Chapter 2

"Love makes you stupid." Joshua scowled at Justin. "I m not in love with him." "Lust then." Joshua raised his head up a little in a bid to preserve his pride as he strode away from Justin. "I m not that easy." Justin laughed. "Yeah, and pigs fly." Joshua turned around and glared, but Justin was already heading back toward his own office and snickering at him. He resumed walking and pretended he wasn t a little miffed at Justin, even though his best friend was absolutely right. Oh, who was he kidding? He loved sex. His picture should appear next to the word "slut" in the dictionary. Not that there was anything wrong with being a slut. Sex was a beautiful thing. It was something to be enjoyed, and he had certainly put in plenty of hours when it came to that particular activity. However, he preferred to label himself as being sex-positive. The term sounded so much better. * * * * James parked his car and got out. It was a windy day in San Francisco, and the weather was just perfect. The sun made the temperature warm enough, but he didn t feel its stinging heat at all. It was an awesome day all around. He could have put his car inside the garage, but he had a few more errands to run. He didn t want to open and shut the sliding garage door multiple times throughout the day, so he simply stopped his car in front of his building. He owned the entire building anyway, so nobody would be inconvenienced. The building only consisted of two levels, but it was wide and spacious. When he had discovered it a few months prior to his college graduation at twenty-two, it was rundown and hideous. However, he had fallen in love with it. He had always known he wasn t interested in working for someone else, but he had no idea what he would do after obtaining his business degree. However, once he had gotten a tour of the building, he made up his mind to purchase it. He would live and work in the building. He had pleaded with his parents for a huge loan that would allow him to make a down-payment on the building. His struggle hadn t ended then and there. He had to clean and work on the building to make it liveable. He had to scrimp and save as he embarked on a new journey, which was a small catering business. He didn t have the best culinary skills in the world. After all, he hadn t worked in the kitchen in his parents restaurant often enough, but he would pick things up left and right, and he had succeeded in acquiring a few regular clients in his first year of starting the business. Word-of-mouth from his clients to their relatives, friends, and acquaintances helped expand his business even further. It had taken him fourteen years to get to where he was now. He didn t like to be dramatic, but his first few years were filled with days and nights of endless tears and sweat as he attempted to get the business rolling and surviving while working on the building whenever he could. When he finally had some savings to spare, he had hired a contractor to fix what he couldn t do on his own. Nowadays, the building looked vastly different from what it was all those years ago. The ugly gray paint had been replaced with an assortment of other colors. His hand-me-down furniture had been donated. Instead, he had bought new pieces in the styles he preferred. Or he had called on some professionals to work on installing them into the building itself. He rubbed the door handle in nostalgia as he took that brief trip down memory lane and fished out the key from the pocket in his pants. He unlocked the door and was about to enter when he heard the sound of another car stopping right in front of his building. He turned around immediately. Then he beamed at the sight of his parents alighting from the vehicle and walking toward him. He opened his arms widely and chuckled as his mother embraced him tight and hard enough to make him wince "Hey, Mom," he greeted before glancing at his father. "Hey, Dad." "Hey, James. Lydia, for heaven s sake. James is thirty-six years old. Can you not rub his hair down as if he s still three?" Lydia glared at her husband. "Can you not be a grouch for even one second? James is my son, and he will always be my baby no matter how old he gets." Thomas scoffed. "We have five grandchildren. You can spoil and pamper them if you need to, but leave James alone. He s an adult now." James bit his lower lip in amusement as his parents proceeded to argue with each other. He was used to their behaviors, and he knew he wouldn t be able to utter a single word in between, so he shut his mouth and let them continue with their silly squabbling as he watched and tried not to burst out laughing. His dad had a point, though. His younger brothers, Jeremiah and Jonah, were married and had two and three kids, respectively, but his mother would always treat him as if he was still a toddler. He used to be embarrassed by her coddling, but as he grew older, he appreciated her more and more. Or he was probably lonely. Being single sucked sometimes. He didn t have someone to share his life with, and it was so much worse when he was going through a horrible day.