“How do you figure?” Jack asked.
“Nick’s dead. He didn’t give a shit about you, even when he was supposed to be your best friend.”
Jack blew out a deep breath.
“Dave’s right,” Gabe said quietly.
“Do you know his cousin had no clue about us? He told me I should have outed myself to Nick in private, given him time to come to terms with the fact I was gay.”
“Did you tell him what really happened?” asked Gabe.
“No.”
“Suppose you come clean.” Dave smirked. “No pun intended. What’s the worst that could happen if you stop keeping Nick Foasberg’s secrets?”
“End of the world as we know it.” Jack shrugged. “And I’d feel fine.”
“I’m serious. Maybe you should set the record straight.”
“And how am I supposed to tell a dead man’s secrets? Why would I come clean now except as some sort of sick revenge? I’ll look like an asshole.”
Gabe rolled his eyes. “Why worry? You look like an asshole anyway.”
“Ha-ha.” Jack listened as the jazz combo played something he vaguely recognized. Brubeck, maybe. The waitress came by again, but he cashed out. He’d had plenty to drink. Way more than enough. They sat in silence for a while, and it was good.
Dave watched the musicians, and Jack watched Dave.
Being with Dave—drinking, watching a game, or listening to music—was nice. As Dave relaxed, he shifted down so their shoulders pressed together. The heat of Dave’s skin warmed Jack’s even through the fabric of his suit. It was almost pleasant, sitting there like that.
Almost enough to make him forget he’d had tea with Dave’s mother. Better not to make any decisions about that on a snootful of alcohol.
“Time for me to go. If I don’t, I’ll fall asleep right here.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Dave asked. “We’d wake you before last call.”
“I don’t want you hauling my ass out of here over your shoulder.” Jack motioned for Dave to move so he could get out of the booth. Dave offered to help, but Jack shrugged him off. He managed to rise awkwardly, bracing himself on the booth’s edge while he got his cane and gripped the handhold. People who can’t walk right when they’re sober have no business drinking.
Gabe stood to leave. “I’ve gotta hit the head first.”
“I can run Jack home,” Dave offered. “It’s no trouble.”
“I’m beat. I’m heading out anyway.”
They both looked at Jack.
“I’m on Gabe’s way. He can take me tonight.” Jack read the disappointment in Dave’s eyes. “Maybe some other time.”
Dave gave him a brief nod. “Sure.”
Jack let Dave walk away. While he waited for Gabe outside the bathroom, he wondered if he’d done the right thing. Maybe he’d be better off with company than alone.
Jack followed Gabe to his SUV in silence.
When they edged away from the curb, Gabe asked, “Will Skippy bring you to get your car tomorrow?”
“Skippy’s in Vegas. But I’ll get a ride from someone.”
“It’s none of my business…” Gabe hesitated like he had something to get off his chest and wasn’t sure the best way to go about it. “It seems to me like you’ve got something going on with Dave.”
“You’re right. It’s none of your business.”
“You gotta stop looking for love in the closet, coz.” Gabe’s voice was even but chiding.
Jack closed his eyes, but he smiled. As if.
He could have let Dave take him home, and they’d have probably broken the land speed record up the stairs to bed. But he’d met Dave’s mother. He’d sipped tea from her little china cups.
Whatever had happened with Dave—sport-fucking or friends with benefits or whatever they called what they’d had with each other—he wasn’t sure he could do it after the way Dave’s mother patted his hand and said, “It was a pleasure meeting you.”
Whatever he and Dave were, it wasn’t that.
After a while, Gabe asked, “If we take Nick’s scene, who’re you going to send out?”
“I don’t know yet. The cousin seemed pretty sure he didn’t need us.”
“How’s he doing?”
“He’s processing.” Jack knew Gabe expected more than that. Gabe could go on for hours about how people felt about shit. “Angry. I gave him the SOS card.”
“This is some fucked-up shit, Jack. I’ll be happy if he doesn’t call.”
“Maybe he’ll change his mind.”
Gabe turned down the street that led to Jack’s neighborhood. It was a study in contrasts: shotgun houses that were either pristinely kept—little smurf cottages—or so run-down they barely looked like they’d last through a strong wind.
A lot of the houses were rentals now, full of teens who didn’t want to live on campus at the local university, or—in the worst of cases—squalid flophouses for addicts who lived a hairbreadth from homelessness.
Jack’s place was too close to the train tracks. Too far from the brand-name supermarket.
Jack had lived in the house he was raised in ever since his parents had taken off in an RV. He’d purchased the place from them, and his monthly payments along with social security made their golden years possible.
Jack’s neighborhood wasn’t particularly safe, but Jack had never had trouble there, except in high school when he’d fallen afoul of Nick and his fag-bashing posse.
When Gabe pulled up to the curb, Jack grabbed the latch to get out. Gabe caught his arm. “I have a joke.”
“Tell it.”
“What do you get when you combine a guy who has no idea how good he is, a guy who has no idea what’s good for him, and a blood-soaked crime scene?”
Nothing’s as irritating as family. “I don’t know. What?”
Gabe slanted a dark look at Jack before he let go. “I guess we’re going to find out.”
Chapter 6
The phone rang at 3:00 a.m.
Jack fumbled for it, drunkenly knocking everything else on his nightstand to the floor before he finally got hold of it.
“Wait,” he ordered, taking the time to right a bottle of water before he sat up and put the phone to his ear. “What?”
“Hello?” A vaguely familiar voice.
Jack had to swallow before he could speak. “Jack Masterson. Who’s this?”
“It’s Ryan Halloran.”
Ryan Halloran… Not a Foasberg, then. Why the hell are you calling me at 3:00 a.m.?
“Hello.” Jack waited.
“I’m sorry to call so late.”
“It’s not late,” Jack argued. “It’s early.”
“Right. I couldn’t sleep.” An audible sigh. “I couldn’t even stay drunk. I went through a whole bottle of whiskey, and I can’t seem to…let things go.”
“I’m sorry.” Jack’s tongue was shaggier than his bathroom rug. He took a few swallows of water before speaking again. “Look, if you want to talk, I can do that.”
“I guess I do, or I wouldn’t have called.”
“Okay. What do you want to talk about?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, if you did know, what would it be?”
Light laughter. Maybe Ryan wasn’t too drunk for a joke. “I have a…a proposition for you.”
“Yeah?” Jack was still sleepy enough to picture Ryan’s all too Nick-like body poised naked over him. Sweat dripping from his brow while he—
“I’m willing to let your company take the job if you let me work alongside you.”
Earsplitting feedback destroyed the cheesy porn sound track in Jack’s inebriated fantasy.
Despite the fact Jack never worked in the field anymore, despite the fact he would normally send a two-man team out to clean that scene, Jack had planned on doing the job alone.
And he only just now realized that fact.
“That’s not what I had in mind.”
“I’m sure it’s not,” Ryan said wr
yly.
“A lot of people believe they can do this type of work, but when they get right down to it, they can’t. I know you’re a doctor—”
“I’m actually a nurse.”
“A nurse?” How do you afford that house? “Okay. Well, you’re probably used to cleaning up blood and things of that nature, but it’s still different when it’s someone you know.”
“Which is why you’re so anxious to do the job.”
“I’m not anxious. But a team from Grime can get in there and erase what happened for you while you spend your time—”
“You weren’t going to send a team. You were planning to do the cleaning yourself.”
“I— What makes you say that?” How did he know?
“Is it true?”
Jack hesitated. “Yes.”
“We both want the same thing, even if it’s for different reasons.”
“Do we? What is it you think I want?”
“I think you want closure.” A long pause. “What do you think I want?”
“I…” Jack wasn’t sure he should say it. “I’m not sure what you want.”
“Come on.” Now the voice was liquid sex. “It’s easy to be honest in the dark, Jack.”
God, isn’t that the truth. “I think you want to punish yourself.”
“What makes you think—” Fumbling noises. The sound of ice in a glass. Maybe a swallow or two and then a sigh. “Why would I want that?”
“So you could say you’d done everything you thought you should do?”
“Fuck you.” Ryan cursed, then huffed out a laugh. “You’re probably right.”
Jack relaxed fractionally. “I know I’m right.”
“Because you have a lot of experience with the bereaved?”
“Not at all.” Jack took another sip of his water. He wished it were cold. He wished it were rum. “For obvious reasons, I’m the behind-the-scenes guy. Gabe is the face of the business. He’s the client whisperer. Eddie does human resources, such as they are. We have a couple teams of cleaners. We’re pretty small-time, but we stay busy.”
“Why for obvious reasons?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said for obvious reasons, you’re the behind-the-scenes guy. I guess it’s not so obvious to me.”
Jack made himself more comfortable against his headboard. “It’s hard for me to navigate some of the scenes. When we get hoarders, it’s impossible.”
“You were injured in the Freeway Complex Fire, right?”
“Yeah.” Jack took a deep breath. “That was me. I fell through a roof.”
“That was some pretty dramatic shit.”
“Not on my part. I was unconscious for most of it.”
“I’m looking at the news article right now. It says here you had multiple fractures of the pelvis and legs. Some second-degree burns. Knee-replacement surgery. Both knees?”
Thinking back on all that made Jack’s throat close up tight. “Just the left knee.”
“It says three other firefighters were injured. Burns, major head trauma, awful stuff. Everyone survived, though?”
“You Googled me?”
“I’m using Nick’s laptop. He had all the related articles bookmarked.”
Jack’s heart lurched erratically. “He did?”
A thump on Jack’s bed made him jump out of his skin until he realized he’d left the bedroom door open for Skippy’s cat. She positioned herself on his lap and kneaded his thigh muscles to tenderize him before making herself at home.
Before he knew it, he was stroking her weirdly blue fur.
Time passed before Ryan spoke again, but it was comfortable. Like sitting with a friend, watching a game. Jack didn’t feel required to say anything, but it was nice knowing someone was out there listening. Ryan must have felt the same way, because he didn’t seem in any hurry to end the call.
“I don’t think Nick ever stopped being your friend.”
“Right.” Jack paused midstroke to feel Tasha’s low purr against his fingers. “I didn’t stop being his.”
“Didn’t you?”
“I guess that depends on your definition of friendship.” I kept his secrets. “You stuck by him.”
“Not really. He used to come to AA meetings at the hospital annex, and I saw him there. He was pretty down. I thought I could help.”
“Did you?” Jack asked. “Help, I mean?”
“No, I didn’t. I probably only prolonged things by letting him move in with me.”
“You’re being a little hard on yourself.”
“I’d been down that road before. In the end, nothing you do matters. You can’t will someone to live if fate has other plans.”
“But you didn’t exactly cause his death either.”
“No. But maybe if I’d told someone—his wife or his mother—how desperate things had gotten…”
“You don’t think they knew?”
Ryan exhaled harshly. “He was such a phony with the rest of the family. He was so glib, and—”
“We’re talking about a drug addict here. No one puts up that good a facade. Don’t you think he stole from them too? They knew.”
“They knew he had problems. We…we all knew.” Soft sobbing accompanied the sounds of Ryan’s breathing. “But not how bad they were. God, why didn’t I tell someone who could help? Why did I think I could help when no matter what I do, it’s never enough.”
“Whoa. Time-out. Don’t do this to yourself.” Jack glanced at the clock again: 3:15. “Look, you’re not at the house alone, are you?”
“No. Someone’s here, and I guess my outburst just woke him up. Wait a minute.”
“Okay.” A few seconds passed. Jack heard another male voice. The words weren’t clear, but the tone was…coaxing.
Ryan came back on the line. “I have to go.”
“Wait, were you serious about doing the job together? Is that what you want to do?”
“Do you?”
“Yes.” Jack closed his eyes. “I can be at your place with my equipment by nine.”
An audible sigh. “Make it ten. I haven’t gotten any sleep.”
“All right. Ten.” Jack ended the call.
He waited a few minutes to see if he was likely to fall asleep again. When sleep seemed out of the question, he rose from his bed and headed for the kitchen to put on some coffee. The cat followed him, threading her lithe body between his leg and his cane to get his attention. Did she sense his turmoil?
“Might as well get some work done.” Jack told himself he wasn’t talking to Skippy’s cat.
He. Was. Not. Talking. To. A. Cat.
“Got to make sure I have everything we’ll need on the van, including an extra Tyvek suit and boots big enough for Ryan.”
He tapped his fingers on the counter while he waited for the coffee to brew.
When it was done, he took a hot, black mugful to the front window and looked out on the empty street while he waited for it to cool enough for him to drink.
A cop car crawled by. Otherwise he could see nothing but the sulfur-yellow glow of streetlights.
Tasha twined around his feet and attacked the bottom of his sleep pants. He had to grab the waistband to keep her from pulling them down.
“Stop.” She used her paws like hands to trap his foot and then rubbed her face along his toes. “No. Would you stop?”
He dragged the cat along with him as he sought out a small flashlight he kept in one of the entertainment center drawers. Once he focused the beam of light onto the hardwood floor, she pounced on it, stalking and chasing it around for several long minutes. He amused himself by making spiral patterns while he sipped his coffee.
When he turned the light off, then on again, the cat went apeshit.
“This isn’t playing,” Jack told her. “I’m just occupying your time so I can make up my mind in peace.”
He couldn’t get Nick’s sad little room out of his mind. For all Jack couldn’t lay claim to any sort of artistic sensibili
ty, his parents’ old furniture had the lived-in look of any thrift-store-and-spool-table decor. He still had pictures of family on the walls. He kept boxes of get-well cards from people who’d seen him through some of the worst months of his life.
There was even a row of stuffed animals on the mantel, monkeys with messages like “Hang In There” and lions that featured sayings about pride. Dumb stuff, but when he looked at it, he knew people cared about him. Family and friends were there in the background, waiting like a safety net.
What did Nick have to cling to in those last days? A cousin he’d disappointed like he’d disappointed so many people before. A crucifix from a church that made him feel guilty. Suits he was never going to wear, a bed he couldn’t share.
Christ.
In Jack’s mind, he replayed the hours he and Nick had spent in his old bedroom upstairs during the months leading up to graduation. Spring sunshine on the south-facing window made his room so hot their naked bodies dripped with sweat as they rolled and writhed against each other. Winter nights they’d lain there shivering, huddled together for warmth, whispering secrets and lies.
Sacred time spent discovering each other’s bodies.
Their affair began in freshman year. They’d satisfied themselves with frottage and blowjobs, but Nick always had to push things further. One day he’d penetrated Jack stupidly with no preparation, and Jack had cried from pain and anger and something he couldn’t name. Fear of the unknown. Loss of the fantasy.
Something that made him ask himself, Is this all there is?
Nick made promises every time, and Jack believed them. Jack always believed Nick, no matter how much he put Jack off, no matter how many excuses he came up with for hiding what they were.
Jack was in love. Why wouldn’t he believe?
Nick said he felt the same way, but the time wasn’t right to tell the world. He said it might be a kick to shock people, but coming out had to wait until later—until they were ready to move on anyway in case the world wasn’t ready for them.
He’d said maybe when they were seniors, they could go to prom together. He’d promised they’d apply to the same colleges, room together, come out as a couple, and be open about things with their families. What reason had he given Jack to doubt him?
Of course now, Jack understood. A man says anything he has to in order to get off, and as little as possible after.
Jack: Grime and Punishment: The Brothers Grime, book 1 Page 4