by John Inman
“You should have been watching where you were going.”
“Shut up. Now, tell me you love me back.”
Wyeth sniffed. He was getting teary-eyed again. “I do love you back. I’ll never forget how beautiful you were lying there unconscious at my feet, concussed to within an inch of your life in your little mauve shorts. You were so nice and quiet.”
“I wasn’t unconscious. I was faking.”
“I knew that.”
“And I can be quiet when I want to be.”
Wyeth rolled his eyes. “No, you can’t.”
Deeze paused for a second. “You’re right. I can’t.”
“Deeze?”
“Yes?”
“Am I mistaken, or have we just ratcheted our relationship up another notch by saying we love each other?”
“You’re not mistaken. I’d kiss you, but I don’t want to get you fired. I can barely support myself on a teacher’s salary. So come on, Wy. I have to get back to my kids before they dismantle your wonderful library brick by brick and I find myself on a street corner peddling all my surplus crayons and construction paper to make a living while you get fired anyway and we end up just two more homeless guys sitting in the library sucking up the free air-conditioning and pretending we don’t stink to high heaven.”
“Wow. Dr. Seuss has nothing on you.”
Still holding hands, Deeze tugged Wyeth toward the sound of the lady in the children’s room who was now giving her best impersonation of Yertle the Turtle, which was so over the top that Deeze’s kids were roaring with laughter. Wyeth barely heard a thing the woman said above the pounding of his own heart. Still stunned by current events, his was the only somber face in the crowd. If there was a laugh in him anywhere, he would have been hard-pressed to find it.
He stared over at Deeze, at his bright-eyed grin, his joyous, handsome face. Their eyes met briefly as they settled cross-legged on the floor next to Jake, who had patted the floor at either side of himself in the hope they would join him.
Deeze’s fingers brushed Wyeth’s as they both ruffled the boy’s hair before all eyes turned back to the lady with the big colorful book in her lap and the Yertle the Turtle voice. Deeze and Wyeth laughed with the kids, pretending to be as rapt at the story as all the five-year-olds sitting on the floor around them. In truth, Wyeth had eyes only for Deeze, who seemed to feel the same if his eyes locked on Wyeth’s were anything to go by.
Later, Wyeth couldn’t recall a single word the woman said. Not one. In fact, he had no idea what the story had been about at all. Not a clue. She could have been reading War and Peace or the operating instructions for her new Maytag washing machine for all he knew.
On the other hand, Deeze had said he loved him.
That was a much better tale to contemplate anyway.
Chapter Eleven
IT WAS Tuesday evening. Deeze was at class, and Wyeth had just finished a five-mile run around the harbor, with a reluctant Chaucer bitching and moaning at his heels every step of the way. The moment they stepped through the apartment door, Chaucer made a beeline for the bedroom, where he crawled under the bed, all the while growling obscenities to himself and the world at large.
Wyeth peeled out of his sweaty running clothes and was about to fish Chaucer out with a broom handle to apologize, when his cell phone rang. Naked, he padded across the living room to dig his phone out of the puddle of damp running clothes piled on the floor where he’d dropped them.
The caller was Deeze.
“Have you tried to find me?”
“No,” Wyeth answered. “Aren’t you at class?”
“I didn’t make it. I’m with Agnes.”
“You mean the old lady next door?”
“None other.”
“I always knew you’d leave me, but I thought it would be for someone younger. And richer. And possessing a dick.”
“Funny. Get down here and wait with me.”
“Wait with you? What are you waiting for? Where are you?”
“Mercy Hospital. The emergency room.”
Wyeth tensed. “What happened?”
“I’ll tell you when you get here.”
“Okay. Give me fifteen minutes.”
Wyeth was there in twelve. He found Deeze sitting at the back of the waiting room next to a Coke machine, sipping a Diet Sprite and looking worried.
“Baby,” Deeze said when he spotted Wyeth approaching.
Wyeth dropped into a chair beside him. “So what happened?”
“I found her on the street in her housecoat, walking around in a daze, talking funny, and acting all out of it. I immediately shoveled her into the car and brought her here. She cussed me the whole way.”
Wyeth tried not to smile. Agnes could be cranky. “So what’s wrong with her?” he asked. “Did her insanity finally take a turn for the worse? Was she speaking in tongues? Chasing squirrels through the park?” Wyeth suspected he was being a bit sarcastic, so he toned it down. “Sorry. Have you talked to a doctor?”
Deeze cast his eyes around the room, which was filled with miserable people sitting there like they were. Waiting. Waiting. “It’s the chemo. The doc said her body is too old to accept it any longer. They may have to lower the dose.”
“Chemo? You mean she has cancer?”
Deeze’s eyes skittered back to Wyeth’s face. “Yeah. She’s had it for several years.”
“She never said.”
Deeze shrugged. “That’s Agnes. She never talks about the important stuff. Just bitches about the ketchup dispensers at Denny’s and how they never squirt properly. Or the price of eggs. Or how they always air commercials on TV for disposable douches while she’s trying to eat dinner.”
Wyeth stuck his tongue in his cheek. “Yeah, I don’t like that either.”
Deeze grinned, then he just as quickly frowned. “This isn’t good news, Wy. Without the chemo, the cancer will gain a foothold again, and that’ll be it.”
“You’ve known this all along,” Wyeth said.
Deeze nodded. “About the cancer, yeah. Once in a while she’ll tell me something important. Just sort of slips it in among all the crazy stuff. You have to be paying attention to catch it. I really do like her, you know. I feel it’s my duty to be a friend to her. Poor thing doesn’t have very many. None, actually, as far as I know.”
Wyeth reached out and clutched Deeze’s hand. “Then I’m sorry.” He didn’t add that he was also sorry for all the times he had dissed Agnes in front of Deeze, or maybe Deeze forgave him for that already. Even he had to know how infuriating the old lady could be.
“Are they going to admit her?” Wyeth asked.
“No. I’m waiting to take her home.”
“Then I’ll wait with you.”
Deeze’s eyes burrowed into Wyeth’s. He looked tired, Wyeth thought. But Deeze smiled anyway. “I was hoping you would.” He brought his hand up and ran his fingers through Wyeth’s wet hair. “You were running.”
“Yeah, don’t get too close. I haven’t showered yet.”
“I noticed,” Deeze said, wrinkling his nose. Wyeth slapped his arm.
Together they settled back, trading sips from Deeze’s Diet Sprite and waiting for Agnes to be brought out to them.
“I’m sorry she’s sick,” Wyeth said, pulling himself from his thoughts. “If I’d known, I might have been a little nicer to her.”
Deeze grunted a laugh. “What are you talking about? She loves you. Told me if I didn’t claim you for myself, she was going after you.”
“You have to be shittin—”
Before Wyeth could finish, the sound of carpet slippers slapped their way toward them, and Wyeth looked up. Agnes was on the arm of a handsome young orderly. She was wearing a housecoat with tea roses all over it, and her hair was poked up under a snood. Wyeth wasn’t sure, but it looked like she was naked under the housecoat.
Spotting Deeze and Wyeth back against the wall, she cried out, “There’s my boys! Ain’t they cute together? They
love each other, you know. I’m the one that got them together.”
The orderly said that was nice and, with a secretive smirk, passed the old lady into Deeze’s care after giving each man an appreciative glance.
Well, he’s gay, Wyeth thought.
Agnes patted her snood, waiting for someone to tell her how nice she looked.
It was so blatantly obvious, Wyeth dragged the words out of his throat as a concession to all the times he’d been snippy with her. “You look nice,” he said with all the enthusiasm of a man being led to the gallows.
Of course, she was instantly offended. “Nice? I’ve just been prodded from one end to the other! They even lost my nightgown and knickers! I’m lucky I still have my teeth!”
DEEZE BIT back a grin at Agnes’s retort, pleased that she was clear-headed enough now to complain. He’d been deeply concerned when he found her on the street, though he wasn’t going to let her see that. “Sorry about your knickers,” he said. “How do you feel?”
“I’m weak as a kitten,” she announced, putting on a brave face. “But as soon as they adjust my meds, I’ll be right as rain. Good as new. Fresh as a daisy.”
Deeze made a funny face for her benefit. “So you OD’d on the drug that makes you speak in clichés, and now you won’t be doing it anymore. Is that what you’re telling us?”
“Ass,” Agnes growled. Turning her back on Deeze, she took Wyeth’s arm and started dragging him toward the exit.
Smiling, Deeze trailed along behind, carrying the old lady’s folded-up walker and admiring Wyeth’s ass while they headed for the door.
A tap on the shoulder stopped Deeze in the hallway outside the emergency room. It was the young doctor who had treated Agnes. The doctor spoke in hushed tones while Agnes and Wyeth strolled off through the front doors toward the parking area, both apparently still thinking Deeze was right behind them.
When the doctor finished explaining things to Deeze, they shook hands, and the doctor headed back from where he came. Deeze hustled out the door to find that while he had sat inside the hospital waiting room, day had turned to night, blue skies to stars.
He spotted Wyeth waving to him from the parking lot and took off at a jog to catch up, enjoying the flexing of muscles after sitting on a plastic chair for the past three hours.
“Well, where the heck have you been?” Agnes grumped when he huffed up to them. Then she gave him a slightly gentler gaze. “Did the doctor talk to you like I asked him to?”
Deeze patted her shoulder. “He talked to me. Now then, let’s get you home,” he said quietly.
“IT WAS sweet of you to help Agnes, Deeze.”
Deeze shrugged. “She’s a friend,” he said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “She’d do the same for me.”
“Are you sure?”
Deeze coughed up a tiny laugh. “Well, not entirely.”
Deeze and Wyeth lay in bed. A sheen of after-sex sweat glistened on their bodies, drying in the breeze coming through the bedroom window. It was hours after they had carted Agnes home. The moon was high in the sky outside, and they were snug and comfortable. Wyeth dreaded going back to work the next day. The cool air wafting over them heralded the beginning of autumn, and he was thrilled to death about that. It had been a hot summer.
Hot in more ways than one.
Wyeth lay cradled in Deeze’s arms, his back to Deeze’s chest, Deeze’s sated cock nestled unthreateningly against his ass where only minutes before it had been anything but unthreatening.
Deeze brushed a kiss across the nape of Wyeth’s neck. “The doctor told me she won’t last long with the current dose of chemo, but she refused to let him cut it. It’s a toss-up now as to which will kill her first. The cancer or the meds.”
“I’m sorry. I hope she knows how lucky she is to have you caring about her. Without you, she’d be going through this alone, and that would be truly sad. You’re a good person, Deeze, and I’m just as lucky to have you as she is.”
Deeze snuggled closer, pressing himself to Wyeth’s back. His voice was a contented rumble, his breath hot on Wyeth’s shoulder. His strong arms circled Wyeth, clinging tight, holding him so close he could hardly breathe.
“I love you so much,” Deeze muttered, sending a rush of desire coursing through Wyeth’s system like a shot of adrenaline.
The words fell from Wyeth’s lips. He couldn’t have stopped them if he wanted. “I love you too, Deeze. I love you more than anything.”
A momentary silence settled over them. When Deeze stiffened behind him, Wyeth wiggled around to face him, burying his face in the luscious forest of hair on Deeze’s chest. It was his favorite place to be. “What is it?” Wyeth asked. “What are you thinking about?”
Deeze’s fingers played through Wyeth’s locks. He scooted down in the bed so their faces were aligned. Their leg hair bristled together, their flaccid cocks nestling side by side. Deeze’s warm eyes fixed on Wyeth’s, and a tiny smile twisted his mouth.
“As far as I’m concerned, our trial period is over, Wy. I know what I want. I’m hoping I know what you want too. I think it’s time we start thinking about moving in together. I mean, if you’ll have me.”
Wyeth swallowed hard, melting under the longing expression on Deeze’s handsome face. He traced a thumb across Deeze’s lush lips, lips still swollen and red from kissing the stubble on Wyeth’s face since he hadn’t shaved since that morning. Wyeth knew his lips probably looked the same, since Deeze’s stubble was even thicker than his own and Deeze hadn’t shaved since morning either.
A trace of Wyeth’s old insecurities struggled to break free, but he forced them into the shadows where they belonged. He had changed a lot since being with Deeze. He was a stronger person now, and he knew it. He was also a person who understood love. He trusted it now. No one had ever taught him that before. Or maybe he had simply never let himself give into it so completely before. Until Deeze came along, love was a concept that had no place in real life. Not Wyeth’s life, at any rate. Now love was the driving force of everything he did. Everything. It lived inside him through every second of every day. It steered his every move, consumed his every thought.
And it made him truly happy.
“Yes,” Wyeth answered immediately, not even considering his reply. He leaned in to taste those swollen lips, to wrap Deeze more securely in his arms. “Yes, I’ll have you. You’re all I’ve ever wanted, Deeze. Living with you would be….”
“What, baby? What would it be?” There was tenderness in the question. Wyeth wasn’t fooled by the mischievous glint in Deeze’s eyes. Deeze fooled around about a lot of things, but he wasn’t fooling around now. He was dead serious.
At that moment, Wyeth loved the man so much he thought his heart would truly burst, shattering into a zillion pieces, like Alderaan after the Death Star zapped it out of the universe. A tremor coursed through his body. He fought the urge to throw himself out of bed and dance a jig around the bedroom. Or laugh like a maniac. Or maybe just lie there and blubber like a baby from sheer adoration. If it hadn’t meant he would have to peel himself from Deeze’s embrace, he might have done one or all of those things. As it was, he wouldn’t have moved from where he was for anything in the world.
“A dream,” he whispered, his lips on Deeze’s chest. “Living with you, Deeze. Knowing you’re really mine. It would be a wonderful, perfect dream.”
Wyeth lifted his head and watched as Deeze absorbed the words, his dark eyes studying Wyeth in his arms, seeking the truth in what Wyeth had said. By the smile that touched his lips, Wyeth knew when Deeze found it. Deeze’s large, gentle hand came up to cup the back of Wyeth’s head while he planted a soft kiss on the tip of Wyeth’s nose. “It’s a dream for me too, baby. I love you so much I have to fight screaming it to the world a dozen times a day.”
“Me too.”
“I love you so much, I want to hire a plane to skywrite it across the heavens.”
“Me too.”
“I love you
so much I think we should make love again as soon as I can replenish my testosterone after the last fuck we shared, which was—what, twelve minutes ago?”
Wyeth grinned. “Hmm. That last one wasn’t quite as romantic as the others, but I think I like it anyway.”
Deeze grinned back. “Goody.”
They snuggled cozily in each other’s arms while the night deepened around them. The sounds of the city drifted through the bedroom window, along with the cooling breeze. The hue of a blinking traffic light flashed a spot of red on the dresser mirror, sending it ricocheting across the room. An ambulance screamed a few blocks away, announcing to the city that not everyone was having a good night. Some homeboy’s lowrider blasted rap music as it rumbled past the apartment building. The sound of laughter growing louder as people spilled from the bar down the street indicated it was two in the morning and the drunks were headed home.
Wyeth pressed his lips to Deeze’s chin, inhaling the scent of the man he loved so much, not minding the stubble one little bit.
“I’ll take good care of you,” Deeze whispered. “I promise. I’ll never hurt you, Wy. Never.”
Wyeth couldn’t speak since there was a lump in his throat the size of a softball. He could only nod.
They lay contentedly in the darkness while the city gradually quieted around them and the night rolled its way to dawn. Eventually, Deeze slept.
Wyeth lay awake until the sun peeked through his bedroom curtains. Quietly, he slipped naked from Deeze’s arms and tiptoed to the window to gaze out on the coming day. He was standing there when Deeze opened his eyes.
“You’re so beautiful,” Deeze muttered, patting the mattress at his side. “Come back to bed for a few minutes before we have to go to work. Please, baby, I want you next to me.”
Wyeth didn’t need to be asked twice. He threw himself back into bed and wormed his way into Deeze’s arms. They lay like that until the jangle of Chaucer’s leash and the scratching of Chaucer’s toenails on the front door told them someone needed to go out.