This Place Could Eat Him Alive

Brent is the kind of guy who knows he's hot shit, but most people like him anyway. Maybe it's because he hates public speaking, and he'll always blush and trip over his words which everyone seems to think is just adorable. After he sits back down, he heaves a dramatic sigh of relief and laughs. The rest of the table where he is seated laughs with him and pats him on the back. I find it vaguely sickening. Since when should anyone be congratulated for fucking up?

I think it's mostly his looks. The most perfect face you've ever seen: symmetrical, patrician, but not so elegant as to be unapproachable. His body is admirably tall and slender, but not so thin as to appear frail or stringy. He has the kind of straight, fine, dark blond hair that makes you want to run your hands through it.

We work for a fundraising company in downtown Boston that is always holding these sorts of circle-jerk social events in which people congratulate each other and drink a lot. I detest them. As for what I think about Brent, well, I guess you might qualify my feelings on him as mixed.

Okay, I might as well admit it: I have had some rather sexually explicit dreams about the man. They bother me. Not because I'm not out as gay at work (I don't go around announcing it, but there are people who are aware, and I don't mind). No, it's because at first there was nothing I especially liked about Brent. His chat around the office was mostly dull, except for his occasional contribution of an admittedly disarming smile or his musical baritone laugh.

I sound like I have a crush on him, don't I. Well, perhaps. And perhaps I also sound like a bitter nobody, envious of Brent because he has the looks and the charm that I lack. I have ambition and intelligence, but there is nothing that can ever equal being simply easy to like.

But that's not the whole story.

One evening, I made a poised and eloquent (but, secretly to myself, sarcastic and exasperated) speech presenting an award to some eager young go-getter. I can't recall her name, but she had raised an impressive amount of money for us that quarter. Leaving the event, I overheard some elevator chatter about Brent.

"Well, I'm pretty sure the suit Brent was wearing tonight is a knockoff, honestly. A good one, maybe, but a knockoff." This was from Tim, who had a trust fund and didn't need to work.

Erin, the office gossip, chimed in: "I feel like Brent is okay, I guess, but sometimes he says super triggering things. Plus, someone told me he cheated on his wife with another man and that's why she left him. I'm sorry, but that's not the kind of behavior we want around here."

I was suddenly flooded with compassion for Brent. I'd been an asshole. We all had. This place could eat him alive. I resolved to approach him the next day, if I could manage to overcome my reaction to that smile.

My opportunity came the next morning in the coffee shop next door to our office. Like a creepy stalker, I knew his order: medium coffee, one cream, no sugar. I wanted to taste it, wanted to know why he liked his coffee that way. I wanted to know him.

He was ahead of me in line, but after I got my usual cappuccino, I saw that he'd spotted me and held the door on his way out. "Hey," he said, with a toned-down version of That Smile. "How's it going, Drew?"

I found myself more talkative than usual. "Good, thanks. You're smart to get a regular coffee. No way to know how long I'll be able to afford these cappuccinos, with our job security not exactly being in the end zone right now."

He nodded. "Truth. I just started here so I'd probably be the first to go, but I guess it could happen to anyone. I know you have a great reputation here, though."

Brent was genuinely sweet. I wanted to kiss him right at that moment. But I had to decide how to act like a normal person and continue the conversation instead.

"I'm sure you'll do just fine," I said. "With your looks and charisma, you've got everything it takes to succeed here."

This got a much unexpected reaction from Brent. His dynamic face fell, and he sighed. "I moved here just for this job. My relationship recently ended, and I don't have anything else. And I know people everywhere are sharks and they'll eat you up. I can't expect much, but. You know what I mean?"

The cynical side of my mind said: Drew, he's playing you. He knows you have influence in the company. He doesn't want a connection, doesn't want friendship. He certainly doesn't want anything like love.

I could feel myself pulling back. Distancing myself from him. I needed to take action before we finished our coffees, entered the office, and possibly never said anything meaningful to each other again. So I asked, of all the ridiculous things, if he had seen the fish tank on the fourth floor of the office building.

He laughed a little. "No, I didn't know there was one. Are you inviting me to go look at it?" And there came a hint of that sparkling smile.

"I think we have a few minutes, yeah. Right this way, and I will show you some rather pointless but nonetheless pleasant-looking fish. In a tank."

"You've got a deal, Drew." I loved the way he said my name.

I've always thought the fish were like fake flowers: pretty, but ostentatious and depressing in the same way that thousand-dollar ergonomic chairs and lobby sculptures that nobody ever had time to look at were. Brent, though, watched them carefully for about thirty seconds before seeming to drift off in thought. Then he shook his head a little, and to my slight shock, put his hand on my shoulder. He looked directly at me, and his eyes were a pale green.

"Thanks for taking me up here," he said. "Maybe we could get a drink after work sometime." As if it was nothing. As if he made this kind of request all the time, which I was certain he did. But for a moment after he asked, I saw those green eyes flicker down and to the left before they returned to meet mine. I saw sadness, and then I saw hope.

I could barely breathe to answer, because of those eyes. But somehow I managed to smile and say, "Sure. How about tonight?" This must have been my public-speaking skills taking over. He was so shy. I had my hand on his shoulder too, then, and my arms found their way around his body. His eyes closed. I kissed him, softly, right there in front of the fish tank. There was nobody else on the fourth floor except us. He pressed up against me, and I felt him getting hard. My own dick responded, and I whispered: "Brent. Not in front of the fish."

I was rewarded with that musical laugh of his. "Okay, I'll see you after work then," he whispered back.

I came across him smoking a cigarette outside after work. I didn't know he smoked. There were many things I didn't know about him. We walked down the street to a bar nearby.

"What are you drinking?" I asked.

He seemed nervous. "I'll have a, uh, gin and tonic."

I asked the bartender to make it two. "I wouldn't have figured you for a gin and tonic type," I remarked.

"I'm not. I usually drink Jack and Coke. But I wanted to seem classy." He laughed and looked away.

"Brent, please. You can have whatever you want. Cancel that order," I called to the bartender, "he'll have a Jack and Coke and I'll have a scotch on the rocks." The bartender smirked, and I could imagine her thoughts: first date.

That, it was. We talked about the fish we had seen, and then about how the workday had gone. I learned that he lived alone now, but had a two-year-old daughter, Isla, with his ex-wife. He showed me a picture of a little blond girl sitting in a toy fire truck. "She looks like a very good driver," I said.

I myself had no family or children. I'd been in foster care and aged out of the system at eighteen, but had been recognized as intellectually gifted and ambitious. Yes, I have always been proud of my strengths, and wary of people like Brent who seemed to have no need for things like pride or grace.

There was a brief awkward silence after looking at the picture of his daughter. I had many questions, none of which I knew how to ask. But then he said: "Drew, I want you to know something. Alicia from billing told me about you. She said she thought you'd be a good person to reach out to, because you came up from basically nothing and built your entire career yourself and you're one of the most powerful people she knows."

I was horrified.

This was why he wanted to spend time with me? Because Alicia from billing said I could help him go places?

He must have seen it on my face. He took my hand. "Drew, I'm sorry, that came out wrong. I'm so- that's really not what I meant. I don't know why I said it. Okay? That's not the reason I'm here with you."

"Okay," I said. "But you should know that I did not come up from nothing. I am not nothing." I felt tears prick my eyes. I didn't cry.

Brent looked like he wanted to crawl under the bar. "Drew. I like you. That's all it is. I want to get to know you. It has nothing to do with anything Alicia said."

I took a sip of scotch. I tried not to look at him, but I couldn't help it. This beautiful man seemed to be interested in me. Me: at least fifteen years older than him, and maybe a seven on a scale of one to ten in looks, while he was a definite ten.

Still, I knew I would have to be the one who decided what happened next. "I understand," I said. "I heard them talking about you on the elevator. Everyone seems to be fascinated with you. And I can see why."

That shy smile again. "I'm going to pay for these drinks," he said in what seemed to be an almost mock-decisive tone, "and then I'd like it if you came back to my place with me. If you want to, that is."

If I wanted to. Who was he kidding? Of course I did.

As he opened the door to his place, he looked back at me and raised his eyebrows. "Come in?" he said.

"Yes, I think I will. Do you have a fish tank here?"

He laughed and shook his head. Then he closed and locked the door, and in one smooth movement like a dancer, drew me in for a kiss. Deep, this time. I'm not sure how we got our coats off. Then, we were on the couch and he was on top of me, unbuttoning my shirt. His hands slid over my chest, and he kissed me again as I unbuttoned his. Shirts off, we were both breathing hard, unbuckling and unzipping each other's pants. We were both hard. His dick had prominent veins and a large circumcised head, flushed red.

I took it in my hand and began to stroke, as I released my own. He lowered his head and flicked his tongue against my slit. I wanted his lips on me, but I said "not yet. Turn around, sixty-nine so I can still touch you."

I couldn't stop pulling on him with my hand, starting to feel him get wet with precum. It was this, him dripping, that made me start to moan as he turned his body around on top of me and took me into his mouth. His lips slid up and down as I began to explore his balls, lifting them and rolling his sac in my hand. Then starting to lick them.

He lowered his head further, taking me deeper into his mouth until the head of my dick hit the back of his throat. Sucking harder, until I cried out. I was cumming in his mouth, grabbing his hair. He swallowed and I kept licking and sucking his balls, stroking his dick. "Cum for me, Brent."

He started to shake, and I squeezed his dick as he shot like a fountain onto my chest. "Oh fuck." He raised himself off of me, leaned over and kissed my mouth. His green eyes half-closed, and that somehow sad smile still on his face. "I made a mess all over you," he said.

"I don't mind," I replied. And I didn't.