The Boyfriend Experiment Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  The Boyfriend Experiment

  Sean Ashcroft

  Copyright © 2017 by Sean Ashcroft

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Chapter One

  No matter how many times he looked out the viewing window, Gabriel never got used to seeing the Earth from above. Even after ten days in space, it made his heart flutter every time, his lungs feel tight.

  That was Earth. That huge expanse of blue, green, and brown was his home. It was where everyone he’d ever known and everyone he ever would know lived.

  It seemed so small, and so lonely from here.

  On Earth, everything felt distant. Places, people, everything. But from up here, it was different. He’d never felt so connected to the rest of the world as he did looking down on it from above.

  That was probably ironic, but it was hard to get past the sheer sense of awe to appreciate the irony.

  “Are you staring out the window again?” Connor asked from behind him, startling Gabriel out of his thoughts.

  “Like you never stare out the window,” Gabriel said, pushing away from it to give Connor room to look out as well.

  “It is beautiful,” Connor said, moving beside Gabriel. He’d gotten the hang of microgravity a lot faster than Gabriel had.

  Well, Gabriel still hadn’t quite gotten it at all. He wasn’t the most coordinated person who’d ever lived. Luckily, working for a private company meant he didn’t really need to pass a physical.

  Otherwise he would never have gotten to go to space.

  He hadn’t believed he was really going until the shuttle cleared for takeoff.

  “This is my life’s work,” he said. “I deserve to enjoy it. I’ve been dreaming of this since I was in junior high.”

  “I know. But I never asked what made you want it so bad.”

  “I never felt at home on Earth,” Gabriel said, wondering if that was too honest. “I mean, I never really felt like I fit in.”

  “Kind of like an alien?” Connor asked.

  Gabriel nodded. “Kinda like an alien, yeah. And then I got obsessed with space, because what if I was an alien and I had to find a way to get back to my own people, who’d make me feel comfortable and happy? Obviously I’ve come to terms with being boringly human since, but…”

  “But wanting to go to space stuck. I gotcha.” Connor nodded.

  “Right, yeah. You never really told me why you wanted to go, either.”

  Connor shrugged. “Seemed like a cool thing to do. Impress the kids. Give the wife something to be proud of.”

  “She’s already extremely proud of you,” Gabriel pointed out, relieved that Connor hadn’t thought his reasons were strange. Or at least, hadn’t said so if he did.

  “Yeah. Yeah, I really lucked out with her.” Connor smiled the same warm smile he always did when he talked about his family.

  He looked like a really tough guy on the outside—he only had an inch or so on Gabriel, but he was broad-shouldered and bald-headed, with a few tattoos scattered around—but on the inside he was basically a human marshmallow. At least, when it came to the people he loved.

  It must have been so nice to have people like that. People who he felt at home with.

  “Everyone I’ve spoken to talks about how life-changing seeing it like this is, but I didn’t understand what they meant until I saw it for myself,” Gabriel said quietly.

  “I thought maybe you were looking for someone special down there,” Connor joked. “Nothing like looking down on the planet to remind me of all the reasons I have to go back.”

  Gabriel’s stomach clenched at that. Connor had a wife and two kids, all of whom looked at him like he was the most important thing in the world.

  He didn’t want that, exactly, but he’d never been so jealous of another person as he was of Connor for what he had to look forward to when he got back to Earth. His children would run to him, wrap their arms around his legs as his wife approached, hugging him tight, welcoming him home.

  There wouldn’t be anyone waiting for Gabriel. Once all the post-flight paperwork was over, he was taking a cab to the airport, and then a plane home.

  And then another cab to his empty apartment, because he didn’t even have anyone he was close enough with to meet him there. Or at home. Or for a quiet coffee the next day.

  No one would want to hear all his stories. He didn’t have anyone to tell them to.

  Seeing how small the world was had made him feel more connected to everyone in it, but it had also made Gabriel realize how profoundly alone he was.

  His whole life had been building up to this moment. He’d worked every hour he’d been awake to get here since he was in high school.

  And now he had no one to share his victory with. No one to be proud of him.

  “There’s, uh… there’s no one down there for me,” Gabriel said after a few moments. “No one waiting.”

  “Yeah there is,” Connor said. “There’s someone waiting for everyone. You just haven’t met them yet.”

  The skeptic in Gabriel wanted to laugh at that, but in his heart, he wanted to believe. He wanted to think that there really was someone out there for him, someone who he could share everything with, someone who’d understand him and want to spend the rest of their life with him, exactly as he was.

  It just sounded too good to be true.

  Chapter Two

  Ever since he’d seen Gabriel Vaughn’s name on his appointment list, Reid had been excited to meet him. He’d followed the first manned Atmos flight closely, keeping tabs on all the news that came out of it.

  He’d followed Gabriel’s public account on Twitter, marveled over photos of the Earth from space as if there weren’t hundreds of them, laughed at his sense of humor over the space espresso machine and the photos he’d taken of floating pens in all kinds of elaborate configurations.

  The whole thing had been so exciting, and now he was getting to meet the guy he’d been excited to see updates from. Gabriel seemed so fun, and how often did you get to meet someone who’d been to space?

  He’d been in high school when NASA shut down the shuttle program, and it had felt then like a part of humanity’s hope had been shut down with it. Now, Atmos was giving people some of that back.

  With the world the way it was at the moment, everyone could use a little hope.

  He was smaller than Reid had been expecting, with dark hair down to his chin and stubble trailing down his neck. Strong brows Reid would have killed for himself, and kind, warm b
rown, bright eyes.

  He was also a lot younger than Reid had assumed he would be. Younger than Reid, even.

  “Go easy on me,” Gabriel said as he sat down on Reid’s examination table, his back unnaturally straight. “You’re my first physiotherapist.”

  Reid chuckled at that. The guy had been to space, and he was nervous about this?

  He understood. A lot of people hated to deal with medical problems at all. That was why he’d always worked on being as friendly and comforting as possible. He wanted people to finish their treatment programs and get better, not come to dread coming into his office or seeing him in the hospital.

  “Well, you’re my first space man,” he responded, moving around behind Gabriel to poke him in the shoulder. He winced, jerking away from Reid’s touch.

  He’d been moving gingerly from the moment he came in, so Reid was guessing he was in more than a little pain.

  “I think the technical term is astronaut.”

  “Whatever you say, Ziggy,” Reid replied, noting the way Gabriel hissed as he put his fingers on his lower back.

  He felt thin. Not just thin, but unnaturally light.

  Reid was used to seeing this, but he was used to seeing it in coma patients. Not in people who’d been to space.

  “I think that was Starman, not space man,” Gabriel said. “And I’m not even an astronaut, anyway. I’m a rocket scientist.”

  “For real?” Reid asked. He hadn’t known that. All he’d known was that Gabriel was part of the shuttle crew. He’d never even thought to look into his background. That would have felt weird and intrusive.

  He’d assumed he was ex-military, so the short, skinny guy in front of him was kind of a surprise.

  “For real. A rocket doctor, even. The deal was that if I designed the shuttle, I got to go to space.” Gabriel shifted on the table, whining softly at the movement.

  Reid’s heart went out to him. Going to space was cool and all, but it had obviously been hard on his body.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Doctor Stardust, then.”

  “Ziggy Stardust was an alien,” Gabriel said.

  Reid grinned, glad that Gabriel had definitely caught the reference. He hadn’t been sure before. Gabriel was hard to read, but that was probably because he was exhausted and in pain.

  “And you came from outer space,” Reid argued. “Take your shirt off.”

  “You could buy me a drink first,” Gabriel complained, but Reid caught the faintest hint of a smile turning up the corner of his lips as he moved to stand in front of him. “And I don’t come from outer space. I come from Iowa.”

  “Like Captain Kirk?” Reid asked. He knew he was outing himself as a huge nerd, but Gabriel had come in wearing a Batman t-shirt, so he figured he was in good company.

  It seemed like the kind of guy who’d want to work on space shuttles would be into Star Trek, too.

  Gabriel laughed at that, a genuine, happy sound that made Reid smile. All he wanted was for Gabriel to be comfortable. That was all he wanted for all of his patients.

  Gabriel pulled his shirt off over his head, and Reid could see immediately why he was in so much pain. He’d never been a big guy—he was only about five-eight, and naturally slender—but his muscle tone was practically non-existent right now.

  That had to hurt. All his muscles would have been under strain just keeping him upright.

  “You know, I know you lose muscle mass in space, but I’ve never seen it before,” he said, taking a step toward Gabriel. “Do you know how much you weighed before you left?”

  “About a hundred and twenty-five pounds,” Gabriel said.

  That meant he’d always been a little underweight, but obviously, the pain was new.

  “And now?”

  “A hundred and seventeen, give or take a few ounces.” Gabriel licked his lips. “That’s a big difference, right? It doesn’t sound like much, but…”

  “If it’s almost entirely muscle, yeah. That’s like…” Reid paused to do some mental math. “Seven percent of your body weight. And that’s really fast to lose that. You were only gone twenty-one days, right?”

  “Right, yeah. I, uh… I might’ve slacked off with my exercise routine.” Gabriel shifted again, looking down at his knees. “The good news is that I’ll never do that again.”

  “Hey, as long as you learned your lesson,” Reid said, not wanting to add to Gabriel’s woes by lecturing him. “And this is nothing to be ashamed of. You went to space. And we can totally fix all of this.”

  Gabriel breathed a sigh of relief, his shoulders slumping for a second before he straightened them reflexively again. “Yeah?”

  “Yeah, sure. I mean… this is a little outside of my wheelhouse, but we can figure something out and have you back to normal in no time.”

  Space-related muscle loss was new to him, but helping people recover after long periods of limited or no mobility was his thing. This couldn’t be all that hard, and he didn’t want Gabriel to worry.

  “That’s everything I want to hear,” Gabriel said. “Well, no, what I wanted to hear was that you were gonna wave a magic wand and take all my pain away, but that’s close enough.”

  “I don’t have a magic wand, but I do have tape,” Reid said, walking over to the drawer where he kept it. “You want blue, pink, or green?”

  “Would I be boring if I said blue?”

  “It’s a pretty electric blue, so it won’t be boring at all. I can also offer you that color they call ‘flesh’ but isn’t really the color of anyone’s skin, ever. That would be boring.”

  “I’ll stick to the blue, then,” Gabriel said.

  “Good choice.” Reid smiled, plucking the roll of tape from the drawer. “I do a lot of work with kids and teenagers, so the bright colors help. I think,” he said. “This will add support for your muscles. I’m also gonna give you a really basic set of strength building exercises and some diet guidelines. Are you a vegetarian?”

  “No,” Gabriel said. “Bacon is the only thing that brings me true happiness, I’m not willing to give it up.”

  Reid chuckled. Gabriel’s sense of humor translated into real life just fine. “Me neither. Good news is you can have basically unlimited bacon for the next twelve weeks or so. Treat yourself to a steak, get some almonds…”

  “I’m allergic to almonds,” Gabriel said.

  “Probably skip them, then. You need to be able to breathe to do your exercises.”

  “I do enjoy not dying of anaphylactic shock.” Gabriel nodded, leaning forward with only the slightest wince as Reid put a hand on his back. “Your hands are warm,” he commented.

  “I make sure to warm them up before every patient. I hate being touched by cold hands as much as everyone else does,” Reid explained. It was a small thing, but people tended to appreciate it, so he always made sure his hands were warm before he touched anyone.

  Not many people mentioned it, but Gabriel clearly didn’t miss anything.

  “I’ll need some time to work out a personalized plan,” Reid added as he started applying tape to Gabriel’s back. “So I want you back here in two days, okay?”

  Gabriel nodded again. “Okay, sure. Do I keep the tape on?”

  “Yeah, keep it on as long as it’s not bothering you. You can still shower, it shouldn’t fall off unless you scrub it. Hot showers will help the muscle soreness, so definitely feel free to take those. And if the tape does come off and you’re nearby, you can just drop in and my assistant will re-apply it for you. She’s awesome, you’ll like her.”

  “The one with the big purple glasses?” Gabriel asked.

  “That’s her.” Reid grinned. The glasses were the first thing he’d noticed back when he met Annmarie, too.

  “Okay. Tape, shower, appointment in two days. I think I can handle that.”

  “And if you have any questions, I’m just a phone call away,” Reid assured him, barely containing his excitement at getting to treat something he’d never seen before.

  Bes
ides, Gabriel had laughed at his jokes. He was the best patient Reid had seen all week.

  It wasn’t entirely professional to be excited about someone being in pain, but Reid figured that if anyone would understand, it’d be Gabriel. Scientific curiosity was a trait they obviously shared.

  “I’m extremely unlikely to call, but thank you for the reassurance,” Gabriel said, getting down carefully from the table.

  “You can also email,” Reid said. “I’ll give you a contact card.”

  “Thank you.” Gabriel stretched carefully, groaning as he moved.

  He wasn’t in great shape right now, but Reid had seen worse. He could handle this.

  He had to handle it. How else would he get the opportunity to hang out with a real live astronaut?

  Chapter Three

  Gabriel groaned as he shuffled into his new lab space, wishing for the hundredth time that he’d been confident enough to ask Reid to put tape on his legs, too.

  He’d been embarrassed enough about the state of his body that he couldn’t bear to take his pants off. He’d never been overly muscular, but he also hadn’t looked like he was wasting away before, his vertebrae sticking out along his back and his ribs showing as though he’d been left to starve for three weeks.

  Gabriel had never cared all that much about his body until he’d abused it to the point of pain. He couldn’t have avoided all the muscle loss, but he regretted not taking the risks—and the consequences—as seriously as he could have.

  Reid had been kind about it, and Gabriel believed him when he said it wasn’t anything that couldn’t be put right, but at the moment, it hurt to walk, stand, or sit. Even lying down in one position for too long was hard. He hadn’t gotten a full night of sleep since he’d gotten back, tossing and turning to find a comfortable position every twenty minutes.

  It was exhausting, and he really hoped Reid could fix him.

  “What happened to you?” Alice asked from her own desk, peering up at Gabriel as though he’d walked in with his head under his own arm.

  “Space happened to me,” Gabriel said, heaving himself into his chair. He’d resisted the college’s attempts to replace it with an ergonomic one, and he suddenly regretted that decision. It wasn’t supporting his back or his thighs at all.