Candy Man (5 page)

“Is that all?” Finn asked, but he was smiling and not particularly disappointed. “My friend, you need to work on your story. The least you could say is that your second job is feeding the monkeys, and they demanded more bananas.”

Adam couldn’t help it. He smiled. “I was gonna work on my ‘abducted by aliens’ schtick, but you caught me before I had it ready.”

Finn’s wide, mobile mouth could sure stretch a smile into the stratosphere. God, he was a good-looking kid. “Well, I’ll leave you to it. But hey—” Casually, Finn grabbed his bicep, and Adam let himself be turned. “If you go down that way and then turn left, you’ll see my dad’s deli, River Burger.” Finn reached into his pocket and pulled out a coupon, which he showed to Adam like a grade school teacher would show a student. “This here is a coupon for free garlic fries and a drink, no purchase necessary. I’ll be behind the grill this morning, so when you get lunch, come by for some garlic fries, okay?” He nodded earnestly, but God, Adam hated charity.

“Finn, naw, I can’t let you do that. Those are for customers and—”

“And friends,” Finn said. His hand was practically burning through Adam’s coat, and without so much as an apology, he reached under the hem of the thick blue wool and shoved the coupon in the pocket of Adam’s jeans. Adam gasped because that hand was more than a little personal, and because, oh God, he hadn’t been touched since Robbie, and his body was so
not
going to ignore this beautiful kid with the apple cheeks being this close.

Finn dropped his hand and grinned, still holding on to Adam’s arm. “Okay? So I’m going to see you on your lunch hour?”

Oh hell. “Well, you know.” Adam swallowed and smiled shyly. “Those fries were pretty good.”

Finn whooped out of nowhere, throwing one fist in the air and bouncing on his toes. “Score one for my team! Yes! See you at your lunch hour!” He came back down to the boardwalk from the stratosphere. “Now, you know, I’m not going to take
my
lunch break until I see you, so if you try to get out of this, you’re sort of screwing me over.”

Adam groaned. “Oh, now, Finn, you don’t want to go counting on—”

But it didn’t matter. Finn had finally let go of him and was turning in the direction of the deli, talking to Adam over his shoulder.

“Now see, you can’t ditch. You don’t like charity, so this is worse, right? That’s a promise!”

And he was disappearing, so Adam had no choice. “Yeah, fine,” he muttered. “But remember, I didn’t get a break last night until I fell on my ass!”

“Well remind Darrin today! Don’t let me down!” And then he was gone, trotting down the boardwalk as the stores around him opened.

“Why’s it matter so much?” Adam asked, but he didn’t shout it, and he wasn’t planning to go back on his word. With a sigh, he kept up his walk around the perimeter of the little three-block area, greeting as many people as possible with their free coupon.

He walked to the end of the boardwalk, took a right, then walked past more shops until he came to the Railroad Museum on his left and the same parking garage Finn had used in front of him. The garage was in the shadow of the overpass, but instead of feeling the presence of the freeway, Adam felt like all of that concrete sheltered them from the big bad world. It wasn’t until he saw the parking garage that it occurred to him to ask what Finn had been doing on the riverfront walk.

“Naw,” he muttered to himself. “Why? Seriously. Kid, why you gotta….” But he didn’t finish that sentence, and continued back to Candy Heaven, because Darrin said he had half an hour on coupon duty, and it was someone else’s turn to freeze their ass off.

But when he walked into the store, Joni, the shorter, stouter girl with the buzz-cut dark hair, said, “Hey, did Finn find you? He was over here looking before he opened up the grill.”

“Yeah,” Adam muttered, setting the basket of coupons down on a stool near the riverfront entrance. The other entrance was back behind the two cash counters, which made for a nice flow of customers from one end, through the barrels, around the chocolate counter, to the register. Adam was starting to get a feel for how the business moved. “He found me. Thanks.”

“What’d he want?” Darby asked, her red-streaked ponytail swinging behind her as she poured barrel-shaped root beer candies into an actual barrel. “He’s not usually so insistent.”

“He wanted me to come by on my lunch hour,” Adam said, a little rattled by all of the attention.

“For what?” Anish asked. He was in the chocolate corner again, but instead of working with chocolate, he was using tongs to put sour gummi tape into a cellophane bag. When it had been weighed, the little bags would be wrapped tightly and put into barrels for purchase.

The customers were trickling in, and Adam guessed they had another half an hour before the place was wall-to-wall people like it had been when he’d arrived the day before. “I don’t know! He gave me a coupon. Honestly, I was gonna take my sandwich there and eat my fries, that’s all I know!”

“Children,” Darrin said dryly from the counter, “can we give our new student a chance to settle before we ask for his report?”

“Yeah, but Darrin, you know that Finn’s just getting over Perry! We don’t need him breaking his heart over Tall, Dark, and Military, you know?”

Darrin looked at Joni thoughtfully. “Who says he’ll break Finn’s heart?”

“Well Jesus, it’s not like he’s gay!”

The whole store shut down, customers included, to look at Adam, who swallowed and looked away. Absurdly, he remembered that moment in the barracks, when Heller and his fucking trash talk had finally gotten to be too much. Robbie couldn’t even meet his eyes after that—the memory just ripped him raw.

“Man, could you knock off the bullshit about faggots already! Jesus, Heller, it’s legal in the service and everything!”

“What’s your problem, Macias? It’s not like you’re one of them.”

“That’s not what your cock said when I sucked it last year!”

Deafening, condemning silence, because Adam had said what nobody said. He searched out Robbie’s eyes, thinking that yes, Robbie wanted to come out, wanted to be a couple, and this way they could be, and nobody could gainsay them.

Robbie looked away, curled his lip, and Adam heard the word before he uttered it.

“Faggot.”

Adam looked around at the little store with the rainbow banners and the rainbow candy, and thought that this
had
to be easier than that last time. “No one said I wasn’t,” he said quietly. “Gay, that is. Nobody said I wasn’t gay. ’Cause I am. So, you know. There’s that.”

He looked up and met Darrin’s eyes steadily, not wanting to talk about it. Any of it. “Where do you need me, boss?”

Darrin’s smile was nothing but kind. “Help Anish with the weighing. We’re pretty low on the premeasured packets, and we need as many of those as you can churn out.”

“Awesome.”

Adam ignored everything—the silence, the emerging chatter—and went to help Anish with the task. He got so intent on weighing the sour tape and wrapping it in the cellophane that he almost didn’t hear Anish address him.

“What?” he asked, pulling himself out of those terrible last months of eating alone, of Robbie’s recriminatory looks, of knowing Robbie and Heller were sneaking behind the Humvees, and it was all okay because neither of
them
said the word “gay” and made it stick.

“It’s always hard,” Anish said softly. “It always takes bravery. Making a statement about yourself is never easy. Even if it’s ‘Dad, I don’t want to study business.’ Joni knows that—I’m sure Darby is chewing her out as we speak.”

Adam nodded and shrugged. “Thanks,” he said quietly and went back to weighing candy. But he felt better, and he made extra sure to smile at Anish when he could manage it. Because Anish was right. Making a statement—or an overture of friendship—was never easy.

B
USINESS
DIDN
’
T
exactly taper off, but it
did
become more manageable around two in the afternoon, when Darrin started giving out breaks. Adam took his last, because he still felt like a little bit of a weenie for almost passing out the night before, and it was three thirty by the time he and Ravi went jogging out to the sandwich shop. Ravi was picking up for Darrin, who was going back to count drawers and do paperwork, as well as for himself and Anish.

There were a lot of food places in Old Sac. This one had sort of the standard elements. A glass display case with sample meals, sandwiches, and desserts separated the employees from the customer seating area, and a register sat on the counter near the back. This particular deli had five or six tables, the small metal kind that made Adam think of ice cream parlors, and chairs to match.

Finn was preslicing meat on the back counter as Adam and Ravi walked in, but he looked up almost immediately, turned the slicer off, and smiled. “There you are!” he crowed. “Here, let me put fresh fries in.”

The enclosed space was pretty warm after the late afternoon chill of outside. Adam slid his coat and backpack onto a chair and pulled his sandwich, water, and sketchbook out of the pack.

Ravi nodded at him and went up to order while Adam sat down and made his PB&J disappear. He was down to the dregs of his water and starting a sketch when Ravi sat down across from him to wait for his food.

“What is that?”

Adam shrugged. “Just something I do.”
Something I thought I was going to make a living doing.

“Can I see?” Ravi watched in fascination as a quick sketch of Candy Heaven took shape, and then laughed, his white teeth flashing in his sienna face. “That is very good—there’s Anish and Miguel and Darby and Darrin—” He stopped and grinned. “That is a
mazing
, Adam. Did you go to school to learn that?”

Adam shrugged. “I was. Car broke down, lost my job, lost my grant….”

Yeah. It didn’t sound any better when he said it out loud than in his own head.

“Well, you need to find a way back to school,” Ravi said with conviction. “That is much too good a gift not to share.”

Adam shrugged again. “We’ll see,” he said, because it hurt to commit to things when you were afraid you couldn’t get them done. He kept working, since Ravi didn’t seem to mind watching him, and when Finn called him up to pick up his order, Adam signed the sketch and ripped it out of the book.

“Here—you can keep it, or give it to Darrin or whatever, ’kay?”

“This one I’ll give to Darrin,” Ravi said decisively, and then he smiled wickedly. “But you need to draw one of Anish and I so we may give it to our grandmother—we’ll frame it and everything. We can even pay you for it, if you like.”

Adam’s palms actually started to sweat. Oh God—money. He could buy his own damned fries. He could come here and watch Finn work, and not eat free like a charity case.

“That would be great,” he said, feeling a tiny metal string between his shoulder blades uncinch. “Tell you what, I’ll bring you something nice and inked tomorrow—you pay me what you think it’s worth, okay?”

Ravi grinned. “Excellent. Anish and I will be sure to get in our good sides.” He grabbed his bag and left.

At the same time, Finn washed his hands and called back to a middle-aged ginger-haired man working in a small room behind the counter, “Dad, I’m on break!”

“Hear ya!” came the reply, and Finn trotted around the counter, a suspiciously full tray in his hand.

Adam glared at it. “You’d better be eating most of that,” he said seriously.

Finn’s eyes were as wide and as guileless as an infant’s. “Oh, I’m sure I’ll eat some,” he said, nodding like someone with his physique could eat two hamburgers and two orders of garlic fries.

“But Finn,” Adam began, not even sure how he was going to finish that sentence. He took a deep breath and the PB&J in his stomach laughed mockingly at him. Oh man, those hamburgers did
not
smell any worse than they had the night before. In fact, now that Adam knew how good they tasted, they might even smell
better.

“Tell you what,” Finn said, picking the food baskets off the tray and putting a hamburger most
definitely
in front of Adam. “How about you draw a picture for
me
, and I’ll consider it payment.”

Adam looked around the little deli, thinking that he’d like to put Finn—the real Finn—behind the counter, and the cartoon Jake from
Adventure Time
sitting at one of the tables.

“Yeah,” he murmured, wanting that burger really badly. His stomach gurgled, reminding him that he hadn’t been eating a whole lot
before
he’d left San Diego either. “Yeah, okay. I can do that.”

“Good,” Finn said, and took a bite of his own burger. He chewed and swallowed while Adam was putting his sketchbook away, and then added, “That way I know I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Adam pulled the drawstring on his little day pack and turned back to the burger. “How do you know my company is even that good?”

Oh my God—that grin. Should be put in a bottle and used to disarm enemies, or solve world hunger or something.

“’Cause it’s been pretty worth it so far. Now tell me, how was your day?”

Adam looked at that young, earnest face and swallowed. “Well, you know. I delivered coupons, weighed candy, came out to my new boss—all in a day’s work.”

Finn didn’t startle at the “came out,” but his grin increased in width, amperage, and all-around lethal capability. “
That
sounds like a good day’s work, amigo. Now give me details.”

Adam took a bite of his burger, chewed, swallowed, and said, “Yeah, sure. But maybe when we’re done eating, ’cause this? My friend, this is a masterpiece.”

Adam had spent so much time alone, both his last few months in the Army and the time after that in San Diego, and while he worked on his burger with what should have been single-minded dedication, he also found himself captivated by Finn’s bold monologues.

“So like a bridge, right? But something amazing, like, say, the one in Australia or the Golden Gate, but I want it to go across a
city
, right? Why can’t we do that? I mean New York does it, but they do it across the rivers, but I still think we should just do it across a city—”