Upside Down(10)

“Flowers for Algernon,” I said to the lady who was now scowling at me. She didn’t understand the enormity of this revelation, but I knew who would. I pulled out my phone, hit Merry’s number, and didn’t even give her time to say hello, though I did try and keep my voice down. “It’s not music he listens to in his headphones. It’s audiobooks. He reads books, and not just any books, Merry, but classics. Well, modern-day classics and holy fucking shit could he be any more perfect?”

“New phone, who dis?”

“I’m not even kidding right now,” I replied. I ignored the daggers Mother Teresa was giving me because of my colourful language. “His grandfather didn’t die, and he wasn’t heartbroken by some incomparable Adonis that I’d have to track down and kick in the shins. He was crying because of the book. Guess which audiobook he was listening to that puts him in the stratosphere of cool? Guess!”

“The Social War by Simon Mohler Landis.”

I stopped like I’d teleported to an alternative universe, blinked, then sputtered. “What the actual fuck, Merry. Who hurt you?”

She laughed. “I don’t know which book he was listening to, but I can only assume you spoke to him?”

“I made him smile. In a good way. And you haven’t guessed the book. You’ll never guess but, oh my God, Merry. He just became a twelve on the scale of one to ten on perfection.”

“This will be over a whole lot quicker if you just tell me.”

I grinned, even just thinking about it. “Flowers for Algernon.”

There was a long beat of silence. “Oh.”

“I know, right?”

“That explains the tears.”

I sighed happily. “It does. It tells me so much about him. Plus, I spoke to him. Like actual words, in somewhat semi-coherent sentences. Unlike The Social War by Mohler Landis. Jesus Christ, Merry. We need to talk about the credibility of your bibliophilism.”

She laughed again. “So can we stop calling him Headphones Guy now he has a name?”

“I think so. His name is kind of perfect, don’t you think?”

“Okay look, Jordan, I’m just going to say this at the risk of you having a freak out on the bus, in public, but I don’t want you getting way ahead of yourself so here it is. Yes, he’s gay. He’s even asexual. We know this. He said he was. What we don’t know is if he’s seeing someone, dating, or married even. Or what he does for a living.”

“What difference does his job make?”

“What if he’s an undertaker? Or a hitman?”

“Undertakers and hitmen need love too, Merry. Probably more than other people.”

She snorted. “We’re talking about this tomorrow, okay?”

Hmmm. “Fine.” I ended the call, determined once I got home I’d do some social-network stalking. How many guys living in Sydney called Hennessy could there possibly be?





Chapter Four





Hennessy





He knew who Daniel Keyes was. He knew the author and title of one of my favourite books in the world. Nobody knew who Daniel Keyes was. Well, not guys I’d dated anyway. Some were lucky to know which end of a book to hold. I had nothing against guys who didn’t read, per se, but most of them couldn’t even pretend to act interested when I told them about books I loved.

But I only had to mention the title and Jordan knew who the author was. And his eyes when I admitted it wasn’t music I was listening to… well, his grey-coloured eyes melted like silver, warm amber with hints of blue and green. And he smelt really good, and his nervous rambling was kinda cute.

At the meeting the night before, I thought he’d looked familiar and I wondered where I’d seen him before. And I’d wondered where the hell he’d seen me. What did he call me the other night? He called me Headphones Guy, so it was either to or from work, or maybe the gym. And then I recognised him on the bus. Of course I’d seen him get on the bus before, always at the same stop on Crown Street, but I didn’t reconcile him with the guy at the meeting the other night. But now it kind of clicked.

I had to admit, I was intrigued.

I’d been intrigued after the meeting, when he’d broken down the defensive walls he’d put up around his acceptance of being somewhere on the asexual spectrum. He talked a mile a minute, and it was kind of hard to follow at first, but he was clearly very smart and articulate, and he was funny as hell. But he was also vulnerable, and he was there for help on understanding and coming to terms with who he was. Being intrigued by him in a romantic way wasn’t on the cards at all. I couldn’t and wouldn’t abuse his trust in me as a support group leader.

But then he had to go and know who Daniel Keyes was, and he just had to look at me in a way that made my heart squeeze. Eye contact was such a big thing for me, and there was no way he could even know that.

So there I was at work the next day, distracted enough for Michael to notice. “You want to talk about what’s got your mind a million miles from home?”

Michael and I had known each other forever—since primary school, then high school, and later on at university where we both studied fields of computer sciences. We were never overly close as kids or at high school, but at uni we had social circles that overlapped like a Venn diagram, with him and me in the middle common element, and we just clicked.