Between These Sheets

by Devon McCormack

  I’m not used to that.

  I remember being a kid. Dad shouting at the top of his lungs. Always screaming at me for one reason or another. How I fucked up doing a chore around the house. How I fucked up in school. How I fucked up his life. No matter how far away I am from the little trailer in Texas that I grew up in, I’ll never get far enough away to forget the tone in his voice when he berated me and my bro. Every moment that we needed something from him was a moment of inconvenience that was liable to set him off, sending him flying into his latest tantrum. And he proved with Miles just how much he never wanted kids. Just how much of a pain in the ass we were for him to have to deal with.

  “I don’t understand why I’m the one who always gets fussed at,” I say. “Everyone fucks up, but they don’t have to hear about it all the fucking time. They don’t get screamed at over stupid shit. I’m always getting shouted at.”

  Even though we’re discussing William, I’m talking about Dad. Feels like I carry him with me everywhere I go. Every co-worker who screams at me is just another chance for Dad to lash out at me through them.

  Reese gazes at me in silence. I know what he’s doing. Judging me. Blaming me.

  “I wouldn’t fucking do this to myself,” I insist. “This isn’t like Tyler. He was just being a dick. William is seriously getting on my case over something stupid.”

  “I don’t think you do it to yourself. I just wonder if sometimes your attitude toward people is more what turns it into a big deal than the thing that starts these kinds of fights.”

  “So you’re blaming me?” He’s just like everyone else.

  “I’m not saying William was right to get that fired up about putting the fucking fuel in the forklift or that Tyler was right when he was being an ass to you. I’m just saying that I’m sure your reaction to them doesn’t help things any.”

  “No shit. Whatever. If you got a problem with how I am, I can walk today.”

  “Why do you have to take it there? I’m trying to help you, Jay.”

  “I don’t need any help, Reese.” I stress his name, emphasizing the way he said mine.

  But as he gazes into my eyes, I can’t help but think how much help I really need. How alone I feel. How alone I’ve always felt. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to get lectured by some trick.

  Not a trick—my boss. This is how fucking in the workplace complicates shit.

  “Everyone needs help,” he says. “Every one of us. I didn’t get here today without help or by pushing people away when they try to offer me a hand. Not that I haven’t done that in the past, but at some point, you have to accept the assistance.”

  Considering all he’s been through, way fucking more than me, I’d be stupid not to at least hear him out.

  “Maybe next time something happens, you could walk away for a bit. Maybe just tell whoever is getting on your nerves that you need a ten-minute break and then head off. If someone accuses you of something, you can just say okay, even if they’re totally wrong. Just find your bearings and maybe confront them again when you’ve thought things through. I don’t think these sorts of things would turn into a big fight if you took a minute to think them through, but you just start going off like that, and then no one’s listening.”

  He has a point. Several points that sound like they’re worth considering. Now I see why he’s the boss-man. He’s the first I’ve ever run into who seems to actually give a shit about his employees. Although maybe he just cares about me because we fucked around. I wonder if he’d have been as understanding about my tirade if I hadn’t let him up my ass a few hours earlier. But he was nice to me even after I threw him to the ground, and he wasn’t fucking me then. So maybe he’s just a good guy.

  “I could do that,” I admit.

  “I’d appreciate that. And if you need to come chat with me about it, yell at me about it, feel free. I’ve already given Martin and Carter permission to come and vent to me any time things are getting hard during the day. Sometimes you just need to get stuff off your chest, but without getting in everyone’s faces.”

  So he does this for more people than just me? Suddenly I don’t feel as special. But in a good way. Like he just sees me as any other employee, not like I need special care because of anything we’ve done. I’m also a little disappointed. I don’t know why. We just fucked around a bit. He doesn’t owe me anything because of it.

  He’s the kind of guy someone would be real lucky to have. A real catch. Hot as fuck. A good guy. Good listener. Someone who’s been through enough shit in his life that he understands what’s important.

  I don’t know why I’m letting my thoughts go there. Not like he’d want to do anything with me, some asshole he works with…someone he’s hooked up with twice. I could never be the kind of guy someone like Reese would want to be with. He’d want someone on his level. Someone successful. Someone with money. Someone who doesn’t have all these fucking petty attitude problems, which must seem like total bullshit to someone who’s been through such serious shit. Who’s been through war.

  God, why am I fucking thinking like this? I don’t even know this guy.

  “Thanks,” I say. “Can I go now?” I need to get back on the floor. Need to get away from him.

  He seems surprised by my curt response.

  “Oh, shit. No—I didn’t mean that like I’m not listening,” I say. “I really do appreciate it. I just think I should get back to help out with getting this stuff shipped out.”

  He blinks a few times before saying, “Sure. Go ahead.”

  I start for the door.

  “One more thing,” he says.

  I stop and turn back around.

  “You want to swing by my place later?”

  Of course I fucking want to swing by his place. “This ass is yours whenever you need it,” I say with a wink.

  His lips curl at the edges, assuring me that whatever I do for him must at least be good enough for him to keep coming back for more, which is a fucking relief. Because it feels good every time, and I want it again…and again…and for however long it keeps feeling as good as it does.

  I head back to my work, but William doesn’t give me any more shit about the forklift, which he filled with fuel after I headed up to talk with Reese.

  As I help move some boxes onto the trucks, I find I’m filled with an eagerness that I’ve never really felt while working before. I actually have something to look forward to other than just getting home and desperately trolling Grindr for a trick.

  I shouldn’t feel this giddy about it. It pisses me off a little.

  I don’t do relationships. They’re complicated. They never end well. I’ve only had a few in my early twenties, but after learning that the only way they end is catching someone messaging another guy behind your back, I decided I couldn’t do that to myself anymore. It wasn’t worth the fights or the screaming matches. It wasn’t worth putting my heart out there only for it to get beaten up.

  When my shift ends, I head back to my place for a bit. Shower off. Pick out what I’m going to wear. I don’t have anything nice. Just my work clothes. Closest thing is a polo with a lube stain on it. I debate for a few minutes before I decide it’s not noticeable enough for me to stress about it. I throw it on and head to Reese’s place.

  He’s also cleaned up when I arrive, smelling of a fragrance that catches my attention. A striking cologne that’s almost as hypnotizing as he is.

  He leads me inside. “Want a drink?”

  “A drink? Oh, I don’t have to fuck and go?” I ask, teasing but kinda serious too.

  “No,” he says, turning to me, a serious expression on his face. It comforts me.

  What am I doing? If this all goes south, I’m gonna have to quit this job and move on…to where next? How many cities do I need to bounce around to before I realize that wherever I go, I’m still there? My problems are still there. The pain and the hurt is still there.

  “A drink would be nice,” I say.

  12

/>   Reese

  I fix him a vodka Sprite at the kitchen bar. He sits in one of my stools, looking cute as fuck in a burgundy polo, his chest filling it out real nice. I can see his nipples through it. Makes me want to skip any pretense and strip him down, take him the way I’ve wanted to since we fucked in the supply closet. But I don’t want him to think I’m an asshole who only wants him for his body. He’s a good guy. He’s just guarded, and that’s something I more than understand.

  He looks around uneasily. I know he’s still in shock from how clean my place is. He had a similar expression on his face when he was here the first time. Makes me self-conscious.

  “It’s the service,” I explain. I offer him his drink and start making my own. “That’s why I keep everything so clean. You don’t really have the luxury of keeping things tidy when you’re shacking up with a bunch of other guys and you’re spending your nights roughing it around the desert.” I’m trying to downplay the far messier explanation. One I’m not ready to share with him.

  “That makes a lot of sense,” he says, appearing sympathetic rather than judgmental, which is more often than not the response I get from tricks that I bring home.

  “What was that like?” he asks. Tension rises within me, and he must sense it because just as quickly as he asks, he says, “Sorry, that was a stupid question. I guess you don’t want to talk about it, considering—”

  “No. I’m getting better. Laura says it’s good for me. She’s my therapist. We’ve been working on this together for a long time. Believe me.”

  He must think I’m all kinds of fucked up with the way I talk about this shit. He can’t understand what it was like. Can’t understand everything we went through. Can’t understand what it’s like to murder a human being and have to find a way to make peace with that in your own head. To go around constantly trying to justify putting a gun to someone’s head and blowing their brains out because you were scared as shit that they were about to kill you.

  “At first,” I say, “it wasn’t much different from how I was raised. I was with the state when I was a kid. You know the ones that never get adopted? That was me. So I just moved around from one orphanage to another. Shared dorm rooms with a bunch of other guys. I signed up for the armed services because I was told it was a good way to pay for my education. That it was the only way I’d be going to college. So I was in the Reserves. Studied business at UT. And then we went to war with Iraq, and I was deployed. It was about a year that I was gone. Most people were deployed for fourteen months. That was it. I don’t think most of us realized what we were getting ourselves into. We were kids. And at first, boot camp was fun. It was this bonding experience where you got to hang with all these cool guys and goof around. But then shit got real when we were being shouted at by our superior officers and being told to scramble to get away from the machine guns. And the IEDs.”

  “IEDs?”

  “Improvised explosive devices. That’s what caused a hell of a lot of injuries during the war. It’s how I…”

  I can’t say it. I try to get the words out, but I choke on them.

  “Got it,” he says as though he’s trying to give me an excuse not to finish my sentence. I appreciate it.

  “I think a lot of guys thought the war would be real black and white. But is the woman running down the street an ally or is that baby she’s carrying really a bomb? You don’t know. And you have to make split-second decisions, a lot of which you regret.”

  He stares at me wide-eyed. I got so lost in telling him about my experience that I almost forgot he was here.

  “That sounds horrible,” he says.

  “It’s not something a bunch of eighteen-year-olds should be expected to do. Die for their country. Suffer for their country. Too many guys I know came back from that messed up.”

  I imagine the distant look in Caleb’s eyes. His agitation whenever we tried to go out with some of our old friends. The way he broke down when some of his anti-war buddies gave him a hard time about having participated. That all bothered me too, but not the way it bothered him. I loved Caleb so fucking much, and now he’s fucking gone.

  Forever.

  Jay’s eyes are still on me. I’m trying to figure out what he’s thinking, but as he glances down, I realize I’ve stopped making my drink. I grab the Sprite bottle and pour some on top of the vodka in the glass. I stir it with the spoon I left out from making Jay’s drink. Then I take a sip.

  “Sorry. I needed a little something.”

  “I would, too. Jesus. Crazy to think it was that long ago…the war in Iraq.”

  “Yeah. Over a decade, and there are days when it feels like I’m still right there. Like I never came home to this life. Like everything that’s happened between now and then is the dream and the war is the only reality.”

  “That’s crazy,” Jay says. “How that short amount of time can fuck a person up so much.”

  “Yeah. Real crazy.”

  “So the post-traumatic stress disorder…do you mind if I ask you about that?”

  Yes. I mind a lot.

  “Started having a lot of episodes after I got back,” I say. “Intense. Unforgiving. Unbearable. Made it difficult for me to go to work. After I started a job at a distribution warehouse in Vinings, I had a serious episode. One of my co-workers had actually been through ’Nam and encouraged me to get help.”

  It’s not a complete lie. The story about the episodes and my co-worker’s well-meaning attempt to help me are true, but really, I quit that job shortly after and found another, hoping to avoid the issue. It wasn’t until a year later that I sought treatment. But that’s something I don’t want him asking questions about. Something he surely doesn’t even want to know about.

  “Well, I think we’ve talked enough about my grim life,” I say. “What about you? You seem like you’re pretty well-traveled. Like you’ve been around the block a few times. What’s your story?”

  “I don’t have much in the way of a story. Not like yours. I was raised by my aunt and uncle from the age of twelve…until I was old enough to get out on my own, and I never really liked school and didn’t have the means to go anyway, so I had to start looking for work right after. Picked up odd jobs wherever I could. This and that. I don’t like people ordering me around. Well, except in the bedroom that is.”

  He winks at me, and my cock twitches. A rush of adrenaline shoots through me. He’s so fucking sexy that even something so simple gets me all worked up.

  “So I obviously have trouble staying in one place.”

  “But why do you move around so much? Why not just find a new job in the same area?”

  He takes a sip of his drink and shrugs. “I guess I just haven’t found anywhere I really like. You know, it’d be nice to settle down somewhere. To find a place that I really like. But nowhere I’ve gone has really impressed me.”

  “And what do you think of Atlanta?”

  “Nice enough. Got a lot of horny guys on Grindr, I’ve noticed.” He has a sly look in his eyes and a fat grin across his face.

  “Oh, yeah. We have plenty of those.”

  “The weather here could be better. Damn, it’s a hot-ass summer. Humidity isn’t very forgiving. Especially in the factory.”

  “No, it isn’t. But you think you’ll stick around?”

  “Maybe. If things keep working out as well as they are. You know…with the guys.”

  Despite the playfulness of his tone, I feel like he’s totally serious.

  “So that’s how you live your life?” I ask. “Some place doesn’t work out, then you just move along?”

  “Look, I don’t need a lecture right now.”

  “I’m not trying to lecture you. I’m just asking a question. Not everything has to be a fight, Jay.”

  He takes a breath, once again reminding me of how Caleb would have to calm himself when he got short with me. “It’s just easier that way.”

  “How many cities have you lived in?”

  “Let’s see…San An
tonio, Dallas, Houston, Baton Rouge…Mobile for a while. Boston for a bit. New Orleans. And then here, I guess.”

  “You got a place to run to next?”

  “I do, actually,” he says, his grin suggesting he’s always ready to be out the door as soon as things start heading south. “Was thinking that Chicago might be nice. I figured I might at least like the weather better.”

  “The cold?”

  “It’d be a change from this humidity. At least for a bit. What? You haven’t lived in a lot of different places?”

  “I grew up in Tennessee, but I moved here shortly after I got back from Iraq.”

  “Why Georgia?”

  I tense up. I don’t like the conversation shifting back to me, but I’ve spent years learning the art of ambiguity, so I can handle it.

  “To stay close to someone,” I reply.

  “Ooh. A lover?”

  “A good friend.”

  “Must have been a really good friend if you were willing to move here with him.”

  “He was. The best of friends. A guy named Caleb.” I choke a little on his name as I say it. “Met him when we first went to war. We hit it off real well.” The tension rising in my chest is intense. I worry that if I’m not careful, I might have a panic attack.

  13

  Jay

  I can tell this guy means a lot to Reese just by the way he struggled through his name, but he’s become even more rattled than when he was talking about the war. It makes me wonder why this Caleb guy isn’t in his life anymore. They must’ve been a couple. Surely this guy had to have been more than a friend, like Reese said he was. That would explain why he acts so weird when he says his name.

  Reese drinks from his cocktail, but he takes his time as he gulps down what must be at least a shot’s worth of vodka. I’m waiting for him to continue, but he just stares off.

  “What happened to him?” I ask, figuring that’s where the story was leading.

  “He passed away,” he says, his face turning red, his jaw tightening as he seems to be trying to keep himself together over it.