Infamous

by Jenny Holiday

  He wondered what it would be like to wake up in Jesse’s arms in a fluffy warm bed instead of on the lumpy cold ground. He wondered what it would be like to sleep skin to skin.

  No, that wasn’t right, either. He didn’t wonder. There was no idle conjecture going on here. He yearned to know. Burned to know.

  “Get in the bed, Hunter.”

  He got in the bed.

  Then: a lovely, slow sinking sensation. The cessation of effort, of surrendering his weary body to a soft bed.

  Or to a hard chest.

  Jesse had maneuvered them so he was spooning Hunter. His hands came to Hunter’s neck, and he pressed against the taut muscles there. Just like at the pond, but this time they were horizontal and naked.

  Hunter’s eyes slipped closed in ecstasy as the massage continued.

  “You’ve had such a long day,” Jesse whispered.

  Hunter wanted to argue that if that was true for him, it was doubly true for Jesse, who’d performed last night and then flown in to do the gala.

  But the softening that was occurring in his neck muscles seemed to have infected his jaw. All that came out when he tried to speak was an inarticulate, “Mmmph.” He tried again, “Jesse, I—”

  “Shhh. I know everything’s weird,” Jesse whispered in his ear, stopping the massage and pulling Hunter’s back flush to his chest. “We’ll talk in the morning. Sleep now.”

  They did not talk in the morning.

  Because Jesse was a fucking coward.

  He always had been. What was that line from Beth’s new therapist she was forever quoting? “You can’t change people.”

  Which was why he left the note.

  Jesse told himself he couldn’t bear to wake Hunter. It was a convincing enough lie to propel him out of bed and out of the house. Hunter had been so beautiful when he was asleep. Well, he was always beautiful, but that morning, there had been such an exquisite vulnerability about him. He looked so young, even with the gray hair. Jesse hated to think of the world weighing heavily on his friend—of entitled socialites and dying kids and all that bullshit.

  He wanted to protect Hunter from all of it. The idea that he might have succeeded, at least last night, made Jesse feel like that asshole Leonardo DiCaprio on the Titanic: “I’m the king of the world.” He wasn’t sure which had been the better feeling: the moment Hunter had wrapped his lips around Jesse’s dick or the moment Hunter had come into his arms and lay back against his chest, trusting Jesse enough to lay down his burdens, set aside his unanswered questions, and sleep.

  But, later, on the plane, Jesse forced himself to be objective about the situation. Between dying kids and entitled socialites, Hunter had indeed had a hell of a day yesterday.

  Probably, though, all that paled in comparison to asshole rock stars wreaking havoc in his life and then not even sticking around long enough to answer a few totally fucking reasonable questions. Jesse hadn’t even been able to face his sister after such a shitty move—he’d begged off seeing her and Gavin.

  It was just that as he’d lain there this morning, awake before Hunter, he’d started to think of Matty. Matty the rainmaker, who’d done exactly what he promised: done his stupid “branding,” cleaned up the mess Jesse had made, and transformed the band into a powerhouse.

  Delivered Jesse’s heart’s desire.

  He sighed as the plane touched down in Pittsburgh. There was going to have to be a reckoning with Hunter. He understood that—he wasn’t that much of a dick. All he’d done, he could see now, was postpone it.

  But first, he had a sound check.

  Good. Sound check would be a kick in the ass. A good way to steel himself. A reminder of his first principle, which was increasingly painful but no less true for it.

  He would do anything to protect the music.

  Three days had passed since Jesse left, and Hunter couldn’t get one phrase out of his mind: pity fuck.

  Two little words. Eight letters.

  They should not have had such power.

  But there they were, floating just below Hunter’s consciousness pretty much all the time. At the most inappropriate times, actually.

  “What’s the matter with you, Dr. W.?”

  “What?” Crap. Avery. “Sorry. I was daydreaming for a minute there.”

  Day-nightmaring was maybe a better word for it. Glazing everything he thought had happened two nights ago with a thin wash of his new favorite phrase: Pity fuck.

  Avery had come to town for a checkup with her cardiologist, and she and her mom had popped into his office to say hi—and to share the happy news that her latest test results were all good. It was looking like they wouldn’t need to get her on the transplant list for a few more years.

  He held himself back from ruffling her hair. She was twelve now—not a little kid anymore. This must be a taste of how parents felt. One day you had a little kid. Then you blinked.

  “Avery, will you invite me to your wedding?” he asked impulsively.

  Her brow furrowed. It was the wrong question. He’d meant it only as a wish, a prayer. A promise that he would see her survive. That he would be able to mark a big, adult milestone with her, like a wedding. But it had been a poor example. He shouldn’t make bullshit hetero-normative assumptions about how anyone’s life was going to play out, much less a pediatric patient’s.

  “Or to your college graduation,” he said. That made more sense.

  “We’ll invite you to everything,” Lisa, Avery’s mom, said, her voice quiet but resolute. She was leaning against the doorframe of Hunter’s office, like Jesse used to do.

  “How come you’re not married?” Avery asked with her signature forthrightness, swiveling the guest chair she was seated on back and forth.

  Good question. Julian had talked about it sometimes, but Hunter had always brushed it off. Maybe some part of him had known from the start that the lie they were living wasn’t going to sit right with him indefinitely. That it would eat away at him until there was more gangrene than healthy tissue left. But he couldn’t deny it was something he secretly wanted, someday. What could he say? He went in for all the hetero-normative romantic crap he’d just been reminding himself not to project onto Avery.

  “It’s harder for me,” he said slowly, trying to think how to answer her question. They’d never talked about it, but Avery and her family knew he was gay. It wasn’t a secret. It had been right there in the program at the gala they’d all attended.

  “Gay marriage was legalized in Ontario in 2003,” she said, and her inflection suggested 2003 was so far in the past, it might as well have been 1903. But, he supposed, 2003 was more than a lifetime ago for her.

  He shared an amused smile with her mom. “It’s not that. It’s more the odds. Only a small proportion of the population is gay. So finding a match sometimes seems like finding a needle in a haystack.”

  Avery nodded, like she understood. But then she made a full rotation in her chair and said, “I miss Jesse. Don’t you?”

  Hunter tried to conceal his surprise at being thrown that curveball.

  “I do,” he said, because it was the right thing to say in the circumstances but also because it was true.

  Missed him so much he almost felt sick.

  Pity fuck.

  When he looked back on the extraordinary events of the other night, he no longer knew how to interpret them. Not that he ever had—Jesse had promised they’d talk the next morning, but then Hunter had awoken to a bullshit note that had said, Couldn’t bear to wake you. Talk soon. —J.

  Jesse bidding on him at the auction had seemed, as it was unfolding, a gesture that was both grand and kind. Befitting of Jesse. Of the larger-than-life rock star, who was, at his core, and no matter how much he tried to project otherwise with his manager’s “bad-boy” label, a really nice guy.

  Rationally, Hunter understood Jesse had done it because he’d felt bad. He hadn’t wanted Hunter stuck with Faheem or with Mrs. Worthington. Hunter had, at the time, interpreted it mo
re as a friend doing a friend a solid. A really big, really expensive solid, but that was Jesse for you.

  But maybe it had just been pity.

  Maybe it had all been pity, the auction and everything that had happened afterward.

  But then . . . that was ridiculous. People didn’t have sex with their best friends out of pity. Did they?

  It had been real in the moment. He’d seen the effect he’d had on Jesse.

  Maybe . . . Shit. After all, they hadn’t spoken.

  On the other hand, it had only been three days. They had gone three days without talking during the tour.

  Not very often, though, and never without a few texts.

  He was going crazy. Gaslighting himself.

  “Did you know he invited me to a show? He said I could come to any of them.”

  Damn it, what was the matter with him? He was at work, for God’s sake. Talking to a former patient. Time to shake off the existential crisis and do his damn job.

  “That sounds like him,” he said, schooling his voice to neutrality.

  “My mom said I could go if you signed off,” she said, grinning goofily.

  “That’s why we’re here, really,” said Lisa. “The cardiologist said it was okay if we took precautions, but I’m not sure about her getting on a plane. I know enough time has passed, and she has to live her life, but I worry so much about infection. And we . . . well, we trust you more than anyone.”

  Hunter’s chest warmed at the praise. “What about going to see them in Buffalo? Then you could drive. I think they have a show there soon?”

  They had a show there five days from now. He knew because he knew everything about the current Jesse and the Joyride tour.

  “That’s a great idea,” said Lisa. “I think we could all use some fun.” But then she quickly followed that with, “Oh, but I don’t want to presume that he’ll give us four tickets.”

  “I’m sure he will,” said Hunter.

  Avery clapped her hands in glee. “Will you ask him?”

  Hunter was tempted to tell Avery to ask him herself. She had his number. But he was the adult here. Was he going to let his own neuroses get in the way of doing his job? Of making one of his all-time favorite patients happy?

  “Sure,” he said, trying to infuse the word with enthusiasm he did not feel.

  Funny that his first contact with Hunter, after their initial meeting on the train, had also been on Avery’s behalf. Of course, it was different now, because of everything that had happened. Because . . .

  Pity fuck.

  Jesse stared at his phone. Like maybe he could press Send with the power of his mind.

  His finger certainly wasn’t cooperating. It was shaking like a goddamned leaf.

  It was just a stupid, inconsequential text.

  How’s Avery? How’s everything? Show was shit tonight.

  But he was too much of a fucking coward to send it. Maybe he should take a shower. He’d retreated to his room after the aforementioned shit-tastic show—both Cleveland and wherever the fuck they were now (Indianapolis? Minneapolis?) had not been shows for the record books—and composed The Text That Could Not Be Sent before doing anything else, including changing out of his sweaty stage clothes.

  Fine. Shower. Maybe the hot water would clear his head.

  He stripped and sighed. The problem was not the text. The problem was—

  Hunter’s custom ringtone rang through the silent, dark hotel room. Jesse pivoted and tripped over his guitar as he lunged for the phone on the nightstand.

  “Fuck!” he shouted as his toe caught on the corner of the metal bedframe. Pain lanced through him. He ignored it. All that mattered was he get to the phone.

  If Jesse had thought his hands were shaking like a leaf before, now his petal-fragile fingers were being battered by a hurricane.

  Avery wants to come to your Buffalo show.

  That was it?

  But what the fuck did he expect? He was the jerk who’d left the breezy note. He was the asshole seemingly bent on glossing over everything that had happened between them. And now he was gonna get pouty when he was getting what he wanted?

  Of course. I’d love to have her. Is she up to it?

  Yes. We had her in for her one-year-postsurgery checkup, and her cardiologist is really pleased with how she’s doing.

  Jesse pumped his fist like he’d just gotten a Grammy nomination. Awesome. I’ll have Amber get in touch with her tomorrow to work out details. Tell her—and I’ll tell Amber—that if she can be here early enough for the sound check, we’d love to have her at that too.

  There was no immediate reply.

  Fuck. It was up to him. He’d signaled the way things were going to be with that stupid note, and Hunter had taken the cue. If Jesse wanted . . . something else, if he wanted his friend back even, it was up to him.

  The fingers-as-leaves-in-a-storm metaphor was still apt as he painstakingly typed the next text. Will you come too?

  Do you want me to?

  Yes.

  The floaty bubble things that indicated Hunter was typing a reply appeared. Then they disappeared. Then reappeared.

  Jesus Christ. He felt like he was in a game show where he had chosen curtain one over curtain two, and he was waiting to see what his future would be. Only instead of nothing versus a new car, it was, nothing versus . . . everything.

  Fuck that shit. He wasn’t waiting for the bubbles. He banged out a reply, his hands steady this time. Look, I know we need to talk. I know I made everything weird. Come to the show. We’ll talk. The next day is an off day. I was going to head back to Toronto, but we can discover the deindustrialized wonders of Buffalo instead, maybe?

  He had no fucking idea what he was going to say during this “talk,” but he’d figure that out. Or, more likely, he wouldn’t, and he’d make a hash of things again. Regardless, he needed Hunter with him. He knew that now with certainty. Something about having him right on the other end of the phone crystalized how much he missed Hunter, regardless of what had happened between them in the past or would happen between them in the future.

  There was no answer to his text, though.

  “Damn it!” He pounded the mattress.

  All right, then. One more try. I miss you.

  It was the unvarnished truth.

  After that, the answer came right away. OK.

  His second fist-pumping victory in the space of five minutes.

  How was the show tonight?

  Relief surged through him. He had Hunter back. In some format, anyway. It was shit.

  As he typed, he slumped back against the headboard, limp with relief and . . . Noticed his toe was bleeding like crazy? What the hell?

  Why was it shit? What happened?

  Damned if he was going to leave Hunter hanging with no reply, no matter if he was bleeding out the Red Sea here.

  Hang on a sec. I’m bleeding. BRB.

  He got up and hobbled to the bathroom for towels.

  The sound of Hunter’s ringtone echoed through the room. Several times.

  “Damn it!” Grabbing a couple of towels, he hopped back to the bed and picked up the phone.

  There was a string of texts.

  What?

  Like actually bleeding?

  What happened?

  And now there was an incoming FaceTime.

  The mini medical emergency was a blessing, really, because he didn’t have time to freak the fuck out before he picked up.

  “What happened? Are you okay?”

  And there was Hunter, concern unfurling across his beautiful face. Jesse couldn’t stop looking at the phone. Hunter was wearing a tank top and he was in Jesse’s living room, but he was standing, as if the news of Jesse’s injury had brought him to his feet.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I stubbed my toe on the bed frame a bit ago, and I didn’t notice I’d actually cut it.”

  Because I was too busy falling over myself to get to the phone. To get to you.

  “It’s actuall
y pretty impressive looking in here,” he said, surveying the previously white sheets on which he’d unknowingly been resting his bleeding foot. “Very Bates Motel. It’s good. I haven’t destroyed a hotel room on this tour yet. I’m falling down on the job. Matty’s going to be on my case for not being ‘bad’ enough to maintain my rep.”

  “Let me see your toe.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “Let me see it.” Hunter scowled and a certain pissy bossiness had crept into his tone.

  “I’m not Billy. I don’t need a video exam.”

  “Show me your goddamned toe, Jesse.”

  “Okay, sheesh. Hang on.” He set the phone down temporarily, hoisted his leg onto the bed and gingerly removed the towels he’d been using to staunch the blood. There was a deep cut there, but it was clean, and it seemed to be done bleeding. He turned on the bedside lamp, aimed the phone at his foot, and reversed the camera.

  “You’re going to need a stitch or two in that.”

  Jesse made a dismissive noise. He didn’t have time for stitches.

  “Turn me around,” Hunter said, still with the bossy voice. “Look at me.”

  Jesse reversed the phone and got himself situated against the headboard, belatedly realizing he was still naked—he’d come bolting out of the shower when Hunter had originally texted, and he hadn’t yet gotten dressed. He pulled the covers up over himself.

  Hunter cleared his throat. “The bed frame was metal?”

  “Yup.”

  “When was your last tetanus shot?”

  Hunter was in efficient-doctor mode. It was pretty cute. “I have no idea.”

  “Ask for a booster when you get your stitches.”

  Jesse didn’t say anything, but Hunter must have—correctly—interpreted his silence as lack of enthusiasm for this plan. It was just that he hated doing stuff like finding a doctor on the road. It fucked with their finely honed routine.

  “Listen to me,” Hunter said, slipping into full-on Lecturing Doctor mode. “That’s a deep cut. It could get infected. And if you don’t get it stitched, it will heal funny, and then you’ll have an ugly toe. Do you want an ugly toe?”

  Jesse chuckled. “Point taken, Doc. I’ll have Amber take me tomorrow.”