Finding Joy: A Gay Romance Read online

I could work with that. “Sounds good.”

  “He’ll come by your guest house tomorrow at 6:00 a.m. to pick you up. Make sure you’re ready to go by then—it’s about five hours to Awassa, and I’d like you to be there by midday.”

  She waved a hand in the direction of the cubicle I was supposed to occupy. “All the stuff you need to go over is there. There’s a copy of the contract, so you know exactly what we need to deliver on. The IT guys will come in an hour or so to set you up. They’ll have a phone with a SIM card for you too.”

  She pushed off the desk she’d been leaning on and offered me another warm smile. I could not say I was feeling unwelcome in Addis Ababa. “I need to get to a meeting, but I’ll be back before you leave. We’re so happy you’re here and can’t wait to put you to work.”

  I laughed again as I dropped my backpack on the chair in my desk. “I’m glad to be here too.”

  As Bonnie walked away, I found that I meant every word. I could say it had to do with Tefare and Bonnie being the only two people I’d interacted with so far. But it was more than that. I felt at home here in a way that I rarely felt anywhere.

  Chapter 2

  I woke up to another chilly Addis morning, and quickly realized I had overslept.

  My ride would be here to pick me up in less than fifteen minutes, and of course I’d be a whole-ass mess when he got here. I jumped out of bed and got myself packed up for my trip. Since I’d barely taken anything out of the bag to begin with, I was done in a couple of minutes. I did a quick wash-up in the bathroom and was stepping out onto the guesthouse parking lot with my shoes in my hands when a white SUV pulled up next to me. The top of the truck was piled high with what looked like footlockers, which probably held supplies for the field offices and some of the materials we would need to run our survey. I smiled to myself at the familiar sight, which promised weeks of adventure and hard work.

  When the driver jumped out of the vehicle and came around to my side, I finally got a good look at him.

  He was not what I was expecting. For some reason, I’d envisioned Elias as some sort of Tefare doppelgänger. And why my stupid mind decided all Ethiopian men were seventy years old with Don King hair would remain a question for the ages.

  No, Elias was beautiful.

  He was very tall. Had at least five to six inches on me, and his movements were easy and fluid as he approached.

  “Hi Mr. Walker, my name is Elias Fikru.” He smiled as he shook my hand, and all I could do was stare. “I’ll be driving you today and for the time you’re in the field.”

  His eyes were a deep brown, like dark roasted coffee, and his smile was warm and friendly. I needed to look away. One thing I was very aware of was that same-sex relationships were still very much illegal in Ethiopia. I had researched before coming, and as far I could tell there didn’t appear to be outward violence like in other countries, but it certainly didn’t mean it was okay to make eyes at guys I was working with.

  Checking out a colleague within thirty seconds of meeting him definitely did not qualify as proceeding with caution.

  A colleague who would apparently be driving me for the whole trip. And because my caffeine-deprived brain was a hell of a liability, I opened my mouth without thinking. “I thought you were the logistics coordinator. Why are you driving me the whole time?”

  He laughed, and I felt the ripples of it in a place that had no business waking up for this. “I’m used to driving in the areas we’ll be working in and I need to be there anyway, so I usually drive when the projects are in the south.”

  I nodded dumbly at his perfectly reasonable explanation, and stretched my hand out with as much professional demeanor as I could manage. For someone who had his shoes in his hand and probably epic bed head. “That makes sense. Nice to meet you, Mr. Fikru. Please call me Desta, and thanks for getting me so early.”

  He widened his eyes when he heard my name, which only twenty-four hours into my time in Ethiopia was beginning to feel like a compulsory reaction. My first name, Desta, means joy in Amharic, one of the official languages of Ethiopia. And my parents had given me “Joy” in English as a middle name to really hammer in that I would be a happy guy.

  Once, when I asked him about my name, my dad told me when I was born, it was the only word he and my mom could think of. They’d been young and in love, with a new little person in their family, and were about to embark on another adventure, so I was double the joy.

  My name had always been a source of infinite delight for any Ethiopian person I met, and it seemed like Elias would not be the exception.

  “Very nice to meet you, Desta, and please call me Elias.” His face transformed as he gave me a bright smile. “Your name is Joy,” he said with genuine amazement in his voice.

  I dipped my head, not sure how bubbly to be about this. “Yes, it is.” His eyes on me were doing things, so I decided to veer from anything that prompted hard staring. “I was told to look out for camels.”

  He tipped his chin up in the direction of the road and lifted a hand, waving it back and forth. “Some pastoralist tribes do walk their animals around to find watering holes and pasture this time of year, so we may see camels on the road,” he assured me with another wide grin. “It’s quite a sight, long lines of them walking in perfect order.”

  I nodded as he talked, excited for the idea. “That will be cool to see,” I said, tucking my shoes under my arm, ready to get on the road. That’s when Elias finally looked down at my feet and laughed, a deep, rough sound like his voice was still waking up.

  He pointed at the ground by my feet. “No time for shoes, huh? Or are you trying to be the American Abebe?” His eyebrows lifted, and I swooned a little. And seriously, what the hell? The man had perfect eyebrows, and why was I even noticing that?

  Who gets hot for eyebrows?

  Me, apparently.

  I glanced up at him, feeling sheepish about my disheveled state. “Oh, I wouldn’t presume to walk in Abebe’s footsteps, with or without shoes.” Abebe Bikila was a source of great pride for Ethiopians, who in 1960 won gold for long-distance running in the Rome Summer Olympics. He ran the entire twenty-six miles barefoot.

  Elias made a sound of approval, like he appreciated my knowledge of one of Ethiopia’s greats. “Desta, you’re practically Habesha!”

  I shook my head at him for saying I sounded like a native Ethiopian. I knew I had to be blushing. This gorgeous man’s attention had me a little flustered. “I wouldn’t quite hand me the Habesha card yet.”

  He laughed again, and holy shit was I going to have to watch myself with this man.

  “I need to hear how you got your name some time. But first,” he said, gesturing to the passenger side of the truck. “Did you have your breakfast yet, or some coffee? If you’re in Ethiopia, you cannot start the day without getting some bunna. We can get you something before getting on the road.”

  His accent was also going to be an issue. His voice was so deep, and the lilt with which he spoke English was giving me shivers. There went those eyebrows again. It made him look rakish and I wanted to climb him. The lack of caffeine had to be partly responsible for the eyebrow fixation. I wasn’t functioning at my full capacity.

  “Sure, that would be great, actually.” Wasn’t I the eager beaver this morning? “I haven’t eaten yet. I decided to forgo food and get more sleep,” I confessed while I moved to open the passenger door. “I’m definitely still jet lagged too. And I got my name because my parents knew they were moving here when I was born.”

  He got in on the other side, and after we were both settled, he drove us out of the guesthouse. Once we were slowly making our way to the main road, he briefly turned to me, his expression curious. “Really? Were your parents working here?”

  “Yeah, they moved here a few months after they got married, in 1990. They came to work with Children International. After the food crisis, you know?”

  He nodded at my words, but the smile that had been on his face was replaced with a
grimace as he started the car. “Many people working with international organizations came here once those photos of starving children were seen around the world. Unfortunately, for too many people, that is still all they care to know about our country.”

  I sighed in agreement, certain that if I hadn’t been personally connected, I’d probably be one of those who made all kinds of uninformed assumptions. “My parents were captivated with this place from the moment they arrived. They were only here for a year that first time. But they came back in ’94, after I was born. My dad was pretty set on me having an Ethiopian name, and Desta it was. He loved this place.”

  Elias’s smile made a reappearance, and this one was radiant, like it pleased him to no end that my dad was infatuated with his country. “I like that story. Sounds like your father has a strong soul. He knows how special our country is, and not everyone can feel that.”

  I gulped, almost sad I had to tell him. “He died, my dad. When I was in high school.”

  His face grew serious, and when he turned to me, his eyes were so full of sympathy I felt like crying. “I’m sorry to hear that. It must have been very hard to lose your father so young.”

  I looked out the window and exhaled loudly, once again bemused at the onslaught of mixed emotions I’d been hit with since I’d arrived. “Yeah, it was hard.” After all these years, whenever the death of my father came up, my usual answer was aimed more at trying to make the other person less uncomfortable. But here in the half-light of the Ethiopian dawn, for some reason, I felt like I could say the truth. “It still is hard, but we got through it. My mom loved living here too. She’s so excited I’m here.”

  He exhaled at my words, and I was surprised to find I didn’t shrink at Elias’s reaction. It didn’t feel like pity—it felt like he was trying to hold space for me to feel what I needed to.

  He gave me a few moments, and when he spoke, it was back to the business at hand. “Then we must not let you down. First stop today is to get the best coffee in town.”

  I was grateful to him for changing the subject—it was like he could sense I didn’t have the energy for this much emotion right now.

  I smiled, shaking my head. “Wow, that must be something. I’ve already had pretty amazing coffee, and I don’t think any of the places were particularly special.”

  He nodded, listening as he drove through the busy streets. “We’ll go to Kaldi’s—they have breakfast and coffee there. All farenji love that place.” He straightened his back, like I’d just challenged him to blow me away with this cup of coffee. “I think it’s because the logo and colors are similar to Starbucks in the States.”

  I laughed, now really eager to see this place. “Oh, really? Like they copied it or something?”

  “Well…” He kept his eyes trained on the road, and I wished I could see his face more clearly, because I was pretty sure there was a dimple happening. “I think they might have borrowed the idea a bit too closely. I heard Starbucks requested they make changes to it, and they did.” He lifted his right hand, index and finger close together. “Now it’s a bit similar, but not too much. I’ve never been to the U.S., but all the visitors say the coffee here is a lot better.” He lifted a hand to point at the parking lot of a very busy-looking café. “We’re almost there, so you can judge for yourself.”

  I looked at him askance and tried hard to not grin at the level of seriousness this coffee talk had gotten. “It’ll be better. Like I said, every cup of coffee I’ve had in Addis so far has been next-level delicious. I had like, five macchiatos yesterday. It’s probably why I couldn’t sleep.”

  He did turn around then, just a flash of teeth and happy man, which after only twenty minutes was already enough to weaken my defenses.

  The crush was inevitable at this point.

  “Yes, farenji always go a little overboard with the coffee at first. Don’t worry, I’ll remind you to switch to tea if you have too many.”

  I flashed him my own smile this time. “Thanks. I need help when it comes to resisting the siren song of caffeine.”

  He gave me a look that was equal parts side-eye and genuine empathy. “Our coffee can be hard to resist.”

  I gulped and looked out the window again, because now I was feeling things just from the guy using the words hard to resist.

  I pulled myself together as we walked into the café, and started taking in the place. I expected a small storefront like the others I’d been to, but this place was huge. It could seat at least fifty people, and it was buzzing. It looked more like a café you’d find in Italy than the States. There were murals all over the walls with maps of the different coffee-producing regions in the country. The colors of the store were the yellow, green, and red of the Ethiopian flag. The floors were gleaming white marble and there was a lot of dark wood, chrome, and glass. Most of the tables were filled with young men and women. And there were servers walking around delivering coffee, pastries, and what looked like multilayered fruit smoothies in tall, skinny glasses. The smell of fresh roasted coffee beans was mouthwatering.

  When we got closer to the service counter, I finally got a good look at the logo. I grinned at the familiar green-and-white circle, but at the center, instead of the mermaid, was a small coffee cup surrounded by the precious Ethiopian coffee beans. I pointed at it to get Elias’s attention. “It’s slightly similar, but definitely not the same.”

  It took him a second, but when he realized I was referring to the logo, that ever-present smile came out again. “Yes, no mermaid for us. Our magic is in the coffee.”

  “This is true,” I agreed, charmed with him and the unapologetic pride he clearly felt.

  “What would you like?” Elias asked as he gestured toward a hand-painted menu above the counter, and I realized he was offering to buy me breakfast.

  I shook my head and slid my hand in my pocket for my wallet. “No, I can get it…”

  His expression was serious, and he directed a short but very firm shake of his head at me. “No. Desta, I will pay for breakfast. Please.”

  Where did that dip in my stomach come from? This wasn’t a fucking brunch date. I was working. My lack of self-preservation seemed to be reaching new levels on this trip. Still, I caved. “I’ll have the egg and cheese croissant.”

  Holy shit, that smile and those dancing eyes were like kryptonite. I almost swooned from the way he was looking at me. He rubbed his palms together like I’d given him the best news he’d heard all week. “Eshi, Desta.”

  “All right, you win, but I’m buying next time,” I said, feigning annoyance, and made a show of pouting and crossing my arms over my chest, eliciting a grin from Elias.

  While he took care of our order, I looked around. There were a lot of what looked like students or young professionals, some dressed very fashionably. Not exactly what I would call American fashion, but a mash-up between European and hipster styles. Other than a group that could have been South Asian, everyone else was Ethiopian.

  I turned back to Elias to ask him a question, but he was focused on his phone. I waited for him in silence, still exploring the place. I noticed that some patrons ordered in a mix of Amharic and English. I thought about the Spanglish I’d grown up speaking at home, and it occurred to me that when I was here as a baby, Amharic had been in the mix too.

  We sat down to wait for our orders. When the server brought the food I saw that Elias’s drink came in a clear glass coffee cup, and I couldn’t tell what it was. The bottom two-thirds of the cup had a clear amber-colored liquid, but the top looked like very dark coffee. “What is that?”

  Elias worked on spooning quite a bit of sugar in the mysterious drink before pushing it toward me. “It’s a Spris, half coffee and half tea. I order it so I can drink more and still be able to sleep. Habesha love their bunna and chai breaks, and I can end up drinking too much caffeine if I don’t watch it. As you already found out, Desta.”

  Oh man, winking.

  Sexy winks were not going to be good for me.
r />   I cleared my throat in another weak attempt to keep it together. “Interesting. I’ll try that next time.”

  Another wink. Yep. I was in trouble.

  I tried to regroup and went with a topic that wouldn’t lead us down a path that risked more appearances of the dimple, or more winking with perfectly lashed brown eyes. “So how long have you been working for Aid USA? Do you like it?” I asked, holding back a whimper after taking a second sip of my incredibly delicious macchiato.

  Elias swirled his spoon, trying to dissolve all the sugar he put in his very short cup of tea/coffee as he talked. “About five years. I got the driver job while I was still in university.” He talked as he took careful sips. He licked his bottom lip every time, and I needed to find another spot on his face to focus on, because this was going to end poorly.

  “So you worked full time while in school? That’s a lot.”

  He shrugged, fiddling with the cutlery the server had brought us. “I went to Addis Ababa University, and their classes are very demanding. I didn’t really work the first three years, but I got this job the last year.” This time he ran his tongue over the little spoon. Oh God.

  I nodded, trying hard to focus on what he was saying, but it was a struggle.

  “I wanted to do an online master’s degree from a school in the UK right after I finished my B.A., and the embassy jobs pay well. I also had a lot of time to read in between drives,” he said, smiling. “And they helped with school, which is nice. The logistics coordinator position is interesting too.”

  There was something in how he said that made me want to ask more questions.

  “That’s great.” I knew in a lot of the places I’d worked in, U.S. Embassy positions, even service ones, were coveted because of the pay and benefits. I also knew of colleagues in other countries who took jobs that were completely unrelated to their actual degrees because the pay was better. “What’s your degree in? Did you enroll in the master’s program?” I asked, genuinely interested.

  Something in his demeanor changed with my questions, and when he looked at me, it was different. He was really looking at me now. I thought the Elias of the past thirty minutes would be a problem, but this intensity was enough to set my insides on fire. “In psychology, and yes, I did. I finished it this past May. The master’s was in cultural psychology, actually.”