by Wayward Ink
“My folks were killed in a train accident,” he blurted out. “I don’t have any other family that wants me, and the bank took the house I grew up in. I thought it would be easy to find a job in the city, but I didn’t have enough money for a place to stay, and it’s hard to get work when you don’t have an address to give a potential employer.”
Finn let out a long, low whistle. “Sounds to me like you had a ton of shit dumped on you all at once.”
“Yeah.”
“I should have asked this the day we met, but how old are you?”
“Eighteen,” Trace replied. “When my folks passed it was just a few weeks before my eighteenth birthday, so I was already too old for Social Services to get involved. My grandfather wasn’t interested in getting to know me. He was mad that my mom married my dad. He never thought my dad was good enough for her, so he never came around when I was growing up. Still, I didn’t really expect to be told to go away.”
“That’s pretty damn shitty of him, if you ask me. You’re still his blood.”
Trace turned his attention back to his sandwich. He didn’t have to be told how shitty it was—he’d lived it.
“I’m going to grab that box now. Take your time and finish your food… and if you ever want to talk, I’m here, okay?”
Trace nodded. “Okay.”
The scrape of Finn’s chair being pushed back was followed by the echo of his boots as he retrieved the box. Trace kept his head down so Finn wouldn’t see the tears that had begun sliding down his cheeks as soon as he’d started telling his story. As much as he didn’t want it to, it hurt that his grandfather wanted nothing to do with him. In his head, he’d allowed himself to build up hope that there was still someone who cared about him; a hope his grandfather had shattered with his callous words. Now, as he finished his lunch, he found himself wondering if there would ever come a time when he’d feel safe getting his hopes up again, or if this was how life was, and he’d have to learn to accept it.
Shoving those melancholy thoughts from his mind, Trace focused on the large box of papers Finn set in front of him and reached for the small stack he had left from the previous box. At least here he had a purpose and someone who seemed to have plenty of work for him to do.
“I SAID A coil, not a spring,” Finn snapped. Trace had been working there several weeks. He should have known the difference, did know the difference, but his head had been in the clouds all morning, thinking about how this would have been his parents’ twentieth wedding anniversary. The pain had sliced through his chest as soon as he’d seen the date on the calendar, and he’d been flustered and fucking up ever since.
Finn’s voice snapped him back to the moment; it raised the hair on the back of his neck and sent a shiver through him. Biting his lip hard enough to taste blood, he fetched the coil and passed it over, shivering when Finn treated him to a scathing look.
“Pay attention,” he snapped.
“Yes, sir,” Trace muttered, on his way to get the broom.
Of course, as luck would have it, he grabbed the middle of the broomstick, turned with it, and wiped out half a shelf, sending a loud clatter of parts and pieces to the ground.
Finn came stalking over to assess the damage, eyebrows scrunched up in a scowl that darkened his whole expression, again. Trace stood there staring at the mess in disbelief, unable to make a move to even start cleaning it up. He could feel the prickle of tears behind his eyes and tried his hardest not to let them fall.
“What the hell is up with you today?”
“I-I’m sorry,” Trace stammered, brushing at the stray tear that slithered down his cheek.
“Don’t be sorry; tell me what’s going on.”
Trace blinked and looked up into Finn’s eyes, shocked to see that the annoyance had faded, replaced by a look of concern.
“W-would have been my parents’ anniversary today,” Trace managed. “I-I just, I-I can’t stop thinking about them. I’m so sorry I keep fucking up.”
Trace almost stopped breathing when, instead of reprimanding him, Finn enveloped him in a hug.
Finn’s voice was rough and low when he spoke in Trace’s ear, sending a shiver down his spine. “You never have to apologize for that.”
It had been months since he’d been hugged, and Trace couldn’t help but snuggle into the embrace and rest his head against Finn’s chest.
“D-do you want me to clean this up and go for the day so I’m not in the way?” Trace asked as he stepped back from Finn’s embrace with a harsh reminder to himself not to get too comfortable there.
“No, let’s clean this up together and order some lunch,” Finn replied, reaching for the broom Trace had dropped and placing it back in the corner. “The damned legs weren’t working out well anyway, so I think we can both use a break.”
“Oh, okay,” Trace said, grateful that Finn was letting him stay. Wandering around the city could be exhausting and unpleasant, especially when the cops insisted on rousting him whenever he stayed in one place too long.
Kneeling, the pair picked up the spilled pieces and put them back on the shelf, then Finn placed the flat of his palm in the center of Trace’s back and ushered him over to a chair.
“Do you like Indian food?”
Trace shrugged. “I had curry once; it was really good.”
“Then curry it is. How hot do you like it?” Finn asked, pulling his cell phone from his pocket as Trace began to shake his head.
“I-I really can’t afford….”
“Did I ask what you could afford?” Finn asked. “You work for me and I pay you and feed you, that was the deal. So, curry, yes? Lamb or chicken?”
“Um, chicken, but not too spicy,” Trace replied. He’d never expected feeding him to mean more than sandwiches and a drink.
Finn nodded, ordered chicken for Trace and lamb for himself, then tossed the phone on the table and pulled up a chair across from Trace.
“So, how long were they married for?”
Trace blinked at the rapid subject change, and his throat constricted at the reminder of his folks. “Would have been twenty years today,” he finally muttered.
“High school sweethearts?”
“Yeah.”
“My folks, too; they’ve been married twenty-seven years now,” Finn shared.
“It’s hard to believe they’re gone.”
“You were an only child, I take it?”
Trace swallowed hard and nodded. “Yeah, they, um, tried for more, but it just didn’t happen. It was nice, though, because it always felt like we did more together, since I didn’t have an in-house playmate like most of my friends.”
“I can see that. I’ve got two sisters and a brother myself. I’m pretty much right in the middle, which means I spent as much time helping corral the youngest one as I did getting ignored.”
“That kinda sucks.”
“Yeah, it kinda did, sometimes. Other times it was nice. At least I got some time to myself.”
“Were you into this stuff when you were younger?” Trace asked, gesturing to the sculptures around them. He’d been dying to ask that question.
“Building stuff, yeah, I was. Statues in particular, no. I didn’t get into that until after I’d taken a couple welding classes and started getting all these ideas. I started drawing them out and working on them after work, a little at a time, and after about three years, I took some pictures and started showing them around. A gallery uptown thought it would be cool to have a showing, so we set it up and ended up selling three of the five pieces. I got my first commission after that showing, too, and things took off from there.”
“That’s really cool. I think they’re amazing. Do your folks support what you do?”
“Yeah. It took them a little time to accept the fact that I was gonna keep on doing it regardless of what they thought, but in the end, they came to a few showings and listened to what folks were saying about the pieces and really got behind me.”
“Nice!”
“How about you? Did you have plans before your folks passed?”
“Not really. I kind of knew college wasn’t gonna be in my future; we just wouldn’t have been able to afford it, at least not without a scholarship, and I wasn’t gonna bank on one of those.”
“Why not? Grades not good enough?”
“I had decent grades—better than decent—but I wasn’t top of the class or anything. I played sports, but again, I wasn’t, like, some all-star who was gonna get recruited. I played for fun; it wasn’t about being the best or anything like that.”
“So nothing interested you?”
Trace shrugged. “I liked a few of my classes, but if you’re asking if I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up, no, I hadn’t figured it out. Probably never would.”
“Never say never. You’re still young yet; you have plenty of time.”
Funny, but when Finn said it that way, Trace could almost believe him. Almost.
“HOLD IT LIKE this,” Finn instructed, his voice low and firm in Trace’s ear. It took all of Trace’s self-control not to moan and shift backward, rub against Finn, tilt his head back, and beg his boss to mark him. A stupid move that would certainly get him fired, which was why Trace forced himself to focus and do as he was told.
“Light bursts here and here,” Finn explained, molding his front to Trace’s back, his fingertips sliding to guide Trace’s hand. “You want to tack the pieces together, not melt them.”
Trace nodded, focused on doing it right, smiling when Finn let him do three more without assistance.
“Yeah, just like that, kid,” Finn breathed against his neck, then ruffled Trace’s hair before stepping away. “Good job.”
Trace flushed with praise and shame, because the dreams he’d been having had only grown in intensity, and his boss featured prominently in all of them.
Shaking his head to clear it, he focused on his task, tacking the pieces Finn had set aside for him. When he was finished, he carried them over to Finn’s worktable and set them down, then went to check them off the list Finn made for him each morning.
The next thing on the list was sorting the boxes of parts that had been delivered the day before. He loved that task because it required very little attention, allowing him to watch Finn work, and imagine those rough, callused hands sliding down his back or tipping his face up so Finn could kiss him.
It was all he could do not to moan at the thought. He shivered, dug into the first box, and started placing the parts on the correct tables. Despite the coolness of the morning, the workspace was hot from the blowtorches they’d both been using. Finn had already pulled his shirt off, and as Trace placed an old metal hubcap on the table designated for weapons parts, he found himself watching the lines of sweat streaming down Finn’s muscular back.
The man was as impressive as his sculptures.
Trace glanced down at himself and was reminded of how much weight he’d lost—not that he’d ever been particularly big to begin with, but he’d had good definition and had kept in shape. Now he was crack-whore skinny, with his baggy jeans held up with rope since his belt had broken.
When he found his eyes locked on Finn again, he chastised himself for thinking Finn would ever look at him that way. What could he possibly have to offer, considering he didn’t even have a place to live, let alone a clue about his future. Best to keep his focus on his work and never let Finn catch on that he was ogling him.
Still, his eyes refused to listen when Finn stepped back from his statue a few minutes later, swiped his forearm across his brow, and turned, abs flexing as he stretched his back and rolled his shoulder before hunting down the next piece.
Trace’s mouth went dry and he found the air around him almost too hot to bear. Then Finn smiled and Trace turned away, busying himself before Finn had a chance to see how a simple smile affected him.
“I HAVE A spare bedroom at my house you can use. It’s small and pretty cluttered up right now, but if you’re willing to help me sort through it, it’s yours,” Finn informed him a couple of months after Trace started working for him.
“I can’t afford that,” Trace stammered.
“Did I say I was charging you?” Finn snapped. “Look, I don’t know where you’re sleeping, but I can tell you’re not getting much of it.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll pay better attention.”
“I’m not admonishing you. I’m pointing out a fact.”
“I can only afford four hours a night, so I kinda wander until three, then I get about three-and-a-half hours’ sleep and a hot shower,” Trace explained.
“All the more reason for you to quit being stubborn and accept the room I’m offering,” Finn told him.
Trace tried to imagine what living with Finn would be like, how badly it would warp his already desperate and needy dreams, but saying yes would allow him to start saving up money to get a place of his own. “Okay,” he finally said, gaze fixed on the ground.
“Don’t look so thrilled, kid.” Finn chuckled. “You haven’t seen the mess we’ll have to clean up yet.”
He hadn’t been kidding. After work, they’d walked out the back door together for the first time, Finn arching an eyebrow at him when he’d pulled his backpack from the place he stashed it every morning. Behind the same dumpster Finn had found him in.
Finn shook his head. “Really? You could have brought it inside, you know. Would have been safer.”
Trace didn’t have a response to that. He just hugged his bag to him, a bit uneasy about the agreement he’d made to take the room. He was glad to see that Finn’s house was nothing big or fancy. Just a little one-story ranch-style house set at the end of a row of similar houses, not much bigger than the house he’d grown up in.
The room Finn led him to was filled with spare parts and pieces of what looked like old motorcycles.
“Side project,” Finn explained. “Just haven’t had time to do more than try and get the parts together. We can move them out to the shed; I probably should have put them out there in the first place, but I figured I could work on the bikes in here in the winter and make some progress on them.”
“So what happened?”
“Procrastination,” Finn said with a laugh. “By the time I got home from the shop it was pretty easy to convince myself that a beer and my couch were better places to be.”
“I can see that.”
“Hey now, don’t you go encouraging me, I can be lazy enough on my own.”
They shared a laugh at that before digging in, and by the time they had the room emptied and the bed frame and mattress set up, Trace was more than happy to flop in a chair and watch TV with Finn.
“You stick around long enough to be legal and I’ll buy you your first beer,” Finn said, passing him a soda.
“You’d let me work there that long?”
Finn cracked his beer open and took a long drink before looking Trace’s way. “Why not? You’re catching on quick and, like I said when I invited you to work with me, I need the help. Who knows, you might decide you like it and want to make statues of your own.”
Trace froze with the soda halfway to his mouth, trying to wrap his brain around Finn’s words. “Y-you think I could?”
“If you put your mind to it, yeah, I do. If it was something you wanted to try. As long as you keep up with the tasks I have for you, I have no problem with you spending your free time drawing up some ideas and fiddling with the spare parts on those back racks.”
A slow smile crossed Trace’s lips as he thought about the two racks in the back of the warehouse. There were a lot of odds and ends there and a few uniquely shaped pieces, too. He’d eyed them when he’d been organizing, and wondered why Finn wasn’t using them. It would be neat to try to make something on his own, though he had no idea what at the moment. Just the promise of it was enough right now.
“Think about it,” Finn said, before turning his attention back to the TV. “There are worse ways to spend your time.”
“FIX YOURSELF A
plate and sit down.”
Finn’s voice, smoky-deep with a tinge of grogginess, froze Trace in the doorway of the kitchen. The sight of Finn shirtless, in only a pair of baggy sweatpants, left Trace breathless and more than a little bit hard. He was grateful he was wearing jeans and an oversized T-shirt long enough to conceal his arousal from his boss’ eyes.
“Well, what are you waiting for? It isn’t going to dish itself up.”
Trace gulped and shuffled over to the stove, dishing up a serving of grits and corned beef hash. In the three weeks he’d lived with Finn, he’d developed a taste for coffee, mostly because there was little else to drink in the morning. Pouring himself a steaming cup, he joined Finn at the table and dug in.
“I’ve got three parts I need you to pick up today, and I’ll need them before noon. You can take the truck; just don’t wreck it.”
“I won’t.”
Finn nodded and turned his attention back to his food, while Trace barely tasted his, so busy studying the scowl that rarely seemed to leave his boss’ face.
Trace nibbled his upper lip. He didn’t want to be nosy, but he wasn’t raised to sit by quietly while someone else was upset. Even if Finn wasn’t family, they were living together now, and that made them something, right? It took a little back and forth in his mind to convince himself to ask. “Is everything okay?”
Finn grunted and glared at his plate before tossing his spoon down with a clatter.
“I fucked up one of the pieces and it’s too damned close to the showing to fix it the way I want to. I’ve got a guy calling a couple times a week to bug me about sitting down with him to create a piece on commission, and as much as I’d love to take it on, knowing it will be on display in his bookstore downtown—which is a treasure trove of old and rare books, meaning people with money come in there, which could lead to more commissions—I can’t, because I’m having a hard enough time now without making time for something new.”
“Can I help?”
“You’re already helping, more than you realize. The stuff you get done around the shop has bought me a ton of extra time. This is all on me. I took longer than I should have planning the pieces out for the gallery, and now that I’m working on them, I keep second-guessing every damn thing about them.”