Love in Tandem

by Natalie Arden

  Ignoring the muffled complaints from the couple about the lack of selection and the smallness of the garage in which he kept his rental bikes, Scott set them up and watched them cycle off with an unspoken sigh of relief. A relief that quickly faded when he returned to his seat behind the rental desk and realized that he had worse problems to deal with now.

  The situation truly wasn’t fair. He’d done his research before he picked this particular flavor of appointment software for the bike rental side of his cycle repair shop. It was supposed to be simple to install, simple to use, and totally compatible with way more obscure accounting programs than the one he was using.

  Instead of that, he’d had nothing but problems since day one. Appointments that never showed up on his copy of the schedule. Appointments that duplicated and reduplicated themselves until Scott was frantically preparing practically his whole fleet of bikes and considering borrowing extras from his friends, only to have a single dude show up and be shocked by the four hundred dollar bill for what he’d intended to be a single bike. It wasn’t that these problems weren’t fixable. Scott was pretty used to customer service after years of owning his shop, and he’d managed to make the sale almost every time – excluding the extra twenty bikes that one guy clearly didn’t need. But taking time to fix broken appointments was taking time away from the meat and potatoes of his business: bike repair.

  The bike rental was supposed to be a sideline. A way to make a little extra cash without taking too much of his time. But the administration side of it was turning out to be hell.

  He opened his accounting software with trepidation, just to check. As expected, the transaction he’d just completed had failed entirely to show up on his spreadsheet, despite hitting sync at the end of his transaction the way he always did. And, when his eyes scanned down the list of other transactions from the past few days, that wasn’t the only error.

  It was enough to make a guy consider going back to the pen, appointment book, and answering machine methods he’d started out with. But Scott knew, despite his frustration, that that wasn’t going to be enough. That was good enough for the locals, but the out-of-towners who wanted to rent bikes to tool around the conservation area, or who came in with their own bikes after slipping gears not meant to take the joggling of dry creek beds, didn’t think it was up-to-date enough. They liked the front of the shop to look small and quaint – aside from the latest model or two that Scott always kept in the window display – but once they got inside, they wanted emailed receipts, quick credit card transactions, and everything to take two seconds to complete. Writing out receipts by hand was barely on their radar.

  What all of that meant, annoyingly, was that Scott was going to have to fix his appointment bookings and his accounting software, and – based on where his finances stood in the spring after a slow winter for the cycling business – he was going to have to figure this shit out on his own. He could do this. He wasn’t stupid. He’d always been better with his hands than with a keyboard, but he wasn’t stupid. These programs advertised themselves as practically running on their own.

  How hard could it really be?

  3

  Eamon

  From the outside, his parents’ house looked much the same as it had when Eamon was young. Same solid yellow bricks, carefully tended garden, and curtains carefully drawn against the possibility that the sun might fade the upholstery.

  From the inside, it was a different story. There had been a smell to the house he’d grown up in: something undefinable, but homey. Something unforgettable. Now the house smelled like nothing, or maybe a little bit like the lemon cleanser the property management company used. The furniture wasn’t the same as it had been when he was young – he’d replaced most of the old stuff before his parents had retired – but that hardly mattered when it was covered in dust sheets awaiting a return that no one had really expected to happen.

  It was a common enough story, Eamon assumed. He’d helped his parents to retire in Florida for the winter, and by the time their second summer in the south rolled around, they’d been too settled in to want to come back to the tiny town he’d grown up in. On his salary, it was nothing to keep the house around until they decided what to do with it, and the thought of it had come to him when he was trying to figure out somewhere to hide out for a while.

  Technically, it was his house anyway, though even if his parents’ names had still been on the deed, they wouldn’t have prevented him from coming to stay for a while. That is, if he’d told them of his plans.

  There were so many questions they’d inevitably have, and Eamon didn’t feel equipped to answer any of them. The anger had seeped out of him in the days since he’d been removed from his office by security, and all that was left was the sinking feeling that he’d failed. He’d let his company down. He’d let his workers down.

  He’d let his parents down.

  They’d been so proud when he’d started his app straight out of university. Even when it was just him and a couple of coders in an office, they’d been proud of how independent he was. Of how much he was doing on his own. That was what they’d taught him after all: that there was no point in asking for help if you could do things on your own.

  That was the kind of attitude that had let Eamon take his company skyrocketing past the competition before he’d turned thirty. His personal attention to every detail, even when the company had expanded beyond those few coders and he had a lot less personal input on the code itself.

  It was a lesson he’d been grateful for, more than enough to ensure that his parents were looked after for the rest of their lives. It was a shame he couldn’t see them as often as before, but he flew down to Florida on his rare and overbooked vacations, and that would have to be enough.

  Technically, Eamon could have gone down there now and hid out among the retirees at their luxurious retirement village, but the thought made his blood run cold. He couldn’t face his parents now, not with his failure written all over him. He’d try to see them soon enough, but for now he’d take grateful advantage of their old house.

  He walked through the quiet rooms ripping dust sheets off pieces of furniture at random and leaving them in untidy heaps on the floor. It didn’t do much to make the place seem more lived in, but it would have to do for now. Tomorrow, he could call the property management company and ask them to send a cleaner in early. They could get the place back to normal, or something that seemed more or less like it.

  If there was anything about the situation that could be said to be normal.

  Eamon hadn’t spent much time in Sellis Creek since high school, and virtually none since his parents’ move to Florida had made his Christmas and Easter visits a non-starter. It wasn’t too far from Columbus but there was no reason to come back here. Not for Eamon. No people, no culture, no work, and no gay community. He’d fled for the bright lights of civilization the first chance he’d got and he’d made sure that everyone he’d known back home knew he’d left for better things. That was why it was the perfect place to stay for him to stay flying under the radar.

  Far enough and small enough that no one would look for him here, yet close enough to the city that he could be back in town at a moment’s notice. In case he had to come back and fix all the problems he was sure were cropping up at work without him, for instance. It made his fingers itch to think about how far out of the loop he’d flown in less than a week’s absence. So far, Kevin hadn’t said much about problems, focusing his infrequent missives on the plans for the next board meeting, but Eamon figured that was Kevin being kind. Unnecessary, but kind.

  The fridge, unsurprisingly, was empty. The few provisions – milk, cereal, a carton of eggs – that Eamon had picked up at a gas station on his way over looked lost and alone in the perfectly cleaned white interior. He’d had to turn the fridge on too. He’d forgotten about that. But it would probably be cold soon enough.

  New appliances aside, the kitchen was the room that should have most resembled his
childhood memories. The remodeling his parents had finally allowed him to pay for had brought in new cabinets, a fridge with a complicated set of ice settings, and a better table, but the general layout of the room had stayed the same.

  Instead, the inescapable emptiness of the cupboards and the pristine condition of the mat by the back door made the room feel even more alien than the rest of the house.

  He moved through the upstairs even more quickly, tossing off dust sheets with an energy that belied how quickly the house was sapping his strength from him. It was a decent-sized house – certainly much bigger than his penthouse in the city – and yet it felt as if it was smaller, almost closing in around him and entrapping him in uncalled for memories.

  Living here had not been that bad, Eamon reminded himself firmly. Dull, mostly. He’d been a bit of a geek in high school – the kid who knew more about computers than anyone else cared to find out – and gay on top of that. It hadn’t won him too many friends, but neither had he been bullied more than anyone else. His parents had been a little confused by both of these things, but they’d still loved their only son, and they’d been proud when his nerdiness had blossomed into a job he’d made all on his own. They weren’t as sure about either of the boyfriends he’d introduced them to in the past, but given that both those relationships had gone down in flames, maybe they’d just seen something there that Eamon hadn’t while he was still in that first flush of love.

  Besides, he wouldn’t be here all that long, and he’d barely have to interact with the locals. He could handle buying groceries or whatever from someone he’d known in high school. His real life was back with CarreSys.

  He looked around his childhood bedroom with dissatisfaction. It had been a guestroom for years, of course. There was nothing left of the child or the youth he’d once been. But it would have been weirder to sleep in the master bedroom among the perfectly preserved relics of his parents’ winter life.

  At least this room was empty. Plenty of space in which to start fresh. He tossed his suitcase into a corner of the room and went in search of sheets to apply to the naked bed.

  Later, while waiting for his takeout dinner to be delivered, Eamon wrote and rewrote an email to Kevin. Someone should know where he was in case of emergency, right? And he still wanted Kevin to update him on the board’s activities, on their progress towards the takeover that he – somehow – was going to have to stop from too far away. The thought was almost enough to make him want to run right back to the city immediately, but instead he sat among the dust sheets on the couch and thought grimly through his options. There would be time enough for his reappearance later.

  4

  Scott

  Mid-morning on a Wednesday wasn’t exactly Scott’s busiest time, so he was in the back, running inventory on the spare parts, when the bell above the door chimed its cheerful greeting.

  “Be there in a second,” he called out, setting the clipboard down on the last shelf he’d checked to remind himself where he should pick up again.

  No response. There hadn’t been any appointments in the book – though there was still the possibility that his website was failing yet again – so maybe someone was just in to browse? It was a little early for the teenagers from the local high school to come in and drool over the mountain bikes they couldn’t afford, but maybe someone had a half day. Scott quickened his pace, wiping dust from his hands onto the thighs of his jeans as he pushed open the door to the main shop, and stopped dead, the door thumping shut behind him.

  The guy standing in front of the window display was definitely not from the local high school. Not from anywhere local at all, Scott was pretty sure. He wouldn’t say he knew every face in Sellis Creek, but he could be pretty sure that he wouldn’t ever forget a face like that.

  In profile, as he looked over the bikes in the window, the man had the strong jaw and the delicately arched nose of a Greek demigod. As he turned toward Scott, dark brows framed clear gray eyes that seemed to take Scott in at a glance. His mouth was fixed and still, but there was a hint of a curl to his lip that made Scott wonder what he’d look like when he laughed.

  Not a local, for sure. Locals didn’t tend to wear sweaters like that: the thin, expensive kind that draped just so over broad shoulders and looked like it had been tailor-made to accentuate the slim curve of his waist. Maybe it had been: anyone who wore a watch like that probably had the money for tailoring, and those jeans looked pretty fitted too, unless that was just how perfect his ass was all by itself. Which didn’t make sense for a tourist either, actually. Even the ones who brought his bikes back mysteriously damaged because they didn’t understand the outdoors still usually dressed more casually if they wanted to head out to the conservation area.

  On the other hand, they generally didn’t look as good as this stranger.

  Scott swallowed – hopefully subtly – and said, “Good morning! How can I help you today?”

  “Not sure,” the stranger said, deep voice like honey seeping its way over Scott’s annoyingly hopeful heart. “I used to ride a bit. Was just passing by and thought I’d see what you have here.”

  “We have bikes for sale and for rent,” Scott said. “I do some custom builds if you had something specific in mind, though you might have to wait a little while for parts on order. Where were you thinking of biking?”

  “Around...town?” The stranger sounded confused.

  “There’s some lovely trails out in the conservation area,” Scott said helpfully. “It’s a little further out of the way, but the spring foliage is really beautiful, and the birds are starting to nest again.”

  “The conservation area?” The stranger’s mouth twisted. “That old dump? Really?”

  “It had some hiccups,” Scott admitted, squashing down his desire to defend his hometown. “But there was a big clean-up effort five or six years back and it’s really lovely now.”

  The stranger shrugged. “If you say so. I haven’t seen it in maybe fifteen years.”

  A snicker forced its way out of Scott’s mouth. “Okay, fair enough,” he said, his shoulders relaxing a little. “Anyone might be suspicious if that’s what they’re thinking of. But it’s a completely different place now. You’d be shocked.”

  “I’ll take your word on that,” the stranger said. There was a glimmer of humor in his eyes now, and it only made him hotter. Scott was going to be drooling on the counter if this kept up. “I distinctly remember it being good for only one thing.” He raised an eyebrow. “Maybe two. And you’d better not let your parents know about either of them.”

  This time, Scott didn’t even try to smother the laugh in his belly. “It’s different now,” he said ruefully. “I can promise you that much.”

  “A whole lot of things are different now,” the stranger agreed. He looked around the shop again, taking in its proprietor as well as the selection.

  “Well, I had to finish school before I could build up the emporium of wonders you see before you,” Scott joked. “Sorry it took so long.”

  “The shop?” The stranger looked puzzled for a moment. “Yeah, there definitely wasn’t anything this nice here when I was growing up.”

  Scott flashed him his best grin. “You’re welcome.”

  The stranger’s hand went to his mouth as though to cover a smile, and Scott fought the urge to rip it away and see what this total hottie looked like when he wasn’t being a dick about Scott’s hometown. He leaned on the counter instead, watching the crinkles form at the corners of the stranger’s eyes.

  “So you grew up here too?” Scott asked after a moment of slightly awkward silence.

  “Yeah.” The guy shrugged “But I haven’t been back in a while.”

  “Too bad about that,” Scott said, looking the stranger up and down. Subtly, of course. The kind of look a guy could explain away if he wasn’t interested. But specimens like this didn’t walk into Scott’s shop every day: of course he was going to take his chances.

  “You really think so?” I
nstant disdain, but there was something oddly familiar about it. If it cracked in the middle, maybe, or if it was talking about something else...

  “Yeah.” The word came out sort of garbled as Scott tried to place the stranger again. Take off the fancy clothes, age him down a decade or more, give him a much worse haircut… “Man, this is going to seem super weird, but were you in Mrs. Batista’s English class?”

  “She taught here for a million years,” the stranger said, smirking. “Wasn’t everyone?”

  “Okay, fair.” Scott waved a hand. “I mean, the same year as me. The year Bryson broke his collarbone and had the dumbest cast in the world. Sitting up front like a scarecrow, blocking everyone else’s view.”

  “Shit.” The stranger looked almost haunted. “That was the year all right. And he couldn’t hold the book up properly so he got out of reading aloud for an entire semester. I could have done with an injury like that, frankly.”

  “Me too.” Scott grinned widely, leaning even further across the counter. “Though it might have fucked me over in shop class, and that was the only thing I was actually any good at in all four years.”

  “I should have guessed,” the stranger said, looking at the bike parts surrounding them.

  “Got me where I am today,” Scott said proudly. “But I don’t think you were in that one with me, right? Just English.”

  “God, no.” The stranger shivered visibly. “Just English. Though I have to admit–” And self-deprecating looked good on him too, the bastard. “–I can’t quite recall your name.”

  “Scott.” He held out his hand across the counter. “I can’t remember yours either, I’m afraid.”