An American Homo in Paris (3 page)

A crowd of tourists had stopped to watch him, taking photos and clapping when he finished, all laughing and excited. One tried to shove a few Euros in his hand, but Benji waved her off and pulled his shoes back on, laughing. His smile lit him up inside, and it hit Ziri like a punch in the gut. One thing was absolutely certain— he needed to come up with a dare so wild, so audacious, that Benji picked the forfeit instead. But how to get him to say Aaron’s name on the Metro?

“I can’t believe I did that.” Benji groaned, but he was still grinning. “You are a bad influence.”

“You were wonderful.” Ziri meant it. “You made me want that kiss even more.”

Benji rolled his eyes. “Yeah, okay, whatever. I’m going to upload this video now.”

When he was done, they started walking north.

“What is your favorite part of Paris?” Ziri asked, hoping for a hint of where they should go next. “The clubs? The food?”

“The food is great; I’m kind of addicted to those ham sandwiches. But really I think— I think it’s just how old everything is. How much history is here. I mean, you don’t see stuff like this in Idaho. I think I’ll miss that part a lot.”

Ziri couldn’t imagine. He’d lived in or near Paris his entire life, the evidence of millennia of civilization all around him. It was in the streets he walked and the words he spoke. History was a tangible thing here. He liked that Benji appreciated that about the city. Damn, why did this guy have to be leaving tomorrow?

“And your least favorite part?”

Benji’s eyes dropped to the ground and his smile disappeared. “No one hugs here. At home, my friends, we all— it’s stupid. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”

Ziri’s heart lurched a little. “No, it’s okay.”

“My friends at home, we’d hug. All the time. When we were happy. When we were sad. Just to say hello. My friend Carrie, she gives these
epic
hugs, just to say hi. But here, it’s all handshakes and cheek kisses. Sometimes, you just really need a hug, you know? You just need someone to…”

He sniffed and wiped at his eyes. “I’m sorry, I’m really homesick— but I also kind of wish I weren’t leaving. I can’t wait to be home, but I’d gotten really attached to the idea of living in Paris with the love of my life.”

“It’s okay.” Ziri rubbed at Benji’s shoulder, not quite comfortable with the idea of a hug, and yet wanting to offer comfort how he could.

Benji sniffed again, digging the heel of his hand into his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.” He pulled Benji closer and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. Half a hug. But then Benji turned into him, wrapped both arms around Ziri’s waist, and
clung,
burying his face in Ziri’s shoulder. Wow, yeah, full-blown hug. The contact of that strong body pressing against his made Ziri bite back a groan. He tried to remind himself that Benji had just been left by his lover, that he was sad and just looking for comfort, but damn, it felt good to hold and be held. It was intimate— it crossed a line for him, and it made him want to cross more. As many more as he could. He squeezed Benji gently, experimentally, and Benji squeezed back and pulled away.

“Thank you.” Benji gave one last squeeze before letting go completely. “I really needed that.”

“You’re welcome.” Ziri ducked his head. “I can see why Americans like those so much.”

Benji laughed, wiping at his eyes again, and Ziri tugged his arm.

“I know where we should go next.
Allons-y
!”

****

Quartier Pigalle

“The Moulin Rouge?” Excitement bubbled up in Benji as he looked up at the iconic windmill sign. He turned to Ziri, who was watching him with a sly grin.

“Do you want to see the show?” he asked.

“Are you kidding me?” Benji looked at the windmill again. Yeah, he’d been wanting to see a show at the Moulin Rouge since he arrived in Paris, but it was expensive, and Aaron didn’t like theater. Thank god he didn’t say that aloud— Ziri would probably make him
audition
for a show at the Moulin Rouge for that. “I’d love to, but…”

“Then we go. I invited you, it’s my treat.” Ziri took his hand and squeezed it. “It’s too late for lunch, but we can still see the matinée.”

“This isn’t… it isn’t too touristy?”

Ziri raised an eyebrow. “Parisians love our city too.”

Benji followed Ziri’s lead as they were led to their seats and a bottle of champagne was poured. Ziri smiled and raised his glass. “
À la vôtre
.”

“
À la vôtre
,”
Benji repeated.

During the show, Benji found his gaze wandering to his companion, and he studied him in the dark. Ziri’s close-cropped hair would be curly, Benji decided, if it grew longer. Short like this, it would be soft and spiky against his palm, and his fingers itched to touch it. Yeah, he’d felt that stuttered breath when he hugged Ziri earlier— this was no one-sided attraction. It felt strange and new to look at a man like this, to really study a man with sexual interest— a man who wasn’t Aaron. Sticky feelings, awkward and exciting, but they hurt a little too. Sure, he’d checked guys out while he was dating Aaron, but that was about fantasy.

Ziri wasn’t fantasy. He was
possibility
.

And impossibility.

Benji reached out without thinking and touched Ziri’s hand. Ziri glanced over at him, a question on his face, and that moment of surprised eye contact made something in Benji split in two, spilling out yearning and regret and desire so fierce it took his breath away. He slipped his hand into Ziri’s and mouthed the word “
merci
.”

Ziri didn’t pull his hand away.

After the show, as they were walking toward the Metro, a guy with dreadlocks shouted something from across the street. Ziri looked up and grinned. “Come on.”

The man kissed Ziri’s cheeks and offered Benji a hand to shake.

“Alain. Are you a friend of Ziz?” he asked in heavily accented English.

“Ziz?”

“It’s a nickname,” Ziri explained. “My friends and family call me that. You can too, if you like.” His smile was warm, and Benji blushed a little at being invited to call Ziri what was obviously an intimate name. “Alain is Hélène’s boyfriend; he works in a music store near here.”

“
Enchanté
.”
That was a word Benji knew well enough, having endured all of Aaron’s tedious job-related dinner parties.

“Excuse me for just a moment, Benji.”

The two Frenchmen launched into rapid conversation, gesturing with their hands and laughing. It didn’t bother Benji— wasn’t he used to this by now? But it did give him time to study Ziri in the late afternoon sunlight, like he had during the show. And damn, he liked what he saw.

If Aaron was a throbbing sore spot on his heart, Ziri was the best kind of balm— distracting and gentle and full of light.

As Benji watched, Ziri clapped his friend on the shoulder, leaned in and bussed his cheek, then turned back to Benji.

“Ready?”

“Where are we going next?”

Ziri cocked his head to the side and studied Benji for a moment. “Is there a place in Paris you’ve wanted to go, but haven’t had a chance yet?”

Benji thought about it— he’d seen most of the sights, many of them multiple times. “Père Lachaise.”

Ziri raised an eyebrow and gestured to the Metro stairs.
“
Après toi
.”

They barely had to wait for a train, and the car they boarded was crowded. They stood close together, bodies brushing, and when Benji wobbled on his feet, Ziri slung an arm around his waist to steady him.

“Why haven’t you visited Père Lachaise?”

“Aaron said it was morbid.” The words popped out before Benji had a chance to think, and as soon as he realized, he clapped a hand over his mouth.

“Too late.” Ziri held out his hand. “Phone.”

Benji handed over his phone.

Ziri opened the video camera and started recording. “Benji has done it again, and now he needs to swap pants with me.” He handed the phone to a girl seated nearby, whispering something in French, and she held it up in one hand, stifling a laugh with the other.

Benji stared as Ziri unbuckled his belt. He was
serious
.
The guy was going to take off his pants.
On the Metro.

Ziri’s pants pooled around his ankles, and he stepped out of them, standing in the middle of a laughing, clapping crowd in nothing but his t-shirt and a pair of purple briefs. Teasingly, he looked up and down Benji’s body, and Benji took the unspoken hint and let his own gaze follow the lines of Ziri’s tanned skin from face to—
don’t look at— dammit.
Okay, it was a nice bulge. Benji closed his eyes. When he opened them, Ziri held out his pants with an expectant expression.

“You may still forfeit, if you like.”

Benji’s hands went to his own belt, and he channeled his inner stripper. Before today, he wouldn’t have said he had an inner stripper. He wouldn’t have said he had an inner Gaga either, but the fountain episode had proven
that
wrong too. He was half-hard from seeing Ziri in his underwear, and everyone on the train was about to see it. The thought actually kind of turned him on more.

Fuck it. He took a deep breath and tried not to think about Ziri’s muscular thighs as he kicked off his shoes. He jutted one hip and bit his lip, peering at Ziri from under his eyelashes as he dropped his zipper. Ziri bit his own lip and groaned a little, hamming it up for their audience, but hell if that didn’t go straight to Benji’s cock, now trying to push its way out of his unzipped pants.

That’s about the point it all went south. Benji tried to peel out of his skinny jeans, holding onto the pole for balance, but his feet got tangled and he spilled forward and fell into Ziri.

“This isn’t fair. My pants are harder to take off,” he muttered, face flushing.

Ziri’s eyes sparkled as he took Benji’s jeans from him. “Our stop is three stops away.”

Benji grabbed Ziri’s pants and pulled them on, then watched as Ziri struggled into his jeans. Turnabout was fair play, because Ziri was flushed and struggling to tuck his own not-so-flaccid cock into Benji’s pants. Finally finished, he thrust his hands in the air and grinned.

The thrill of public exposure and the relief of not getting caught flooded Benji’s veins like an electric current, and around them, the train car erupted in applause. He gave a little bow, then reclaimed his phone.

As he was uploading the video to YouTube, he noticed the view count on the fountain video had hit 20,000 views. He’d never had that many before. “Hey, check this out—” he showed it to Ziri. “I guess my people like you.”

****

An American Homo in Paris on YouTube

Post-Aaron Dare #2

In a crowded subway car, Ziri faces the camera, a mournful expression on his face.

“Benji has done it again,” he says. “And now he needs to swap pants with me.”

There’s a rush of movement as the camera changes hands and a murmured conversation in French. Then, the camera settles and Ziri removes his pants and holds them out to Benji.

—SHOW MORE—

JennyIRead
: OMG!!!
#ziji

CarrieandMike
: Benji, OMG. Call me.

Boyluvsboys
: you guys are my heroes. I’d bottom for either of you.

JennyIRead:
BLB, stop trying to sink the ship!

Boyluvsboys:
Cannot with you, Jenny.

—SHOW MORE—

****

Cimetière Père Lachaise

God, Ziri was nervous. He hoped he hadn’t played this wrong. If he had, he could always blame all the blood in his brain going to the little head when he saw Benji in his underwear on the Metro. His cheeks heated at the memory of Benji striking that sexy pose and teasing him. He had to hand it to the American— he knew how to work a crowd.

He watched Benji’s face as they approached the glass-surrounded tomb. The glass was covered with lipstick marks and messages scrawled across it. Benji’s jaw dropped a little, his hands balled into fists at his sides, and then he looked at Ziri.

“That’s— Ziz.” The intimacy of his nickname on Benji’s lips stirred Ziri, but when the look of wonder broke out on Benji’s face, that’s when he knew he’d gotten it right. “That’s Oscar Wilde’s tomb.”

“J’ai pensé—”
Ziri swallowed. Lots of Americans headed straight for Jim Morrison’s tomb. And why wouldn’t they? But this was Benji. And while he didn’t know for sure how Benji felt about the late lead singer of The Doors, he had a pretty good idea that a man who titled his blog “An American Homo in Paris” would have some affection for Wilde. “I thought this would be why.”

He stood back and watched as Benji approached the tomb and studied it. The expressions on the American’s face swung like a pendulum from wonder to grief and back again. His lips moved as he read the epitaph, chin trembling as he got to
“
And outcasts always mourn
.”
Finally, he wiped at his eyes and returned to Ziri, pulling him into a tight embrace. “Thank you.”

Ziri wrapped his arms around Benji and hugged him back. “This is a place of mourning,
oui.
But also, celebration. He’s honored here in a way he couldn’t have been at the end of his life.”

Benji nodded into his shoulder, then let go. “Where to now?”

Ziri looked at the clock on his phone. “Dinner,” he said decisively.

****

They lingered over dinner and then a second bottle of wine, neither of them wanting the night to end. They left the restaurant and found a quiet bar by the Seine, not far from the apartment Benji had shared with Aaron. They swapped pants again— this time in the privacy of a restroom, thank-you-very-much— and then Ziri told him stories of his childhood in a mostly Algerian neighborhood in Saint Denis, and Benji talked about growing up in a redneck town in Idaho.

Benji found himself watching Ziri’s lips move as he talked, and the way his honey-brown eyes seemed to light up when they discovered something they had in common. Every inch of Benji’s skin seemed to tingle and ache, and he couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that his pants had been warm from Ziri’s skin. Ziri’s muscular thighs had stretched the denim. Ziri’s cock had pressed against this zipper. Who knew letting someone wear your pants could feel like having them under your skin?