“What are you doing here, Crash?” Nick asked. He didn’t like where the situation was going, though he shouldn’t have expected anything better from Crash.
“I picked up a double shift.” Crash said. He was staring at Wes who was starting to squirm under his cold gaze. “What are you doing here?”
“I brought Wes to the doctor,” Nick said.
“I was attacked,” Wes supplied helpfully.
“Then you best make sure they did your rape kit right,” Crash said. His expression was that of a mean cat playing with a lame mouse. Nick had the feeling he was only getting warmed up. “I mean, what good’s a bloody ass if they bungle the evidence so badly the DA cannot prosecute. Am I right?”
“Crash,” Nick snapped at him. He knew perfectly well that Crash knew that wasn’t the case with Wes. Nick had told him so himself when it had first happened. “Shut your fucking mouth.”
“I wasn’t… no one… I wasn’t raped.” Wes was spluttering as he backed away a couple of steps.
“Well, that’s good then, huh?” Crash said. “Nobody likes a butt-raped boy. Not even Nick here and I’ve got a feeling—present company excluded, of course—he’s not real picky.”
“We’re leaving,” Nick said as he took Wes’s arm. With his free hand, he pointed at Crash. “You. You are a goddamned prick.”
Crash blinked, all wide-eyed innocence. “Moi? A prick? I was only teasing, there’s no need to get so worked up.”
Nick wasn’t listening, he had a grip on Wes’s upper arm tight enough to leave bruises as he stalked away. Wes was helpless to do anything other than try to keep up.
“Nick! Where are you going, Nick?” Crash’s voice was loud and echoed across the parking lot. People turned their heads and stared at the commotion, but Nick didn’t turn and he did not look back. “I was only having some fun! Nick, come back! Nick!”
Nick gave him the finger over his shoulder as they reached the truck and he finally let go of Wes to unlock the passenger door so he could get in. He went around and got in the driver’s seat and was about to crank the truck when someone slapped the passenger side window. Wes jumped then made a soft sound of pain as the motion pulled his wounds.
Nick turned to find Crash standing there, smiling as he leaned close to the window to speak through the glass. “There seems to have been some kind of misunderstanding,” Crash said.
Nick hated the face looking back at him, the ice-cold malice and sick humor twisting Crash’s face into one he recognized very well. It was the one he’d been willing to forget about, willing to pretend had been a fluke and yes, a misunderstanding, when he first met Crash. He’d been okay with accepting that maybe he wasn’t utterly insane, but the face staring at him through his truck window was the face of madness. It was madness that Crash could hide, Nick had learned that much, but when it surfaced it was ugly and it was brutal. It was dangerous.
“Go fuck yourself,” Nick said as he cranked the truck and put it in reverse to back up, all without ever breaking eye contact with Crash. “That’s the only person you’re gonna be banging for a while, you freak.”
“Don’t be like that, Nick,” Crash said, walking alongside the truck as Nick began to move. “We can work this out. I promise.”
“No,” Nick said. “Bye, asshole.” He gunned the truck and it leapt forward, jostling them over speed bumps in the lot and making Wes cry out. “Sorry, sorry,” Nick said to him, but he didn’t slow down. He was too pissed off and freaked out.
“TOODLES! BYE-BYE NOW, NICK AND WES!” The sound of Crash’s maniacal gaiety pierced the cab of the truck like swords then Nick was bumping over the curb and turning into the street to the sound of honking horns.
“Are you all right?” he asked Wes after they were a couple blocks away.
“I’m… I think so, yes,” Wes said. He turned to look at Nick, big brown eyes huge in his face. “What the heck was that?”
“That was Crash,” Nick said. “He has really bad social skills.”
“I think he was just… jealous,” Wes said. “He really seems to like you. I mean, people don’t do that kind of thing if they don’t like the other person.”
“That wasn’t like,” Nick said. “That was insanity.”
“Yeah, it was kind of crazy, sure,” Wes said. “I just meant…. I don’t know. Is he your boyfriend?”
“We were dating, I guess,” Nick said. “He wasn’t… isn’t… my boyfriend though, no.”
“I don’t want to cause any problems with you guys,” Wes said. “If hanging out with me is why he got so mad, then maybe—”
“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” Nick said. “I’m supposed to what? Stop hanging out with you to keep that nutcase happy? No, I don’t think so. If he did that about you then he’ll do that about everybody I know and that shit does not fly with me.”
“If you really like him though, we can not hang out as much or something,” Wes said. “I’m trying to be helpful.”
“Well, I don’t like him that damn much,” Nick said. “So stop it.”
He had never liked anyone so much that he would risk all of his friendships to be with them. Of course, he’d never been in such a situation before, but now that he was it was crystal clear to him. Friends, of which he had few, mattered more to Nick than having a jealous freak of a boyfriend.
They lapsed into silence until Wes dropped off his prescriptions. On the way to the restaurant, he flexed his fingers and wiggled them experimentally. He showed his hand to Nick who raised his eyebrows at what he saw. There was a bruise forming on the back of Wes’s hand just below the knuckles.
“What happened?” Nick asked.
“Crash has a really firm handshake,” Wes said. He wiggled his fingers again. “Wow.”
“Fuck him,” Nick said.
“Nick, I’m—”
“Don’t apologize.”
“Okay,” Wes said. He stared at his bruised hand until they arrived at Stayin’ Alive.
22
In the days that followed, Nick didn’t see or hear from Crash. He went back to eating in the break room with the other staff and avoided the morgue, something that was made easy by a decided lack of dead bodies. As a whole, Sparrow Falls grew quiet and calm on the grisly death scene and people began to relax the tiniest bit. Spring was coming right along, early to arrive and quick to leave in the Deep South. Everyone was taking time out from the horrible murders that had racked their fall and winter to get down to the business of planting gardens and mowing lawns that had lain dormant all winter long, but had sprung back to bright, vigorous life at the first hint of lasting warmth.
Nick took to having lunch with Wes a couple of times a week at Wes’s insistence. As it turned out, Wes could cook, he liked doing it and he was actually good at it. Nick learned Wes had almost gone to culinary school before he decided to become a website designer. It was quite a departure, but as Nick ate Wes’s made-from-scratch chicken pot pie, he was glad he’d kept cooking as a hobby. Dawn Marie ate with them half the time and was none too subtle in her insinuation that she thought Nick and Wes should have sex on a regular basis.
Neither of them told her they’d once had a more professional relationship where they did exactly that, but she probably knew anyway.
After lunch, Wes told Nick that the stitches and staples holding the skin of his back together had finally been removed, but he was still not operating at full capacity. Then he took his shirt off and showed him.
“See? Almost better,” Wes said, standing there in the living room of his sunny little cottage. He bounced a little in place, damn near ecstatic to be free from the anchors in his flesh. “I’m still achy, but it’s such a relief to at least be able to tie my shoes without worrying about ripping something open or loose.”
Nick had known it would take a while to heal, but he had been somewhat misguided when it came to imagining what the damage to Wes’s back was really like. What he saw caused Nick to nearly swallow his tongue.
Nick softly ran his hand down Wes’s ruined skin and said, “Yep, you’re getting there.”
“It’s awful, isn’t it?”
“Nah.” Nick said. “Scars are sexy, don’t you know.” He kissed the back of Wes’s shoulder, felt the lines of the scar tissue pressing against his lips like shushing fingers, and had to suppress a shiver at feeling the leftovers of such brutality. It made Wes smile though. He kissed up the nape of Wes’s neck then said, “Let’s go take a walk, huh?”
“Yes, let’s,” Wes said as he picked up his shirt and tugged it back on. “It’s a beautiful day for a walk.”
Wes liked to stroll around the grounds of Gallagher House and take in the riotous explosion of color from Tobias’s gardens. Butterflies swirled around them in colorful tornadoes; the air was rich with the scent of flowers and fruit blossoms, wisteria hung from arbors in swaying curtains of white and purple. Nick looked away from the curl and swoop of wisteria petals blowing away on the breeze and took Wes’s elbow to steady him when a sneeze rocked him forward and he lost his balance.
He put his arm around Wes’s shoulders to help steer him to a bench sitting next to an espaliered pear tree. Wes was still sniffling as he fished in the pocket of his light coat to get his handkerchief. Nick imagined that Wes wore bow ties, too; there was something so old-fashioned about Wes.
“So—” Wes said after they sat down, only to cut off with a violent sneeze followed by a sniffle.
“I thought you said your allergy pills help,” Nick said.
“I forgot to take one,” Wes said. Through his clogged nose, the words came out muddled and mushed together, but Nick could translate sneezy-speak fine.
“You want me to go get you one?”
“No, I’m okay,” Wes said. It sounded like, Dough, nime ogey.
“All right, but don’t be a hero,” Nick said as he sat down beside him.
Wes laughed then blew his nose loudly, the sound like the honking of an angry goose. He mumbled an apology then folded his hankie and put it away. Like a magic trick, he pulled out a fresh one to dab his watering eyes with.
“We should go back to the house so you can drug yourself,” Nick said. “Maybe try again this evening with Dawn Marie instead.”
“I’m fine,” Wes insisted.
Nick rolled his eyes. “If you say so, Sniffles.”
“Hmph,” Wes said. He folded his hands in his lap and wiggled his pinky around. The movements were clumsy, the finger didn’t want to cooperate, but he no longer had to wear a brace to hold it still.
“What were you going to say before you started exploding?” Nick asked.
“Exploding?” Wes glanced over at Nick then smiled. “Oh, right. The sneezing, yeah. That just hit me out of nowhere, not even a little warning. Ninja sneezes.”
Nick smiled then said, “Well? What was it?”
“I was just going ask… I don’t know if I should now,” Wes said.
“Come on, out with it,” Nick said.
Wes sighed. “I was wondering if you ever heard from that Crash guy after the craziness at the hospital back in February.”
“Nope,” Nick said. Since it was Crash and Crash was by no means a normal person, Nick found the radio silence odd as hell, too. He also wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. If Crash decided to cease all contact with him then all Nick could think about that was, Good.
“Don’t y’all work together though?”
“We both work at the hospital, but he’s down in the morgue,” Nick said. “I stay away from the morgue as much as possible. We don’t even mop down there on the night crew.”
“That’s good, huh?” Wes asked.
“Yeah, it really is,” Nick said. “That guy is a fucking psycho. He almost fooled me though. I’m glad I saw what a freak he really is before I ended up involved with him.”
“Me, too,” Wes said.
Of course Wes was glad he hadn’t gotten involved with Crash, the jealous mental defect. Most people didn’t want that kind of relationship for their friends and the folks who did were terrible friends. After Wes’s initial offer to stay away from Nick, he had mulled it over and informed Nick during their lunch of Boogie Burgers (an unfortunate name, in Nick’s opinion) and Saturday Night Fries that he was sorry he’d said that stuff in the truck. Crash, Wes had determined, really was a total asshole and he’d hurt the heck out of his hand, too. He’s a mean asshole, Wes had amended then he had pondered aloud about whether or not he should have Gold Chain Cake (chocolate cake with rich butter cream frosting and gold nonpareils) or some Funky Town Tiramisu for dessert. Nick had suggested he go all out and have a Roller Coaster Cascade.
Wes surprised Nick by taking his hand and gave it a light squeeze, like a question. Nick looked down at their hands on the bench; Wes’s on top of his, fingers loosely curving over the back. He glanced up to find Wes watching him, red-nosed and watery-eyed as he smiled at him, shy and a little hopeful.
“It’s a really pretty day, right?” Wes said. He sniffled and blinked as his eyes streamed more water. “All the sunshine and birds and—”
He sneezed again, all over himself and Nick both. Nick rocked back on the bench with a surprised curse and Wes looked like he wanted to die. “I am so… Oh, God.” Wes shook his head and looked away, down at his feet. “I am dumb. No, no… I am retarded.”
Nick wiped the spit off his face with the tail of his t-shirt and yes, it was gross and yes, he would have vastly preferred it had Wes not sneezed right in his face, but Wes’s allergies were not contagious. Nick was one hundred percent certain that he was going to live.
He took the second hankie off Wes’s knee where he’d laid it in case of another sneezing fit. “Look at me,” Nick said.
Wes sniffled and turned his head, looking at him like he wanted to flinch, like he expected Nick to say, Can confirm: you are a dumbshit. Instead, Nick wiped his face, blotting up the water streaming down his red cheeks and swiping under his runny nose. Then he put the hankie back in Wes’s lap and looked back across the rolling green lawn like nothing had ever happened. He could see Wes quite well from the corner of his eye; he was looking at Nick with questions in his eyes and a tentative ghost of a smile—he wanted to smile about it but wasn’t sure if he should.
Nick reached over, grabbed his hand and gave it a firmer squeeze as he said, “Yep, it is a pretty good day, even with the sudden showers.”
There was silence for a drawn-out moment, then Wes’s happy laughter rang through the tangled, wild garden and Nick smiled to himself.
Mission accomplished.
23
A week later Nick had to go out to his truck for a pack of cigarettes so he could have his after-lunch smoke. He leaned in the driver’s side, popped open the glove compartment and grabbed his smokes. He locked the truck again, shut the door and turned to walk back toward the side of the building where most of the employees gathered to smoke and chit-chat before they had to go back inside.
Crash was standing there behind him, leaning against a parked car. He smiled at Nick when he turned around and Nick startled so badly he fell into the side of his truck.
“Hey,” Crash said.
“Fuck off,” Nick said. He started to step around him.
“Whoa.” Crash held up his hands. “What is with the hostility, Nick?”
“What the—” Nick stared, at a complete loss. “You know what’s with the hostility.”
“Oh, that.” Crash flicked his hand to the side like he was shooing away an annoying insect. �
�You’re not still mad about that, are you?”
“Mad? No, I’m not still mad,” Nick said. “But I also don’t want to have anything to do with you anymore. Before you ask me why, let me just tell you: Because you are a goddamn psycho, that’s why.”
Crash blinked; corners of his pretty mouth turning down.
“I’m sorry about that,” Crash said. “I admit that I might have overreacted. That’s why I’ve been giving you some space. So you can get over your upset and what have you and we can start fresh. We can talk about it though if you feel the urge to share your feelings and other assorted fun things.”
“I did share my feelings,” Nick said. He ticked off the points on his fingers. “One; you can fuck off because two; I don’t want a damn thing to with you because three; you are a headcase. What you did was not fine with me, not in any reality, not ever and I am not impressed with your bullshit.”
Not only had Crash’s jealousy been over the top—though considering that he was crazy, Nick supposed maybe it hadn’t been—the things he had said to Wes were cruel. Pointlessly, needlessly cruel. On top of that, he had hurt Wes intentionally and so badly he’d left a bruise on his hand that had taken days to fade away. In retrospect, Nick realized that Crash’s hateful behavior had been downright sadistic. Crash had really enjoyed it once he started digging his fingers in. The sight of Crash’s face looking at him through his truck window that day was the icing on the cake, the number one reason with a bullet that Nick was not interested in dating Crash any longer (though his other shitty behavior would still have been a deal-breaker). Crash’s mask had slipped off and what he’d seen lurking beneath was a monster.
“Give me another chance,” Crash said. He was no longer leaning casually against the car like he thought all was swell with the world. Like he thought Nick would fall into his arms, sobbing his forgiveness against his chest. “Let’s fix this, Nick. You and me. We can do this. We’re good together, right? Let’s stay good together.”
Shades of Night (Sparrow Falls Book 1) Page 28
