Redesigning Landry Bishop

by Kim Fielding

  “Look,” she said. “This isn’t the best time for this, but I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

  Uh-oh. “It can wait until you return.”

  “No, I want you thinking about this. Now, don’t tell a soul, okay? Nobody knows. But I’m considering retiring.”

  “Oh.” That wasn’t what he’d expected her to say. “But you’re so young!”

  “Thank you, darling. But I’m nowhere near as young as I used to be. And the show… well, I love it. I love doing it. But it’s exhausting. As I’m sure you’ve noticed. I’d like to spend more time with my family and explore some other interests. And I’d like to get the hell out of LA. I’m considering a charming villa in Napa. It has vineyards.”

  Landry ignored Jordan’s gesture to finish the call. “That sounds great, but we’ll miss you.”

  “What I want you to consider, darling, is taking over permanently. It’s time for a younger, fresher voice anyway, and I know the Landry Show would be a big hit.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Just think about it. Tonight’s not good anyway. Too post-traumatic. Mull it over and we’ll talk terms when I get back.”

  Feeling slightly numb, Landry heard himself agree and thank her. Then they exchanged goodbyes and he set the phone aside.

  Jordan gazed at him, eyes big but mouth turned down slightly at the corners. “That’s an amazing opportunity, isn’t it?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “National audience. Tons of money. Endorsement deals out the wing-wang. Fancy parties with A-list movers and shakers. Yachts? Private jets?”

  “I… I believe you’re overstating matters.”

  “But still.”

  “But still.” Landry sighed. “I dreamed of this when I was a kid. Being famous, I mean. I even knew what my celebrity nickname would be: Mr. Martha.”

  Jordan set a hand on Landry’s thigh. “As in Martha Stewart?”

  “I was going to have two lines of housewares. Bishop would be for upscale department stores like Neiman Marcus.” Of course at that point in his life, he hadn’t been within eight hundred miles of a Neiman Marcus. “And the other line would be called Landry, and they’d sell it at Walmart and Svoboda Ranch and Home, so that every couch in Peril would sport a Landry throw blanket and every kitchen would have a Landry toaster.”

  “You could do that, right? If you took over Suzee’s show?”

  “Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. I…. Let’s watch TV, okay?”

  Jordan snuggled close and handed him the remote. But before Landry could click anything, Jordan snatched it back. “Do you want advice?”

  “I don’t know.” Landry tipped his head back and shut his eyes. “I don’t think I know anything anymore. If I ever did. Steve used to… he’d guide me.”

  “It’s great that you had someone to do that for you. Maybe if I’d had a guide, I wouldn’t have floated so aimlessly through my twenties.”

  Landry spent a few minutes considering what would have happened if he hadn’t met Steve. No mansion with a Jag in the garage. No talk shows. No trips to New York to meet with people in the fashion world and go on TV. No book deals? He wasn’t sure about that part. He’d still have his blog, though. He’d be helping people with their wardrobe and with entertaining. Maybe he’d be perfectly happy. Although he wouldn’t have a PA, and that meant no Jordan.

  “I think floating is perfectly acceptable in one’s twenties. It’s a period when many people are attempting to find their identity and place in the world.” He sighed, aware he was channeling Lord Thistlebottom again. “Better than still being uncertain of those things in one’s midthirties.”

  “Well, I think self-image is always open to alteration, at every age.” Jordan was already scrunched up close, but now he wrapped an arm around Landry’s shoulders and squeezed. “And that was gonna be my advice, actually. Forget about what you think you should be or what anyone else thinks you should be. Your heart knows what path it wants—you just gotta find that path and follow it.”

  Landry opened his eyes and turned his head toward Jordan. They were nose to nose. “That’s good advice.”

  “I didn’t invent it. Somebody gave it to me, in fact.”

  “Yeah? Who?”

  Jordan traced Landry’s lips with his thumb. “Elaine. Right before I applied to work for you.”

  Before Landry had fully processed that information, Jordan slid off the couch, separated Landry’s knees, and scooted between them. Grinning wickedly, he untied the drawstring of Landry’s sweatpants. Quick as a wink, Landry sat bare-assed on the couch, his sweats and underwear tossed aside.

  “We can move—” he began.

  Jordan stilled him with a warm palm cupping Landry’s balls. “Nope. We’re gonna do this right here.”

  “But—”

  “Lie back, Lan. Relax. Give me permission to make all your decisions for the rest of the evening. I’m declaring you one hundred percent responsibility-free.”

  All his decisions. Wouldn’t it be lovely to just hand everything over like that? To scoot over and let someone else drive, and not even tell him where to go or how to get there? But life wasn’t like that. An adult had to maintain control of himself. Except… maybe Landry could ease up a little? Just for now.

  “You don’t have to… cater to me,” Landry said.

  Jordan removed his hand from Landry’s crotch and clutched both of Landry’s shoulders. He wasn’t smiling, and his eyes glittered with intensity. “This isn’t catering to you. Can’t you tell? This is what I want too. I’m being totally selfish. ’Cause tonight I want to feel you. Taste you. And I want to watch while you finally let go—and know that I did that.”

  Nothing in the world could make Landry say no to this.

  He gave just a tiny nod, but that was enough to bring back Jordan’s grin, to make Jordan hold him more tightly and crush their mouths together in a ravenous kiss. And a moment later, it was enough to cause Jordan to begin licking at Landry’s urgently hard cock.

  Despite his acquiescence, Landry couldn’t do nothing. So he reached out and laced his fingers through Jordan’s soft hair. Jordan hummed his approval.

  There was something deliciously dirty about this scenario: Landry half-naked and sprawled wantonly on his expensive couch, Jordan fully dressed and bowed over Landry’s groin, clever tongue and agile fingers busy at their task. Lord Thistlebottom would never enjoy this. Oh, but Landry was enjoying. Every bit of hot, wet suction. Every inch of probing pressure. He scooted his ass down a little, spread his legs as wide as possible, tipped his head back against the cushions, and let go.

  He howled when he came.

  Afterward, dazed and melty, he allowed Jordan to lead him to the bedroom. Landry stood while Jordan finished undressing him, and he watched as Jordan stripped too. Then Jordan tumbled him into bed. He plowed into Landry’s tingling, compliant body until both of them were too sated to move.

  Landry didn’t get up to brush his teeth and do his bedtime skin-care ritual. He didn’t even bother to deal with the sticky mess on their bodies. He simply allowed Jordan to hold him close, Landry’s head pillowed on his chest. He fell asleep listening to Jordan’s strong heartbeat.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “I’M never going to be content to fly the cheap seats again.”

  Squirming in the plastic airport chair between flights, Landry peered at Jordan over his phone. “Well, set your sights lower, because there’s no first class on the next plane.”

  “No warm chocolate chip cookies?” Jordan grinned.

  “We’ll be lucky if it has engines instead of frantically flapping pigeons.”

  Jordan’s snorts of laughter lifted a bit of the anxiety from Landry’s shoulders, but just a bit. Honestly, if he thought he could get away with it, he’d board the next flight back to LA. But he knew that if necessary, Jordan would drag him down the Jetway and onto their tiny little Scottsbluff-bound plane. Why had he agreed to this trip to begin with? Surely he could have
found some excuse to stay in LA. A home-furnishings emergency, perhaps. An important meeting with a pop diva who needed tips on theming her shih tzu’s engagement party. A pressing need to invent new Thanksgiving mocktails.

  Ugh.

  “It’s almost time,” Jordan pointed out. “Want anything before we leave civilization?”

  “Ah, you mock. But have you ever been to western Nebraska?”

  “Never been to Nebraska at all. But I have been to Lind, Washington. Several times. Had family there and we’d go visit sometimes. The social event of the year in Lind is a demolition derby with farm combines, and the second big entertainment is watching wheat grow.”

  Landry grunted. It sounded as if Lind might have certain similarities to Peril. “So then you know.”

  “Eh. People are still people, whether in LA or Lind. And even Lind has all the basics of life. Electricity, running water, Diet Coke… the whole shebang.”

  Unconvinced, and fighting the temptation to indulge in the savory soft pretzels he’d spied nearby, Landry returned his attention to his phone. Suzee’s producer had sent him yet another apology. Landry texted back that he should stop saying he was sorry and give Todd a raise instead. His literary agent was checking on the book’s progress; Landry sent a quick summary. A shoe designer who was a friend of an acquaintance was hoping to meet Landry sometime soon. She was certain he was going to love what she’d been doing with espadrilles. A booking agent in New York wanted to know if he was free for another late-night talk-show visit.

  Really, Landry’s PA should have been handling these, but worrying about footwear meant Landry could partially ignore the gnawing in his gut.

  But then it was time to board.

  The flight was turbulent, which didn’t seem to bother Jordan, but Landry gripped the armrests, closed his eyes, and pretended to nap. Even if he had managed to fall asleep, it wouldn’t have lasted long. In almost no time at all, they were bouncing to a landing in Scottsbluff.

  One good thing about a small plane was the quick disembarking process. Luggage arrived almost immediately, and Jordan took both suitcases and followed Landry across the airport’s single gate to the car rental counter. Landry didn’t pay attention while Jordan chatted with the rental clerk, so when they got outside and Landry saw their vehicle, he came to a halt.

  “You rented a pickup truck?”

  Jordan patted the driver’s door. “It’s a big one. Seats five, so plenty of room for our stuff.”

  “There would be plenty of room for our luggage in a sedan.”

  “Where’s the fun in that? When in Rome, right?” He slapped the door again. “C’mon, let’s go. Missy’s waiting.”

  Scowling, Landry helped pile the luggage into the rear of the cab, then got into the passenger seat. He was fairly certain he hadn’t ridden in a truck since he left Nebraska. SUVs, yes; pickups, no.

  Fortunately the weather was warm for October. Some of the trees near the North Platte River showed fall foliage, but those bits of color disappeared as they headed east and the sun set behind them.

  “I wish I could see more of the scenery,” Jordan said as he drove.

  “Nothing to see.” That wasn’t exactly true. The Sandhills had a beauty of their own, the land furred with soft grasses and curved as sensuously as a Georgia O’Keeffe painting. They were nothing like the stunning ocean vistas of Big Sur or the breathtaking majesty of towering redwoods. But there was beauty nonetheless.

  During the ninety-minute drive to Peril, they passed only a handful of cars going the other way.

  Landry gave Jordan directions once they reached town—not that anything in Peril was hard to find. It felt odd to be rolling down streets still familiar after all these years, almost as if the plane had transported them back in time. They passed the Byway Inn, as decrepit as ever, and Svoboda Ranch and Home. Tillerson’s Ford dealership was still there. The Dairy Queen. The high school where Landry had once counted the days until he could escape. The library. The little smattering of shops that surrounded the town square, which still had the gazebo in the middle. A brightly illuminated flagpole, but with the flag taken down, probably at sunset. At the base of the pole, metal plaques with the names of Peril men who had died in the World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq.

  When Landry was a kid, another plaque commemorated a supposed victory over local Lakotas in the late nineteenth century. But then a group of high school students—including Missy—had presented a formal protest to the city council stating that the Lakotas had been massacred by invading whites. The students wanted a sign to commemorate that. In the end, the council had achieved a sort of compromise: while they refused to erect a new sign, they did take down the old one. As best as Landry could tell in the partial darkness, the compromise still held.

  At Landry’s direction, Jordan turned south on Third Avenue, then east on H Street. Most of the houses were modest single-story structures with white siding and deep front porches, with a few larger four-square houses mixed in. They’d all been built a century earlier. But Missy’s house was a little older and considerably larger. The darkness made it hard to discern colors, but Landry thought the house was the same pale yellow as always, with the same fish-scale trim under the roofline and the same agglomeration of additions ruining whatever symmetry the original house had once possessed.

  After Jordan parked on the street, Landry simply sat there. He would have willingly stayed put for a long time, maybe until he finally ordered Jordan to take them back to Scottsbluff. But the front door burst open and a flood of people rushed toward them, and it was too late to run away.

  “Home,” Landry mumbled.

  EVERYBODY talked at once. Missy and Rod, her bear of a husband. Aunt Trudy. Ten thousand first cousins plus assorted seconds and once-removeds. And of course Missy’s twins, Blake and Bryanna, who’d taken an immediate shine to Jordan. He sat in the living room in the middle of it all, seemingly as pleased as punch, with children hanging off him and a smile on his face.

  Landry, however, was cowering. Okay, maybe not quite. He sat on a ratty old armchair, his late father’s favorite spot for watching TV football. Yet even though the chair was in a corner, people loomed over him, asking a few questions but mostly bombarding him with every notable event in Peril since his exit. Who’d been married, had kids, divorced. Who’d gotten hired or fired. Old businesses that had closed and new ones that had opened. A panoply of illnesses, accidents, and natural disasters.

  As if the flood of talking wasn’t enough to overwhelm him, Landry was constantly surprised by how old everyone had become. His cousin Terry, for instance, was ten years Landry’s senior and, when Landry was in high school, had a reputation for living wild. Back then he lived in a trailer on his parents’ property and spent most of his time wandering the highways on his motorcycle. He would rumble back into Peril with a girl perched behind him, she and Terry would spend a couple of weeks drinking and dancing at a bar, and then she’d leave—only to be replaced a few weeks later. Now Terry was married to someone he’d gone to high school with, and he had a paunch, a bald spot, and a job at the Ford dealership.

  Other cousins who had been toddlers when Landry left were now fully grown—he couldn’t even recognize many of them—and a few already had kids of their own. Although Aunt Trudy retained every ounce of her vitality and forcefulness, she now walked with a cane and complained about her knees.

  What did they see when they looked at him? Certainly not the teen who’d fled as soon as he could.

  Missy saved him at last. Standing in the center of the living room, she raised her voice above the din. “Okay, okay. Enough family love for now. You’ll all get plenty of Landry time, I promise. Now everyone go home so we can feed him.”

  Although it took some time for people to gather coats and say their goodbyes, they ultimately obeyed, and blessed silence settled over the house. Except for the Disney movie the twins watched at full blast—but Landry much preferred “Let It Go” to the chorus o
f cousins. Jordan and Rod sat together on the couch, deep in conversation; Landry wondered what the topic was. He had met Rod only once, when he and Missy made a honeymoon trip to Disneyland, but Landry liked the guy. He was originally from Rapid City, South Dakota, but had come to Peril to teach high school. Apparently he’d liked the place—and Missy—enough to stay.

  Missy poked Landry’s shoulder. “Come help me with dinner.”

  They walked into the kitchen together, and Landry took a good look around. “Nice job. I like it.”

  “Really?” Missy seemed a little shy at his praise.

  “Really. Did you design it yourself?”

  “Rod and I did together. We did most of the work too. We pulled out all the fugly seventies stuff Grandma and Grandpa put in, but the cabinets are the originals.”

  Landry stroked the painted wood on a cupboard door. “I love how well you integrated the modern touches without losing the vintage appeal. Well done.”

  “Wow. The Landry Bishop likes my kitchen.” She fanned herself with one hand and pretended to swoon.

  “You look good too. I didn’t get a chance to say that before the hordes descended.”

  She looked doubtfully down at her torso. “I’ve put on weight.”

  “It suits you.” He meant it. She wore jeans and a Deadpool sweatshirt, and her hair had undoubtedly been cut by their great-aunt Pat, who’d been cutting hair at her salon downtown since mammoths roamed the plains. But Missy looked happy and confident and comfortable with herself, and that made her beautiful.

  “Well, thanks. I bet you don’t weigh an ounce more than you did when you left here.”

  “It’s LA. They monitor those things.”

  She snorted, opened the fridge, and began pulling items out. “Thing One and Thing Two ate already. Which is fine, because the only foods they’ll willingly consume right now are cheese pizza, Tater Tots, and those packaged fruit snacks. And apples, but only if they’re peeled and sliced.”