Just the Three of Us

by J. M. Snyder

  Suddenly, Braden slid out of the booth and stood. Wiping his mouth, he tossed his napkin onto the table. Before he could walk away, Remy asked, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Bathroom,” Braden said. “I gotta pee.”

  “Announce it to the world,” Remy grumbled, but he let Braden go.

  Lane watched until he disappeared into the men’s room, then shifted his gaze to Remy. He looked so serious, Remy leaned forward and clasped his hand. “Alone at last,” he purred playfully.

  “I think I know why he’s doing this,” Lane said. He turned his hand palm up so Remy could hold it better.

  Remy laughed. “This is nothing. Sometimes he’s worse.”

  “No, listen,” Lane started. Then, with a sigh, he said, “Back at the house, I think he saw us kissing in the kitchen.”

  Remy shrugged. “So? That was tame, baby. If you want a real kiss…” He raised Lane’s hand to his lips and opened his mouth. Holding Lane’s gaze, Remy licked out his tongue and pressed it between two of Lane’s fingers. Lane’s skin grew hot and wet as he worked his tongue into the small gap, breaching it, suckling. He cocked an eyebrow, promising more.

  With a laugh, Lane pulled his hand free and wiped it on a napkin. “I’m being serious. You told me yourself Braden doesn’t know about us. About you.”

  “Maybe Kate said something,” Remy suggested, but he knew she hadn’t. When he started dating Lane, he even brought up the subject with his ex-wife, and they had discussed at length how they might explain his sexuality to their son. Kate’s opinion had been that Braden was too young to understand adult relationships, his or hers. Mike was introduced as a special friend. He must have seen how intimate they were together, but Kate didn’t flaunt the relationship in front of him. Remy had agreed to introduce Lane the same way.

  Only if Braden had seen them kissing without further explanation, maybe that would make him a little pissy.

  Remy reached for Lane’s hand again, but Lane pulled it out of reach. “Here he comes.”

  “We’ll talk to him,” Remy promised. Sliding to the edge of the booth, he stood before Braden could sit down again. “You about ready, kid? I have to take a leak, too, so you and Lane head out to the car, hmm?”

  Braden glowered at Lane. “I’ll wait here for you to get back.”

  Remy began, “I said—” Then he saw the almost imperceptible shake of Lane’s head and sighed. “Fine. Whatever. Refill your drink and I’ll be right out. Lane?”

  “I’m good,” Lane told him.

  Remy headed for the bathroom, pausing to glance back. Lane was still seated, and Braden was playing with the soda fountain, spilling more soda than he managed to get into his cup. Yeah, they had to talk this out, before things went any further between them.

  * * * *

  Back on the road again, Remy let a couple miles go by in silence. They crested Afton Mountain and started down the far side of the highway, on their way to Staunton and points beyond. When he felt the pressure in his ears from the altitude, he flexed his jaw to get them to pop, then half-turned in his seat to look at Braden. Once again behind Lane, Braden nursed his soda while staring at the darkness beyond his window. Remy reached back to touch his knee, and Braden jumped. “Hey,” Remy said softly.

  Braden glanced at him. Without removing the straw from his mouth, he muttered, “What?”

  “Listen, um…” Remy wasn’t sure where to go or what to say next. “Maybe things got off to a bad start, you know? I don’t want you acting this way for the next two weeks. So what’s really bugging you, hmm? Can you tell me?”

  Glaring at the back of Lane’s head, Braden shrugged.

  Remy rubbed his son’s knee. “Is it me, maybe?” he offered. “Did your mom say something about me not wanting you to come along with us? Because I think we’ll have a great time, just the three of us. I think we can really have a lot of fun. But not if you’re in this mood of yours.”

  Braden said nothing.

  Remy tried a different tactic. “You were real excited back home when I first showed up. What happened, huh? What changed that?”

  No response.

  “Fine.” Remy turned back around, facing the road again. “I tried. But if you’re mad about something, I can’t talk to you about it unless you tell me what it is that’s bothering you.”

  Softly, he heard Braden mutter, “Nothing.”

  “What?” Remy asked, looking over his shoulder at his son.

  Braden spoke again, louder this time. “I said it’s nothing.”

  “Then snap out of it, mister,” Remy told him. “I’m not going to let you ruin our Christmas, you hear?”

  Chapter 6

  Remy’s original plan had included stopping at a grocery store close to the cabin to stock up on food and supplies. But the time they had spent at Kate’s getting Braden threw off their schedule, and the Jeep was pretty full of presents and Christmas decorations, anyway. A little before nine, they pulled over at a Wal-Mart outside Roanoke to grab a few things for the morning—eggs, bacon, bread, coffee. They would run out Saturday to really stock up, but at least there would be something for breakfast when they woke up.

  On a good day, without traffic, the drive to Peaks Resort at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains took a good four hours. The Blue Ridge were part of the Appalachians, a long chain of mountains stretched across the eastern coast from Georgia to Maine. As Lane drove, the mountains were a dark cloud on the horizon; he wished it were daylight, because one of the things he liked best about the mountains was their blue-hued appearance on the horizon. Hopefully there would be a spot at the cabin where he would be able to see the colorations better. It would be a pretty backdrop to the wintry chill. In Virginia, the chances of snowfall in December were rare, but blue mountains framing pine trees and the frost-encrusted ground would make it seem Christmas-y nonetheless.

  At ten thirty, Lane exited the interstate on Remy’s guidance. He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw Braden, stretched across the middle seat. The boy’s pillow rested on his backpack, and Braden was curled into himself, fast asleep. Finally, Lane thought. He hadn’t formed any real opinions about the boy yet, but he was glad there would be no more bickering for the rest of the night.

  Following Remy’s directions, Lane navigated the Jeep along a convoluted route that led through a small town and onto a wide dirt road that narrowed as the woods crept closer and closer on either side. Soon trees hemmed them in, and Lane flicked on his high beams to see better. He could imagine all too well a deer dashing out in front of their car and ruining the rest of their night. Or, hey, venison for dinner tomorrow, he thought, smiling to himself. Bet Wal-Mart doesn’t sell that.

  Remy grinned slightly. “What are you smiling about?”

  “You, me, naked,” Lane said, wriggling his eyebrows suggestively. “In a cozy bed with flannel sheets, and a roaring fireplace, and a bear-skin rug.”

  “I like your train of thought,” Remy said. “But the fireplace is in the main room. There’s oil heat for the rest of the cabin. The rugs are Native American patterns, not fur. And we have to make the beds ourselves. I’m sorry to say I didn’t pack any flannel sheets.”

  Lane shrugged. “They get too hot anyway. Between the two of us, I’m sure we can find a way to warm up the room all by ourselves.”

  Remy laughed and glanced over his shoulder at his son. When he saw that Braden was sleeping, he reached over and placed his hand high up on Lane’s leg. Remy’s fingers fit easily into the space where Lane’s thigh met his hip. Then Remy snuggled in a little further, fingers working down toward Lane’s crotch. A sudden, welcome pressure on Lane’s cock piqued his interest and chased away the weariness beginning to seep into him.

  “That’s the spot,” he murmured, dropping one hand off the steering wheel to cover Remy’s. Their fingers laced together and pressed heavily against the pillowy cushion of Lane’s crotch.

  Throughout the trip Braden had been silent, a brooding silence, and
Lane had felt the boy’s anger seething behind him for most of the drive. Now he was sleeping, and the mood in the Jeep had lifted. There was only Remy and himself, and the sweet crush of his lover’s hand on his body. Even though they started on the wrong foot, they could still turn things around. Maybe this vacation wouldn’t be such a disaster after all.

  * * * *

  Shortly their headlights illuminated a rustic, wooden sign that read Rainbow Lake Campground. Just beyond it was a small log cabin with another sign, this one tacked to the railing that ran the length of the porch. Office, it read and, a small board hanging under it read, Closed.

  Lane slowed down, but Remy waved him on. “I have the keys already,” he said. “We have about a mile and a half to go. Keep left at the fork.”

  A marker reading LAKE stood at the fork in the road, with an arrow pointing to the left. Lane followed it, moving slower now that the dirt road had dwindled to nothing more than two rutted tire tracks worn into the earth. They passed a few other cabins—larger than the office one, obviously meant to be rented out by couples or families—and saw a couple of tents pitched a ways off the road. “There’s a spot for RVs down the other trail,” Remy told him as he drove. “When I told my mother we were coming here, that’s the first thing she asked about. Anywhere with hookups for their Winnebago is the Ritz Carlton in their book.”

  Lane laughed. He had met Remy’s parents once, when their travels brought them back around Richmond for the day. In their late sixties, they resembled nothing more than a pair of aged hippies; the only things missing were peace symbols and bell-bottom jeans. Flower children reliving their youth. They were very nice, Remy’s mother in particular, even if she had inadvertently been a little demeaning. “You’re just the type of boy I wanted Jeremy to meet,” she had cooed, giving Lane a bear hug. “Once he told us he was gay. Ralph thought he’d pick a fairy but I knew he’d go for a sensible, straight-acting guy like you.”

  Lane knew it was difficult for people of their generation to be accepting of homosexuality, so he just smiled and didn’t say anything. It had taken years to bring his own parents to a place where they didn’t accidentally make a derogatory remark about anyone different from them, though his elderly grandmother still complained about being Jewed down by a haggler at the flea market, or gypped by a high price at the grocery store. He had given up trying to correct her slights. If the worst thing Mrs. McIntosh could say was that Lane acted straight, he could live with that.

  Now, though, he teased Remy, “As long as they’re not planning to show up while we’re here.”

  “God, no,” Remy groaned. “They’re up in Alaska watching the Northern Lights, or something. One unexpected houseguest over the holiday is enough for me, thank you very much. Turn here.”

  Lane took another left where the road diverged. A few minutes more and his headlights swept over a large cabin standing alone in a clutch of tall pines. It was one level, square, with a steeply slanted roof and a thick chimney perched on one end. There was no railing, just a flat, open porch stretching across the front of the cabin. A couple steps, hewn from logs split in half, led to the porch and the heavy, wooden door in the center of it.

  A wreath of pine boughs and cranberries hung on the door, and a single light glowed in a lantern resting on the floor beside the door. From its steady glow, Lane could tell it wasn’t a flame, but it still added to the ambiance.

  “I love it,” Lane whispered as he eased the Jeep to a stop just to the right of the porch. He cut the engine and stared at the cabin, awash in the glow of his headlights. After a breathless moment, he turned to Remy. “It’s perfect.”

  Remy leaned across the gear shaft to claim a kiss. “I’m glad you like it,” he murmured, stealing a second kiss before resting his chin on Lane’s shoulder. “Wait ‘til you see inside.”

  They exited the Jeep from either side, and the sounds of their doors thumping shut seemed muted in the dark, winter night. Grass crisped with frost crunched beneath their shoes, and Lane tucked his hands into his pockets for warmth. He met Remy in the front of the car.

  Wrapping his arms through Lane’s, Remy hugged his lover close and rested his head on Lane’s shoulder. “I’ll get the bags,” Lane told him, “and you get Braden.”

  “Let me give you the tour first,” Remy said. He released his hold on Lane and slipped his hand into Lane’s pocket, as well.

  Lane took his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Lead the way.”

  Their shoes clomped on the steps, then on the porch. Lane had to let go of Remy’s hand long enough for Remy to unlock the door, but took it again before they went inside. Remy reached for a light switch just inside the door, turning on a pair of lamps framing a large, dark sofa seated directly in front of the fireplace.

  Lane stared at his surroundings with wonder. The place was, in a word, beautiful. The walls had been left uncovered, so instead of stale, white paneling, the wooden tree trunks with their individual knots and whorls shown through. The floor was the same way, but polished to a dull shine from years of use. Gorgeous, hand-woven rugs in Native American designs covered the floor—a runner behind the sofa that led from the door into the house, a large shag rug in front of the fireplace, a tree skirt in one corner where a Christmas tree would look perfect.

  As excited as a little boy, Remy pointed out all his favorite features to Lane. “The side tables are carved from antlers!” he said, running a hand over the veneered surface on which sat one of the lamps. “The stones in the fireplace come from a waterfall up higher in the mountains. That’s why they’re so smooth. Look at this! The framed pictures on the walls were taken right outside. And they’re held in place with railroad spikes! How cool is that?”

  Lane let himself get swept up in Remy’s excitement. The kitchen flowed right off the large main room, separated by two wide steps that led up to it. On one side was a large, sliding window; all Lane could see from it were the lamps reflected back at him, but he knew the view in the morning would be breathtaking. A rugged table and four straight-backed chairs were nestled in front of the window, and the kitchen countertops circled along the other side. “There’s a stove, refrigerator, sink, the basics,” Remy told him, pointing out each appliance as he named it. “Microwave, toaster oven, dishwasher, garbage disposal—state of the art, all of it. And you can’t see it now, but on the other side of the sliding door is a huge porch with a grill and patio set, and a stack of firewood against the house.”

  As if to prove it, Remy reached for a switch on the kitchen wall and suddenly the world beyond the sliding window blazed to life. Lane caught sight of a flicker of white as a startled deer that had been investigating the porch fled into the night. “Look at that!” Remy cried with a laugh.

  Lane laughed with his lover. He was happy Remy was so happy. This would be a wonderful two weeks, even if Braden moped the whole time.

  On the other side of the cabin, a wall with four doors in it hid the bedrooms. The door at the far end, closest to the kitchen, opened onto a large bathroom. There was the claw-foot bathtub Remy had raved about, but to Lane’s relief, there was also a shower head above the tub, and a curtain to pull around it for privacy. A toilet, two sinks set in a long vanity, a mirror the length of one wall, and a cabinet stocked with fluffy towels completed the room.

  Or so Lane thought. But Remy opened the folding door to the cabinet wider and showed off the stacked washer and dryer in the corner. “Why’d I bother packing so much underwear then?” Lane teased.

  “Who wants to do laundry on vacation?” Remy countered. “Seriously, this is for emergencies only. No chores for either of us for the next ten days.”

  “What constitutes an emergency?” Lane wanted to know.

  Remy closed the folding doors and led him out of the bathroom. “Power outage. There’s a generator, and reserve cans of gas in a shed just off the back porch. We’re set for life here, babe. I’m telling you.”

  “Too bad we only picked up a few things when we stopped at W
al-Mart,” Lane said. “If we had stocked up, we’d never have to leave.”

  Remy grinned. “I know, right?”

  They checked out the bedrooms next. Each had beds, dressers, and nightstands, and the light switches turned on lamps beside the bed. Each had a closet whose door slid shut and a small desk and chair in one corner. Each also had a large, floor-to-ceiling window, hidden behind a heavy drape that could be pulled aside to take in the view. Remy said the lake was in that direction, so the bedrooms looked out over the campground’s namesake,

  “Why do they call it Rainbow Lake?” Lane asked. “Do you know?”

  Remy shrugged. “It’s manmade, and they keep it stocked with rainbow trout.”

  “Are you sure it isn’t a subtle way to attract a gay clientele?” Lane joked.

  Remy grinned. “Oh, believe me, I asked.”

  Caught up in his lover’s enthusiasm, Lane laughed. “What did you say?”

  “When I paid for the rental,” Remy explained, “I asked the guy in the office if they were gay-friendly.”

  “You didn’t,” Lane said.

  Remy nodded. “I did. Know what he said?”

  Lane couldn’t imagine. “What?”

  “You have to picture him,” Remy said, setting the stage. “Old man, in his eighties, probably running this place all his life. He sort of looks me up and down and then squints a little and says he’s money-friendly.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Lane asked with a surprised laugh.

  “He said, I don’t care what you are, as long as you pay up.” Shaking his head, Remy added, “I picked him up a bottle of Jack as a present. I mean, he was nice enough, and he looked like a whiskey man to me.”

  “Or we could split it,” Lane suggested. “Send Braden to bed early one night and pour each other snifters in front of the fire.”