by R. Cooper
Rafael’s even, measured tone was as gentle as fingertips at the top of Chico’s spine. Chico regretted wearing a thin, white athletic tee and his collection of silver necklaces. Between that and the measuring tape he’d draped around his neck earlier, which moved when he did, he felt like he’d displayed his skin on purpose.
Which was stupid because dancers displayed skin all the time. Rafael was showing more than he was. Chico imagined him draped across the sofa, arms bare, legs open, one foot on the ground, and began to strip away the hastily glued-on embroidery. He could fix it later. What else did he have to do with his nights?
“Controlled,” Chico mused, only a little breathless. “That’s a good word to describe your dancers.” And Rafael as well. He was the opposite of Chico. “That must be nice. She’ll listen to you, though. You’re a good, I mean, you seemed like a good teacher to me, from what I saw the other night. And what I saw in your waltz class, although I know I wasn’t there for long.”
“You’re welcome to come back,” Rafael offered, without a trace of a smile in his husky voice. That came a moment later, when he went light and teasing. “I promise not to show you off in front of everyone again, cross my heart. Not unless you want me to.”
“Oh God.” Chico had to fight not to turn around. He touched his stinging cheek and flicked another look out the door. He felt like a teenager with a boy in the house, although his mother had never thought to demand he leave the door open like she had with his sisters. “I’m blushing,” he murmured at last. He was smiling too, and jittery with excitement and nerves. “You’re very good at this.”
“Is that okay?” If Rafael’s gaze was anything close to as warm as his tone, Chico was better off keeping his eyes on his work. “After what you said the other night, I thought you might not mind.”
“No. No, it’s….” Chico took a deep breath. “It’s been a long time since someone bothered to tease me like that.” With interest and attention, which was something he hadn’t even noticed until now, or at least hadn’t let himself think about. Somehow he’d stopped expecting John to flirt with him and tease him, as if it was something couples didn’t do once they lived together. He’d stopped expecting a lot of things, as if he wasn’t worth the effort.
“I didn’t mean to make it awkward.” Rafael’s soft apology broke into his moment of realization. Chico must have been quiet for a while.
This time he did twist in his chair to give Rafael a quick smile. It only lasted for a moment, until he actually got a good look at Rafael sprawled out on the couch with his shirt twisted and more of his chest exposed, his arm along the back of the couch and his legs open like Chico ought to crawl between them.
He swallowed and lifted his gaze too late not to be caught fantasizing about Rafael’s cock in his mouth. He turned around.
“Awkward is my natural state these days,” he revealed shakily. Rafael shouldn’t do those things while Chico was this vulnerable. The man taught dance and emphasized precision and how movements had meaning. He knew exactly what his body was doing. And his mother was right there.
“I can’t deny the awkward, but I have to say there’s something sweet about it. You’re very honest, even when you aren’t speaking. It’s those eyes. Truthful and sincere and incredibly appealing.” And then Rafael had to go and be kind again.
“Too honest,” Chico corrected, as though his blood wasn’t singing at what he was hearing. “I’m not exactly at my best.”
“You’re nervous and sort of skittish, if you don’t mind me saying so, but so are most people who’ve been through the wringer.” Rafael was curious, and Chico couldn’t blame him, considering how all over the place he was now. “But for all that, you seem pretty together to me. What do you consider you at your best?”
“You really want to know?” Nobody just asked questions like that, certainly not people Chico barely knew. “I’m not that interesting,” Chico added. “And ‘skittish’ makes me feel like a deer.”
“A soft, little deer on wobbly legs, with the hugest, brightest brown eyes I’ve ever seen,” Rafael said softly.
Chico spun around to look at him and found he couldn’t meet Rafael’s eyes while those words were hanging in the air between them.
He faced forward and stared at the notebook. “You’re teasing me, Mr. Raf.”
Rafael hummed in agreement… or perhaps encouragement. “I’m flirting with you, Mr. Silva.”
Davi must have told Rafael Chico’s last name. Davi could have told Rafael anything about him, and still Rafael was trying to flirt with him?
Chico tried to imagine his old life, and if Rafael would have liked him if they’d met in the city.
“Me at my best?” he wondered, after several moments of contemplation. “I haven’t felt that way in a while. Years, maybe? I can’t remember,” he answered at last. “Oh shit.” He put his head down in the middle of stiff, itchy tulle and let one high laugh escape, then another. He waved a hand behind him when he heard Rafael move. “I’m not having a breakdown. I just… is it your quiet teacher vibe? Because I don’t do this around anyone else, not even Davi.” He chortled into the tutu, then lifted his face. “You know. I don’t think I had anyone to tell about John. I think he liked it that way. Not in a scary abuser way, or, yeah, I guess. Not scary. But definitely isolating. As though if I was around other people, I’d notice what a loser he was. God, he was such a loser. All my time ended up going to make him look better. Nice, clean apartment, advertising our social life so all his friends online could see it, learning to make quinoa, as though I’m any sort of a cook. As though it’s some miracle food, when I’m tired and I just want a peanut butter sandwich.”
Chico stopped to heave a breath. “And now you’re flirting with me, and it’s so nice I don’t know what to do.”
He immediately dropped his head again to giggle into the sugarplum fairy’s skirts.
“Are you all right?” Rafael moved again, probably sitting up.
Chico shook his head, then changed his mind and nodded. “It’s that. It’s when you do that. You care, and you actually react to what I’m doing and what I’m saying. You’re the complete opposite of him, and that must be what triggers it. I think of him and how he’d compare, and God, what a loser.”
“Thank you?” Rafael replied hesitantly, no doubt thinking Chico was crazy.
Chico sobered up. “What does it say about me that I thought a loser was too good for me?” The question was real. But it was also something for therapy, or maybe another evening on his balcony, not the costume closet of the Winters Dance Studio. Chico sat up. “You know, it could be the nights up here. I’ve had nothing to do but think and stare at the stars.”
“They’re a nice view, aren’t they?” Rafael offered sincerely, bringing Chico around to face him. He gave Chico a friendly grin. “Clarifying, somehow.”
“Yeah,” Chico agreed, smiling without any hysteria in it this time. “They’re almost worth everything. Every weird, horrible thing I’m still getting used to, like how long it takes the two cashiers to ring people up at the grocery store. Or everyone knowing my name. The stars are great.”
Rafael smiled back. “I’ve always thought so.”
Chico flashed back to the articles and pictures in the foyer, although he really couldn’t think of a way to ask why Rafael had given up professional dancing. He bit his lip and gave him a careful look. “They helped you too?”
If the subject was painful, Rafael hid it well. He rolled his shoulders. “They still do. After a bad day, there’s nothing like going out to let the view soothe my weary body and somewhat tired soul. Maybe I should feel alone, looking at them, but I don’t.”
“Oh yeah?” Chico opened his eyes wide. “I find it hard to believe you don’t have anyone to stare at the stars with you.”
He ought to keep pins in his mouth to keep from saying things like that in Rafael’s presence. But Rafael only gave him a long, toe-curling, intense study, before curving his mouth up in pl
easure. “So you say, but I noticed a few more gray hairs the other day, and yet again no one was in bed with me when I woke up.”
Chico released a relieved breath at the lightly flirtatious reply. He hadn’t meant to sound like he was inviting himself to stargaze with Rafael and would probably have frozen if Rafael had offered. All the same, he frowned because Rafael was entirely too good at reading him already.
He put his nose in the air. “Don’t even start. You know you’re sexy,” he scoffed, making Rafael’s smile grow. Now that he’d said it, Chico kept going with his hand in the air to forestall any more of Rafael’s denials. “First, there is your face, and your jawline and your eyes and the way you smile. Then you’ve got that athlete dancer thing going on. Like, your thighs and arms and stomach, are just… there aren’t words. And we won’t talk about your ass out of respect for your parents in the next room. But let’s not pretend it isn’t there.”
Rafael was outright laughing now. Silently, but in a way that made his whole body shake.
Chico wrinkled his nose at him. “You probably get all kinds of attention, even in a small town like this.” His throat wasn’t tight at all. He wasn’t drooping down with terrible posture while he thought about that baker. “Any gray hair you get is only going to make everyone even more hot for teacher. I was thinking that before you came in.”
“Crushes on teachers are not my thing.” Rafael’s laughter tapered off, although his eyes were still bright. “Were you really thinking about me before I got here? Because that is information I am very interested in.”
“Uh,” Chico said, stupidly, and cast about for a less embarrassing topic of conversation. “What happened to the person who used to do all the costumes for you?”
Rafael wrinkled his nose at the clumsy subject change, but it didn’t really seem to bother him. Maybe it was the knowledge that Chico was blushing and squirming. “Her arthritis got really bad a few years ago. You’ll see her at the performance, though, front row. We’ve never been able to find anyone to replace her, but the volunteers and my mother try. The problem is we do a lot of recitals, especially for the younger kids. You know”—Rafael leaned back into the sofa again—“the classes aren’t technically for children alone. You could always take a tap class if ballroom doesn’t appeal to you.”
“You still think I could take a class?” Chico ignored his embarrassment to ask.
“I think the rush of endorphins from the exercise would do you some good.” Rafael gave him a slow nod. “And the socializing, the friendly touches. It improves moods. They’ve done studies.”
Friendly touches. Chico rubbed a hand down over his hip. That touch had felt a lot more than friendly to his touch-starved body. His mouth went dry again. “I wouldn’t have a partner. And I don’t know that I’d be much good at it anyway. It sounds like something it would be more fun to do with someone. A friend. Or a date.” He met Rafael’s gaze, then lowered his eyes. “I don’t think I’m ready for that.”
“Yeah?” Rafael took his time answering. He looked down too, for another few moments, but then he lifted his chin. “Well, at least I had you in my class for a little while.”
Chico frowned but didn’t get to ask what he meant.
Mrs. Winters appeared in the doorway. “Class? What class is that, Raf, darling? The one you should be teaching right this moment? That class?”
Chico jerked his shoulders straight and sat upright.
Rafael rolled his eyes but obediently got to his feet. “Yes, Mama,” he told his mother playfully, not sounding remotely intimidated by all the motherly sarcasm. He kissed the top of her head as he went by, then murmured, “Be nice to him,” with enough intent to have Chico frozen all over again.
Rafael finally looked back at Chico and gave him a smile that was not as gentle as it could have been. “I’ll see you later, Chico. Feel free to keep thinking about me while I’m gone.”
He said that with his mom glancing between them, and then he disappeared out the door, leaving Chico alone.
With Rafael’s mother.
With Rafael’s imperious and sharp-eyed mother.
“Chico, yes?” She pronounced his name like it was Spanish, and Chico couldn’t think to correct her. Her gaze swept over everything and missed nothing. “You don’t want to dance?”
“I don’t think I should right now.” He mumbled like the he had the first and only time he’d ever attempted to go to confession.
Her expression indicated Chico had cut her to the quick and that she would make him pay for it. However, what she said was “But you will,” with a certainty that had him wriggling internally.
He blinked at her, and she squinted in return, as if she was trying to see inside of him. “You will,” she repeated and then crossed the room with sure, precise steps.
“You embroider?” she pressed, elegant and commanding as she came forward. Mrs. Winters prodded the pencil on top of the notebook and tapped the sketch he’d done. “What eyes you have to see this,” she remarked, meaning something else entirely from what her son had said when he’d compared Chico to Bambi.
Nonetheless, Chico went still, and she patted the top of his head with one slender hand. “It’s beautiful, darling, carry on,” she announced in the voice of a grand dame, and she left him to it, sailing back out from whence she came.
Outside, in the other room, Mr. Winters continued to play the piano. But he did pause for a moment to shoot a sympathetic look in Chico’s direction, as if he understood Chico’s apprehension.
The entire family was full of mind readers. Chico dropped his gaze to the tutu and kept it there for the rest of the afternoon.
FIXING SEAMS, tutting over what had once been some gorgeous beadwork, and blushing when Rafael glanced at him occupied his time for two more afternoons. The rest of the volunteer seamstresses came and went, mostly, he was guessing, fixing their own kids’ costumes first before they would start on the rest. He was surprisingly chill with that. He was the single gay loser with no life to get back to, so he could set up outside the practice hall and rip out crappy stitches to his heart’s content without worrying about getting home in time for dinner.
When he did go home, his back ached and his fingers stung with pinpricks like he’d been sewing stinging nettles, but he noticed with clear, wide-awake attention that he still hadn’t gotten around to curtains. He could sew them as well as buy them, if he found fabric he liked.
The thought was an idle one. Brandywine had no fabric store, only a cramped place that sold yarn. Which was just as well, since a cursory look through his remaining boxes showed his sewing machine and thread were likely boxed up at his parents’.
But Davi had assured him that the apartment would heat up during the days in the summer and be cold in the winter, so he ought to get some curtains. With that in mind, he made a special trip to Brandywine’s hardware store to buy the cheapest curtain rods he could find. Davi already gave him a lot for free; Chico could leave his place with some nice window treatments.
The purchase was oddly uplifting. Chico didn’t have his sewing equipment, or even fabric, but he’d taken a step. Davi was going to be so pleased. Though Davi was going to want to be the one to hang them. He’d probably bring out an automatic drill or something.
Inspired by his success, Chico hesitated and, instead of immediately driving back out of town, walked down to one of the restaurants he hadn’t been to yet. He had no desire to take any pictures of his food or let anyone know where he was going. All he really wanted, he realized, was a sandwich. Maybe some fries.
He never finished an order of fries. He didn’t know why, because he loved them. It was one of the nice things about being in a relationship, having someone to share his french fries. He missed that, although it was no reason to go without food. Ice cream and frozen dinners every night was kind of ridiculous. Especially when he could have been treating himself to something he actually had an appetite for.
Eating in public was another matter. He had
a feeling his energy was going to leave him about halfway through dinner, so he didn’t risk it. He stared at the menu and ordered a club sandwich with fries, to go, and wandered around the restaurant’s lobby while he waited.
The restaurant was the kind of place that served basic, standard fare and had a waiting area with gumball machines next to a potted plant and a board full of business cards and fliers for local events. Chico tucked a paper copy of the menu into a pocket, to put on his fridge like a proper single person, as he meandered—casually—toward the board.
Mostly it was what he expected: teens looking for summer jobs as pet sitters or babysitters or amateur gardeners, something for AA meetings the next town over, a card for a church rummage sale. The poster for the area’s Pride celebration surprised him, since Davi hadn’t mentioned that.
In town, the senior center needed visitors, which was one of those things that made Chico’s eyes sting. His family was so big it was hard to imagine someone without any family who cared. Even Davi still had Chico’s parents to look out for him while his own were being stubborn assholes.
He moved on to study a poster for Movies Among the Trees, a summer film series in the clearing at the north end of town where people apparently picnicked on the ground outside and watched family movies. The movies were free. Sitting in the dark surrounded by people he didn’t have to actually talk to might be something he could do.
He was wondering how to get a copy of the films and times, when movement at the restaurant entrance caught his attention. He took in the sight of Rafael and the baker together, then quickly turned to face the board with some survival instinct he hadn’t known he possessed.
His pulse was so loud in his ears other people should have been able to hear it.
Perhaps they could. Or perhaps the small town restaurant had a tiny lobby.
