From the Ashes (19 page)

“We could go outside instead,” Jesse offered. He wasn’t even horny anymore, and he was getting annoyed with Tomas for being so easily offended. Yeah, Michael was being a bit of a douche. Who the fuck cared?

“Yeah.” Tomas said only the one word, but the set of his face told Jesse he was pissed off.

Jesse kept his mouth shut until they’d gotten wristbands and pushed out into the drizzly night. Only a few partygoers mulled around the streets, as if everyone was done with going out and was out already.

“So, the alley?” Tomas asked, his jaw tight and his expression mean.

Shivering, Jesse wrapped his arms across his chest. “No. I don’t think so.” He took a few steps away from the bouncer and tried to get his thoughts in order. He didn’t want to leave the club, but he didn’t want to stay either. The only thing he knew was he wasn’t going to suck Tomas off just so Tomas could feel like he’d won against Michael. “What is your issue? I thought we were having fun.”

Tomas frowned deeper, and he crossed his arms. “That was fun? I know Michael is your friend, but no offense—”

“Don’t say it,” Jesse warned.

“He’s an asshole,” Tomas finished, undeterred. He gestured back toward the club. “I don’t know what his problem is.”

“He’s just protective. And upset because Henri’s fighting with his boyfriend. Michael was my only friend the first two months I lived here.”

Tomas threw his hands up. “Yeah, such a good friend you didn’t want to call him after your house burned down.”

That stung, and Jesse didn’t even know why. “I would have called him…” Jesse’s voice rose, “…if you hadn’t been all over me to stay at your place, I would have—”

“Now it’s my fault?” Tomas flinched like Jesse had slapped him. “I should have left you wandering around with nothing but a dog and a bag of groceries?”

Jesse hated the look of hurt on Tomas’s face, but he
really
hated the insinuation that he couldn’t take care of himself. “Henri got me money, and Sharon gave me some too.” Jesse wished Tomas understood. Michael was part of Speedy Coffee, the only place Jesse had besides Tomas’s house. “I love where I work.”

Tomas ran both his hands through his hair. “I’m not asking you to quit your job.”

“No. You just wish I’d spend all my time with
your
family and friends. Your family and friends who don’t even know we’re a couple.”

“For fuck’s sake.” Tomas waved his hands—his normally cool and easygoing manner lost. “I told Rick.”

“Oh, yeah? You going to tell Diego too?” Jesse didn’t know what put the venom in his voice. He hadn’t realized until he said those words how much Diego’s attitude toward him had hurt. Diego had been at least as obnoxious as Michael, but Tomas hadn’t seemed to care that his brother treated Jesse like shit.

Tomas stilled. “You want me to tell my family? Is that it?”

“I don’t care if you tell your parents.” Jesse stepped closer, but he couldn’t bring himself to touch. If he felt Tomas’s body, they’d go back to Tomas’s place and go to bed. They’d cuddle and get each other off and go back to pretending none of this mattered. Anyway, he was pretty sure Tomas’s parents knew, in their own way. “They’re cool to me, even though I know your mom hates the dog.”

Tomas let out a quick exhalation, like a laugh breaking through the clouds in his eyes.

“And Maria’s awesome. But Diego…” He rubbed his face, frustrated that he couldn’t leave things with Tomas’s family alone. “I want you to tell him.”

“Why?” Tomas paced a few feet away. “What difference does it make? I tried, you know.” He pointed a finger at Jesse, as if somehow this was his fault. “I tried to tell him one time when I was younger, and he—”

“Well, tell him again,” Jesse shouted. In the end, he didn’t know if it would make any difference whether Diego knew. Maybe he’d still be an asshole, but at least he’d be an asshole Jesse didn’t have to pretend around. “Tell him until he knows.”

Tomas looked at the ground. The space between them felt thick and dark, like neither one of them could reach across. “No.”

Jesse blinked, the fight going out of him. “No?” Tomas had never denied him anything. Not if Jesse asked outright. “You really won’t?”

“No.” Tomas shook his head. His face was tight. Pained, but determined. “I’m sorry, but I can’t.”

“Oh.” Jesse scrambled for what to say. Mostly, he just wanted some space and for Tomas to leave.

“I’m going to head out.” There was a beat of breath, and then Tomas asked, “You coming?”

His voice may have wavered on the last word.

Jesse felt like he was going to cry. “No. I want to go back to the party.” He wanted to dance and drink and have fun with his friends. He wanted to be out—flash his queerness at everyone for one night. Jesse didn’t need to become a club rat—he didn’t have the money, the time or the inclination—but it was fucking Halloween. He’d moved across the state for nights like this. Jesse refused to spend all his time hiding in the closet with Tomas.

“Oh, come on…” Tomas touched Jesse’s arm. His quick caress was too much. Jesse really was going to start crying if he didn’t walk away soon.

Like someone had flicked a light switch, Tomas’s expression changed to angry. “You going to stay with Michael?”

“No.” Jesse should have said he was, just to be a dick, but he could tell Tomas was close to losing it, so he pulled that final punch. “I’ll go to Henri’s.”

“Fine.” Tomas turned halfway around. He rolled his shoulders forward and hung his head low. He looked as miserable as Jesse felt.

“See you tomorrow?” Jesse needed something—some knowledge that he wouldn’t lose Tomas entirely. “Oh shit. You’ll be working, right?”

Tomas shrugged. “I’ll see if I can get a split shift.”

Jesse’s lip trembled. Tomas tried to give him everything. He tried so hard.

“Give me a ride? Or should I take the monorail?” They’d only be apart for one night, but Jesse knew it would seem like longer.

“I’ll give you a ride.” Tomas finally looked up. His eyes were dark and full of tears. “You want one, right?”

There was so much need there, so much Jesse wasn’t sure he could fill. “Yeah.” He took a deep breath, and then stroked Tomas’s hairy arm with the back of his hand. His throat tight, he said, “Of course, baby.”

Tomas chuckled at the pet name, but the sound was thick and wet. “Okay,” Tomas said. “See you then.”

Chapter Sixteen

Around one, Tomas pulled into his driveway. He’d driven the whole distance without knowing what he was doing, his chest so tight he couldn’t breathe.

It was just one night they’d be apart, but it hurt like the beginning of the end. Tomas knew how his brother would react. He’d seen it that first time, when he was fourteen. Felt it still like a sting across his cheek.

The lights were on at his parents’ house. Tomas slipped out of his truck and got his and Jesse’s bags from the back. The last thing he wanted to do was deal with his parents.

Chardonnay and Sushi scraped and barked in the backyard, yowling intermittently. Tomas would have to bring Char in for the night to calm her down.

Right as he pushed the key into his lock, his parents’ porch light turned on. Tomas pushed his door open, trying to avoid them, but a voice rang out from his parents’ front door.

“Tomas,” Diego called to him. He jogged down the concrete path to the driveway. “Where the fuck have you been?” He looked over Tomas’s clothes, scowling in disgust.

“Out.” Tomas had forgotten he was still wearing his mesh shirt. He’d been too fucked in the head to think about changing when he’d gotten to the truck.

“Dressed like a homo?”

“Fuck off.” Tomas opened his door and pushed inside. He didn’t know what Diego was doing at his parents’ house at one in the morning, but he didn’t care. He needed to get some sleep before his shift. “I’m tired. What do you want?”

Diego stepped in behind him, crowding Tomas into the house. “I came over to help out dad.” He frowned, and for a second he looked more sad than angry. “Chester died.”

“Oh.” Tomas leaned against the armrest of his couch. Chester was an old dog and had been spending more and more time under the picnic table. As much as Tomas had known this was coming, he was still sad. “Did you take him…?” He didn’t even know what a person was supposed to do with a dead pet. Though he didn’t think it was safe to bury them in the backyard.

“We took him to the vet’s office.” Diego crossed his arms. For a second it almost felt like it had when they were kids and talking about some adventure they wanted to hatch. Chester had been their dog, unlike Sushi who’d always been closest to Maria. “They disposed of the body.”

Tomas and Diego had been ten and twelve when their dad found Chester eating out of a dumpster at a building site. They’d played with him nonstop.

“I’m sorry, D.”

“Bah. The kids were upset.” Diego shrugged in a way that was too casual. Like he was The Man and had never had the tender feelings of a little boy.

“Well, I’m sorry for them, then.”

Chardonnay and Sushi were still whining in the backyard, so Tomas went to the door to let Char in, but Sushi and Char wandered around, sniffing and not paying him any attention. They were looking for Chester, probably, and calling out every time they couldn’t find him.

“I see Dad built your boyfriend’s dog its own house,” Diego said from the kitchen.

Tomas knew he was saying
boyfriend
to be an asshole, but he wasn’t going to play this game tonight. It was too fucking late. “Yeah.” He crossed past Diego to get to the fridge.

Diego made a scoffing noise. After Tomas had grabbed a soda from the shelf, Diego reached in and took a beer.

“What?” Tomas drank down a cold and almost painfully fizzy swallow of Coke.

“So he is?” Diego’s sneer was pure challenge. “That faggot’s got you converted?”

“You want me to say no, right?” Tomas flopped into his couch, pissed at this whole conversation. “That’s what you’re doing, trying to get me to deny it, so you can ask again, and I can lie to you another time?” Tomas stared at the blank, black screen of his television.

“You sick fuck.” Diego slammed a hand into Tomas’s closet door, making a loud noise.

That’s all Diego was anymore—maker of loud noises, guy who strutted around and put on a show.

Tomas rubbed his eyes. “What the fuck do you know? Or care?”

A blow cracked across the back of his head. Spots dancing in his vision, Tomas twisted off the couch before Diego could smack him again.

“You brought that pervert into our home? Into my parents’ house, where my kids play?” Diego’s face was red and his hands fisted. He stalked across the room like he would murder Tomas and kick his dead body.

Stepping closer, Tomas got up in Diego’s face. Diego wasn’t bigger than him anymore. He was still taller, yes, but he wasn’t as built. “Shut your mouth about my boyfriend.”

He almost wanted to make the sign of the cross for calling Jesse his boyfriend under his parents’ roof, but even with that sense that he’d spoken something of a curse, he felt lighter, more free.

“Your
faggot
boyfriend.” Diego scowled. He slapped Tomas’s chest.

“That all you got? Calling him a fag?” Tomas shoved him. “Jess and I are together.”

Diego lunged, but Tomas got a forearm under his chin. Crushing Diego’s neck, Tomas pinned him to the wall.

“We’re together, and Jesse lives here. With me.” He let go.

Diego bent at the waist, gasping. He got his voice back in a second, the sound of it low and cold. “You telling Mom and Dad about this? Gonna make them go to your wedding and make Mom cry her eyes out to see you marrying a boy in a dress?”

Tomas snarled in a breath. He tried to hold back. He really did. But before he knew it, he cracked his palm against Diego’s skull.

Diego recovered, wiping his eyes from the blow. He glared at the floor like he’d burn a hole through it. “It’ll break her heart.”

“No.” Tomas ground his teeth, trying to get his temper under control. “I wasn’t going to tell them. But if they ask, I’m going to tell them the same thing I’m telling you—mind your own business.”

Diego looked mutinous, his face red and the set of his mouth angry.

Tomas wasn’t going to give him the chance to argue. “Get the fuck out.” He grabbed Diego’s arm and shoved him toward the door.

“Toma—”

“Out.” Tomas opened the door and pushed him through. He didn’t even look at his brother before he shut him outside.

Jesse waited by the intersection where Tomas always met him after class, his backpack heavy on his shoulder.

Cars slowed at the light, and at the end of the backed-up traffic, he spotted Tomas’s white truck.

He grinned. Sure, Tomas had texted and said he was coming, but the reality was something different. Even though they’d been mad at each other the night before, they still lived together. Tomas still took care of him.

The light changed, and the cars drove forward. Jesse walked toward the pull-out where drivers stopped to pick up students. Tomas got there first, so Jesse broke into a jog—his backpack feeling lighter.