by Jay Bell
“Are we sneaking in the back door again?” he asked. “Caesar?”
The only response was a gentle snore, Caesar gripping him tighter like he was a teddy bear. Jason shook his head and laughed, wondering how he was going to carry a six-foot-tall wrestler up to his bed.
* * * * *
Church was just as dreadful as Jason had expected. Of course it didn’t help that he and Caesar had gotten home at two in the morning, or that the adrenaline from their race down the freeway had kept him wide awake. He alone seemed to suffer from this. Caesar had practically sleepwalked up the stairs with him, fallen into bed, and returned directly to dreamland. Jason had tried to undress him so he’d be more comfortable, a gesture that always looked romantic in movies but in reality involved lots of tugging and shoving around of dead weight. In the end, Jason got him down to his jeans. Afterwards he sat there another half hour, watching Caesar sleep.
Now he was paying the price. Stifling another yawn, he ignored the pastor’s lecture on giving back to the community and instead glanced around at the flock. Most had gray, white, or missing hair—older people trying to make friendly with God before they went to meet him. Jason did a double-take when he saw buzzed blond hair, not because of the strong neck, but because the profile was familiar.
Sensing his stare, the person turned to look in his direction. Kurt—his brief minigolf partner and Caesar’s closest friend. He looked hungover from the party last night, but then again, Kurt was always rough around the edges. Even now, decked out in a suit, he looked more like Mafia-hired muscle than a wholesome church-goer. After a quick upward nod, Kurt returned his attention to the sermon. Jason tried to do the same, but felt distracted. When this was all over, was he supposed to go over and say something? They were friends with the same person, but not exactly friends with each other.
As it turned out, the decision was made for him. Once he and the Hubbards had spilled out of the church, he saw Kurt walking toward him. Jason met him halfway, glad he did so when he heard what Kurt had to say.
“So, you and Caesar, huh?”
Jason swallowed, remembering the extremely public kiss last night. “Looks that way. Kind of a shock, huh?”
Kurt scoffed. “I’ve been friends with Caesar since the third grade. Nothing about him surprises me. Not anymore.” He dug in his suit jacket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Smoke?”
“No.”
Kurt put a cigarette between his lips, talking even as he tried to light it. “What I want to know, is how serious you guys are.”
This took Jason aback. “Huh?”
“Like, are you his boyfriend? Or are you doing the friends with benefits thing too?”
Jason’s face burned, mostly because he didn’t know the answers to these questions. Still, he felt he should at least pretend he did. “We’re pretty serious.”
Kurt nodded. “That means poor Steph is all on her own again.”
Jason relaxed somewhat, seeing where this was going. “Yeah. She was actively searching at the party last night.”
“For real?” The cigarette fell from Kurt’s mouth. He bent to pick it up, looking hopeful when upright again. “Man, I should have been paying attention instead of getting wasted. She have any luck?”
Jason shook his head. “Nope.”
“Maybe you can put in a good word for me. Tell her I’m interested. No, tell her you think I’m interested, but that you aren’t sure.”
“Okay.”
Kurt stared at him as he pulled on his cigarette. “What else should I do?”
“How should I know?”
“You’re gay, right? You’re like half-girl, half-guy. You should know what women want.”
Jason raised an eyebrow and laughed. “I’m not half-anything. And I don’t know jack about relationships. Caesar is my first… everything.”
Kurt smirked. “So no advice?”
“Be nice to her?” Jason said. That seemed pretty safe. “I’ll talk to her, all right?”
“Thanks, man.” Kurt spit on the ground, then nodded over his shoulder. “Looks like your ride is getting impatient.”
He turned to find the Hubbards waiting by the car and went to join them. On his way, he considered the idea of Steph and Kurt as a couple. That would get her safely out of the way, and give her something to do besides text Caesar when she felt lonely. How hard could it be? All he had to do was convince her that Kurt was sexier than he was creepy.
* * * * *
Jason burst into the room. Caesar, stretched out in bed, looked up from his cell phone and gave him a rude “what the fuck?” expression. Or maybe he was just surprised at Jason showing up in the middle of the morning on Saturday, when everyone else was at home.
“I’m on laundry duty,” Jason explained.
“Oh.” Caesar pointed toward his bathroom. “In there.”
He stayed where he was and glared. “Have you even taken a shower yet?”
“No.” Caesar cocked an eyebrow. “Are you all right? You look tired.”
“Maybe because for the last month, I’ve been up every night sucking your—”
“Hey!” Caesar said, laughing nervously as he swung out of bed. Then he hurried to shut the bedroom door. When he turned around, he didn’t look pleased. “What the hell is going on?”
“I’m sick of doing all these stupid chores while you lounge around. The whole damn week has been like this!” Jason hadn’t been doing chores, but the endless family obligations were grating on his nerves. School had been demanding too, which meant all he had time for were quick visits to this room every night. “I’m not your whore,” Jason hissed. “And I don’t want to be your maid.”
“Okay,” Caesar said holding up his hands. “I’ll help you with the laundry, all right? We’ll get it done together. Then I’ll take you out somewhere nice.”
“Not possible, because I’ll have some stupid chore rewards shopping trip I have to go on.”
Caesar’s eyes brightened and he snapped his fingers. “We’ll go to the shooting range! Dad keeps talking about the upcoming hunting trip. You need to learn how to shoot for that.”
Jason’s anger was replaced by abhorrence. “I don’t want to go hunting!”
“You do if you want to be a Hubbard,” Caesar said. “Don’t worry. It’s all just standing around in the woods. Nothing ever happens. Anyway—you, me, and a shotgun. Sound good?”
“No,” Jason said honestly. “Although it’s better than shopping with your mom. Last time she made me pick out five different ties.”
Caesar grinned. “We won’t stay long at the shooting range. I’ll show you the absolute basics, and then we’ll go do something fun. That’s what you need, right?”
Jason felt his lips twitch but held back. “That and help with the laundry.”
True to his word, Caesar hauled the hampers downstairs, and as each load came out of the drier, he helped Jason fold and put away the clothes. Naturally the great and powerful Caesar lifting a finger around the house attracted attention, but they played it off like they were eager to get to the shooting range. This became harder to pretend when they were actually finished and Caesar was loading a long black bag into his car.
“Is that yours?” Jason asked.
“Yeah. We keep all the guns in my dad’s closet, but this one is mine. Peter has one too. No doubt you’ll have your own someday.”
“Oh boy,” Jason deadpanned.
“Don’t like guns?”
He shrugged. “They’re kind of scary.”
Caesar shut the trunk of the car. “They can be fun too. You’ll see.”
He drove Jason to the western edge of the city limits where a large shooting center occupied a portion of an even larger park. As they got out of the car, the air was filled with gunshot so frequent that it reminded Jason of exploding popcorn. Caesar seemed completely at home here, leading them to the registration desk and taking them through the process with bored familiarity.
“You come here
a lot?” Jason asked.
“Quite a bit, yeah. Dad likes to shoot, which means I’m supposed to like it too. What we’re doing today is easy. You’re lucky Dad is out of town on business or he’d be tagging along and making this more stressful than it needs to be.”
They were handed a cardboard box which Jason carried so he wouldn’t have to handle the gun. Then they walked through the complex until they were out on a field. Here the gunshots were much louder. Jason flinched at first, but shots were being fired so often that his instincts gave up on trying to warn him. Their destination was a simple wooden structure resembling a doorframe to nowhere. A table sat next to it. He set the box on the table, scooting it over as Caesar unbagged his gun. Jason didn’t hide his apprehension.
“Another first for you?” Caesar asked. “I remember you making that face the first time you saw my gun.”
Jason rolled his eyes. “So what is that thing? A rifle?”
“Nope. This is a twelve-gauge shotgun.”
“I thought those had two barrels?”
“They can. This one is a single.” Caesar moved the cardboard box to the ground so he could lay the gun sideways. “Let’s go over some basics.”
Jason tried to keep up as Caesar pointed out each part and explained its purpose. The only information Jason committed to memory was where the safety was. Aside from that, he figured shooting was a matter of taking aim and pulling the trigger. Then Caesar made him hold the gun, which wasn’t as intimidating as Jason had expected. Childhood memories of playing with toy versions came back to him, and while the long barrel was heavy and the stock made of real wood instead of plastic, he tried to get into the mindset of this being fun.
The cardboard box held stacks of clay discs called pigeons, which could be loaded into a simple machine one at a time. Jason liked that part. He put a disc in the machine, pulled a lever, and the disc was flung high into the air. Laughing, he did this three times in a row.
“Stop wasting them,” Caesar said, shotgun in hand. “Wait until I say ‘pull.’ Then I’ll blow the poor pigeon out of the sky. Ready?”
After they had both put in earplugs, Caesar stepped into the empty doorframe and pointed his gun at the sky. “Pull!” came his muted command.
Jason pulled the lever and watched the disc as it soared into the heavens, muscles tensing as he waited for a loud explosion.
Nothing happened.
He looked to Caesar, who was laughing.
“I had the safety on!”
Jason shook his head and loaded another pigeon. This time when he was told to pull, the clay pigeon was just beginning to drop from its ascent when it shattered into pieces. Jason looked politely impressed, but felt genuinely so when nine out of ten clay discs met their end this way. Thirty discs later, Jason was asked the question he’d been dreading.
“Want to try?”
“Okay.”
Caesar had to show him how to hold the gun right, then fix his stance, and finally, adjust his head to be in the right position. Jason was beginning to feel like an action figure by the time Caesar finally returned to the table.
“Pull.”
He shot as soon as he saw the disc, even though the barrel wasn’t pointing at it. The gun jerked in his hands, the noise not as jarring as expected but still flinch worthy. Of course he missed his target. Caesar gave him a thumbs up anyway and readied another. Jason managed to get the gun reloaded, which felt like an accomplishment, even though he did nearly get smacked in the face by the ejecting cartridge.
The second attempt didn’t go much better, nor did the next dozen, but after some coaching from Caesar about shooting the pigeon at the apex of its ascent—and about twenty more tries—Jason finally hit his first target.
“Yes!” he shouted, surprised by the rush. “I did it!”
Caesar laughed. “Congratulations. Today you are a man. Now move over so I can have my turn.”
Jason found himself almost unwilling to hand back the gun, discovering a new appreciation for the sport and the skill needed, especially as he watched Caesar shatter another eight. Then it was Jason’s turn again. They ran out of ammunition before they ran out of targets, but at the end of an hour, Jason had managed to hit another pigeon.
“Not bad for your first time,” Caesar said as they walked back to the complex. “My dad is going to be thrilled you got a head start. A little more practice and you’ll be ready for the big trip.”
“Hunting for animals,” Jason said, his smile fading.
“Like I said, nothing ever happens. Peter might bag a rabbit or a squirrel and think he’s hot shit because of it, but mostly it’s just us standing around in the woods looking stupid.”
“Then why bother?” Jason asked.
“Because we always rent a cabin,” Caesar said, “and that means we’ll have our own room. Peter will bunk up with Dad.”
“Yeah, okay, but there’s nothing we can’t do there that we don’t do at home already.”
“We can lock the door,” Caesar said. “Then I can hold you in my arms until morning. No more worrying about sleeping in too late and Mom finding your bed empty.”
Jason waited for the perverted twist, but that was it. Caesar wanted to be able to hold him without fear of being caught. Suddenly, a hunting trip sounded positively romantic.
When they returned to the car, Caesar’s phone was buzzing on the driver seat. Jason waited patiently as Caesar sat there and responded to text message after text message.
“Steph?” he asked after ten minutes of this.
“I’m almost done,” Caesar said. Five minutes later, he glanced up and seemed surprised to see Jason sitting there. “Sorry. Wanna grab a bite to eat?”
“Only if you leave the phone in the car,” Jason said.
Once seated at a Mexican restaurant, he was disappointed to see the phone had come inside with them. At least Caesar had the decency to shut it off after a few more buzzes.
“What’s her deal?” Jason asked. “She seems so together when I talk to her.”
“Steph?” Caesar asked. “She has it together. Believe me. Sometimes people get a little needy, that’s all. You understand that, right?”
“Yeah,” Jason said grudgingly. “But I hope she finds a new boyfriend soon. I don’t like competing with a phone.”
Caesar chuckled. “She won’t stay single for long, don’t worry.”
“Speaking of which, what about her and Kurt?”
“Kurt?” Caesar shook his head. “They don’t have anything in common.”
“Nothing?” Jason pressed.
“Not really.”
“They say opposites attract.”
Caesar didn’t look convinced. “Steph is elegant. She never loses her temper, always chooses her words carefully. Kurt is… rough. They both have messed-up parents, but besides that—”
“Messed up how? I already know about Steph’s dad.”
“Kurt’s mom is a pill junkie. She’s either wacked out on something or mean because she’s trying to get clean. It’s always one or the other. Kurt’s really good at coping though, and a lot of the advice I give Steph about her dad comes from him.”
Jason leapt on this. “Then that’s what they have in common! Kurt can comfort her—”
“I can’t imagine Kurt comforting anyone.”
“—and Steph will round out his edges a little. All we have to do is get them started.”
Caesar shook his head and laughed. “You really want her paired up, don’t you?”
Jason didn’t share his amusement. “When we got back to the car, how many text messages or whatever were waiting for you?”
“Does it really matter?”
“Just humor me. How many?”
Caesar broke eye contact and frowned. “I don’t know. Fifteen. Twenty.”
“That would be normal if you were writing back after each one. Instead she just keeps hitting you with a barrage of them until you do respond.”
“She gets lonely.”
“She needs help.”
“She’s fine.” Caesar looked back to him. “You could get yourself a cell phone, start competing.”
“Maybe I should,” Jason said. “I could text you even when we’re together. Might be the only way to get your attention.”
Caesar raised an eyebrow. “I’ll talk to her, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Happy?”
“Yeah.”
He wasn’t though. As the waitress brought their food, he once again found himself torn between the likable Steph he talked to in person and the intolerable texting maniac who kept interrupting his time with Caesar. Jason had considered gently mentioning the issue to her, but he hadn’t seen much of her the previous week. She hadn’t shown up at Caesar’s wrestling meets like she used to. At the time, he had taken that as a good sign, but now he wasn’t so sure.
“Don’t say anything to her,” Jason said. “Let’s just try to get her and Kurt together. See if that helps.”
“Fine.”
Caesar worked on assembling a fajita while Jason examined the special he’d allowed the waitress to talk him into. As far as he could tell, his meal consisted of cheese-stuffed peppers. Conversation was stilted for most of the meal, Jason wishing he hadn’t brought it up. When the table was cleared, he ordered dessert just to buy time. He didn’t want them going home and ending the day like this. Luckily, he found inspiration when a group of older women were seated at the table across from theirs. He felt a little guilty because something Steph had mentioned was about to bail him out, but whatever.
“Makes me miss my grandma,” Jason said. “How about you? Are your grandparents still alive?”
Caesar nodded. “Most of them. My dad’s parents are both still kicking. My grandpa on my mom’s side passed away when I was little. I don’t remember much about him.”
So far, not at all interesting. “I guess I’ll meet everyone eventually,” Jason tried. “I hope so. I usually like grandmas.”
