by Brandon Witt
The thoughts raced in Wesley’s brain. What the hell was he supposed to say to that? If he validated Travis’s fears about his kids getting teased, which they would, he might as well tell Travis to get out of his bed and never come back. However, if he pretended otherwise, he’d be showing Travis just how selfish he wanted to be. And in that vein, the thought that screamed the loudest was the thrill of Travis referring to them as a unit.
“I can’t figure out what I’m supposed to do, Wesley. Wendy says the kids will be fine. That if I’m happy, they’ll do better, and they’ll grow up strong enough to be whoever they are.”
Wesley smiled. Thank God for Wendy. “She’s right. They will.”
Travis raised an eyebrow, waiting.
Feeling like he was being tested, Wesley pushed on, saying what he did not want to say. “Travis, I really do think what your sister is saying is true. I really do. I also think that your concerns are true too. I’m sure some jackass will say something about their dad being… about you and me. But I also think kids get teased all the time. If it’s not one thing, then it’s another.”
“Yeah, I know. But it’s different if it’s about me. If my kids are getting teased because of something I choose to do.”
Let’s move away. Let’s move to California or New York, where it won’t be a big deal. Let’s escape this town. Go somewhere we can be a family.
Wow, Wesley. Move fast much? And talk about selfish—suggesting the kids give up their home so you can be with their dad is the definition of selfish.
“I wish I knew what to say, Travis. I feel like anything I say is going to be wrong.”
Travis smiled, looking at Wesley again. “That’s exactly how I feel too.”
They looked at each other for a long time. It took everything in Wesley’s power to keep silent, to keep from begging Travis not to leave him. It was difficult enough to make him feel pathetic.
Yeah, that was helpful.
When Travis spoke again, his words were whispered. “I don’t want to lose you. I don’t want to stop this. I also don’t want to hurt my kids. But, I lo—”
Wesley felt his eyes grow large, and he tried to keep his expression stable. He was certain that he failed. Was Travis about to say what he thought he was?
Travis’s body tensed for several moments, then slumped, almost as if in defeat. He met Wesley’s gaze, his expression direct and confessionary. “I love you. I feel silly saying it. Like it’s too soon or some shit, but I do. I’ve only felt this one other time, so I know what it is. I love you. I even told Shannon several days ago.”
Before knowing Travis, the idea of some guy telling his dead wife that he loved him would have sounded creepy and just plain weird. However, now that he was in it, Wesley couldn’t imagine anything better. The fact Travis had “talked it over” with Shannon made it more real than just about anything he could imagine.
Wesley couldn’t keep from beaming. “I love you too, Travis. So much. It scares me how much I love you.”
Travis smiled back. Gentle, if not a little sad. “I know you do.”
Wesley waited, wanting to pull Travis to him, to kiss him and have him inside again, this time without the damned condom. Something in Travis’s expression held him back.
“I love you, Wesley.” Travis’s hand squeezed Wesley’s, their fingers still intertwined between them. “Honestly that makes it so much harder. I think I would know what to do if I didn’t love you. I could end it. Chalk it up to really great sex or something. But I do. I love you.”
Wesley wanted to hear why. He wanted to have that romantic exchange of each of them listing all the things they loved about the other and sharing the exact moment they realized they loved the other. He wanted giddy. He wanted sweet. He wanted full-out, hot and heavy sexy. He wanted… something besides this tension-filled declaration of love.
“I feel like I’m supposed to say I’m sorry for making you love me or something. I feel like it’s bad.” He hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but he couldn’t deny the truth of his words.
Travis leaned closer and kissed him before pulling away. “I don’t want you to feel like that. Not at all. I just wish it were easier. That it wasn’t so… complicated.”
“I’m willing to do whatever I can do to help make it better.” Wesley fished for ideas. What in the world could he do? Though Travis had lived in El Do longer, he was new to the whole being gay and out thing. Although now that he’d thought of it, Travis actually hadn’t gone quite so far as to say that. Whatever. It was just a label. Meaningless.
Wesley caught the expression that crossed Travis’s face—the one Travis seemed to quickly try to erase.
“What? What is it, Travis? I can tell you thought of something. What can I do to make it better?”
Travis offered a forced smile and shook his head. “No. Nothing. I think I’m just desperate. I’m sure we can figure it out. Right?”
There was that naivety. Wesley wasn’t so sure they could figure it out. But there was nothing he wasn’t willing to do to give it a try. “Just tell me. Please.”
Travis hesitated again, making Wesley think he was going to refuse.
“Well, maybe….” He cleared his throat. “Maybe you could butch it up a bit?”
Wesley flinched. “What?”
Travis looked at him, desperate pleading in his eyes, his voice full of apologetic defensiveness. “You know, just be a little more manly about some things or something? Maybe that would make it a little easier on people….”
Wesley tried to not be hurt. He really did. He also tried to stuff down the flare of anger. “What do you mean? Do I embarrass you?”
Travis rushed forward. “I don’t mean you’d have to change much. You know. Just maybe dress a little more normal.”
“Normal?”
“Not so fancy. Maybe less purple or something.” Travis still wasn’t meeting his eyes. “Maybe walk a little straighter?”
“Walk a little straighter?” Wesley cringed inwardly at the squeak in his voice.
“Well, you kinda swish at times.”
“You want me to be straighter?” There was that new shame. Maybe he was experiencing life backward. Wasn’t shame supposed to be early on, when you were figuring yourself out? Not after two decades of being an out and proud gay man. But it was there, and it was greater than the shame John Wallace had ignited, yet it was brought on by the man who’d just claimed to love him.
He was not going to cry. He wasn’t going to. He wasn’t sure if the tears burning his eyes were from anger or hurt, but they were there, blurring Travis’s form.
He was not going to let them fall.
He turned onto his back, letting his head lay against the pillow, and stared up at the dark ceiling.
Travis reached out, trying to take the hand Wesley had withdrawn. His voice filled with an apologetic tremor. “I’m sorry, Wesley. I shouldn’t have asked it like that. Just forget I said anything.”
He wasn’t going to make it. Wesley felt a tear roll down his cheek. Thankfully it was on the side of his face away from Travis. His voice cracked as he spoke, betraying the tears he kept hidden. “I think you should go now.”
He felt Travis’s body freeze beside him. “Wesley, really, I’m sorry.”
“Just go. Please.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
THE BULL’S gaze bore into his back as Travis unloaded the feed from the bed of the truck. He turned, looking the buffalo in the eye. The nearly two-thousand-pound animal didn’t so much as bat an eyelid, just stared with an accusing glare.
“Really, Jarrod? You’ve got to give me shit too?”
As if in confirmation, the bull blinked and continued with his silent indictment.
Travis looked down, meeting the brown eyes of Dunkyn, who looked rather insignificant next to Jarrod. Dunkyn too leveled a judgmental stare at his master. “Yeah, I’ve heard it from you all day, Dunk. Go chase the buffalo.”
Dunkyn didn’t oblige.
&nb
sp; The buffalo and corgi weren’t the only ones to pass judgment on Travis Bennett. He’d felt it ever since he’d gotten up that morning, though he’d only managed an hour or two of sleep after coming back from Wesley’s.
He’d heard it in the way Wendy slid his huge thermos of coffee across the kitchen counter.
He’d seen it in the way Mason smiled gently up at him as Travis woke him for school, and in the way Avery thanked him for braiding her hair with the gold ribbon woven into the strands.
He’d felt it when Caleb looked over his shoulder as he walked up the school sidewalk and told his dad he’d see him after work. Travis could hear the undercurrent, the resounding question of why his dad would screw things up with the vet when Caleb had defended him at such a great cost.
Dolan’s licks were less frantic and more repulsed in nature.
Krissy knew her boss was a prick. The way she showed him her progress toward her high school diploma reeked of accusation. From somewhere in her belly, the baby found time between dividing and multiplying cells to mock him.
Even Wendy’s fucking rabbit had glared at him when he’d stopped by The Crocheted Bunny to bring Wendy a cheeseburger at lunch. Nutmeg had stared at him with her creepy pinkish red eyes and called him a coward. A coward and an asshole. A coward and an asshole and a hypocrite.
Only Jason didn’t lay blame on him. Of course, Jason wouldn’t even look in his direction. To him, Travis was nothing more than an invisible ghost, something he had to walk around and give great effort to avoid, but a ghost, nonetheless.
Travis turned his back on Dunkyn and Jarrod and the entire herd. He could feel some of the females staring at him from deep in Mr. Walker’s woods. He continued to unload the feed, ignoring the animals’ judgment. As it had all day, his body shifted to autopilot as his mind pondered his guilt.
Guilt was too strong a word, really. It was just a matter of timing. He probably shouldn’t have said he loved Wesley and then immediately asked him to man it up a bit. In his defense, Travis reasoned, he hadn’t been planning on asking Wesley to change anything. Of course, he hadn’t exactly planned to confess his love, either. Sure, he’d told Shannon, but he hadn’t been ready to take that step with Wesley, not yet. However, as soon as he’d said it, though scary, it had felt right.
He did love the man.
He’d known with Shannon quickly too. Of course, that had been the knowing of a teenage boy. It had grown, just as he and Shannon had grown. If anything, though, that fact gave him more confidence in his feelings about Wesley.
He’d known love—true, undying love. The breakup, fight, argue, changing the babies’ diapers, morning breath kind of love. The kind of love that remains after the lust disappears, when the manners wear off, when you wanna strangle the other person. The kind of love that allows the lust to reappear, even with all that other shit mixed in.
Too soon or not, Travis Bennett knew love. And he knew he was in love with Wesley Ryan.
He also knew he was in lust with Wesley Ryan.
And he knew he loved that combination.
He and Shannon had been through a hell of a lot worse than asking the other to change a couple of things. For fuck’s sake, Shannon had loved him in spite of him fucking other men!
Wesley was just too sensitive.
Maybe it was just a gay thing. Maybe because Wesley was more feminine than himself. Shannon was sensitive too. She’d come unhinged when Travis had told her she acted like a bitch sometimes when she was on the rag.
Man, had she screamed. She’d even thrown something at him. What had it been? Not a plate….
A pang shot through his chest as he realized he couldn’t remember.
Whatever it had been, they’d fought, they’d yelled, they’d gotten over it. She didn’t get all quiet and then tell him to leave.
Wesley was just too goddamned sensitive.
The eyes burned into his back. He couldn’t tell if it was Jarrod or Dunkyn. He refused to look and continued to toss out the feedbags.
Plus, Wesley had asked if there was anything he could do to help. Travis hadn’t just pulled the request out of his ass. The man had asked how to help make things easier on his kids.
Was it really that much to ask? To not wear some damned foo-foo designer jeans and Easter-colored shirts? Maybe a scarf wasn’t always necessary anytime it was below fifty degrees. Was it really that hard to move your shoulders instead of your hips when you walked?
Maybe Wesley just needed to wear a pair of boots.
Drive a different car.
Not play with the fucking Barbies every time Avery and Mason wanted to. Or at least not ask to play with the Barbies with them.
However, he kinda loved watching Wesley play with the dolls. It wasn’t like Travis hadn’t spent countless hours playing with the Barbies as well.
He loved the fuck outta Wesley’s guts for driving that pansyass car with a fucking rainbow sticker around town.
As far as being able to move that ass? He didn’t remember any of the guys in college being able to get fucked like that.
Travis tossed the last bag of feed out of the back of the truck and hopped down, then stripped off his jacket and threw it over the side of the truck bed. Though it was still snowy, the afternoon sun was warm. Travis glanced over toward the field. Jarrod had wandered off toward the females, but Dunkyn remained where he’d been, though he’d sat down in the snow.
They stared at each other.
“Fine, Dunk. You win. I’m an asshole. Got it.” He patted his thigh, and the dog bounded over the snow, pausing to lower his head into the powder and burrow toward Travis for a few moments before popping his head back up. Travis chuckled. “I might be an asshole, but you’re the dumbass.”
Dunkyn padded the final few feet up to Travis, only pausing when he was beside him and looking up, expectantly.
Obliging, Travis bent and scratched the dog’s ears. “All right, let’s get this shit moved into the barn.”
Though Emmitt Walker had more money than God, Travis hadn’t been able to convince the man to upgrade any aspect of his barn, even though he offered to sell him the items at cost. Mr. Walker liked things traditional. Travis had taken him to his own remodeled barn in hopes of convincing him. Mr. Walker had taken less than three minutes, didn’t even let Travis finish showing him all the bells and whistles, before proclaiming that Travis had gone soft, that he might as well have turned his barn into a spa.
In truth, Travis enjoyed both extremes. There really was something more satisfying about working at Mr. Walker’s farm, even if Travis was able to be more efficient at his own. In addition to wanting to keep things authentic, Mr. Walker was also a perfectionist and a bit of an elitist. Or at least he didn’t share well. It was fine for him to drive his trucks and tractors into the barn, but God forbid Travis back his truck into the barn to make unloading easier.
Travis didn’t really mind this either. Mr. Walker, though unwilling to share his toys, paid much more than Travis felt was needed for the work he did. Travis had said as much, but Mr. Walker always waved him off. More than any of it, though, Travis didn’t want to lose the buffalo, or his access to the property. There were too many memories here. Too much of the past two decades—times with Shannon by the pond, summer picnics with the kids, teaching Caleb how to fish for catfish. Mr. Walker’s farm felt as much like home as his own house did.
Dunkyn stayed by Travis’s side, walking back and forth from the pile of feed by the truck to the barn as Travis transported the bags inside. As he often did, Travis spoke to the dog, bouncing his thoughts off his old friend.
“I guess, if I’m being honest, I’m the one who’s afraid of what people will think. I want my kids to be brave. To be whoever they want to be, no matter what the fuck anyone else says.”
Dunkyn looked up as Travis paused with two bags over his shoulder and peered down at the dog.
“Is it teaching them to be brave to be with Wesley, or am I just being selfish? Is all the brave
shit just spin?”
Trying to wag his quarter-inch tail, Dunkyn only succeeded in waddling his butt back and forth in adoration.
“Caleb was for sure brave with the fucking Jackson kid. And Wesley doesn’t even seem to think twice about what people think about him. He moved from the city to here to take over someone else’s business and didn’t even try to hide what he was. Takes guts, right?”
Dunkyn continued to wag, this time adding a tongue loll or two just to show support.
“And Shannon… well, I know what she’d tell me to do. And she’d have loved Wesley.”
The slamming of a door caught Travis off guard. He hadn’t heard anyone else drive up. Letting the feed down off his shoulders, he left it on the concrete of the barn floor and walked toward the open door.
Emmitt Walker was walking toward the barn, his truck parked just on the other side of Travis’s. Though never overfriendly or demonstrative, the man looked even more cantankerous than usual. He looked up and paused when he saw Travis in the doorway. “Hey, Bennett.”
Travis stepped out of the barn and walked toward the other man. “Hey yourself, Mr. Walker. How ya doing today?”
Mr. Walker didn’t answer but bent down to scratch Dunkyn’s head as he waddled up to the older man. Mr. Walker hadn’t taken to Dunkyn when Shannon had bought him for Travis. Like Travis, he’d considered the smaller dog a substandard excuse for what a dog should be, until he saw Dunkyn darting in and out of the buffalo’s hooves, herding them effortlessly. From that moment on, he’d been a die-hard fan of the dog.
Travis waited until Mr. Walker and Dunkyn’s bonding moment had passed and Mr. Walker stood back up.
“I saw your truck down here from the window.” Mr. Walker gestured up the hill toward his small mansion of a house.
