by Courtney Lux
Trip drums his fingers on his knee. He knows someone responsible and good enough at math to make sense of this issue. “The phone got any charge?”
Scarlett pulls the phone from her pocket. “Not much—I’ll charge it at the restaurant later.”
“Give it here.” Trip sticks out a hand. “I might know a guy.”
Nate picks up on the fourth ring.
“Good morning, Nathaniel.” Trip pulls one foot out from under Scarlett’s thighs to prod at June. “You got plans today?”
“I’m thinking about scheduling that job interview.” Nate clears his throat. He’s never very good on the phone, and Trip can’t tell if he’s in a bad mood or just being Nate.
“What? No, you can’t. You still have a couple weeks to go.” Trip wiggles his toes when June tries to pull off his sock. “We have a deal.”
“Trip, we talked about this.” Trip can hear the sound of his closet doors sliding open and closed. He’s probably just out of the shower after a run. “I need to move forward, and it’s a good office.”
“Nuh-uh, no way.” Trip tugs his foot out of June’s hold when she leans down to suck on his toes. He can feel Scarlett and Liam watching him, but he pays them no mind. “What if I make you a better offer?”
“You have an office with health benefits and opportunities for upward mobility?” Somewhere in the background, Trip can hear the sound of drawers opening and closing.
“No, but I got an apartment with no power that you can come see.” Nate has an odd preoccupation with getting to see where Trip lives, and he knows it’s too tempting an offer for Nate to let pass by. “Couple of the roommates are home. You can see them live and in-person and everything.”
Nate’s quiet, then says. “I don’t know.”
“Pretty please?” Trip is not about to resort to begging, but he’s running out of ways to ask without sounding desperate. “This issue might even require research and maybe you can make a spreadsheet or something. You’ll love it. And I’m here—math and research and me. What could be better, huh?”
Nate’s breath crackles against Trip’s ear. “Fine. Okay.”
“Okay?” Trip shifts his feet down to the floor, warmer now.
“I said okay,” Nate replies. “What’s the address?”
Trip resists the urge to give Nate the number for the building across the street and recites the address correctly and then listens while Nate repeats it. “Perfect. If you wanna bring coffee, I wouldn’t complain.”
Nate sounds less gloomy when he says he’ll stop at a Starbucks.
Trip drops the phone onto the coffee table. “We officially have someone with a college degree coming to figure this out for us; you’re welcome.”
Scarlett and Liam are looking at him with twin smiles.
Scarlett looks at Liam. “Told you so.”
“I know you did. Seeing is believing, though.” Liam giggles.
Trip narrows his eyes. “What?”
Scarlett and Liam chime in unison, “Nothing.”
Trip, unsettled by whatever secret it is they suddenly share, looks from Scarlett to Liam and back again, but he’d never admit to feeling left out, so he lets it go.
Nate arrives barely an hour later, a box of coffee in one hand, two paper bags in the other. Trip eyes the box and steps aside to let Nate through the door.
Liam and Scarlett watch him with the same overlarge grins they’d directed at Trip when he got off the phone.
Nate nods a hello to both of them; his eyes rest for a long time on the baby. “Hi, I’m Nate. I’m Trip’s friend.”
“Nice to see you again, Nate.” Scarlett stands. She waves June’s hand for her. “This is June, that’s Liam.”
Liam stands, offers a hand, still smiling first at Trip and then at Nate. “Nice to meet you. It’s always interesting to find someone else who can tolerate Trip for prolonged periods of time.”
“Hilarious.” Trip watches the way Nate’s eyes go wide when he tips his head up to meet Liam’s gaze. “Terrifying thing, ain’t he?”
Nate frowns at Trip before turning back to Scarlett and Liam. He lifts the cardboard box higher. “I brought coffee and bagels.”
“We love you already.” Liam applauds and goes to the kitchen for mugs.
Nate puts the coffee and one of the bags on the table. He pulls a book out of the second bag and offers it to Trip.
Trip studies the glossy yellow cover and flips through the pages. “Is this to make a fire for extra light? Cause I’m pretty sure that’ll just get us kicked out.”
Nate rolls his eyes. “You said you didn’t have a laptop for the online course. It’s a GED test prep book.”
“I can see that.” Trip squints at a page in the science section. Taking the test to get his GED had been a conversation held in passing while they were lying naked in bed late one night a week earlier. Trip hadn’t put much thought into it beyond mentioning that he was considering taking the test.
“We should get your eyes checked.” Nate accepts an empty mug from Liam. “You do that all the time.”
“Do what?” Trip inspects a section on test taking skills with distaste.
Scarlett returns from her bedroom with a shoebox of torn-open envelopes that she places on the coffee table. “You squint when you try to read something.”
“Like, all the time.” Liam fills his mug with coffee. “You need glasses.”
“I do not.” Trip tosses the book at Liam.
“Don’t throw it.” Nate lifts the book from the floor. He puts it on the coffee table between them. “It wasn’t cheap.”
“Didn’t ask you to buy the damn thing, did I?” Trip snaps.
“Well, now you’re stuck with it.” Nate touches a brief kiss to Trip’s temple as he takes the seat beside him. “Something for your bag that’s actually yours.”
Trip stares at the book. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. We can check test dates later.” Nate sips his coffee and casts a look around the apartment. “This is where you live.”
Trip looks around, too. The wood floors are recently scrubbed, but the sunflowers over June’s playpen are chipping and the painted clouds around the window have blurred from the leak in the ceiling. Liam’s added a new abstract mural above his corner of projects; it’s done in soft earthy shades of green and brown.
“This is where I live.” Trip pats a hand against the faded floral cushions of the couch. “Little bit of a roach problem, there’s no hot water, and now there’s no power. It’s not exactly the Ritz.”
“I’ve been trying to figure out why you always smell like clean laundry since we met.” Nate looks at the floor where the laundromat hums below. “Makes sense now.”
“Mystery solved.” Trip crosses his legs on the couch.
“One of a thousand when it comes to you.” Nate starts sifting through the box of paperwork. “The hot-water thing should get fixed by your landlords. Have you contacted them?”
Trip and Liam exchange a look. “Not exactly.”
“How long’s it been out?” Nate peers up from the papers in his hands.
“It comes and goes, so two weeks, maybe?” Scarlett bounces the baby on her knee and feeds her shredded bits of a bagel.
“You need to call; that’s not normal.” Nate looks up at the crack above the window. “Does that leak? You should mention that, too. They can probably get in and fix all of that—the roaches, too.”
“Our living situation is… how should I say this?” Liam takes a bite of a bagel and chews before speaking again. “It’s a unique situation.”
“What do you mean?” Nate looks around at all of them; his gaze settles on Scarlett. “Kel says you guys have some sort of deal going.”
“We do.” Trip steals Nate’s mug for a drink of coffee. “People across the hall technically hav
e both these places—they’re rent-stabilized.”
“You pay them rent and they just share the other apartment.” Nate pours a new mug of coffee for himself. “And you can’t call the landlord to fix stuff because you’re not technically supposed to be here.”
“See? Told you he was smart.” Trip trades his mug with Nate’s and casts a wary glance at the GED book still on the table.
“Kel’s pretty good with home utility stuff. If you know where the water heater is, he can probably take a look for you.” Nate dumps all of the paperwork onto the coffee table and shuffles it into some semblance of order.
“I know how to fix a water heater. I’ve been keeping the damn thing alive for nearly a year.” Scarlett waves him off. “We just need a new one. I’m not sure about the leak above the window, though.”
Nate looks at the crack in the plaster. “It probably just needs caulking or something.”
“Didn’t know you were such a handyman, Nathaniel.” Trip watches while Nate scribbles things on envelopes and punches numbers into his phone.
“Used to help do repairs at the resort,” Nate murmurs, his attention more on his work than on Trip. “I can’t do everything, but I know a few things.”
“You got a tool belt?” Trip takes June without question when Scarlett stands abruptly and offers her to him. “I think I might like you in a tool belt.”
Nate takes note of the baby and tickles one of her feet. “I’ll see what I can do.”
Nate writes things down, and when Scarlett comes back into the family room dressed in her hotel uniform, they have a long exchange about interest and missed bills and lawyers. Nate steps out into the hall a few times to make calls.
Trip sits on the couch and eats a bagel while June has a bottle on his lap. Trip watches Nate work and makes a running commentary about how sexy it is to watch Nate punch numbers into a calculator and ponder over old bills that earns him the occasional look or touch from Nate.
There’s a scramble for ninety dollars that involves pulling furniture away from the walls and digging through pockets and the bottoms of bags. When Nate offers to spot them some cash, he’s answered with a collective no.
Scarlett speaks for all of them. “We can take your help, but not your money. No one here likes being in the red.”
Nate looks as though he might argue, but in the end, he doesn’t have to. The money is gathered and the conversation is forgotten.
When Nate steps back out into the hall to make another call, Liam smirks at Trip. “If I were going to fall in love with someone, it would definitely be Nate Mackey.”
“Turn up the charm and he might be into a quickie before you have to get to work.” Trip accepts semi-soggy bites of bagel from June. “He can be a little uptight, but he loosens up eventually.”
“Mr. Mackey only has eyes for one person in this apartment. I’m just waiting on my wedding invitation.” Liam is busy at work with a canvas and his paint, but he pauses to point his brush at Trip. “I don’t know how you do it. I really don’t. You’ve either got a magic penis or you’re a better con man than I originally thought.”
“Little bit of both.” Trip eyes the book on the coffee table. “Don’t start planning on hair colors to match the wedding party just yet. As soon as he gets working again, he’ll get himself a nice, respectable man, and I’ll be slumming it twenty-four seven with your ugly mug again.”
Liam clicks his tongue. “I know you’re short a few diplomas, Morgan, but I never took you for stupid.”
“Nathaniel and I have a good thing going—mutually beneficial.” Trip sips his coffee and keeps the mug well out of June’s reach. “Gotta end sometime, though. It’s just the way of the world.”
“Uh-huh. By the way, never go into acting; you’re terrible at it.” Liam hums “All You Need is Love” by the Beatles while he paints.
Trip’s about to threaten Liam’s hair or artwork when the apartment door opens and Nate steps back in. He tucks his phone in his pocket. “You should be getting power in a few hours.”
“Thank you.” Scarlett squeezes Nate’s arm with gentle fingers. “Really. You’re amazing.”
Nate indicates the box on the table where all the envelopes have been smoothed and stacked into a neat pile. “Those are all in order and the calls from today are marked on the most recent bill. If they give you any issues, you’ve got it documented that all of this happened.”
Trip yawns. “Great. Now we just gotta make sure we don’t do this every month.”
They all exchange a grim look. None of this is getting any easier.
Nate apparently knows it’s not his place to say anything. He’s looking around the apartment awkwardly, curious and uncomfortable at once.
“We’ll figure it out.” Liam breaks the quiet. “We always figure it out.”
Trip drags his hand through his hair. “Yeah. It’s good for now, right? It’s taken care of.”
They all nod their agreement, though no one says anything.
Liam takes the baby. Scarlett finishes dressing for work and gives them all kisses on their cheeks before disappearing out the front door calling that she’s got the night off. Trip gives Nate a brief tour of the rest of the apartment—the bathroom and its cracked tile, the kitchen with the lemon-colored walls, Liam and Devon’s cramped bedroom, Scarlett and June’s room and, finally, his room.
Nate touches one of the wire hangers near the door. “This is a closet.”
“You shut your goddamn mouth. This is a three-bedroom apartment and I’ve got this room all to myself.” Trip nudges his blankets with a toe. “The bed’s not too bad; you wanna see for yourself?”
Nate eyes the blankets on the floor. “Maybe later. Your walls are thin and there’s a kid in the other room.”
The apartment is loud with the rumble of dryers downstairs, and Trip is uneasy under the knowing looks Liam keeps directing his way, so he suggests a move outside.
“No balcony, but we’ve got a fire escape.” He points to the cardboard containers on the table. “We can bring coffee.”
“It’s the middle of November.” Nate looks dubiously at the window. “And I don’t know if I trust your fire escape.”
“We’ll bring blankets.” Trip tweaks the edge of Nate’s sweater. “And it’s not that high up. If it falls, we’ll probably only break a couple bones.”
Nate reluctantly agrees, so they sit together on the fire escape, their thighs touching and shoulders bumping under the warmth of the blanket. They drink coffee, and Trip lights a cigarette.
“Those things are awful for you.” Nate waves his mug at Trip’s cigarette. “You’re gonna destroy your voice and then you won’t be able to sing anymore.”
“Can still play.” Trip blows smoke out toward the bars of the fire escape. “Besides, I’m cold. It makes me feel warmer.”
Nate tucks an arm around Trip’s shoulders, pulls him closer. “Better?”
Trip nods. “Still not tossing the cigarette.”
“Fine.” Nate turns his gaze more fully at Trip. “I have a question.”
“You’ve always got questions.” Trip transfers his cigarette to his left hand so he can lift his coffee mug with his right.
“That you never answer.” Nate hikes the blanket up higher over his shoulder.
“Maybe you should give up on asking them then.” Trip sips his coffee. “Doesn’t seem to be working out too well for you so far.”
“I helped you get your power turned back on.” Nate bumps Trip’s ankle with his. “You owe me. Come on.”
“You’re as much of a fuckin’ weasel as I am.” Trip sits back against the ledge of the window and kicks his feet in the open space above the stairs. “Go ahead then. Ask your stupid question.”
“Do you ever go home?”
“Home right now, aren’t I?” Trip waves his mug at the fire e
scape.
“I mean to wherever you’re from?” Nate shakes his head when Trip offers the cigarette. “Have you been back there since you ran away? Does your family know you’re here?”
Trip replaces his cup on the ledge outside the window. “Don’t go back and don’t know if they know. I don’t think so.”
“They didn’t look for you?”
Trip thinks back to the early days in the city. Liam had made it his mission to find a missing child report on Trip and succeeded after a few weeks. He’d printed the page and it had hung proudly on their fridge for nearly a year. “I think so, for a bit. I’m sure there’s some sort of law that says you gotta look for your kid when they disappear.”
“Do you ever miss them?” Nate’s brushing his fingers slow and light over Trip’s shoulder. Trip’s not sure Nate realizes he’s doing it.
“You miss that dead brother you hate?” Trip hooks his free hand over Nate’s knee. “Or that pregnant sister you’re so bent out of shape over?”
“Yeah, sometimes.” Nate’s fingers pause. “I’ve got issues with everything that happened, but he was still my family. I still miss him… and me and my sister are doing better. I called her on the way over here actually.”
“Well, ain’t you a good brother.” Trip blows a smoke ring and watches it stretch and dissipate before blowing another.
Nate snaps his fingers near the circle of smoke and they watch as it forms into a heart before fading. “Do you think your family misses you?”
“No.” Trip blows a larger ring and sends a smaller ring tumbling through it.
“Showoff,” Nate mutters. “What about your friends? You think they miss you?”
“Didn’t have any.” Trip waves away the smoke.
“Someone must have cared about you.” Nate’s hand closes on his shoulder. “Someone loved you. I can tell.”
“Thought I was the romantic.” Trip points his cigarette at Nate. “And you’re outta questions.”
“We didn’t specify how many I could ask.”
“Well, I’m specifying how many answers I’m willing to give right now,” Trip snaps.