Love Can't Conquer

by Kim Fielding

  “Just don’t expect me to wear a suit and black cap. I hate suits.”

  “I’d rather see you in your ranger uniform. It’s sexy.”

  “So you’ve said.” Jeremy knew he sounded a trifle smug, but it was nice to be admired. And the uniform did look good on him.

  They chatted lightly as they crossed town, and they got to the window factory early enough to spend some time just sitting, drinking coffee and watching the rain sheet down the windshield. Qay seemed reluctant to leave when it was time to go. “Thanks for this. It was nice.” And then he surprised Jeremy by leaning over and briefly pressing his sweet-tasting lips to Jeremy’s. “Really nice.” Then he was darting through the rain, leaving Jeremy grinning like an idiot.

  JEREMY DID not enjoy furniture shopping. He had specific tastes and didn’t like it when salespeople tried to talk him into crap he didn’t want. He didn’t like fussy or ornate, but he wasn’t a huge fan of modern either. He wanted good quality, and he wanted the furniture to be comfortable, because he actually intended to use it, goddammit. When he was a kid, the living room contained a couch patterned in gold, cream, and brown, with cushions that would never lie straight. He was strictly forbidden from bringing food anywhere near it. It gave him immense satisfaction as an adult to eat on his couch—and do several other activities that would have given his mother a stroke.

  He finally found a sectional in pale gray. It had clean lines and, the saleswoman assured him, stain-resistant fabric. It was large enough for even a man his size to stretch out. He picked up some other pieces as well: an armchair, a coffee table, a dining table with chairs, a side table that could double as a desk. None of the headboards satisfied him, so he ordered a simple frame to go with the new box spring and mattress. It would tide him over until he found a headboard he liked. The store promised to deliver everything to his apartment in two weeks. By then he hoped the damage would be repaired.

  The furniture hunting took a good chunk of the day. Normally Jeremy would have been grouchy about it, but he kept remembering the look on Qay’s face that morning and the cotton-candy touch of Qay’s lips against his. It hadn’t been an incendiary kiss like their first one, but it had been sweet and ripe with promise.

  Over an afternoon coffee at P-Town, Jeremy replayed that morning kiss in his head, not caring if Rhoda spied his dopey smile. Once he regained a little energy, he intended to look for a new laptop, a task he anticipated with even less enthusiasm than finding a new couch. In the meantime, he sipped his coffee and grinned idiotically and allowed his gaze to float around the room.

  Two tables over sat a young family, a father and mother with a baby and a little girl about kindergarten age. The youngster pouted theatrically over something—she was good at it—and her parents patiently tried to cajole her back into good humor. When the father pulled a ridiculously silly face and settled a paper napkin on his head, the girl couldn’t hold out any longer. She erupted into noisy giggles.

  It was a cute scene. But as Jeremy watched, his smile faded. To the best of his recollection, his own parents had never joked around with him. They had never been cruel, but even when he was young they treated him seriously, as if he were another adult, albeit a small one. Being trapped into marriage by an unwanted pregnancy had apparently killed all their frivolity and joy.

  That was bad. But even worse was Qay. Keith, really. He hadn’t specified why he’d felt imprisoned and hopeless in Bailey Springs—so hopeless that he believed death was his only escape. But Jeremy had a good inkling. The expression on Qay’s face when he talked about his father was one Jeremy had seen before. Many of the homeless kids he encountered at work bore that same expression. Jeremy had no idea of the type or extent of abuse Keith had suffered at his father’s hands, but the wounds were still deep and open thirty years later.

  Dammit, Jeremy should have suspected something back in high school. No kid was as troubled as Keith Moore unless something serious was going on. Jeremy was smart—he should have figured that out. And Keith would have had nowhere to go for help. The Moores were pillars of the community. Mrs. Moore was involved with most of the local civic and charitable organizations, and half the town’s residents relied on Dr. Moore for medical care. It was unlikely that Jeremy could have magically convinced the authorities to do something to protect Keith, but he could have at least been a friend. Fuck. A pair of sympathetic ears might have been enough to save Keith from decades of pain, but Jeremy had let his shyness get in the way of reaching out.

  “You look like you’re ready to kill someone,” Rhoda said. He’d been so busy with his thoughts that he hadn’t noticed her approach.

  “Not quite. But I’d love to go back in time and shake some sense into my younger self.”

  She laughed. “You and pretty much everyone else on the planet, honey. Hell, I had a nightmare once that I’d received Divine Judgment, and my punishment was to endlessly relive every dumb thing I did when I was a kid. It was awful.”

  “This dumb thing affected someone else’s life.”

  “Yeah, those are the worst ones. It’s bad enough I did things to screw myself up, but I hate thinking about the ways I messed up other people.” She patted his shoulder. “We’re human, baby. Comes with the package.”

  She was right, but he didn’t feel any better about it. “I bought furniture,” he said, knowing it was a non sequitur. “And I’m about to go computer shopping.”

  “Sounds like a productive weekend.”

  “I guess. I’m going hiking tomorrow.”

  “Solo?” she asked, tilting her head slightly.

  “With Qay.”

  That made her eyebrows rise. “He’s not a fuckwad?”

  “He’s not. Your superpowers didn’t fail you. I was the one at fault. But I apologized and he’s forgiven me.”

  “Oh, I’m glad. And I’m also glad he and I can be friends again. Tell him to come back.”

  A bit of Jeremy’s former good mood returned. Qay deserved a friend like Rhoda on his side. “I will. He’ll be happy about it.”

  Laptop shopping turned out to be relatively painless. In fact, the new one was a lot nicer than his old one, with a faster processor, more memory, and better screen resolution. He got a pretty good deal on it too. He took his new purchase back to the hotel and sat with it for a while, trying to decide whether to pick Qay up after work. Dinner together would be nice, and while the rain had stopped, Jeremy’s SUV beat TriMet any day.

  In the end, though, he decided it would be too stalkery if he showed up tonight. He didn’t want to overwhelm Qay. They had all of Sunday to be together. So he worked out at the fitness center, ordered from room service, and spent the rest of the evening playing with his new computer.

  ON SUNDAY morning Jeremy nearly bounced out of bed. Even though he was about to spend the day outdoors, most likely getting sweaty and muddy, he showered. Then he put on his hiking gear, which he’d fortunately salvaged from the devastation in his apartment. He jogged to his SUV.

  P-Town opened late on Sundays, which was too bad. He figured he and Qay could stop for a quick breakfast somewhere else on the way out of town. When he pulled up to Qay’s house—nearly ten minutes early—Qay already stood at the curb, grinning. He held a large paper bag in one hand.

  “Morning,” Qay said when he climbed into the car. “Um, am I dressed okay? I don’t exactly have REI in my closet.”

  Jeremy inspected him. Scuffed work boots, jeans, a gray sweatshirt, and the leather jacket. Not the best, but they were only doing a light hike today. “You’re fine,” Jeremy said with a reassuring smile. “We’re walking about five miles. There’s some elevation gain, but nothing crazy. Will your feet be comfortable in those boots?”

  “I wear them all day at work, so I guess so.”

  “At least you’ll be safe if there’s glass on the trail.”

  Qay snorted. “True.” Then he rustled in the bag. “It’s not P-Town, but last night after work, I picked up a couple of things at the store
. Um, muffins, sandwiches, granola bars…. I wasn’t sure what you’d want.”

  That was about the sweetest thing anyone had done for Jeremy in a long time. The silly grin reappeared. “Actually, a sandwich would be great. How about if I hit drive-through for coffee?”

  “Captain Caffeine strikes again.” Qay’s smile was audible in his words.

  Fed and energized, they headed northeast. Qay didn’t ask where they were going, and Jeremy wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing or bad. Maybe it meant Qay trusted him, or maybe it meant Qay was passively resigned to taking whatever came to him. In either case, he seemed content to gaze out the windows as they zoomed along the freeway in the light Sunday-morning traffic. This wasn’t the most scenic part of town, but he likely didn’t come this way often.

  Just after they reached Troutdale, Qay twisted in his seat to face Jeremy. “If you don’t let me change the radio station, I’m going to lose my mind.”

  Jeremy hadn’t really paid any attention to the music. “What’s wrong with it?”

  “I’m not a thirteen-year-old girl.”

  “You don’t have to be to like this song.” Jeremy was arguing for the sake of form. He didn’t know who the singer was, and the song itself was innocuous and forgettable. It was just background noise. But he enjoyed Qay’s impatient huff.

  “No, probably some twelve-year-olds listen to it too. For fuck’s sake, Jeremy. I don’t have much sanity as it is.”

  Jeremy passed an eighteen-wheeler with a giant photo of french fries on the side, then an old van hand-painted with bright swirls and squiggles. “You could sync my phone with the stereo. I think I have Justin Bieber and One Direction on my playlist.” A bald-faced lie that, as he’d hoped, made Qay groan loudly.

  “I didn’t realize you’re a sadist,” Qay said.

  “Only on weekends. It’s a hobby.”

  Another snort, and then Qay reached over and began to fiddle with the radio controls. “There must be something decent,” he muttered as he scanned through the wavelengths. He seemed about to settle on Led Zeppelin, which would have been perfectly fine with Jeremy, but then Jeremy’s phone rang. It was a generic ringtone, not the ones he’d assigned to Rhoda, his work contacts, or Nevin Ng, whom he occasionally joined at the gym or to watch basketball games. He ignored it, leaving the phone untouched on the console next to him.

  “Phone’s ringing,” Qay said mildly.

  “Uh-huh.”

  Qay tapped the armrest. “Not going to answer it?”

  “Not unless it’s you. I’m spending today with you.”

  “I don’t own a cell phone, so I know it’s not me.”

  Jeremy briefly glanced away from the road toward Qay. “Really?”

  “Don’t need one. Who’d call me? My apartment has a landline.”

  “I’d call you.”

  Qay laughed softly. “I believe you. And I could call you when I needed my next chauffeur service.”

  I’d service you anytime. Jeremy had just enough sense not to say that out loud. By then the ringing had stopped and Robert Plant was bellowing out “The Lemon Song.” Jeremy barely managed not to sing along with the innuendos.

  “How do you—” Qay began. He stopped when the phone rang again.

  “What does the screen say?” Jeremy asked him.

  Qay picked up the phone and peered at it. “Frankl.”

  Jeremy’s buoyant mood crashed and his stomach tightened. “Fuck! Could you do me a favor and put it on speaker?”

  After a moment of fumbling, Qay did, and then he turned down the radio. “What’s up, Captain?” Jeremy asked loudly.

  “We got a good lead.”

  “Don’t tell me you found prints in my apartment.”

  “No. Patrol got called on a criminal mistreatment charge. Guy turned out to have an entire pharmacy in his bedroom, along with a few other items he wasn’t supposed to have. And his girlfriend’s kid might not survive, so this guy’s facing a long haul as a guest of the state. He’s in the mood to talk.”

  “Shit,” Jeremy said. He’d heard stories like this plenty of times—seen them himself when he worked for the bureau—but they still made him ill.

  Frankl sounded equally disgusted. “Pretty much. Look, I need to talk to you. There’s stuff you need to know. I can meet you at Mickey D’s again.”

  “Can we do it tomorrow? I’m… tied up today.”

  “Yeah, okay.” Frankl clearly wasn’t pleased with the delay. “Meet me there at nine. And be careful, Cox. Keep an eye out.”

  Shit, shit. “I will. Thanks, Captain.”

  For a minute or two after disconnecting the call, Qay was silent. Then he cleared his throat. “Criminal mistreatment? What’s that?”

  “Child abuse. The fucker they arrested beat the shit out of his girlfriend’s child.” The words tasted bitter.

  Qay made a noise deep in his throat and turned away. Jeremy imagined he wasn’t finding the greenery beside the road all that interesting. The better view was out Jeremy’s window, where the Columbia River rolled on like liquid steel. Jeremy lifted his coffee cup and swallowed the cooling dregs, and he wished he knew what to say that would make things better.

  “My father…,” Qay began, but he didn’t finish the sentence. It hung heavily between them.

  Jeremy set down the cup and reached for Qay’s leg. “I know.”

  “Yours?”

  “My parents never laid a finger on me. They punished me by sending me to my room without anything to read.”

  Jeremy couldn’t decipher the meaning of Qay’s answering sigh. “I thought about killing him,” Qay said. “I even planned different ways. I could slip something into his bourbon, maybe greet him at the door one afternoon with his hunting rifle in my hand. I was going to kill her too. She didn’t hurt me, but she knew what he did, and she… she just turned away. Popped a few of her pills and pretended everything was hunky-dory.” He was still talking to the window, but he pressed his thigh slightly into Jeremy’s touch. The denim of his jeans was worn soft as suede.

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “I was chicken. I knew if I did it, I’d spend the rest of my life in a cage, and I couldn’t face that. I preferred to die. Of course, I ended up in a cage anyway. But I finally got out.” He turned to look at Jeremy. “You’re a cop. You still want to hang out with me after I told you this?”

  “I’m a park ranger, not a cop. And yeah, I really do.”

  Qay turned up the radio and leaned back in his seat. Jeremy couldn’t see, but he thought Qay might be smiling. But then something must have occurred to Qay, because he switched the radio off completely. “What that guy said…. Are you in danger?”

  “I know as much about it as you do.”

  “Then shouldn’t you meet with that Frankl guy?”

  “Tomorrow. I’m sure I’m safe out here, and today is officially our second date. I want it to end better than the first one.”

  “The first one was good until the last part,” Qay said quietly.

  “It was.”

  A short time later, Jeremy pulled into a parking lot. It wasn’t crowded on this cold morning, so he had a good choice of spots. “Multnomah Falls?” Qay asked. “I’ve seen photos but never been.”

  “It’s a nice little hike. Do you want anything to eat or drink before we go? There’s a visitors’ center.” He pointed at the large stone building. “They have espresso.”

  “Nope. I’m good.”

  Jeremy had brought some bottled water in a daypack. He stuffed his first-aid kit in there too—because you just never knew—plus a well-worn trail map and the leftover food from Qay’s stash. Then he adjusted his coat and hoisted the pack onto his back. “Let’s go,” he said after locking the SUV.

  They set out at a leisurely pace. They weren’t in a hurry, and if Jeremy had gone at full speed, he wasn’t sure Qay could keep up. Not only did Qay undoubtedly have much less experience hiking than he did, but his work boots were no match for Jeremy’s exp
ensive day hikers. Anyway, it was nice to poke along, greeting a few other walkers and looking closely at everything they passed. Some of the views were breathtaking, and Jeremy and Qay paused to admire them, but Qay seemed just as interested in smaller things like rocks and trees.

  “Weird,” Qay said, not quite touching a tree branch where tiny tufts of bright green stuck out among small gray lobes.

  Jeremy moved in for a closer look. “The green parts are moss. The gray is felt lichen. Peltigera collina.”

  Qay’s eyebrows rose. “What’s the tree?”

  “Oh, that’s easy. Pseudotsuga menziesii. Douglas fir. They’re not true firs, though, despite the common name. The genus is Pseudotsuga instead of Abies. They’re sort of in a category of their own.”

  “Do you know all this stuff?” Qay waved his hands widely, indicating everything, apparently.

  “Not all of it. I’m better with biology than geology, for one thing, and if it’s something obscure, I may be stumped. Douglas firs aren’t obscure.”

  “Jesus.”

  Jeremy wasn’t sure whether Qay was impressed or overwhelmed. “Have I nerded you out?”

  Qay responded with a wide, easy grin. “I find nerds kinda hot even when they don’t look like Marvel heroes. I just don’t know how you can know so much.”

  “I was a bio major. Plus it’s my job, sort of.” Jeremy closed the space between them and bent a little to whisper in Qay’s ear. “Hot, huh?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Hmm. Dysphania pumilio. Ailanthus altissima. Ambystoma gracile.”

  “Is that Latin dirty talk?” Qay asked with a low chuckle.

  “Nope. An herb, a tree, and a salamander.”

  The chuckle turned into a laugh. “I have no idea how to counter that.”

  “You could whisper sweet philosophy nothings in my ear. Or… hell. Just stand there and smile like that. That’s good enough for me.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Qay said, ducking his head.

  “Is not. Jesus, you used to give me just a crooked little lift of your lips and make my heart go pitty-pat long before I had a clue what that meant. Yours is the gold standard by which I’ve been measuring smiles for thirty years.”