by David Connor
“The garbage, Troy. Now. Please?”
Troy finally obeyed.
“Under or from behind?” Spencer asked, turning back. “Where do you want me?”
Yeah, nothing suggestive there.
“Uh…” Getty thumbed at his brow and the plywood nearly fell. “Your call,” he said, regaining control.
Getty smelled heavenly pressed against Spencer’s back. His arms raised up, his mouth at Spencer’s ear as he leaned around to put in the screws, Spencer wanted to forget the repair job and just hug him forever.
“Oh. Sorry.” He had turned his head to get out of the way just as Getty moved the same way. They softly clunked foreheads.
“Just a brush, really. No problem.”
The way Spencer crouched, their lips were in perfect alignment. In fact, when Getty had finished the m sound, they’d come together, Spencer’s bottom one between both of his. And guess who’d noticed. Troy, back from the dumpster in record time, was grinning ear to ear.
“We almost done here?” Spencer asked.
“Close to it, I’d say.” That had come from Troy.
The rest of the morning was fast-paced and chaotic. Spencer recited recipes to Troy at one mixer, while making dough for something different at a second one. Due to the wait for that day’s product, Spencer offered his regular early customers free Christmas cookies and cocoa for the inconvenience of having to return later for their favorite breads and rolls.
“Guess that means tonight I’ll be baking a few hundred more cookies.” Spencer’s heart fluttered, and Getty was nowhere in the room.
Rex and Charlie arrived ahead of most of the press. They loved their cake. That was one good thing. Charlie handed off a card key and a regular one. “The card opens the back door to the hotel kitchen,” he explained, “and the other works the lock to the cooler itself.”
Rex kissed his beloved. “I can’t believe in less than a week we’ll be man and groom.”
“I’m wearing silver,” Charlie stated. “Rex will be in gold to match our cake, and we’ll be coming down the aisle to ‘Silver and Gold’ from Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer.”
“No wonder people think the homos shouldn’t get married.”
Spencer spun around. The dissenting voice had sounded like Mrs. Beckerman’s, but surely the kind, sweet, elderly woman who’d been patronizing his family’s store since Spencer was a child would never say such a hurtful and homophobic thing.
“Sounds tacky as hell, where you boys will be going without a lot more prayer and a lot less cake, you ask me!”
Or maybe she would. “Mrs. Beckerman!”
“I was never keen on this whole twelve gays of Christmas thing from the start, Spencer Holiday, but I’ve been coming to this bakery since your father opened it thirty years ago. He would be ashamed of what you’re turning it into.”
The first few reporters to arrive were all writing a mile a minute. A guy with a camera was filming the entire exchange.
“There are twelve couples,” Troy said. “That makes twenty four gays.” Because, you know, apparently that point needed to be made. “Technically, only twenty-two now, since—”
“Not important, bro,” Spencer said, figuring there was no need to air Stefan and Kevin’s dirty laundry in public. “I think my father would be proud of what I’m doing, Mrs. Beckerman.” Spencer found himself touching the shamrock pendant that nestled in the chest hair over his heart. “He believed in love, in any form it took, and never for one minute, the whole time I was lucky enough to have him in my life, did he make me feel anything less, certainly never shame, for loving a man.” Spencer glanced toward Getty standing in the background.
“Have you heard from other protestors?” one of the reporters asked.
“A couple of letters through the mail, some postings on our Facebook page and Twitter...”
“Really?” Troy asked. “That’s bullshit!”
Spencer shrugged. “Not totally unexpected, but nothing when compared to a brick through the window. They’re not going to stop me from doing something nice for wonderful, loving men who have every right under United States law to come together and live as spouses just like any heterosexual couple in America.” Spencer almost wished he’d had fireworks and patriotic background music. “Neither is Grayson Devries. I’ll give away a free cake every season to show my support of gay marriage. I’ll protest outside Devries’s house and office every day if he tries to take that right away.”
“Well, I voted for the man, and I think I’ll just take my business elsewhere,” Mrs. Beckerman said.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Spencer told her. “If ever you become more tolerant, if ever you realize who any of us love is no detriment to you and your existence, I will gladly welcome you back.”
There was a smattering of applause as Mrs. Beckerman left, followed by Mr. O’ Connell, and Miss. Muier. Apparently Spencer’s soliloquy hadn’t moved the two of them as much as it had those who stayed. After another hour of chit chat about same-sex marriage and raspberry filling, after answering the same question ten times in six different ways and standing beside his cake, trying to “look natural” in the most unnatural circumstances he could ever imagine, Spencer was glad to see the reporters go. “Thank god that’s over,” he said.
“You did good, Spenny.”
“You did,” Getty echoed, picking a piece of lint off Spencer’s green Christmas apron with the rainbow squiggles in the shape of a Christmas tree—a gift from Heidi Reed.
“Was that there when they took the pictures?” Spencer fretted.
“They’ll edit it right out,” Getty claimed.
“Hopefully they’ll just run the photos of Turkey.” Troy looked incredibly handsome in his red apron with the crisscross rainbow candy canes, and the way he’d handled himself, so mature and articulate, it made Spencer beam.
“What now?” Troy asked, his mouth full of chewed bagel.
“Mom and Dad would be proud of you too.”
“Yeah?”
“Definitely.”
The afternoon went by quickly. Spencer carefully wrapped the cake for travel the next day, then worked on decorations for some of the others, while Troy waited on customers and took phone calls from Isabelle between classes. Things seemed slightly less combative between the young lovebirds by day’s end. Was happily ever after for kids their age possible? Spencer knew the deck was stacked against them. It happened sometimes, though, for some couples. He’d been certain it could happen for him at one point, with Getty. They’d discussed it in tuxes at senior prom, and made all kinds of promises. Then, later that night…
“Okay, maybe it’s not.”
“Maybe what’s not what what?” Troy asked.
Before Spencer could answer even one of the three, the front door burst open. “My book hit number one!” Kevin ran right for him and planted a kiss on his mouth, just as Getty came out from fixing the ceiling fan in the kitchen that had somehow come loose on one side.
“Congratulations!” Spencer said it twice, once mid-kiss, and again when his mouth was free.
“Okay, granted it’s number one in a subcategory of a subcategory of a category, but still, you’ve got to come out with me to celebrate.”
“I’m pretty busy,” Spencer said, but the hopeful look on Kevin’s face forced him to reconsider.
“Okay. Raginini’s… right next door, for like an hour or so?”
“Seven?”
“Make it eight.”
“Eight’s a date.” Kevin kissed him again. “See you then.” He left all smiles.
When Spencer looked behind him, Getty was gone. He found him in the kitchen, right before a thud on the bakery side.
“The huge shade just fell off the front window!” Troy hollered. “I think putting it back up’s gonna be a two man job!”
“Be right on it,” Getty called back.
Spencer had to laugh. “I’m starting to think this place is haunted. I’m starting to think my whole l
ife is haunted!” As he formed the braids for Anna’s hair from fondant—one of the couples actually wanted a Frozen cake—he looked toward the ceiling. “Mom… dad… are you ashamed of me?”
“Don’t even joke about something like that. Your parents loved you unconditionally, Spence.”
“I’m sorry your daughter doesn’t.” Spencer meant it sincerely, and he hoped he hadn’t come off facetious.
“Yeah.” Getty looked at the floor from up high at the ceiling fan. He shook his head. “I can’t let my love life ruin hers or wreck her child’s chances of a happy home.”
“No,” Spencer said.
“We talked a little while ago. I told her how I felt… about you.”
“And she said?”
“She didn’t want to hear it.”
Not much variation from what Troy had implied. “Then that’s that, I suppose.”
“I’m sorry, Spence.”
“That’s the way—”
“Hey!” Troy and another burst through the kitchen door. “You can’t go in there.”
“I am going to sue your ass, Holiday.”
“Sorry, customers aren’t allowed in the kitchen. Not sorry, I wouldn’t let you anywhere near my ass.” Spencer only thought the last part, as Stefan—whose real name was probably Steve—stood in front of him huffing like a bull before a fight. Lucky for Stefan, Spencer was able to stop himself from poking him, even if just barely. “The shop’s mailing address is on the little rainbow sticker you brought in for your free cake. I’ll be on the lookout for a manila envelope with legal docs. Now, have a nice day—or better yet, don’t.”
“What did you make Kevin do?”
“What did I make him do? Nothing. He came to me. Maybe if you had treated the man with the slightest bit of… Nope.” Spencer raised his hands in surrender. “None of my business. And you wouldn’t get it anyway. People like you don’t change. People like you can’t even see the need to. Please leave, Mr. Noir.
Yup. Spencer would bet the whole bakery his name was Steve Black. If he ever got a look at the jerk’s birth certificate, that’s what it would say.
“I saw him kiss you.” Stefan’s eyes were little black slits, like an angry snake about to strike.
“You stalking him?” Spencer asked.
“You fucking him?” Stefan shot back.
“Not yet?” Spencer immediately wished he could take it back, even as he pondered whether the dig had been for Getty’s or Stefan’s benefit. “Now get out of my kitchen.”
As the lawyer sulked off, escorted by Troy, Spencer wondered if he would actually file suit, and if so, on what grounds. Legal minds seemed able to just make things up, like the ones that would soon be running the state, who still thought they could somehow weasel around The Supreme Court’s interpretation of the constitution in order to stop same-sex marriage. It had been on the news again that morning, one official stating emphatically how he would encourage and stand by those who wanted to refuse to hand out wedding licenses to two men or two women after the first of the year, maybe sooner. Not only that, Devries said he would rally others to do the same across the nation, all in the name of preserving the institution of marriage and all it stood for. He’d been down the aisle four times, which showed what it stood for to him was a big party and gifts off his registry at Crate and Barrel, then Pottery Barn, and then Bloomingdales.
“I better check on that shade,” Getty said.
“Wait. I…” Spencer gripped his chest against a sudden pain.
“Spence! What is it?” Getty came down off the ladder.
“Just sore. Too much kneading and rolling.”
“Oh.” Getty began to massage Spencer’s shoulders. “You need a vacation right after Christmas.”
“I wish.” Spencer closed his eyes, reveling in Getty’s strong hands. He wished he could take his shirt off to feel the masculine roughness of them and the warmth of his touch. “Oh yeah.”
“Man… if only things were different.” Getty’s grip on Spencer’s shoulders tightened.
Spencer turned, so he could capture Getty’s gaze. He wanted to kiss him. “But they’re not.”
“No,” Getty said. He could read Spencer’s mind. “I wouldn’t change the past, but if I could fix things now, I’d have never let you shut yourself in your bedroom alone again.”
“And you’d never have to shower alone.”
They kissed then. They had to. And their mouths explored one another in a way they hadn’t for a very long time. Spencer’s heart went pitter pat. He smiled.
“That was nice,” Getty said.
“Yes, it was.”
“Better than Kevin?”
Spencer laughed. “Quite a bit.”
“It seems like we can’t really spend more than five minutes alone without that happening.”
“Sounds like a problem… considering…” Spencer tried to sound lighthearted, though the gravitas of the situation was quite heavy.
“Yo, bro! We’re on the news.” Troy pounded on the wall between the shop and the kitchen, jangling the copper molds hanging on Spencer’s side. One fell. Getty picked up its hook, which had popped right out of the wall.
“I’ll add it to the list,” he said.
Spencer took Getty’s hand to lead him through to the shop, but let go before they entered the section with the TV, where newsman Noah Netherland, who had been there that morning, was giving his report. “Holiday said he’d gotten threats and complaints via the Internet, and longtime customers who walked through his door daily for years spoke their objections.”
“It’s just not right,” Mr. O’Connell said onscreen.
“I wonder if he knows how big his bald spot looks in high definition,” Troy mused. “Give it up, Dean, you’re not fooling anyone. Go bald and be proud.”
“Shh.” Spencer waved the back of his hand toward his brother, wanting to hear the rest of what Netherland was saying.
“‘What’s next? Polygamy? The right to marry farm animals and house pets?’ Mr. O’Connell asked me.” Netherland frowned dramatically. “Do people honestly expect Charlie Brown to marry Snoopy, or Shaggy to propose to Scooby Doo?”
“Why don’t we have a dog?” Troy asked.
“Quiet.”
“Certain local legislators seem to agree with O’Connell and the others,” Noah Netherland said. “Grayson Devries warns same-sex couples not only will new marriages cease once again in every county in this state very soon, the ones happening now will be nullified, just like when Prop eight was passed in California.”
“And eventually nullified,” Spencer said to the flat screen.
“You think he’s gay, Spenny?”
“Who?”
“The news guy Noah Neverland.”
“I don’t know,” Spencer answered.
“He sounds gay,” Troy declared.
Spencer was about to object to his little brother grouping people by stereotype, but he worried how gay he might sound while doing it.
“Holiday Bakery’s proprietor, Spencer Holiday, claimed to take the online harassment in stride, telling me and others he’d actually anticipated it from the get go.”
“Not totally unexpected, but nothing when compared to a brick through the window.”
Spencer cringed at the sound of his voice through the speakers. My god! He did sound gay.
“Nothing that’s going to stop me from doing something nice for wonderful, loving men who have every right, under United States law, to come together and live as spouses just like any heterosexual couple in America.”
The camera cut back to a shot Noah Netherland outside the shop that morning. “So despite the actions of some ‘prejudice thugs’, as Holiday’s brother, Troy, called the assailants who busted out their window this morning…”
“Oh, no,” Spencer said. “No, no, no, no, no.”
“Spencer Holiday says he will keep making wedding cakes for same-sex couples long after the twelve gays of Christmas. Back to you, Sonny.”<
br />
Spencer looked to Troy. “What did you say?”
“Not that. Well… okay… exactly that, but not about the side window. I was taking about the other time the other one was busted.”
“They made it sound as if someone broke our window this morning, because of the…”
“Twelve gays of Christmas?”
“Oh my god! It’s going to catch on… that stupid phrase Mrs. Beckerman came up with.”
“I think it should!” Troy declared. “Let’s take it back. It’s kind of cute if we used it lovingly.”
“We have to correct them.” Spencer felt dizzy. We have to let them know that the busted window we have now has nothing to do with the cake promotion.”
“This probably aired about three or four times by now, Spense.”
Getty was right. “I gotta sit down.” Spencer did, on one of the stools at the counter, but then he popped right back up. “I left the cards in the kitchen with the reporters’ names and numbers.”
“Spenny, come on. Chillax. Let it go.”
“We have to make the correction.”
By the time Spencer found the right one and returned, Isabelle had arrived in person, and she and Troy were bickering outside on the sidewalk, all animated in front of the large display window—the one that had actually been vandalized way back in June. On TV, the weatherman was giving an ominous warning. “You’re going to want to get off the roads before around four tomorrow and stay off of them for the next couple of days.”
“I better check the van’s tires when I finish here. Or maybe you should wait and take that cake down after the storm,” Getty suggested, tending to the shade on the window above the side counter.
“I can’t. Their wedding is in five days—four we may as well say. I can’t get all the way down there on the day of the ceremony, plus get the next cake ready on time.”
“Then hire someone who can,” Getty suggested.
“With what? My credit cards are maxed out. The store account is nil. Everything I’ve made for weeks I’ve poured back into cake batter and icing. I’ll be fine.”
“At least let me go with you.”
