."
Annie hugged him back. "I'm just glad you're here. It'll be good to have family around. I love my roommate, Mark. He's like another brother to me, but you and I share a history. Nobody else quite gets my jokes like my little brother."
She stepped back, ruffled his dark brown hair with her fingertips and smiled. Annie and Steve were four years apart and she had treated him like her own personal doll from the time he was born, keeping watch over him and telling her mother what to do for him in a way that had exasperated her mother at times. Annie and Steve had a connection that nothing could break.
One of the two bedroom doors opened and Mark stepped out. "Oh, great! You're here! Welcome to our humble abode!"
Mark crossed the distance quickly with his long legs and Steve put out his hand to shake but Mark just took it and pulled him in for a hug.
"Annie has told me sooo much about her little brother. We're so happy to have you here." Mark stepped back and beamed.
Steve just smiled bemusedly. "I'm... glad you feel that way and that I'm not putting you guys out."
"Absolutely not," Mark replied with a wave of his hand. "You are welcome to stay here as long as you like. Now, it's already six o'clock. I insist on taking you both out for dinner. Chinese?"
Annie looked at Steve and he nodded. "Sounds great to me."
"Okay, there is the most fabulous little place two blocks down. You're just going to love it."
*****
Looking at the menu, Steve admitted that they did not have a Chinese restaurant in the town where he and Annie had grown up so he'd only ever had the chance to try a few dishes and mostly stuck with the one he knew he liked. Mark immediately ordered a feast of different flavors for everyone to share.
"You've got to try new things or you'll never know what you like." Mark admonished him.
Mark tried to show him how to hold chopsticks. "You simply cannot eat Chinese food properly with a fork. It just isn't done."
Mark put the sticks into Steve's hand and tried to show him but Steve couldn't get the hang of it. Steve's stomach started to growl audibly.
"Wait!" Mark put up a hand. "I have it. I saw this on a cooking show once."
Mark took the wrapper the chopsticks came in and rolled it up tight then put it between the chopsticks to give Steve some leverage. Steve picked up a piece of shrimp and popped it in his mouth.
"Success!" Mark crowed. "So, Steve, what plans do you have now that you're here?"
"Well, I'm enrolled at the University for my junior year. All my community college credits transferred. I'll be looking for a job and once everything is in place, I'll get out of your hair and find a place of my own."
"No hurry," Steve shook his head. "It'll be great having you around. Another man in the house to counter your sister's estrogen. I don't exactly do a great job of that. She overwhelms me."
They laughed and dug into the food with a will, shifting plates around and sharing the different dishes that seemed so exotic to Steve. They refilled the little teacups often and ate until they were satisfied.
Annie picked up the fortune cookies and tossed them around then cracked one open. "Hmmm... I think I got yours Steve. It says 'be open to the unknown, you are embarking on a new life.'"
"Sounds like good advice to me," Mark said. He cracked open his and read. "Love will find you in an unusual way this year. Hmmm, I wonder what that could mean? Maybe that's yours Annie."
"I think it works for you," Annie replied. She cracked open her fortune. "Use the music of nature to relax. Always sound advice."
The three headed back to the apartment, stopping at the liquor store on the way for a couple bottles of wine.
*****
They had been playing Scrabble for a couple hours and were solidly into the second bottle of wine when Annie called it a night.
"I'm going to hit the hay gentlemen, I bid you adieu." She blew kisses to them and headed off to her bedroom.
"Little more wine?" Mark asked, holding the bottle and jiggling it from side to side.
"Sure," Steve replied. "Sounds good. I'm already about two sheets to the wind, might as well go for three."
They were sitting on the couch that would be Steve's bed for the night, just a foot apart. Steve's eyes kept straying to the opening of Mark's shirt, where hair peaked out, and up to his softly swept golden hair. He was struggling to keep himself from just staring openly.
Mark shifted in his seat so that one leg lay flat on the sofa between them, his ankle under the knee of his other leg. He rested his cheek against the back of the sofa. He hadn't missed the frequent heated looks Steve had tried to hide. He suspected that Steve didn't even know what he was doing.
Steve took a sip of his wine, his eyes looking into those of the man sitting opposite him over the rim of the wine glass. Was it just the wine? He'd never found another man so wildly attractive. Oh, all right, there was Jimmy in Science class and his professor of British Lit at the community college. He knew he was gay but in such a small town he'd been afraid to explore the possibilities, of which there were darn few. Earlier, when Mark had laughed and patted his knee at some inane comment Steve had made about the electric company, a jolt of electricity seemed to rush through his system.
Mark drained the rest of his wine glass, set it on the coffee table and stood. "I'd best get to bed before I fall asleep right here."
Steve popped up off the sofa and swayed. Mark reached out a hand to steady him.
"Easy there, you okay?"
"Yes, I just don't usually drink that much wine in one night."
