Paper Hearts Page 3

  “I’d hate to think her lunacy was contagious.” Dinesh gave a bitter laugh. “You know, her parents were pretty whacko too. Not the same way.” He threw himself into one of Jordan’s chairs. “They had their biases, but they didn’t go in for a lot of organized religion themselves. I thought she and Sam were the good ones, the ones who got out and made things better for themselves. I guess I was wrong.” He looked up. “Sam is the good one. I can promise you that.”

  Jordan blushed and turned to look out the window. “He’s very nice. I like him a lot. But this isn’t about Sam, or his relationships. It’s about you, and this game Ida is trying to play.”

  Dinesh chuckled. “I’d hate for you to think Sam’s likely to play the same kind of game. Or Sam’s likely to suddenly turn around and embrace some kind of right-wing religion that makes him hate himself. He’s been on his own since he was fifteen. They gave him the boot for being gay.”

  Jordan straightened up. It wasn’t appropriate for Dinesh to share this information, not at all, but his concerns for Sam’s privacy faded under his horror. “Fifteen? Who does that?”

  “Bad people. He’s okay now, you know? He’s safe, and he’s built quite the life for himself. Ida was always different. She was there for him as much as anyone could be, in that family, and she never came around looking for a handout.”

  Jordan reached out and put a hand on Dinesh’s. “It’s got to be hard to be torn like this, between your wife and your friend.”

  Dinesh opened his mouth, and then he closed it again. “I was about to say I’m not torn. It’s mostly true. I was torn, when she first started to turn her back on Sam. I’m not torn now. Sam’s always been there for me. I’m always going to be there for him. I hope whoever he winds up with in the long-term will be too.”

  Jordan wanted to be that person, as much as he wanted air to breathe. He just didn’t know what Sam wanted.

  * * * *

  Sam was Dinesh’s supervisor. In theory, that meant he should have control over where Dinesh went during the work day, and how he comported himself on the job. In practice, Sam tended to assume the people reporting to him were adults until they proved otherwise. As long as the work was done and deliverables were met, he didn’t care what process people used to get there.

  That was for most of his regular employees. When it came to Dinesh, his trust was absolute. Dinesh was his next of kin on every legal document he had. He wasn’t about to tell the guy who would be making his end of life decisions he needed to see his butt in a chair between nine and five.

  When Dinesh got back to the office from wherever he’d gone storming off to, Sam could see he needed a friend more than he needed a boss. Production on the show they’d met about in August had ground to a halt while the team pulled the old show runner back in, due to Mike Coker’s fans bombarding the studio with actual feminine products, but that wasn’t important right now. Dinesh needed someone, and LAPD could handle the fans behaving badly.

  Sam headed into Dinesh’s office and closed the door behind him.

  “Don’t worry,” Dinesh said, leaning back in his chair. “Legal found a clause in his contract that provided for termination in case of disruptive behavior. He’ll be gone as soon as we can film his death scene. It’ll be messy, too.”

  “Good. Glad to hear it. What did my charming sister have to say?”

  Dinesh groaned. “That obvious?”

  Sam chuckled and sprawled out in one of Dinesh’s visitor chairs. “Call it an educated guess.”

  “She’s trying to position things as though she kicked me out, and says she’ll take me back if I go to counseling sessions twice a week with her pastor.” He took two fistfuls of his hair and pulled. “I can’t decide if she’s sincere or if she’s just messing with me, you know?”

  Sam scoffed and gently disengaged Dinesh’s hands from his hair. “She’s trying to get more cash out of you. That’s all. What did Jordan have to say about it?” It wouldn’t change his mind about Ida, but he was dying to know Jordan’s take anyway.

  Dinesh’s mouth quirked up, just for a second. “Well, he thought the lawyer was being sincere.”

  Sam laughed and clapped his hands. “Nice, and perfectly lawyerly. He wasn’t about to trash Ida in front of you, so he had to say it that way. Adorable really.”

  “Right?” Dinesh snickered and held his head in his hands. “I definitely picked the right lawyer. Seriously, though. He did tell me he’s seen this gambit work.”

  “For real?” Something cold gripped Sam’s stomach. He’d suspected Jordan might be too good to be real.

  “Yeah—for couples that were both sincerely religious. He’s never seen it come to anything good in families like ours. Christ, I can’t understand what happened to us. What drove her to find God all of a sudden? What turned her this way? Why are you the only one who got out and stayed normal?”

  Sam looked out the window for a moment. “Well for one thing, if everyone else is acting one way and I’m the one who’s different, I’m probably not the normal one. I’m just saying. And let’s face it. None of us has exactly gone down the same road. Mom and Dad were who they were, and all of us kids found our own coping mechanisms to deal with it. The way they were, it leaves a mark on you. For a couple of my brothers—and yeah, I’ve looked into how they’re doing, every time they showed up with their hands out—it was drugs. For another couple of them it was booze. Ida’s tried a few different things now, and an opportunistic charlatan got his claws into her. Me, I found success. Nothing helps you get over your parents’ bullshit as much as being able to buy out the mortgage on their house ten times over.”

  Dinesh acknowledged this with a wry grin. “You’re not kidding. I just…for a little while there I was tempted. I thought maybe, just maybe, I could buy some time with that dumb ‘counseling’ session and make her see reason. I love her, and I don’t want to just give up.”

  Sam held his breath. “What did Jordan say?”

  “I didn’t tell him I was thinking about giving in. He just said he’d never seen something like what she was suggesting work in a case like ours. He definitely left the choice up to me. He didn’t pressure me or anything.” Dinesh picked his head up and gave Sam a long, measuring look. “I think he’s pretty into you.”

  Sam knew he was blushing, but he just looked away. “He’s into me now. A week from now, a year from now, who knows? Life is short, Dinesh. Maybe he’ll get religion and decide to go follow some weird pastor.”

  “So, what, you’re just going to string him along?” Dinesh steepled his fingers together.

  Sam stood up and walked to the window. “It’s not stringing him along, Dinesh. If things work out right, we’ll be together for a while. And then when we’re done, we’ll split up. It’s not a big deal if we don’t want it to be.” He rested his forehead against the glass. “And I doubt a divorce lawyer is going to have weird ideas about making a mountain out of a molehill, in terms of our relationship to one another.”

  He liked looking out from the windows in the office tower. The network had one of the taller buildings in Manhattan, and Programming was on one of the higher floors. On a day like today, Sam really was among the clouds. He could barely see the people running around down on the ground, going about their lives.

  “So many people make these promises, to themselves and each other, and they just can’t do it. They can’t live up to what they’ve promised themselves, and it just winds up being terrible for everyone involved. Look at you and Ida. I thought you guys had staying power. I don’t believe in that stuff, but I figured if anyone had the power to prove me wrong, it would be the two of you.

  “No one could have predicted what happened to you. No one could have stopped it either. It’s better to just not fake it, and to enjoy your person while you’re together. Don’t put yourself through all the grief and bitterness that comes with not being able to live up to unreasonable expectations. Enjoy what you’ve got and move on.” He turned away from the windo
w and looked back at Dinesh.

  Dinesh was looking back at him, eyes narrowed and lips pursed. “Have you spoken to Ida recently?”

  Sam scoffed. “I haven’t talked with Ida since she decided her newfound religious beliefs meant she couldn’t associate with one of those people.’” He laughed, because it was pretty silly when he thought about it. “She’s sent me texts once in a while, trying to get me to go to some conversion night thing her church does. I don’t respond, and she doesn’t seem to actually expect me to. It works out well for both of us.”

  “Hm. Do you feel torn, or caught between us?”

  “Not even a little bit.” Sam stuffed his hands into his pockets and laughed. “Are you kidding me? Ida’s my sister, sure, but I know exactly who’s been here for me. I was honestly more worried you might feel torn, you know? With her making the kind of demands she was. Is.”

  “Nope. I stand by my principles.” Dinesh took a deep breath. “I miss her, don’t get me wrong. But I miss her because she threw everything important to us out the window, not because I regret leaving since she made everything, you know. Weird.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “So, the writers are torn on this show. Half of them want the asshole to go out sacrificing himself nobly for the others, which will at least buy off the vocal and obnoxious fans. The other half want him to go out doing something exceptionally stupid. Jim and Joe, the two leads don’t give even half a crap, they just want him gone. It got to the point where the big one, Joe, offered to hook his pickup truck up to the asshole’s trailer and drive it into Lake Calabasas.”

  Sam flinched. “I had no idea things were that bad on the set. I thought Joe was the nice one.” He’d give in to Dinesh’s need to change the subject.

  “He is,” Dinesh smiled grimly. “Jim locked Mike into his trailer one day and Joe got blamed for it. They all laughed it off as a ‘prank,’ but the asshole had been flubbing his lines because he showed up too drunk to work. No one said anything because they didn’t want to rile up his fans.”

  “Well, he’s gone. You’ll make it happen. I’ll sign off on it.” Sam waved his hand. “You going to be okay?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I trust Jordan to take care of everything. He’s got a good head on his shoulders, you know?” Sam hesitated. “Don’t let him go, okay? He’s a good guy.”

  Sam smiled politely and headed back to his office. He didn’t need Dinesh to tell him what a great guy Sam was. He also didn’t need Dinesh to give him advice on his romantic life.

  Dinesh had always been a romantic. He was a big believer in things like soulmates and True Love Always. Sam knew, better than anyone else, just how fluid love could be. He wasn’t going to pretend to be someone he wasn’t, and he wasn’t going to get Jordan’s hopes up either. Assuming, of course, Jordan was looking for something permanent himself.

  He scanned over the list of shows he had to consider for next year. More than half of them were romances, or at least had romances as a central theme. Each and every one of those struck him as incredibly unrealistic. Not only were they contrived and absurd, but they did their audience a disservice.

  Last year, they’d wrapped up a ten-year run of an amazingly popular romantic drama by marrying off the two leads. It was completely contrived, required a ton of retcon to make it happen, and the fans ate it up like an all-day chocolate buffet. Not a single reviewer or fan, not even the usual peanut gallery of complainers, bothered to say, Oh, wait, didn’t she stab his brother with an icepick? Didn’t he firebomb her car? No, there was a wedding, and that was the end of it. Love conquered all, to include good sense and the basic rules of plotting.

  Worst of all, fifteen separate magazines ran articles within three months about having the “perfect wedding, just like Star and Mike.” Nothing about how to have the perfect marriage, just the perfect wedding. It all made Sam sick. No one’s wedding was going to look, sound, or even taste as good, because no one else’s wedding had an army of costumers, set designers, and videographers doing multiple takes to get it right. The parts were played by humans, who got things in their eyes and had too much to drink.

  But you couldn’t tell them that. No, they had to lie and tell each other they’d be together forever.

  Oh well. It all got him paid. As long as he could find like-minded men who were content to live happily in the moment, and take every day as it came, he’d cheerfully manufacture romance for the people who needed it. As long as he could keep things real in his private life, everything would work out just fine.

  Chapter 3

  Jordan didn’t own a car. It wasn’t necessary in Manhattan, and parking it would just be an unnecessary expense. When Sam suggested they go apple picking as a date one Saturday in early October, Jordan instantly thought of a thousand reasons it couldn’t be done. He kept them to himself, because he couldn’t wait to see how Sam pulled it off.

  It turned out that Sam did own a car, a big Porsche SUV that guzzled gas like water, and had three booster seats in the back. When Sam showed up outside Jordan’s building, those three booster seats had occupants—one boy of about seven, and twin girls of about four.

  “These are Dinesh’s kids!” Jordan covered his mouth. He hadn’t meant to show preference like that. “I’m sorry—I’ve only seen you in pictures.”

  “It’s okay. We haven’t seen pictures of you at all.” The little boy, Jai if Jordan was remembering correctly, looked Jordan over. “Are you coming apple picking with us?”

  Sam’s cheeks turned red, but his voice stayed confident as Jordan climbed into the car. “It’s more like you three are coming apple picking with me and Jordan, buddy. I’d already set today up with him when your dad asked me to help him out. And since I love spending time with you all, and Jordan’s an awesome guy I think you’ll like a lot, I figured I might as well combine the two.”

  Jordan smiled and buckled his seat belt. He didn’t mind at all. He didn’t particularly want kids of his own, but he didn’t mind other people’s kids. “I think this should be a great time. How about you?”

  “Apples!” cheered the girls in the back, Malati and Malini.

  All three kids fell asleep ten minutes after hitting the road on their hour-long drive. “Every time,” Sam said, shaking his head when he saw them in the mirror. “All three of them, as soon as you get them in the car. They’re out like little lights. They’ll need it. This place we’re going to has plenty of run-around space for them. They need it, poor things.”

  “Yeah. Apparently, their mom has been violating the injunction against bringing them to that church of hers.” Jordan grimaced and looked down. The Mishra divorce was getting uglier by the day. He didn’t want to bring it up to Sam, but since he’d brought the kids with him, he didn’t feel he had a choice.

  “I know. Malini cried when I talked to her. Said the pastor tried to tell her she wasn’t allowed to talk to me anymore. Dinesh just about lost his mind when he heard that, and with good reason. He’s down at the house with the police now, getting the last of his things and theirs. It’s going to be hard on all of them, but it’s the only way.” Sam grimaced. “I wouldn’t have sprung turning a date into family time on you without fair warning, but I didn’t have a lot of warning myself.”

  “Hey, I get it.” Jordan took a chance and grabbed Sam’s free hand. He gave it a little squeeze. “I’m not about to complain about it either, you know? I’m just glad we finally got to get together.”

  “Me too.” Sam’s gentle smile sent butterflies through Jordan’s chest.

  They pulled into the parking lot at the orchard, and Jordan gaped at the size of the operation. The place had to be the size of Rhode Island, with more apples and other orchard fruits than Jordan could identify. They had a massive playground, a petting zoo, a cider mill, and even a distillery on site. The place had to be a gold mine.

  “This just boggles my mind.” He turned around slowly as Sam roused his nieces and nephew. “How is this just an hour outside of the city?”

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; “It’s a whole new world once you leave the concrete jungle behind, isn’t it?” Sam laughed and took Jordan’s hand, and the five of them got in line to get their bags.

  The line was long, and the parking lot showed the place was doing great business today. Once the five of them got into the rows of trees, though, they quickly forgot anyone else was on site. Jordan could hear a few people in the distance, but they didn’t have to fight for access to apples or trees.

  Jai was tall enough to reach some of the lower branches, a fact he cheerfully lorded over his sisters. Jordan couldn’t let that stand. He hoisted Malini up onto his shoulders so she could grab some apples too. Sam spotted what he was doing and did the same for Malati, who promptly grabbed a rotten apple from the nearest tree and dropped it onto Jai’s head.

  Jordan tried not to laugh, not least because poor Jai was going to have a devil of a time getting apple bits out of his hair.

  Filling their bags didn’t take much time at all. The stingier part of Jordan thought it was a good racket, charging that much money for a few minutes’ entertainment, but he’d had fun. They certainly would have paid more to get that many apples in the store. They brought their haul back to the car and trudged down to the playground, where the kids got to run amok for a while with other kids.

  “Poor Jai,” Sam laughed. “He’s still got smushed apple in his hair.”

  “He’ll survive.” Jordan grinned. “He’d been taunting the girls without stopping. He kind of earned it.”

  “Well yeah, he did. Still, I’m going to hand him back to Dinesh smelling like applesauce.” Sam spread his arms wide over the back of the bench they sat on. “What are favorite uncles for, if not to get them dirty and messy and riled up before handing them back?”

  Jordan basked in the sun, and in the casual touch. “Do you get to see them often?”