by Tanya Chris
“Come over here and eat,” he told Tanner.
“Can’t you just …?” The table looked too far away and staying that upright seemed impossible. The exhilaration of being clean had already faded to exhaustion and now the nausea was returning too.
“Fine.” Joe picked up the dishes and brought them over and plunked them down on the arm of his chair roughly enough that soup threatened to slop over the edge. “Is there anything else I can get for you two?”
“You do work here,” Pyotr pointed out.
“None of this is in my job description.”
“I know.” Pyotr went over to Joe and wrapped the towel he’d been drying himself off with around Joe’s neck and pulled him in for a kiss.
He watched them for a moment, curious and almost turned on, then looked down at the food Joe had left. There was no way he was eating all of that. Soup—chicken noodle—and a sandwich. Tuna fish? Did Joe really think he could eat tuna fish?
“Try it,” Joe admonished. “Eat what you can and we’ll finish the rest for you. And yes, I’m getting yours,” he told Pyotr.
Pyotr got dressed while he managed to spoon a few mouthfuls of soup into his mouth. He didn’t even try the sandwich. There was no way. Chewing might kill him, and tuna? No. He looked up to find Pyotr lurking over him and picked up the sandwich and held it out to him.
“Eat the soup then,” Pyotr said, but he took the sandwich over to the table.
Pyotr was wearing his gun again, he saw. It sat in a holster against the small of his back, reminding him that there was a Russian spy looking for him, which didn’t make it any easier to swallow. He probably should’ve been more worried about guns when he’d made arrangements to meet a foreign spy in the first place. Of course a KGB agent would be carrying a gun, just like Pyotr was. But he hadn’t given a damn then.
It wasn’t that he’d had a death wish exactly, but death had seemed like the inevitable result of where he was heading, the only question being when and how, and death by being shot was probably easier than death by shooting up. And a lot quicker too.
Now he thought maybe he’d like to live after all, though when he thought of everything that came after this, he was overcome with an exhaustion that went deeper than his body. Getting clean was only the first step. There was staying clean, which he’d failed at before, and then there was doing something about all the trouble he’d gotten himself into.
Even if Pyotr could somehow make the CIA forget that he’d been willing to sell classified plans to the Russians, his employer wasn’t likely to forget it. He’d been one sick day away from being fired anyway. This would definitely do it. And he didn’t know whether his parents would take him back or not. He’d been lying to them for so long that even if he told them the truth now, they might never trust him again. He didn’t even trust himself.
He ate as much of the soup as he could. He really did. Some part of him realized that calories might give him strength, but his stomach said anything he ate would just be that much more to throw up. His stomach was on a closet-cleaning binge. Everything had to go.
When he’d choked down a little more than half the bowl, skipping the noodles and concentrating on the broth because it slid down easier, he bailed from the chair, diving back into the nest of blankets on the mattress on the floor, ditching the towel as he crawled between them. Everyone there had seen him naked already, and clothes hurt. The seams pressed and scratched and made his skin crawl.
Over at the table, Joe and Pyotr sat across from each other with their bowls and plates. There was a bottle of vodka in front of Pyotr, and Joe had his eyes on it. Tanner didn’t think addicts were supposed to be drinking, but he wasn’t about to tattle. The amaretto had helped get him to sleep the other night.
“Can I have a drink?” He wasn’t sure amaretto would stay down, but a few hours of not being in his body sounded good. “I mean a drink drink,” he clarified when Joe came over with that same stupid glass of water he’d been forcing on him all day.
“What, alcohol? No.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re in the middle of detox.”
“Yeah, and it’ll help. It helped last night.”
“And how did you feel this morning? Look, I wasn’t expecting you to detox today or I wouldn’t have given you anything last night. The only thing worse than detox is detox plus a hangover. Trust me.”
It wasn’t that he didn’t believe Joe. He’d definitely felt worse that morning than he’d ever felt in his life. It was just that an escape, however temporary, sounded like it’d be worth some later pain.
“You were drinking,” he accused Joe.
“Hey, yeah,” Pyotr said. He stood up from the table and came over to them. “I thought addicts weren’t supposed to drink.”
“Haven’t had a drink in six years,” Joe said. “One wasn’t going to kill me.”
Tanner frowned. That wasn’t what they’d told him at Narcotics Anonymous when he’d tried to get clean before.
“I had stuff to accomplish last night,” Joe added. “It did the trick.”
“And the whiskey for breakfast this morning?”
“You’re one to talk. I wasn’t drinking alone.”
Pyotr went over to the table and picked up the bottle of vodka and screwed the cap back on it. He brought it over to the bar and slammed it down.
“No one’s drinking anymore,” he said. “Fuck. You two. Do you not get that these are your lives at stake? You could’ve died using, Joe. You’re really willing to risk going back there? It’s a miracle you’re not pos. IV drug use, prostitution.”
“Who says I’m not pos?” Joe asked.
“Oh my God, you’re positive?” That freaked him out. “Shit. You shared needles?”
“When I had to, I did. You never shared a needle?”
He shook his head wildly, because fuck no. That was the main thing they told you never to do. But even so, he knew the possibility wasn’t impossible. He hadn’t gone that far in his addiction yet, but that was only yet.
“You don’t think your HIV status is something you should’ve shared before we got intimate?” Pyotr asked. He had his hands in fists as he advanced on Joe, but Joe didn’t back up.
“Nope. I’m on anti-virals, get my loads checked every few months, and I’m undetectable. We used condoms. That covers it.”
“It doesn’t cover it. I’ve got a right to know who I’m fucking around with.”
“Then maybe you should ask, because you’ve fucked around with two addicts in the last two days. You think I’m the risk because I know I’m positive? He’s the risk.” Joe pointed at him. “He’s an untested IV drug user.”
“I told you I never shared needles,” he protested.
“Doesn’t make you negative. Unless you’ve been tested, it makes you an unknown.”
He shrugged. It was true he hadn’t been tested in a long time. He was an IV drug user. He wasn’t about to drop by a clinic.
“And what about you, Pyotr?” Joe asked, whirling on him. “When was the last time you were tested?”
“I don’t need to be tested. I’m the only one in this room not sticking needles in my veins.”
“Don’t know if it was the needle anyway,” Joe said. “Could’ve gotten it from a john, could’ve gotten it after.”
“After?”
“After I got clean I did a lot of fucking around. It was the only way I had left to get high.”
Tanner felt himself nodding. The drug had leeched out most of his interest in sex, but without the drug? He’d be down for a good endorphin high any day and every day. Getting back his sex drive was one of the positives of getting clean. For sure he’d be taking advantage of it.
He’d known Joe had personal experience with addiction, but this other information—the prostitution, his HIV status—that was unexpected. He wasn’t going to judge Joe for any of it. They were experiences that had made Joe the man he was, but it sure looked like Pyotr was judging him, even th
ough he wasn’t exactly saying anything. He’d gone back to the table and was sitting there with his head in his hands while Joe hovered over him.
“I’m guessing you do a fair amount of fucking around too, Pyotr, considering it didn’t take much convincing to get you in bed with either of us.”
“I’m not positive,” Pyotr mumbled through his hands.
“You’re not tested, which is different from not being positive. I’m the safest one in this room. I know exactly what my status is and I’m treating it, taking proper precautions for it. You two are the ones gambling with people’s lives.”
“Hey,” Tanner said softly. “I didn’t say anything, so leave me out of it.”
He hated that they were fighting. The noise felt like a sledgehammer to his skull, not just because he was dope sick and hurting, but because they were kind of a team, the three of them. He wanted everyone playing on the same side.
“Did you know he was positive when you let him fuck you?” Pyotr asked him. “Don’t you think you should’ve known that?”
He wanted to bury his head under the blankets, to shut them out. He didn’t care if Joe was positive, and it wasn’t because he might have come here with a death wish. He knew that someone with an undetectable viral load carried no risk. His only real boyfriend, back when he’d still been happy and healthy and able to make sane choices, had been positive. Brett had talked him through the whole thing, shown him the statistics.
“Undetectable means he’s not infectious,” he told Pyotr. His stomach was so queasy that even talking felt like movement.
“I know that.”
He couldn’t tell if Pyotr really knew it or if he just didn’t want to admit to being ignorant. He’d lost all sense of up or down. He’d been feeling better before he ate that soup, before everyone started yelling, but now the soup came up in a sudden rush.
He rolled, hunching, not enough time to do anything except get his mouth over the floor instead of the bedding, but Joe was there like he’d been expecting it. He got the basin in place just before the bile released in a chicken-flavored torrent.
As he retched and retched, bringing up more than he’d swear he’d put down, Joe rubbed soft circles onto his back and glared at Pyotr until Pyotr slunk away and left Joe to clean him up and cuddle him back to sleep.
Chapter 13
Pyotr
Pyotr sat at the table, the lantern next to him barely illuminating Tanner’s quiet body on the mattress near the stove. Joe was in the kitchen cleaning up after dinner. Now and then the beam from his headlamp flashed through the narrow window set in the swinging door. He’d been cleaning a long time. Given that dinner had been soup and sandwiches—again—how much could there be to clean up?
He twisted the shot glass in front of him back and forth. It was empty, had been empty since he’d learned about Joe. He didn’t have a drinking problem. He’d happily go without a drink if it would help Joe and Tanner.
He could really use one though, and if Joe was going to barricade himself in the kitchen, he wouldn’t know if Pyotr knocked back a shot or two. Which made him wonder if he actually did have a drinking problem.
It was just that it had been a lot to take in. He was still reeling from everything he’d heard, and the fact that neither of his lovers were exactly speaking to him didn’t make it easier.
Joe pushed out through the swinging door. He looked Pyotr straight in the face. The sudden brightness of his headlamp beam right between his eyes made him flinch.
“Sorry.” Joe tilted the headlamp until it aimed at the floor, then walked past the table without another word. He crouched down and touched his hand to Tanner’s skin then, seeming satisfied, he rose and went over to his bedroom and disappeared through the door.
OK. Enough was enough. Obviously he was going to have to force a reconciliation. Joe hadn’t shut the door to his room, but even if he had, he would’ve barged right through it. He wasn’t letting Joe slide away so easily.
Joe stood at the window, his back to the room. He’d turned his headlamp off and Pyotr hadn’t brought the lantern in with him, but the moon was bright enough to see by in a vague, gentle way.
“I’m sorry.” He waited for Joe to turn around and acknowledge him but when Joe didn’t, he plowed ahead anyway. “I was scared and I did the macho tough guy act by getting angry.”
“Nothing to be scared of. You’re fine.”
“I was scared for Tanner—he’s got an impaired immune system and no ability to make rational decisions—and scared for you too. Prostitution, addiction, HIV—it’s just a lot to take in, Joe. I’d been worrying about how much danger Tanner was in and I had no idea what was going on with you.”
“Look,” Joe said, his back still to Pyotr. “I appreciated you railing me last night. I wanted to be fucked and you did a great job of it. And I’m glad you’re here to look out for whatever bad guys may be coming for Tanner, but Tanner and I aren’t actually yours to protect.”
He kind of wanted them to be though.
He crossed the room and wrapped his arms around Joe from behind. Joe let him do it, but his body remained rigid and his focus remained outside the window.
“I know you’re grown people,” he said. “You’ve made some mistakes, but that doesn’t mean you can’t take care of yourselves. It’s just, these last couple of days, they’re the closest I’ve been to anyone since leaving Russia. Maybe it’s forced intimacy, maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but I feel like it does. It feels good to connect. It feels good to have someone to take care of, someone I want to do right by.”
Joe barked out a disbelieving laugh. “Come on, you’re a secret agent, watching over the free world.”
“Nah, it’s not like that. They don’t send me into burning buildings to rescue babies. Mostly it’s just missions like this one. Acquire a target or neutralize a threat, then get myself out. What happens to anyone else doesn’t matter. That’s not how my work gets graded.”
“So what you’re doing for Tanner is special.”
“Special, yeah. That’s a good word for it. What I feel for him is special, and for you too. See, there’s no room for intimacy when you’re a double agent. It’s bad enough for anyone who’s undercover, but it’s worse when you’re a double agent. Everyone I talk to, I’m lying to. And I assume they’re lying back at me. Like my handler—supposedly she’s CIA, right? But what if she’s a double agent too? I’m in a bubble, and it’s lonely in here.”
“You couldn’t have one person you told? You told me and Tanner quick enough.”
He smiled into the back of Joe’s neck. Yeah, he’d told Joe and Tanner quick enough, and he shouldn’t have, but he loved that he had. It was such a relief to admit to who he was and know that this mission—save Tanner—was definitely worth accomplishing.
“Why didn’t you ever connect with someone before?” Joe asked.
The smile dropped from his face. “Because I’m not supposed to, obviously, and what would be the point? I’ll look after Tanner while he’s recovering, and hopefully that’ll be helpful to him, but no healthy person is going to want to be in a long term relationship with someone who can’t ever say where he’s going or what he’s doing, who’s never home, who might be arrested for treason by either government at any moment. And why start something with someone when it won’t last anyway?”
“I know that feel.” Joe slumped back against him, finally giving in to his embrace. “Who wants to be in a long term relationship with someone who’s positive either? Guess that’s why I don’t share my status. It’s not worth getting into if they’re not going to stick around and once they know, they’re not going to stick around.”
“Don’t say that. You’re worth dealing with your status. If your partner got on PrEP, you could even ditch the condoms. Between PrEP and monitoring your viral load, you’d be doubly safe.”
“You say that, but look how you reacted.”
“Like I said, surprise and concern. I still think you should’ve
told me beforehand. There’s laws, you know.”
“Yeah, fucking discriminatory, unfair, unsafe, hypocritical, homophobic laws.”
“OK, OK.” He stepped back, giving Joe some space. “I’m not saying I disagree with that. I just don’t want to see you thrown in jail if someone gets a bee in their bonnet when they find out you didn’t tell them ahead of time. I wasn’t planning on reporting you myself.”
“When you meet people as you’re going about your spying duties, do you tell them you’re gay?”
“Of course not.”
“Because it’s none of their business, right? They’d just judge you for it, make assumptions about you without knowing you.”
“OK.”
“OK?”
“I get the parallel. I agree with your reasoning. Your status isn’t my business. It’s not like I don’t have secrets of my own which I never tell people. Not even the people I sleep with.”
Joe laughed. “We’re all about spilling secrets this week apparently. The snow falls down and the covers come off.” He gestured out the window where the snow lay like a heavy blanket.
It was pretty like this, if you didn’t have to walk in it, and he wished more of it would fall, that they could stay here, the three of them, trapped but safe and never have to worry about Russian spies or HIV disclosure laws or the possibility that Tanner could get his hands on more heroin.
“What did you do with that stuff Tanner gave you earlier?”
“Why, you need it for evidence?”
He sighed. He’d come in here to make peace. “I just wanted to make sure it wasn’t anywhere he could find it.”
“Don’t worry. I didn’t keep it hanging around. Tanner needs to know it’s gone. If he thinks it’s here somewhere, it’ll haunt him.”
“Was it haunting you?”
“I couldn’t stand knowing it was there,” Joe admitted. “I don’t know why, exactly. It’s not like I couldn’t have gotten some at any point, like the only reason I stayed clean was because it wasn’t there, but I saw it—saw his stash—and it triggered something. Knowing where it was, how easy it would be to take it. Maybe not even inject it, you know, just sniff a little or skin pop. I itched for it.”