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“Doesn’t mean I’m not still frosted.” Skip tossed Russell the car keys and climbed in the passenger side. He wasn’t mad, exactly, just embarrassed to have given in and afraid of what he might have given away.
“Next time, you can sleep on the cot.”
Skip gave him a squint-eyed glare. “Your good looks will get you in trouble one day.”
Russell just smiled and put the car in gear.
Mom expected him to be on time for visiting hours, and they had a ways to go. “We’re going to need to agitate the gravel to get there by two.” Skip had a stop in mind before they got to Firland.
“I’ll drive as fast as John Law will let me.” Russell pulled the car onto Highway 99. They’d gone several miles, time Skip spent running through solo licks in his head, when Russell spoke up.
“How long has your mother been in the sanatorium?”
“It’ll be a year next month.”
“That’s rough.”
Skip tried not to talk about her illness, so he didn’t follow Russell’s comment with one of his own. It had been rough, and there was no use in belaboring the point.
“Our neighbor was in the sanatorium for about four years,” Russell said, his conversational tone inviting a response.
Someone with manners might have asked what happened. Skip didn’t want to know. The neighbor lived or he didn’t. Either way, he lost four years out of his life.
Years Skip’s mother would never have another shot at.
They kept quiet all the way through Tacoma and the forest and farmlands of Federal Way. When they hit the city, Skip directed Russell to head back up onto First Hill. It was twenty minutes after one.
Russell cocked his head in a wordless question when they drove past the Sorrento.
“Need to stop at my apartment,” Skip said.
“Did you forget something?”
“Not really.”
In another block, Russell pulled the car to a stop in front of Skip’s building.
“I’ll be right back.” Skip blew Russell a kiss, which made the other man squirm. “And bring you a treat for being such a good boy.”
“Wait.”
Skip paused, frowning when Russell climbed out of the car.
“I can just wait here,” Russell said. “You don’t want me hanging around.”
But that was exactly what he did want, even though it made no sense. “Please.” Seeing Russell would brighten his mother’s day, and if she overestimated things, he’d set her straight later. “Mom doesn’t get many visitors. I’ll make it worth your while.”
He left Russell frowning on the sidewalk, and came back with a big box of maple bars and chocolate éclairs.
He handed one of the éclairs to Russell, who made a face. “You are the devil incarnate.”
“Later I’ll show you how I can suck out the cream.”
“Hardy har har.”
Skip settled into the passenger seat. “We’ve only got half an hour to get to Firland, and I hate like anything to be late. Let’s get this chariot rolling.”
They skinned in without an extra second. Russell parked in the lot in front of one of two gray-painted barns housing the sanatorium. The grounds were bare of plant life, and the whole place looked more utilitarian than healing.
“Used to be a Naval Hospital.” Skip pointed Russell toward the main door, the box of maple bars tucked under his arm.
“You sure you don’t want me to wait in the car?” Russell sounded nervous, but Skip was determined to introduce his mother to the first guy in forever to rattle his chain.
“Nah, come on. You’ll like Mom.”
Skip was careful to keep a cushion of space between him and Russell, because he didn’t want him to go ape over something as stupid as a hand on his arm. He led the way to the main desk, a gunmetal contraption at the back of the bare front lobby. The young nurse watching the desk hadn’t yet learned the frozen stare most of the others used on him. Her smile still had some heart.
“Hey Miss Jones,” Skip said. “This is Russell. I’ve got some maple bars today. Help yourself.”
Miss Jones blushed to the roots of her permanent-waved hair. “Hi, Lawrence. Hi, Russell.” She took one of the donuts from the box. “Your mother’s been moved back to the bed rest ward, Lawrence. I’m sorry. She’s on the third floor.”
Skip dropped his gaze to the floor. He had to swallow twice before he could get any words out. “Thanks, Miss Jones. We’ll find our way there.”
Disappointment and just plain sadness bogged down his spirits, filling his veins with sludge. They jogged up the stairs, Russell not quite touching him, a weirdly comforting presence. She must have had another hemorrhage. Skip’s feet squeaked on the linoleum, and fear squashed his other emotions.
Skip stopped at the top of the stairs. “If we see a nurse, keep walking. Most of them act halfway between Napoleon and Attila the Hun, so unless they speak directly to us and demand we stop, just keep moving.”
The way to the bed rest floor was painfully familiar. A nurses’ station sat at the bend in the hall, and Skip stopped there reluctantly to ask for his mother’s room number. Reluctant because he referred to the nurse on duty as Dracula’s Daughter.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Johansen, but visiting hours are for family members only.” Her nasal whine always ran about a quarter tone sharp. Drove him crazy.
“Russ is family. He’s my cousin from Missouri, and he’s only here for another couple days.”
Dracula’s Daughter pursed her skinny lips and drew her cheeks in tight. Skip bit back a laugh. Who’d try to smuggle someone illegal into this hell house? Well, he was, but these were special circumstances.
“All right, then. Your mother is in room twenty-eight.” She pronounced her verdict, and before she could draw a breath for a lecture, he headed down the hall. Russell followed, his footsteps soft in the gathering hush.
The place smelled like antiseptic, old blood, and pain. Skip had grown used to it, but a glance over his shoulder showed him Russell was trying to adjust. “Room twenty-eight is right down here.”
Russell huffed a word Skip didn’t catch. Might have been “Minnesota.” Might have been “okay.” Might have been “gonna barf.”
Skip often wanted to barf in this place.
They reached the door to his mother’s room. He gave it a quick tap and turned the handle.
“Skippy.” Her raspy voice wasn’t any louder than a whisper, the only sound left to a woman who used to sing torch songs with a band.
He crossed the room, doing his best to keep his face clear of what he felt. She looked awful. Worse than awful. She was pale, and she’d lost weight even since he’d seen her on Thursday. She lay flat on her back, a chartreuse dressing gown around her shoulders, her graying hair spread out over her pillow. “Hi, Mom. You got your hair done.”
Her hand was as fragile as a baby bird in his grasp. “What’s got that smile on your face?”
Most of the patient rooms had two beds running parallel along one whitewashed wall, across from a set of windows left open year round. The fresh air was supposed to promote a strong constitution, which the patients would need if they were to survive the cold. On this visit, the second bed was empty, so they had the room to themselves. Russell still stood in the doorway. “Come in,” Skip said to him. “Come meet my mom.”
Russell approached as slowly as if he were taking a long walk off a short dock, and for a second, Skip panicked. Bringing him here might have been a bad idea. Russell took a position across the bed and reached out his hand, the rigid lines in his face easing. “Hello, Mrs. Johansen. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
So formal and correct. Skip gulped on the wave of emotions sluicing over his heart: pride and pleasure and pain. The warmth in Russell’s tone nudged a few more points in his favor.
Mom touched his fingers, a light stroke, as if assuring herself he was real. “What nice manners you have.” She took his hand more firmly, shot a glance at Skip. “He’s a real gentleman, Skippy. And so handsome too.”
“Mother.” Skip couldn’t stifle the heat rising in his cheeks. “He’s standing right there.”
Without letting go of their hands, his mother settled farther back in the bed. “You can call me May.” Her smile was interrupted by a weak cough. “It’s been ghastly, Skip.” Her voice caught, and she started to cough again. She let go of his hand and drew out a napkin from a packet near her pillow.
He couldn’t help but wince when she brought up blood with every spasm.
It took several minutes for her breathing to ease. When she was calm, she put the soiled tissue in a little bag hanging from her bed’s rail.
“Did you bleed a lot this time?” he asked.
She scrunched her nose the way she had when he was a kid and she cooked cabbage. His grandmother claimed the vegetable was good for children, but they’d both hated the smell and the slimy texture. Mom served it every so often, though, because she wanted Skip to grow up big and strong.
Deciding she didn’t intend to answer him, he changed topics. “I brought some donuts, and since you don’t have a roommate, you’ll have to eat them all yourself.”
She smiled, an echo of the flirtatious young woman who worked in some of the most notorious nightclubs in the city. “You and your young man will have to help.”
Your young man. Russell’s eyes widened, but his smile never faltered, and Skip had another reason to be grateful no one else was in the room.
“Here, Mom. Let me get you one.” Skip took a napkin and a maple bar from the box and set them on the table beside her bed. “Maple bar or éclair?”
“Éclair.” She wheezed. “Tear it in half for me, will you?”
He broke the bar into three pieces. His mother picked the smallest, but at least she ate some. They chatted for a while about everything except her illness. She told him about the patient who’d been given a day pass to get married, and he told her about Long Beach. He made her promise she wouldn’t give any maple bars to Dracula’s Daughter, and she laughed and told him she’d save them for the night shift, where the nurses were younger and not yet so hard.
Too soon, a bell chimed. Time to leave. Skip squeezed his mother’s baby-bird hand and bent down to kiss her forehead. “I’ll be back Thursday, okay?”
“With more donuts, I hope.”
“Good evening, Mrs. Johansen. I hope you rest easily tonight.” Russell still held his mother’s hand. She’d never let go of him.
“Thank you, Russell, but only if you call me May.”
He smiled, tentative, a blush brightening his cheeks. “All right, May. You take care.”
“I will.” She squeezed his hand with enough force to turn her knuckles white. “And you take care of my son.”
“I will.”
They walked out of the building in a small clot of other visitors. Leaving his mother in such a depressing place flattened Skip’s spirit. It usually took him a few hours to recover. This time, he had the additional worry about Russell. His mother’s parting comment—to take care of her son—would have been fine if they were a couple engaged to be married, but put a lot of pressure on a man he’d known only a matter of days.
He couldn’t decide whether saying something would make things worse or better.
Later, at the apartment, Skip made good on his promise to demonstrate his technique with the éclairs, a process requiring candlelight and plenty of sucking. Russell liked the demo just fine.
Later still, shadows hung from the corners of the room like dusky velvet drapes. A single taper sat on the end table, casting a circle of gold around the bed. Russell lay flat on his belly on the bed, naked and exhausted, doing his best to suppress a grin. “You didn’t need candles to seduce me.”
“Sure I didn’t.” Skip straddled Russell’s thighs like he belonged there, and Russell clamped down on his lower lip to keep from saying something foolish. He liked this man, though they only had a few more days. Talking about it would just make it harder to leave.
In response to the steady, warm pressure of Skip’s hands on his back, Russell exhaled deep enough to quiet the chorus of insecurity still yammering in his head. They’d gone at it hard, even a little rough, a much better way to spend time than worrying whether Susie and Ryker would show.
Skip’s knuckles dug deep into the knots between Russell’s shoulder blades, making him wince. A groan started deep under Russell’s breast bone, crawling out, carrying a load of leftover tension with it.
“I was just wondering...” Skip’s fingers flexed across the steel belts running over Russell’s shoulders as if he were playing a tune. “When did you know you were queer?”
The question bolted Russell’s jaw shut. His first response, denial, shredded under the pressure of Skip’s knuckles, the weight of his thighs, and the corresponding swell in Russell’s own cock trapped between the bedding and his body.
Too honest to lie. Too scared to say anything at all.
When he didn’t answer, Skip filled the silence with his own story. “I was about twelve or so,” he said, “and one night, me and my buddies were looking for trouble down by Occidental Park.”
He shifted, scooting farther up Russell’s hips. Russell had to swallow another groan when Skip’s cock—warm and half-erect—rested against his ass. Half listening, he basked in the strength of Skip’s hands as the other man worked out the knots in his shoulders.
“Must have been nineteen forty-two or maybe forty-three,” Skip continued, “and the whole place was full of grunts and squids, guys fresh out of boot camp and headed overseas.” His strong fingers moved to the small of Russell’s back.
Russell flinched, then exhaled into a sigh.
“A group of working ladies came past us.” Skip’s fingers fanned out along Russell’s ribs. “Tight dresses and hair all curled. Lips painted red.” He dug in with his fingertips and pulled back till his wrists met over Russell’s tailbone. “My buddies stopped what they were doing just to watch them walk by.”
With relaxation spreading through his limbs, Russell wondered at Skip’s generosity, his open spirit. Russell wanted to repay him in kind, if he could find the courage.
“Then this GI came along. For some reason, he was in his dress whites, and the cut of his jacket made his shoulders look as huge as yours.” Skip’s fingertips traced a line along Russell’s spine and across his shoulders, sending shivers in their wake.
His voice was soft, husky, seductive, and although Russell didn’t want to dig into his own history, he found he couldn’t move. He lay pinned by Skip’s weight, his heat, and the growing regard he had for the other man.
“So that was it, you know? My buddies stood there arguing over who would get which working girl, and all I wanted was the sailor.” Skip kissed the shivering skin between Russell’s shoulder blades. “With Mom working down there, I knew a few queens. My wrist wasn’t limp, but ever since then, I knew what I wanted.” He smacked Russell’s ass. “A broad-shouldered, clean-cut guy like you.”
Quicker than thinking, Russell reached back and grabbed Skip’s wrist, jerking him to the side. For a moment, they lay facing each other, breathing hard. Russell was taller, bulkier, and stronger. He’d also spent a lot more time on a wrestling mat in high school. With a quick move, he rolled over, pinning Skip to the bed. “You prefer clean-cut men?”
“Yep.” Skip flexed his hips, pressing their cocks even harder together, and the intensity jerked the breath from Russell’s lungs.
The rising moon added a silver glow to the candlelight around them. Russell tipped his head, unable to resist tasting the clean sweat from Skip’s skin. He licked his way down the other man’s neck, long and wet, rocking his hips slowly.
Skip twisted away. “Not till I’ve heard your story.” His voice held a gasp, which fired Russell even more.
“Now come on.” Skip tugged on Russell’s hands, pulling them closer together. “My dick will argue if you try to tell me you’re not a fruit.”
The candle flickered, and Russell found a mark on the wall where an old leak took the shape of a spider’s web. Talking scared him, fear annoyed him, but all his jagged emotions were muted by the delicate press of Skip’s cock against his own.
“Why do you want to know?” Russell asked, delaying the inevitable.
Skip’s laugh was warm and rich, distracting him almost as much as the smell of sex from the white cotton sheets. Russell gulped and tried to bring his attention in line. “I really don’t remember much, anyway. Too long ago.”
“Come on, Counselor. Don’t hide the evidence.” Skip ran his fingers along Russell’s throat. “When did you know?”
“College.” The memory could have killed his mood, but if anything, his cock hardened. That might have been Skip’s fault. “My roommate was...older. He had a few friends...good friends... Fellows who could keep a secret.” Between the group of them, Russell had experienced enough to know where his inclinations truly lay. “Everything happened behind locked doors.” They’d acted like members of an informal club, where stroking each other off was the price of membership. “But then he and some of the others graduated, and I went home for the summer. As much as I enjoyed my time with them, I knew it couldn’t last, so I started dating Susie.”
There. He’d done it. He’d told someone else about his past. This small, dark room and these shared confidences recalled him to those days. Nothing that happened here would have any bearing on life outside, back in Red Wing or, God forbid, in his family home.
This door locked too.
“You killed it with Mom today.” Skip squirmed, tugging Russell onto his side. Russell let himself be moved, relieved that Skip hadn’t brought up any questions about his future girlfriend.
“It didn’t even rattle your cage when she asked you to take care of me, and I...I owe you one.” Skip paused, thoughts shifting behind his eyes. They lay quiet, belly to belly. “I keep telling myself to leave you alone, but I keep running right into your arms.”
“And I keep catching you.” In a different world, he’d never let go.
The silence was interrupted by a swell of chatter from outside. A group of people, all tenors and baritones, walked along the street under the apartment window. The burnt wax smell from the candle layered over the smell of sex, and an idea took shape in Russell’s mind. As natural—as gloriously peaceful—as it felt to hold Skip, to feel the rub of his coarse hair against Russell’s chest, he had to explain himself.
“Your mother is a lovely person,” Russell began, choosing his words carefully. Skip raised his chin as if he expected a blow. “My parents wouldn’t understand us the way she seems to. They’re...well, ever since Rory was killed, my mother doesn’t smile.” Russell wet his lips, as disappointed with himself as he knew his parents would be. Words alone wouldn’t explain the shroud of sadness still wrapped around his family. “I thought if she had a wedding to get ready for, it’d cheer her up.”
Skip’s brow wrinkled. “So you were going to marry Susie to make your mother happy.”
“No.” Russell sagged onto his back, dragging Skip with him. “I was going to marry Susie because that’s what a man does, but”—he shrugged, honesty forcing the words from him—“it would make my parents happy too.”
Skip rose onto his hands and knees, crawling on top of Russell. “I can show you one or two other things a man can do to find happiness.” His grin glowed through the semidarkness.
Russell ran his hand through Skip’s hair, pulling the curls away from his face. “You’ve got till Wednesday.”