by Tinnean
Chapter 4
BECAUSE THANKSGIVING had been so late this year, it was only a few days later that I brought up the subject of Christmas cards.
“Isn’t it a little early?” Wills asked. He’d had to go in to work for a few hours earlier in the day, but when he arrived home, he’d showered and changed into more casual clothes, and we’d had dinner—open-faced sandwiches of leftover turkey, stuffing, and gravy, baked potatoes, and a spinach salad with a raspberry vinaigrette dressing.
“Not really.” I hated waiting until the last minute, something Tim had encouraged. He had insisted I had the nicest handwriting of all the boys, and the job of signing the cards for our clients—Happy Holidays from your friends at 3F Corporation!—had fallen to me. Tim felt 3F, which stood for “Fun, Fun, Fun” was innocuous enough that it wouldn’t upset any of their families if they should find the cards. “3F? Oh, a company I do business with on occasion, dear. Surely I mentioned them?” The cards themselves had been white with gold trim, graced by a simple winter scene, suitable no matter the religious persuasion of our clients. “Besides, I’ll be swamped with getting the place ready for Christmas.”
“Aren’t I going to help you?”
“If you like, babe, but I would have thought you’d want to spend your evenings doing—” I waggled my eyebrows. He was wearing white sweat socks but no shoes, and I kept stealing glances at his nearly naked feet. “—other things.”
“Always. But I was looking forward to picking out a tree with you and…. We are gonna have a live tree, aren’t we?”
“Of course.” Even if that hadn’t been my original intention, I’d have indulged his request.
“Great. And we’ll decorate it together too. I haven’t been able to have a tree since I moved out.”
“How come?” Even at our lowest time, that first Christmas I’d been with the boys, Tim had made sure we had a tree, even though it had only been a few branches we’d scrounged from a lot after hours when no one was around to see, and stuffed into a milk carton. I knew Wills had never been in a situation like that.
“Too busy with work.” He shrugged. “What kind of decorations are you putting up?”
I let him change the subject. “Holly.” I hummed a few bars of “A Holly Jolly Christmas,” and he grinned. “Pine garlands and pine cones, mistletoe, poinsettias. I usually stencil reindeer, Santas, and Christmas trees on the windows every year too.”
“I wish you’d let me help.” He sounded so wistful.
I went to him and put my arms around him. “Sure, babe. Whatever you want.”
He leaned into me. “It’s too bad we don’t have a fireplace.”
“A fireplace, hmm?” That was an interesting idea. The living room had originally been a bedroom, and behind one of the walls was a bricked-up fireplace. It couldn’t be that difficult to get it unbricked, and what a great Christmas gift that would be!
I’d already gotten him most of his gifts: a cloisonné globe and stand for the corner of his office; some games for his computer; a new case for his laptop; an Armani tuxedo that appeared black—until the light struck it just right, and then it became obvious that it was actually midnight blue—along with a traditional five-pleat white dress shirt, tie, and cummerbund. Wills had a narrow waist and long legs. Hopefully the tux wouldn’t need too much in the way of alterations.
Now, how would I be able to get the fireplace opened without him knowing? He’d be bound to notice the dust.
“It would be neat to hang stockings from it,” he was saying. “We did that back home. Marti and Jar would get so excited, pulling out all sorts of surprises. That was the most fun to watch; they’re so much younger than me. I got to fill the stockings.” He was lost in the memories, and it was easy to see they were very happy ones. “Jill would film it with the camcorder.” He laughed softly. “You’re lucky, babe. You didn’t have to sit through fifteen years’ worth of Christmas movies.”
“I wouldn’t have minded.”
“You say that now. We’re talking hours’ and hours’ worth!”
I still wouldn’t have minded. “Did you roast chestnuts in the fireplace?”
“Yeah. Just like in the song.” Wills nuzzled a patch of skin below my ear. “We’re a very Norman Rockwell kind of family.” He let me go. “I think I’ll give Dad a call and see if he and Jill would mind sending my ornaments here.”
“Your ornaments?”
“My mom gave me one every year before she died. Even the year she died there was one, although I didn’t get it until the following year. It was a little boy pulling a smaller boy on a sled. She’d had it made especially for me. Merry Christmas to the new big brother.”
“She was pregnant at the time of the accident?” Wills had never spoken of her, beyond telling me she’d been killed in a car accident when he was five.
His expression was so sad. “Yeah. Mom and Dad had just found out. No one else ever knew. We moved back home….” He saw my confusion. “Dad was so broken up he asked my grandparents if we could stay with them, and then I overheard him telling Grandpa to sell our house. That was almost worse than Mom dying. I could pretend she was coming back, but the house…. It would be there, but it wouldn’t be ours.”
My heart went out to that poor little boy, who not only lost his mother but his home as well.
“Grandpa never did put the house up for sale. After… well, after some time had passed, things got better and we moved back home. Dad was going through some things in the attic, and he found a cache of Christmas presents from the year before. Mom always liked to start her shopping early.” He shook off his sadness and smiled at me. “She’d have loved you, babe.” I liked to get my shopping done early too. “So, okay. If you want to spend the day writing out Christmas cards, we’ll spend the day writing Christmas cards.”
“Why don’t you call your dad, and I’ll get the boxes of cards.” I went into my office, where I’d put them in the closet after I’d bought them the day after Christmas last year: best time, best prices. I hadn’t realized that by the following Christmas, I’d be out of the business and wouldn’t need so many. There was a wide variety—religious, secular, humorous, serious, with big-eyed kids, with Santas, with animals, with winter scenes of picturesque villages, and it took me a few trips to bring them into the living room.
Wills blinked when he saw all the boxes. “Um….”
“I like to be prepared.” I grinned at him. “What do you want to hear, babe?”
“Excuse me?”
“I always listen to Christmas music when I write out my cards. I’ve got Nat King Cole, Boyz II Men, Elvis, the WODS-FM Boston Ultimate Christmas Album….” After I had called Jill to find out what kind of Christmas music he liked and she’d told me of the radio station he’d listened to when he was living at home, I’d gone online and bought the whole series.
“Surprise me.”
I loaded the CDs into the player, and Nat King Cole’s silky-smooth baritone came out of the speakers, singing about chestnuts roasting on an open fire. I made myself comfortable by the coffee table and glanced over at my lover. He was sprawled out on the rug, wearing those 501 jeans and a cable-knit sweater that belonged to me. The sleeves were pushed up, and he looked for all the world like a teenager doing his homework. That was, until he looked up and saw me watching him. Wills was smiling—the half grin that had my insides doing loop-the-loops—and his tongue peeked out between his lips.
“Want to put this off for now? We could….” He rolled onto his back and rocked his hips slightly.
“I thought you were the one who believed in delayed gratification?”
“Damn. Hoisted with my own petard.”
“Serves you right. Now, to work.”
“Well, it was worth a try.”
“The cards now, babe, but if you get them done fast enough, we’ll have plenty of time for….” I let my gaze rake over his body, lingering on his groin.
“What are we waiting for, then? I’m halfway d
one!”
I settled down to write out my cards. Although my list wasn’t as extensive as the previous year—I no longer had to send cards to all our clients—there was still Paul and Spike, Tim and Cris, the brothers Tom and Mike out in Los Angeles, various other boys who I kept in touch with, Vince, my lawyer, the accountant who was letting me work with him until I could build my own clientele, and of course, family.
I gnawed on the end of the fountain pen Tim had given me years before. “Should I put anything in the card I’m sending my family?” I’d been able to send Ma and Acacia cards, knowing they would get the mail long before Poppa came home from work, but this was the first time in twelve years that I’d be able to include Poppa in the greeting.
Wills was scribbling away industriously. Beside him was a small stack of completed cards. “Beyond ‘Love, Theo and Wills’?”
I couldn’t catch my breath. Sure, we were a couple, but somehow signing a card that way made us seem more of a couple.
Wills mistook my silence. “I’m sorry, Theo, scratch that. Of course you don’t want to sign the card like that.”
I could move fast when I wanted to. I pounced on him, pushed him back onto the rug, and straddled him. “You’d really be okay with me signing the card like that?”
“Theo, have you suddenly gone mental on me?” His expression was exasperated. “Of course I’m okay with that. How do you think I signed the cards to my family?”
He saw a future for us. He really saw….
“I thought… I thought….”
“Ah, babe, you think too much. You know something, Theo?” He sighed as I rubbed my palms over his chest. “You really rock my trousers.”
“Well, you cause serious trouser-rockage in mine too.” I was pleased to find his nipples like pebbles.
“If we had a fireplace,” he murmured, “we could be doing this on a faux-fur rug, and you’d know my nipples were hard because of you and not because it’s so freaking cold in here.” I knew he was teasing me. It was always warm in the house. “Hey!”
I stripped off his jeans, shoved mine down off my hips, and rolled on a condom. A couple of slicked fingers to prepare him—I’d learned to keep tubes of lube in every room—and I was in him before he could do more than gasp out his readiness to be taken.
He gripped my waist with his knees and rocked up to meet each of my thrusts, panting heavily, his lips parted as moans spilled from them. It had been a long time since he’d made any effort to muffle the sounds he made.
And God, he felt so good under me, so right. I balanced my weight on my knees, brushed the hair off his forehead, and framed his face. His eyes were like dark chocolate.
“I…. Wills, I….” In spite of the fact that I’d told him I loved him on his birthday, I still found it almost impossible to say the words. Even now I couldn’t get them past my lips, but it didn’t seem to matter.
“I know, Theo. I love you too.”
After we’d both come and were lying there trying to get our breathing under control, he shifted under me.
“Am I too heavy for you, babe?”
“Never. But this floor is freaking hard.”
I rolled off him, knotted the condom, and tossed it aside.
“Hey, I didn’t want you to move!”
“Come on, tough guy.” I kicked off my jeans, grabbed his hand, and pulled him to his feet. “We can continue this on the couch.”
Something else went on my list for him: a thick, plush faux-fur rug for right in front of his fireplace.
This was going to be an awesome Christmas.
THE NEXT day he came home from work to tell me he had to go out of town again. “I’m sorry, Theo. You’ll have to get the tree without me.”
“Where do you have to go this time?” So far he’d been to Houston, Seattle, and Bangor, Maine.
“St. Paul.”
“Minnesota?” I’d gotten a little better at geography. “Huntingdon has an office in Minnesota?”
“Huntingdon has an affiliate in Minnesota.”
“They’re sending in the first string.” I was proud he was going, in spite of the fact that I hated he was going.
He gave me that smile and hunched a shoulder, then pulled out his suitcase and a garment bag. While he went to the closet to get his suits, I pulled out his thermal underwear. I’d had a john who’d been from Minnesota, and Minnesota in December was cold.
“Will you be back for Christmas?” I did my brave little soldier act. I was pretty proud of myself for hiding how much I hated it when he went out of town. I knew he wouldn’t cheat on me… well, I was fairly certain he wouldn’t, but he was used to having sex every night, and there were just so many fucking temptations out there….
“I should only be gone about a week. I’ll be back, babe.”
And maybe I wasn’t as good at hiding my feelings as I’d thought. He spent the night making love to me, and as a result we overslept.
“Mr. Vincent is gonna be so pissed….” He scrambled into his shirt and pants, stepped into his shoes, and sat on the bed to tie them.
“I’ll get you to Dulles on time.” I pulled on sweats and a hoodie. “Get your suitcase. I’ll get the garment bag and the keys to the Corvair.”
He held his hand out. “I’ll drive.”
“Babe….”
“Theo.”
“Okay.” He actually was a better driver than I was.
I didn’t know how he did it, but he made every single light, although some just barely. He pulled up at Departures, brushed a kiss across my mouth, and got out. I slid over to the driver’s seat and buckled up—the Corvair hadn’t originally come with seat belts, but I’d had them installed after we’d been stopped and ticketed by a cop who didn’t want to hear that they weren’t in use when the car first rolled off the assembly line—then rolled down the window to offer some last-minute advice.
“Eat your veggies. Don’t get your feet wet. Get to bed early….”
“I promise I’ll take good care of myself.” He took his suitcase, garment bag, and overcoat from the backseat and shoved the door shut. “I’ve gotta run, babe.”
I sighed. I wanted to kiss him, but this was a public place, even if it was so early the area was almost deserted.
Wills leaned down and kissed me one last time through the open window.
This time my sigh was a contented one. I watched as he jogged toward the terminal, but just before he entered the building, he glanced back over his shoulder, pursed his lips, and blew me a kiss.
The big lug.
Once he was out of sight, I put the car in gear and drove home.
Almost walking on air, I contacted the architect. “You can say, ‘I told you so.’ I want the fireplace in the living room opened up.”
Walter came over, practically salivating, and measured and took notes and frowned thoughtfully. “I can have it done in—”
“You’ve got five days. Seven if you factor in the weekend.”
“I’ll do the best I can.”
“It will be better than your best, because if you finish on time, I’ll give you the cost of the job as a bonus.”
“It’ll be done!”
Chapter 5
THE NEWLY reopened and refurbished fireplace had a fire screen, a solid brass and black tool set, wood basket, and andirons. Bricks more than a hundred years old were given a coat of white paint. The new mantel was a rich golden oak, and the surround was granite with hints of red. The old, pitted firebox had been replaced with a new one, and the chimney cleaned and repaired.
Walter completed it with a couple of days to spare.
Not that meeting the deadline mattered, as it turned out. Wills had called the day after it was finished to let me know he’d run into a snag and the job was going to take a little longer.
“Thanks for letting me know.” I hoped he didn’t hear how disappointed I was. “Watch out for those Midwest farm boys. They look all innocent, but they’re not.”
“I promise
I’ll be careful, Theo,” he said, laughing, “but it won’t be a problem. They’re not you.”
He said the most romantic things.
“I miss you, babe.”
“I miss you too.” His voice was warm and did unbelievable things to my insides.
I wanted to tell him I loved him, but the words stuck in my throat, and then he said, “I’ve gotta go now, Theo. Bye.” And he hung up.
Well, every time he said “I love you,” I’d say, “me too,” so he knew I loved him, and that was what was important.
The next morning I went down to one of the lots that had sprung up the day after Thanksgiving and would vanish the day after Christmas. I picked out a nice blue spruce, thick and lush and about six feet tall, and bought yards and yards of pine garlands that would be tacked to the crown molding throughout the apartment. I’d do the decorating myself. I didn’t want Wills in the living room until Christmas.
The man who took my money had one of his boys tie the tree to the roof of the Corvair—the knots had to be undone once because he’d tied the doors closed with me outside—while I put the garlands in the tiny trunk, which was in the front of the car.
Once home, I hauled the tree up the stairs and into the living room, then retrieved the live garlands before going back down to put the car away.
Next year, I promised myself as I took out the boxes that held the ornaments, tinsel garlands, and lights, and then plugged in the lights to make sure they were all working before stringing them on the tree. Next year we’d do the tree together—string the lights, hang the decorations, maybe mull some wine or have hot cocoa with peppermint candy canes sticking out of the mugs, and then we’d make love on the rug in front of the fireplace.
My stomach rumbled, and I realized the afternoon had flown by and it was past dinnertime. I wasn’t really in the mood to cook just for myself, but I didn’t want to go out either, not even for takeout. I took a container of tomato sauce from the freezer. The label on it said there were two meatballs and a sweet sausage in it also. I stuck it in the microwave to defrost and started a pot of water boiling for the angel hair pasta I intended to have for dinner.
