by John Inman
Deeze had a moment to take in a few details while he was airborne: 1. The guy had freckles and glasses; 2. When the guy tried to catch him in midfall, his book went flying and landed in the lagoon with a splash, startling a duck, which was actually pretty funny; and 3. The guy was tethered to the stupid black-and-white dog that had caused the whole mess to begin with. Consequently, that made the redheaded guy Public Enemy #1 as far as Deeze was concerned.
He was about to say so when he completed his somersault and the back of his head hit the cobblestones with a brain-rattling thud. Right at the redhead’s feet.
“Ouch,” he wheezed with what breath was left in his lungs, which wasn’t much. He squinted straight up into the noonday sun and waited for his eyeballs to stop twirling from the impact. As soon as they ceased spinning like cherries in a slot machine, he tilted his head a little to the left to take in the redhead staring down at him with a worried expression.
“Freckles,” Deeze muttered, and his eyes rolled up into his head one last time. His brain took that opportunity to shut down completely, and Deeze’s thought processes went black.
Suddenly, Wyeth wasn’t the only one out to lunch.
WYETH KNELT in front of the park bench while the startled duck continued to squawk behind him and his poor book settled to the bottom of the lagoon, getting fatter and fatter as it soaked up more and more water. The noonday sun banged down on the back of his neck as Wyeth squatted there like an idiot, staring down at the unconscious guy sprawled out in front of him.
“You killed him,” he said to Chaucer.
Chaucer wagged his tail and pranced proudly about as if to say, “Thanks. I do what I can.”
There were several people milling past on the cobblestoned path, but they turned away from the drama unfolding before them—the modern-day version of being polite, Wyeth assumed. If a person wants to break his neck in a public place, the least he should be granted is the right to do it without a bunch of strangers staring and making droll comments. Consequently, no one gave the guy lying flat on his back in the middle of Seaport Village a second glance.
No one but Wyeth. Wyeth, in fact, gave the guy several long and appreciative glances. His eyes made several trips back and forth from the guy’s battered running shoes to the crown of his curly-black-haired noggin, lingering at several points of interest in between, of which there were many.
He turned to Chaucer again. “The least you could have done was kill somebody ugly.”
Chaucer turned away and hacked up what looked like a burrito wrapper.
Wyeth mumbled, “Lovely. Thanks for the input,” and centered his attention back on the unconscious guy. He reached out and gave the man a tentative poke in the chest. No response. He laid a hand to the man’s cheek and received a surprise rush of endorphins galloping up his arm at the delectable feel of the man’s blue-black five-o’clock shadow (and here it was only noon; how butch was that?). He lifted one of the guy’s eyelids and saw nothing but the snowy white of an extremely healthy eyeball—no colored iris, no recognition, no sign of life, nothing.
“This can’t be good,” Wyeth blabbered to himself, giving the guy another nudge with his finger. Wyeth was starting to get a little desperate here. Maybe Chaucer really had killed the dude.
Wyeth was about to reach for his cellphone and dial 9-1-1, already rehearsing inside his head the spiel he would give the EMT’s. “Yes, sir. I don’t know what happened. The guy came out of nowhere and keeled over like a tree. It had nothing to do with my dog, you understand. The man just collapsed right there in front of me. Wham. He should have known better, of course. Who in their right mind would be jogging on a hot day like this anyway, I ask you? It must be 110 in the shade. Tsk, tsk. He’s clearly insane, sir. Clearly.” And then maybe he’d throw in a couple more tsks for good measure.
Yes, Wyeth decided, that sounded pretty good. Nicely absolved him of all blame and laid it clearly on the handsome moron’s very own shoulders.
At that moment, the handsome moron opened his eyes and said, “What happened?”
He appeared to stare up at the sky in considerable surprise before blinking a couple of times to get his bearings. Then twisting his head to the side, he took in the redheaded guy leaning over him.
“You fell,” Wyeth blurted out, sliding his glasses up his nose with his index finger. “My dog had nothing to do with it.”
DEEZE BLINKED again. It was all coming back to him now. Jogging, the waves lapping at his feet, the stupid dog stepping out in front of him, the collision, the uncontrolled flight, the crash landing.
And eventually—the pain. Damn, his head hurt.
“Liar,” he rasped through a voice box that wasn’t quite up to snuff yet for casual conversation. Complete sentences were still out of his grasp, so he added, “Dog. Yours. Cujo.”
The redhead in front of him opened his eyes wide and tried to look innocent. “Dog? Dog? What dog? I don’t have a dog.”
“But you just said—”
“You’re hallucinating. I didn’t say anything.”
Deeze lowered his eyes to the guy’s hand, which happened to still be resting on Deeze’s chest. Around the man’s wrist a leash was wrapped, and at the end of the leash, down around Deeze’s feet, was a dog. The dog was sitting on its ass and eating what looked like a burrito wrapper. Judging by the condition of the burrito wrapper, it wasn’t the first time it had been eaten.
It was clearly the dog that had sabotaged his run—black and white, scruffy, none too bright, just tall enough to spectacularly trip over. It was the same dog, all right. He’d know it anywhere.
Refocusing his eyes on the redhead, he said again, “Liar.”
This time the guy staring down at him had the good grace to blush and look guilty. His fingers spread wide across Deeze’s chest, and for some reason, Deeze really enjoyed feeling them there.
“You’re right,” the redhead said. “It’s my dog. And I’m sorry. But it really was an accident. Here, let me help you up.”
Clutching the redhead’s arm, Deeze pulled himself to a sitting position, but not without a few creaks and groans. His first instinct was to pat the back of his head, then gaze wonderingly at his fingertips to check for a smear of blood or a chunk or two of gray matter. There were none. Clearly all neurological damage was contained within. Great. That should simplify any future exploratory surgeries needed to unscramble his brains.
Deeze once again focused on the man at his side. The redhead had a nice, gentle smile on his face, although his blue eyes still looked a little worried behind those godawful black-framed glasses he wore.
“Nothing’s broken, right?” the redhead asked. “Can I get you anything? A Coke, a cold pack?” With a little smile, he added, “An ambulance?”
Deeze narrowed his eyes. “I can’t believe you’re smiling. Nice teeth, though. Very white.”
“Uh, thanks.” The man immediately molded his face into a more acceptable expression of solicitude. But his eyes appeared to be studying Deeze’s bare legs and the bulge in the front of his running shorts. What was that about?
“I really am sorry,” the redhead finally said, wrenching his eyes back to Deeze’s face.
This time he looked like he meant it, so Deeze decided to forgive him. “I like your hair,” he said.
A flush crept into the man’s cheeks. “Uh, thanks,” he muttered again, this time clearly embarrassed. As if he couldn’t think of what else to say, he added, “It’s red.”
For the first time, Deeze smiled. When he did, he noticed no teeth fell out and no jawbones snapped apart, so he was encouraged to smile a little wider. “It certainly is,” he said softly.
The redhead stood and offered a hand. “Let me help you up. Maybe you’d better sit on the bench for a minute until you pull yourself together.”
“I’m together. I need to finish my run,” Deeze said.
The redhead put a finger to his lips and said, “Shush. Let’s just get you on your feet first.”
/> “You shush like a librarian,” Deeze said.
The redhead looked startled, then impressed. “How incredibly prescient of you. As a matter of fact, I am a librarian. Maybe when you landed on your head, it made you psychic.”
Deeze grinned. “Wouldn’t that be cool?”
“Yeah well, I wouldn’t get my hopes up.”
Deeze finally accepted the proffered hand and snapped, crackled, and popped his way to his feet. A groan leaked out when he lowered himself to the park bench.
“What hurts?” the redhead asked.
“Butt, right shoulder blade, left heel, thumb—no, wait, both thumbs, a couple of metatarsal ligaments, third vertebra, index finger, little toe, brain stem, ego. Everything really,” Deeze answered. Then he decided he probably sounded like a whiner, so he recanted. “Just kidding. It’s not like I haven’t fallen before. I really will be all right.”
He reached out and petted the dog.
“That’s Chaucer,” the redhead said.
Deeze cast a squinty-eyed leer at the animal, who still had half a burrito wrapper hanging out of his mouth. “Hello, fucker.” Then he turned to the guy. “And you are?”
He was blessed with another very attractive blush. This one crawled up the dog owner’s neck and reddened everything from his chin to his hairline, ears included.
“I’m Wyeth,” the guy said.
“Deeze,” Deeze answered. “As in DZ. Short for Darryl Zachary. Are you really a librarian?”
“Yeah.”
“At the downtown library?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you work Monday through Friday?”
“Uh, yeah. Are you working your way up to making a point? Got a book overdue? Need your library card renewed?”
It was Deeze’s turn to blush. “Nope. Just chatting.” He let his eyes graze over Wyeth. The dry-wiking shirt, the Asics, the…. “Say, do you always exercise in dress pants?”
“I’m not exercising. I’m walking my dog on my lunch hour and reading a book, which is now lying at the bottom of the lagoon with a fish nibbling on it.” He looked sadly at the lagoon. “Make that two fish.”
Deeze didn’t care about the book. “Do you ever run?”
“Not unless I’m being chased by a velociraptor.”
“So that would be never.”
“Pretty much.”
Deeze sadly watched while the redhead—while Wyeth—checked his watch and looked immediately uneasy.
“You have to get back to work,” Deeze said. He had no idea why that thought depressed him so.
He was even more depressed when Wyeth said, “Yes. Are you sure you’ll be all right?”
Deeze grinned. “What if I said no?”
Wyeth lowered his chin and gave Deeze a look of weary impatience, rather like a schoolteacher who’s had a tack put in her chair one too many times by the rottenest kid in class. His voice dropped an octave. “I asked if you’d be okay.”
Deeze still had his hand on Chaucer’s head, scratching the mongrel’s ears. “Yes,” he said softly. “I’ll be okay. If you have to get back to work, just run along. I can limp home on my own. Shouldn’t take me more than one or two excruciating hours. Don’t fret yourself. Have a nice day. Life. Whatever.”
“You’re not going to make this easy, are you? Where do you live?”
Deeze smiled brightly. “Not far.”
Two minutes later, they were walking side by side along the waterfront. Chaucer bounced along behind, sniffing at everything they passed. Wyeth’s hand cradled Deeze’s elbow, and Deeze purposely staggered a little bit every couple of minutes so the guy wouldn’t remove it. He wasn’t born yesterday.
“I LIKE redheads,” Deeze said out of the blue. “I’m gay, by the way. Are you gay? I’m single too. Are you single?”
They were walking in front of the Hyatt Regency. Wyeth could smell the lunch menu wafting out across the patio and circling his head. Smelled like something fishy.
He tried not to smile. “My single status is none of your business. Are you sure you’re really hurt?”
Deeze dragged him to a stop. “We forgot to scoop your reading material out of the lake.”
“It was a lagoon. And don’t worry about it.”
“Did you check it out of the library? Will they bill you for it?”
“I’ll cook the books. Won’t be the first time.”
“Then you’re a dishonest librarian. That’s a relief. So. Was that the first time you ever dropped a book in a lake while walking your homicidal dog through Seaport Village prior to tripping an innocent jogger and feeding pilfered reading material to city-owned salmon?”
“Lagoon. And they were koi, not salmon. And you are hardly innocent. Nor is Chaucer homicidal. He’s just—oh, never mind. It’s none of your business.”
“Which part is none of my business?”
“All of it.”
Now Deeze was smiling. He gave another intentional reel sideways, not quite going so far as to slap the back of his hand to his forehead like a swooning Aunt Pittypat in Gone with the Wind. He pointed toward a table outside a bayfront cafe, making sure he made his finger tremble a little while he did it. Great acting requires attention to detail, after all. “I think I’d better sit down for a minute. Woozy.”
Wyeth wasn’t falling for that. “We’ll have to order something, you know. You can’t just sit anywhere you want around here.”
“Then let’s have lunch. You treat. I don’t have my wallet.”
“How convenient. And I already had lunch. Keep walking and stop pretending to stagger. The Academy Awards are over. Let’s get you home so I can get back to work and you can resume your life of annoying people and trying to cadge free meals from total strangers.”
Deeze pouted. “I thought we were friends.”
“You’re hallucinating again.”
“You’re a hard man.”
“Only under the right circumstances,” Wyeth said.
He stumbled to a stop, dragging Deeze to a stop beside him. His face got the reddest it had been so far. His entire head looked like a giant strawberry. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”
Deeze chewed on his lower lip, flashing a dimple momentarily. “I think you did.”
“I’m not sure I like you very much.”
Deeze chewed a little harder. “You’d be surprised how many times I hear that in the course of an average day.”
Again, Wyeth tried not to grin. “Oddly enough, no, I don’t think I would.”
“Oh look!” Deeze said, pointing up ahead. “There’s my apartment building.”
“Holy shit,” Wyeth said. “You live right across the street from me.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Can this day get any blacker?”
Deeze gave him a gentle elbow in the ribs. “You’re such a kidder. The word of the day on my Word of the Day calendar this morning was ‘serendipitous.’ Can you beat that?”
“Mine was ‘horseshit,’” Wyeth responded.
“Your Word of the Day calendar sounds more interesting than mine.”
They stopped in front of the street door leading into Deeze’s building. The moment they stopped, and just before Wyeth could say, “Here you go. Sorry about your fall. Seeya,” Chaucer rose up on his back feet and started humping Deeze’s leg.
Deeze stared down at him. “I hope he’s using protection.”
Wyeth was mortified. Well, even more than he was already. “Chaucer, come away from there!”
Chaucer humped all the harder, tongue hanging out, eyes crossed, his little doggie butt flying up and down. If he kept it up, he’d probably barf up the burrito wrapper again.
Deeze was sort of bouncing around due to Chaucer’s energetic humping, but he managed to say, “C-come up for t-tea.”
Wyeth rolled his eyes. “I’d rather set myself on fire. Chaucer, stop it!”
“Then I hope I see you at the library,” Deeze said through a 300-watt smile.
“Seems unlikely,” Wyeth snorted. “I don’t imagine you read much.”
“Do Bazooka gum wrappers count? The ones with the little cartoons inside?”
“No.”
“Well, that’s just not fair. Elitism in literature really pisses me off. You as a librarian should be offended by it too.”
“You’re impossible. I’ve gotta run.”
“You said you don’t run.”
“I meant I’ve got to go.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Okay. Toodles.”
That caught Wyeth off guard. “Oh. Well, g-goodbye then,” he stammered, and spinning on his heels, he hustled off in what was clearly a hasty retreat, dragging a still-humping Chaucer along behind him, straining at his leash. The dog was clearly not a fan of coitus interruptus.
Deeze watched until the redhead disappeared around a corner.
Only then did Deeze dab gentle fingertips over the bump on the back of his head. With his other hand, he patted his heart.
“Ouch,” he said again, this time with a grin.
Chapter Two
TWO DAYS later, Susie, the young volunteer who roamed through the library gathering up all the books ignorant people left lying around because they were too lazy to put them back on the shelves where they belonged, waved to Wyeth from across the stacks and hustled toward him with a manila envelope tucked beneath her arm.
Blushing prettily, she handed it over. “Somebody dropped this down the book return slot outside. Since you’re the only redheaded librarian on the premises named Wyeth, it must be for you.”
Wyeth stared at the envelope. “Huh?”
He took it from her hands, ignoring the flirty wink she cast in his direction, said, “Thank you,” and walked away while Susie sighed and watched him go.
Wyeth ducked behind a bookshelf marked Romance A to D and plopped himself down at his own private desk before checking out the envelope in his hand. Sure enough, right there on the front of it, in a rather ungraceful hand with what looked like a fourth-grader’s clunky penmanship, in orange crayon, no less, was printed the words For Wyeth—The Redheaded Librarian.
