Shades of Henry (The Flophouse Book 1)

by Amy Lane

  “Okay. I’ve got a place. Bratwurst for you, grilled veggie kabobs for me. We can do this.”

  Of course they could. Lance made his way to one of those industrial-chic places with a polished concrete floor and sanded wood tables. Inside would have been unbearably loud, but outside on the patio, with the river breeze picking up through the tree-lined boulevard and the sunset sky overhead, it wasn’t bad.

  They chatted about movies and books—Henry had read anything and everything when he’d been on deployment, and Lance was insanely jealous, because the only things he’d had time to read were medical journals.

  It was a fun moment, until their server, a happy, perky girl with blue ends to her curly brown hair and an infectious laugh, left their plates on the table with a happy wave. Lance looked at the veggies on his plate—absolutely lovely grilled mushrooms and pineapple and peppers—and then he met Henry’s eyes across the table, his face sober.

  “Want to see something?” he said, out of the blue.

  “Here?” Henry raised an eyebrow and tried to make it dirty, just so he could see Lance’s smile again.

  “Yeah.” Lance reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He had to dig a moment, but eventually he pulled out a picture. With visible reluctance, he handed it over to Henry.

  “Oh my God!” So cute. Round little cheeks, round little chin, and the same great, comforting ear-to-ear smile. “You make me want to have kids, and I gotta tell you, kids drive me nuts.”

  “I’m fat,” Lance said shortly. “Can’t you see it? I’m rolling in it. It’s gross.”

  Henry looked back at the picture, thoroughly wounded for that happy little boy. “It’s adorable. Who told you that little boy was gross? They should be shot!”

  Lance looked away. “No one had to tell me—”

  “Oh yes they did,” Henry snapped. “Just like someone had to tell me that being gay was bad.” He looked at the picture again, absurdly hurt for the kid in the little school uniform, his eyes sparkling with the same wicked humor Henry had seen in Lance’s eyes every day for the past few months. “You’re beautiful.”

  “Fat,” Lance whispered. “I heard it every day from my parents. When I hit high school and started working out, they were singing my praises. Of course, I knew it was to deal with the stress of the big gay secret, but God, that was addicting. The better I made my body, the better son I was. And then… then when I started at Johnnies, you know, you start reading reviews. And suddenly I was that little fat boy again. And the more ripped I was on camera, the more praise I got on the websites and….” His voice wavered, and Henry swallowed hard.

  “You’re sitting on the other side of the table from me,” he said randomly. “I’ve never had this, where I needed to touch someone to reassure them. Why are you sitting on the wrong side of the table from me?”

  Lance tilted his head. “It’s my fault that we’re not next to each other?”

  Henry shook his head. “No. It’s your fault because you don’t look at this little kid and see that smile. And those eyes. And… and the guy I’ve been falling in love with for months. It’s your fault because you don’t look at your body and see how beautiful you are, and how much I… I depend on you. How smart you are.” His voice was wobbling off its axis, and he couldn’t seem to get it to spin right.

  “I… I don’t know how to stop… stop hating food,” Lance said miserably. “I… I look at your french fries and I think about that fat little kid—”

  Henry got up and moved to Lance’s side of the table, squeezing over on the bench. Deliberately he reached across the table and dragged his bratwurst and fries over. “I see fuel,” he said, making sure he had Lance’s complete attention.

  “That’s very healthy of you,” Lance said dryly.

  “I see a really beautiful guy letting his vegetables get cold.” Henry took a deliberate bite of a crispy french fry.

  Lance let out a breath. “I see carbs,” he said. Henry could hear his swallow. “I love carbs.”

  “But can you live with yourself if you eat them?”

  “No.”

  Henry pulled a mushroom off a kabob and dipped it in the balsamic glaze before popping it into his mouth. “That’s pretty good,” he said. “Here. Have one.”

  Lance smiled briefly. “Okay.” He crunched the mushroom, and Henry could feel a part of him relax.

  “I looked up bulimia, you know,” Henry said conversationally. “I’m gonna be a PI. Figured I’d sharpen my skills.”

  “So what did WebMD tell you?” Lance asked, his voice as arid as Death Valley.

  “It told me that it’s a long-term condition. That even if you never throw up another meal, you’re going to be playing Peter and Paul with your intake for the rest of your life. That stopping the purge cycle could lead to weight gain, but it’s still better for your heart. That every day you need to wake up, look in the mirror, and love who you see, and remind yourself that this person you love needs to eat to survive.”

  Lance wiped at his face with his napkin. “WebMD didn’t tell you that,” he said, voice broken.

  “Not all of it. I’m gonna be a good PI. I looked a few more places.”

  Lance breathed in hard through his nose, keeping his face averted, and Henry leaned his head on his shoulder. “Will it help if I tell you every morning that I love who I see?”

  “Why wouldn’t that help?” Lance’s voice cracked.

  “Will it help if I suggest you see a shrink when Randy goes? And that way, you can come back and tell everybody what it was like, so they won’t be so afraid?”

  Lance breathed in again. “Well played.” Because Lance would go first so the guys in the apartment could break their own cycles, and Henry knew that about him.

  “I’m glad you think so. Look at me, being all affectionate in public. Isn’t that cool, how I changed? Isn’t that proof that anybody can? Even practically perfect and healthy and well-adjusted people.”

  That got a strangled laugh from Lance. “Why would I—”

  “Face it, Galahad. You won’t be happy with yourself if you get all weird and emo about my job when I know you’re hurting yourself every day.”

  Lance broke then, wrapping his arms around Henry and holding him so tightly Henry couldn’t even dream of them being apart. Then he buried his face against Henry’s cheek and wept softly, and Henry let him, not caring about stares, not caring that their food was getting cold. They were in the Lavender District for one thing—there were lots of same-sex couples, not just in the restaurant, but everywhere.

  But for another, this, Lance trusting him with the pain, the uncertainty, the purging—this was the thing Henry had never been given with Mal. This was a part of Lance’s heart that nobody else would get to see—or even, as far as Henry could tell—would appreciate. Henry would stand up on their table and shout, “I’m gay, motherfuckers!” if it would help Lance not hurt himself.

  If it would help the two of them be okay.

  Lance’s breathing finally grew even, and he let go, grabbing some more napkins to clean up his face—and Henry’s. After a quiet moment, he turned back to their food and snagged another mushroom.

  “I’ll make the appointments tonight online,” he said. “One for me, one for Randy. See if we can start a trend.”

  Henry kissed his cheek. “Good.”

  They ate then, side by side, enjoying the quiet and the coolness of the falling evening.

  Lance took a final bite of vegetable and breathed out. “I love you too,” he said. “I love you a lot.”

  “Wasn’t too soon?” Henry asked quietly.

  “Apparently not.” Lance closed his eyes as though just appreciating the evening. “Apparently it was exactly the right time.”

  “That’s a first.”

  Lance laughed a little. “Maybe it’s the start of something awesome. We can only wait and see.”

  They didn’t have sex that night, which should have been a terrible disappointment. But what happen
ed instead was quieter and more magical.

  When everyone had gone to bed, they ended up on the couch, talking quietly.

  They made plans.

  An apartment, when Henry could help with the rent. Some furniture. A PI’s license for Henry, a fellowship for Lance after this year of residency. A house in a couple of years. Did they want kids? Maybe. Lance liked them. Would Lance want to meet David and Henry’s oldest brother if he came to town? Of course. Would Lance introduce Henry to his sister the next time they had lunch? He was dying to. What would Henry do if he didn’t like PI work? A law degree? Possibly—possibly not. So many things to do, so many places to go. Vacations neither of them had ever taken, but wanted to take together.

  Henry sat back against the corner of the couch, his arms around Lance’s shoulders, thinking about the future in a way he never had before.

  That sense he’d had when he’d arrived in Sacramento, that his entire life was over? That feeling was a bad memory.

  The letdown at the end of the case had faded, and what was left was a building thrill of what his life could become.

  Somehow, in the past few months, the future had gone from a wasteland of loneliness to an exciting, living thing, something that he could change, something that he’d already changed. Yeah, he had a past—and Malachi still loomed large, a shadow Henry might never truly escape, only learn to live with. There was a reckoning there, and Henry knew it. But even that felt less awful, less full of shame, less covered in guilt and remorse.

  Henry had so much more to do now.

  The future was exciting.

  He had control over his future in a way he never had before.

  And it all started with the man in his arms.

  Hungry

  “SO, DR. Galahad Luna—”

  “People call me Lance.” Lance gave the psychiatrist—Dr. Stevenson—a brief, professional smile.

  “It says here you’re a resident at UC Davis. What are you doing here at Kaiser?”

  Lance grimaced. “You’re actually on my health insurance from my other job, and since I was taking a friend here from that job anyway….” He held out his hands so Stevenson could make the obvious connection.

  “What’s your other jo—oh.”

  Stevenson’s balding head came up from the file he was scanning, and he looked at Lance again in mild surprise. “John Carey Industries. Wow. Okay, so, eating disorder. Is that all we’ve got going? Just making sure.”

  Lance fought the temptation to roll his eyes. “Why? You used to seeing a lot of train wrecks in porn?”

  Stevenson’s homely features, his sagging jowls and eyes surrounded by wrinkles, became sober almost immediately.

  “Yes,” he said. “Some fairly well-adjusted guys, one guy who told me, ‘Hey, I’m so over therapy but you seem nice,’ and a bunch of other guys who came to me with eating disorders and then quit porn and came back and said, ‘You know, it’s weird, I can eat a whole cheeseburger now. Go figure.’ But yeah. Maybe it’s because your boss has decent health insurance so I catch a lot of you before you go nuclear. But since I sort of got known for treating you guys, it’s been….”

  “Interesting?” Lance supplied, arching his eyebrows, as if he was talking to a colleague.

  “Hard,” Stevenson said instead. “Because you’re all young, you’re all bright, and you’re all beautiful. And getting you to see that is so difficult.” His eyes wandered someplace far away. “It’s worth it,” he said after a moment. “But not easy.”

  Lance grunted. “Tell me about it.”

  Stevenson cocked his head. “No, son, that’s your job.”

  Lance swallowed. “Look, my eating disorder is… pretty standard. I was a roly-poly kid, and I got tired of hearing about it, so I leaned up. Then I took this job where you can see a tic-tac against my stomach if I eat it close enough to a scene, and I got pretty good at tossing my cookies. I’m… I need a calorie diary and a nutritionist and, well, basically to quit porn and to settle down and make my life about not tossing my cookies. Am I right?”

  “Wow. It’s like you’re a medical professional or something.”

  Lance rolled his eyes, and in response, the doctor pulled out a bag of… knitting?

  “In this heat? Are you kidding me?” Lance could feel the stickiness from outside still oozing on his skin.

  “It helps me not strangle cocky young assholes who think they know my job,” Stevenson said irritably. “Now tell me some more about how you’ve got your eating disorder licked.”

  Lance let out a breath and closed his eyes. “You’re right. I don’t. I really don’t. I just….” He laced his fingers behind his neck and decided to talk about what was really bothering him.

  “My boyfriend got out of an eleven-year abusive relationship,” Lance said, because that was the thing that had been chewing on his heart on the way over. Bulimia, yeah, yeah—Lance was functional, but Henry’s denial scared him. “The guy had him over a barrel too. Either they keep fucking in the closet, or the asshole would wreck his military career and out him to his family.”

  Stevenson put his knitting down. “This is new.”

  “Yeah.” That was aces. Lance loved it when he was a medical anomaly. “Well, my guy said stop, and the asshole said go—and he did exactly what he wanted and kept fucking going.” Stevenson sucked in a breath, and Lance plowed on. “And my guy won’t even say the fucking word. He took a dishonorable discharge to get away from his brother-in-law—yeah, you heard me—and he’s been getting his shit together for the last couple of months. And he seems to be doing good. Great. Like… like he was just waiting to be free to see what an awesome human being he could be. Me and him, we watch over this group of porn kids—”

  “My last patient?” Stevenson said, and Lance nodded. “He mentioned you both. Seems to think of you like parents.”

  “Right?” Lance said, standing up so he could pace. “Like, neither of us want to just leave them alone—they… they seem to need some steadying, you know?”

  “I am stunned,” Stevenson said.

  “You’re a real sarcastic asshole, anybody tell you that?”

  “It only comes out in a safe place.” Stevenson picked up his knitting again. “It’s my reward for dealing with people who will jump out of their skin if I breathe in too hard.”

  Lance lifted a shoulder. “That’s fair.” He exhaled. “So yeah. When I leave here, I want the calorie diary, the newest treatment plan, all the mental games I have to play in my own head to get over my fucking self so I can eat a sandwich and not puke. I am down for that shit. But right now, before I even concentrate on that, before I can even think about that, I need to know two things.”

  “Shoot.”

  Lance looked over at him. He was knitting, but he was also gazing at Lance thoughtfully, so Lance thought he’d run with it.

  “The first is, are we doing these kids a favor, hanging around, trying to find a way to not bail on them? Are we giving them false hope or screwing with their self-sufficiency? My heart says no—my heart says they need us. But we all have shit we carry from our upbringing. My parents were like, ‘Hey, you are a truly self-sufficient being in your twenties, so if you want to continue contact, you need to stop being gay.’”

  Stevenson let out a pained grunt. “Motherpusbucket.”

  Lance’s eyes went wide. “Excuse me?”

  “Sometimes the wrong people really do end up in therapy. I’m sorry. I’ve just… I hear that story a lot, and I am never ever happy about it, and I will never get over it, either.”

  A teeny corner of Lance’s soul began to warm up a little. “So does that mean I don’t have to?” he asked gruffly. “Me and my boyfriend—it’s okay if that still hurts?”

  “Yeah, Lance. You had a support system for much of your life, and it disappeared. It’s okay if that hurts for a good long time.”

  It was difficult to swallow, but Lance managed. “Good,” he said. “We’ll get to that. So, is it wrong, me and Henry,
trying to help these guys out?”

  “No,” Stevenson said, unequivocally. “Don’t let them become codependent on you. Don’t get in their way of growth. But if they need to know someone’s there to care for them, and you two, you decide you’re their people, that works. You brought Randy here when you realized he needed more than you, right?”

  “Yeah,” Lance said. “And there’s at least one more guy we need to bring in, but he’s closer to Henry, so I’ll let him do it.” Lance growled. “Which brings me to my second question. The one that’s driving me batshit and I need it answered before I can concentrate on myself.”

  “Go for it. I’m going to need a couple of weeks to unpack this conversation anyway.”

  Lance gave him a one-sided smile, because he realized he wasn’t being easy.

  “So Henry’s parting gift from this psycho who kept him in the closet was being forced.”

  “Raped?” Stevenson qualified delicately, and Lance looked at him, actually met his eyes, so the guy could see how serious he was being.

  “Yeah,” he whispered. “And sometimes, when he’s talking, shit just slips out. Shit like ‘Yeah, Malachi sliced my shirt right off my body once, to keep me from leaving the hotel room.’ Or, ‘Gee, I hope my sister’s okay.’ And when he showed up here—his brother works at Johnnies—he looked like hell. His dad had pretty much beat the crap out of him, and Henry’s not a small guy. He let it happen. And I’m worried,” Lance burst out, so relieved he almost cried. “He kisses me in public now. He smiles. He cracks jokes. He’s still sort of a grumpy asshole, but that works for him. And I’m like, ‘Okay, when’s this going to come out?’ I can control my eating, or if I can’t, now I know that there is a headspace and some hard work that will let me do it. I have faith that will work. But I can’t control when all of this is going to burst out of Henry, and I don’t know how bad it’s going to be.”

  “Oh. Well. Just when you think you’ve heard it all….”

  “What?” Lance demanded.

  “You are reasonably functional. I’d like to see you get the bulimia under control. I’d really like to see you gain ten pounds, even if it’s muscle. But yeah, you’re right to be worried. Your boyfriend sounds functional too, but that’s some baggage he’s carrying around.” He shook his head, his fingers moving of their own volition in wool that was a military-green color. “Does he seem to be violent?”