by Amy Lane
Channing gave him a droll look. “It’s a Dell—this thing weighs ten pounds. I once dropped it on my foot and broke my frickin’ toe.”
“But—” Tino waved his hands at the idea of wasting a perfectly good gaming computer, and Channing rolled his eyes.
“Landscape, Tino. Burglar in your room! Now stay here!”
Tino’s eyes bulged as Channing cracked the door open and peered out. “Screw stay here,” he muttered, reaching into his pocket for his phone. “I’m going to go check on Sammy.”
Channing pulled back for a moment, and Tino was blinded by a grin he didn’t know was possible in this situation. “Good idea,” Channing mouthed and then slid through the open door and crept soundlessly down the empty hall.
Tino followed, except when Channing went straight, heading for Tino’s room, Tino took a right and checked on Sammy.
Sammy slept like the angel he could be, on his stomach this time, mouth open slightly, snoring like a band saw. Well, Tino had seen Channing fall asleep on the couch like that—the adenoids must run in the DNA.
Tino had taken a step back toward the door when he heard Channing shout, “Who in the fuck are you?”
Sammy’s eyes shot open and Tino remembered the phone in his hand.
Oh, it was hard.
He sat next to Sammy, one arm over his thin shoulders while Sammy looked soundlessly for guidance and Tino talked to the police.
And all hell broke loose in the room next door.
The fight raged quick and hot—a fracas that was breaking furniture and, judging by the grunts and groans of the participants, possibly bones too. Tino wanted more than anything to jump in and help his boy—but first he had to take care of Sammy, and he had to make sure help was on its way.
“Stay where you are, sir—a car has been sent,” said the dispatcher at pretty much the time Channing shouted, “No, asshole, you’re not getting away with—oh fuck!”
This was followed by a shout and a crash that sounded like it came from outside, and a scream.
It was that last thing that forced Tino out of the room. First he whispered to Sammy to hide under the bed, and Sammy, eyes wide, did just that. It was uncanny. Tino could swear he wasn’t the same kid who’d made him miserable for weeks at the beginning of their relationship.
Instead he lay there, eyes glinting in the double dark, while Tino said, “I’m gonna go get your uncle Channing, okay?”
All it took was one hesitant nod and Tino was hauling down the hall, swinging into his bedroom in time to see Channing bending over the open window and looking down onto the lawn.
“Oops,” he said, grimacing up at Tino.
“Oops?” Tino glanced wildly around the room, which was pretty much destroyed. The laptop dangling from Channing’s hand was cracked in half, which was only fair since Tino’s laptop keyboard was separated from the screen—also cracked in half—and all the pieces were lying in different parts of the room. His Star Wars figurines were scattered and/or destroyed, and in general, the sweet, peaceful little room he’d come to think of as a sanctuary had been turned upside down.
But all of that was secondary to Channing.
He had bruises on his face, and a nasty cut on his cheekbone, and a swelling on his jaw. He was standing, hip cocked like his knee or his toes hurt him, the arm not carrying the laptop held defensively at his ribs.
“Channing?” Tino asked helplessly, his hands making fluttery motions around all of those painful injuries, but Channing just kept looking outside.
Then the noise permeated Tino’s awareness—sort of a low, moaning howl.
Tino turned his attention to the backyard.
“You threw him out the window?” Tino asked, taking in the smashed blinds and the window treatment that had been yanked off the wall, leaving scars. “Out the window?”
“I didn’t throw him!” Channing defended. “I—well, we were fighting, and….” He looked uncomfortable. “Look at him—he’s like three hundred pounds of muscle.”
Tino looked at the powerful figure on the lawn, currently lying on his back and moaning as he looked at an obviously broken leg. “Yeah. Channing, how did you manage that?”
Channing grunted and brought his hand up to his throat—which was starting to show a very frightening, very distinctive pattern of bruising. “Well, he was winning,” he said shortly. “So I hit him on the head and kicked at his chest and he went over backwards.”
Tino looked down at the enemy. Without his uniform, he was sort of every mother’s nightmare of someone who should be breaking into a house—stocky, powerful, shaved bald with a graying goatee, and beady little eyes.
“That would be the security guard losing his job,” Tino said. “Won’t his company be surprised.” Even as they watched, they heard an anguished little cry, and a slight female figure called out “Jimmy!” and went tripping across the lawn.
“And Mirella,” Tino said, watching the drama unfold.
“Of course,” Channing said, shaking his head. In the background they could see the police cars lining up as they drove down the road to get to the driveway.
Tino turned toward him. “You pushed the bad guy out the window,” he reiterated, still in shock.
“Looks like.” Channing shrugged sheepishly. “I mean, I guess it could be worse. We could be debauched and sexed out, and you could be mad at me for taking your virginity and destroying your future.”
Tino sputtered and gaped and then smacked him on the arm. “Do you—how could you—I….” He looked at Channing again, saw his injuries, and thought of him running into danger with nothing but an old laptop to protect his family. “You asshole,” he finally managed. “You could have been killed!”
His voice cracked with killed, and Channing reached out and palmed the back of his head, pulling him close and whispering into his ear while Tino burrowed against his chest.
“I’m fine.”
“You came in here and… and… and….”
Oh God—Tino didn’t cry. Tino organized, he bossed, he got irritated, but he did… not….
Cry.
He cried—he fell apart against Channing, touching all of his injuries with hesitant fingers, carefully kissing the bruises on his chest, on his neck, on his face.
Sammy must have grown impatient, because he called out, “Uncle Channing! Tino! You’re okay!” from the doorway, and before Tino could pull away, Channing dropped the laptop and opened his other arm, inviting Sammy in.
That’s where they were, standing by the window, when the newly hired and soon-to-be-fired security company let the police in. As the cops thundered inside, weapons drawn against any additional intruders, Tino could see an ambulance pulling down the driveway.
A Slight Change of Plans
SAMMY fell asleep while leaning against Tino at around 1:00 a.m. Tino scooped him up in his arms and continued answering the nice sergeant’s questions until Channing intervened, breaking away from his own questioning officer to do it.
“Let Tino go put Sammy down,” he said. He caught Tino’s eye. “Tino, you can stay there and keep an eye out for him until we’re done here.”
Tino wanted to object. Channing was hurt but, like a jackass, had declined to go to the hospital, and Tino was perfectly capable of answering the same questions sixty times.
But Sammy was exhausted and upset, and he needed someone with him, someone he felt safe with, and Tino appreciated that Channing trusted him with the thing he loved best.
And he also appreciated that after he got Sammy settled down, he got to lie down on top of the covers next to him and listen to the rumble of voices in the next room while he worried. Bruises on his throat. Bruised ribs, a sprained ankle, and what probably should have been stitches on his cheek. Channing had accepted on-scene medical attention but had wanted to stay in the house, which didn’t keep Tino from worrying, not one tiny bit.
When he wasn’t worrying about Channing, he was worrying about what he and Channing had been doing when
they’d heard the clatter.
Please stay tonight.
Would Tino still make that decision? He’d been going to. Could he take that back?
He fell asleep wondering.
He wasn’t sure exactly what time of the morning he felt Channing lie down behind him, spooning him as he’d been spooning Sammy, before pulling a quilt up over the both of them.
But he woke up in Channing’s arms and realized the answer was no, he couldn’t take it back. He didn’t want to take that back. If Channing Lowell could run down the hall with nothing more than an old laptop and have faith that everything would be okay, Tino could spend the night in his arms and hope for the best.
In the morning Channing was still there, one arm thrown heavily over Tino’s stomach and his breath rattling loudly in his ear. Tino looked at the fan of his lashes on his tanned cheeks for a moment and thought that maybe, just maybe, they could figure out a way.
CHANNING was right—their lives got much less hectic after that moment.
The next day they slept in. Tino slithered out of bed first and, ignoring his room and his destroyed computer and beloved collector’s items, padded down to the kitchen to make coffee. Jacob was only partially right about his cooking. For Sammy, he made kid food—and seriously, how many ways could you screw up a pizza bite?
But he’d been making good breakfasts for Channing—oatmeal with chopped fruit, omelets with fresh ingredients, or even simple toast, buttered warm and served immediately with jam.
He set out to make a good breakfast for the men in his life, and one of the few things left in the pantry was pancake mix.
An egg, some oil, and butter and syrup. He had it mixed and on the griddle and the coffee dripping in the coffeemaker before he called his mom.
Who—once she established that her beloved oldest child was fine and not injured, killed, or violated in any way—had way too much fun asking him for details of the maid/security guard crime spree that had apparently been wreaking havoc in Channing’s little area of Granite Bay. His mother looked up the news on her laptop as Tino talked to her, telling him all the details that had made the press.
“Oh look, Tino—here you are. You’re front page of the Bee. Oh, I wish your laptop still worked—you could see it. ‘A series of break-ins that has been baffling police and terrorizing—’ Tino, did you feel terrorized?”
Tino grunted. “No, Mommy, I felt pissed off. The maid was horrible, the security guy gave me the willies, and I really just wanted to fire everybody twice.”
His mother giggled. “How very bourgeoisie of you, my child. But wait—I’ve got the best part. ‘Last night brave homeowner Channing Lowell defended his son and domestic partner from a home invader, sending the burglar to hospital and the maid to prison.’ That’s very exciting, except”—she lowered her voice suspiciously—“Tino, why are they calling you his domestic partner? At first I thought it should be domestic employee, but partner….”
Tino swallowed. “Uh….”
“Tino, is your father going to have to go over there with a shotgun?”
Tino snorted at the pixilated humor in her voice. “You’re both liberals, Mom. You hate guns. No, Channing isn’t taking advantage of me. In fact, he’s being a perfect gentleman.”
“Oh,” his mother said amiably. He could hear her crunching on her Raisin Bran as she spoke. “Is he being too much of a gentleman? Because you’re a handsome boy, Tino—if you can’t work your hot-boy wiles on him and get him to put out, maybe he’s really straight.”
Tino covered his eyes and groaned while his mother cackled hysterically. “Mom,” he said, his voice pained.
“Sweetheart, you were setting out to win him over. Please don’t tell me you got him all won over and haven’t given him his prize!”
“Mom!”
“You do realize you were born six months after your father and I got married, don’t you?”
“Uh….” Tino flipped a pancake in horror.
“Yes—because all those morning coffees worked, sweetheart. And one morning, neither of us made it to school.”
“But… plans!” he strangled out. “Job! Business! I got a degree!”
“Yes,” she said, the laughter in her voice gentling. “You know what life is, don’t you?”
“Achieving the goals you set for yourself with hard work and determination?”
“My darling, we had a little boy and your father gave you baseballs and footballs and golf balls and every kind of sports equipment known to man. He talked about how you would marry a beautiful girl, just like he did, and how he would watch the grandchildren while you traveled the world playing some sort of game. Then we had a little girl and he talked about how he would need a bat to drive away all the young men, and how he would protect this innocent flower from all the harshness life has to offer, and she would grow up to be a dancer or a teacher or a designer.”
Tino continued to make pancakes, his brain a big blank. “Uh….”
“Well, obviously you dumped all your balls into the toy box and went straight for the little plastic ten-key machine your uncle gave you for your birthday. And your father was so proud—stopped bragging about your sports career and started bragging about how smart you were. You came out when you were twelve, and he stopped planning your wedding to a girl and started campaigning for marriage equality. Your sister said she wanted to start her own dinner box business, and he put away the dance shoes and brought out the bungee-cord-and-ice-chest delivery system. And he never stopped loving either of you. Plans are what you make when you are starting your life, Martin. Life is what happens when you’re making your plans.”
Tino put the last pancake on the stack and turned off the heat, and then wiped his eyes.
“I don’t have to decide anything until the end of the summer,” he said, his voice rough.
“No, you don’t.”
“I really, really like him, Mommy.” He kept his body turned toward the sink and his shoulders curled as he grappled with emotions that fought like titans in his chest.
“Then you should be with him when you can. And if you like him enough, you’ll find a way to make that longer than you thought.”
“Yeah. Okay.” He took a few more breaths. “Thanks, Mom.”
“I’m really glad you called, Tino. I would have worried. I’ve got a new girl who just applied—her name is Carrie and she has an eight-year-old daughter that she has no childcare for. Ask your nice Mr. Lowell if he would mind having a little girl there to play with Sammy sometimes, and I can send her over tomorrow. She has her own apartment out in Folsom, so you won’t have to worry about her having her own quarters, and she’s got a lot of energy, so she can probably get you all set up for the week.”
“Mommy, when I grow up, I want to be as awesome as you are,” he said gratefully.
“Well, when you grow up, I want you to be as happy as I have been,” she told him, her voice ringing with meaning. “Make those decisions for me, and we’re even.”
Tino swallowed, and his mom said, “Tell me what Channing says,” into the silence before ringing off.
Tino stood there for a few moments, staring off into space. That’s where he was when a pair of strong arms wrapped around his middle and a big warm man lined up along his back.
Tino closed his eyes and leaned his head back against Channing’s shoulder.
“Smells good,” Channing murmured in his ear. “You made us pancakes?”
“Yeah.” Tino turned in Channing’s arms and leaned his head on that strong chest. “And I talked to my mom.”
“Mm….” Channing nuzzled his cheek along Tino’s temple. “What did she say?”
“She said she could have a maid here tomorrow if you don’t mind that she brings her little girl with her until school starts.”
“Not a problem.” Channing stroked Tino’s hair away from his brow and tilted his face up so they could see the other’s eyes. “What else did she say?”
“She said I made it t
o the papers as your domestic partner.”
Channing threw back his head and grimaced. “Oh God. I’m sorry, Tino. I don’t know where they got that impression.”
Tino wrinkled his nose. “From two guys running around in their underwear, smelling like come, and from the fact that I wasn’t in the room that was supposed to be mine. Don’t be dense, Channing. And she wasn’t mad. There were no offers—no serious offers—to come down and defend my reputation.”
Channing cocked his head and regarded Tino skeptically. “Doesn’t living in a domestic partnership with me reduce the number of cows your father can get for you in marriage?”
Tino crossed his eyes and stuck out his tongue. “The only way he gets cows in that exchange is for someone to check my maidenhead. If some town elder tries to stick a finger up my butt to see if it’s still tight, I’m borrowing your old Dell and taking off his head.”
Channing had to clap his hand over his mouth to keep from laughing loud enough to wake Sammy, and Tino grinned wickedly at him, proud of cracking him up. Eventually Channing ended up bent over, hands on his knees, breath coming in big gulps as he tried not to lose it.
Tino worked around him, gathering utensils and the plate of pancakes and setting everything up for them on the island. He was just about to go upstairs and wake Sammy when Channing came up alongside him and rubbed his chin against Tino’s temple. “I’d give your father a lot of cows for you.”
“That’s nice,” Tino laughed, leaning back. “You asked me to stay last night. Was that for….”
“As many nights as we can manage,” Channing said.
“Then maybe we do that. Virginity, it’s overrated. If it was that important, people wouldn’t lose it all the time and never get it back.” He turned away, not able to meet Channing’s perceptive gaze then, not wanting to talk about misgivings or fears or about job interviews he’d been lining up before his computer was destroyed.
Life was what happened when you were making plans. He would make plans and then see what his life had to say about that.