DANIEL held tight to his chest the fifteen-pound bag of dog kibble Aiden asked him to pick up before he left for work. It was easy to get since the pet store was in the same shopping center as the woodshop. The door opening and shutting pulled Ranger’s attention from his hearthside bed. He shook and trotted to Daniel.
At first hesitant to get a pet, Daniel came to expect the loving greeting by their loyal hound. It was Aiden’s idea to train Ranger to recognize Daniel as Poppy to distinguish him from Aiden. Daniel thought it silly, but he’d grown used to the name. He patted Ranger’s head and brushed him away when his loving became too frisky. Sidetracked by the chicken kibble, Ranger pawed at the bag. Daniel nudged him off farther so he could set the bag down and remove his boots.
Aiden came from the kitchen. “Good, you remembered Ranger’s food.” He carried the bag away from Ranger’s snout and sat it on the pass-through. “We were almost out.”
“No trouble,” Daniel said, unlacing his boots. He noticed the aroma of roast beef and boiled potatoes and carrots—one of his favorite meals. Nonetheless, the nagging chill continued to travel along his nape.
After Daniel stowed his boots by the front door and stood, Aiden gave him a burly hug. “I missed you.”
Daniel, a foot taller than Aiden, kissed his curly head the way Aiden liked despite Daniel’s still being unused to showy forms of affection, even in private. Aiden tightened his arms around him, and Daniel rubbed his back. He reveled in the loving, but knew something was up.
Daniel stepped back and Aiden gazed up at him. For sure, worries percolated behind those honey-brown irises that still could sap Daniel of his breath. Pulling on his beard, he asked, “Why do you look at me that way?”
“What way?” Aiden said, shrugging. “I’m glad you’re home, that’s all. I want to take you in with my eyes. I didn’t see you all day.”
Daniel hung his jacket on one of the hooks by the door and lifted the day’s mail from the console. “I’m sure that’s it.”
“You got a letter from your sister,” Aiden said.
Ranger dropped a stuffed toy by Daniel’s feet. Daniel tossed it as far down the hallway as he could. “I’ll read it later.” He sorted through the rest of the mail. Same old things. Bills. Junk.
“Did you have a good day?” Aiden asked, his voice higher in pitch than normal.
Daniel eyed him. “As good as usual. How did your day go? Anything newsworthy?”
Aiden made an exaggerated sad face, one that masked the inkling of burdensome truth. “Newsworthy?” He scratched behind his ear and shrugged. “Mostly Ranger and I have been home alone.”
“Haven’t you got started on your new writing assignment, the one you told me about the other day, to keep you busy?”
“About strip mining in Glacier National Park? I started to, but got preoccupied with spring cleaning.”
Daniel expected Aiden to say more. He noticed the extra creases in Aiden’s forehead and the wavering smile. Years studying people who seldom expressed emotions but couldn’t help but reveal them on their faces had taught Daniel when someone harbored a secret.
Rather than worry about it right away, he chose to move past Aiden and wait for him to broach his troubles when he was ready. Down the hallway, he took the stuffed toy from Ranger’s mouth and chucked it into the living area. Tail wagging, Ranger raced after it.
In the bedroom he sat on their queen-sized log bed, the one he made special for Aiden, and tore open Elisabeth’s letter. Choosing to defy the ministers, she was the only one of his family members who remained in regular contact with him since the shunning. He also stayed in touch with his brother Mark, who wrote once or twice a year, and on a few occasions sent him a text message from work asking for advice on money or his young marriage. Lately, since Mark and his wife had a baby, those texts seemed to lessen.
Elisabeth’s letter expressed her usual thoughts, highlighting family news. Everyone was healthy. Their baby sister, Gretchen, whom Daniel had only met on two separate occasions, was growing faster each day and had begun walking and making words. David and Moriah were starting to show an interest in the opposite sex. Grace, at eighteen, found herself in the throes of love more often than when the moon rose. Mark and his wife Heidi were trying for a second baby, but so far God chose to withhold any more blessings. Elisabeth, as usual, refrained from mentioning much about herself. She merely wrote that her students at the one-room schoolhouse where she taught first through eighth grades were becoming smarter than she. She also had her funny way of asking about Aiden. Although Elisabeth was aware of Daniel and Aiden’s relationship, she never stated that she knew. “Hope Aiden is well and continues to help in your endeavors,” would be the most she’d say.
And their parents, Elisabeth wrote, continued to toil into their middle ages. Dad complained about his aches and pains and the harshness of waking in the dark during winter months. Mom, her arms full with the bobli Gretchen, wore a worn expression common to most women with squirming babies. Elisabeth’s subtle language maintained an optimistic air, but Daniel read enough between the lines that she wanted him to understand how much Dad and Mom missed their eldest son.
“There’s nothing that can be done about it,” he mumbled to himself, scanning Elisabeth’s letter one last time. He wanted to stay in touch with each family member, but he could not force them to refuse the ministers’ ruling. He missed his family, yet understood his parents’ desire to maintain the customs of their Amish denomination even if it did pain them to avoid him. They needed to live by their creed. Daniel also needed to exist by his.
He slipped the letter in the envelope and tucked it inside his dresser drawer for later correspondence. He addressed Elisabeth’s letters to her school so that their austere father would not intercept them. Meanwhile, a hot shower and change of clothes seemed more appealing than writing a letter.
Fifteen minutes later, dressed in fresh clothes and with a damp head of hair, he returned to the dining table, where Aiden had set out the steaming roast and potatoes and carrots. Ranger sat expectantly under the table. The hound was still learning discipline, and Daniel would put up with no dog hankering by his feet while he ate. Daniel called for him in a low voice, and Ranger slinked to the fireplace and waited on his belly. The embarrassing, yet delightful, sensation of warmth and power swelled Daniel’s breast each time Ranger obeyed his commands. The symbiotic relationship of man and beast. He appreciated the loyalty and obedience from growing up on a farm, where animals were a way of life. A way of life he often missed.
Wondering when Aiden would crack, he sat down to the table and led grace. Afterward, they ate mostly in silence. Ranger’s tail thumped against his bedding with anticipation for the meal to finish when Poppy or Daddy would reward him with a treat.
“What did Elisabeth write?” Aiden said.
Daniel glanced up over his plate. “The usual. Everyone is healthy and well. She mentioned you again. Grace has a new boyfriend this month, from Kansas.”
“Maybe she’ll marry him and move there, and we’ll be a little closer.”
What difference would it make, Daniel wanted to say. “Most likely she’ll find another boy. You know how girls are at her age, Amish or otherwise.”
Aiden asked about the shop, and if any new orders came in. Daniel told him no, and that he heard the door chimes ringing maybe four times. Phedra, the shop girl he hired last month when Aiden became bogged down with new writing assignments, said she sold a few knickknacks and consignment items. He asked why Aiden lit a fire on such a warm day.
“Guess it gives me and Ranger extra company without a TV.”
“How would TV give you company?”
Aiden puckered his mouth. “I guess you wouldn’t know about that. Just a dumb reference. Never mind.”
“Are you wanting a TV?”
Aiden shook his head. “I prefer not. I’m the one who wants to live as rustic as we can, remember?”
Daniel ate more of his roast beef and mentioned needing to prune the cottonwood tree out front. The more he rambled, the more he anticipated Aiden would cut him off and disclose the troubles concealed behind his blinking eyes. Daniel was surprised when Aiden cleared their dessert dishes and yet no word.
Perhaps Daniel had misread the ominous signs, and Aiden merely was experiencing the first pangs of spring fever. He’d grown accustomed to Aiden’s restlessness during the early spring, when the snowmelt called out the birds and animals and Aiden yearned to join them in the surrounding forests.
Aiden tinkered on the computer while Daniel sat in his favorite easy chair by the fire, sketching a new design for a bureau a wealthy young couple in La Salle contracted him to build. Working from drawings was new to him. Since he was a boy, he and his uncle cut straight from the wood, harnessing generations of instruction on where to cut without needing calculations or figures. The Amish had an intuition for measurement and mathematics that did not require blueprints or book learning. Nevertheless, one day when Daniel became overwhelmed with the increasing workload, Aiden suggested he make rough sketches to keep track of the projects. A few days later, exacerbated yet happy with the work, he reluctantly tried it, and he found it to be a good way to settle his mind, although he never admitted this to Aiden.
Within eyesight of Aiden, he sketched for at least a half hour. Finally, Aiden cleared his throat. “Daniel, there’s something I have to tell you.”
“What is it?” Daniel kept the pencil point to the paper, though he’d stopped drawing.
“You were right. Something newsworthy did happen today.” Silent a moment, Aiden continued. “I’ve received an unusual call today. I’m unsure what it means, but it involves you.”
“Who called?”
Aiden stood from the computer and sat on the sofa catty-corner to Daniel. He fixed his eyes on the fireplace, where the orange flames had shrunk to thimble size.
He licked his lips and swallowed. “Conrad called me.”
Daniel recognized the name and understood he had been an important figure in Aiden’s past, but could not place a face. “Who is he again?”
“My ex-boyfriend.”
The pencil went limp between Daniel’s fingers. He tapped the eraser end against the paper. “And what made him call you after all these years?”
Aiden shuffled to the fireplace and seemed to strike a pose by the mantel, which Daniel made for Aiden as a surprise housewarming gift a month after they moved into their old red cedar log cabin.
Daniel repeated his question. “What made him call?”
“He wants to come here,” Aiden said.
Daniel gripped the pencil. “Is it so bad for someone to visit?”
“We haven’t had any visitors to our new place yet,” he said with a shaky smile. “Odd he’d be the first. Wouldn’t you say?”
“Not so odd.” Daniel lifted one eyebrow. “Unless it causes you much worry? Is there something else that bothers you about him coming?”
Aiden sighed and paced before the fireplace. “All afternoon I’ve been tinkering around the house, barely thinking about anything but Conrad’s phone call. I wanted to drive up to the shop and see you, but I decided to wait. I was afraid I might plow into a tree with my mind so full of everything.”
Daniel’s curiosity piqued. He watched Aiden walk back and forth, until Aiden stopped and stared at him. Daniel read the doubts in his golden-brown eyes. “I figured something was up when I first stepped inside the house. Tell me, Aiden, what does he want from us?”
Aiden turned to face their portrait on the mantel taken during one of their backpacking trips into Glacier National Park. The frame replicated a log cabin, much like the one they lived in before settling in their rancher home. They looked happy together. Grins stretched their suntanned faces, and a brilliant twinkle shone in their eyes.
Seeing himself in photographs still unsettled Daniel. He harbored the ancient Amish belief that photographs snatched one’s soul. Theirs wasn’t the only religion to believe in such superstition. He learned in school that Muslims also discouraged picture taking. On some level, he knew cameras could not steal away souls. Yet the sight of his own image seemed arrogant and haughty, and he turned away with heated cheeks.
Toward the photograph’s shiny glazing, Aiden said, “I don’t know how to phrase this exactly.” He turned fully and accepted Daniel’s hard ogling. “He wants to stay here longer than a visit. He’s sick, Daniel. He’s very sick and needs people to care for him. He wants us to care for him.”
THE fireplace sighed after Aiden spoke the words that had stewed in his mind since Conrad telephoned. To hear them suddenly seemed surreal. He widened his eyes and stretched his mouth, limbering his lips before revealing more.
“He told me he has cancer and no one to help him,” he continued without averting his eyes from Daniel. “Out of the blue, he asked that I—that we—be his caregivers while he receives radiation treatments.” He swallowed hard and, waiting for Daniel’s reaction, turned back toward the fireplace and tinkered with the mantel.
Even without looking at him, Aiden could picture Daniel pulling on his moustacheless beard, which he kept neatly trimmed now that he was no longer in the Amish order. Aiden knew Daniel wanted to form his phrases in his mind before speaking. It was that Amish patience that sometimes irked Aiden.
He would do whatever Daniel wanted, regardless of Conrad’s needs. Yet Aiden uttered his news with such acute tones he gave Daniel little room for dispute. He clutched the mantel and slowly looked over his shoulder. “What do you think of that?”
Daniel licked his lips. “What did you tell him?”
“I told him I’d have to speak with you first, of course. I’m still shocked he asked such a thing.”
“Why can’t he stay with friends or family?”
But as far back as Aiden could recall Conrad had few friends, and his family, living in Michigan, maintained limited contact with him. He held back from saying too much about the Barringers, realizing that Daniel, too, had such a family. “He doesn’t have many friends and his family isn’t very supportive. Plus he was laid off a few months ago from his computer job, second time in two years.”
What Aiden took for sympathy passed over Daniel’s ebony eyes. Daniel’s gaze fell to the carpet. “Where is he now?”
“Virginia, near DC.”
“Isn’t he getting treatment there? Surely he can find the best medicine in the world around the nation’s capital. Why would he want to come here?”
“He says the doctors insist he have someone to help him, or his prognosis will be less positive. Studies prove it. I checked on the Internet. I think he thought I was still living in Maryland with my parents. There’s a state-of-the-art cancer clinic right here in Kalispell. I’ve driven past it a few times.”
Daniel peered at his slapdash sketching. “I’ve driven past it too.” The hiss of fire filled the pause. Daniel said, “You say he was laid off. How will he pay for these treatments? He didn’t ask that we do?”
Aiden shook his head. “He won’t ask us to foot the bill, I’m sure. At least I think I am. I’m guessing he has COBRA or he’s using his savings. Conrad always was frugal, more than you in some ways.”
Daniel’s shoulders rose higher and a shudder seemed to grip him tighter than the pencil he squeezed in his large, calloused hand. Aiden hadn’t meant to judge Daniel against his former lover, even if he had delivered his words as a compliment. He never compared the two of them in any way, not intentionally.
For Daniel, Aiden was his first—and only—male lover. That Aiden knew for certain. He had no other man with which to compare Aiden. When they first met while Aiden was working on his freelance article in Henry, the heart of Illinois Amish Country, to report on Amish customs for Midwestern Life magazine, Daniel had no need to admit his naivety for Aiden to understand.
Those clumsy days trailed behind them. Their future was theirs to grasp and make into whatever they wished. Now, another obstacle sought to disrupt their world.
After a thoughtful pause, Aiden said, “Look, Daniel, I don’t like this any better than you. We just moved here. We have a life to build together.”
Daniel’s expression was full of the agony of being forced to decide between two horrible choices. Bring a man who was a stranger to Daniel into their home, or leave him to face cancer alone. He drew in his lips. “What kind of cancer does he have?”
“I didn’t think it was proper at the moment to ask for details.”
“There’re all types of cancer.” Daniel’s words traveled to Aiden’s ears in fragments. “Some cancers in the United States are as easily treated as simple maladies. Others hold death sentences.”
“I guess when I call him back I can ask, but I’d like to be able to give him an answer one way or the other.”
Daniel exhaled for what seemed the first time since Aiden revealed his news. His breath came out so heavy, the pages in his lap quivered above the sound of the dying fire. Aiden paced before the hearth again, savoring a moment of vital life while trying to shirk the burden of disease that poised over their heads.
A bitter taste lingered on his tongue. He hankered to speak more, despite realizing he must wait for Daniel to find his proper words first.
Daniel lifted his eyes to meet Aiden’s. Aiden stopped pacing and edged closer to Daniel on the easy chair. Daniel appeared to want to leap across the pine coffee table and shake him. But Aiden faced back toward the fireplace, providing him the courtesy to speak without restraint.
“It’s all strange,” Daniel mumbled. “So very strange.”
Aiden pivoted his shoulders and gave Daniel a hopeless, pleading look. “What should we do, Daniel? How are we to handle this? I know the answer, but please, speak it for me.”
Daniel stroked his beard. “You should call him back,” he said under his breath. “Tell him he can come. How do you tell a sick man who asks for help you cannot give it?”
All along, Aiden knew, those were the words Daniel would speak.