by A. E. Wasp
Troy shook his head.
“That is a crime,” Pippi said. “Tree, you suck as a boyfriend and spokesperson for Red Deer. You’re fired.” She held out her hand. “Troy, come with me. I’ll show you the fun places.”
Troy took her hand and let himself be pulled up. Since sex was off the menu, a walk to the river sounded better than sulking in the living room. “You coming?” he asked Dmitri.
Ron, Gil, and Annie came out from the dining room carrying dirty dishes into the kitchen. “I’ll stay and help clean up. Then I’ll meet you, okay?”
He and Pippi exchanged a long look. “All good?” she asked him.
“All good. Just want to visit with mom and dad a minute. I swear I’ll come out.”
She punched him on the shoulder. “You’d better. Troy, do you need shorts?”
“Nope, got some in the truck.”
“Yay! Go change. Meet us in the back yard.”
“Take the dog!” Annie yelled from the kitchen.
Moby barked wildly, and Sweetie clambered to her feet with a happy yip.
“Is she okay for the walk?” Troy asked Ron.
“I don’t know. What do you think, Dmitri?”
Dmitri ran his hands over her, pushing at her joints, at her abdomen. She shifted a little under his hands but didn’t yip in pain. “If you go slow. Can you carry her if she needs it?” he asked Troy.
“Sure thing. We never leave a man behind, right, Sweetie?” His hand dropped to her head the way it did anytime she was near him.
“Awesome. Let’s go!”
Angel and Pippi grabbed some beer from the fridge and went out the back door.
Gil and Annie waved Dmitri and Ron’s help away. Dmitri could hear them singing in the kitchen as they cleaned. It was something they’d done as long as Dmitri could remember. They didn’t always know all the words to the songs they sang, and their voices wouldn’t win any awards, but it made them happy, and it made Dmitri happy to hear it now. The house felt alive in a way it hadn’t in years.
Ron sat in the easy chair across from Dmitri. He was a new friend of Dmitri’s parents. They hadn’t met him until they’d moved up to Lyons and Dmitri realized he didn’t know much about the man sitting in his home. He’d thought Ron was about his parents’ age, but now he realized the man was in his mid-forties at the most. The weather-beaten skin and salt and pepper hair had thrown Dmitri off.
“How you and Troy doing?” Ron asked, surprising Dmitri.
“Fine, thanks.”
“Really? He’s doing okay? He’s out, what, three, four months?” Ron crossed his leg, resting his ankle on his knee, his gaze uncomfortably intense on Dmitri’s face.
“Four. And yeah. For the most part.” Dmitri fiddled with his beer bottle, peeling the label. “He’s had, well, these nightmares. This one, in particular, this one night…” Dmitri shook his head, staring at the bottle. “It was bad.” He didn’t know why he was opening up to this near-stranger, but when he risked a glance, Ron was nodding as if he understood perfectly.
“Be almost odder if he wasn’t,” Ron said.
“Were you in the military?” Dmitri asked.
“No. But I work with a lot of people who were. A lot of my clients served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Pakistan. I’m even still working with guys from Vietnam and Kosovo.”
“Kosovo.”
Ron nodded. “One guy was a pilot. Did a buncha bombing runs over Bosnia and Kosovo in the nineties. My business, sadly, is booming. I’ve talked to a lot of these guys. Do you know what you’re getting into?”
Dmitri barked a laugh. “No. Not really. But I’m starting to see just a little bit. I started to do some research after that night.”
“What happened?”
Dmitri looked around to make sure they were alone, then slid as close to Ron’s chair as he could. “He had a nightmare. A really bad one. His eyes were open and he was yelling and everything. I thought he was awake at first. Then he took a swing at me when I tried to touch him.”
“Did he hit you?” Ron asked seriously.
“No. No. And I know he never would,” Dmitri trailed off.
“He might.”
“What?” Dmitri’s gaze snapped back to Ron’s face.
“When he’s trapped in a nightmare like that, he might hurt you. He won’t mean to, and it will make him feel like shit, but it could happen anyway.”
Dmitri’s jaw dropped. He knew he must look like an idiot, but he felt like Ron’s words had hit some sort of a barrier in his brain. He heard them, but they didn’t process. He couldn’t fit them into the Troy-shaped place in his mind. They didn’t fit.
Ron took pity on him and went to the kitchen to grab a fresh beer. He replaced the half-finished lukewarm one Dmitri had gripped between his hands. “I know it’s a lot to process. I’m not a doctor or a counselor, but I’ve worked with a bunch of these guys and gals. Ask me anything, hit me up but know that the answer to everything is going to be something like ‘probably’ and ‘it depends.’”
Dmitri nodded quickly. “Okay. Okay.” He took a long swallow of beer. It was early for him to start drinking but it felt necessary. He picked at the label. “Will he always be like this?”
“That’s the wrong question. You want to know if it will get better?”
“Yeah.”
“Most likely, yeah. If he works at it, he can manage and integrate everything he’s experienced in his life. Time helps. He’s just at the beginning of it. It’s not a life sentence, but it can be rough. But there are a ton of things he can do to help himself.”
“What can I do to help? I told him I’d done some research and he got really defensive. I’m afraid to say anything.”
Ron threw a look over his shoulder out the window. Dmitri craned his neck to see as well. There was no sign of Troy and the girls. Ron moved closer to Dmitri. “The first thing you have to do is decide what you want to be to him. Friend? Boyfriend? Acquaintance? And then you have to stick to it. Right now, the last thing he needs is someone he thinks is there for him flaking out on him when he needs it.”
“Wow, don’t sugarcoat it.”
“There’s no point. My job is to train these dogs to help people deal with their shit. Ignoring it, pretending one day everything will just all be better doesn’t help anyone.”
Dmitri sighed, a hand over his mouth.
“It’s a lot to think about, isn’t it? For some guy you just started dating?” Ron really did look like he got it. Dmitri wondered briefly if Ron was gay and speaking from experience.
“What if I can’t do it?” Dmitri asked, looking directly at Ron. “What if I’m not that big of a person? Not that good of a person?”
“Not being able or willing to deal with a person’s emotional issues doesn’t make you a bad person. It’s part of the dating process, part of discovering each other and what you can be, are willing to be, to each other. If someone has problems that you can’t handle, that doesn’t make you a bad person.”
Dmitri frowned. “Doesn’t feel that way.”
Jay sat on a flat rock in the middle of the river, feet under the water in a strong current. They floated out in front of her, whitewater sloshing over her toes. “So, you joined the army when you were, what, eighteen?”
“Nineteen.” The rock Troy perched on was not as flat, and he struggled to find an easy place to sit. Further down the river, Pippi and Angel reclined in the shallows, legs pointed downstream and letting the water rush over their shoulders and down their bodies. The river was everything Pippi had said it would be and more. Troy could have gladly spent all day there.
“And you’re how old now?”
“Twenty-five.”
“So basically, you’ve spent your whole adult life, barring the last what, three months? Preparing for war and being in a war zone. And you think you’re just supposed to walk away from that and be normal? Just, pop back into civilian society? I’ve seen enough documentaries to know it isn’t that easy.”
&
nbsp; For some reason, Troy didn’t mind Jay’s forthrightness. She wasn’t tiptoeing around his military service, about the fact that he was in the army, in a war zone, and might be having some issues readjusting, but she also isn’t looking at him like he’s something to pity. He liked that they were strangers to each other, that they had no relationship yet to worry about screwing up. He felt like he could say anything to her and she would just take it at face value.
“Yeah. It is kind of strange. I’m feeling a little lost. I didn’t expect that.”
Jay nodded. “Is it easier here where no one knows you than back in West Virginia?”
Troy shrugged. “Well, I’m not out to my family, so there’s the cherry on top of my messed-up sundae.”
Jay pulled her toes out of the water and hugged her knees. “Ouch. That’s hard.”
“I don’t think my sister would care. I think she suspects. She’s ten years older than me. Practically raised me.”
“You miss her?”
Troy realized suddenly that he missed his family with a deep longing. He had shortchanged them and himself. He barely remembered leaving; his brain had been so scrambled when he got back. “Yeah, I do. I just had a great conversation with her yesterday. She wants me to come home for the holidays.”
“You gonna?”
“I don’t know. Maybe at Christmas. After finals.” Unless he wanted to hide forever, he was going to have to come out to his family. But that would have to wait. One crisis at a time. He didn’t want to hide forever. He wondered if his sister would like Dmitri. She probably would.
The sound of laughter came from down the trail, as the rest of the party joined them at the river.
Troy watched Dmitri’s face across the campfire as the sun set behind the foothills and prayed to whoever might listen that he didn’t screw this up.
chapter twenty-seven
Half a mile from home and Dmitri could already see Troy’s truck parked in his driveway. He pulled up next to the old red Ford, put the car into park, and, with his hands still wrapped around the wheel, rested his head on it.
The last thing Dmitri needed tonight was company. Even hot company that wanted to sleep with him; that’s how bad of a day it had been. He didn’t remember making plans with Troy for tonight. It was Thursday, and on Thursdays, Troy was usually at work by now.
Maybe it wouldn’t be too bad. Maybe Troy had cooked something healthy and nutritious and tasty to save Dmitri from eating cereal for dinner again.
And maybe Dmitri was the worst boyfriend ever. He liked Troy a lot, maybe even more than that. Maybe he liked Troy enough that it terrified him. But still, sometimes Dmitri found it difficult to be around someone else so much. Plus, the strain of not talking about the nightmares, the thousand-yard stare, and all the other obvious - to Dmitri anyway - symptoms of something that was at least PTSD-adjacent if not the real thing.
He’d given up trying to get any details about Troy’s time in the Army. It was as if Troy lived only in the now. No reminiscing about the past and no planning for the future.
Dmitri shut the car off and opened the door, expecting Moby to greet him as she did every day. No Moby. She must have been in the house with Troy. Troy was stealing his dog’s affection, and, though it made Dmitri feel petty, it annoyed him when Moby snuggled next to Troy on the couch instead of next to him.
Dmitri sighed. He was not a nice person, not a good person. When he saw the green Saturn wallpapered in stickers parked behind Troy’s truck, he groaned out loud. Bracing himself mentally, he went in the house.
The thumping bass of some kind of electronic dance music greeted him as he stepped through the propped-open back door into the kitchen.
“Be careful! That’s still wet,” Troy called. He stood on a stepstool in a sea of tarps, painting the trim over the cabinets. Danny and Ravi crawled along the floor, touching up the baseboards.
The whole kitchen had been repainted in the pale green color Dmitri remembered admiring while they had watched some home decorating show a few weeks ago. Dmitri walked into the room, hands holding his briefcase and suit jacket carefully away from the freshly painted walls.
The kitchen table, chairs, and bar stools were shoved into the living room, so Dmitri tossed his stuff on the couch. Moby whined from her cage when she saw him, tail thumping on the ground.
“Hey, Mobes,” he greeted her, sticking his hand through the wires so she could lick him.
“Don’t let her out,” Troy called from the kitchen. “She keeps walking through the paint.
Now that Dmitri looked, he could see a few pale green paw prints in the carpet.
Danny popped up in the doorway and noticed the direction of Dmitri’s gaze. “Don’t worry about that stuff,” he said. “We’ll get it out easy.”
“Yeah?” Dmitri didn’t feel very reassured. Covered in sweat, Danny wore denim shorts cut very short and a tight white tank top, both of which were dotted with paint splotches. He looked like the beginning of a cheap porno, not someone who knew how to get paint out of anything.
“My dad’s a painter. He has the stuff, works great.”
Dmitri nodded.
“Do you like it?” Danny looked nervous as he gestured with his paintbrush in the general direction of the kitchen.
“It looks great.” Dmitri mustered a smile. “How long did it take you?”
“We got here like right after you left. Troy wanted to surprise you. Said you’d been having a hard week.”
“He’s not wrong.”
“Great! Well, I’m gonna get back to work before the paint dries. If you’re hungry, there’s pizza on the dining room table. It’s from lunch, but I’m sure it’s still fine.” He practically skipped back to the kitchen.
Dmitri grabbed a slice of cold pizza and ate it as he walked up the stairs.
Twenty minutes later, he lay on his bed in shorts and a t-shirt, arms behind his head staring at the ceiling. The bass thumping through the floor let him know the boys were still painting. He should go and be visibly excited and thankful. He knew it. And he would. Any second now.
Troy appeared in the doorway. Damn. Busted. Now he couldn’t lie and say he’d gotten a work phone call or anything.
“Hey,” Troy said, sitting on the bed next to Dmitri. “Tough day at work?”
Dmitri sighed. “Yeah. Too many meetings and not enough success in the lab.”
“Are the meetings why you wore the suit?”
“I find when people are talking about funding, it helps to wear a suit.”
“I’ll bet. You looked great in it.” Troy pushed Dmitri’s curls off his forehead, letting the hair slip through his fingers.
“Thanks. You look pretty hot yourself.”
Troy looked down at his paint spotted jeans and ancient t-shirt. “Yeah? You like it? I call it Renovation Shabby Chic.”
“It works for you.” There was a crash from downstairs followed by laughter. “Are you sure the boys are okay down there unsupervised?”
“They’re fine. And Ravi’s only four years younger than I am.”
“I keep forgetting that. How is he?”
Troy shrugged, pulling away from Dmitri. “He came out to his family. Over Skype.”
“Ouch. How’d that go?”
Troy stood up, checking the bedspread for stray paint. “Not too well. They tried to get him to come home, but he reminded them school had already been paid for. He needs to go home over Winter break. Apparently they already had a potential wife picked out for him.”
Dmitri sat up, swung his feet over the edge of the bed. “That sounds rough. How’s he taking it?”
Troy walked around to stand in front of Dmitri. “Seems to be handling it well. He’s talking about taking Danny with him when he goes home.”
“That seems like a big deal. Didn’t they just start dating?”
Troy gave a one-shoulder shrug and bent down to kiss Dmitri. Dmitri held onto his hips and gave the kiss his full attention. This they did really well.
Maybe too well, actually. There’d been more than a few conversations recently that had transitioned into sex when the emotions got too heavy for either of them. It was just easier to kiss than to talk.
Dmitri tipped back down on the bed, pulling Troy with him. Troy smiled against Dmitri’s mouth and braced himself on his hands. “The boys are downstairs.”
Dmitri slid his hands under Troy’s shirt and pouted internally. Of course they were. He wouldn’t even get sex now. Perfect.
Troy kissed Dmitri slow and deep, his hand on Dmitri’s neck, thumb rubbing against Dmitri’s jawline the way he loved. When Dmitri’s hand slid down to Troy’s ass, Troy slithered off Dmitri. He stood by the bed and held out a hand to help Dmitri stand up. “Come downstairs, say thanks.”
“Do I have to?” Dmitri wanted to talk to people about as much as he wanted to go to another budget meeting.
“They worked hard, and all they got paid was mediocre pizza.”
Dmitri sat up and stared at the floor. “Yeah, well, I didn’t ask them to.”
Troy’s smiled faltered. “Do you not like the color? It’s one you pointed out when we were watching the Property Brothers.”
“No, it’s fine. I just…” He shrugged, not sure how to explain how much he hated people doing things for him. “I just like to pay people for doing work for me, or do it myself. That way I don’t have this, this debt hanging over my head.”
“What are you talking about? What debt?”
“You know. Somebody does something for you, and then the next week they’re all like, ‘hey, remember when I helped you fix your car? Yeah, well, I need someone to help me move a thousand pounds of scrap metal. Are you free?’ You can’t say no. You owe them. So instead of hanging out in my pajamas on my day off binge-watching Orphan Black, I’m doing someone else’s chores for free.”
Troy blinked at him long enough that Dmitri thought he’d broken something in Troy’s brain. “Is that how you see it?” he finally asked.
Dmitri shrugged again. He seemed to be doing it a lot this conversation. “Yeah. There are always obligations with friends, with things like that. That’s how it works.”
