Saving Trevor

Regrets

"So what's it like?" I ask sitting across Joshua as we have our drinks

"What's what like?"

"Being hated by... literally everyone," I say chuckling

"You know it's not that bad, since I'm a detective people never assume I'm a cop until I flash my badge. Kinda get to pass under the radar a little bit"

"Detective privilege? Didn't know that was a thing"

Joshua laughs, "wow you really don't like that I'm a cop do you?"

"It's not my favorite thing about you but it's also my least favorite thing about you," we laugh together.

"Is that why this isn't a date? You're embarrassed by me?"

"With the number of tickets my mom's gotten in her lifetime, if she ever found out that I was interested in a cop she'd disown me." With a grin he sips his drink and I ask, "what?"

"Nothing"

"No tell me, what?"

"You just admitted that you're interested in me which confirms this is a date"

"It is not, we're merely two people getting to know each other over drinks"

"So a date?"

"Nope, not a date."

I mean honestly I can't date a cop, I can see Trevor now making a bunch of jokes about it and never letting me live it down. Joshua would be a bad idea but I can't help it though, he's so nice and his smile literally makes me feel better, but I can't imagine having any real feelings for a cop I just can't.

"What about you? What do you do?"

"I'm a junior editor at a magazine"

"Really? That sounds exciting"

"Not really, since there's a whole team of us I barely get to do any of the work."

"Maybe you just don't want to do any of that work"

"Maybe I don't"

"Then what is it? What do you really want to do, Silas?"

"Honestly I want to work for the social media team, I have these great ideas about how we could make our social media presence more digital, and not just repeating the printed pages, but I'm kind of—"

"A chicken?" He asks with a smile

"What? No... afraid, I'm afraid"

"Of what?"

Shrugging I answer "not being as good as I think... looking stupid"

"Say the most ridiculous thing you could think of to me right now"

"What?"

"Say something dumb, something unfathomably stupid"

I scoff staring at him and the smile on his face, "okay um..." I take a moment to think, "irregardless is a real word."

Joshua laughs "I mean yeah it is, but at what cost? People should know better, the English language has way too many words for that one to be used as often as it's used."

"What's your point Joshua?"

"Right, my point is that even though you said something very ridiculous, absolutely nothing about you looked stupid. It could be that I'm being a little bias because I like looking at you no matter what you're saying, but if you speak what you really want then the thought of you looking stupid becomes obsolete."