Divisions (Dev and Lee) (8 page)

“Suit yourself,” he says, but his big paw slips between my legs to see just how pent up I am. I squeak theatrically and squirm.

“You’re embracing this whole ‘gay’ thing,” I say, curling up at his side so I can slide my fingers inside the buttons of his shirt.

“You forgetting that whole deal where I came out on national TV?”

“Yeah, well.” I grin. “After Hal’s piece, I got interviewed on radio.”

“Radio.” He snorts. “You sounded way too normal on that. Nobody can tell you’re a…a queeny little fox.”

I push my paw in farther and tickle him a bit, and he squirms more to oblige me than out of ticklishness. “Queeny? Since when do you say ‘queeny’? Anyway, I’m in a shirt and jeans!”

“Uh-huh.” He grins. “And you’re in bed trying to tickle a big football player. That’s pretty queeny.”

“Well, how am I supposed to sound like that on the radio?” I reach a little lower and grope him, because he was groping me and it’s only fair.

His squirming becomes more real. “Rrf. I don’t know. You can look like a vixen, so…”

“That’s totally a stereotype.”

“Uh-oh.” He fixes me with a golden eye. “Sounds like I’m in bed with Activist Fox again.”

“Queer power!” I squeeze his erection through his pants, then my awareness of the line we’re edging toward makes me let go. His tail whips around to curl across his body, and he follows, rolling his body in my direction.

I manage to sweep my tail out to the side, rolling onto my back as he lands on top of me, driving the breath half out of me. His muzzle lowers near mine. “Mmm, the only way to get rid of Activist Fox is to replace him with…” He kisses the front of my muzzle, licks down along my whiskers. His weight keeps me pinned, his arms slide down under my back to hold me tightly. “Boyfriend Fox.”

“Mmm.” I lick back. “No fair. Your boyfriend powers are too strong for me!”

“It’s no use struggling.” He squeezes and then drops his muzzle for a warm, open-mouthed kiss, and after that there aren’t a whole lot of words for a while.

It’s a minor miracle that we manage to keep our pants on, with all the kissing and wriggling around, but Lee seems pretty happy just to make out, and that’s good enough for me. I can’t get rid of the image in the back of my mind of what might happen if my parents split up, of the family Thanksgiving we just left being permanently in the past.

If it’s that rough for me, it’s gotta be worse for him. Kisses and my arms around him do seem to relax him, and he doesn’t reach into my pants or grope me again, though he does mutter a couple promises about what our first night living together is going to be like. But thankfully, he doesn’t mention his father, not during all the time I’m pressing him into the bed, holding his light frame against me, and not when I roll over and let him lie on top of me. My ribs are still bruised from the Gateway game a month ago, and all the smaller bruises since, but he’s light enough that he doesn’t hurt them. Not much. Not enough for me to make him move.

We’re both in a half-doze when he shifts his muzzle, looks at the clock, and tenses all over. “Where’s Father?” he says.

I feel my fur prickle. The clock reads 12:14. “What time did he leave?”

“We got here just before 11, didn’t we? So he’s been gone an hour.” Lee jumps off the bed, so smoothly I barely feel him shift. He grabs his phone and brings it to his ear.

I roll onto my side, watching him, still trying to catch up to his change in mood. The last remnants of the sleepy half-aroused contentment take a little while to drift away from me.

He paces, perks up at a voice from the phone, then immediately scowls and puts it away. “Shit. He’s not answering. Can we take your car?”

“And go where?” I sit up on the edge of the bed. Lee’s already shoving his arms into his coat sleeves.

“That liquor store?”

I reach for my coat, more slowly. “And if he’s not there?”

“Then we’ll go somewhere else. I know what my car looks like. I can keep an eye out for it.”

His tail is tight against his leg, so I pull my coat on. “Okay. Don’t stress. I’m sure he just wanted to make sure he didn’t walk in on us.”

“As if we’d really have sex the day he tells me about the divorce,” he mutters, patting his pocket to check for his room key.

I nudge him in the back as he opens the door. “He knows you. And anyway, we were pretty close.”

“Mmf.” He grumbles, holds the door for me, and lets it swing closed.

He’s still tense in the car, ears flicking around, fingers tapping the armrest. He stares out the window, scanning the sidewalks and streets without saying anything. “I’m sure he’s fine,” I say, because I really believe it.

We stop at a red light. Lee turns to me and reaches over to squeeze my thigh. “Thanks,” he says.

“Well, what do you expect me to say?” I try a grin.

“I mean, for doing this. I mean, you’re probably right, he’s probably fine. I just…” He bites his lip.

The light turns green. “I like that you’re concerned about your family,” I say. “And I don’t mind doing this.”

“I know you need to get up early.”

I wave a paw, driving on down the road. “I can be a little tired. I can sleep on the plane, too. There’s the liquor store.”

Lee sits up, scanning the lot for his car as I slow and pull in. There are only three other cars, and by the time I’ve parked, he’s slumped back into the seat.

I coax him out of the car and into the store, where we ask the ermine behind the counter if she’s seen an older fox. “Oh, sure,” she says. “We talked a bit.”

Lee leans across the counter urgently. “Do you know where he went?”

The ermine nods. “He asked if there was a place a fellow could drink a bottle of wine alone. I said the White Pine bar would probably be pretty empty tonight.”

“White Pine’s open?” Back when I was in high school, that was the dive you went to if you wanted to drink with your fake ID and not get caught.

“Sure.” She squints at me. “Hey, you’re that football guy, right?”

Lee grabs my sleeve. “You know how to get there, right?”

“Yeah, and yeah,” I say to both of them.

The ermine digs around under the counter. Lee’s halfway to the door already. I move to follow him, but she’s looking for something specific that I guess she wants me to see, so I wait a moment.

She digs out a newspaper, the Lakeside Gazette, and folds it around to a picture of me they must still have on file from high school, under the headline, “Local UFL Star Comes Out.” She looks at the picture, then at me, and grins. “It is you!”

“That’s me.”

The ermine scans the headline and then looks at Lee. “So this guy’s your boyfriend?”

“Yeah.” Lee’s ears are down, his tail tip flicking restlessly. He forces a smile, though. “And we’re looking for my father. Sorry, but we do have to get going.”

“Could you just sign this?” She holds the paper out to me and gives me one of the credit card signing pens by the register.

I wish the picture wasn’t under the big “COMES OUT” headline. “Sure,” I say, and scrawl my signature and “#57” across the bottom of the picture.

“Awesome.” She gazes fondly at the paper. “I’m gonna frame this up on the wall, if that’s okay.”

It occurs to me that if she does, people will think I buy booze at this store. “Um—”

“Dev, please.”

Right. We’ve got things to do. “Sure, fine.” I raise a paw. “Thanks for the help.”

It’s been a while since I went to the White Pine, but it’s not like there’s a lot of roads out here. Lee’s even more fidgety as I turn onto County Road 8. “It’s two miles,” I say. “Just relax.”

There aren’t many buildings. The only light out here is the circle of headlights along the road, showing gravel at the side, and that’s bright enough that I can barely see the outlines of trees in what little moonlight and starlight there is. We pass the Greasy Gary’s gas station and the Pine Mart convenience store, both dark and empty under the single street light. Then we plunge back into dark, empty country roads. “I hope he’s there,” Lee says. “Because if he went there to drink and then tried to drive back…”

“Your dad wouldn’t do anything that stupid.” Stupid being a relative term; I did it a couple times in high school, but I know the roads and I was never all
that
drunk. That I remember.

“Not sober,” Lee says.

“Have you ever seen him drunk?”

“No.” Lee leans against the door. “He’s always been responsible.”

Which is funny, considering Lee himself isn’t always the most responsible guy in the world. I wonder how much of him comes from his mother, that passion and the willingness to go haring off on crusades. “Well, I’m sure he didn’t get trashed and go driving around Lake Handerson. Anyway, we’ve passed like three cops just since we’ve been out. They’d pull him over if he was driving funny.”

“Great.” Lee’s laugh is harsh. “Maybe I’ll get to bail
him
out of jail. Chaz probably remembers me.”

“It’s only been two weeks. And that was pretty memorable.”

He doesn’t answer, just sits up staring ahead at the bar trying to see the cars. I slow and turn, but again, by the time I park, it’s clear Lee’s car isn’t here.

We get out again, go in and talk to the bartender, but he says no other fox has been in, certainly not in the last hour. He recognizes me too, but not from the coming-out article, and I escape without signing anything or having Lee identified as my boyfriend.

In the car, Lee tries calling again, and again his father doesn’t answer. He stares at his phone and then pulls up another number and stares at it for a solid minute. “Who else are you calling?” I ask. “Police? You got Chaz’s number on speed dial?”

He shakes his head, and then taps the Call button and picks it up. “It’s Wiley,” he says, in a low, guarded tone I’ve rarely heard him use, ever. “I know it’s late. I’m sorry. It’s Father. I just wanted to know if he’d called.”

I don’t need to hear the female voice on the other end to know he’s talking to his mother. His tone gets sharper. “Because he went to a liquor store and then disappeared.” Pause. “No, I don’t think that, but I was just thinking he might have called…no. Well, he’s alone on Thanksgiving, so—Yes.” Another pause. “Fine. Happy Thanksgiving.” And he hangs up.

What do I say? “How’s your mother” doesn’t seem appropriate. So I just say nothing as we head back in the direction of the hotel. He stays glued to the window, staring out, ears flat against it, straining to hear through the glass.

We don’t see any sign of his car all the way back to the Quality Lodge, where Lee gives up and stares down at his knees. But as I’m parking, I glance to the right and stop. “Hey,” I say. “Isn’t that your car?”

He sits bolt upright and looks, and shoves the door open. “Hold on!” I say, but he’s closed it before I get any other words out. I park, and jump out to join him over by his car.

“It’s okay,” he says, and sniffs the air around the door, ears up and flicking around. “I think he was alone, but it’s so cold, it’s hard to tell. Don’t think there was any alcohol on his breath.”

“Maybe he’s back at the room.”

“Uh-huh.” And we both run back inside.

At the room, Lee calls, “Dad?” as he opens the door. But nobody answers, and the room is empty. Lee checks the bathroom and comes out shaking his head.

I lean against the door, holding it open. “You’re his son. You should kind of know how he thinks, right?”

Lee rubs the side of his muzzle, and then his ears perk up. He looks kind of disgusted and angry. “If he…” His eyes rest on the bench where his bag sits. He sighs and walks past me, out into the hall. “His bag’s gone. I bet he got another room. Sit by himself, stay out of our way.”

“Drink alone,” I remember.

“Yeah.”

I follow my fox back to the front desk, where the stoner clerk blinks as we ask him if the fox who was with us got another room. It takes him a while to answer, though I can’t tell if he’s struggling to decide whether to tell us or struggling to remember. Eventually, though, he says, “Yeah, about ten minutes ago. Maybe an hour?”

“I need the room number,” Lee says.

“Uh…” There’s another long pause.

“Come on, you saw us come in with him.” Lee leans over the counter. “He’s my father.”

I put a paw on Lee’s shoulder. “You know,” I say, “if he’s got a room here, then he’s okay, and you’ll see him in the morning. Maybe we should just let him sleep.”

He turns to me, blue eyes challenging mine, and I know exactly what’s going on in that pause. But he decides I’m right and waves to the clerk. “Thanks,” he says, and lets me take him back to the room.

We don’t bolt the door, in case his father comes back. Lee drops his coat on the office chair and sits on the bed, tail curled beside him. I sit next to him, naturally.

“You need your sleep,” he says.

“Uh-huh.” I wrap an arm around his back. “And you need a shoulder.”

He doesn’t lean into the embrace, but he doesn’t pull away. “I’ll be fine.”

I pull him against me. “Listen,” I say, “I know you’ll be fine. But maybe you’ll be just a little bit better if I’m here with you?”

“You’ve got to worry about football,” he says. “Every game’s important. You can’t be at 95% because your boyfriend’s parents are splitting up.”

“You’re important. And anyway, I’m not going to be at ninety-anything percent. The game’s four days away and I can sleep on the plane.” I’m sure most of the rest of the guys on the team are not spending their Thanksgivings exercising and resting up for the game. Except maybe Gerrard.

“What about your family?”

“I’ll call. I’ll go over in the morning and we’ll have breakfast the way we planned.”

“Your dad’ll be upset.”

I laugh. “That I spent the night here? Now you’re just making things up. Dad won’t care. I mean, as long as you don’t call him a cocksucker again.”

“I didn’t call
him
a cocksucker. I called
you
one.”

“Yeah, well, he doesn’t like that either.”

“No.” He stays stiff for another few seconds. “If you’re really sure…”

I squeeze again. “Fox, I’m sure. You need me, and I’m here.”

“I don’t—”

“Shut up, doc.”

He grins, and then allows himself to relax against me. “I’m still not really sure I’m in the mood.”

“Yeah, well.” I lean over and rub my nose against his ear. “Even if that lasts until the morning, I’m okay with it.” And then I whisper right into the soft fur of his ear, “
But I don’t think it will.”

He squirms, but just leans in closer. “You might be right,” he says. “I just wish Father’d called or something.”

“It does seem like something you’d do. You know, decide you know what’s best and just sneak off and do it. Very foxy.”

He laughs, a soft, sincere laugh. “It is, I suppose. All right. Well, look. What say we get under the covers and get our arms around each other and forget about my father for a little while?”

His eyes aren’t quite sparkling, but at least he sounds a little more cheerful. So I kiss him on the nose and say, “Deal.” The clothes hit the floor and we slide under the sheets, and I hold his body to mine, both of us on our sides facing each other.

We’re both hard, and I’d be ready to go if he started something. But because he doesn’t, I don’t; I think that what he needs is just to be held, to have someone shut out the complications and frustrations of the world, and that I can do that is a joy to me. He presses his muzzle into my shoulder and wedges one arm between us, curling the other over my chest. My arm reaches all the way over his arm and chest to his opposite shoulder, and I keep him warm, and we fall asleep like that.

In the morning, I wake up around the same time he does. He’s managed to turn himself around to a more familiar position, his back against my stomach, his rear against my erection. My arm’s draped over his chest, and when I trail it down past his stomach, I find the tip of his hard cock ready as well.

Still, I just give it a little brush, like by accident, and then let it go. He shivers, presses back harder against me, and we snuggle pleasantly like that for a bit. “What time do you—do we have to be there?” he murmurs.