by Rachel Kane
“I’ve never been a boyfriend. So I have no information on whether I’ll be good at it or bad at it. I don’t even know what to compare it to. Clearly it’s not like being a CEO, because when I make command decisions without you, it hurts you! Nor is it like being a brother for what I hope are obvious reasons. Charlie…I could be awful at this.”
“Sure, I realize that. But that’s not what I’m asking. I’m asking for a promise from you.”
He looked so sorrowful now, the way he’d looked when he was at my door. Wary, as though I might refuse the promise. As though I might turn out to be like everyone else in his life.
“I promise you that I am not a violent person,” I said. “Far from it. I would rather run and hide. Like you, I suppose. We’re a lot alike. I promise you, I will never hurt you like those men hurt you. I can’t promise not to be clumsy and ignorant. That’s just me. I don’t know what I’m doing in this world. But I can tell you I am never cruel.”
Maybe it was enough. Maybe it was the right thing to say. Charlie’s face softened, and he dropped his sack onto the floor.
“I’m scared, Val. I love you, but I’m scared. Do you understand how many times I’ve been hurt?”
“I do. And that’s why I promise never to try to help you again, I will never offer to protect you or buy you things—”
“Wait—”
“Because I understand now how gifts must look like threats to you. So I’ll never offer you one again.”
“Wait, wait, Val… No, that part, I need to apologize for.”
I blinked. “I’m confused. Aren’t you mad that I helped you?”
“Well, yes, but I think I was wrong to be? I mean, shouldn’t people who love each other try to protect each other? Isn’t that part of the bargain?”
“I would have thought so,” I said, “but given your past—”
He flopped onto the couch. “It’s so confusing.”
“So I should help you and buy you things and work behind the scenes—”
“No!”
“So I shouldn’t help—”
He threw back his head and laughed, and I couldn’t help it, I laughed too.
“Oh god, Val, I am so confused.”
“Just tell me the rule, Charlie, and I’ll follow it.”
“That’s just it. There aren’t any rules. There shouldn’t be. I love you. Why should I get pissed off that you want to give me a gift? I shouldn’t. But my history…”
“Maybe I should offer first, and then listen to your answer? You could turn down every offer, if you wanted to…but at least you’d know I cared enough to make them? I cannot bear to see you hurting, Charlie, and I would do anything in my power to protect you…if you’d let me. But I can listen to you. I will blurt my intentions, and you can veto them, and then you don’t have to worry about me going behind your back. Eventually I think you could learn to trust me, couldn’t you?”
“You’re the most trustworthy person I know,” he said. “That’s the part I forgot, when I got scared. I felt like you were manipulating me, but you weren’t. You were trying to help. Badly, I might add.”
“Agreed.”
“Because damn, I really don’t have a job now.”
“I can talk to the mall people if that would help?”
“Oh god no, please don’t,” he said, but he was smiling.
“Then…can we try again?” I asked. “I know, I’ll take back the bike. That will be a good symbol of our trust in one another.”
“Um…no. I’m definitely keeping the bike.”
I blinked in surprise. “But I don’t want you to think it’s too extravagant.”
“I’m sure I’ll find a way to pay you back.”
I glanced at the bedroom. “We do still have an awful lot of condoms and lubricant.”
“Seems like a fair trade,” he said.
I sat next to him and reached for him, tentatively, not sure if it was allowed. He sank into my arms and kissed my chin. “So…are we back together now?” I asked. “Can I tell Theo?”
“There’s one more thing,” he said.
“For me to apologize about?”
“No, for you to think about.”
He slipped out of my arms and picked up the sack he had left on the floor. He dumped it out onto the table. Hundreds of letters, more letters than he’d had before. “This is the other part of it. This is something I want to ask you about. We’re both looking for our place in the world. Maybe this is it.”
“Answering children’s letters to Santa? I know you have the elf costume, but I think I would make a stiff, off-putting Santa—”
“No, no, helping kids in need. That’s what I’m thinking about. I saw your eyes when you first saw the letters, and when we talked about the food bank. You want to help people. I want to help people. Maybe…maybe that’s our new job? We could start a charity. You could organize it, you could make all kinds of charts and do the planning, and I could handle the people side of things, hiring, managing, talking to the public…”
He didn’t even have to finish the sentence, before my mind went into overdrive. There was a lot to think about. Setting up a nonprofit is a very different process than a corporation. Even things like the retirement plan for our future employees were handled differently. We’d need a lawyer. Maybe a team of them. More immediately, we’d have to canvass the currently existing charities in town, finding out what was being done, so we didn’t overlap. We’d have to coordinate—
“Earth to Val?”
“Quickly, Charlie, grab the wrapping paper and one of those markers!”
I ripped the plastic off the wrapping paper and opened it onto the table, blank side up, and began writing, putting my words in boxes, drawing arrows to denote lines of communication.
“Hey,” he said.
The key would be starting small and focusing: Do you work on housing, by buying up available properties and figuring out how to distribute them to people in need? Do you focus on healthcare, and offer free clinics? Is it better to feed people, or clothe them? Educate them, or give them jobs? Should you—
“Ahem,” said Charlie.
I glanced up. His elf shirt had somehow come undone, and was slipping over his shoulders. He wasn’t wearing anything underneath it, and his muscular chest had never looked more inviting. I dropped the marker, and it clattered off the table onto the floor.
“Don’t you think we should celebrate our new project?” he said. The shirt slipped to the floor. Oh, look, his elf pants had come undone too. He wasn’t wearing anything under them, either.
I didn’t hesitate. I drew him towards me…
…and finished unwrapping him, like he was a present just for me.
27
Charlie, Christmas Eve
Two days later and they’re finally emerging from Val’s apartment. Charlie’s nervous. Tired, warm, happy, but nervous. They’ve hardly been out of bed, and his legs are trembling.
“What if they hate me?” he asks.
Val scowls. “They’re not going to hate you.”
But Charlie’s not sure. Val seems a little nervous too. Charlie almost wants to say, let’s skip meeting your family, let’s stay in, we can watch Christmas movies and drink eggnog and no one will judge me for not being good enough for you, but that’s silly. The joy on Val’s face these past couple of days has removed any doubts in his mind.
They’re in love, and they’re perfect for each other.
So there’s nothing to worry about, right?
It doesn’t stop him from being nervous. The whole drive down, he’s plucking at his new cashmere sweater. Somehow Val found time to provide new clothes for him. When? He doesn’t know. Val is mysterious sometimes. How were the clothes a perfect fit? And yet they are. He can imagine Val, secretly on the phone, reciting Charlie’s measurements to a boutique. What were sizes, after all, but more numbers? Anyway, Charlie couldn’t stop looking at himself in the mirror. He’ll get back to his flannel shirts soon enough,
but for today, he’s going to look upper-crust.
The house is out of town. They pass miles of farms, forests, fields of cows and crops. Last night was the first snow of the season, and everything is lightly dusted with white. It turns everything clean and beautiful.
Here’s something he just realized: For the first time in a long time, he’s actually tranquil.
It doesn’t make sense. He’s nervous about meeting Val’s family. They’re so rich, they live in a world he doesn’t understand at all.
And yet…he belongs. Val’s arm is around him, and anywhere Val goes, he can go too.
He never knew you could be nervous yet also at peace.
He doesn’t have to be afraid anymore. That’s part of it. That’s a huge part. There’s nothing wrong with having a protector…it just has to be someone you trust. And he has never trusted anyone the way he trusts Val.
Hell, just the things they’ve been doing to each other the past few days have required a ton of trust, as well as every ounce of his strength. It turns out those chin-ups he used to do at the bus, come in handy for certain positions.
But he’s got to get his mind out of the gutter, because they’re here. There’s the lake, calm and gray under the snowy sky, and as they round a curve…there is the house.
It seems wrong to call it a house. It’s a mansion. Huge, old, stately in a way that suggests security and safety. Val hardly gives it a second look, but Charlie is rapt. He’s never been into a house so big before.
He doesn’t have to touch the doors. The driver lets them out of the car, and before they get to the front door, someone has already opened that for them. Someone takes their coats (because now Charlie has a winter coat, and will never be cold again) and shows them into a room with an enormous fire roaring in the fireplace.
There’s a Christmas tree twice the size of theirs, towering to a high ceiling, laden with ornaments. Tinsel and holly decorate the moldings, and everywhere you look there are rich reds, golds and greens; there are candles; there is food. It is a world of plenty.
“So this is him,” says one of the two men near the fireplace. “The Christmas elf.”
“Hello,” Val says. “Theo and Micah, this is my boyfriend, Charlie.”
“Hi,” offers Charlie.
Theo stares at him a second, then at Val, then breaks out into a huge smile. “You didn’t tell me he was gorgeous.”
Charlie’s used to a certain kind of admiration, a sense that he is being weighed in the balance, his looks tallied up to show his value as a human being.
That’s not how this feels. Theo and Micah aren’t staring at him hungrily…there’s a warmth and generosity to them, like Charlie is a long-lost relative. It’s like how your aunt tells you how handsome you are, just before pinching your cheek. There’s something innocent about it.
Of course Charlie knows that this is the result of long conversations. He’s heard Val in the other room, talking to his brother. Hushed negotiations, like an under-the-table business deal: I don’t care what Mother thinks, Theo, he’s mine, and she’ll have to get used to it. Yes, you will too.
He and Val didn’t talk about that. In a way, Charlie didn’t want to spoil it, this idea that Val was bravely defending Charlie, the idea of Charlie, against his skeptical family. This was Val at his best, calm, methodical, slowly plowing down every objection until everyone saw things from his point of view.
A lot of work had gone into this moment, and when Charlie saw the warmth in Theo’s eyes, he knew it was genuine: Val had convinced his brother that Charlie was really The One.
Or had he?
“So, there’s one thing,” says Theo. “A promise Val made to me.”
“Come on now, it’s not the time for that,” says Micah. He looks sympathetically at Charlie. “They’ve been talking nonstop about you.”
“I was promised a private conversation with Charlie,” says Theo, “and I intend to collect. Hell, it’s better than Mother talking to him.”
“That’s true,” say both Micah and Val simultaneously.
Except now Charlie is nervous again.
There’s a long hall, and on every side are huge, well-lit rooms, all decorated, all aglow. Theo is already halfway down the hall.
“It will be okay,” says Val. “I’ll go with you.”
Charlie is ushered into a room lined with books. There’s a portrait above the fireplace, of some very old man who looks a little like Val, only bald and angry.
Theo takes the armchair next to the fire. The fire lights his face in an odd way, makes him mysterious.
“Have a seat,” Theo says. It might have been a suggestion, but to Charlie it feels like a command.
Why does he feel like he’s in trouble.
Theo’s eyes flick over to Val. “Give me a few minutes with them.”
“Theo—”
“Hey. You promised.”
Charlie shoots Val a look: Help me! But Val nods to his brother, and begins to leave. One last touch on Charlie’s shoulder.
Then the door is closed, and they are alone.
Val hasn’t prepared him for this. Maybe it didn’t occur to him how strange it was. Maybe this happened with everyone they brought home.
That didn’t make it feel any more comfortable.
“Look, it’s weird and awkward to talk about this stuff, and I sure as hell don’t want to do it in front of people,” Theo says. “But there are some things I need to say. I spend a lot of time worrying about Val. God, you know what our mother said this morning, when she heard you two were coming? I quote: A family like ours is something like an enormous, complicated garden, that requires frequent tending. When unruly branches shoot up, they need to be snipped.”
He makes scissors of his fingers, snip, and Charlie shifts uncomfortably in his seat.
“We’re an old family, with a lot of old traditions, and working for our company is one of them. Val was part of that great tradition, far better at it than I ever was. But now that’s gone, and he’s on new territory.”
Charlie thinks of the plans, the wrapping-paper chart, all the steps Val has outlined. But he’s scared to say anything.
“I’m afraid at first I had fears like my mother’s,” says Theo. “Tending a garden isn’t just about snipping branches, it’s also about scrutiny of who comes into the garden. The deer who wander over the fence to eat your flowers. The moles digging underground, destroying your plants at the root. And I was scared you might be a parasite, coming to feed off my family’s legacy. I hate how blunt that sounds…but I wanted to be honest with you.”
He’s watching Charlie carefully, and Charlie senses that a moment has come, a test. This is what he has been nervous about all day, and the reason Val has seemed on edge as well.
He can argue with Theo that he is not a parasite. That would be one valid response. He’s not interested in Val’s money, and everything he has gone through recently has been because he’s not a gold-digger, he’s just the opposite.
Another tactic would be to say Theo has no right to judge. That the whole idea of needing permission to love Val, the idea that they need to bow before the family, is ancient and ridiculous. That they’re grown men, and don’t need anyone’s permission to be in love.
But he puts himself in Theo’s shoes for a moment. This family has been through a lot. Val wasn’t the only one who left the company, after all. And Charlie has heard about their mother’s illness, her recovery, her continued weakness and frailty.
And he realizes that Theo’s garden metaphor isn’t about power. It isn’t about permission at all.
It’s about continuation.
He’s not telling Charlie that he sees him as an intruder.
He’s telling Charlie he thinks Val needs protection from the world.
“I know what you mean,” he says. “I’ll watch over him. I think he’s stronger than you realize. He’s honest, he’s thoughtful, and when he knows what he wants, there’s a power to him that is unstoppable.”
“He was a great businessman,” Theo says.
“And he’ll be great at the next chapter of his life too. But yes. I will watch out for him. I’ll make sure he doesn’t get lost.”
It’s strange to talk about Val like this. But the look of relief on Theo’s face tells him that he has said the right thing. Theo nods and sighs.
Charlie feels a tremendous amount of respect in the room right now. Theo’s respect for him, for not arguing, not trying to defend himself, but understanding the questions.
Val starts to apologize, when Charlie emerges into the hall, but there’s no time for that, not with the way Charlie rushes into his arms. He hugs Val tight, kissing him.
“Did it— Did he—?”
“It’s fine,” says Charlie. “Theo’s just looking out for you, that’s all.”
It’s like a weight has been lifted off of Val. For the first time today, he sees Val smile. “It’s not that I needed his permission,” he starts to say, but Charlie shakes his head.
“You don’t have to explain. I’m just glad we hit it off.”
Dinner is a feast, and Val isn’t touching any of it. The turkey and the duck, the ham and the roast, none of it lands on his plate.
“Aren’t you hungry, dear?” asks his mother from her place at the head of the table.
“Actually, I was in the mood for hashbrowns,” Val says. “With onions.”
“I’m just relieved it’s not spaghetti,” Charlie says, and Val laughs.
“No, I’m never touching that again!”
Nobody at the table understands why they’re laughing, and for some reason that just makes it funnier, and Charlie’s practically in tears, leaning against Val’s shoulder.
“What is a…hashed brown?” Mother asks, looking around at the family, and now the whole table is laughing.
It’s late now, almost time to go home. The air is crisp, and Charlie is glad for his new coat. Their feet crunch against the frosted grass, as Val leads him to the dock that juts out into the lake.
“Oh my,” Charlie says. The gray clouds of earlier have blown away, leaving a crystal-clear sky overhead. The moon seems enormous, almost close enough to touch, while the stars might be tiny snowflakes, shining in the light. There’s not a single sound to distract from the view, except the rush of the wind and the creak of ice.
