This was him learning, day by day and night by night, who he was and what he wanted. Hearing the words creep from his mouth. Clumsy and uncertain at first, then bold and brave. Inhibitions gradually giving way until this was him saying and doing the craziest things in bed, scarcely recognizing his own passion.
“God, I’ve never had anyone lean on me the way you do,” Stef said.
“I didn’t even know leaning was a thing,” Jav said.
As the days grew shorter and the nights longer, Stef curated all of Jav’s sexual discoveries, loaded them on a great ship and sailed it into open waters. But it wasn’t only sex in the vessel’s hold. Trunks and chests began to fill up with simpler moments as Jav realized he couldn’t have asked for a more custom-made buddy.
The way Stef grabbed, pummeled and roughhoused with him woke up dormant, childhood memories of horseplay with Ernesto. Only this time, no adult yelled at them to settle down, knock it off or take it outside. Roman was a hopeless chaperone. He pawed at them, wanting to be included. Or he gazed unblinking as the two men wrestled and laughed until they wheezed.
Some quiet evenings, Jav lay on the couch with Stef’s head on his chest and Roman sprawled on his legs, and happiness would fall on him like a thick blanket. When Stef locked arms around Jav’s waist at the stove and leaned on him, Jav had to stop cooking and taste the moment. Close his eyes and hold it tight, unable to remember the last time he felt this content. This complete.
It’s so easy with him.
It’s too easy…
He spent long moments tallying up Finch knowledge like gold coins. Stef loved The Police, U2 and R.E.M. He’d read Frank Herbert’s Dune series three times. His sneezes always came in threes and fours. He got weird but tremendous satisfaction from sweeping a floor. His expression turned distant and sad when he talked about his childhood cat, Ping. Mallomars were his favorite cookie. He kept a stash in the kitchen cabinet and his eyes narrowed when Jav took one. He often laughed in his sleep. He loved to be touched anywhere and everywhere, except the backs of his knees—he’d jump clear out of his skin.
Jav knew things like this now.
He recognized the wistful moodiness whenever Stef got off the phone with his father. He understood why Stef knocked shave-and-a-haircut on Rory’s door as he left for work in the mornings. He learned the difference between Stef’s creative silence and his exhausted silence. He could judge how bad a work day was by how much Stef put away at dinner. He knew Stef was horny when he took off his rings and his wristwatch and put them in a little pile. He knew the change in Stef’s breathing that meant he was falling asleep, and the sounds he made right before he came his brains out.
Their lives meshed effortlessly. Stef fit him like a second skin.
This is too easy. This can’t possibly last. It’s not supposed to be this perfect with the first guy I find. I didn’t even find him. We just met. It was an accident. This can’t be The One.
Or can it?
Desperate for a third-party opinion, he called the one person who probably had zero interest in offering him relationship advice. He sighed as he dialed. Only the idiotic Javier Landes would phone up an almost-ex-friend-slash-lover for counsel. With his wife’s counsel as a Plan B.
“¿Qué onda, fucky?” Alex said. “It’s been forever.”
“I know.”
“Are we friends again?”
“I need to ask you something,” Jav said, deciding to act as if they were friends and barrel straight in. “When you and Val started dating, was it easy?”
A confused pause. “Easy?”
“Yeah.” He could explain further but opted to hold still a moment.
“Dude, it was easier than breathing,” Alex said. “I can’t even say it was dating. Literally overnight, we went from being friends to being together. Are you asking me if we fought?”
“Well everyone fights,” Jav said. “I’m asking if it ever felt too easy. Like you were waiting for the other shoe to drop?”
“No,” Alex said, with a speed and assurance Jav envied. “And if you met someone, and it feels easy and you’re waiting for the axe or the shoe or the whatever to drop, it’s because you think you don’t deserve easy. What did I tell you about that?”
“Yeah, I know,” Jav said, exhaling.
“Say it.”
“I’m worth more and I deserve it.”
“Damn right you do.” A few beats of silence passed. “Did you meet someone?”
“Yeah.”
“Good,” Alex said. “That’s great, I’m glad.”
“Me, too. It’s new. And it’s…”
“Easy.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, maybe I’ll meet them someday.”
Jav smiled at the safe, gender-neutral pronoun. “Maybe you will,” he said. “If I don’t fuck this up.”
“Oh my God,” Alex said. “You’re still the same idiot.”
“The only one allowed in the room,” Jav said, laughing.
Between Wayne’s incessant drilling and his grueling ab workouts, Geno became the Bubba Gump of shrimping. He could fold and slide by pure reflex now, fast and unconscious.
“Now, this is all easy-peasy in a controlled scenario when I’m being nice to you,” Wayne said from the floor, looking up at Geno.
“This is being nice to me?” Geno said, rubbing the sore spots between his ribs.
Wayne grinned. “In a real attack, the guy’s not going to be on top of you patiently waiting for you to escape, right?”
“Right.”
“So now make like you’re choking me, pretend to throw some punches at my head and face.”
Geno reached to set his left palm by Wayne’s collarbones. He moved his right fist in pretend punches. At the same time concentrating on keeping his thighs completely immobile and keeping a sixteenth-inch space between his groin and Wayne’s.
“With your weight pressing down on me, it’s hard to shrimp out,” Wayne said. “Plus you’re whaling on my head. As the victim, what’s my knee-jerk reaction now?”
“Push me away?”
“Exactly. Maybe with one arm I’m protecting my face, but this other arm I’m going to be pushing and hitting at your chest, right?”
“Right.”
“Wrong. You have to go against instinct in a fight from above. The attacker is going to expect you to push them away, which is why instead…” In a lightning-fast move, both his hands shot up, grabbed Geno’s head and pulled it to his chest. “You pull him in close.”
Geno could feel the heat of Wayne’s skin through the thin T-shirt. Feel Wayne’s heartbeat against his face. Feel his huge, warm hands holding his head.
Don’t hold my head. Let go my head. Please let go my head. Stop. Please.
He closed his eyes and thought about passing out.
“See how my elbows are out?” Wayne said from far away. “Now it’s harder for you to throw punches, harder for you to get a chokehold on my neck. Key to an attack from above—pull them in close. Understand?” He let go Geno’s head and Geno sat up, trying to disguise his labored breathing.
“Try again,” Wayne said. “And really go for it this time.”
Geno went for it.
“Come on, dude,” Wayne said. “Fight me like I just killed your moth—”
Without another thought, Geno went for the jugular. Wayne’s eyes bulged, then narrowed. Faster than he demonstrated before, he had Geno’s head tight against his chest, his elbows keeping blows at bay. “Okay? Now. I got your head, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Geno said, still hoping he’d faint.
“The head is the key.” Wayne’s hands spread wider, coming around Geno’s face. His fingertips pressed into the bridge of Geno’s nose, one of them nearly in an eye socket. “You turn the head. Forget about the body. Turn the head and the body follows.”<
br />
A mighty strain on Geno’s neck as his head was turned. His shoulders followed and he began to roll.
“See now,” Wayne said. “You just let my hip come up. Now I can shrimp out.”
All at once, he was gone, leaving Geno sprawled on his side. He looked up at Wayne, a few feet away, dancing from foot to foot, his dukes up.
“Pull ’em in close and turn the head,” he said. “Ready to try?”
Geno stared, his tongue dried to the roof of his mouth.
“First time’s the hardest,” Wayne said, lowering his voice and his fists. “Heart behind your teeth but you do it anyway, right?”
“Right.” Geno’s eyeballs prickled as he lay down. He pressed his teeth together when Wayne mounted him.
“So we’ll make like I’m fighting you.”
One of Wayne’s hands curled at Geno’s throat. The other raised in a curled fist. His knees squeezed Geno’s ribcage and the edges of the gym began to darken.
“Pull close,” Wayne said. “Turn the head, shrimp out and run like hell.”
The dark swept in from all sides. Blacker than midnight, with no stars to light the way. Within the black, Nos was at war.
Geno pulled against the cuffs, his screaming wrists crossed behind his head, his bloody forearms against his eyes. The man mounting him put a hand on Geno’s throat. Then the hand slid around the back of Geno’s neck, pulling his head up. The guy’s knees weren’t at Geno’s ribs, they were up around Geno’s shoulders. And the guy’s other hand wasn’t raised high in a fist. It was down low, curled around what he wanted to put in Geno’s mouth and—
No, my head, let go my head, no don’t, don’t, I can’t breathe, my head.
Carlito turned his head away.
Turn the head, Mos said.
Look at me, brother mine, look at me look at me look at me.
Mos cried out, making the stars shake. Turn the head.
Geno turned his head.
“Holy shit, dude,” Wayne cried. “That was amazing.”
Geno blinked the dark out of his eyes. He was on his feet. Wayne was on the mat, looking at Geno like a kid at a Christmas tree.
“I did it?” Geno said.
“Fuck yeah, you did. Holy crap, you nailed it.” He got up and bear-hugged Geno, slapping his back.
“I did it,” Geno said. Laughter like sobs hiccuped out of his chest. “I fucking did it.”
“Pony, is your boyfriend coming for Thanksgiving?” Lilia asked.
My boyfriend, Stef thought, rolling the word around his mind.
How did this happen?
I saw him across an empty gallery. I thought he was hot. I hoped we’d hook up and get naked. Have a good time and be on our way. Now he’s my boyfriend.
“Are you coming for Thanksgiving?” Stef asked.
“I thought you’d never ask,” Jav said.
“What was your backup plan?”
“Well…” Jav’s brow furrowed over the skillet where two steaks were searing. “Ari’s going to Guelisten, naturally. And Val Lark kind of called me.”
“Kind of? She rang once and hung up?”
Jav kicked Stef’s calf. “She said she had room at her table. I was always welcome and I shouldn’t be alone on Thanksgiving.”
“What did you say?”
“I said thank you so much, I’m putting my own plans together and I’ll let you know.”
“Would you have gone?”
Jav’s mouth twisted sideways. “Well, second of all, I’m not sure I was ready for a family reunion of that nature.”
“Second?” Stef said. “What happened to first?”
“First was how you felt about it.”
“Me?”
“Yeah. Isn’t that what you do? Check with your boyfriend before you go have dinner with an ex?”
I have a boyfriend, Stef thought, watching Jav turn the steaks and tilt the skillet to let the juices pool at one side. Butter and garlic floated into Stef’s nose, making his stomach growl.
“I would’ve been cool with it,” he said.
“Really? Or are you being generous since I’ll be with you?”
“I’m being generous.”
“Thought so.”
“I wouldn’t have made a scene, but I wouldn’t have been entirely cool with it. By the way, my brothers will be at Thanksgiving, too.”
Jav’s head swiveled, eyebrows raised. “By the way? Dude, I know I’m new at this but I think that comes up earlier in the conversation.”
“Is Guelisten now looking like a more attractive option?”
“No, I’m in, but… Have you brought a male date around your brothers before?”
“No.”
“So it’s sort of coming out.”
Stef shrugged. “They know who I am. I just want a pleasant evening. And it will be. Stav will be there. Micah will be there. A lot of other people I—”
“Micah’s coming?”
“He always comes,” Stef said. “Love is a great wisdom made up of small understandings. Remember?”
Stef’s eldest brother Nilas was all Finch. White-haired since he was forty, tall and glacial with the personality of a folding chair. His date, Patricia (not Pat or Patti, she made abundantly clear), was chilly to the point of cryogenic stasis. Not even Jav could get her to open up. And if Jav couldn’t, no one could.
Kurt Finch, unfortunately, had his mother’s genes. The Wakefield men tended to be short and stocky. Their hair stayed dark but it receded quickly. Kurt’s eyes were so dark brown, they blended with his pupils, giving him a fevered look. He had a cruel little mouth that often got him in big trouble. Rory once threw a bag of frozen peas in his face when he crossed a line with her. He was sixteen and fresh at the time. Years later, during the raging catfights of the Finches’ divorce, an adult Kurt called his mother a dyke. Marcus Finch hooked a foot around the stool his middle-aged, middle son was lounging on and pulled it out from under, sending Kurt sprawling.
“You do not disrespect your mother,” he said. His hands made a familiar gesture and for a wild instant, Stef thought Marcus was actually going for his belt. A gleeful horror filled his chest at the thought of Marcus opening a can of whoop on Kurt’s fat ass. The moment passed, though, and Marcus only gave a half-hearted kick to Kurt’s rump as he stormed off. Stef wisely cleared out too. Nothing made Kurt more surly than being put in his place.
Standing next to Jav during drinks, Kurt looked even shorter, stockier and meaner. Stef could tell Jav was in escort mode, a garage door of poised charm pulled between him and this sullen troll. Tall and handsome, secure in his good manners, he did his job of finding the best in people.
And damn, he looked terrific doing it.
He conceded the casual dress code with his nicest jeans, a grey button-down and the vest from his three-piece suit. As he talked, he was crossing his arms and pushing his biceps up with his fists. A frat boy trick, but effective. Kurt’s gaze on Jav was a little disdainful, but he kept his mouth shut.
Good, Stef thought. Because you pull any shit and I will fucking kill you.
He wouldn’t.
It just felt good to think it.
Kurt brought no date to dinner. Rory parked him with Nilas and Patricia at one end of the table where they could entertain or annoy each other. Stef and Jav were down at the cool kids’ end with Stav and Micah. Rory and Lilia took center seats across from each other. Miscellaneous friends filled in the chairs until the long table was crammed tight.
Jav’s garage door pulled up and he bloomed like a cactus flower after a rainstorm. He and Micah had a long comparative discussion about Ladino and Spanish. He talked animatedly to Lilia about books, debated Rory on politics. He and Stef fired their little arsenal of private joke grenades at each other, laughing. When he was through eating, Jav set his silve
rware across his plate, folded his napkin, then put a casual hand on the back of Stef’s chair, leaning in to listen to a guest’s story. Stef laid a hand on Jav’s knee and gave it a small squeeze, feeling the roll of muscle beneath denim.
For all of the golden, candlelit, laughter-filled afternoon, he wanted for nothing. His needs were met and he was perfectly comfortable. His wants were met and he was perfectly happy.
Thank you, he thought.
Jav, Stef and Stav kicked Lilia out of the kitchen and tackled the washing up together. Nilas and Patricia took themselves home (to crawl back into their coffins, Stef guessed). Kurt loitered in the kitchen, getting in the way and doing nothing. Staring at Jav like he was a Petri dish of Ebola.
“So where’d you two meet?” Kurt asked.
“Stonewall,” Stef said, just as Jav answered, “Prison.”
At the sink, Stav gave a snort of laughter before stifling the rest.
“Dude,” Stef said. “We talked about this.”
Jav ducked his head. “Sorry. We met at Stonewall.” He dried the plates as Stav washed, stacking them on the counter.
“Well you’re just awful cute,” Kurt said. “If fudge-packing is what you’re into, I’m happy for you, bro.”
“Thanks for the visual, bro,” Stef said, scraping leftover mashed potatoes into a Tupperware.
Here it comes.
“Tell you, Stav,” Kurt said. “It’s a weird day when you find out your little brother craves dick.”
“Weirder when he sleeps with your best friend,” Stef said.
“Hoo, that’s awkward,” Jav said quietly.
“Right?”
Kurt’s upper lip twitched. “So who bottoms?”
Now Stef looked at him. “You know, man—”
“I do,” Jav said, his expression mild as he moved the dishtowel around a plate. “I’m the bitch in the arrangement.” He was wearing Lilia’s pink bibbed apron over his clothes, and Stef swore to God he’d never wanted him more.
A Charm of Finches Page 24