Rye drove and drove and drove. With every mile that he put between himself and Charlie the storm clouds in his stomach grew. So did the likelihood that his car would crap out and leave him stranded somewhere in rural Wyoming.
But it wasn’t anger he felt; it was a snakier, sneakier, more uncomfortable feeling.
Disappointment. He was disappointed in Charlie.
Yeah, he’d known that Charlie wouldn’t like him letting River, Tracy, Nate, and Biscuit use the Crow Lane house. That was why he hadn’t told Charlie in the first place.
But over the last month, Charlie’d learned so much about himself. He’d faced demons that had been long buried, delved into his relationship with Jack, laid himself bare to Rye when it came to sex.
When he’d told Charlie about his own parents, Charlie had raged against them, and agreed with Rye about how lucky he’d been that he had friends who could give him the affection his parents never had.
Rye had thought he understood. How cruel people could be. How powerless it was possible to feel. What a relief it was to find ways to rebuild that power.
But was Charlie only sympathetic when it cost him nothing to be so? When there was no risk involved? Did he only care about the people he loved, and everyone else in need could go to hell? Rye didn’t want to think it of him, but the pit in his stomach wouldn’t let him dismiss the idea.
Rye pulled off the main road and turned off the car. It was mostly dark now and drizzling, a fine mist that delicately beaded his already damp hair like dew on a spider’s web. It smelled clean and green out. How could rain through trees in Wyoming smell so different than rain through trees in Seattle? It was just one more reminder of how far Rye had moved from everything he once knew.
Rye sat in the car, in the dark, in the middle of a road no one drove down. The night critters were emerging and the day critters were bedding down; a brief, noisy overlap.
Rye had begun to think of Charlie as the person he might be able to have a life with. A life with joy and comfort, silliness and fun. Care. A life that was also about something bigger than themselves. But if he and Charlie didn’t even agree that it was good for kids in need of a safe place to have one...what hope was there?
Rye sighed from the depths of his being, turned the car on, and started back toward Garnet Run; to the Crow Lane house. His house.
He shoved his book in his back pocket and used his phone’s flashlight to guide him, and he went inside out of the rain.
Out of habit, he settled on the spot where he’d laid his sleeping bag when he first arrived, in the corner, facing the door. He wished Marmot were with him. If she were, she’d be sticking her nose out the front doorway and into the rain right now. She’d let the rain dampen her whiskers and cheeks and then she’d retreat back indoors, shaking her head like a dog to dry off before curling next to Rye.
He leaned against the wall—which, he noted with a combination of grudging satisfaction and grim resentment, didn’t squish the way it had before Charlie reframed it.
Ugh, damned Charlie with his way of making everything better and stronger.
Everything.
Rye slumped. Everything about his life—except, fine, maybe his takeout options—was better now than it had ever been. He had a job. He had a place to live that he didn’t constantly worry about losing, whether for monetary reasons or interpersonal ones.
He had a relationship that he loved with someone who truly saw him for who he was and cared about all of him. He had the space to contemplate a future—futures, really. All the possible futures.
And it was all because of meeting Charlie.
Without Charlie this house would currently be falling down around him, unnavigable by all but Marmot, who could flit through the most intimidating of rubble like it was a kitty amusement park.
The image reminded him of a video he’d seen: of a woman who had turned her small, suburban house into a maze of cat ramps with archways and tunnels between the rooms. He thumbed through his phone to find the video again.
God, Marmot would love that. He could just imagine her appearing in the kitchen while he was making breakfast, sticking her little head in at the smell of bacon cooking. Or seeing her pop into the living room and jump onto his shoulder from the ramp near the ceiling.
If Jane were there too, they’d probably chase each other. Jane would take up residence on a platform and snooze there peacefully until Marmot pounced on her and got her to play, exhausting them both until they curled up in a fluffy pile on the floor.
Fuck, that was an adorable picture.
He wished he was with Marmot and Jane. Wished they were curled up with him on the couch, purring, Marmot’s a light rumble and Jane’s the sound of tearing metal.
Which means you wish you were back at Charlie’s.
“Shut up,” Rye grumbled at his treacherous brain.
He let his eyelids fall half-shut to better see the cat playground he was envisioning. Tracy and Nate, and especially River, would get a kick out of a cat playground in the house.
He pulled up the hood of his sweatshirt and let his eyes drift the rest of the way shut as his mind wandered in the dark.
Ramps a little below the ceiling, yeah. Cat-sized holes between the rooms so Marmot could sneak attack. Maybe some textured places for her to rub her cheeks or scratch her back on. Steps leading to a platform with a cat bed, or a scratching post, or her litterbox.
Rye smiled. Yeah, the kids would definitely get a kick out of it. And River loved animals; they’d said so several times. Maybe they’d like to help build the ramps and things. Or probably they’d just really like to play with Marmot. And Jane. Any cat, probably. They should try and get a job at an animal shelter—that would be ideal for them.
Rye googled animal shelters in Garnet Run only to see that there weren’t any. He widened his search and found no shelters or pet adoption locations anywhere nearby. Shit. So much for that idea for River.
Rye shoved the phone back in his pocket and drew his knees up. He closed his eyes again and let a vision begin to form in his mind. It started off hazy, but as more and more pieces fell into place Rye wondered if maybe he was onto something.
The sound of tires crunching on dirt yanked him back to attention. A moment later a human-shaped bulk slightly darker than the darkness outside was silhouetted in the doorway.
Charlie.
Something leapt in Rye’s stomach, dolphin bright and joyous. Then he cringed farther into the corner as the beam from Charlie’s flashlight shone directly in his eyes. Rye threw his hand up.
“Dammit, Charlie.”
The flashlight beam dropped and Charlie walked over to him. He loomed, then he sighed, then he lowered himself to the floor beside Rye.
“I thought you’d go to Jack and Simon’s.”
“Didn’t want to make Jack feel bad for turning me away.”
“Jack wouldn’t have turned you away.”
“You’re his brother—he should have. You’ve got dibs on him in a fight.”
“Doesn’t work that way,” Charlie said softly. “Not anymore.”
Rye’s joyous dolphin, dormant since Charlie had sat down, gave a little quiver and popped its nose out of the water.
“So how does it work, then?”
“Jack’s your friend. He’ll be there for you,” Charlie said simply.
“Oh.” Rye couldn’t tell if Charlie was happy about that or not.
Charlie sighed audibly, his large shoulders rising and falling in a motion that seemed like surrender.
“Jack wants me to be happy. I want you to be part of my life. So Jack would be there for you.”
“Oh.”
Want. Want, present tense. That was something.
Even though it was warm during the days now it still got chilly at night and Rye wished he’d brought his coat. Or that they weren’t fighting so Charlie could wrap his arms around him. Charlie was always so warm.
After an awkward silence, Rye said, “They won’t burn down the house.”
Charlie tensed, but Rye wasn’t trying to fight.
“Just listen. Charlie, I know those kids. I was those kids. They’re gonna treat the place with care because it’s the only place they have that’s just theirs. If they just wanted to smoke weed or hang out they could go anywhere. There’s, like, nothing here. They could sit in any field or clearing. But they wanted someplace that felt like home, that felt safe. Private. So they’ll be careful. I know they will.”
Rye could feel Charlie’s eyes on him even in the dark.
“You wanted a place to escape to.”
“Hell yeah. I wish I’d had a place like the Crow Lane house.”
“Where’d you go instead?”
“Oh, uh. Bad places.”
“That’s ominous.”
“Just places I shouldn’t’ve been been. When you’re thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, and you don’t have any money, the only places you can hang out are places where, like, anyone can hang out, you know? And lots of the people I met were great. But some of them weren’t.”
Charlie didn’t need to hear these stories right now, though.
“When I was a kid I thought I was so tough,” Rye said. “I did stupid shit to seem grown up and invincible. It’s just better if you have someplace to go that’s safe, where you don’t have to do those things.”
Charlie frowned.
“Charlie. Jack isn’t the only teenager who deserved someone to step in and take care of him. You cared for him because he was your brother. But what about everyone who isn’t lucky enough to have someone like you?”
Charlie’s frown deepened, but he turned toward Rye in the dark and reached for his hand.
“I...haven’t thought about it before,” he said slowly. “I never thought about a connection between taking care of Jack and taking care of other teenagers. It’s... I don’t know why I didn’t make the connection.”
“I get it. You were totally focused on just making sure you and Jack made it day by day.”
Charlie cleared his throat.
“Back then, I tried to do what I thought my parents would do. Be the kind of parent they were. They were generous.” His voice sounded tight. “And I thought that I was too, I guess. But... I guess there are ways that I’m really not.”
Rye hated to hear the defeat in Charlie’s voice, but his heart sang at the acknowledgement. He hadn’t been wrong about Charlie.
“Charlie, you are generous. You’ve been nothing but generous to me. You help all these people who come into the store. You protected Jack when you were kids. Made sure he had everything he needed. But you’re not a kid anymore. You don’t have to just think about what your parents might’ve done. You can make your own choices now.”
“You really know what you think is right. In here,” Charlie said, touching Rye’s chest with two fingers. “It’s not about following rules or being polite or doing what other people expect. You just know your values for yourself. I really admire it.”
Rye leaned his head against Charlie’s shoulder.
“Thanks. With a shitbird father you kinda have to make sure you know your own mind or there’s a chance you could end up believing his. Anyway, you have time now,” he said. “To figure out what your values are, you know?”
“They might not be the same as yours,” Charlie warned.
“That’s okay. As long as they’re compatible.”
“Yeah?”
“There are definitely things that wouldn’t be okay. But then those wouldn’t be compatible. Like, if you thought about it and decided you didn’t think people should be equal or that money was more important than lives or that you wanted to destroy the planet, then yeah, we’re not compatible. But I’m pretty sure we’re okay on all those fronts. Right?”
“Yes.”
“We can talk about stuff,” Rye said. “Whenever you want. That’s...that’s what couples do, right?” he ventured, gritting his teeth in case Charlie wasn’t sure he wanted to be a couple anymore.
But Charlie leaned in and gathered Rye in his arms.
“Right,” he said.
They sat that way for a while, then Charlie said very softly, “I’ve never had a fight before.”
Rye knew what he meant: a fight with a lover, a partner. He meant: Is it over now? Are we okay?
“We’re okay,” Rye said. “As long as we keep talking, we’re okay.”