He Took Jude's Money, Ken Won His Heart novel · Chapter 1 of 40
Chapter 1: Parker's Pet
Jude brings donuts to his anniversary and overhears George admit he is dating him for money; George dumps him on camera and the video posts before he reaches the stairs.
On the night of their anniversary, Jude Parker carried a dozen donuts onto the number nine bus.
The bus was packed with students going home for the weekend.
He held the box high over his head so nobody would crush it.
When the doors opened at Eastgate Avenue, his wallet slid out of his jacket and landed on the floor.
Jude was a big man, and bending down on a crowded bus took planning.
Before he could plan it, a hand picked the wallet up.
It belonged to a boy in a faded gray hoodie, tall, with a quiet face and a backpack that had been patched twice.
The boy opened the wallet, looked at the thick fold of cash inside, and closed it again.
"Yours," he said.
"Thanks," Jude said. "Wait, let me at least buy you a coffee."
The boy was already off the bus.
Jude watched him cross the street without looking back, and then he forgot him, because it was anniversary night and George was waiting.
George lived on the third floor of a building Jude's father owned.
Jude paid the rent on that apartment, though George liked to say it was a gift from the universe.
He knocked, and George opened the door in a fitted black shirt that Jude had bought him in Milan.
"There he is," George said.
George pulled him into the hallway and kissed him, slow and deep, with a hand sliding up under Jude's sweater.
His palm settled flat on Jude's stomach and squeezed.
"Mm," George said against his mouth. "This is my favorite part of you. Don't let anyone on that campus tell you to change it."
Jude laughed, warm all over. "You're only saying that because I brought donuts."
"I'm saying it because it's true. Stay here a second. I'll get my jacket, and we'll go to that Italian place."
George took the box from his hands, kissed him again, and slipped back inside.
He left the door open a hand's width.
Jude stood in the hall, grinning at nothing, and heard the apartment fill with laughter.
George's friends were in there. Four or five of them, from the sound of it.
"Open the box," one of them said. "Is that the anniversary gift? Donuts?"
"Two dozen on Tuesday, a dozen today," George said. "It's the only thing he knows how to give. Feed him and he thinks you love him."
The room roared.
Jude's smile stayed on his face a moment longer, because nobody had told it to leave.
He had a hundred small memories of George saying that exact kind of thing to him, softly, in the dark, and meaning it.
Now he wondered which of them had been rehearsal.
"How much longer are you doing this?" another friend asked. "You've got to be tired of acting."
"Two more months," George said. "Tops. The lease runs through June, the card has a good limit, and I'm getting the new phone for my birthday. Then I'll tell him it's not working out."
"And the car?"
"The car stays with me until he asks for it. He won't ask. He apologizes when I'm late."
More laughing.
"Honestly, I should get a medal," George said. "Do you know what I put my hands on every night? Do you know what I tell him?"
Somebody made a sound of mock horror.
"For money, a car and a vacation in Bali," George said, "I'd tell him he's beautiful every day of the week."
Jude pushed the door open with two fingers.
The apartment went quiet.
George was on the couch with the donut box on his knee and a glazed donut halfway to his mouth.
Four friends sat around him, and every one of them already had a phone out.
"Hey," George said. He did not stand up. "Babe. You were supposed to wait in the hall."
Jude crossed the room and picked the silver car keys off the bowl by the television.
He put them in his pocket.
Then he took out his phone, opened the banking app, and pressed three buttons.
The card George carried stopped working.
"What did you just do?" George asked.
"I paid for the donuts," Jude said. "That's all I'm paying for."
Every phone in the room followed him, and Jude felt his face go hot under the lights.
His voice shook, but it kept going. "I heard what you said. I heard all of it."
George finally rose from the couch.
He looked at his friends, then at Jude, and the sweetness left his face.
"Fine," George said. "You heard. Good. I was tired of pretending anyway."
"George," one of the friends whispered, delighted.
"Do you know how hard it is?" George said, louder now, for the cameras. "Every night I had to put my hands on all that and say I liked it. You think anybody would touch you if your name wasn't Parker?"
Nobody laughed this time.
They only watched, with their phones raised.
"You should be thanking me," George said. "I'm the only person who ever did it. Ask anyone."
Jude's chest felt too tight for the sweater he was wearing.
He wanted to say something huge, something that would make all of them feel what he felt.
All he could think of was the box on George's knee.
"Keep the donuts," Jude said.
So he took his keys and left.
He made it down three flights of stairs with his hand on the rail the whole way.
On the second landing his phone buzzed in his pocket.
On the first landing it buzzed again.
By the front door he took it out, and the screen showed a video of his own back walking out of a room, with a caption underneath.
Parker's Pet Gets Dumped. 4,212 views.
The number rose while he watched.
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