by R. Cooper
He’d offered to walk Chico to his car, but Chico had only continued to stare up at him until Rafael had given him this strange, shy grin and asked, “Really?” before leading Chico to his car. He had a small SUV, a few years old, and the backseat was filled with boxes of fliers and one or two coats. The seats were clean, but the floors needed a vacuum for all the pine needles and pollen and trail dirt Rafael had dragged in with him. The interior smelled like coffee, and it was warm enough that Chico didn’t need to stay curled up in his sweatshirt, although he did.
“You made that,” Chico answered, in total awe, and watched in fascination as Rafael shook his head.
“I’ve discovered I don’t like seeing you cry. Not like this.” Rafael scowled out the windshield. “There’s you tearing up about the tragic love story, and then there’s you sobbing into your sleeve. I couldn’t just leave you there alone, thinking you had to hide it.”
The way he phrased it should have meant more embarrassment, but Chico only continued to stare at him. “You said I could cry. That it was okay.”
“It’s more than okay.” Rafael exhaled a garbled, rough few words that Chico couldn’t make out. He drove them off the school grounds and through town before he looked over at Chico again. “Do you want me to take you home?” he asked. The teacher who knew everything was gone. Chico would have been more stunned by that if the ballet hadn’t stolen his everything.
He slowly shook his head, and Rafael made another little noise before turning toward Alberi Lane. “The way you stare at me sometimes. You kill me and you’re not even trying.” Rafael sighed deeply. “You have all these feelings, and you show them like it’s nothing.” He briefly took his hands off the steering wheel to gesture helplessly. “Everyone around me is about passion for the art, passion through the art, and there you are, wounded by my ballet and curled up in my car and gazing at me. God. How you look at me makes it hard to remember where I’m standing. Do you even realize?”
Rafael sucked in another long breath and then straightened again, as quickly as someone raising a curtain. “I’m glad you came and that you got to see the ballet as a member of the audience. You deserved that, and the kids were so glad to see you. They all loved their costumes, by the way. Your additions to the costumes looked really good.”
Chico gave him a frown and finally remembered how to speak. “What are you talking about? Who cares about those right now? I could embroider flowers in my sleep, but you made that.”
Of all people, he would never have expected the embarrassment or modesty from Rafael. “I contributed,” he corrected Chico in his husky voice. “The kids did it. And my dad did most of the choreography.”
“You talked them through it, and you taught them to do those things, and you brought everything together.” Chico waved his hands to sum up every emotion he’d felt in that audience. “That’s amazing. It was amazing. Just so you know.”
“Well, when you put it like that,” Rafael offered, with a little smirk. He could have been playing, acting as though he didn’t believe what he was hearing, but then Chico knew he did because his smirk grew into something genuine. “I told them you were moved to tears. I’ve never seen those kids so excited.”
That took away some of Chico’s dreamy, ballet-induced mood, but not enough to make him move when Rafael pulled up in front of his house. Cabin was a better descriptor than house, though it had a small yard and a driveway and even a mailbox. The windows were dark, and the porch light wasn’t on, so Chico couldn’t see much, but he stared at it curiously as he gracelessly slid out of the seat.
He forgot about the sewing kit like he’d forgotten about his own car, and he followed Rafael up the driveway into his home. Rafael offered a hand to lead him over the stone path to the door, but turned back in surprise when Chico took it. Chico had no idea what would make him look that way.
Inside Rafael’s house was much like inside his car. Nothing was dirty or messy, but one look around said a busy, distracted man lived there. Chico stepped into the living room and slipped his hand free to go study the framed pictures on the walls.
More photos of his family, some of Rafael, much younger, with other dancers at a studio Chico didn’t recognize. Some of the boys had their arms wrapped around Rafael. Sometimes he had his arms around them. “You were popular,” Chico remarked, in front of an artsy, black-and-white photograph of Rafael, who was young, maybe twenty or twenty-one. He was naked, although arranged so nothing too scandalous was visible. Another male dancer, equally nude, was at his feet. The picture looked like part of a series of artistically nude dancers, which was the only reason Chico didn’t say anything about Rafael displaying a picture of himself like that in his living room.
But he did reach out to stroke a fingertip over the image of him. Young Rafael’s expression was very serious. His body was a wet dream.
“I don’t look like that anymore,” Rafael said, as though Chico were expecting him to still be twenty.
Chico shot him a knowing glance, which made Rafael sigh. He pulled Chico’s hand from the picture and held it again. More than anything else he could have done, that made Chico smile.
“Yes, I was popular,” Rafael admitted. “A bit of a slut all around, but we all were. Long days together, why not? That sort of thing. I never hurt anyone, though. You should know that. I’m still friends with everyone I’ve slept with. Well….” He frowned thoughtfully in a way Chico didn’t believe for a second. “There was this one who was really more of a hate-fuck—” He shut up when Chico clapped a hand over his mouth and kept walking.
Rafael had to follow, since he still had Chico’s other hand.
“The shoes from my mother’s last professional performance,” Rafael explained from behind Chico’s palm when they reached a shadowbox containing a very worn pair of red toe shoes. Chico took his hand away to let him speak. “This poster is of Elisabet as Juliet in Romeo and Juliet. She has one of a poster from my run in The Sleeping Beauty, and I hate it. They chose a weird photo.” As though nothing at all was strange about Chico silently exploring his living room with Rafael in tow, Rafael filled him in on everything they passed by. “That’s my couch. Nice and close, if you’re interested.” He leered in an over-the-top way at Chico until Chico’s skin was hot, but he let himself be tugged toward the fireplace and the mantle, which held, of all things, a baseball signed by someone whose name Chico didn’t recognize. “And that’s from my dad.”
Chico’s surprise must have been obvious because Rafael gave him a rueful grin. “My mother will make it sound like my father is the one who is too serious, too focused on ballet—and he is, don’t get me wrong. My father breathes ballet in a way that not even my mother does. But he’s a big believer in other influences. When I was little, he took me and my brother and my sisters to a professional baseball game and told us to look around. He knew nothing about sports, mind you, but he wanted us to see if we might like it. Why he picked baseball, I have no idea. Anyway, after the game we each got a signed ball, and I kept mine. Found it after I moved out on my own up here. I like to be reminded there is more to the world than dance.”
“Your mom said your dad was the one most angry with you for quitting professional ballet.” Chico tilted his head up in question.
“Did she? Did she tell you that when she met my dad, she insisted she wasn’t ever going to regard any man as more important to her than dancing? She insisted that right up until they got married.” Rafael had the most evil look on his face. “My father has her wrapped around his finger. He’s almost too powerful.”
“I like your mother.” Chico defended her for absolutely no reason, and went hot again as Rafael studied him. He ducked his head and left the living room for the kitchen, with Rafael close behind.
In a fruit bowl in the middle of the counter sat a somewhat shriveled yellow onion. Chico blinked at it in astonishment.
Rafael finally, finally, tugged his hand away.
He cleared his throat, loudly, and began to
talk faster. “You fed me. I should offer to feed you. But I should probably explain that I’m not really a cook. I mean to cook. I like to cook. I try to cook. Once every few weeks I convince myself I will make the time and buy food and prepare it right, but then I get busy and distracted and that never happens. All I think I have in the house are English muffins, apples, and peanut butter. I might have microwave popcorn. You want an apple? Or I could order a pizza. I sometimes bribe the kids who work there to drive it out here.”
Chico stared at him in outright astonishment, then felt a huge, terrible smile form on his face. “Silly Raf.” He darted out his tongue to wet his lips when Rafael turned around and looked hurt. “Did you buy that onion so you could talk to me?” Chico didn’t wait for an answer. “Do you think I care that you don’t cook? I served you grape jelly, the most childish of all the jellies.”
“I like grape jelly.” Rafael nearly pouted. “I didn’t mind. Better a dinner of herbs, or however the quote goes.”
The ache behind Chico’s ribs, the one that hadn’t left him since the ballet, showed no signs of going away now. He stared at Rafael for long enough that he could see Rafael wanted to say something. Then he shook his head.
“I’m not hungry,” Chico told him seriously. “Show me your stars.”
HE WASN’T nervous. His legs were wobbly on the stairs, but Rafael put a hand to the small of his back and led him up to his bedroom. Chico walked past Rafael’s bed without doing more than noting it was made, which surprised him, and that it was covered in layers of warm, multicolored blankets. “I get cold at night, and my mornings are easier if I’m warm,” Rafael explained, after clearing his throat. He opened the door to his balcony and gestured for Chico to precede him.
He’d left the bedroom lights off, but Chico’s eyes adjusted after a few moments. They were the same stars above him that he saw every night, but Chico put his head back to stare at them as though he’d never seen them before.
After a while, he sighed.
“Do you want to sit down?” Rafael offered immediately, waving to the two large wooden chairs behind them. This was the man who had flirted to make him blush. Whatever Chico had expected when that man finally got Chico in his bedroom, it wasn’t hushed, nervous questions.
Chico sat, then frowned when Rafael did the same. A small table was between them. Chico thought about it and decided he didn’t like that, so he got up again and resettled himself in Rafael’s lap. Rafael exclaimed quietly in surprise, but wrapped his arms around Chico and let him curl up against him. He found one of Chico’s sleeves and pulled on it to expose his hand and his wrist. Then he tugged the sleeve back until it covered Chico’s fingers.
Chico would have stared at him if the light would have given him any detail.
“The ballet really stayed with you, didn’t it?” Rafael was keeping his hands above the sweatshirt and his words were soft and careful. Possibly, Chico had thrown him for a loop by cuddling him like this. Chico could not make himself care.
“Yes,” he said simply, and wriggled closer. Rafael gasped a little and spread his legs to give Chico more room.
“Did I tell you the kids all loved what you did?” Rafael added, perhaps more breathlessly than he had been before Chico had squirmed against him.
“Yes.” Chico paused to glance at the silhouette of Rafael’s face. “But I didn’t do much. And the poor inventor, I skipped him entirely.”
“No, it worked that way. He’s overlooked by everyone at first.” Rafael’s hand stroking down his back almost made up for Chico’s mistake.
“I’ll do better next time,” Chico offered, then swallowed. “That is, if you’d like me to keep helping. If not with that”—the graduation performance was once a year, and next year was a long time away—“then maybe with one of the other recitals. If that’s all right.”
Rafael took his time answering. “That’s all right.” His voice was huskier, like he couldn’t quite control everything.
Chico let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding and rested his chin at Rafael’s shoulder.
“That talk we were supposed to have,” Chico began, after a beat. “When….” He could do this. “When your boyfriend of three years cheats on you and leaves you for someone else… that is… I mean…. It’s not even the cheating as much as… after years of being undermined by someone who should have supported me. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I would like to trust you. With me. I already”—he lowered his voice—“I already want you and like you, and when you dance with me, you make me feel like I could be great at it, you know? But I’m scared. Which you know. I mean, you already know, because I spilled my problems all over you many times. But. Shit. You know what I mean. I’m working on things.”
“Hmm.” Rafael murmured thoughtfully. It was the first time he’d ever sounded like his dad that Chico had noticed. “Everything takes practice,” he decreed at last, not seeming terribly put out to hear that Chico didn’t trust him completely yet.
God, he was so different from John. Chico was even allowed to tease him.
“That is such a dancer thing to say,” Chico grumbled, but sweetly, and shifted to get more comfortable.
“Anything that will get you back in my arms.” Rafael responded in the flirty tone Chico was familiar with, if not used to. He put his warm face into Rafael’s neck before turning to sneak a peek at the stars.
He really hoped this was the right decision. It felt like it, like something brave Davi would approve of. All he knew was that it scared him too much to be called settling.
Rafael probably had his head back. He probably had his eyes closed as well, unless he was looking at the stars and thinking exactly what Chico was thinking.
Chico took a deep breath. “Rafael?”
“Yeah?” Rafael’s arm muscles tightened, but his voice was even.
Chico tilted his head up to whisper. “Are you tired?”
“A little.” Rafael moved as if he was trying to get a good look at Chico and couldn’t. Good. For once he couldn’t judge Chico’s mood before Chico could. “I’m still kind of wound up. It’s why we take a day before the performance. I don’t want people crashing from the first high during the actual ballet.”
All that was very interesting, but not exactly what Chico was driving at. “So you’re off tomorrow?” he pressed.
Rafael inclined his head. “Yes.”
Chico took another breath and then put his mouth to Rafael’s skin. “So am I.” He frowned for Rafael’s stillness, and for the rest of what he had to say. “I should also tell you that despite the cheating boyfriend, I was negative on my last two tests.” He cleared his throat. “If you were interested in that information.”
“I thought you wanted to wait—” Rafael started in a rasping, dry voice, then grabbed at Chico before he could finish his sentence. “Yes,” he declared firmly. “Yes, I am interested in that information.”
“Oh good,” Chico agreed stupidly, and surged up to kiss him.
THE VANILLA-SCENTED sweatshirt was somewhere out on Rafael’s balcony. Chico’s shirt was pooled on Rafael’s bedroom floor. Chico had been trying to remember words since he’d emerged from Rafael’s bathroom, nervous and scrubbed up and minus his pants. The problem with that was Rafael’s mouth and his hands. God, his hands.
“The thing is….” Chico was wound so tight he could hear it in every strained word. Lips beneath his ear didn’t help any more than Rafael climbing over him onto the bed. Unlike Chico, Rafael had stripped off his clothes in seconds and hadn’t seemed to miss them. Then again, he didn’t need them.
“Yeah?” Rafael lifted his head to look Chico in the eye, which wasn’t fair. Chico stared at him in a state of blank arousal, then turned his head so Rafael would kiss the skin on the other side of his neck. Rafael was very obliging. He settled over Chico on his knees, kissing his throat and smoothing his hands over Chico’s ribs.
That was how they’d ended up here. Chico had opened the bathroom d
oor feeling tiny and skinny with the lights on, until Rafael had tugged him toward the bed and kissed his mouth and asked if he was sure and swept the palms of his hands across Chico’s skin. He’d done that under the stars too, and in the studio’s sewing room. A little thing, but huge, somehow, to Chico and his pounding heart.
“I used to look better than this.” Chico closed his eyes and panted at the ceiling, letting Rafael’s mouth trail down to his chest and then up to his shoulder and then to his mouth again. Rafael’s hands followed the same path, except when Chico rolled his hips up to meet them. Then those hands would skim down to Chico’s thighs or his ass. Only for a moment every time, and it was driving Chico crazy.
“Huh?” Rafael licked at Chico’s lips, already stinging and full from the thousand kisses outside beneath the night sky. The stars were beautiful but Rafael hadn’t once glanced at them.
Chico forgot whatever else he’d been going to say. “You can’t keep your hands off me,” he announced instead, way too shocked to be cool about it. He raised his arms and wrapped them around Rafael’s gloriously naked back. He pushed his palms against the muscles Rafael both took for granted and worked hard for, and knew his face was hot and flushed.
“Not if I don’t have to.” Rafael spared a moment for whatever Chico was trying to tell him, but his attention was obviously elsewhere. Chico opened his eyes wide and smiled, although Rafael couldn’t see it. Rafael held himself up on his arms, putting his biceps to work as he dragged his mouth down Chico’s chest.
Chico slid his legs open, bending one knee to the bed in case he was being too subtle. Rafael had thoughtfully set lube and a condom on the bed while he’d been waiting for Chico. The least he could do was use them.
Rafael had hair over his eyes when he glanced up. His mouth was red. His gaze seemed caught on Chico’s face. He eased up, very slowly, and held himself over Chico with no indication of strain. Chico just touched him, not even envious at the display of strength. He petted his jaw and his shoulders and the shivery, hot muscles of his arms. Then he stroked his back and his sides, all the way down to his ass.