Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 5

noticed you. More than that. I think I had about a dozen wet dreams about you that summer."
    "You're joking."
    "Nope. I remembered you. Those funky boots you used to wear. The mesh shirts. The piercings. The nipple rings… Shit, you have no idea what you did to me."
    "Why didn't you say something? Back then, I mean? I didn't think you knew I was alive." Ted was stunned, still unbelieving.
    "I was nineteen and I was just figuring out I was gay. I didn't know what to think. I was avoiding you."
    "You were avoiding me ?" Ted was sitting up now, his mouth slightly open.
    "I guess I was a good actor, even back then." Len's expression was wistful. He took a long breath and exhaled softly. "I've had to be. And I've done things I'm not very proud of. I kept telling myself it was for my career."
    "Hollywood isn't exactly breaking down the doors looking for gay actors," Ted agreed. "I'm lucky. Nobody cares if the makeup guy is queer."
    Len snorted. "They'd probably worry if he wasn't ."
    "So the supermodel you were within the photograph…?"
    "My agent's idea. But it's just show—at least it is now. I stopped sleeping with them a few years ago. I felt like a real shit, using them like that. I just couldn't do it anymore."
    Ted swallowed hard. He was pretty sure it wasn't just "using" the women, as Len had put it, which made the guy feel like shit. The pain he saw in Len's eyes was no act. He bent down over Len and brushed his lips over his jaw, then kissed him.
    "So," Len said as he pulled Ted into his arms and rolled over so they lay on their sides. "You never answered my question. Will you stay the night?"
    Ted's whispered "Yes" was lost as he kissed Len again.
    CHAPTER 5
    Thirteen months later…
    Ted yanked on the stiff collar of his tux and shifted on his feet. The reporters had left—thank God!—and he was standing backstage, waiting. He'd been waiting for a good hour now, hoping that someone would tell him what he was supposed to do, but every time he asked, they just shrugged and disappeared in the chaos. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to go back to his seat.
    Probably not , he thought, lifting the bronze statuette and staring at it. He'd never seen anyone sitting in the middle of the audience holding an Oscar in their hand when he'd watched the Academy Awards as a kid.
    A few minutes later, there was a flurry of movement from the doorway to the small room. "Teddeeeeee!" Tina shouted, throwing her arms around him and kissing him on the cheek. "We did it!"
    He wasn't going to remind her that it was his makeup design that had won them the Oscar.
    Let her enjoy it. She certainly helped make it possible.
    "So what now?" she asked when he didn't say anything.
    "No clue. I guess we just hang out backstage and see who the other winners are?"
    They made it as far as a large room with a huge flat-screen TV, not far from the stage. Too late, it seemed, to catch the Best Actor announcement.
    "Oh, no," Tina cried out. "We missed it!"
    Several of the room's occupants turned and glared at them. Ted took Tina by the hand and led her out into the hallway, a few yards away from the place where the winners were taken for photographs and press interviews. A large crowd had already gathered there, but Tina pulled him toward it, elbowing their way through until they were standing only a few rows back from the object of the press's interest. There was no mistaking the auburn hair, even over someone else's head.
    He won!
    Ted had hoped and prayed for this. He knew how hard Len had worked on the film and he'd seen how incredible the man was. He was so relieved that Len's fellow actors had seen it, too.
    Tina dragged him forward, pushing a few people out of the way to get to the front of the crowd.
    "Congratulations," Ted mouthed when he caught Len's eyes.
    Those beautiful eyes! In the six weeks they'd been living together at Len's beach house since Len had returned from shooting a new film in South America, Ted still hadn't gotten used to waking up to those eyes looking back at him. Even now, he felt his body respond.
    "Tina," he said into her ear, "we really should go." He and Len had gone to such lengths to avoid the media scrutiny, and he was hardly about to blow Len's cover now when he'd finally been recognized for the outstanding actor he was.
    "No," she said, her expression suddenly serious. "Stay here. You need to stay here."
    Ted was about to protest again when he caught her exchanging a nod with Len. "Tina, I really think—,"