by RJ Scott
No parent will want you anywhere near their kids, you fucking idiot.
The only silver lining was that Dad had set up a trust to pay all four years of my tuition, used it as a tax write-off, so I didn’t have to leave college. Even if I do end up sleeping on a bench in the middle of a Minnesota winter, just to be able to stay and study. I shuddered at the thought and glanced out of the window at the sleet and hail smashing against the glass. I knew the college had emergency housing they could give me for a few days, but it was never intended for a long-term situation and certainly not for enough time to get through to the end of the year, not to mention the remaining time with my chemistry degree. When I had that degree, I could do anything, but even that had been slipping from my grasp, slowly but surely, as I fucked up assignments and had nearly burned down the lab during my last practical.
I died a little more inside when I cast a look at the people waiting for me to talk, and my gaze snapped to Hayne’s. His eyes were the color of chocolate, and I lost myself in them for a moment until he blushed and glanced away.
Those same eyes had shown fear at first until he’d found out that I was heading for the same place as him. I thought he’d seen nothing but a jock when he’d met me, and I’d noticed that reaction from some of the students on campus before. I wasn’t small. Hell, compared to Hayne I was a giant, and he might’ve known me, and may even have heard about my aggression at the last game. It seemed like a lot of people on campus had heard about my steroid abuse and me losing my shit if the pointed looks I received were anything to go by. I wondered if the concept of me going to a grief group made me feel as less of a threat to him. All I knew was that there was compassion in his velvet eyes. I cleared my throat and waited for words to come to me.
What exactly had I done for Christmas and how could I explain without having to elaborate?
“The usual,” I finally offered. If usual was eating Cheetos and drinking water for Christmas dinner or watching the ball drop on a crappy TV that kept fizzing and popping as it tried desperately to show me colors.
Monica, the leader of this group, was a motherly type; an older woman, all soft and cuddly around the edges, with brown hair. She sent me an encouraging smile, and I knew she wanted more from me. Hell, shouldn’t I be breaking down right now, sobbing out my story, about how my brother died, how it was my fault, how my dad couldn’t look at me, how my mom was a ghost in her own house? Wasn’t that what they wanted to hear?
None of those words made it out of my head, and so the turn passed to the girl sitting next to me, dressed from head to toe in black, with thick kohl-rimmed eyes and an angry expression. Obviously I wasn’t the only one who didn’t want to be here.
“I hate this mandatory shit,” she snapped and tugged her sleeves down, drawing attention as she did to the marks on her wrists. She pulled at the threads that were stark against her pale skin, and I tried not to stare. It was all I could do to stop myself from offering my fist to bump in agreement. Seeing a private counselor after Luke’s death had been bad enough, but being forced to sit in a room with other people and talk about myself? That was hell.
Goth-girl sighed heavily. “Okay, whatever.” It soon became obvious that the angry attitude wasn’t just an act. “I’m Alice. Yes, it’s after the book, and yes, I hate it. Mom had breast cancer, stage four. She died on Christmas Eve last year. Dad lost his shit, ended up being committed. I went to an aunt who was a real bitch, always on my back, but Dad came home early December, and I spent Christmas with him.” The whole monologue spilled out in what seemed like a single breath. “So yeah, it was a blast, and it’s not like I fucking give a shit about any of them.” She air quoted the words, and I suspected her Christmas had been as awful as mine.
I waited for her to add something, but she deliberately turned to the boy sitting next to her with a very loud, “Next!”
The student was startled, jumped in his seat, and I recognized him as a fellow science major, physics I think, very clever, normally wore glasses.
“I’m Oscar, uhm… I spent Christmas with my mom and my brothers. We had our cousins over, my grandparents. It was a good Christmas, no time to think about missing Dad at all.” He stared down at his hands and added a wistful, “No time at all.”
There was silence then, and we all looked expectantly at Hayne, who sat, back straight and chin tilted defiantly. He was really something, with his head of messy curly hair that appeared so soft, and those gorgeous eyes brimming with emotion. He’d spoken about the “gay” thing as if I might want to know, and he’d never met me before. I wasn’t exactly out and proud, but I loved whom I loved. I know the proper label is bisexual, but living under Dad’s roof, that was a word we didn’t use. I’d lost the one person who’d understood my sexuality. My brother. Luke wasn’t just my brother; he’d been my friend and confidant.
Hayne still wasn’t talking, and I wondered what the protocol was at this point. Should the baton skip him? Or what?
“Hi, I’m Hayne. I spent Christmas with Mimi and Mom,” he began, and his tone was soft, melodic, full of happiness. I guess everyone else knew who Mimi was because he didn’t elaborate for my sake. “We had a really good Christmas Day, but…” He tilted his chin again, and I wondered if maybe he was working through whatever his grief was with sheer grit and determination. “New Year’s Day was hard because that was always our day, mine and Jay-Jay’s, and I felt incredibly alone, and the meds didn’t seem to want to help me. But then, on January second, it was easier.”
A lot of people nodded as if they agreed with what he was saying, that after Christmas and New Year was done, it was all so much easier.
We went around the room, all five of us saying something, and then we were back to me, and I didn’t have to say anything, but I thought I should because everyone else there had shared a small part of themselves, and I kind of wanted to say something.
“Okay then. So my name is Scott. I’m a hockey player with the Eagles, or at least I was until before Christmas.” I glanced around to see if anyone recognized me or my name, or hell, even hockey. Not one person showed anything but polite interest. “I self-reported for steroid abuse. I wanted… hell, I don’t know what I wanted… but it wasn’t any more of a life without my brother, where I did nothing but fuck things up, and where my home life was strained.” I cleared my throat, as the words were all bunched up and stuck there. “So yeah, Christmas sucked.”
The leader smiled at me, all compassion and understanding, and I couldn’t help myself. I bristled. That set the tone for the rest of the meeting. We talked about coping strategies, academia, and cats. A hell of a lot about cats, which seemed to be goth-girl’s way of coping.
Maybe I need to get a cat. Where would a cat live? In a box with me?
The meeting ended at eight, and I left just as quickly as everyone else, all apart from the kid called Oscar, who wanted to talk to Monica alone.
“You stink,” Alice announced as she passed me.
“It’s my bag,” I defended, but she wrinkled her nose and scurried ahead. She wasn’t making herself very likable with her prickly in-your-face attitude.
“Ignore her,” Hayne said from my side. “She’s not always like that, but holidays suck, right?”
I made a general noise of agreement and hoisted my huge bag over my shoulder, pulling the case on wheels with me.
“You going somewhere?” Hayne asked.
“In between places,” I said and didn’t add anything else, but the look he gave me was thoughtful.
“We should get coffee,” he tugged at his scarf, hiding half his face again. I know we’re about to go out into a storm, but I really wished he didn’t hide his lips. He pushed back the long curls that fell across his forehead with an impatient huff, then unrolled the scarf. Were we not going outside then, or had he understood my unspoken wish? “This way.” He headed down the corridor away from the exit. I had two choices. The first was heading out into the storm with nowhere to go; the second was to fol
low Hayne.
The cute and sexy guy was the lesser of two evils. That was all it was, so I went after him, and finally we were in a back room, without windows but with a working coffee machine. I knew where we must be. It was obvious from the rainbow flags, the notices about sexual health, the posters about love and support. The entire room was a kaleidoscope of color.
Hayne dropped gracefully to his knees, rummaged under a desk, his ass in the air, and I had to stop myself from saying something inappropriate, as any jock would.
“Aha!” Hayne said and pulled out a Tupperware container with a flourish. “Leftover Christmas cookies. You want?”
Given I’d eaten nothing since breakfast, the idea of anything resembling food was a very good thing. He passed the box to me, and I peeled the lid open. Inside, Santas nestled next to angels, and snowmen were stacked next to three Rudolph cookies. These could’ve fed me for two days, but I didn’t take them all. I very carefully selected two Santa cookies iced in scarlet, white, and black. They were the biggest. I nibbled on one and watched Hayne poke at the coffee machine, pressing buttons and muttering under his breath, until with a triumphant smile, he passed me a white coffee.
“I hope you like creamer because we didn’t have any black coffee capsules left. Hermione said she’d get some, but she’s kinda flaky. Last time we sent her out for sugar, she came back with a bag of rice.”
“Rice?”
He grinned ruefully. “Don’t ask.”
“With cream is great,” I said and inhaled the scent of the wonder that was hot caffeine. I finished off the second cookie, sipped at the coffee, and all that time Hayne was staring at me. At first, I caught his gaze and met it head on, and then I couldn’t look at him, because he was staring at me with a hundred questions in his expression.
Not a good thing when I didn’t have any answers.
“So, where are you going?” he asked and gestured at my bags. “What’s in those apart from foul-smelling but expensive hockey stuff?”
I could’ve lied, told him nothing, kept everything to myself, but he was harmless, curled up on the sofa in front of me, a rainbow on the wall behind him framing his face and his soft curls.
“I don’t fucking know where I’m going, okay? I’m out of money, and I’ve fucked everything up so much that my friends aren’t my friends anymore, and I don’t even have a place to stay.” My words were aggressive, and he winced as they spat out at him. He sipped his coffee, then deliberately placed his angel cookie on his knee and hesitated for a moment before sighing.
“Nowhere?” he asked softly.
I shook my head, and the tears stuck in my chest made me press a hand to my heart at the pain. “Dad kicked me out.”
“Because you’re gay?”
“I’m not gay,” I snapped, and he did that whole wincing thing again. I honestly think he expected me to launch myself over and attack him right there and then. “I’m bi.” Saying the words out loud to someone other than Ben or my brother was weird. The shape of the words felt foreign to me, but I was only telling the truth.
He smiled then, a soft smile, and picked up the angel cookie to eat some more. “So they kicked you out for being bi?”
“No.” I huffed a laugh and helped myself to a Rudolph and another fat Santa. “Mom doesn’t even care who I am anymore, and Dad? He’s all about the way people see our family, and it was okay while I did what he said, as long as I tried to make him proud and aimed to be a mini-Luke. But when I decided to stop doing that, and believe me, I did it in spectacular fashion, he was done with me.” I pointed at the bags. “That’s all of it,” I said. “Everything I own or at least everything he thought I’d need.”
“Is Luke your brother?”
I nodded because the words hurt too much to say.
“And you lost him?”
“I hate that term,” I said tiredly and slid down in the comfortable chair. “I didn’t lose him. It’s not as if I’ll ever find him one day. He drowned.”
“I’m sorry. To lose a brother, I can’t imagine.”
I had to know more details of why Hayne was at the group. I couldn’t help myself. “Was it one of your family who died?”
“No, my closest friend, leukemia, six months ago.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.” And I was because it made his soft smile slip to think about his friend.
He concentrated on the cookie, but there was so much pain in him, and I wanted to reach for his hand and reassure him. I didn’t because I wasn’t sure if it’d be welcomed at all, and I was all out of being pushed away by people. He glanced up and tilted his chin, just as he had in the meeting.
“Look, Scott, I know this is going to sound weird, but I have somewhere you can stay for a while. It’s not much, and you’d have to put up with…” He waved his hand at himself, and God knows what that meant. “It’s yours if you want it.”
I stopped mid-bite, Santa’s head remaining intact for the time being. “What?”
“In my house, you can have a mattress on the floor if it helps. We have a shower and a washing machine. You can stay.”
“You don’t know me.” I couldn’t help the disapproval in my voice. He was too vulnerable to be offering a place to a total stranger.
He looked right into me. “Grief knows grief, and I want to help.”
I was lost, and he was an angel offering me space on his floor. There wasn’t anything else I could say. I wasn’t stupid.
“Thank you.”
Four
Hayne
What have you done? What have you done? Hayne, what have you done?
The walk to my house in the howling winter storm was brutal and slow. The sidewalks were coated with slippery sleet and snow, which made walking difficult. The wind was bitterly cold and scoured any exposed flesh. My nose ran, and my eyes watered. Scott, somehow, kept pushing onward, shoulders up, his face, head, and neck exposed to the brutal weather. Ice particles clung to his long, dark lashes. I pulled off my mittens—they were mates to the purple-pink scarf—and offered them to him about two blocks into the walk. He shook his head, dislodging about an inch of snow. A sudden urge to towel off his hair, then blow it dry overtook me. Maybe sit him over the old-fashioned metal grate in the hardwood floor that blew hot air into the attic. Cover him with that dark rose blanket Mimi had made for my bed two years ago. Feed him some of the tuna salad in my dorm fridge and offer him a glass of lemon-lime soda or some corn chips. Perhaps he would smile at me, and we’d cuddle under the soft knitted coverlet as the storm rattled the skylights.
“… more than me.”
A gust roared around the corner of Blue Bonnet Drive, hurling snow and tiny bits of ice into our faces.
“Take them. I have a scarf,” I yelled to be heard over the whipping wind.
He shook his head and crammed his hands deeper into the pockets of his varsity jacket.
I sighed in defeat and trudged on, slipping off the curb as I went to cross the street. Scott helped keep me steady, his fingers biting into my biceps.
“… careful.”
I nodded at the garbled warning, picturing his words being ripped from him and carried skyward to Ullr, the Norse god of snow and skiing. Man, skis would be nice…
We plowed onward, his elbow rapping mine with every step, as if he were staying close in case I fell or was lifted heavenward as his words had been. Knowing he was there was nice.
“That’s my place,” I shouted as we joined Periwinkle Lane. The houses were older on this block, like mine, and probably fifty percent were rentals housing OU students. He shucked his bag higher on his shoulders, and gave me a curt nod. Stepping into the ratty foyer of my house had never felt better. We both sighed at the blast of warmth enveloping us.
“That was the longest four blocks ever,” Scott grumbled, his cheeks windburned and bright red, his hair and eyebrows frozen. I stamped my feet to knock the snow off my boots. Scott did the same.
“The lease is in my name, and my room is up ther
e.” I pointed up the stairs that climbed to the second floor. “Down here is the living room, laundry room, and kitchen. Second floor has two bedrooms which are my roommates’, and we’re in the attic. Oh, and the bathroom is on the second floor, but I suggest you use the corner shower and toilet in my studio. My roommates don’t believe in cleaning. Anything.”
“Noted.”
We peeled off our wet coats and draped them on hooks by the door. Boots were placed on a boot tray to dry. Scarves and mittens were hung over the railing.
I was just starting up the stairs when Dexter came thundering down on the heels of a young woman in a bra and skirt. She shrieked and giggled and bounced around me and Scott. Dexter paused midway down the stairs, his attention riveted on the burly hockey player standing behind me.
“I know you,” Dexter said. I glanced back at Scott. My guest seemed uneasy, his eyebrows knotting up slightly. “Did we meet at that party Ken Inver threw when semester started?”
“Uh, I don’t know. Maybe,” Scott muttered. I tried to move around Dexter, but he simply put a hand on my head and held me in place. I hated it when people did that. Damn jocks.
And yet you’ve invited one to sleep in your sacred space. What have you done?
“Yeah, it was you. Man, you were all sorts of fucked up. Took a swing at Lonkowski,” Dexter said with a grin.
“Sorry, I don’t remember.” Scott was so distant now, his speech cold as the night we’d just come in from.
“No, I bet not. You were a wreck,” Dexter said, slapping Scott on the shoulder in praise.
