AS THE PLANE LANDED, SAM flipped the bracelet Ari had given him to make sure he couldn’t be recorded. No camera would see him in California. But when he turned on his phone, there was still no text from Nico.
He tried calling again, but it just went to the prerecorded voicemail, so he didn’t even get to hear Nico’s voice. Sam didn’t leave a message. That was too desperate. He’d already left a slew of texts, and Nico hadn’t bothered responding.
There was another international text, another Thanks for staying at Club Azul, please take our survey so we can rub salt in the wound because you’re so much more into Nico that he is into you, because otherwise why isn’t he even answering your texts?
Sam wasn’t going to read it. He hit delete.
And blocked the number.
It sucked being the one guy in the whole world who actually felt anything. Who cared.
At the airport curb, an Asian woman waved him over. She stood in front of an electric blue Ferrari 812 GTS Spider with a white racing stripe down the driver’s side. “Linda Sue,” she introduced herself, dropping the key into Sam’s hand, “789 horsepower. Zoltan said you’d be kind to my baby.”
“I promise.” Sam thanked her, admiring the car’s lines. It was perfect.
His phone app was already set with driving directions for the house where Nico had borrowed the bike. It was a point of pride for Nico that he had memorized the address—911 Jacaranda—and mailed them $872 in cash to pay them back the cost of that bike, new.
Sam had looked up jacaranda: they were these trees that bloomed purple flowers, pretty much like a Dr. Seuss illustration. And 911, well, heck, that was his birthday. Easy to memorize for him too. From everything Nico had told him, Hergenreder’s Institute wouldn’t be hard to find from there.
Getting behind the wheel felt oh so James Bond right. And on the open highway, shifting into fifth felt like how that lady had described meditating, the one time they’d tried to do it as a private family lesson back when he was in fifth grade.
“Don’t try, just be, breathe.” She inhaled. “Breathe, be just, try don’t.” She exhaled. “Don’t try, just be, breathe.” She inhaled.
The whole wonky syntax thing made Sam think of Yoda. He couldn’t stop himself, and said in his best Yoda voice, “Meditating, I am.” Which completely gave him the giggles.
The meditation teacher frowned as she exhaled. “Breathe, be just, try don’t.”
Trying to stop just made it funnier. His dad had cracked up then too. His mom wasn’t far behind. And then, all three of them were laughing, and the meditation teacher lost track of where she was and had to start all over again. They hadn’t meditated again, but it was a good memory to hold on to, of when they felt like a family.
Hardtop down and in fifth gear, with the V12 roaring behind him, shooting along CA 178 East at exactly fifty-five—cops with radar guns loved nabbing sports cars—was Sam’s kind of meditation.
Exactly 0.82 miles from the address he’d programmed, Sam crested the rise in the road and saw it. Hergenreder’s Institute was two stone buildings on a hill with a construction crane on the far side. He turned onto one of the residential streets opposite and U-turned to park in the shade of a massive magnolia tree.
Sam tried to see the building with 007 eyes. Forty feet up, a row of windows glowed red in the shadows—prison cells, just like Nico had told him about. Seventy kids inside. Maybe sixty-nine, if they hadn’t replaced Nico. Locked up just because they were Queer. Like Nico. Like him.
Sam set his phone to record video, propped it in the driver’s window, and gunned the engine. Across the street and up the steep hill, he took it slow to not scrape the undercarriage. Crept past the Institute’s driveway entrance, then up the hill. Left along an alley that had a chain-link fence with green privacy fabric blocking off the construction site—but the gate was open and he could see the construction office trailer and a fence with razor wire beyond. Left again, past a line of pickups and vans down the steep incline to the main road again.
He crossed back to the residential area where the Jacaranda house was and pulled off to the side. Sam checked the recording. He’d gotten what he needed and could study it later.
The idea of Nico being trapped in there was almost physically painful. And Bec and all those other teens were still locked up inside.
Sam shook it off. It was time to meet Nelson.
He roared back down the hill, leaving the Institute behind.
Sam parked outside the Target. He called up the image of Nelson on his phone, making sure he’d recognize him, and did his best magical penis swagger across the parking lot.
Entering the store, he took off his Bond aviators—no hiding behind sunglasses this time—and slid them into the neckline of his No Time to Die Craig-Bond blue Brunello Cucinelli Oxford button-down shirt. He’d had it tailored, and while he might not be as muscular as Bond, or Nico, at least Sam could work the muscles he did have. He scanned the aisles, checking everyone in a telltale red employee shirt. No. No. No. No. And then, by the quick-grab refrigerator shelves, something about the hunch of the shoulders of the guy stocking plastic tubs of lettuce caught Sam’s eye.
He strode over.
His hunch about the hunch was right.
“Nelson?”
The guy raised his head, blinking in confusion. “Do I know you?”
“Instagram friends.”
“Oh.”
Sam could see him mentally running through his forty-eight followers, most of them from his church, trying to figure out who Sam was.
“I’m James,” Sam said. The guy didn’t need to know who Sam really was. “I was hoping we could talk…”
Nelson checked that no one was near them. “I’m kind of working… And I’m not supposed to be alone with another guy.” He got really busy studying the dates stamped on the romaine lettuce containers.
“Any guy?” Sam knew he was being flirty. But this was for Nico.
Nelson blushed. Fidgeted with the ring on his left hand, fourth finger: wedding ring. Nelson checked again for someone to save him, but their section was empty. Just the two of them.
Sam turned on the charm. He’d been charmed by Kevin and Nico. Enough to know how it was done. Enough to do it. “I want to know how you pulled it off. How did you marry a girl, when what you want is…” Sam let his eyes travel down Nelson’s face and neck to the unbuttoned V of his red polo. The white choker necklace set off alarms in his head. It’s what Nico freaked out about. The same kind of necklace that had shocked him! And this guy wore it like it was just jewelry. Sam pushed the thought away. He had a job to do. He let his eyes slide down Nelson’s chest. Made his voice flirty. “Something else.”
“I don’t know you.” It was weak. Almost like Sam could feel Nelson’s will crumbling under his gaze.
“You could.” Sam tilted his head to the side and hooked a finger under his Craig-Bond Quantum of Solace black leather Prada belt with a silver buckle. Nelson’s eyes went there, like the audience checking out Frida’s Crank Shaft bulges. Sam waited for Nelson to look back up to his face. When he did, Sam gave him that half smile, lips a bit higher on one side. The look Nico had mastered. That had mastered Sam. Maybe it wasn’t subtle, but then again, Bond wasn’t a subtle guy.
Nelson’s breaths got faster, and the pupils of his eyes dilated a bit, even under the store’s bright LED lights. It was a bit of a thrill to know he could have this effect on the guy. And the store cameras wouldn’t record him, just Nelson standing there, panting at a blur of color in the air.
“My parents want to send me to the same place you went,” Sam said. “To get ‘straightened out.’ Does it really change you, or did you just shove it all down?” Sam reached out a finger and trailed it down the front of Nelson’s shirt. “Down,” he repeated. The guy was trembling, but he didn’t stop Sam. He didn’t back away. Sam stopped his finger at Nelson’s leather belt. “Down.”
Nelson licked his lower lip. “Maybe we could go somewhere… to… uh…” Nelson’s words stalled.
“Talk?” Sam supplied, pulling his hand back a few inches but leaving it between them, hovering. Teasing.
“Uh huh!” Nelson swallowed.
A woman came over to the crate of bagged avocados behind them and Nelson said loudly, “Let me show you where that is.”
Sam dropped his hand fast but kept his face smooth. Interested. Bond-slick.
He followed Nelson past pet food and detergent to an empty room by a side entrance. Nelson spoke as he closed the door behind them: “They’re going to use this for curbside pickup, but they haven’t—”
Nelson stopped talking as Sam moved in to stand way too close.
Sam’s face was just inches from Nelson’s, and he could tell Nelson wanted to him to kiss him. Nelson’s breath was sour, like he’d just had a yogurt. Sam ignored it and reached past Nelson’s waist to twist the lock in the doorknob.
“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Nelson said, reaching out shaking hands to touch Sam’s chest.
Sam traced his fingers along Nelson’s arm. He’d be cute, in a nerdy kind of way, if he weren’t so repressed.
Speeding up, Nelson pulled up Sam’s shirt, touching Sam’s bare skin underneath.
Maybe not so repressed after all.
Nelson lunged forward to kiss him.
Nico’s face flashed into Sam’s mind. Maybe he could do this without doing anything more. Nelson wanted him. Wanted this. And they both knew it. Which meant Sam had made his point.
Sam stepped back to avoid the kiss, letting Nelson’s hands fall off him. “So, Hergenreder? The Institute? Good idea, or terrible?
“Shit.” Nelson covered his face. “Sarah would kill me if she knew I was here. So would Dr. H.”
“I’m guessing it didn’t change anything, about how you feel?”
Nelson’s hands clenched into fists. “It changed what I do about it!”
“Doesn’t seem it.”
Nelson closed his eyes. He was so busted.
“Help me stop him,” Sam said. “We can go public with it being a reprogramming institute. And that ‘reprogramming’ is bullshit. You’re their star graduate. If you tell the truth, it will blow the whole thing apart. We can take Hergenreder down, free everyone else locked in there.”
Nico’s dream, and it was so close, Sam could almost taste it. The feeling of power was heady.
He reached out and touched Nelson on the cheek. “What do you think?” If it would seal the deal, maybe he should kiss him?
Nelson shuddered. “You’re like some gay terrorist. You want me to blow up my whole life to live some sick lifestyle!”
Sam hated that lifestyle line. Standard-issue bigotry. Make it a choice, then blame people for not choosing better. He ran his hand down to Nelson’s neck, skipping over the white metal necklace to press against Nelson’s chest. Moved in closer. Their lips just inches apart, Sam said, “It’s not a lifestyle, it’s a life.”
Nelson pulled away this time. “I’d lose everything. Sarah, my job, the church.”
“Everything fake about your life?” Sam pointed out.
“NONE OF—” Nelson started shouting but stopped himself, shifting to an angry whisper. “None of that’s fake!”
Sam gave him a really? look.
Nelson’s eyes narrowed. “Did Dr. H send you, to test me?”
But in the silence that followed they both knew that if it had been a test, Nelson had failed it. Spectacularly.
And the humiliation of that was clear on Nelson’s face.
“You need to leave.”
“Nelson. Come on. We can still do this.” Sam tried to appeal to Nelson’s ego. “You can change everything. Be the hero—save everyone in Hergenreder’s prison!”
Nelson let out a bitter laugh. “I don’t know where you come from, but this is Lost Hills.” He held up his wedding ring. “This already made me a hero.”
There was nothing left to say after that.
Sam had failed.
One Good Thing
How come when James Bond flies all over the world following clues something always comes from it?
I do it, and two dead ends.
Shit.
I’m wiped. Got stuck in traffic from Lost Hills and a 48-minute drive became 2 hours and 14 minutes of bumper-to-bumper hell. Ferraris aren’t built for traffic jams. They’re built for the open road.
Like me.
Ha! Even I don’t believe that.
Like Bond.
Like Nico?
Anyway, crashing at a hotel here in Bakersfield. It’s not like there’s any rush to get home before school starts. Maybe I’ll take a day, drive to San Francisco. Go all A View to a Kill. It’s just over a four-hour drive, if traffic behaves. I’ll stay there overnight and fly home Thursday morning.
Nico still hasn’t answered any of my texts.
Ari wasn’t much help. “Oh, Baby. Cis-on-cis romance? Not my area of expertise. Frida’s the advice queen. Run it by her.”
Frida just said I should give Nico more time.
I almost feel guilty about flirting with Nelson. Bond would have slept with him—and I didn’t!—but Nico’s silence feels like somehow he knows. He knows that I almost kissed Nelson. That Nelson wanted more. That it so easily could have been more…
And the things I did. Touching Nelson. Letting him touch me. Would I have done that with another guy in front of Nico?
No!
I want Nico to know I’m into him, not someone else. Not anyone else.
It feels like I cheated on Nico, a little.
But I did it for him!
And, if I’m honest, there’s another kind of guilt swirling in my stomach. I used Nelson, like Kevin used me.
I used being hot—okay, that’s a crazy thought, but I guess some guys think I’m hot—I used it to try and get what I wanted.
Classic Bond. He uses sex to manipulate all the time.
Hell, he has sex with the Bond Girls in all these movies, and it’s almost always to push them to do something they wouldn’t have done before the seduction.
Classic magical penis move, like with Pussy Galore in Goldfinger.
Sex is a tool. Being sexy is a tool. That’s where I learned it.
But I feel like shit.
Shit!
James Bond is a terrible role model.