by Harper Logan
He wanted to just get into his truck and drive to find him, and hold him in his arms again and taste his lips and every other part of him. But even if he did, that wouldn’t change anything. Adrian would still leave tomorrow.
Chandler pounded his fist against his thigh, bitter tears coming to his eyes. He bit his knuckles to hold back the scream that was threatening to escape.
Think of April, he thought. Don’t frighten your little girl.
He tasted blood. It hurt, but not as much as the pain of losing Adrian for the second time.
7
Driving into Rosebridge after weeks on the road was always refreshing. Seeing the familiar landmarks whizzing by, smelling the aroma of the air that was somehow different than anywhere else he’d ever been; everything that told Adrian he was home. He always relished it, because even though it was home, he never stayed for too long. That was always how he liked it. Stationary meant getting restless.
This time, though, Adrian felt different as he passed the blue sign on the side of the highway welcoming him to Rosebridge. It felt like he’d really lost something. This time, he would really never see Chandler again.
Maybe he’d made a mistake. He’d meant every word he’d said about starting the garage with Chandler, but he might’ve gotten carried away. Chandler had called him a dreamer, and he was right.
What was wrong with dreaming of a happier, more fulfilling life? After all, wanting to make something of himself and experience the world was what’d led him to join the army in the first place. It was what had brought the two of them together.
Goddamn Chandler. Yeah, it was a risk, but didn’t he at least want to try for April?
He’d even admitted it—there was nothing in Everetteville for them. April’s gifts would go to waste. So what the hell was he so afraid of?
It occurred to Adrian that maybe there was a gap of experience preventing him from understanding Chandler’s thoughts. After all, he wasn’t a father. He hadn’t gone through a rough divorce and had to raise a baby on his own. His life, in perfect honesty, had not changed so much from when he’d gotten out of the army. Shit, it hadn’t even changed so much since high school. He’d hardened up some, sure. But what responsibilities did he really have?
After dropping off his load, Adrian parked his semi at a local lot and took a bus to his apartment, a studio on the south side of town. The place was small and sparsely decorated; Adrian hadn’t bothered with much interior design since he spent more time in his truck than he did at home. For the most part, he used the apartment as storage space for the few belongings he had.
After taking a shower, he stretched out on the twin sized mattress shoved in the corner of the room and slept.
He drew in another drag of his cigarette and Chandler did the same with his. A string of Humvees roared by, carrying a squad of men off to some mission that no longer concerned the two of them. They’d be on a plane for home the very next day.
“I know what we said,” said Chandler. “But I just can’t seem to abide with the idea of never talking to you again.”
“What do you got in mind?” Adrian asked. “Staying up all night on the phone like a couple of teenaged girls?”
“I’m more of the writing type,” Chander replied, straight-faced.
“E-mail?”
“Hell no. Can’t hardly find my way around a computer. I’m talking about letters.”
Adrian laughed. “I should’ve known. So, you want to be pen pals? Yeah, sure, we can do that. That’d be nice. Make sure to spray a bit of your cologne on there too, and leave a kiss mark while you’re at it.”
Chandler punched him on the shoulder. They were both laughing, but Adrian felt melancholic on the inside. The reality was finally hitting him—they’d spent their last intimate moments with each other, and soon enough the closest they’d get would be words on a piece of paper. But maybe that was better than not ever talking again.
He’d pretended he was fine with their agreement. Chandler had been the one to suggest it, and he knew that he was right—what they had couldn’t continue. But he wished it could. The way he felt about Chandler made no sense, but it was real and powerful, and it was difficult to imagine ever feeling this way about another person ever again.
“Hey, McGee,” Chandler called to one of their squad mates who was passing by. “Mind taking a picture of me and this jackass, here?” He pulled out a disposable camera and tossed it over to him.
The photo captured Adrian standing with Chandler in front of the transport truck that the two of them had used to hide their night-time unions. His shirt was off, his weapon slung across his sweat-gleaming chest and gripped in his right hand. On his face, he was wearing a smile that hid the deep and aching longing for the man next to him, who he’d fallen deeply in love with.
Adrian jerked awake. Looking around, it took him a moment to remember where he was. It always happened when first coming home from a long time on the road. After washing up, he ate a bowl of stale cereal and then tossed the remainder of the box. Thoughts of Chandler were fresh in his mind, especially after that dream. He scooped up his jacket from where he’d thrown it the night before, and from the inside pocket pulled out the photograph.
He’d taken it out of Chandler’s copy of Rainbow Six while he’d been busy giving April a bath. He felt a little bad for stealing it, but told himself that Chandler would get over it. Or maybe he wouldn’t even realize it was missing. He put the photo up on the fridge, sighed, and then took it back down. Why the hell had he even taken it? He needed to be forgetting, not holding on so tightly. He hovered the photo over the trash can, but couldn’t throw it away. It wouldn’t be right to just throw it away after stealing it, so he slipped it into a box where he kept some of the letters that he’d exchanged with Chandler.
“Mom? Hey, it’s me, Adrian. Yeah, Mom, I’m back in town. ‘Course I will. I’ll be over today. Need me to pick anything up for you? Sure? Alright, I’ll see you later. Love you too. Bye.”
Adrian went down to the parking garage and pulled the cover off his old Ford pickup truck—the same one he and Dad used to work on. After one false start the engine growled to life, and he pulled out and hit the road for his childhood home. On the way, he made a stop at the grocery store to pick up some food. Mary-Ann Stokes may have said she was doing okay, but Adrian knew that she was trying not to trouble him.
“Oh, dammit, Adrian. I told you I was fine,” she said, opening the front door for him. “Come on, hand me over one of those bags.”
He passed her the lightest one, and went to the kitchen to unload.
“You call this fine?” he asked as he peered into a nearly empty fridge.
“I’m just one person,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. “You’d be surprised how far that much will go. Besides, I could stand to lose a few pounds. Come here, honey.” She took him by the shoulders and pulled him down to give him a kiss on his cheek.
“Hi, Mom,” he said. “Everything been okay? You get that check I sent?”
“Yes,” she sighed, pouring him a glass of sweet iced tea. “You don’t need to send me so much. I’ve got social security and a bit of savings. You’re the one who needs to be saving money.”
“I just want to make sure you’re alright,” he said. “I’ve got some put away, myself. And I don’t spend much.” He walked to the living room, sipping on the tea. “So, you been doing okay?”
“I’m fantastic,” she said, joining him. She seemed to be slower than he remembered, her face a little older and more weathered. Maybe that was just the result of not seeing her for a few weeks. The subtle changes you don’t notice when you’re around someone a lot suddenly seem very apparent after you’ve been away. She sat down on the couch and watched him as he looked at the pictures on a side table. He picked up a framed photo of him and his father standing proudly in front of the same pickup truck that was now parked out in the driveway.
“Doesn’t it get a little quiet around here?” he aske
d.
“The nurse comes by once a week,” she replied, shrugging. “The TV is plenty of company, otherwise. How was your trip?”
“Fine,” he said. “Took me to Arizona, Nevada, and Arkansas. I, uh, I saw an old friend. An old army buddy, Chandler Longman. He was with me in Iraq.”
“No kidding? What a small world. You ran into him?”
“No, he lived in the town I went to in Arkansas, so I looked him up.” He walked to the window and stared out at the line of beech trees that provided dappled shade to their street. There used to be a tire swing hanging from one of them. Dad had put it up, and would push him around in it. Now there were no more kids on the block to use it, so it’d been taken down years ago. He thought about April, and wondered if she’d like using a tire swing. Was everything going to make him think about Chandler, now?
“Oh,” Mom said. “You two were good friends?”
“We were.”
“It’s nice that you kept in contact. He must’ve been happy to see you.”
“Yeah. He’s got a daughter now. He’s raising her all on his own. I never would’ve imagined him as a father, let alone a responsible parent.”
“People do change. I had one girlfriend in high school, goodness, did she like to party. Drinking, smoking, a new boy every month. She dropped out before graduating. Always thought she’d end up pregnant, or homeless, or something like that, but she turned her life around. She’s retired now, I imagine, but she used to be a realtor. I’d see her mug on bus stop benches all the time.”
“Have I changed? Since the army, I mean.”
“Well, sure. You gained a few inches in the waist area.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
She laughed. “You seem to be more serious than you were before. But you’re still as flighty as you always were. But that’s fine, if being on the go is what makes you happy.”
Did it make him happy? It was at least better than standing still.
But why?
He’d never questioned it before, but the answer was clear to him now. It was because of Chandler. After coming home from Iraq, he still felt the grip that Chandler had on his heart. It was that hold that kept him on the road. He really was wandering in an unconscious effort to stay ahead of the void that only one person had the ability to fill.
“Yeah, maybe,” was all he could muster.
Now that he’d seen Chandler again, and lost him for the second time, he realized that he’d been waiting for someone who would never come. Chandler was afraid, just like he was. Maybe it was time to stop and finally put down roots. Maybe it was time to start his own life. No more wandering. No more running.
“Are you okay, honey?” Mom asked.
“Fine,” he said. “It’s just got my mind running, that’s all.” He went over and kissed her on the top of her head. “So, what’s for dinner?”
She snorted. “Is that why you went out and bought groceries?”
After helping to take care of some household chores, including changing the oil in Mom’s car and going through her cluttered e-mail inbox, they cooked dinner together—a simple lasagna with homemade meat sauce, Adrian’s childhood favorite. After washing the dishes, he sat on the couch with Mom and watched TV for a few hours, but his mind was elsewhere.
The following day, Adrian got a call from one of the contracting agencies that connected him with new delivery jobs. He’d never felt reluctant to take a gig before, but today it was just about the last thing on his mind.
“Got a shipment of vehicles going to California from Virginia, livestock to Wisconsin from New Hampshire, nondescript electronics to Arizona… These contracts all start next week. You’ve got your pick of the litter, Mr. Stokes.”
“Anything going to Arkansas?” he asked.
“No, that’s all I’ve got.”
“Alright. Thank you. I’m going to check the load boards, then I’ll get back to you.”
He logged onto the load board, a website where contracts were posted for any available truckers, and checked to see what was going into Arkansas. There were three jobs, all to Little Rock. He started to formulate some plan in his mind for how he could get on out there and divert his return trip through Everetteville, and then shut the website in a burst of frustration. Here he was, warping his life in order to put him closer to Chandler. Had every decision he’d made over the past five years been influenced by his feelings for Chandler in some way?
It was time to start living his life for himself. It was time for a change.
Struck with a new and fierce determination, Adrian made a silent promise that his delivery to Everetteville was his last. His time as a long-haul trucker was over, and along with it, any remaining faith that he and Chandler had a chance at a life together.
He had to move on. He had to stop wandering, pining for something that could never be. He had to forget about Chandler, or else waste the rest of his life waiting.
A week later, Adrian was depositing the money made from selling his truck into his bank account. It was enough to cover the remainder he owed on it, with a bit extra. That extra money wouldn’t be around for long. He’d staked his entire savings along with a small business loan on his new plan—an auto garage, just like he’d talked about with Chandler.
He would run the place himself, and he already had a small list of waiting clients; people he knew through driving, old friends, and friends of Mom’s. He was confident that things would work out—a confidence that stemmed from his unconscious determination to prove Chandler wrong.
Adrian had told himself that he was done with him, but he still found his mind wandering back to Everetteville. Every decision he made seemed to be colored by what he felt for Chandler. He played with the idea of hitting up the bars to find someone to distract him, that maybe having a woman in his bed might help make him forget about the one man he wanted to be there, but in the end, he decided against it. He’d played that game before, and it never helped. Besides, something just didn’t feel right about it, like he’d be betraying Chandler.
It was fucking ridiculous, thinking that way, but he had no control over it. Why the hell did he feel like he was betraying someone who he wasn’t even with? Someone who had no desire to be together with him?
The more he thought about it, the angrier it made him, and it pushed him harder to make the shop work.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you so fired up in your whole life, not since you and your dad used to work on cars together,” Mom mused.
Adrian was over at the house helping her repair a leaking sink, and was filling her in on the progress with the shop.
“You’re just happy that I’m settled in Rosebridge,” he replied, laughing.
“I’m proud of you,” she said. “Could’ve been all the way in Arkansas and I still would’ve thought you were making the right decision. I am glad you chose home. It’s nice to know you’ll be around. Maybe I’ll even see a girl in your life, soon? And some grandchildren, God forbid?”
“Now that’s pushing your luck.”
“Don’t give me that, Adrian. Once your business starts growing, you ought to find yourself a partner and settle down. It ain’t fun to get old and lonely, you know?”
She said it jokingly, but he knew that she was speaking from experience, and it hurt him to hear her say that. She hadn’t wanted to remarry since Dad died, and being in this house by herself had to be very lonely. “I know, Mom. For now, I’m trying to make this work the best I can. I’ve got a space secured. I’m signing the papers next week.”
“That’s wonderful, honey.”
It was getting to the point where Adrian wondered if he might live as a single man for the rest of his life. He did want to give Mom a grandkid, but he just couldn't imagine meeting a woman any time soon—or later, for that matter. It was far too soon for him to think about any type of romance.
When would he be free?
Any thoughts always seemed to bring him back to him, and as much as he hated to admit
it, he enjoyed thinking about Chandler.
Maybe he’d always be wrapped up in the man’s spell. Maybe he’d never be able to stop loving him.
After all, they’d been through so much together. Chandler had always been there to watch his six. They both had put their lives on the line for the other many times. They’d survived through many close calls, when friends and brothers-in-arms sometimes had not. Chandler was the one person in that place that he trusted and relied on entirely, and the bond they’d shared had transcended the bounds of a normal love.
8
“Thanks for hosting April’s party, Lexie,” Chandler said as the two of them cleaned up the mess left in her apartment by nine sugar-loaded toddlers. Three months had gone by since the wind had carried Adrian back in and out of his life, and April had just turned five years old.