Nights in White Satin

[ChrisGibson]

I am just seeing comments. Ralph always complicates things, and Russell's life doesn't seem to be getting easier. I have to honestly say, I would love to spend a weekend at Brad, Cody and Nehru's. It's very sexy and very loving. Russell just needs to find whatever it is that touches him in the same way. He's still got some hills to climb and we'll see them next week.

 

[ChrisGibson]

TONIGHT EVERYONE HAS TO START COMING CLEAN


Russell had stopped trying to predict the future, or understand who he was anymore. There was a freedom to being this new person who wasn’t afraid. He’d once been scared of being called a faggot and been unable to even conceive of touching another human beyond a hug. Now, in his bed room, he was frantically fucking Ralph who lay on his stomach, eyes closed, his fist pounding the mattress, and Russell pounded him, as they urged each other into something more intense than they had experienced at the beginning of winter.

He told himself not to compare, but when it was over, when the orgasm seized him from the base of his balls to the balls of his feet and his toes curled, he knew he loved Ralph more than he loved Jason, and loved having sex with him more.

“We should never have stopped,” Russell said, half exhausted.

To Ralph, fucking girls was different. All fucking was wrong, a sin, but fucking girls made him feel safe. It was easy. They were available. It confirmed something, but he wasn’t sure what the something was, and maybe Russell could have told him because his mom was a shrink. But fucking guys, or at least fucking Cody had been something else altogether. It had been urgent, more…. Maybe more real. Certainly more unsafe. He had felt completely unsafe, completely like he didn’t know who he was anymore, but also more real, more alive.

And fucking Russell, the urgent, but completely coordinated movements they made on this bed, was another thing from that. It was nothing like Vanessa or that girl on the football field. It was all of him. It was every goddamn thing he wanted.

“I’m so out of control,” Ralph said, exhausted. Looking at the ceiling and taking his hands through his hair.

“I didn’t used to be like this.”

Russell looked at him.

At last Russell said, “I’m sort of out of control too. I don’t exactly know myself anymore.”
Part of him wanted to be having sex all the time, ,and the other part missed the him who didn’t know anything about it, who had lots of time to himself and never thought of running down the street to climb into Jason Lorry’s bed. He missed his virginity. He missed himself.

“Maybe,” Ralph allowed, “but at least you had the sense to be out of control with guys.”

Russell waited for an explanation.

“Guys don’t make babies. No matter what you think happened bad with a guy, it doesn’t matter for a life time.”

“No…” Russell said, not quite comprehending what Ralph was saying.

Ralph turned around and Russell was surprised by the beauty of his back, the globes of his behind, his powerful legs, his tawny hair, the strength in his arms, his fragility. Ralph suddenly burst into tears crying into Russell’s pillow.

“She’s pregnant, Russ.”

Russell’s whole body went cold. His face froze.

“Vanessa?”

Ralph sobbed uncontrollably and Russell looked at the door, knew it was locked but hoped he really knew, and put his hand on Ralph’s shoulder.

“No,” Ralph said. “Tasha Bell.”

Russell stopped himself from asking who the hell Tasha Bell was.

“I’ve been fucking around. She was some cheerleader at Lourdes.”

Russell remembered seeing Ralph fuck some girl against the wall of the fieldhouse. Was that her, or was it someone else?

“I feel so stupid.”
Or did it even matter?

When Russell had seen five seconds of the teenage shows on TV where twenty five years olds were sleeping around and pretending to be seventeen, he’d been disgusted. But here he was, not yet seventeen, in bed with someone who had been in bed with numerous people and going to be with that guy’s best friend who might or might not be sleeping with girls, and also in love with his brother.
Something had to change.






The night winter began to end was the night that Chayne Kandzierksi made the caramel apple cake. If one had to do with the other he could never be sure, but the icicles were melting, crashing on either side of the house, and the patches of white on the ground were getting smaller, revealing the spinach brown earth beneath. Chayne had gone down to the store to buy the ingredients for Faye Matthison’s grandmother’s famous caramel apple cake, and finally resolved to give it a try.

He had not begun until it was almost time to sleep, and he knew for two hours before that he should have been in bed. As he mixed the cake batter, he had yawned, and then between baking it and preparing the batter, Chayne had napped, and waiting for the cake to cool and the batter to get cold enough to use, he slept too, and between coats, for you needed many coats of frosting, he also slept and behold, at two in the morning he woke up and Rob came after him, silent and shambling, and Faye, who had been sleeping in a chair came into the kitchen, and Anigel came down from her room where she had been sleeping, and they cut the cake and ate the cake and praised the cake and smoked cigarettes and then Rob and Chayne looked at each other, and before Faye or Anigel could say anything, both men went to their individual computers and began to write.

For two weeks, Rob had written nothing worth finishing, and Chayne had written nothing at all, but for the next two hours, back to distant back, on either side of the living room, they wrote almost furiously as the dark part of night went to another dark part of night, and they yawned and smoked and Chayne thought that, as much as he loved sleeping with Rob, this felt even more intimate, and the two men stood up and yawned and cracked their backs at the same time and Chayne said to Faye who was reading in the easy chair by the window overlooking the front porch, one leg crossed over the other, “I’m throwing you guys a wedding.”

“What?”

“I’ll be your maid of honor,” Anigel called from upstairs.

“Will you give me away?” Faye asked Chayne.

“Of course.”

“Rob, you feel like being a maid of honor too?”

“Uh…. We could make it work.”

“And Jill. Jill too. And Russell a ringbearer?”

“Russell would go for it.”

“Jewell could be my matron of honor. Or Shannon. Or both. I had thought Patti—”

“But she used to sleep with Chuck.”

“Yeah,” Faye said sourly, but not as sourly as one might have thought.



While Chayne was scooping the leftover frosting out of the large mixing bowl into a Tupperware dish, Rob was running the dishwater so they did not have to wake to a dirty house. The barefoot boy with his platinum colored hair and elven face said, “Now, listen, Baby, cause I need to say something to you. And I’ve been debating if you needed to know or not. But I need you to know, and if that’s selfish I’m selfish, only I don’t want any secrets between us.”

Chayne spooned the last of the frosting from the big glass bowl and Rob said, “I heard Jewell say that Ted Weirbach was here.”

“Uh… yes.”

“And Shannon too. A few people.”

Chayne scooped the bowl slower.

“Are you getting at something.”

Rob shook his head.

“It’s just that… You never told me he was here. And he’s your ex.”

“Right,” was all Chayne said, and handed the bowl to Rob who plunged it under the rushing faucet, He squeezed blue soap into the bowl and as it frothed up he said:

“Chayne, do you remember when I came back a day late from the party, the Purim party?”

“Yes.”

“I was quiet. Very quiet. It took us a while to be normal.”

“Yes, I remember.”

Chayne remembered because the day Rob said he wouldn’t be coming home was the same day Chayne had gone back to Ted, and when Rob had returned, for some days Chayne wondered if the preternatural boy suspected anything. It was a relief when, at the end of the week, sitting on opposite ends of the couch writing in their notebooks, toe touching had led to laughing and laughing to lovemaking. It was with a joyful relief that Chayne lay in the bed rejoicing in Rob’s soft and slender body while the blond boy kissed him up and down, murmuring, “You miss your blue eyed boy, Chayney, you miss me? You miss our loving?”

And Chayne never told Rob he was repeating himself. He closed his eyes and ran his hand over Rob’s shoulders and over his face, through is hair, opened his eyes to look at Rob’s almond eyes and treasure his penis, bobbing and firm below his belly. They linked together in more than laughter, kissing and running hands over each other, and the worries about his age or their differences hardly mattered. This mattered, this and the days on the couch, writing together and finishing each other’s sentences.

“A guy,” Rob said, “a friend I met asked me to hang out with him. I knew it meant we’d get together. And we did, Chayne. I slept with him that day I was gone, and you need to know that.”

They didn’t say anything, and as Rob scrubbed out the great glass bowl, he said, “You’re relieved and not angry, which means…. Which means… I don’t know if I’m strong enough to know what you have to tell me, and I don’t need to know. It’s just… I know we’re together, and I know, I know, I’m together with you. It’s not even that I want to be with you. IAM with you. Do you get that? And whatever we did doesn’t change that. I’m fucking linked to you. We’re linked together. If you agree with that statement, then…. Regardless if I never get with someone else again, or… what, we can work it out? Alright?”


MORE TO COME...

 

[CharmedFan28]

Well Ralph got a girl pregnant and Russell is reconsidering his choices. I am glad this revelation made him think and consider what he is doing. Chayne and Rob also have a decision to make. I like them together so I hope they can make it work but with Ted around and others that might be tricky. Excellent writing and I look forward to more tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Chayne and Rob have made their decision. Rob says at the end. But Russell does have a bit to think about.

 

[ChrisGibson]

“I’m not who I want to be.”
Chayne only lifted his eyes to indicate that he was listening.
“I’m not who I want to be,” Russell said again.
“Then who are you?”
Russell had not expected this. He would have gone on about his sleeping with Ralph, his affair with Jason, going from one to the other at the same time, his love for Cody, his lust for Cody. He wanted to go on about this new found obsession with sex where he was almost giving his cousin Jimmy a run for his money. Every time his mind went to an answer, a moral, it fell away and at last Russell answered:
“I’m tired.”
Chayne was good at saying nothing, and Russell said, “I just want to read a book and be at peace and be… I think I want to be a virgin again.”
This was something Chayne should be able to understand, to encourage.
“No, you don’t,” Chayne said simply, and Russell was surprised when he said it.
“You do not want to be what you were before you knew what you know now. You want to be the person you were before, now that you have done what you’ve done now.”
“Yes,” Russell said, because it sounded right. And then he thought it out, repeated to himself what Chayne had said before repeating, “Yes. That’s exactly it.
“But how do I do it?”
“I don’t know.”
Chayne never did lie his way into something, and that was the good and the bad of him.
“I’ve been going between Jason and Ralph, and I don’t really want either one of them.”
“Is that it?”
“Yes,” Russell said. “I love them a little. I love them enough. In fact, I love Ralph a lot. But they could never be enough, and I know I’ll never be enough for either of them. Things would be great if…. If someone else wasn’t on my mind. I feel like every time I go to either one of them it’s to make up for someone else.”
“Cody.”
“Yes.”
“Oh,” Russell half howled throwing his hair back. “I feel like if I could have what we were starting to have, the rest of it wouldn’t matter.”
“That could be true.”
Russell looked at Chayne.
“Are you listening to me?”
“Yes,” Chayne said, blandly.
“Cody is twenty-three.”
“All year. And you’ll be seventeen this year.”
“This is the part where you tell me how fucked up and wrong I am,” Russell said.
Chayne only shrugged.
“Cody’s the same age as Rob, and Rob makes me very happy, and the distance in years between me and Rob is greater than between you and Cody. And then, look at Cameron’s parents. They’re just what they should be, and you see how that worked.”
“But what should I do?” Russell demanded.
“Have any of you considered taking a paternity test?”
“Well, but… we know.”
“No,” Chayne said. “You actually don’t. You know Thom slept with Cody’s mom. You think Cody looks like Thom. That’s what you know.”
“So….” Russell began, “go ask Dad to do this test. That’s…”
“You don’t have to ask Thom,” Rob cut in.
Even Chayne looked at Russell.
“You can do a sibling test. You just need your blood or mouth swabs and Cody’s.”
“Is it cheap?” Russell wondered.
“No,” Rob said truthfully. “But I’m not poor, and I would be willing to pay for it.”
“You really would?”
“I totally just said I would. Please don’t make me repeat myself.”
“You’re getting more and more like Chayne everyday.”
“Thank you,” Rob said.
Russell replied, “And thank you.”





It was Russell who suggested they go out that night. He knew Ralph didn’t feel like being around people, so he let Gilead and Mark have their Friday together and Cameron and Chris as well.

“I have a fake ID,” Jason notified them.

“And you can get away with looking twenty-one,” Russell noted. He couldn’t imagine what he would do with a fake ID.

They took Ralph’s car and Jason, still enthusiastic, said, “I wish we could take the top down.”

“It’s March,” Ralph, feeling more weighed down and realistic than ever said as they whizzed down Finnalay Parkway.

“But it’s almost April,” Jason noted. “almost Easter.”

“Yup,” Ralph said, darkly, “But before you get Easter, you have to get Lent.”



Ralph waited outside the liquor store while Russell went in with Jason. Russell, despite his height feeling distinctly underage, wondered if this was a good idea.

“I don’t even know what to get.”

“You don’t have to know what to get,” Jason said. “I know what to get. You’re just here to carry. And basically, what we’re going to get is what gets Ralph drunk the quickest.”

“I can’t believe he got a girl pregnant,” Russell said as they went through the beer aisle.

“I know,” Jason said. “It was really kind of dumb.”

Russell looked at Jason.

“What?” Jason said. Then, “I know I’ve been with a lot of girls, but you better believe I always had protection or something.”

What that “or something” was, Russell thought of asking, but Jason only said, “Anyway, I’m swinging more and more away from that.”

Russell wondered if Jason knew that he and Ralph had slept together, that Cody had been with Ralph. He didn’t think it was time to bring it up now. The cashier rang up the liquor and they carried the paper bags out to the car.



“I don’t smoke that shit,” Ralph grumbled.

Grinning, Jason held out the bong to him.

“Com’on man, what’s the point in us trying to get you to have fun if…”

“If you’re not going to have fun,” Russell said.

“It’s easy for you guys to have fun,” Ralph said.

“Actually,” Russell held out his hands for the bong and took a great inhale.

“It isn’t,” he said as white smoke left his mouth and his nostrils.

He closed his eyes and put his head back as they all sat on the floor of Jason’s room, and he handed the tall glass bong to Ralph.

“Now, take this.”

Ralph took a hit, coughing, and Russell wondered if he and Jason really had done this more. It was one of the first things he’d done with Jason, though rarely. He took a hit of the burning bourbon, feeling looser, realizing how bad he himself had felt, and let the hypnotic music wash over him.



“Nights in white satin
Never reaching the end
Letters I've written
Never meaning to send
Beauty I'd always missed
With these eyes before
Just what the truth is
I can't say anymore
'Cause I love you
Yes I love you
Oh, how I love you!”





“What is this shit?” Ralph said.

“I dunno,” Jason shrugged. “It’s Russell’s music.”

“It’s The Moody Blues and you two need culture.”

“La de dah, “Jason said, smiling at him as he lit the base of the bong and took a long inhale.



“…Some try to tell me
Thoughts they cannot defend
Just what you want to be….”



“We’ve been listening to this on repeat for the last…”

“Do you want me to change it?” Russell asked in a voice that said he wasn’t going to change it.

“No,” Ralph took a very long draft of brown bourbon.

“No, I like it. It’s good for tonight.”

Russell felt himself doing what he’d been too nervous to do before. He was swaying and dancing.

“I love you,” he sang, “I love you. Oh, how I looooove you.”

Neither one of them was laughing. It was as if they took his drunken singing and swaying seriously. Russell finished his shot, his throat burning, and his head humming, and he leaned over and took Jason’s chin, kissing him. He could tell Jason was startled, and then Jason just shrugged and fell into it, kissing Russell back, as the music played over them and the sagey, earthy smell of marijuana burned in the room, high on liquor and youth, he and Jason made out in front of Ralph.

And then Russell stood up, lifting Jason with him, and Ralph, swaying, stood up as well, entranced in the watching. Russell felt Jason’s hands on his shoulders and on his waist, felt deeply drawn to him, but deeply conscious of Ralph and deeply conscious of what he planned to do next. He slipped his hands into Jason’s shorts, and began to stroke him though his underwear feeling his already hardening penis grow harder. He kept stroking it the way he did all through the night when they were in the dark together, and then, still stroking him, he turned to Ralph and kissed him too.

While Jason moaned, Russell thrust his tongue in Ralph’s mouth and Ralph threw his arms around him, kissing wildly like they had the very first time. Russell went from Ralph to Jason, Jason to Ralph, milking them both, pulling Ralph’s trousers down and then Jason’s joggers. Now, as he kissed one and then the other, he went down on his knee and started to take first Ralph and then Jason in his mouth. As he sucked them the music played on, looping again and again.



“Letters I've written

Never meaning to send

Beauty I'd always missed

With these eyes before

Just what the truth is

I can't say anymore

Yes I love you

Oh, how I love you

Oh, how I love you…”



On his knees, he placed his hands on their asses, soft round hills, different in their ways from each other, stroking them, rising back up to kiss the boys. They stood over him, their mouths open to the pleasure he was giving until, at last, they kissed and Russell rose up, lifting their shirts for them, guiding them to the bed to make love to each other. He brought the bourbon and now he turned off the lights. The last to go were the blinking fairy ones. In the absolute blackness it was easier to do things, as he felt twin mouths on his body and pulled twin faces to him, he knew that in the absolute blackness, it was easier to do everything.


MORE TO COME

 

[CharmedFan28]

Well Russell knows he wants to changing but knowing isn’t the same as actually doing it. I wonder if him and Cody actually are related? This story gets more and more interesting and I look forward to more tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

You said it exactly. Wanting to change is not the same as changing. I don't know that I can sensibly add anything to that.

 

[ChrisGibson]

And then Russell stood up, lifting Jason with him, and Ralph, swaying, stood up as well, entranced in the watching. Russell felt Jason’s hands on his shoulders and on his waist, felt deeply drawn to him, but deeply conscious of Ralph and deeply conscious of what he planned to do next. He slipped his hands into Jason’s shorts, and began to stroke him though his underwear feeling his already hardening penis grow harder. He kept stroking it the way he did all through the night when they were in the dark together, and then, still stroking him, he turned to Ralph and kissed him too.
While Jason moaned, Russell thrust his tongue in Ralph’s mouth and Ralph threw his arms around him, kissing wildly like they had the very first time. Russell went from Ralph to Jason, Jason to Ralph, milking them both, pulling Ralph’s trousers down and then Jason’s joggers. Now, as he kissed one and then the other, he went down on his knee and started to take first Ralph and then Jason in his mouth. As he sucked them the music played on, looping again and again.

“Letters I've written
Never meaning to send
Beauty I'd always missed
With these eyes before
Just what the truth is
I can't say anymore
Yes I love you
Oh, how I love you
Oh, how I love you…”

On his knees, he placed his hands on their asses, soft round hills, different in their ways from each other, stroking them, rising back up to kiss the boys. They stood over him, their mouths open to the pleasure he was giving until, at last, they kissed and Russell rose up, lifting their shirts for them, guiding them to the bed to make love to each other. He brought the bourbon and now he turned off the lights. The last to go were the blinking fairy ones. In the absolute blackness it was easier to do things, as he felt twin mouths on his body and pulled twin faces to him, he knew that in the absolute blackness, it was easier to do everything.






























He didn’t want to ruin the darkness. Always he thought he would get up and leave, and each time the darkness called him back. Arms and kisses, the softness of skin called him back, the pleasure of lying half asleep and listening to Ralph and Jason take each other in the dark brought him back. Sips of liquor, hits of marijuana brought him back, their bodies and their night lit by the occasional burning flame that touched a cigarette, boiled the bottom of a bong, brought him back.
He never made it further than the bathroom across the hall, almost giggling as he skittered past the eager dog. When they stepped out, they never even put on underwear cause no one came to Jason’s part of the house. Once, after he had peed, the door opened and someone kissed him hungrily. He realized it was Ralph long after the kiss had begun and sat down on the bowl and gave him head before he waited in the bathroom while Ralph pissed, and then kissed him again.
But now the heavy grey light of day came through slats, and he could not stay asleep. He lay on his side and looked at Jason and Ralph, brown and ivory, limbs piled together. The room smelled stale with weed and, without thinking, Russell got up and began dressing.




















































The sky grew lighter as he came closer to 1735 Breckinridge, and it was almost April weather, soon enough Easter would be here. He went into his backyard, but only to pull out his bicycle, and then he continued to ride east, bowing his head to the rising sun. He rose through Curtain and across Kirklnad and up to Colum. He rode past Noble Red and Nehru’s house and through the park until he arrived, colder than the sun rising through the trees would imply, at the Barnard house and tied his bike around the no parking sign. He went around the back where it was overgrown weeds in the summer and icy choked weeds in the winter, and he went through the back door and up the back stair. He heard snoring from the room that was either Jill’s or Justine’s, but music was playing in Cody’s room, and he so opened the door.

“Russell!” Cody said in excitement.

Then he tilted his head.

“Russell, are you alright? It’s like…. Eight in the morning.”

“Well, if you’re up I can be up.”

“True,” Cody said. “But hardly an answer.”

Then he said, “Jill is with Shane.”

But Russell had turned his back on Cody, whose dark hair hung like a curtain on his shoulders. He was in his boxers and the little room was hot as always. He had known Cody in this room. They had made love in this room. Russell took off his winter coat and placed it on the chair before Cody’s desk.

“No,” he said, at last. “I am not alright.”

Russell took off his gloves and his hat and scarf and then he took of his boots. He stood before Cody in jeans and plaid shirt and socks and then he took of his plaid shirt, and now he pulled down his jeans. He lifted off his tee shirt and pulled off his long johns ,and then at last his briefs, and his socks, and stood before Cody naked.

Cody sat on the bed, frightened for Russell and full of sorrow and Russell, but Russell saw his penis rising out of his boxers the same time Russell knew his own erection was pointing to his brother.

Cody pulled off his boxers and stood there, well made, browned, thick limbed, thick penised, liquid eyes, sorrowful, full of a heat and love Russell longed for again. They stood naked in front of each other, their eyes welling up and then Russell, turned around and hit the wall with his fist and lay against the wall, sobbing.

Cody pulled his underwear back up and took the old comforter at the foot of his bed. He came to Russell, draping it over him, and as Russell wept in his arms, he whispered nonsense to him, stroking his hair and rocking him until his sobs subsided.

END OF CHAPTER: TOMORROW WE RETURN TO MASTER OF ALL SORROWS

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was an interesting end to the chapter. Russell really is clearly feeling lost. He may enjoy all this sex but I don’t think he has found himself. I am glad he went to Cody. Excellent writing and I look forward to Master Of All Sorrows tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

No, friend, things are pretty lost right now. Sex, of course, is complicated. We moralize about it in two ways: having lots of it is either a great thing or a naughty thing. But I think doing one thing because you are hopeless trying to achieve something else is what's damaging and why Russell is currently so damaged. Ralph confessed, a little while ago, that he was out of control. I think the same could be said for Russell.

 

[ChrisGibson]

CHAPTER TWELVE

WATCH



“I understand that maybe he might not have been the greatest husband, but that Dena. She was a real cold thing if you ask me,” Felice was saying.

“I mean, I know you can’t talk about her because you’re her therapist—“”

“Not anymore,” Patti said. “She stopped seeing me.”

“That’s cold. That’s kind of… Are you pissed?”

“No, because apparently I’m signed up to be paid automatically from her checking account and I’ve been getting a check every week.”

Felice snorted, and Patti said, “But I still can’t talk about the bitch, because THAT would be unprofessional.”

The phone rang and Patti murmured, “Oh, shit.”

“I guess you better get it.”

Patti Lewis and Felice Wynn were on their second cups of coffee and Felice was looking through the circulars for deals on Easter food. Patti picked up the phone and murmured, “Hey, Jackie.”

“Hey, Girl!” Felice shouted. “Tell her she should have never left town and tell her Sharon wants us to go out of town again.”

But the look on Patti’s face had changed, and Felice put down her paper, and frowned.

“Okay,” Patti said. “Okay. You wanna tell him? Honey, let me go get his number. He should be at work in about fifteen.”

Felice had the sense to not interrupt. Something had happened, and she would know soon enough. Patti had gone to the living room and she returned with her date book and flipped it to the middle, turned a few pages, then said, “Jaclyn, are you there? Alright? Okay,..” and she read off a number. “There you go.” She added, “I love you Jackie. I’ll call back and see what’s going on.”

Patti hung up the phone and for a moment it looked like she had forgotten Felice was there, and then she said to her best friend.

“It’s her Dad. Her and Thom’s dad. R.L. He collapsed this morning. He’s at the hospital in Port Gregory.”



Lynn Messing stuck her head in Bill’s office and he could tell that this was business.

“You got a call coming, and it sounds important. I’m about to transfer you.”

Bill nodded and a moment later when he rang and picked up, when Thom said who is was, Bill said, “What’s up?”

“I need to get back home. I need to get to Port Gregory. My dad’s in the hospital.”

Bill Dwyer already had his keys and blazer in hand.

“Hold on. I’ll get Dave and it’ll take us about fifteen minutes. OK?”

He didn’t say ‘bye” that just took time. He called David and said, “You gotta call off work, cause we gotta go. Thom needs us.”

David Armstrong was used to not questioning Bill, and he didn’t. In less than five minutes, he had discreetly kissed Lynn on the cheek, told everyone he had to go, and in ten minutes he was at his brother-in-law’s office and then, in the promise fifteen, with only a small squeak, the car stopped right in front of wear they dropped Thom off, Thom slid into the shotgun seat and lowering his shades and running a yellow light, Bill said, “Where are we going, Buddy?”

“Uh….. Saint Anne’s.”

“That’s where Niall was born,” David, sitting like a grasshopper said, pushing up his glasses.

“Yeah. Well, they won’t tell me anything. I called and they said I wasn’t next of kin, which is crazy, I am. But I guess Jackie is listed, and I haven’t heard from her since this morning, and I don’t know shit. And it took me a while to realize that they could have just asked him if he wanted to speak to me, and if they didn’t ask, they couldn’t, so he must be in some bad shape.”

Thom had rattled all of this off and as the three men sped onto the express way, only David’s face had an expression.

“I need to get one of those cell phones,” Thom said. “That does it. I’m getting one.”

Bill nodded, and clapped Thom on the knee. He had one job, which was to get them to the hospital as fast as possible as safe as possible.







“Should we even be here?” David whispered.

“Of course we should be here,” Bill said. “Thom’s our friend. We’ll be here until he says he doesn’t want is.”

“I dunno. I feel like we’re interfering.”

“That’s because our family’s so incestuous we married each other’s sisters and we don’t have any friends outside of us. Frankly,” Bill said. “that doesn’t seem to have worked so well.”

“Well…” David began.

“It’s no time to assign blame for that. In fact, we don’t even need to. I was a good husband to a wife who resented me, but I took that out on my son, and I was a shit dad to him. I’ve been a shit head of my family. I don’t know if I can get that back. But I have always been a loyal friend. You know that.”

“Of course I know that Bill.”

“And,” Bill continued, “I’ve also been bossy as fuck. So, do me a favor. Call Jeff Cordino and all the guys—except Chayne, I’m sure he already knows—and let them know what’s going on.”

David, used to obeying Bill, nodded and Bill clapped him on the back, sitting several seats away from the Lewis family.



Felice Wynn had no such compunction about giving the Lewis’s distance. She sat between Jackie and Patti and when the doctor came out he said to Kathleen, “Are you his wife?”

“No,” Kathleen said, touching her short pale hair, and then she said, “But… Yes. I guess I still am.”

“I’m trying to find a way to tell you this.”

“Tell it to us straight,” Kathleen said. “We are a family that takes things straight.”

“He’s dying.”

Jackie didn’t take it straight. She sobbed out loud and collapsed into Felice’s chest. Patti looked to her husband, and Thom had the expression that said he wasn’t going to lose control, but it was in his eyes. After all these years she knew his eyes.

“What is happening?” Kathleen said, “Exactly.”

“Organ failue. Massive organ failure. His lungs, his heart. His kidneys.”

“How long do we have?”

“Maybe a day.”

Kathleen closed her eyes while Jackie sobbed.

“He had a DNR.”

“He actually got around to that?” Thom said.

Kathleen said, not to Thom, but to the doctor, “Yes. Of course.”

“We can make him as comfortable as possible. We can do that.”

“No,” Kathleen said. “We can do that.”

“Excuse me, Mrs. Lewis?”

“We can do that,” Kathleen said, her voice very level. She opened her eyes and looked at the doctor.

“If you could save him, he would stay here, but if he’s going to die, he might as well die at home. Whoever needs to sign the papers can do that, and then I guess the ambulance would bring him to us?”

“That’s the way, but….” The doctor said, “Mrs. Lewis, this is highly unusual.”

“We,” Kathleen said, motioning to her small family as Jackie began wiping the her red face with the back of her hand, “have always been an unusual family.”

The doctor cleared his throat. He looked amazed. He said, “I’ll need an address.”

“1735 Breckinridge,” Thom said. “Geshichte Falls.”

Kathleen looked at him.

“Did you think I was going to have you bring him to your apartment?”

“I would have done it,” Kathleen said. “Thom, you don’t owe him anything.”

Thom’s face was hard, like he was trying to hold it together. He shook his head.

“Maybe it’s not about me, Mom.”

The doctor cleared his throat, and he said, “Come with me. Both of you. We can get the paperwork underway. It shouldn’t take long.”

Thom touched his mother on the shoulder and went to Bill who was sitting, knees wide apart, fingertips touching, his head bent.

“Bill, thank you.”

“Sure.”

“No, I mean it. And thank you for waiting here.”

“Is everything okay?”

‘No,” Thom said. “Dad’s not gonna make it.”

“Fuck.”

“We’re bringing him to the house.”

“Well,” Bill stood up. “Dave’s making calls. To everyone I hope that wasn’t high handed.”

“No, it’s just the thing. You’re… Bill, you’re a good friend, and I don’t have a lot of friends. Thank you for everything.”

“You probably don’t need us right now,” Bill said.

“We’re all getting ready to head out,” Thom said.

“You need anything… You just…”

“Why don’t you come on by later. You can Cam and…. Everyone.”

“Are you guys,,, having a wake?”

“It’ll be like a wake,” Thom said quietly. “I think Mom determined to this the old fashioned way, and I’d be,” thom cleared his throat. “I’d really love it if you guys were there.”

Bill embraced Thom quickly, and then clapping him on the back, turned and headed out of the waiting room to find David and head back home.

MORE IN THE NEXT POST

 

[ChrisGibson]

“No, no, don’t help me,” Anigel said, entering the house with two grocery bags, “I can do this all myself.”

Both Chayne and Rob went for the foor, but Chayne touched Rob light on the chest and then Rob nodded and Chayne did it himself.

Rob got up and went out the door to get the remaining bags and as Anigel unshouldered her canvas bag and put down the others on the counter, she said, “Damnit, I almost forgot mayonnaise, but I DID forget bread crumbs, and I am not going back to the store to get them. You know they have a goddamn self checkout now? I had that. And as I was checking my own self out, being my own cashier and bag boy, this bitch was looking at me, a worker who should have been working, and she asked me, she said, were you going to get all three of those juices, because you only paid for one. So I ended up paying for everything she saw in that cart!”

“Were you planning not to?”

“Of course I was!” Anigel shouted as Chayne came back with the last bags. “Shit is too damn high? And what about employee discounts? If I’m beign the bag boy and the cashier, I should get discounted twice. As it was, I planned to spend about seventeen dollars. Treat myself! And because of that bitch I ended up spending twenty-eight.”

“So you’re mad at her because you couldn’t steal?”

Anigel looked at Rob like he was stupid, and pulled two loaves of bread out of the bag, motioning for him to stick them in the fridge.

“I didn’t say I didn’t steal, I said I didn’t still as much as I wanted. By my count, I didn’t pay for at least….” She looked around “half of this.”

“How do you do it?”

“On closer thought,” Angiel continued, “probably two thirds. I definitely didn’t pay for this.”

“You honestly don’t have a problem with just taking shit of shelves and absconding with it?”

“How come,” anigel began, “when rich white people steal its called taxes, the law, and the cost of living, and when poor people try to get a little back for themselves it’s call theft?”

“Chayne, listen to her?”

“The only reason you’re so high and mighty is because…. You’re high and mighty, Rob,” Anigel said. “Middle class people can have middle class values, and rich people can afford to follow the rules. The rules are made for them.”

With little malice, Anigel went up the stairs and Rob, gestured to her departing back and swinging hair.

“Can you believe her?”

“I can’t believe how much our grocery bill has fallen since she moved in.”

“You approve of this?”

“Rob, stop,” Chayne said. “Really. You’re better than this. You’re going to eat these stolen pork chops and this red hot shrimp, so stop posing and but up the groceries.”

“Who the fuck has seen my tampons?” Anigel shouted down the stairs.

“Chayne! Have you seen my goddamn tampons?”

“How the fuck would I—Hold on,” Chayne came up the stairs while Anigel was going through the closet beside the bathroom.

“I can feel it, Chayne. I’m about to have a heavy flow and I’m fresh out. Honestly, all those pro-life motherfuckers who talk about how great children are and how muc they prize women… they might want to give us gree Tampax.”

Anigel murmured, “Not that I pay for them anyway.”

The phone rang, and they both looked at each other.

“Rob’ll get it—oh, thank God. I can breathe easy.”

She brandished the box.

“Bleed easy,” Chayne said.

“You’re so nasty.”

“You love it.”

“Most of the time,” Anigel agreed. “Yes.”

Rob came upstairs with the cordless.

“It’s Patti.”

They both frowned. Rob held the phone to Anigel. “It’s for you.”

“What’s up?” she said.

“Can you or Chayne go pick Russell up from school?”

“We could,” Anigel said, looking to Chayne who could overhear the conversation.

“We’re out of town, and… we want Russell home.”

“Okay,” Anigel said. “well, we can certainly do that.”

Anigel was not a prying person.

“Thom’s father is dying,” Patti said. “We’re bringing him home. Everyone’s going to be there, so….”

“Shit!” Anigel said.

Chayne took the phone from her.

“Patricia, we’re on our way to get him. We’ll leave now. How soon are you bringing R.L. back.”

“As soon as possible. We’re signing him out now. Thanks. Both of you.”

“Don’t worry about. Love you,” Chayne said as briskly as possible and hung up the phone.

He told Anigel, “You found your Tampax just in time.”


MORE TOMORROW

 

[CharmedFan28]

Wow that was an intense portion. I am glad everyone is there for Thom with his father dying. They may not have had much of a relationship or a relationship at all but it’s still his Dad. A very sad time. Great writing as always and I look forward to more tomorrow.

 

[ChrisGibson]

We've moved away from Russell and the kids and their love lives to one of the big bugbears we all come to.

 

[ChrisGibson]

THE WATCH: CONTINUED

“You just spoon on a little, and then you fold. Like this. It’s easier than you think.”

Denise McLlarchlahn Ridecki was in the in the kitchen of the parish house, teaching Ann Ford to make pierogi.

She said, “My mother always said never go to a house of mourning and not bring anything.”

Overhearing, Hannah Decker said, “That’s why I’m taking these cupcakes over.”

“That’s not what I meanr, but you do that, Denise said. She didn’t even trouble to not shake her head.

“Is she pregnant?” Denise wondered, while she quickly dolloped and folded.

“No,” said Anne who was having a little more trouble than Denise’s simple explanation had said was possible.

“Um, just fat,” Denise decided.

“Those look delicious,’ Robert Heinz declared, walking into the kitchem.

“they look like dough wrapped around bits of cold potato,” Denise said with no resentment.

“I can’t believe this is happening to poor Thom,” Father Heinz said in a tone that made Ann and Denise look at each other. Ann’s speed in filling and rolling picked up her, but she said nothing, trusting Denise could do far more dangerous.

“Thom’s almost forty. His father is almost seventy with bad health, What is it you can’t believe?”



Father Tony Ford was siting in the living room overlooking Kirkland Street. The early spring that had brought light to the trees and the new grass outside, now slanted into the west facing room.

“I’ve gotta get that blinder they were talking about.”

“Who was talking about?” Denise said.

“I hadn’t noticed you,” Tony said.

“Well, I’ll forgive that, but after I get finished cooking, will you come with me to my sister’s house, help my drop off some of this food?”

“I don’t know that I’ll even be wanted,” Geoff Ford said.

“You’re they’re priest, and frankly you’ll be wanted far more than Robert.”

“I can’t argue that. Yikes. Have you seen Patti’s face when he speaks?”

“Everyone’s seen Patti’s face when he speaks.”

` Geoff looked like he was still thinking, but Patti said, “Aside from running into people you’ve known your whole life, and actually doing the work of an actual priest, I’m not sure what the bad point of this is.”

“You’re right,” Geoff said, standing up and hiking iis pants up. “I’ll go say Vespers, then I’ll be on my way.”

“Good, I’ll put on a coat and dig up your keys.”

“What?”

“Your keys,” Denise said. “I was going to take them and hold for hostage, only now that’s off the table.”

“You know I’d just get Robert’s and take his car.”

“You thimk I hadn’t thought about that?”

“Denise!” Geoff frowned in not quite unbelief.

“And it was a rickety table with three legs at that.”

“What?” Geoff said, as usual, confused by the woman.

As she died a scarf around over her head, looking like the impersonation of an old woman, Robert Heinz asked, “Where are you going?”

“To get our keys.”





“You fold in the eggs and the butter,” Chayne was telling Russell. “It’ easier than you think.”

All afternoon, Russell had been close beside Chayne in the kitchen. Cooking wasn’t easy, but it was the thing you could do. After Chayne and Anigel had gotten the call from Patti, they headed out to OLM, went to the main office and told them they needed to bring Russell out of class earlier. The secretary would have argued and asked for ID, but Father Branch had been in the main office.

“That’s Chayne, and this is the young woman with the cheerleaders.”

“Anigel Reyes, Father, ”

“Pleased to meet you.” He turned to Mrs. Jankowski the secretary.

“Russell should be in 137, Latin right now.”

Father Branch nodded and said to Jimmy, the office aid. “137. Russell Lewis. Right down the hall.”

They’d explained it all to him in the main office and he went to get his books, followed by Anigel.

“So this is OLM,” she murmured.

“You’ve never been inside?”

She shook her head.

“Never had a need to. It’s more fragrant that I like.”

“It smells like belches and farts.”

“Like eight hundred teenage boys in one spot.”

Russell shrugged. “You get used to it.

“Is R.L. really dying?”

“It seems that way.”

Russell shook his head.

“I hardly know him. We hardly know him. He and Dad were just starting to be ok.”

Russell looked through his locker, which Anigel noted was a mess, pulled out three slim books and stuffed them into his bag.

“Life is a stupid bitch,” he declared.

They had taken Anigel’s car, and on their way to the school, Chayne had made a list of what they should cook and what ingredients they already had, what Anigel had just brought back from the store.

“It’s ungracious,” Anigel had said, “but I wish Patti had called before I’d gone shopping.”

They had coordinated things. Chayne and Felice never imagined that white people would cook the same things as Black people or that, if they did, they would taste anywhere as good. So they only coordinated among themselves.s Sharon immediately went out and baked a ham. Chayne was putting a macaroni in the oven and had done a sweet potato pie while his mother had made a potato salad. Anigel was making hop in john and Chayne decided, as he poured himself and Russell a cup of coffee, that this was enough for three people in roughly the same family to bring, and other people would or should be able to provide more.





“Kristin’s on her way.”

“Kristin’s all the way in Minnesota.”

“She was the first person I called,” Jackie said. “I called her even before I called Patti.

“You thought…” Abby Devalara began, and then she said, “You knew, didn’t you?”

“I think I did. I called her around nine o clock. If she and Reese drive with a led foot they should be here before midnight.”





“Sharon, this is so much food,” Patti said.

“It’s not that much. Not when you look at all the people here, and then you think about tomorrow and what’s ahead.”

“Right,” Patti said. Her blond curls were duller, had less life, and her eyes were ringed.

“You should get a shower or something.”

“I can’t do that, Sharon.”

“Why not? What’s being tired going to do?”

“I have to be here for Thom.”

“How can you be here for anyone if you’re almost not here?”

Patti nodded and she could hear Denise, by the bean dip saying, “Just spoon yourself a little bowl There’s enough Dixie bowsl for that. No need to double dip in the sauce. There’s enough sickness here, already.”

“Besides,” Sharon said, “it looks like your sister has things covered.

Patti nodded and squeezed Sharon Kandzierski’s shoulder. She left the crowded living room and went into the kitchen where Lee Armstrong and Dena were, arranging casserole dishes.

“I did cheese and potatoes,” Lee was saying, and Dena did her string bean casserole.”

“It was my mother’s recipe,” Cameron’s mother said.

“Thank you,” Patti said.

She didn’t know Lee well, but considered Bill’s sister well intentioned, and she moved between pity and rank dislike for Dena. She wanted to say something profound, but she was tired, and all she could do is repeat: Thank you.”



“Have you gotten a hold of Finn?” someone was asking Jackie and she and John exchanged infants, and she said, “Not yet. And he was the closest to Dad.”

“I’ll keep trying,” John promised.



CONTINUED NEXT SECTION

 

[ChrisGibson]

Upstairs Anigel had the television on, and beside her was an ashtray with three stubbed out cigarettes while she smoked a fourth.

“So they think that the man from the strip club killed her?”

“I don’t know who they think killed her,” Anigel was saying to Jill. “I wasn’t really following the show.”

“Then why are we watching it?”

“Because I like to pretend I’m Olivia Benson, and Christopher Meloni is the finest white man I’ve ever seen,”

“How many soare rooms do you have?” Jill asked Russell

“Too many.”

“It’s not too many,” Jill said, “if you want to open a hotel. It’sa great place to have a bunch of people that’s for sure.”

“It’s a great place for your grandfather to die in,” Russell told her.

“Is anybody hungry?” Anigel stood up. “I want some more macaroni.”

“I want a whole plate,” Gilead said, “so I’m coming with you.”

Russell followed them down the hall and toward the stairs.

“I don’t even know what we’re supposed to do,” he said.

“Nothing,” Gilead told him. “We just wait. We’re just all together.”

Russell wanted to say, “Thanks for being here,” but he knew that Gilead would have only shrugged or pretended he didn’t hear.

“I’m not that hungry.”

“Why would you be”” Gilead said. “Your grandfather’s dying.”

“I didn’t even really know him.”

Anigel was at the bottom of the stairs. She looked up at them. Gilead motioned for her to go on.

“What’s wrong with me?” Russell said. “I should be more moved than this.”

“But it’s like you said,” Gilead told him. “You didn’t really know him.”

“I’ve never lost anyone,” Russell said. “I’m almost seventeen, and I’ve never lost anyone. This is the first death in my family. That I remember. And I don’t really feel the way I should.”

Gilead thought of saying something helpful, but anything that arose felt like a platitude.

At last he said, “If you don’t want to eat, follow me and watch me eat.”

They were downstairs, but Russell saw his grandmother going to the backroom where RL was, and he lifted a finger.

Gilead nodded and went on toward the kitchen and Anigel.

The room where Kathleen had entered had only a little light, and R.L. had been sent home with a breathing machine. By the time Chayne, Rob, and Anigel had brought Russell home, his grandfather was already there.

Around him sat Father Ford and Father Heinz, and Jackie was there now, as well as Kathleen. When Kathleen came, hugging herself and looking more as if she was considering something than mourning, Patti got up and squeezed her arm, and then walked out, kissing Russell on the cheek. Russell sat down beside his grandmother and the two of them looked at an old man under a blanket who looked incredibly tired, fallen down into his wrinkles, his cigarette ash grey hair now touched with white. Jackie looked old too. In her sadness, though barely thirty two, her face seemed to have sink into its own folds.

“Did you do Last Rites?” Kathleen said.

“We didn’t know he was a Catholic,” Father Heinz said.

“I don’t know that he was much of anything,” she said, taking the wet cloth and dabbing his lips. “Does it matter?”

“No,” Geoff decided, reaching into the back beside him to pull out a purple stole.

While Robert Heinz did the same thing, Kathleen took Russell’s hand without looking at her grandson. Her face softening, seeming almost fragile, she said, “He wasn’t much of a husband. Or a father. Or anything really.”

CONTINUED NEXT SECTION

 

[ChrisGibson]

“The after school crowd has arrived,” Gilead declared.

Chris Knapp and Cameron came through the backdoor with Mark who wrapped his arms around him. Track and Lacrosss had just ended. He was in jeans and a tee shirt and felt warm through them He smelled like a soap and the shower and his hair was still wet. He looked fresh and Gilead wanted to hold onto him forever. Chris was the same way, buy Chris Knapp was not his boyfriend.

“Where’s Russell?” Mark asked him.

“In the backroom with his grandfather,” Gilead said, slipping his hand in Mark’s.

“Are you hungry?”

“I’m always hungry,” Mark laughed.

Gilead stopped himself from kissing Mark. It seemed inappropriate in a house of mourning. He wondered how he could love someone so much. He always had, from affair, probably since they were Freshmen, but now he could do it openly. He wondered why he loved him so much right now at this minute, and had to stop himself from hovering over him. Did Cameron feel the same way for Chris? Probably. He’d have to ask her. But she wasn’t like a lot of girls, or boys for that matter. She didn’t hover. She didn’t cling. She was cool about him, put some chicken wings on a plate and said, “I need to say hi to Mr and Mrs. Lewis.”

“I think your mother’s here,” Gilead warned her.

Cam’s face changed.

“Nothing I can do about that, right?” she said. “Where are you all?”

“Upstairs in a spare room. Anigel’s got Law and Order on.”

“So that’s where she is,” Cameron said, heading into the living room with her plate.

“What do you guys know about Russell’s granddad?””

Chris asked.

Gilead thought it was strange. Both Mark and Chris were about the same heigh, brunette with clear greenish eyes, in jeans and tee shirt, but they didn’t look a like.

Gilead said, “He’s got about a day left. Russell’s grandmother insisted on him dying here and not in a hospital. With family.”

“That’s the way I wanna go,” Mark said, who despite his usual sophistication, was like any high schooler after a track, stuffing his face with food.

“I don’t want you to go at all,” Gilead said sternly, wondering why he was feeling so tender toward him.

“What?” Mark stopped and stared at Gilead. He looked silly with a chicken wing hanging from his hand and sauce on his lip.

Gilead shook his head.

“Nothing.”

And then he said, “I love you.”

Mark grinned and looked at Chris. He laughed and hid shoulders fell.

“I love you too, Gilead Story.”

MORE NEXT WEEK. UNTIL THEN, HAVE AN ELEGANT WEEKEND

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a great portion! Everyone is gathering together and preparing for the death. It’s a very sad event but I am glad they are all there for each othe. Hopefully Cameron can avoid her mother. I can only see that ending in a fight but being in the same house may make it tricky to stay away. Excellent writing and I look forward to more next week! I hope you have an elegant weekend too!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Thom’s fingers landed on Russell’s shoulder.

“You don’t have to stay here,” he said. “I’ll watch now.”

Russell nodded.

Kathleen was half asleep in a deep chair, her fingers steepled together, and Russell stood up, feeling his limbs ache while Thom took his seat. He couldn’t remember anyone telling him that this was a death watch, that people always had to be here, that when one person left another person replaced them, that someone would be here when RL finally died. He stood behind his dad and then went to his knees and put his arms around Thom and Thom’s hands touched his. Across from them Chayne was sitting with Rob. A moment ago, discreetly, Chayne had put a mirror to RL’s mouth and nostrils, Rob had tilted his head and given him water.

Thom massaged Russell’s hand and kissed it.

“Go,” he told his son. “Eat. See your friends. All of your friends are here for you.”

Russell nodded and bent down and kissed his father on the head before leaving the room/ Patti and Cody stood at the door and he put his arms around her and they stayed like that for a moment.

“As soon as I could get off work,” he said. They all stood together in the hallway, and then Cody said, “I wanna go and sit with him. I need to sit with him.”

Cody went into the room Patti’s hand lingering on his shoulder, and Russell nodded, and touching Cody’s hand, and then his mother’s he left the hallway, looking for his friends.

“Russell!”

“Mr. Cordino.”

“How are you?”

“I don’t really know.”

Jeff Cordino nodded.

“How’s the year been for you?”

“It’s been a year.”

“You got really popular?”

“Did I? I got really busy for sure.”

Jeff nodded.

“Well, I don’t want to keep you.Don’t let anyone keep you. We’re all going to stop you and start asking how you are, but… you know, just find your friends.”

“Mr. Shrader here?”

“Right over there with Faye.”

“Everyone’s here?”

“Just about. I may have seen the Pope.”

Russell actually laughed at that.

“You know what, Russell?”

“Huh?”

“I’m not worried about anymore.”

Jeff gave him a little punch in the arm, and pushed him forward.



“Patti.”

“Chuck,” Patti said. “Thank you for coming. Faye. Thank you.”

Faye hugged Patti and Patti said, “Did you get any food.”

“Not that string bing casserole shit, but I did get some of the nice stuff. You took a shower.”

“Yeah. You looked like… You looked like you’d taken too much on yourself. Taking too much on yourself isn’t going to make it any better for anyone else.”

“You look great, now,” Chuck said.

Faye looked at him.

“I mean, not as good as Faye, but…”

“That’s better,” Faye said. She grinned, and hooked her finger through Patti’s walking away, but telling her, “Seriously, you look good, and seriously, don’t wear yourself out.”

When they left, Denise was leaning against the wall, looking at her sister.

“What?”

Denise shrugged.

“Faye knows everything that was between me and Chuck. She knows.”

“Great,” Denise said. “Does your husband?”







“Hey, Niall.”

“Hey, Dad,” Niall said. He turned around to leave the kitchen.

“I can come back.”

“No,” Bill said. And then he said, “I could leave and come back. If that’s what you need.”

“That’s not necessary,” Niall told him, and cut himself a piece of quiche.

“Niall, I know you don’t like me—”

“I don’t even know you,” Niall said. “I don ‘t know who you are. I don’t know anything about you.”

“That’s fair.”

“You know,” Niall said. “all of these years I hoped you’d be like Uncle Dave is with David. Or with me even. I hoped you’d love me or something, wanting be like a dad. I tried to do right by you. I just hoped that something would happen and your would be proud of me.”

“Niall—“

“I’m not finished. I remember in fourth grade I joined the baseball team. Cause you wanted me to. You said, I sure would be proud of a son who played baseball. You said that. And I joined. I hated it. I was terrible. I got anxiety every time I went to practice. I hated game days. But here’s the thing. You never came.”

“I had work, then Niall—”

“You never came,” Niall said. “And so after three weeks I was just like, fuck this. And Mom enrolled me in dance classes. Which you hated. Cause that would turn me into a faggot, and God forbid that I be a faggot. That was when I decided I thdn’t care about making you happy.”

Bill decided to say nothing. He nodded his head. He had been holding his plate, but noticed this and put it down now.

“Cameron, trying to make Mom happy. Me trying to make you happy. Onlythe truth is, you’re both bad people. You really are. Children shouldn’t bend over backward to make their folks look at them.”

“I know.”

“Wow,” Niall said. “That is not the Bill Dwyer I know.”

“I’m trying, son. I…”

“You’re a horrible person,” Niall said. “I didn’t even know it till you weren’t around.”

Niall’s mouth hung open in disbelief. Suddenly he looked very hurt. He didn’t speak because maybe he couldn.t

“I thought I was the horrible person. And maybe I was starting to be. I thought I was the disease. But it was you. And Mom too. You were horrible.”

“I know that,” Niall, “And if you need me to, you can come and tell me that every day.”

“I think I will.”

“Fine,” Bill said. “But…. You can’t know this. You wouldn’t know it. Listen, I’m not making an excuse, just hear me out.”

“Fine.”

“You never knew me and your Aunt Lee’s dad.”

“He died.”

“Not until a couple of years ago.”

“What?”

“He was awful, Niall. He was a terrible, terrible man. And right now there is a man dying who was terrible, I think. And Mr. Lewis hardly knew him. His kids didn’t know what to do with him. I do not want that to be us. I don’t. When the time comes, when I’m in the spare room or my bedroom or wherever I want you there, but I don’t want you confused. I want to know that you understand you were loved. I want you to think, we had some rought times early on, but things got better. That’s what I want.”

Niall nodded, but his lips were tight. He looked angry, but Bill thought he was just trying to hold himself together.

“That’s what I want, Niall. Now, what do you want?”

“To be able to trust you.”



Anigel came down to the kitchen to cover the food and rinse dishes and Gilead was drying the clean plates she handed to him.

“Is there anything I can do?” asked Mark, who had come down after them.

“Not really,” Anigel said. “Are you going back home or staying?”

“Pretty sure I’m staying.”

“Where is home” Anigel, back to him still inquired.

“I love on Westhaven,” Mark said. Then he clarified, “I meant up north. The good part.”

Anigel turned around and eyed him.

“You mean the white part?”

“That…. Is not what I meant.”

“Um,” she said.

“Father Branch?”

“Marcus,” the middle aged priest greeted him, “Gilead. I sould have known you all would be here.”

“Saved by the priest,” Anigel murmured.

“What are you doing here?”

“Instead of in that cupboard they put all the priests in after school is over?”

“I didn’t mean that.”

“You sort of did,” Father Branch said.

“Called out twice in under five minutes!” Anigel snapped her figners and pointed at Mark.

Ignoring Anigel, Father Branch just said, “Mr. Lewis went to OLM just like you did, and I’m here to pay my respects,and maybe say Last Rites.”

“I think those priests from Saint A’s already did it.”

“The tall one that looks like a Hollywood version of an adulterous priests, and the stubby one with belly?”

“Father Geoff and Father Heinz.”

“Um,” Father Branch cleared his throat. “Well, then I better get back there and to it the right way.”

 

[ChrisGibson]

Anigel started and woke up tipped to the side in a chair in the TV.

“What time is it?” she wondered, her mouth dry.

“Time for you to lay down in a bed,” Jill said.

There was noise downstairs, and she supposed that had waken her.

She looked to Jill and Jill looked at Russell.

“We could use a bit of a walk,” he said.

Gilead had fallen asleep on the bed in the spare room and Mark was half asleep behind him. Russell, Anigel and Jill had gotten halfway down the hall, and Patti was coming out of her bedroom when Jimmy Nespres, Macy McLarhclahn, Ross Allan and Flip Sanders came up the stairs. Patti watched while Ross embraced Anigel and Macy and Jimmu hugged her, but she looked with especial interest at handsome black haired boy, Flipper, who went to his son, and she noted how Russell went into his arms.

“When we heard everyone was coming, we decided we might as well too.”

“It was the food that had me,” Macy said.

“I need a walk,” Russell said.

“I’ve been in a car for two hours,” Flipper said. I could use a walk.”

“We all could,” said Ross.

Anigel said, “I’ll get my coat.

Russell was aware of Flipper’s hand in his Flipper whispered, “When I heard, I had to be here.”



“I need to get back to Tim,” Jewell was saying as she pulled her coat back on and pulled her puff of hair out from it. “He can’t run the Jewell alone.”

“And I have a husband who can’t manage a stove alone,” Shannon said.

“Russell,” she said to the boy who was coming down stairs with Flipper and Anigel, “when are you coming back to the Blue Jewell to sing.”

“That’s right,” Jewell said. “We haven’t seen you since your high school life took off.”

“Look at him,” Shannon said. “So tall. Good shoulders. You fucking yet?”

“Really?” Chayne said to her.

“He’d fucking,” Shannon said to Jewell in confidence. Then she said, “Well,let’s get a move on. We gotta a twenty five minute drive.

“Oops, scuse me darling,” Shannon said, as she opened the front door to leave, and Ralph Balusi and Jason Lorry came through.

“Took you assholes long enough to get here,” Anigel said while Shannon and Jewell headed into the night.

“I had to work at the store,” Ralph said.

“Um,” Anigel said, unimpressed.

“Thanks for coming,” Russell remembered himself. “We’re going out for a moment, but we’ll be back. Make yourself at home. There’s a lot of food. Gilead, Mark and Cam upstairs.”

Russell headed out the house with Flipper and Ross closed the door.

“Wow,” Ross commented to Chayne, looking from the departing Flipper to Ralph and Jason, “You think that might have been an awkward Russell moment?”

“Awkward?” Patti said.

Rob had not expected Patti Lewis to be behind him, but it was Chayne who said, blandly, “All of teenage life is awkward.”