by E. F. Mulder
“Oh. Yeah. The Christmas spirit lives on in me, I guess, at least somewhat.”
They were black with little Rudolphs on them, his eyes, ears, and snout printed on, his little red nose made from itty bitty pom-poms.
“What about the rest of your family? Are they here?” Rudy asked.
“Always. Wherever I go.”
“Cool. The bears…are they from your friends down at the bar? They’re cute.”
“Oh. No…I…I made them for my little brother and sister.”
“No kidding. They’re really good. You could make some money off them.” Rudy picked one up. He looked at it closely, turned it upside down, tugged on its wig. “Maybe sell them right downstairs.”
Gideon took it back and set it by the vent. “Nah. It’s just for them. Special…two-of-a-kind originals.”
“Something to think about. I could probably get you a deal somewhere if you wanted to mass produce.”
“What do you do?”
“I buy and sell recreational real estate—properties for stadiums, concert venues, even theme parks. It takes me all over the country…all over the world, really, where I offer my expertise to others.” Rudy twisted his perfect, plump lips. “God.” He flinched. “That sounded pretty egotistical.”
“Not at all.”
“One good thing about ignoring every other aspect of life—it really left me with a lot of time to make money. Things like this…” Rudy picked up the red bear this time. “They’re always popular with tourists. Carnival prizes, souvenirs…I mean, it’s out of my area of expertise, but what I do know is they could be made for pennies and sold for dollars, so there’s a pretty good profit potential.”
Once again, Gideon reclaimed the bear. “No thanks.”
“Will they be here later…your brother and sister?”
Gideon squirmed a little. “Um…They’re here now. I was talking to them before you came.”
“Down in your apartment? Jesus, Gideon. I shouldn’t keep you.” Rudy went to stand.
“No.” Gideon put a hand on his thigh. “They’re not downstairs. They’re…all around us. Curtis and Beth, Mom and Dad, Gramma and Grampa…the ones on my mom’s side, and my grandmother on Dad’s who took me in…”
“Oh.” Rudy looked up.
“In Heaven. Yeah. Randall and Marcus, too.” Gideon hugged himself like Rudy had, and thought about how good it might feel if they would just hug each other. “At least I hope that’s where everyone is.”
“Randall and Marcus?”
“Guys who were dear to me. I’ve lost a lot of people in my life, Rudy.”
“I’m sorry. When?”
Gideon sighed. “A long time ago for some. Not so long for others. I was angry for a while, too. All the stages…But life is for the living, they say. Wherever I’ve lived, I always found a spot way high up to listen for the angels.”
“And do you hear them, Gideon?”
“All the time. Don’t you?”
They were both quiet.
“You did say I was crazy,” Gideon recalled.
“I did not. I said the world was crazy. People like you, they make it a little less so.” Rudy reached over to touch Gideon’s cheek. “I’m glad they come to see you.”
“I’m glad you can meet them.”
Rudy’s phone rang then. He checked it. “My mom.”
“Take it.” Gideon went to stand. “I’ll give you some privacy.”
“No. I’ll call her back.” Rudy grabbed the bottom of Gideon’s long neon green sleeve. “Nice sweater, by the way. Whimsical.”
“Butt ugly,” Gideon countered, “but festive.”
“As long as you know.”
“Do you want things to maybe be different?” Gideon asked as the phone kept ringing. “It could start right now.”
Rudy took a deep breath, then answered. “Hi, Mom. Merry Christmas!”
“You, too.”
Rudy had put the call on speaker. “It’s early. Is everyone there already?” he asked.
“No, just your father and I. Dash is still in bed. You know teenagers. Even on Christmas, he’ll sleep until noon.”
“Have him call me when he wakes up, will you?” Rudy smiled at Gideon. Gideon returned it.
“I will. You working?”
“Did some stuff earlier. Taking a little break now.”
“You could still come…for Mismatch Day if not Christmas.”
Gideon raised one brow like a question mark.
Rudy raised one finger like, “I’ll explain it later.” They were speaking without words. “Maybe next year,” he said to his mother.
“Say Merry Christmas to Rudy, Russ.”
“Merry Christmas, Son.”
“Merry Christmas, Dad. You guys do anything new and exciting this year?”
“I sent you the email about The Nutcracker. You used to love it on TV, remember?”
“Yeah.”
“I got two tickets, but neither your father nor Dash would go with me.”
“Last thing I want to see is a bunch of fruits jumping around in tights showing their balls to each other, April.”
Now Gideon cringed.
“Russ…Anyway, I was hoping you’d come with me, but I never heard back from you.”
“Sorry. Was it good?” Rudy asked.
“It was marvelous. I took Porter Venette from church.”
“Twelve years old and well on his way to becoming a faggot already.”
“Dad, that’s not…” Rudy looked over at Gideon. “I gotta go.”
“Already?”
“Yeah, Mom.” Rudy got up. “Merry Christmas.”
“You, too. Call us later if—”
Rudy had already hung up the phone. “Nope. Not different.”
“Rudy…” Gideon tried to get to his side, but Rudy kept moving, seemingly unaware of the altitude all of a sudden. “I…I didn’t know that would happen.”
“I should have,” Rudy said. “Son of a bitch!” He grabbed one of the black dress shoes and reared back, like a quarterback about to make a pass using Frank Funn’s oxford.
“Don’t.” Gideon grabbed Rudy’s arm. “Rudy…please don’t.”
“Shit.” Rudy froze, then handed over the shoe. “I’m so sorry.” He growled like a beast, then picked up one of the expensive suede boots, and hurled that instead, as hard as he could, it seemed. The boot hit the dumpster below with a reverberating clang, outdone only by Rudy’s voice. “Motherfucker! Why do I even let him get to me like that?”
“It’s okay.”
“No.” Rudy headed for the side of the roof. “It’s not. After what you just told me, I’m having a tantrum because my father’s a bigoted ass? No way. I’m sorry. I’m just…sorry.” He started down the ladder, moving a lot faster than he had coming up.
“It’s okay, Rudy. You don’t have to go.”
He was already on the ground.
“Rudy…Your shoes and socks…”
“Just keep them.”
Chapter 7
Gideon was kind of glad Christmas 2016 fell on Sunday. He was used to having Sundays off anyway, and was probably the only person in the world who liked work days better. Though several people had invited him for dinner, he’d declined. Now he was having second thoughts.
Gideon reread the message he’d sent to Rudy on Facebook.
Talk to me. Come over. Message me or call. I just want to make sure you’re okay. I have your shoes.
He’d included his number, which Rudy hadn’t used. As Gideon placed his boots on the shelf between a moccasin and a cowboy boot, he reread the very brief response he’d received via Messenger.
I’m OK. And I apologize again. It’s better if I keep my mood to myself.
Gideon had answered that.
You said being with me helps your mood. I like that. I want to help. I can get in downstairs. We could sit at the piano. Please come.
* * * *
It had been several hours. So far, Rudy hadn’t respo
nded.
Gideon fried himself a hamburger, poured some chips onto a Christmas plate he’d gotten at the thrift store—service for one—and sat in front of the TV to catch It’s a Wonderful Life. Just about the time James Stewart was running through the snow, he woke up from a little catnap with an erection. Leaning over the back of the couch, playing with his ass, his forehead against the wall, Gideon came into Rudy’s Rudolph sock. With one in his hand, wrapped around the head of his dick, he moaned into the other one he had in his mouth as he fell back onto the cushions.
“Phew! I guess I’ll have to throw these in the wash before I see Rudy again.”
As several days passed, six in all, Gideon started to wonder if that was ever going to happen. Rudy didn’t answer the second Facebook message. He didn’t call. He didn’t text. He didn’t come by in person. Elvis’s Vegas Sing-Along was packed tight December 31st. First-time revelers and regulars passed the early hours testing Gideon’s impromptu virtuosity.
“He’s fucking playing Chopin,” Eileen marveled. “Without missing a note!”
Grocery checker Kurt showed up again, just before midnight, and made a beeline for Denise’s daughter, Maddie, right beside the piano. They’d been on a few dates since Christmas Eve according to Elvis’s Sing-Along scuttlebutt. Gideon couldn’t wait to see them kiss at midnight. He felt a little bit like Cupid, quite proud of himself.
“Time to start watching the clock!” Brett hollered. “Sixty seconds to go!”
“Outside,” someone said.
“Huh?” Gideon looked to Tina.
“I didn’t say anything. No one did, as far as I know.”
“Oh.”
“Go outside.” Whoever wasn’t saying anything, said it again.
“Fifty and counting.” Brett banged on the bar top just as Gideon got up from the piano. “Come on, 2017! Hey. Where ya going, Giddy-up?” he hollered across the room.
The others had picked up the count. “Forty-five…forty-four…”
“I’ll be right back,” Gideon yelled back. “Maybe.”
“Who’s gonna play Auld Lang Syne?” Stefan asked, standing right between Brigitte and Jacob.
Gideon raced for the door, wondering which one Stefan would kiss. “You don’t need me, guys. Sing it acapella.”
“Thirty, twenty-nine, twenty-eight…”
He could still hear the crowd as he rushed for the ladder on the side of the building. “Ten, nine, eight…” Gideon picked up the countdown, “Seven six…” and climbed the rungs as quickly as he could. “Three…two…” Gideon stepped up onto the roof and into Rudy’s arms. “One. Happy New Year!”
They kissed with fireworks behind them.
“Whoa!” Rudy touched his lips when Gideon took his away.
“I have impulse control problems, remember?” Gideon looked away.
“I’m not complaining.” Rudy brought him back with two fingers on the chin. “I wanted to kiss you on Christmas, you know. There’s probably mistletoe in the brush behind bar. It grows here.”
“Does it?”
“All over. It’s quite parasitic, actually.”
“Well, that’s romantic.” Gideon must have gotten the head tilt right this time. Rudy smiled, and then kissed him again. Then Gideon followed that with another.
“I’m going to keep kissing you, because you know what? You keep disappearing. I wanted to kiss you even before Christmas day. The night we sang I wanted to, and I’ll take responsibility for what went wrong there. Then Christmas day…I wanted to kiss you then, too, but you threw a shoe and ran away from me.”
“I’m sorry,” Rudy said through his fingers.
“It’s upstairs, by the way.”
“Well…I have a lot of shoes, so…”
“A lot? And socks?”
“Those, too.” When Rudy raised his pant leg to show off a gold pair with little champagne glasses all over them, Gideon moved Rudy’s hand and kissed him again.
“It’s okay to throw them when you’re mad, then, I guess. Just stop the running away part,” Gideon said breathlessly. “My point is, this time I’m kissing you right off the bat.” He did it again, pressing his entire body into Rudy’s mouth, chest, stomach, pelvis, and thighs. It left Rudy unsteady on his feet.
“Good thinking,” he managed, backing up to the bricks.
Suddenly bold, as if empowered by Rudy’s taste, Gideon forced him back into it harder and kissed him again. “If I let you go without kissing you this time, I might not see you until Super Bowl Sunday. I’m gonna be busy eating wings and watching football on Super Bowl Sunday. I might not have time for kissing.” Gideon looked into Rudy’s eyes. Gideon looked at his mouth, open, because he was nearly panting, just like Gideon. “Shit. Who am I kidding? I’d make time.”
They kissed some more, grinding their lower halves, pulling one another closer from behind the neck.
“I’m not going anywhere—but…”
“But what?”
“Take this off.” Rudy pulled back the Elvis wig and mussed Gideon’s hair.
“I must look like hell.”
“No.” The kissing grew louder, both men expressing their enjoyment and yearnings with groans and raspy breaths. “But I never kissed anyone wearing sequins before.”
“I could take that off, too,” Gideon offered, breaking the short sentence into two parts, not wanting to take his mouth off Rudy long enough to say it all at once.
Rudy unzipped it partway down, far enough to put his hand on Gideon’s gut, just above the elastic of his boxer briefs. “The angels don’t watch all the time, do they?”
“They have other things to do. It’s okay.” Between every other word nearly, their tongues plunged deeply into each other’s mouths. “Damn.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I might maybe handcuff you to the bar again.” Gideon moaned. “Just to make sure.”
“It won’t have to come to that.”
“Imagine how many times I could have kissed you if I had just left you there.”
“Dozens…”
“Hundreds…”
“You promise not to go again?”
“Well…if I do go again, I’ll come back. If that’s what you want.”
“I haven’t made that clear?” Gideon grabbed Rudy by the hips and pulled him into his hard-on.
“I think I got it.” Rudy’s lips were soft. He tasted like coffee and gum. Maybe he’d been expecting a kiss, his breath all minty. “I’m so glad you came out here,” he said.
“Something just told me to.” Gideon wasn’t finished kissing yet. “Someone,” he said, “the angels, I think,” and then went back again. “You should have come in.”
The gang was singing loud enough to hear them from below.
“I told you, I’m afraid.”
Gideon laughed. “I’m supposed to be at work, so you might have to. I hope they don’t fire me for not playing ‘Auld Lang Syne’ January first at midnight. It’s probably a pretty big part of the gig.”
“They love you. You can do no wrong in their eyes.”
“You think?”
“You don’t see it?”
“Maybe I do.”
“That’s why I’m afraid. I hurt you.”
“Not really.”
“They don’t see it that way. You know…” They finally stopped kissing, at least for a moment. “I was afraid to come up here, too.”
“Is it scarier in the dark?”
It wasn’t very dark, actually. Lights from adjacent buildings lit the space quite well.
“It’s not that,” Rudy said. “If you wouldn’t have come up, I probably would have just left. I’m…I’m a coward.”
“You’re not.”
“I have been, but…but every time I’m with you, Gideon…when I’m not…I can’t get you out of my head.”
“I feel the same way.”
They were dancing to the off-key singing emanating from the bar. Rudy hummed. When the song ended, he spoke again. “A
t first, I tried to write off this pang…this…curiosity to lust…sex…another hot guy…”
“Me?” Gideon asked.
“Yes, silly. You.” Rudy touched his face again. “I don’t always fantasize about kissing a guy. Sometimes we never even get to that part. We just skip it altogether.”
“Yeah.” This wasn’t going to be one of those times. Gideon offered his mouth to Rudy again.
“You intrigue me, Gideon Star. There’s no doubt about that…your talent, your demeanor.” He brushed some confetti off of Gideon’s cheek. “It must have floated down early.”
“Yeah. It’s been doing that all night.”
“I admire the way you took a stand for yourself when I acted like a jerk.”
“I thought we’d moved on from that.”
“Just this last time…let me say…it was almost like I saw you…blossom right before my eyes.” Rudy twisted his lips. “That isn’t a very manly word.”
“I don’t mind it. Men evolve…they grow. Rather slowly sometimes, according to some women I know.”
That got another smile.
“Why that moment…Gideon…with me? Why the shoes?” Rudy looked down.
“Yes. I have them on. I nearly broke my neck coming up the ladder with them flopping around, even with two pairs of socks on.”
Gideon suddenly remembered one of the pairs was Rudy’s.
“Tell me what they mean to you.”
Gideon took a deep breath. “My entire family died in a car accident when I was seven—Mom, Dad, Beth, and Curtis…my angels.”
“Oh, Gideon.”
“They were going to a Christmas concert at Beth’s school. She was five. Curtis was three and a half.” Gideon and Rudy held hands now, like some part of them had to touch. “I stayed home with my gramma, because I had a cold. It was snowing. For a while, I hated snow. Now I miss it…after just one year. Anyway, everyone wore boots except Dad. Dads never wear boots for some reason.”
“No.” Rudy brought Gideon’s hand to his heart.
“Mom insisted Dad wear his dress shoes. Dads don’t like dress shoes either. Me…I wore Dad’s dress shoes all the time, because…Because why? I guess I adored him.”
“Yeah.”
“My hero. My…my dad. And he seemed to really dig his sons…both of us…and Beth, too, of course.”