Home and Away

by Ariel Tachna

  “Yeah, I know you, which is why I brought it up in the first place. Seriously, dude, is there something going on you aren’t telling me?”

  No, I just wish there were.

  “Linc?”

  “Drop it, Pete, okay? When… if”—sweet baby Jesus, let it be when—“there’s something to tell, you’ll be the first to know.”

  Pete didn’t look convinced, but he let it drop. Thank the Lord.

  Pete wouldn’t be bothered by Kit’s gender, but he’d never let Linc hear the end of it if the distraction continued. Until Linc decided what he was going to do, he didn’t need outside “help.” He set the weight on the triceps machine and started his reps to cover his introspection.

  They had another tutoring session tomorrow evening, but after the flirting during their break today, Linc had choices he hadn’t had before. People flirted with him all the time, but usually they wanted Lincoln Joyner, basketball star. Kit openly admitted he admired the basketball star, but the conversation about Luke Bishop had proven that Kit didn’t just see that. For once in his life, someone looked at Linc and didn’t see another mouth to feed, another pair of hands to work on the farm, a ticket to the championships, a ticket out of there. Not that he knew what someone like Kit would want with Linc. Linc wasn’t stupid, as he’d pointed out to Kit when they first met, but he knew his strengths, and academics wasn’t one of them. He did well enough, but he wasn’t making any honor rolls. Kit, though… he was smart, cultured, and gorgeous. He had this awesome internship, and he worked at the tutoring center, and he clearly loved science. He’d worked in theater and thought about things like gay icons and….

  Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, what could he possibly see in a hick from the country, even one who could play basketball?

  Chapter Four

  KIT walked into the apartment, knowing no one would be home yet. He toed off his shoes and went into his room, pulling off his tie as he flopped down on the bed. Uncle Thane would still be at work, just like Phillip and Ephah, but Uncle Blake might be out of school by now, and even if he wasn’t, he would probably answer a text. He dug his phone out of his pocket.

  Is now a good time to call?

  As he waited for the answer, he unbuttoned the top couple of buttons on his shirt and tried to remember if his dad’s Army sweatshirt—the one his mother had always worn when she was missing him—was clean. He could use a little bit of comfort at the moment. He’d started digging through the basket of clean laundry in his closet when his phone rang. He’d find the sweatshirt later. Blake was a more immediate source of comfort.

  “Hi, Uncle Blake,” he said, returning to the bed.

  “Hi. Is something wrong?” Blake’s voice always conveyed his interest and his care, whether he was talking to his nephews, a troubled student, or a server in a restaurant, but it carried an extra edge today.

  “Not wrong exactly.” Kit winced. “I didn’t mean to worry you. I just needed someone to talk to.”

  “Do you want to talk on the phone, or do you want to come to dinner tonight?” Blake asked.

  Kit sank back against his pillows, the nervous tension leaving him at Blake’s immediate answer and the familiar suggestion.

  “On the phone is fine. It’s not serious enough to be a ‘come to dinner’ problem.”

  Blake laughed, the sound doing as much to comfort Kit as any home cooking or familiar sweatshirt could ever do. “You don’t need a problem to come have dinner with us, you know.”

  “Then maybe I will come.” He’d seen his uncles last weekend for Preston’s wedding, but that had been a bigger gathering, with Derek and his family there as well as Preston’s wife’s family. Dinner with Blake and Thane sounded like heaven.

  “What are you in the mood for? I have salmon if you want that, or I could make a pork tenderloin.”

  “Anything you make will be wonderful.” Kit had learned how to make his favorite of Blake’s dishes, but they always tasted better when Blake made them.

  “Salmon, it is.” The smile Kit could hear in Blake’s voice suffused him with warmth. No matter what else happened, he could always count on his uncles. “I was about to leave work, so I’ll be home in ten minutes. Come over whenever you’re ready.”

  “I’ll leave a note for Phillip and Ephah and meet you there.”

  He ended the call, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. Knowing he’d get to spend the evening with his uncles already made him feel better. Uncle Blake could say what he wanted. Kit knew the truth. He owed everything he was now to the unconditional love and support of his uncles.

  LIGHT poured out of the front windows as Kit parked in the driveway fifteen minutes later. By the time he locked the car and walked through the unlocked front door, the knot of tension in his belly had started to loosen. “It’s me, Uncle Blake,” he called as he took off his coat and pushed the door shut against the February cold.

  “In the kitchen,” Blake called back.

  That, too, was as familiar as breathing. From the day Blake had moved in with them, over Christmas break of Kit’s junior year of high school, Kit could count on finding him in the kitchen. Even now, with one of the upstairs bedrooms converted into an office, he still worked at the kitchen table, a pot of tea steaming at his elbow in the winter, the windows flung open wide to let in fresh air in the spring and fall, and a pitcher of iced tea in the summer. Kit stepped into the kitchen to exactly the image he’d predicted. The kettle whistled as Blake turned off the heat and poured boiling water into the porcelain teapot he’d inherited from his grandmother.

  “Can you get two cups out?” Blake asked.

  Kit took two mugs out of the cabinet and set them at the table before taking his usual seat. Blake joined him a moment later. “Thane won’t be home until after seven tonight, so we don’t need to start cooking yet,” he said as he poured the tea. The fragrant mix of hibiscus and strawberry floated up from the cups, settling Kit even more. The routine of Blake’s “tell me everything” tea grounded him. “Something about a customer changing plans at the last minute.”

  “Yeah, Phillip mentioned that. Ephah just rolled his eyes and said that’s why he doesn’t want to be a foreman.”

  Blake took a sip of his tea and leaned back in his chair. “How are your classes going?”

  Kit shrugged. “They’re fine. I’m having to juggle my time a bit to get everything done, between Alltech, classes, and tutoring, but it’s not all that different from when we worked stage crew and still had to get our homework done.”

  “I told you theater was good life experience,” Blake replied with a grin.

  Kit snorted. “Yeah, yeah, turns out assistant principals sometimes know what they’re talking about.”

  “While that’s fresh on your mind, do you want to tell me what’s bothering you?”

  Kit sipped his own tea, trying to buy time to put his thoughts in order. Blake would give him all the time he needed, but Kit had never been good with silence, especially expectant silence. “Have you ever had a crush on someone totally out of your league? Like so far out of your league he’ll probably never even know you exist?”

  Blake chuckled. “That pretty much sums up my relationship with Thane in one simple sentence. You do remember the roasting Heidi gave me at our wedding reception, right?”

  Kit had been too busy dreaming about asking out Trevor, his first real boyfriend, to pay much attention to old stories about his uncles, but he vaguely remembered Blake’s best friend telling a story that had the whole crowd in stitches.

  “Kinda?”

  Blake shook his head with an indulgent smile. “In a nutshell, then. Thane was a senior, I was a freshman, and I figured out I was gay through my crush on him. He didn’t even know I existed, and never would have if you and Phillip hadn’t ended up in my office. So, yes, I know something about unattainable crushes.”

  It wasn’t really the same, no matter what Blake said, but Kit nodded along.

  “I take it you’re feeling that way a
bout someone too?”

  “I never thought I’d even meet him, much less have a chance to get to know him,” Kit explained.

  “Meet who?”

  Kit flushed. “Sorry, I’m all thrown off by this.”

  Blake reached across the table and squeezed Kit’s hand. “Take a deep breath, relax, and remember the kitchen table rules.”

  Kit took a deep breath, let it out, and said, “No judgment, just support.” He and Phillip had worked through all manner of adolescent crises in this exact spot, thanks to that rule.

  “That’s right. Start at the beginning, maybe?”

  “Linc Joyner came to me for tutoring this week.”

  “The basketball star?”

  “Yeah, the gay, out, gorgeous basketball star.” Kit didn’t try to stop the smile he could feel forming. “He came in on Wednesday, and then we had a second session this afternoon, and a third one scheduled for tomorrow after I get off work. He’s worried about his physics grade.”

  “And?” Blake prompted when Kit didn’t immediately continue.

  “And when we took a break today, he flirted with me. Really flirted.”

  “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  “Not bad.” Kit shook his head as he sought the right words. “Unexpected, for sure. I mean, he’s UK’s best player, a shoo-in for the NBA draft…. He’s got the world at his feet. Why’s he flirting with me?”

  “Why shouldn’t he flirt with you?” Blake countered. Kit rolled his eyes. Blake had always turned the question around on him and Phillip when they were having a crisis, especially one involving self-image.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m a great guy any man would be lucky to date,” Kit said, only a little sarcasm in his voice. “But—”

  “But nothing. You’re an intelligent, good-looking, confident man. You’re comfortable with who you are and don’t feel the need to hide that from anyone. That creates a very attractive package.”

  “I have you and Uncle Thane to thank for that.”

  Blake waved away the gratitude. “You have your mother to thank for that. Thane and I put the finishing touches on you, that’s all. If you hadn’t already had the core of it in you, we wouldn’t have been nearly as successful. So tell me again, why shouldn’t he flirt with you?”

  Kit mulled over the question, because he didn’t have the words to explain in a way Blake would accept.

  “He’s a celebrity, and I’m not,” he said slowly.

  “Fame is as fame does,” Blake replied. “He still puts his shoes on one at a time in the morning, and he still struggles enough with physics that he sought out your help.”

  “Not my help specifically, though. Just someone in the tutoring center.”

  “For the first session, I have no doubt that’s true, but unless you’ve added hours, he didn’t schedule the second or third session with ‘just someone in the tutoring center.’ He scheduled them with you. That should tell you something about the value he sees in knowing you.”

  “But that’s what I can do for him. That’s not the same as flirting with me.”

  “Okay, then let me ask you this. Did you flirt back?”

  “Of course I did!”

  “Why? Because he’s a celebrity?”

  “No, because he was a cute guy flirting with me.” Kit glared at Blake indignantly.

  “Then why can’t he see a cute guy and flirt with him?” Blake replied, completely unruffled. Kit hated his uncle’s unflappability sometimes. He said it came from working with high school students. After dealing with them for years, nothing was shocking anymore.

  “But he could have any guy he wants.”

  “So could you. Which leaves you with two questions to answer. First, do you want him—for the right reasons, mind? And if so, what are you going to do about it?”

  Somehow Kit didn’t think answering those questions would be as easy as asking them.

  KIT had just put the salmon under the broiler at Blake’s direction when the back door opened to admit a blast of cold air and Thane. Kit shook his head as Thane practically swept Blake off his feet into a kiss that had to include tongue. When he was younger, Kit swore Thane did it to embarrass him and Phillip, but as he’d gotten older, he’d come to understand Thane really was that in love with his husband. One day, Kit promised himself, I’ll have someone who loves me that much too.

  “We have company,” Blake said breathlessly. Kit took that as his cue that it was safe to turn around.

  “Hi, Uncle Thane.”

  “I didn’t know you were coming for dinner tonight.” Thane opened his big arms wide and Kit stepped into them. He might have filled out since the day he came to live with Thane, a grieving teen with no hope for the future, but Thane’s hugs offered just as much comfort now as they had then. He clung a moment before stepping back.

  “It was a spur-of-the-moment decision.”

  “Boy troubles,” Blake confided.

  Kit stuck his tongue out, because while Blake’s advice varied according to the situation, Thane’s never did.

  “Keep a condom in your wallet,” Kit mouthed along with his uncle. “Use it. Consent is sexy.”

  Behind Thane, Blake smirked at them both.

  “We’re nowhere near that stage yet,” Kit protested. “We just met yesterday.”

  “You met yesterday and you’re already having relationship trouble? I’m impressed. It always took me at least a week before I started having problems.” Thane moved easily around the kitchen, pulling out plates and silverware.

  “Ha-ha. Good thing I’m smoother than you, then, isn’t it? The problem is deciding whether I want there to be a relationship.”

  Thane set the plates on the table and pinned Kit with the same steely look he used on difficult contractors. “Is he kind? Is he smart enough to keep up with you? Is he attractive enough you want to sleep with him? If the answer is yes, then you want there to be a relationship.”

  Blake smothered a laugh. “Really, Thane? That’s the advice you’re going to give him?”

  Thane shot Blake a wicked grin. “You can put all the pretty words on it you want, but what else is there really? If he’s kind, he’ll treat Kit right. If he’s reasonably intelligent, Kit won’t be bored. If Kit finds him attractive, there’s a decent chance the sex will be good. Everything else is secondary.”

  Kit buried his face in his hands to hide the burning in his cheeks. Why had he come home again?

  “Go wash up. Dinner’s almost ready,” Blake said.

  Oh yeah, that was why.

  Thane disappeared toward the downstairs bathroom, leaving Blake and Kit alone again. “I might not have put it as bluntly, but there are worse foundations to build a relationship on than Thane’s criteria. And you are kind enough, smart enough, and attractive enough to be a catch for anyone you decide is worth your time. Don’t let his ‘celebrity’ status keep you from remembering that. When the two of you are alone together, he’s a man just like you are, no more, no less. And if he’s not, then I’m thinking he doesn’t fit Thane’s criteria for good relationship material.”

  Kit thought back over his and Linc’s interactions so far. “No, he’s not like that. I wouldn’t have flirted back if he was.”

  “You have a good head on your shoulders. Use it and you’ll be fine.”

  Thane came back into the kitchen and pulled the salmon out of the oven. “Kit, you should come for dinner more often. Blake doesn’t cook like this when it’s just us.”

  Blake caught Kit’s eye and winked. Kit smiled and let Thane’s lie pass. It was nice to be missed.

  Chapter Five

  “BREAK time?” Linc asked after he and Kit had been at it for almost forty-five minutes. “I know we only have another fifteen minutes left, but my brain hurts.”

  Kit laughed, the throaty chuckle Linc had already come to love. Kit laughed easily, a trait Linc admired, but usually it was a much lighter laugh. Linc hadn’t figured out the pattern of the deeper one yet, but he would, given
enough time.

  “We could call it a day. We’re making great progress. At this rate, you’ll be ready for your test and we can start working on what you’re doing in class so you don’t have to play catch-up anymore.”

  Linc wrinkled his nose. “Until the tournament starts. Then I’ll get behind again with all the travel.”

  “Then we can work ahead,” Kit offered. “Whatever you need.”

  What Linc needed…. He could think of a few things that wouldn’t fall under the tutoring umbrella. He could almost hear his father’s voice. Need and want are two different things, Lincoln. You have everything you need.

  Did it make him greedy to want more of Kit’s time and attention without the focus always on physics? He didn’t even know if Kit was single. Smart without being condescending, good-looking without being vain, kind—see not being condescending—funny without being cruel, everything Linc looked for in a man, all in one gorgeous package. “I appreciate that. Drinks are on me today since you bought one for me yesterday.”

  “You want something out of the break room, or do you want to get out of here?” Kit asked. “Sometimes a change of scenery is enough to get the brain back in gear.”

  Not a date, Linc reminded himself. Just more proof that Kit’s a really awesome tutor. “We can go somewhere else. Did you have somewhere in mind?”

  “We could go over to Coffea. They have tea and coffee, all different kinds, including herbal teas with no caffeine. And it’s big enough there’s usually space to sit. It’s my go-to break spot if I have time between classes.”

  “Sure.” They bundled up against the cold—the temperatures having dropped overnight, although the snow had held off so far—and packed up their books so they wouldn’t have to come back to the tutoring center later.