Walk a Mile

by Sarah Madison

  “No, that never occurred to me.” The anger was back, a flash-flame that licked out over already-scorched ground.

  Jerry flinched at the onslaught of emotion and then winced at the flinch.

  Flynn ignored his obvious pain, anger taking the uppermost hand again. “Don’t you think I’ve tried everything? Gone to every specialist in the DC area and beyond? I did the rehab, did the pain management. Hell, I even went to an acupuncturist for a while. Nothing works. Nothing. Eventually, I had to stop complaining about the pain, or they’d have given me a desk job. I take the tramadol because it makes the ibuprofen work better. It’s manageable. I can deal.” And I take as little of that as possible. I don’t want anyone looking into my medical history too closely.

  “Have you looked up the side effects? Because I have this hazy memory that tramadol isn’t all that—”

  Flynn got right up in his face, pinning him in the chair with a hand on each armrest. Jerry thumped back in his seat, the ice bag slipping off his neck onto the floor.

  “I take the tramadol because it’s either that or drink a bottle of whisky every night. And we all know where that would lead.” Like mother, like son.

  Abruptly, Flynn straightened, turning on his heel to stomp over to the door where he’d left his duffle. Hoisting it up to the dresser, he began opening drawers and tossing things in the bag.

  “Where are you going?” Jerry reached down to pick up the ice bag. It was wet from condensation and melting ice. He wrapped it back in the towel and held it against the left side of his neck. After the first flinching moment when it touched his skin, it really did seem to help.

  “Someone has to watch Nancy. You’re in no condition to sit up all night in a car. You stay here. Take a hot shower. Try and get some sleep.”

  “You shouldn’t be on a stakeout alone. If those guys come looking for the artifact—” He started to get up.

  “You don’t get it, do you?” It was as though someone had opened a blast shield and the blaze of the sun at close range was visible on the other side as Flynn let his thoughts burn at full bore. I can’t be with you right now.

  Jerry let him go. He was starting to understand Flynn a lot better now, for all the good it did him. For once, there was something he didn’t know how to fix. In the aftermath of the adrenaline rush, nausea roiled to the surface. They’d been as close to hitting each other as he’d ever seen. This was his fault, and he didn’t know how to make it better.

  He went over to the window and watched Flynn drive off, tires squealing in protest on the paved lot. Cautiously, mindful of his headache, he bent down and began picking up the pieces of the mug.

  Chapter 11

  THE EVENING passed with excruciating slowness. Jerry had ended up ordering room service, feeling too crappy to go out for a decent meal. He’d been tempted, seriously tempted, to go to the nearest gas station/deli and buy a six-pack of beer, but he’d known if he did, that would be the final nail in the coffin of his relationship with Flynn.

  Besides, he didn’t even like beer.

  He’d taken a long hot shower, his hands braced on the tile in front of him, the nearly scalding water pounding on the back of his neck and shoulders. If the hotel had run to a hot tub, he’d have tried that too. The sad thing was, he felt a small measure of relief as long as he stayed in the shower, but as soon as he stepped out, the petrification of muscles began all over again.

  After the shower, he’d propped up pillows behind him and watched television, wondering when television programming had become so stupid. Flipping through the stations, he finally found one of his favorite old shows on the SyFy channel.

  Near one a.m., he texted Flynn. It took Flynn a long time to answer, so long Jerry was able to think of all kinds of worst-case scenarios. He was pulling on a pair of pants with the intent of driving out to Nancy’s place when the response finally came in.

  No activity.

  The brevity of the tersely worded statement told him a lot about Flynn’s frame of mind. It pissed him off as well. Unable to find a comfortable position in which to sleep, he opened his laptop. He was lying on his back on the floor, his legs up on the side of the bed as he tried to follow an instructional video for deep stretching of the spine, when he heard the ping of an IM message. Slowly, in stages, he got up from the floor. He felt like he’d been given a reprieve from the masochistic yoga instructor when he climbed back into the bed and situated the laptop so he could answer Jane’s message.

  How are things going?

  Jerry snorted back a disgusted laugh as he typed. Just peachy. Flynn and I had a major fight. I found out a lot about him I didn’t know before, but it may be too late now. He hoped not, but he didn’t see how they were going to get past this.

  Oh no! What happened!

  Jerry winced. He couldn’t exactly tell her, now could he? I crossed a line. I thought I was doing him a big favor but should have realized I was trespassing into personal stuff. Thing is, I’ve got a handle on why he can be such a prick, and why the sex has fallen off lately. He got injured on the job before I met him, and he’s in more pain than he’s let on. That much, he realized, Jane could understand.

  Oh dear. I’m sorry to hear that. All of that. But are you sure this is the end?

  Jerry bit his lower lip. He wasn’t sure. He just didn’t know what to do about it. I don’t know. I’ve apologized, but he’s pretty pissed. He says once this trip is over, we’re done. The starkness of his statement smacked him in the gut as soon as he typed it.

  Maybe that would be for the best.

  Jerry stared at the blinking cursor at the end of Jane’s comment. No! I don’t want that! I know it might look like that to you, but you don’t know what he’s like. There’s a big heart behind those barriers. He’s just been hurt so many times, it’s easier for him to be cutting and sarcastic.

  Maybe that’s the real him.

  Jerry’s fingers flew over the keypad, backspacing rapidly to correct the inevitable typo without hesitation. No. That was the real me. Before I met Flynn. He taught me how to laugh, and love, and live again. He appreciates me for the weird, grumpy, precise person I am. Or did he? A small scared part of Jerry thought maybe he was protesting too much, that perhaps he was trying to persuade himself as well as Jane.

  So what are you going to do, then?

  Jerry slumped back into the pillows. I don’t know. The blinking cursor mocked him. He didn’t know what else to say, so he clicked “send.”

  Looks like you’ve got until the end of this trip to figure it out. *hugs*

  There didn’t seem to be much to say after that. He was in no mood to go back to the spinal stretches either, but he did them anyway. He texted Flynn again after half-dozing through more bad television. Normally he sent chatty messages, much as he did with Jane, but two could play the minimal text game.

  Status? The irony of his question struck him as soon as he hit “send.”

  Go to sleep.

  Jerry couldn’t tell if Flynn was softening or not.

  HE WOKE at 6:00 a.m. when Flynn’s alarm went off on his phone. Pawing at the bedside table, he turned the alarm off and tried to go back to sleep. He dozed for another half hour before he couldn’t take it any longer. He got up, texted Flynn, and got the message that no one had attempted to break in to Nancy’s place and he’d return shortly. Jerry dressed for a run and pushed himself hard. Five K later, he let himself back into the hotel room and took another long shower. By the time he’d eaten breakfast and taken a fistful of ibuprofen, he was starting to feel human again. He did the stretches as well, for good measure.

  Of course, he was just killing time until Flynn returned.

  He bit back an irritated snap when Flynn finally let himself in at nine. “I was starting to get worried.” It was all he allowed himself to say.

  Though Flynn seldom blushed, Flynn in Jerry’s body didn’t have the same degree of control over his skin tone. “I had some things I needed to do.”

  “Oh
.”

  “I’ve got some reports to catch up on. Do you mind if I use your laptop?”

  Jerry started to make a wisecrack about Flynn actually wanting to work on reports but stopped himself. The fact he was watching what he said and did around Flynn cut him to the quick, but what could he do about it? It wasn’t just since the switch, though. He’d been walking around Flynn as though he was an undetonated land mine for a while now. The realization depressed him.

  “Sure, knock yourself out.”

  Flynn opened the laptop and made himself comfortable at the table.

  What he was going to do was stop pussyfooting around Flynn. If the relationship was going to last, it would have to stand on its own merits. Flynn had to love Jerry for who he was, not for who he thought Flynn wanted him to be.

  “I’m going out for a while.” He pocketed Flynn’s phone and picked up the keys to his rental.

  “Where are you going?” Flynn’s words snapped like the crack of a whip. His expression was one of narrow-eyed evaluation.

  “Not far.” Jerry shrugged. It would have been nice to think Flynn was worried about his ability to handle being out in crowds by himself, but he’d clearly picked up on Flynn’s suspicion that Jerry was running off to see Jean again. “The hotel referred me to a day spa. I’m going to see if a soak in a hot tub will ease the kinks in this shoulder of yours. We’ve got nothing planned until this evening, right?”

  “This evening?” Flynn frowned in a way that shouldn’t have been adorable because he was wearing Jerry’s face, but it was freaking adorable just the same.

  “Duh, the reunion? Or at least, meeting up with your old high school friends.”

  “We’re not doing that.” Flynn seemed surprised Jerry thought the plan to go to Killian’s was still on.

  “You promised Nancy.”

  “Fuck that. You know I would’ve said anything to get my hands on the artifact.”

  “And look how well that turned out. Well, I’m you now, and I keep my promises. So I’m going. You can stay at the hotel tonight if you want.”

  Flynn looked at him as though he was a small dog that had suddenly developed the booming bark of a Rottweiler. “They’re my friends.”

  “At the moment, they’re my friends.” Jerry gave Flynn one of Flynn’s patented smug smiles. “Come along if you like. No skin off my nose.” He shrugged Flynn’s one-shouldered shrug.

  Flynn raised an eyebrow at him, and Jerry had to steady a small surge of hope. He couldn’t let it run away with him. They had too much to repair in this relationship to believe an eyebrow made any difference, but it felt like something had shifted just the same. He didn’t wait to see what Flynn’s response to this challenge would be. “See you later.”

  Shutting the door behind him, he gave in to the urge to dance a little jig in the corridor. Hah. Let Flynn make of that what he would.

  The hopeful mood lasted all the way to the spa the hotel had recommended. He didn’t believe this visit would do much of anything—it was short notice, after all—but he was desperate enough to try anything. He explained his physical issues to the pretty young massage therapist assigned to him, and she asked a lot of questions as she worked on his neck and shoulders.

  He couldn’t answer some of them, falling back on the feeble “I don’t really remember” lie. It was odd having to use that, both from the standpoint of not knowing all the details about Flynn’s past but also from the unexpectedly empty feeling he had knowing his memory wasn’t perfect any more. He was determined to remember everything she said, however, and was relieved when she gave him a sheaf of home exercises to take with him.

  It was early afternoon when he headed back to the hotel. He wasn’t sure what the massage therapist had done, but he felt better than he had since the switch. Joy of joys, he could turn his head to the left now, without the tight constriction that pulled all the way down his back. The massage hadn’t been a pleasant experience; hell, it had been one of the more painful experiences in his life. The Pretty Young Thing had dug into his muscles with the point of her elbow, and pressed into his armpits with the heel of her hand as she’d stretched and pulled on him. The pain, he discovered, kept him very focused on the here and now. It was one of the more effective barriers to the constant barrage of the thoughts of others. Even the admiration of “his” body on the part of the massage therapist had taken a back seat to the immediacy of the agony he’d felt at her hands. Another reason why Flynn wasn’t actively working to find a solution to the pain, he suspected. Still, after nearly dozing off in the hot tub after the massage, he had hopes he would be able to sleep that night.

  It was a jolt to realize he was acting under the assumption they would still be in the wrong bodies by this evening.

  Well, crap.

  On the way back to the hotel, Jerry stopped to get some gas. Chances were they’d be returning the second rental tomorrow; he needed to top off the tank anyway. The frankly lustful gazes of the young women fueling their car in the next bay over, as well as their X-rated thoughts, reminded him Flynn often used music as a means of drowning out the thoughts of others, so Jerry tucked his iPod into the pocket of his jacket and attached the earbuds before getting out of the car. He studiously ignored the giggling co-eds, thankful when they went inside to pay.

  He’d been tapping his foot along with Joan Osborne as she sang “Hurricane,” but that song ended, and he recognized the opening bars to Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face.” By the time the song got to the refrain, he was singing along, doing a little dance by the pump. The pump registered that the tank was full about the same time the girls came back to their car, and he shifted abruptly into bored customer mode. One of the girls waggled her fingers at him as they got in their car. Jerry gave them a little waggle back but was relieved when they drove off.

  Such was the life of Flynn. Poor bastard. Hurting like hell and everyone around him wanted to fuck him. Including Jerry. He felt like a small worm as he got back into the rental.

  Chapter 12

  WELL, AT least they were riding in the same car.

  Flynn had consented to go to Killian’s. In fact, he’d gone as far as to pretend it had been his intention to go all along. Jerry let his smirk play out over Flynn’s features, knowing exactly how irritating that expression must be. He didn’t push it, though. He didn’t want Flynn backing out at the last minute.

  “Nancy still doing okay?”

  Like I don’t know what you’re trying to pull here. It was the first time Flynn had allowed Jerry to read his thoughts since their fight, and Jerry relished the sense of triumph it gave him.

  “No trouble on her end. I think the story we concocted about sending the artifact to a safe location convinced whoever is behind the thefts she doesn’t have it anymore. Which would be true.” Flynn patted the pocket of his jacket.

  “You brought it with you?”

  Flynn gave one of his classic shrugs. Jerry noted with interest that he used both shoulders, however. “Safer with us than back at the hotel.”

  Jerry nodded in silent agreement. Flynn was still shielding strongly against him, but he definitely seemed different since Jerry had come back from his massage therapy appointment. Or maybe because Jerry felt better, he wasn’t letting Flynn get to him as much.

  “It’s still ticking.” The volunteered information felt like an olive branch. It was unsettling to think it was in Jerry’s best interest for them to remain switched; as long as they were in each other’s bodies, there was no way they weren’t connected to one another.

  “Oh, yeah?” Jerry could play it cool, too.

  “Yeah. If anything, I think it’s getting louder.” Flynn paused, tightening his hands on the steering wheel a moment before speaking again. “I get the impression it’s some sort of countdown.”

  Shit.

  He must have spoken aloud because Flynn snorted. “I know. Not much we can do about it, but it’s one of the reasons I think we need to keep it nearby at all times. Who knows what it
will do or when.”

  “So,” Jerry said into the dark silence that followed. “Tell me something about the people we’re meeting.”

  Flynn took a deep breath and blew it out with a flutter of his lips that sounded very much like he was giving Jerry a raspberry. For the briefest of moments, Jerry could feel Flynn’s lips on the skin of his belly, the way they curved into a smile even as he blew against Jerry’s skin in an obscene sound. Jerry could picture himself laughing, curling up against the tickle of it, and then subsiding into contentment when Flynn kissed him. The idea that those days could be gone punched through his chest like an armor-piercing bullet.

  “Well, let’s see. There used to be a group of us that hung out in high school, and then again in college. Most of us went to the University of Richmond. Nancy, you already know. Tom and Carlene were a fixture all through school. It’s odd to think of them no longer being together. Though, come to think of it, they always bickered like crazy. Tom’s okay, if a bit dull. Maybe he’s changed now that he’s no longer under Carlene’s thumb. Rick was the quiet one with the big dreams of getting out and seeing the world. Shame about him having to drop out of school. He was a bit older than the rest of us because he’d worked to save his money to go to school in the first place. Jimmy was ambitious, too, but it was always about money with Jim. Not surprised to hear he’s a lawyer now. I always knew it would be something like that—a lawyer or stockbroker. I bet being a lawyer appeals more to his sense of theater. I’m not sure he’s coming, though.”

  It dawned on Jerry it was very likely he wasn’t going to remember all these details, which kind of freaked him out.

  “Let’s see, who else? Paul was the big man on campus: quarterback, homecoming king, class president. Probably got some sort of high profile job as well. Frank was always the supersmart one. It wouldn’t surprise me to hear he’s making a killing in IT. He always had some outlandish predictions about the future of technology and nailing them every time.” He paused, a smile easing over his face. “Becky was the glue who held us together. She’s got a wicked sense of humor and is just plain fun to be around.”