The Parable of the Mustard Seed

by Lisa Henry

  Too late.

  The high pitched beeping began, Cricket yipped and howled in accompaniment, and Caleb turned on the water in the sink to drown the smoking garlic bread. He was flushed and panting, his jeans and underwear still bunched around his pale thighs.

  What a mess.

  And John didn’t mean the garlic bread.

  He waved the tea towel around, laughing, as Caleb hitched his pants up awkwardly and shot him a rueful smile.

  Dinner might have been ruined, but Caleb was happy. That seemed like a pretty fair exchange to John.

  They ate their pasta without garlic bread, and then watched a movie.

  Afterwards, Caleb rinsed the dishes and John stacked the dishwater. He showered while Caleb rolled a tennis ball up and down the hallway for Cricket, and then brushed his teeth when it was Caleb’s turn to shower.

  Caleb had a bedtime routine, and John knew it in his sleep.

  He let Cricket outside for a last run of the yard until Darren got home, and locked the door after her when she came back inside. By then Caleb was out of the shower, brushing his teeth.

  John picked up the newspaper from the kitchen floor, and read the comics.

  Caleb padded into the kitchen in his sleep pants. He took the bottle of pills from the benchtop and unscrewed the lid. He tapped a pill into his palm and showed it to John.

  John filled him a glass of water from the sink.

  Caleb swallowed his pill, and then reached for John’s hand.

  John walked with him into his bedroom.

  “You want to read tonight?” he asked softly.

  Caleb shook his head. “I’m pretty tired.”

  “Me too,” John said with a smile.

  Caleb climbed into bed. John flicked the light off and followed him. The moonlight was bright, filling the room with a soft, silver glow. John pulled the sheet up over them, and Caleb rolled toward him. He rested his head on John’s shoulders, and splayed his fingers on John’s chest.

  John curled his arm around him, and tilted his chin to press a gentle kiss to the top of Caleb’s head.

  “I love you,” Caleb murmured. He already sounded halfway to sleep.

  “I love you too, la’u manamea.”

  John listened for a while to the sounds of the night: the house creaking as it settled, the groan of Cricket’s canvas bed outside in the hallway as she shifted, and the sounds of the breeze rustling through the palm fronds just outside Caleb’s window. And above all of them, Caleb’s breathing, slow and steady as he slept. John drifted off at last, content and peaceful and happy, with his arms wrapped around the man he loved.

  The man he’d loved from the very beginning.

  Afterword

  Thank you so much for reading The Parable of the Mustard Seed. I hope that you enjoyed it. would very much appreciate it if you could take a few moments to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads, or on your social media platform of choice.

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  I also have a Facebook group where you’ll be kept in the loop with updates on releases, have a chance to win prizes, and probably see lots of lots of pictures of my dog and cats. You can find it here: Lisa Henry’s Hangout.

  P.S. Keep reading for information about another angst-with-a-happy-ending story by Lisa Henry and J.A. Rock.

  About When All the World Sleeps

  Daniel Whitlock is terrified of going to sleep. And rightly so: he sleepwalks, with no awareness or memory of his actions. Including burning down Kenny Cooper’s house — with Kenny inside it — after Kenny brutally beat him for being gay. Back in the tiny town of Logan after serving his prison sentence, Daniel isolates himself in a cabin in the woods and chains himself to his bed at night.

  Like the rest of Logan, local cop Joe Belman doesn’t believe Daniel’s absurd defense. But when Bel saves Daniel from a retaliatory fire, he discovers that Daniel might not be what everyone thinks: killer, liar, tweaker, freak. Bel agrees to control Daniel at night — for the sake of the other townsfolk. Daniel’s fascinating, but Bel’s not going there.

  Yet as he’s drawn further into Daniel’s dark world, Bel finds that he likes being in charge. And submitting to Bel gives Daniel the only peace he’s ever known. But Daniel’s demons won’t leave him alone, and he’ll need Bel’s help to slay them once and for all — assuming Bel is willing to risk everything to stand by him.

  You can find When All the World Sleeps here.

  An excerpt from When All the World Sleeps

  “Hey, Harnee’s kid,” Daniel Whitlock said, and the smile lit up his whole face.

  Bel resisted the urge to plant his fist in it. “Officer Belman to you, Whitlock.” He took his flashlight from his belt and shone the beam in Whitlock’s eyes. The guy’s pupils had almost swallowed his hazel irises entirely. “What’d you take?”

  Whitlock turned from Bel and shoved his hands in his pockets, pulling his jeans tight across his ass. “I’m going home. You coming with me?”

  They were in the parking lot of Greenducks, a rundown bar wedged between a former beauty salon and a mortgage firm. You had to go down a flight of half-rotted wooden stairs, and then you were in a basement full of cocksuckers. And not the kind you saw in gay bars in movies. No tanned and toned bodies, no goddamn angel wings or leather shorts. These guys stank, and they smoked, and they’d do anything for drugs. Bel only went into Greenducks when he was desperate enough to pretend not to notice the exchanges that went on.

  “I ain’t going nowhere with you,” Bel told Whitlock.

  Fucker. Goddamn filthy tweaker head case.

  Liar.

  Murderer.

  Everyone in Logan, South Carolina, knew who Daniel Whitlock was—what he was. But what made Bel doubly uncomfortable right now was that unlike most everyone in Logan, Bel had noticed Daniel Whitlock long before he’d been in the papers.

  Before he got his badge, Bel had worked a night shift twice a week at Harnee’s Convenience Store, and Whitlock used to come in Thursdays around 1 or 2 a.m. to buy a Twix and a bottle of Mountain Dew. Always went through Bel’s line.

  “That stuff’ll keep you up all night,” Bel had said once, nodding at the Mountain Dew. Whitlock hadn’t answered, and that was the first and last time Bel said anything to him beyond “Have a good night.” But he’d noted the strong, easy slope of Whitlock’s chest under his T-shirts. When it got colder, Whitlock had worn plaid flannel like all the other guys in Logan. But in the summer his T-shirts had been just a little too tight. Close-cropped hair the same linty brown as his faded sneakers. Beautifully defined features, almost too sharp.

  “He don’t want to join us, Danny,” a voice said.

  Bel hadn’t noticed Jake Kebbler standing behind Daniel in the shadow of the bar. If Bel’d had to pick any of the Greenducks crowd for looks alone—besides Whitlock—he’d have picked Jake. Unfortunately, every queer in Logan had already picked Jake, over and over again. “Looks like a gnat-bit curl of pork rind,” Matt Lister had said once about Jake’s dick.

  Whitlock grinned. He pushed Jake against the side of the building. Kissed him. Risky—Greenducks gave queers a place to meet, but it sure as fuck didn’t fly the rainbow flag. You came to Greenducks because it was the closest to safe you were gonna get if you liked restroom blowjobs—not because you were welcome there. And once you were outside, well, you were in hetero territory.

  Jake tipped his head back then slowly collapsed. It was oddly graceful, like a dancer’s swoon. Whitlock tried to catch him, failed, and lowered himself on top of Jake. Kissed him again, or maybe whispered something—Bel couldn’t tell. Then he got up and walked over to his car, leaving Jake on the ground.

  Nice, Bel thought. Your date passes out, so you’re just gonna call it a night? Not that Jake seemed to care. Hell, he probably wouldn’t even remem
ber what had happened when the sun woke him in the morning with a face full of asphalt. Jake didn’t have a brain cell left he wasn’t bent on destroying with meth. And was that . . . yeah, Bel could just about make out the glow of a burning cigarette in Jake’s hand. Stupid asshole.

  Bel walked over to Jake. Wasn’t like he could leave a man to burn to death. Which made him the only one. Whitlock was still standing by his sedan, staring at nothing.

  “You stay right there,” Bel called as he bent to check on Jake. Still breathing. Bel plucked the cigarette out from between Jake’s skinny fingers and crushed it under his boot. When he turned around, Whitlock had taken a step closer. “I told you to stay there.”

  “Need something so bad.” Whitlock sighed. He slid his fingers into the waistband of his jeans, like he was going to tug them down right there in the parking lot. “You wanna fuck me, Harnee’s kid? Can use my car.”

  Bel had been a cop for three years now, and he’d been propositioned more times than he could remember. It was never like those letters in skin mags though. Usually it was some toothless skank old enough to be his grandma, giggling drunken high school girls, or narrow-eyed truckers who would nod to the side of the road in silent invitation like Bel was dumb enough or desperate enough for that. Might as well just roll around in the filthy bathrooms at the truck stop on US 601, pick up his diseases that way and take out the middleman.

  And now, Daniel Whitlock. Who might have been Dear readers, I never thought it would happen to me material back when he was in high school—Bel, still in middle school, had noticed him right about the same time as he’d noticed those weird tingly feelings that made his dick hard—but doing it with a fucking murderer was never going to happen. And Bel was pretty damn insulted that Whitlock even thought he had a chance.

  “Get your ass home,” he said, curling his lip.

  Whitlock reached for his car door.

  “You ain’t driving tonight,” Bel told him. “Ain’t you killed enough folk in this town?”

  It didn’t even register with Whitlock.

  “You walk,” Bel said. “You give me your keys, and you walk.”

  No argument. Whitlock dug around in the pocket of his jeans and held his keys out. “I’m going home now?”

  “Yeah.” Bel took the keys and crossed his arms over his chest. “You’d better start walking.”

  “Okay.”

  Bel shook his head. Goddamn drug-fucked nutjob.

  He watched as Whitlock turned and squinted down the street, wobbling like a compass needle before it fixed its position. Then, his hands still in his pockets, Whitlock started to walk. Bel leaned against his cruiser and looked down at Whitlock’s keys, thumbed through them and found a tarnished Saint Christopher medallion. Not so different from the one Bel’s mama had given him when he’d become a deputy.

  Bel sighed. Figured he couldn’t let the guy get squashed like a possum on the side of the road. He didn’t get to pick and choose who he looked out for.

  He got in his cruiser, turned the engine over, and flicked the headlights on. Set off down the street at a crawl, keeping well behind Whitlock as he stumbled toward home. Bel wondered what it would be like living out there in the woods. Cold as hell in winter, probably, and mosquitoes as big as chicken hawks in the summer. Perfect for freaks like Whitlock and the Unabomber.

  The twenty-four hour diner on Main was empty; Bel glanced in as he drove past at a snail’s pace. Sue-Ellen was working, or at least she was leaning on the counter staring at the small TV beside the register. Across the street, Harnee’s was open too, the H flashing intermittently again, so half the time it just read arnee’s. Bel figured he’d stop in on the way back, just to show the flag. On weekends, the high school kids hung around in the parking lot, trying to get someone to buy beer for them. But tonight the lot was empty.

  Bel remembered a long stretch five years ago where Whitlock hadn’t come to Harnee’s on Thursday nights. Recovering from what Kenny and his friends had done to him, Bel had figured, though he’d refused to join in his coworkers’ gossip sessions about it. Long after Daniel must’ve healed up, he’d still been absent. People’d said his mama bought his groceries. Bel had almost missed him. The guy hadn’t been friendly, but he’d been easy enough to look at. Then Whitlock had showed up the night of October sixteenth and had bought a lighter along with his candy and soda.

  The next morning, the story had been everywhere.

  Kenny Cooper’s house had burned to the ground. Kenny inside.

  Bel had followed Whitlock’s trial with interest. Had even been called to give testimony about the lighter. And he’d been as pissed as anyone when the prosecution had opted to seek a conviction for manslaughter instead of first-degree murder. Wasn’t like Bel gave two shits about losing Kenny Cooper—that asshole had been a waste of air. It was Whitlock’s bullshit defense that had made Bel half-crazy.

  Sleepwalking. Seriously. Like Whitlock was some kind of zombie lurching around eating people’s brains, then waking up the next day not remembering any of it? Yeah, that was the shit you saw in movies. How about Whitlock was a crazy meth head who’d say anything to save his hide? The more Bel’d thought about it, the angrier he’d got, and the more convinced he’d become he’d seen signs Whitlock was off whenever he’d come into Harnee’s. Something not right in his eyes. The way his body twitched while he was waiting for his total, like he was receiving small shocks.

  And Bel wasn’t the only one who, after the murder, suddenly remembered things they’d noticed about Whitlock. Sunday school teachers and guys he’d run track with and even the girl he’d gotten to second base with on prom night, all eager to chime in.

  “Always knew there was something wrong with him.”

  “He had that look, you know?”

  “I smacked him as soon as he put his hands on me. Knew he was no good.”

  And Bel had raged with the rest of the town when Whitlock had been released after eight months in jail. This wasn’t about Kenny Cooper—it was about justice. You didn’t burn someone alive and then walk free, no matter what some quack said on the stand about your sleep disorder. It was impossible to drive five miles in your sleep, shake kerosene around the base of a house like you were watering the goddamn plants, flip your lighter on, then go home and climb into bed.

  Bel looked up the street again. Whitlock was still heading in the right direction. He was passing in front of the Shack now, where Bel drank most times. All the cops drank at the Shack. Hell, all the town did. It was closed at this hour, a few trucks parked out front still. Owners must have walked.

  A battered red pickup swerved onto Main Street, going too fast. It overcorrected, swinging wildly toward the center line before it recovered. Bel recognized it: Clayton McAllister’s truck, so it was probably Clayton at the wheel with a few of his buddies packed into the cab.

  The truck headed toward him, slowing as it passed Whitlock, then braking and backing up. Too far away to hear what they yelled at Whitlock, apart from faggot. A beer can flew from the window and bounced on the road. The horn blared.

  Whitlock stopped. He lifted his head to look at the truck.

  Last thing Bel needed was Clayton and his drunk buddies figuring it was time for another gay bashing. Bel hit the lights, the red-and-blue strobes flashing. Just to let Clayton know he was there.

  The truck didn’t move, so Bel rolled his window down. Just in time to hear Whitlock yell, “Wanna suck my dick, cunt?”

  The truck’s door flew open, and Clayton jumped out. Bel was out of his cruiser in a second, moving automatically to stand between Clayton and Whitlock. “Fellas,” he said, because Brock Tilmouth was getting out of the truck too. “I don’t need any trouble here. Go on home.”

  “You hear what he said?” Clayton was a scrawny guy. Thin and rat faced. Had a few gingery hairs on his upper lip that were trying real hard to be a mustache. Pale blue eyes.

  Bel glanced at Whitlock, who was standing slack-jawed, completely spaced out. �
�I heard, and you’ll live. Get on home, Clayton.”

  “Wanna . . .” Whitlock slurred. “Hey, faggot.”

  Clayton shouted around Bel at Whitlock. “You’re the faggot, freak! Didn’t learn your lesson the first time?”

  Bel’s jaw tightened.

  Hell, he thought as much as anyone that Whitlock deserved a beating. Not because he was gay, but because he’d gotten away with murder. Kenny Cooper had been Clayton’s best friend. They’d bashed Whitlock first, which was what’d made him go all fire starter on Kenny, but everyone knew Whitlock had started it by offering to suck Kenny’s dick.

  And here Whitlock was making the same offer to Clayton. Goading him.

  Bel could remind Clayton not to take the law into his own hands, but Whitlock had done just that—and gotten off almost scot-free. Less than eight months in prison, and what was it? Three years parole? That was a kick in the teeth to Kenny Cooper’s family, his friends, and pretty much the whole town.

  No justice in that.

  What was it his gram used to say? Take an eye for an eye, and soon the whole world would be blind. You weren’t supposed to go out and get your own revenge when you’d been wronged. You were supposed to trust the law to deal with it. But nobody said what to do if the law failed you.

  Hurl beer cans and abuse, maybe. Couldn’t blame Clayton for being angry.

  But then, where was the justice in the law’s reaction to Cooper bashing Whitlock? No arrests made, because Whitlock had sworn he hadn’t seen the guys who’d done it. And yet everyone knew it’d been Kenny Cooper and his buddies. Just no one’d lifted a finger to look into the matter or prosecute Cooper.

  So couldn’t blame Whitlock for being angry either.