The Long and Winding Road

by T. J. Klune

  He shrugged awkwardly, looking down at his hands on the table. “Maybe. But there are some, right? I mean, Anna and Creed and JJ are there. Mrs. P. She’s a good memory.”

  “The best memory,” I said quietly.

  He looked up at me, smiling just a little. “Yeah, Bear. The best.” He glanced at Otter. “And it wasn’t all bad. We got you there. And even with everything that happened after, we still have that.”

  “Package deal,” Otter said, though I could see how much that had moved him. “Couldn’t get one without the other.”

  The Kid laughed. It wasn’t the sound I remembered before we’d come here, but there was still a note of familiarity to it, and I thought maybe it’d be enough for now. “Yeah. Like you’d ever want just one of us.” He shook his head. “I think it’s the right thing to do. At the very least, it’d give me a chance to… I don’t know. Clear my head, maybe. It’d be something I know, something that’s not here. Corey’s going back to Arizona in the fall, and I need to be able to figure things out. How things are going to be without him here.”

  Ah, yes. Corey. There’d been a light in the Kid’s eyes I hadn’t seen in a long time the day that Corey burst into his life with a sharp tongue, or as Kori with perfectly manicured nails. They’d given something to the Kid that I couldn’t, and maybe I hadn’t been too excited at the prospect of a relationship between them so soon after everything the Kid had gone through, but I couldn’t micromanage everything, as much as I’d wanted to. Well, Otter said I couldn’t. We’d kept a close eye, especially after they’d broken up. But the Kid was made of strong stuff, stronger than even I’d given him credit for. But this felt like too much.

  The fact that I’d met Corey already never came up. And maybe that wasn’t right. Maybe it wasn’t supposed to be that way. The day he’d knocked on the door to tell me about Ty, I would’ve never thought he’d eventually be involved in our lives as much as he was. There were days I thought Ty should know, but I realized that it didn’t matter. Sometimes secrets were meant to be kept.

  “You have other friends,” I said. “It’s not just going to be—”

  He snorted derisively. “Yeah. See? I don’t know if that’s really true. For the longest time, I was the oddity, the sixteen-year-old anomaly that was supposed to be the Next Big Thing. It felt like I was in a zoo and everyone just wanted a look at me, the little kid who was smarter than everyone else. That tends to put a damper on things. And then with… my issues, it sort of alienated whatever was left when the newness wore off. I’m lucky Corey stuck around for as long as he did.”

  “Ty,” Otter warned.

  “Right, right,” he said quickly. “No talking bad about myself, I promise. And I’m really not. Or at least I’m not meaning to. I’m just trying to show you how it is. I have classmates. I don’t have friends. And I don’t know that I’m in the best position to try right now.”

  “This isn’t just running away?” Otter asked. “Because if that’s what you’re doing, it’s not going to work. If anything, it might make things worse. The problems are still going to be here when you get back.”

  “No,” he said. “I promise it’s not that. And I know my promises don’t mean much these days. That’s on me. You guys don’t trust me yet. And that’s okay, because I don’t know that I trust myself.”

  Even though I wanted to disagree vehemently, I couldn’t. Because he was right. We didn’t trust him. Not with himself. And here he was, being more transparent than he’d been for a very long time, and all I wanted to do was sugarcoat the hell out of it.

  Life doesn’t work that way, though. Not if you want to stay ahead of it.

  “What happens in the fall,” I asked him instead, “if you don’t want to come back here?”

  He fidgeted a little in his seat. “I don’t know. We stay in Seafare? Or I do and you guys come back here. Or we all come back here. Or I come back here on my—I know it’s a lot. You both have… things here. Your lives. Your jobs. Bear, you especially. Maybe I can just go by myself.”

  “But…,” Otter said.

  “But I don’t think you’d let me do that.”

  “You’re damn right we wouldn’t,” I said. “I told you, Kid. I’m not taking my eyes off of you for the foreseeable future. Consider it your punishment for your less than desirable decisions.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Oh, trust me, I’m well aware of that.”

  “Good. Just so we’re on the same page.”

  “You can’t do this forever, Bear.”

  “Watch me.”

  “Otter?”

  Otter chuckled. “Don’t look at me. You know I agree with Bear.”

  “You guys suck,” the Kid muttered.

  “Very well too.”

  “Otter!” I yelped.

  He blinked. “Wow. I don’t even know why I said that. I’m getting really good at jokes.”

  “Yeah, maybe try a little harder,” the Kid said. “And also, thanks for making a conversation about me all about you.”

  Otter shrugged. “I like being the center of attention. I deserve it after putting up with the two of you this long.”

  “You love us,” I said, trying (and failing) to not make it sound like an accusation.

  “A little bit,” he said, and I had to suppress the urge to jump him right then and there. Apparently minimal validation did it for me. Who knew.

  “Anyway,” the Kid said, sounding disgusted. “Seafare? Thoughts? Concerns? Questions?”

  “You really think this would be good for you?” Otter asked. “Seafare is… complicated. For you and Bear.”

  “But there was more good than bad, right? I mean, we… survived.”

  That wasn’t the best endorsement I’d ever heard, but I supposed I could work with it. “I do miss the Green Monstrosity,” I admitted. “And our family. But mostly the house.”

  “And you haven’t signed a new contract yet,” Otter said, sitting back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest.

  The Kid grinned, and even though it wasn’t as bright as it’d once been, it was something. “Could Corey come too? Stay the summer with us? He’d have to go to Arizona at some point, but we could figure that out later.”

  I sighed. “You’ve already decided this, haven’t you.”

  “Maybe a little.”

  “Kid.”

  “Okay, maybe a lot. But… Bear. I think this could be good for me. To be home. Maybe I’ll even be able to put myself back into someone I recognize.”

  And how could I say no to that?

  IT WAS surprisingly easy, that decision. I thought there’d be more drama behind it, more angst. But the moment we agreed, we all felt… lighter somehow, even if none of us actually said that aloud. But I could see it in the way the Kid carried himself a little taller, the way Otter jumped into planning the move. It was significant, the transplanting of a life, but unlike how I felt when we’d packed up the Green Monstrosity the first time to head east (tense and nervous and excited and second-guessing everything), this felt like the right thing to do.

  We’d made friends, sure, and they were sorry to see us go. They threw Otter and me a party in early May, and we drank and told stories and laughed in all the right places. But it hit me as we stood together, a toast being made to us by everyone else in the room, that these people, while good and kind, had always felt temporary somehow. Like they were placeholders for the real thing waiting for us back in Seafare.

  “That’s because you’re kind of an asshole,” Anna Thompson told me over the phone the next day while I was still nursing a hangover and groaning angrily over the stupid fucking packing tape that refused to cooperate.

  “Thanks.”

  “Well, it’s true. We all are. I mean, I have friends, people at both in and outside the firm, but it’s…. I don’t know how else to explain it. They are people I like, but not people I depend on.”

  I blinked. “Wow. We are assholes. That’s… okay. I think I already knew that. But saying
it out loud? That’s slightly mind-blowing. Have we always been that way?”

  She snorted in my ear. “Probably. I know I’d probably not like us if I wasn’t me.”

  “Deep.”

  “Jerk.”

  I pressed my fingers against my forehead. “It’s a weird thought, right?”

  “What is?”

  “That we’re still us. Even after all this time. I mean, no one keeps their high school friends. Not really.”

  “No one probably went through everything we did. And by that, I mean when you cheated on me with my husband’s older brother who is now your husband when you and I were dating.”

  “Holy fucking shit,” I wheezed, dropping the tape on the floor.

  “Awesome, right?”

  “I didn’t cheat on you!”

  She snorted elegantly. “You kissed Otter when you and I were still together.”

  “That—that’s not what happened. Otter kissed me. I wasn’t even gay then.”

  “Because that’s how sexuality works. Which, sidebar.”

  “Yes, counselor.”

  “And really,” she said, “it’s none of my business.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Because that’s ever stopped any of us.”

  “Right. What are you?”

  “What?”

  “Gay? Bi? Otter-sexual?”

  “Oh. Um. Pan, I think. Pansexual. Probably.”

  “Ah. That… makes an unbelievable amount of sense.”

  “Weird, right? I didn’t even know what that was until last year. Kids these days, having all these newfangled terms. Corey taught me that. He’s pretty smart, that one.”

  “Anyway. Back to the whole cheating-on-me thing—”

  “You are actually terrible.”

  “I lose sleep at night over it,” she assured me. “But our histories are too intertwined to ever be able to let any of us go.”

  “That can’t possibly be healthy.”

  “Probably not. A therapist would have a field day with all of us, I’m sure.”

  “Eh. They kind of already do.”

  “The Kid?”

  “He’s getting there.”

  “And you?”

  “Honestly? I’m relieved.”

  “About coming home?”

  “Yeah. It’s…. I think it’s probably for the best. It doesn’t feel like we’re running away. It’s more like we’re ready to face what we left behind.”

  “That’s surprisingly mature of you,” she said.

  “Right? We’re getting old.”

  “I’m still pretty, so I’m fine with that.”

  I laughed. “God, I can’t wait to see you.”

  “Me too,” she said, sounding pleased. “I’ve got a cleaning service coming out to the Green Monstrosity. The tenants you guys had in there left everything looking okay, but it should be scrubbed from top to bottom.”

  “Oh, hey, you don’t have to do that.”

  “Already done. Consider it a welcome-home present. But if you really wanted to repay me, I can tell you how.”

  “I’m not going to do a threesome with you and Creed, no matter how much he said you wanted one.”

  “He said what?”

  “Uh. Nothing? How about that… sports… ball game on TV last night? My team totally won the touchdown—”

  “I am going to murder him,” she growled. “I had had one too many glasses of wine, and it was a joke.”

  “Oh my god.”

  “I wasn’t being serious. It was just a… thing.”

  “Oh my god.”

  “Stop saying that!”

  “You want me to have sex with you and Creed?”

  Of course, that’s when Otter walked into the room.

  “Who the hell are you talking to?” he barked.

  “Anna!” I said, rather hysterically. “She wants me to get down and dirty with her and Creed, but Creed said it’d be strictly no homo, but that if our dicks touched on accident, that would be okay.”

  “I am in my office,” Anna hissed at me.

  “Put it on speaker,” Otter demanded.

  I did, because he was using that tone of voice that made me want to climb him like a fucking tree.

  “Anna?”

  “Oliver. I am not—”

  “There will be no threesome with Bear.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “Unless you pay me for it first.”

  “What!” I squeaked. “Are you pimping me out?”

  “Two hundred for the night.”

  “Huh,” Anna said. “That’s… unsurprisingly affordable.”

  “I hate you both so goddamn much.”

  Otter kissed me deeply, then left the room, whistling as he carried another box toward the kitchen.

  “This is why we can’t have other friends,” I said mournfully. “Because no one understands just how incestuous this family is.”

  “You think Otter would be into it?” Anna asked.

  “Shut. Up.”

  “Moving on. Repayment.”

  “Right.”

  “So, I hear there’s going to be an opening at the middle school this fall….”

  THE NIGHT before the movers came, Otter and I were in our bedroom, packing up the last of our possessions. Corey and Ty were at Corey’s apartment, doing the same. Most of Corey’s stuff would be sent on down to Arizona to his friend Sandy’s house, where he’d be living after he spent time with us in Seafare. This was the last night in the house. Tomorrow night we’d be in a hotel before we started the cross-country trip back to Oregon.

  Music was playing low off Otter’s phone, and even though we had so much more to do, we were sitting side by side against the bed, legs spread out in front of us, his hand clasped over mine, his thumb rubbing mine. Each of us held a beer, the condensation dripping onto our laps. It was quiet, quieter than it’d been in a week.

  It was good. Strange, but good.

  And because he always seemed to know what I was thinking, he said, “It’s weird, right?”

  “What’s that?” I asked, turning my head toward him. I kissed his bare shoulder once, liking the taste of clean sweat.

  “Everything all packed up. Going back.”

  “Good weird or bad weird?”

  “Good weird, I think. It’s not bad. It’s just… all this stuff, you know? Our whole lives are in these boxes. Everything we own. And yet, even if it all disappeared, we’d still be okay.”

  I laughed quietly. “No one believes me when I tell them you’re a softie.”

  He frowned at me. “And just how many people are you telling this to?”

  “Enough that I realize people think you’re some kind of hardass.”

  “I am a hardass. You see how big I am?” He flexed, and it was so unfair. “I’m intimidating.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Scary as all hell.”

  “Damn right.”

  “You’ve got dust on your nose.”

  “Maybe I like it there.” His cheek scraped against mine as he turned to kiss me.

  “That’s fine with me,” I mumbled against his lips.

  “Good,” he said as he pulled away. Before I could complain, he reached behind me, wrapping an arm around my shoulders and pulling me close. I rested my head on his shoulder and sighed contentedly.

  We were quiet for a time, each of us lost in our own thoughts. He’d been right. It was weird seeing everything stored away, ready for the move. We’d accumulated so much crap in the last four years. And rather than taking it back with us, we’d sold or donated all the shit we didn’t need. The Green Monstrosity wasn’t as big as our New Hampshire house, and even though I was sure we could find room for everything we had, it wasn’t necessary. It felt like we were getting back to who we once were, and I couldn’t help but be nervously happy about it.

  I said, “We’re doing the right thing.”

  He hummed a little.

  “Right?”

  He squeezed me tighter. “Yes. Yeah. I think so. It�
�ll be good for him. For all of us.”

  “And you’re happy?”

  He frowned. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “Just asking.”

  “Fishing, more like.”

  “A little.”

  “Yes, Bear. I’m happy.”

  “But it could be better.”

  “I don’t get where you’re going with this. Bear, we’re good. Everything is good.”

  I took a deep breath, trying to calm my nerves. Which, really, was practically an impossibility, given that I was about to take the biggest leap of my life. My heart was starting to thump almost painfully in my chest, and I had to force myself to remain calm.

  I pulled away from him, setting my beer down on the floor next to us. His frown deepened as he watched me, those lines on his forehead appearing as they always did when he was concerned.

  “So look,” I said, wincing a little as my voice broke. “I wanted to talk. To you. About something.”

  “Okay,” he said slowly. “You know you can talk to me about anything.”

  “I know.”

  “Then why are you nervous?”

  I groaned. “Because I am. That’s the type of person I am.”

  “Yeah, but why are you nervous with me?”

  “Ugh. Would you just shut up for a minute and let me talk? And wow, I didn’t mean that to sound so rude. What the hell.”

  He set his beer down too before giving me his full attention. I was distracted, if for just a moment, by the familiar gold and green in his eyes. This was Otter, I told myself. Just Otter. I’d known him practically my whole life and had probably loved him for just as long, in one way or another. And I could give this to him, because he’d given everything to me.

  Or it could already be too late, it whispered. Because he’s asked time and time again, and there’s always been a reason, hasn’t there, Bear? A reason to say no, a reason to deflect, a reason to push it away and think about it later, later, later. And besides, are you really sure you can do this? There’s no going back, after all. He’ll never forgive you if you offer this and then try and take it away again.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, not wanting to speak with a mouthful of crazy.