Screwups (10 page)

She was still a lovely woman, though she looked out of place to him now. He saw for the first time that the style of her hair, piled up on top of her head, and the skirts she wore were from another decade. He’d always felt that his mother was like one of those moms from television when he was a kid, and now he could see that in a way it was true. She was beautiful, her blonde hair not yet turning gray and her skin still free of wrinkles, but she was old-fashioned, conservative.

“I quit smoking when I married your father,” she said when she glanced up and saw him standing over her. “He forced me to. Now I keep taking cigarette breaks when I want to piss him off.”

Jake didn’t know what to say to that—he couldn’t even recall ever hearing his mother use language that crude before—so he just sat down on the swing beside her. She took a long drag on the cigarette, exhaled, and then stubbed it out in a metal jar lid she was using for an ashtray.

She held the cigarette up in her hand and examined it. “I can’t say I really like smoking anymore.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t do it.”

“Maybe not.” She set the cigarette down in the lid. “I assume your brothers told you?”

“About the divorce? Yeah.”

“It’s just….” She took a deep breath and looked out over the quaint suburban neighborhood with its freshly painted white houses and neatly manicured lawns. “I just need to get away.”

“From us?”

“Not from you.” She smiled at him and took his hand in one of her own. “I always felt like you and I understood each other. I love your brothers—” She laughed gently. “—despite the fact that they drive me crazy. But you were the one who kept me grounded, who made me feel a little less isolated in a house full of boisterous male egos.”

Jake wasn’t quite sure how to take that comment. “You don’t think I’m masculine?”

That made his mother laugh more than he’d seen her laugh since he was a boy. “Oh, honey! Of course you’re masculine. I didn’t mean that at all. But you’re quiet and thoughtful. That’s a good thing. And with you out of the house now, I’ve missed that.”

It occurred to Jake that perhaps she felt about him the same way he felt about her—that they had been allies against the onslaught of his brothers and the autocratic attitude of his father. Now that they were apart, living in the house must be as bad for her as it would be for him. “The past couple years… you’ve been alone with Dad for the first time since the twins were born.”

“That’s right.”

“And you don’t like it?”

She gave him a sad look and shook her head gently. “He hasn’t changed… but I have. I’m no longer the docile young woman he married.” She paused. “And I no longer recall what I used to love about him.”

T
HERE
WAS
no Thanksgiving dinner at Danny’s house. His mother
considered Thanksgiving and Columbus Day to be celebrations of the oppression of Native Americans by European settlers and refused to do anything festive. Danny could understand not wanting to celebrate Christopher Columbus—the guy had been a total jerk—but he didn’t see what was wrong with some settlers celebrating the fact that they’d survived a harsh winter. There was little point arguing over it with his mother. The pilgrims hadn’t been his ancestors anyway. He was Irish. His mother’s family had arrived in New York sometime in the eighteen hundreds.

Regardless of that, he had a pleasant day. He’d always been close to his mother. Coming out to her in his high school freshman year had been easy. She’d even supported him when the school guidance counselor had called her in to discuss his “promiscuous behavior.” She’d stood up to the jackass and said bluntly, “Mr. Allen, what you appear to be saying is that my son was raped—” Danny could hear the trembling in her voice, a mixture of horror and rage. “
—
but you think he deserved it.”

“‘Rape’ is a strong word, Mrs. Sullivan,” the bastard had replied calmly. “According to the other boys, Danny agreed to it beforehand.”

And he had. That was why he’d been too ashamed to tell his mother. The difference between what he’d agreed to and what had happened was enormous, but still, he’d let it happen. If Mr. Allen hadn’t decided to humiliate him further by calling her in, Danny might never have told her.

She had threatened to sue the school, although the school hadn’t really done anything other than ignore the name-calling and the daily humiliations heaped upon Danny. It was his music teacher, Mrs. Kelly, who’d gotten indignant enough to talk to the guidance counselor. She thought she was helping him, but Mr. Allen had been unsympathetic.

In the end, Danny had begged his mother to let it go. Everybody already knew about it. Taking it to court would just increase the humiliation, and they would lose anyway.

Still, he loved her for trying. And he was grateful to Mrs. Kelly for trying too. But there was nothing that could be done.

His mom did cook him a nice lunch—“Not because of that stupid holiday, but because I haven’t seen you for a while and it’s nice to have you home”—of stir-fried vegetables and brown rice, sesame noodles, and vegetarian steamed dumplings. They drank it all down with jasmine tea and, after dinner, they had a little sake. Danny wasn’t twenty-one yet, but that had never mattered to his mother. For his eighteenth birthday, she’d baked him pot brownies.

They sat around in the “sun-room” while they talked over cups of hot sake. The sun-room was a small room on the side of the house that his mother had fixed up with warm hues of gold and terra cotta on the walls, a fake oriental rug, and huge cushions to sprawl on. She used it for yoga and meditation, and Danny had to admit it was a very cozy space to chill in.

“So…,” his mother said, after they’d settled in. “Are you seeing anybody?”

Danny rolled his eyes. “Have I ever answered ‘yes’ to that question?”

“There’s always a first time,” she replied with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Please tell me you’re at least getting laid occasionally.”

“Not recently.” He left out the fact that he expected that situation to change soon. Not because he intended to
seduce
Jake, but simply because he felt that was where Jake wanted things to go, and he was totally down with that.

His mother sighed and took a sip of her sake. “I really don’t think it’s healthy—”

She was cut off by a loud
thud
coming from the front of the house. They both set their cups down and scrambled up as another
thud
came. It sounded as if something was striking the front door. Danny reached the door first and foolishly yanked it open.

Something clipped his shoulder—something hard and
wet
—and bounced up in the air. In the street, tires screeched as an old blue Camry pulled away from their house while some jackass screamed “faggot” out the window. Before Danny could react, his mother shoved her way past him and threw something overhand. It struck the back of the car and splattered into pieces on the back bumper.

“Karma is a bitch!”

The kids just laughed as the car took off, but Danny was amazed. His mother turned back to the house, wiping something off her hands in disgust, and he exclaimed, “Jesus! Have you joined pro baseball since the last time I was here?”

He could smell something now. Something that smelled like… rotten apples.

“Are you okay, hon?”

He rubbed the wet spot on his shoulder. It hurt a bit, but not too much. “Was that an apple?” Looking around him, he could see that two other apples had left wet spots on the door and exploded into brown, pulpy fragments on the front stoop.

“I caught the one that hit you,” his mother said. “Too bad I couldn’t crack their windshield with it.”

Danny pulled off his soiled T-shirt and handed it to her to wipe her hands on. He was as pissed as she was—more. But it was just a stupid prank, and there was nothing they could do about it now. He hadn’t recognized the car, though he was pretty sure it had been Randy Woodman shouting the word “faggot.” He remembered the sound of it. But they’d had to call the town cops so many times for vandalism in their front yard that every call was now met with heavy sighs. Nothing ever came of the reports.

He did his best to smile. “That’s not very centered and life-affirming of you.”

She shook her head and smiled back at him.

G
OING
FROM
Concord to Worcester only took about an hour and a half, so it wasn’t particularly necessary to start out early in the morning. But Jake got the impression his friends were all glad to be escaping their families. Certainly he was. Danny had called the evening before to tell him they’d be arriving at 10:00 a.m., which gave Jake time to shower and dress and eat the usual large breakfast his mother insisted on preparing for him and his brothers. When Eva’s car pulled up, nobody bothered to get out—she just popped the trunk for him to toss his bags in. Then Jake climbed into the backseat, where Danny was lying half-asleep against the opposite door, and they drove off.

Jake’s sense of relief, once they were on the road, was enormous. He let out a huge sigh.

“Fun time?” Eva asked with amusement, glancing at him in the rearview mirror.

“It was interesting.”

“Yeah. Mine too. My younger brother just got fired for hitting on his manager. Dumbass. Now he’s got our father lecturing him for being an unemployed deadbeat and our mother chewing him out for being a sexist pig.”

“Ouch.”

“Well, at least it kept them off
my
case. I should get him something extra nice for Christmas.”

Jake was relieved that she didn’t pry into his own holiday. She and Paul started discussing the rules for the LARP, leaving him and Danny to fend for themselves. Danny didn’t seem to be in a very talkative mood, though. He looked at Jake through half-closed lids, nodded briefly, and then went back to his nap.

So Jake just sat there in silence, staring out his window at the leafless trees along the edge of the highway as they drifted past. He noticed that Danny was kind of twisted, his legs at an odd angle to the rest of his body to keep them on his side of the car. So Jake said, just loud enough for Danny to hear, “You can put them in my lap.”

Danny opened his eyes slightly to give him a long, evaluating look. Then without a word, he lifted his bare legs and placed them across Jake’s lap. He adjusted the jacket he had balled up under his head and closed his eyes again. Jake rested his hands on Danny’s legs, uncertain if Danny might pull away, but he didn’t. He was wearing his usual khaki shorts and the feel of his skin was hot against Jake’s palms. The skin was covered in soft, blond hair that was nearly invisible, and felt silky to the touch. Without thinking, Jake caressed it lightly, barely moving his hands. Danny didn’t appear to mind. He’d never imagined touching someone’s legs could feel so sensual, but he felt his crotch stiffening as he slid his palms against Danny’s skin. The temptation to slide his hands up along the inside of Danny’s thighs was strong, especially when his eyes traveled upward and he found himself looking up one of the legs of Danny’s shorts. At a glimpse of pubic hair, Jake quickly lifted his eyes… only to find Danny watching him, a faint smile across his lips. Danny raised one of the hands resting on his stomach and gave Jake a thumbs-up before letting it fall back into place and closing his eyes again.

Jake wasn’t sure if that meant it was okay to look, or if Danny simply forgave his lapse of manners, but he felt himself blushing regardless. He went back to looking out the window. But of their own volition, his hands continued to caress Danny’s legs.

They stopped for lunch at a Friendly’s, even though they weren’t far from their destination. Jake was all for the opportunity to stretch his legs and use the restroom. He wasn’t very hungry, considering the size of his breakfast, but Danny didn’t seem to be either, so they shared an order of fries and a chocolate malt. There was something intimate about the way they ended up using the same straw—Eva noted it with a raised eyebrow, though she didn’t comment. Jake liked it, liked the feeling of being so close to another guy that swapping something back and forth between their mouths would feel completely natural.

But he could tell that something was bothering Danny, and that bothered him too. When they got back in the car, he waited until they were back on the highway and then leaned in close to talk.

Apparently, it was a little too close because Danny asked him, “Are you going to kiss me?”

“Huh? Oh. No.” Jake backed off just a bit, wishing he
could
kiss Danny. He said in a low voice, “I just wanted to ask you what’s wrong without broadcasting it to everybody in the car.”

Danny smiled sadly at him. “I’m all right. Just the same shit I’ve been dealing with since I was in high school.”

“You have a fight with your mom?”

“No. She’s awesome. It’s just… other stuff.”

Jake nodded. He didn’t know what to say and he was probably already prying. “Sorry. It’s none of my business.”

“Can I lie down again?”

“Sure.”

To Jake’s surprise, instead of placing his legs across Jake’s lap, Danny curled up in a fetal position on the seat, resting his head in Jake’s lap. It was insanely adorable, and Jake couldn’t resist draping his hand across Danny’s shoulder. He felt his dick stiffening a bit and worried that Danny might feel it against his face. But if Danny hadn’t figured out by now that Jake got hard at the slightest contact, he’d have to be a complete moron. And he wasn’t. So hopefully it was cool.

I
F
HE
wasn’t careful, Danny knew, he could easily end up falling in love with Jake. The guy was attentive and sweet, and they weren’t even dating. And that was on top of being gorgeous and perpetually horny. Danny could feel Jake’s cock stiffening in his blue jeans directly under Danny’s cheek, and the urge to nibble it through the rough fabric was almost overwhelming. Danny was resting his left hand on Jake’s leg, just above the knee. Just to be a dick, he slid the hand upward a bit, tracing his middle finger along the inside of Jake’s thigh, until he came into contact with something that was definitely not Jake’s leg.