Bishop put his hands around Edison’s waist from behind while he looked around. His arms felt good around him, but he didn’t want to be too handsy in front of Bishop’s only parent. He heard the confident footsteps before a man turned the corner with a broad grin on his face. Edison could feel his body go rigid as Bishop began to massage his shoulders.
“Eddie. This is Mike…” Edison looked up at Bishop as if they were playing a joke on him. Bishop scrubbed the back of his neck. “This is my dad.”
Edison continued to stand there and blink like an idiot. Bishop’s dad laughed a dry throaty sound—holy cow, he even laughs just like him—as he stuck his big palm out. “Calm down. I’m sure you weren’t expecting to get this turned on when you met me.”
“Fuck. Here we go,” Bishop gritted.
Edison slowly put his hand out, trying to get his brain to reboot, “I-I’m not. I swear I wasn’t thinking like—”
“He’s fucking with you,” Bishop said against Edison’s ear.
Edison laughed, feeling like a fool, knowing his face was ten shades of red.
Mike held his arms out to his sides, glancing down at his body. “The hell I am. You’re looking at the oh-so-slightly more refined version of Bishop, Eddie.”
“Edison,” Bishop clarified.
Bishop’s dad didn’t seem taken aback, but amended what he’d said. “It’s nice to meet you, Edison.”
“It’s really good to meet you, too…sssir… um, Mr. Stockley.” Edison wasn’t sure of the proper title to attach to the end of that sentence, because neither of them seemed to fit. He still couldn’t believe how much Bishop and his father resembled each other. So much so that Edison wondered how many times he’d glanced out of his office window and thought he was looking at his boyfriend but might have been drooling over the so-called ‘slightly more refined version.’
“Just call me Mike, Edison. Only the motherfuckers at the IRS call me Mr. Stockley.” Mike shook Edison’s hand in a firm grip.
Bishop’s dad had thrown on a pair of black track pants, and a white wife beater. It appeared as if he’d splashed some water in his hair to spike up the slightly longer strands on top which was the only way to tell the difference between the two men. Mike pointed towards the couch, “Go on and have a seat. Make yourself comfortable.”
Edison nodded and moved towards the living room when Bishop suddenly grabbed his arm and steered him to the one chair. “I don’t even sit on that damn couch. You can sit right here.”
Edison laughed when Mike flipped Bishop off like they were pals, not missing a beat as he plopped onto the sofa, giving Edison his full attention. “I’ve been asking Bishop to bring you by for weeks. He talks about you all the damn time.”
Edison flushed, his heart skipping a beat at knowing Bishop thought of him so much when they were apart.
“We’re not staying, Mike. Me and him just stopped by before we went to dinner.”
“We’re not in a rush, Bishop, relax,” Edison said, starting to loosen up more since Mike was nothing like a conventional dad.
“Yeah. Sit your big ass down and chill. Edison wants to chat with me.” Mike scowled.
Edison was still feeling as if he’d stepped into the Twilight Zone. It wasn’t everyday a man learned that his boyfriend had a doppelgänger. How the hell old was Mike? Bishop said his dad had him young, but heck. Mike didn’t even have any gray hairs at the temple, or nothing. Even their thick, veiny forearms were identical when Mike leaned forward and braced his elbows on his knees.
“Tell me a little about yourself, Edison. What’s your last name. Who your people is?”
Edison ran his hand over the front of his shirt then remembered he wasn’t wearing a tie. “My last name is Scala.”
“Now, is that Italian?”
Bishop huffed annoyingly from where he was propped beside him on the arm of the chair, and Edison shot him a stern look before he continued. “It is. My father was Italian, and my mother was Portuguese. Which I’m sure is how I got this skin, because my dad was all scruff. He passed a couple years back, so I only have my aunt and uncle now.”
“Where’s your mom?”
“Dad,” Bishop warned.
Edison shook his head. He wasn’t sure what Bishop thought he was protecting him from, but Mike wasn’t offending him. “Bishop… I can speak. If there’s something I don’t want to answer, then I won’t.”
“Oh shit. You got yourself a live one here, B. I like him.” Mike’s laugh was hearty and more jovial than Bishop’s. “Edison, I thought you’d be more… I don’t know.”
Edison believed he knew what Mike was saying. He thought that Edison would be a soft-spoken, no-swearing, pushover who needed to let his guy speak for him. He was gonna show Mike that he was the opposite. He was Bishop’s equal. His son didn’t want a weakling he could boss around. He needed a man who could hold his own and support him when he needed it.