Something Like Winter (4 page)

* * * * *

As if to prove him wrong
about the guest room, Tim’s aunt and her husband came to visit the
following week. As aunts went, Emily was all right. She was usually
good for a laugh, unlike her stoic brother, but as the
24
^th
of
August rolled around, Tim began to worry. Like a rare eclipse, his
mother’s obsessive focus on her husband ceased briefly on one
special occasion, but his aunt’s visit threatened to ruin
that.

As it turned out, he had
nothing to fear.

On Tim’s birthday, balloons
and streamers invaded the house, turning the perfect décor garish.
There was cake and ice cream and only one present—but holy shit—it
was a big one! The wrapped gift was no larger than a ring box, and
inside was a key. Tim knew what that meant. He was out the front
door in seconds, his family close behind.

“
Oh, wow!”

The car was sleek and
black, its curves designed for minimum wind resistance. The three
diamonds on the hood screamed Mitsubishi, and that company made
only one sports car this boner-inducing: The 3000GT!

Tim jumped and punched the
air. “I can’t fucking believe it!” His mom’s eyes went from bright
to flat in the fraction of a second. “Oh, sorry, mom. It’s just so
fu- freaking
awesome!
Thank you!”

“
Happy birthday!” Aunt
Emily chirped. “We pitched in on the rubber floor mats. They’re a
godsend on a muddy day, believe me. Oh, and the air freshener. Ha
ha!”

“
Just be careful,” his
father warned, but his cheeks were flushed, perhaps from the memory
of his own first car.

“
Thank you so much!” Tim
opened the driver’s side door and jumped in. He couldn’t get the
key turned quick enough. The engine roared to life with a ferocity
that would make a lion piss its furry britches. Tim checked out the
dashboard and was about to adjust the seat when he remembered his
family standing outside. Finding the right button, the passenger’s
side window lowered.

“
Wanna go for a ride?” he
shouted.

He watched them debate over
who would go, surprised when his father got into the car with him.
He hadn’t let Tim drive him anywhere since a few basic lessons last
year.

“
I have an errand to run,”
Thomas said.

Tim grinned. “Hold on
tight!”

He put the car in gear and
hit the gas, the car’s engine more powerful than he was expecting.
He nearly ran over some guy who was gawping at him instead of
walking his dog. Tim couldn’t blame him. The car was pure sex. He
turned the steering wheel before committing involuntary
manslaughter, then zoomed down the street and around the corner,
laughing with mad power. When he looked over, his father was
holding on to the door handle for dear life, complexion even paler
than usual.

“
Let’s take it easy,
son!”

“
Sorry.”

Tim brought the speed down
before turning on to the main road. This was too cool! Maybe his
parents were a little preoccupied most of the time, but they sure
knew the right way to compensate.

“
Thanks,” he said again. “I
honestly wasn’t expecting this.”

“
I hope not,” his father
said, but added, “A man should have his independence. Turn here. I
need to go to my office.”

Tim was dying to gun it,
but he didn’t want his dad to regret giving him such a souped-up
car. He stayed on his best behavior all the way to the generic
office building where his dad’s company was located. The parking
lot was empty on the weekend, so he pulled right up to the door.
Tim wanted to wait in the car while his father went inside,
unwilling to be separated from his gift. Hell, he might even sleep
in the backseat tonight! But his father wanted him to come along,
so Tim grudgingly killed the engine.

Once inside, they walked
past the reception area and a row of cubicles to a hallway where
the real offices were. When they reached a door as nondescript as
the others, Thomas dug a key from his pocket and handed it to
Tim.

“
As I said.
Independence.”

Tim’s stomach sank. His
father was giving him a job. He could see through the window in the
door that the room beyond was empty, but he took the key and used
it anyway.

“
This is more a necessity
than a present,” Thomas said.

Tim opened the door and
stepped inside, unsure what to say. His father filled the silence
for him.

“
This was your mother’s
idea. I had the carpet taken out so you wouldn’t get paint on it.
We can always lay it again when you move out, but try not to get
paint on the walls.”

A studio? Tim felt so
relieved that he laughed. He wasn’t against getting a job, but he
didn’t want to work for his father. “Cool! So I can move all my
stuff in?”

“
Anytime you
want.”

Tim turned in a circle,
viewing the space in a new light. “Can I cover up the window in the
door? I don’t want people looking at what I’m doing.”

“
That would be
fine.”

Tim stopped short of asking
if he had the only key. He could always go through his father’s
keychain sometime and snag any duplicates. Tim was never fond of
showing his paintings to other people, and he was planning one that
would raise uncomfortable questions if anyone saw it.

“
Ready?” Thomas
asked.

“
Yeah. Thanks. This is
really good.”

They talked cars on the way
home, conversation coming effortlessly. Once back home, the adults
poured drinks and discussed subjects that bored Tim to tears, but
this made it easy to slip away.

Loading up his car with
painting supplies, and feeling more free than ever, Tim headed
toward his new studio. He could hardly wait. There was so much he
needed to get out of his head, ideas that hounded him until they
were released on canvas. Or in some cases, images that he needed to
exorcise for his own well-being.

In the backseat was a
canvas with a rough sketch. The dark eyes were apparent, but the
shape of the face around them was drawn in light lines hard to see.
If someone were to look close enough, they would discover the
features were male, even though they shared traits with his
ex-girlfriend. Except in the drawing Corey was older, enough so
that when he made a pass at Tim, it wouldn’t have felt like his kid
brother was hitting on him. Old enough that Tim might have given
Corey a different answer.

Chapter Three

Tim shifted in the hard
plastic seat and resisted moaning in miserable boredom. Had he
really wished for the school year to begin? At the front of class,
a thin woman with wiry gray hair read passages from a book. The
idea was to entice them, since they were about to read it
themselves, but so far nothing much of interest seemed to happen in
Holden Caulfield’s life.

The words blurred together,
Tim’s mind turning to sex as it always did when he was bored. When
his brain checked out and left his body in charge, it only ever
wanted a few basic things. This class was almost over, and getting
hard now would be inconvenient when the bell rang, so Tim tried to
find something else to occupy his attention.

He covertly eyed the other
students. The guys didn’t look so different from those back in
Kansas, except for a handful who dressed like cowboys. The hats
weren’t there, at least not in class, but the picnic-patterned
shirts and massive belt buckles were. Girls in Texas favored more
makeup and often wore their hair up. Literally. Hairspray must be
in constant short supply here because a lot of the
hairdos—especially the bangs—were sculpted to defy
gravity.

Tim felt someone watching
him and caught them in the act. A girl, and a pretty one at that.
She had a little of the heavy makeup and sprayed hair, but it
worked for her. Ramrod thin with pale blonde hair, she wore an open
expression that made her appear timid, like a woodland creature.
Their eyes still locked, Tim gave a tentative smile. She smiled
back, adorable as a doe.

Beyond her was a bear, a
hulking package of muscle squeezed into his desk chair. The guy
looked like he belonged in college, maybe as a linebacker on the
football team. He seemed annoyed at the exchange Tim and Little
Miss Doe had shared. The guy had blond hair and green eyes too—not
the same shade as the girl’s, but he could be her brother. Or
boyfriend, since they didn’t share any family resemblance. Tim
returned his attention to the teacher, keeping his eyes averted
even when the bell rang and he left the class.

Time for lunch. Tim
strolled around the cafeteria, checking out the vending machines
full of sugar-free drinks. He got a lemonade, and though he was
hungry, he didn’t line up for food, not wanting to be the pathetic
new guy sitting alone at a table. Making new friends was more
daunting than he’d expected. In Kansas he’d been around the same
people all his life and knew who everyone was, even if he never
interacted with them. And he had been popular. Here, he was a
nobody.

But that anonymity was what
he wanted. Tomorrow he would swallow his pride and sit alone, but
today he went outside and walked around the school, enjoying the
weather. When the bell rang, he went back in for his other classes.
In U.S. History, the teacher didn’t seem interested in starting the
year quite yet and let them “get settled,” as he put it. This meant
everyone could talk. Tim had a conversation with a girl who was
nice enough, but her cheeks kept flushing like they were on a first
date or something. They didn’t have much in common.

When the school day finally
ended, he was eager to get to his car and head home. The new house
was close enough that he could make the trip a long walk or a short
jog, but today Tim had driven. He wanted to make a good first
impression, and this didn’t go unnoticed.

“
Nice car.”

Tim turned, his hand on the
Mitsubishi’s door handle. The guy eyeing his car like it was a
naked woman was stocky, bordering on chubby. But his clothes were
all designer-label, and his hair might have been highlighted, since
it was darker underneath than on top. One thing was for sure: No
common barber had ever touched those locks.

“
Thanks. Just got it for my
birthday.”

“
Sixteen?” the guy
asked.

“
Seventeen.”

“
Ah. Well, that’s what I
got for my sixteenth.”

The guy pointed to a
cherry-red Porsche. Several people were gathered around it, most of
them watching Tim and the guy talking. Little Miss Doe was there,
as was her huge companion and a number of other beautiful people.
High school royalty. Farther away was their court, the people not
quite in their inner circle but desperate to be.

“
You new here?”

“
Yeah. Just moved down this
summer.” He held out his hand, giving the other guy a firm grip.
“Tim Wyman.”

“
Darryl Briscott. Hey,
we’re having a party to help wipe today from our minds. You want to
come?”

Tim nodded. “When and
where?”

Darryl’s smile was smug.
“My place, right now.”

Before they went anywhere,
Darryl walked Tim over to the group for a round of introductions.
His woodland creature was Krista Norman, the tower of muscles Bryce
Hunter. Definitely not brother and sister then. The other names and
faces Tim would have to catch on the sly because he had already
forgotten most of them.

He followed Darryl’s
Porsche to a neighborhood that made his own look destitute. A lot
of his friends in Kansas were rich, so his mind wasn’t blown, but
for the first time in his life he wondered if he was going to make
the cut. This invitation was obviously the beginning of an
interview. Tim had the looks and he had the car, but there were
still plenty of ways to fall out of grace, as he had learned back
home.

Three other cars were in
their convoy, and once parked, Darryl’s driveway looked like a
sports car showroom. The inside of the house was spacious. Rich
homes either had a ton of rooms or scaled-up versions of the normal
amount. Darryl’s home was of the latter variety. Every room was
like a cathedral, the ceilings so high they could have easily
supported an additional floor halfway up.

“
This way, my man,” Darryl
said.

He led Tim through the
house to a room that nearly made his jaw drop. He supposed it
wasn’t so different from his father’s den, but taken to a whole new
level. Instead of a big-screen television, the room had a movie
screen and a projector built into opposite walls. Beneath the
projector was a long L-shaped couch that could seat at least
ten.

Instead of a mere wet bar,
the far wall looked like it had been stolen from a British pub and
teleported to Texas. Set against a giant mirror were shelves and
shelves of liquor bottles, all lit tastefully from
below.

In front of this was an
ebony bar with brass accents and half a dozen empty stools. Tim
happily plopped down on one. Darryl played bartender, switching on
some music as everyone got settled. Then he turned to Tim and asked
a question that sent his mouth watering.