New York Christmas (8 page)

“Relax,” he said. “Look at me.” Chris looked up into Daniel’s eyes and nodded.

“I’ll be fine. Let’s go.”

The first loop around following the other skaters was slow and unsteady. The second was a little faster, with Chris skating less with steps and more with glides. He was concentrating so hard. Daniel needed to pick up a topic of conversation that would take Chris’s mind off what he was doing so his movements became instinctive as opposed to planned.

“Did you ever wonder why English was the only subject I needed help in?”

Chris didn’t reply straightaway but as soon as they were passing the school kids with the penguin gliders he finally replied with a single questioning word. “No?”

“I was so selfish,” Daniel started. “I am sure I took you away from another deserving student in need of support, but I just wanted to spend time with you.”

“You did?”

Daniel was pleased to see that the skating was becoming secondary to Chris’s thinking. He pushed the subject further.

“English never came easy to me. Too many old guys writing stuff I didn’t enjoy.

But I managed steady Cs, you know, enough to get by. When I realized I could get face time with the hottest TA I’d seen I may have fudged some of my essays to get lower grades.” This could go one of two ways here. Chris could get annoyed and huffy that Daniel had kind of lied to him. Or he could see it for what it was—a shameless ploy on his part to spend time with Chris. Thankfully Chris chose the second option.

“Idiot,” he said with affection in the words. He squeezed Daniel’s hand tightly and then stretched his stride so that they were moving faster. With a whoop of encouragement, Daniel stepped up his skating and soon the two of them joined the faster loopers and were able to talk about what they could see: the city lit up in the night sky, the lights, the people and most of all where they were going next.

When they left the rink they were breathless with laughter and Chris was demanding they do it again. Daniel cupped Chris’s face and pressed a kiss to his laugh.

“I’ve fallen in love with you all over again,” Daniel said softly. Chris blinked at him in surprise for a moment. Then he smiled softly and placed his hands flat on Daniel’s chest. Daniel could feel the press of them even through his bulky coat.

“Thank you for finding me again,” Chris said. To Daniel that sounded like a declaration as close to an ‘I love you’ as Chris could get this quickly after meeting again.

He would take the win there.

They followed the path out of Central Park and back into the City proper. The snow was falling again and the lights of the buildings were blurred behind the white curtain.

Daniel didn’t think he’d ever felt happier.

Perfect.

Saturday, December 15th

Chris couldn’t believe he and Ame had made it through the whole of the rest of the week without too much of ‘the talk’ about spending the night at Daniel’s house more than once in the past week or the fact that he could not stop grinning at random moments when he thought about Daniel. It was ten on Saturday morning that he finally relaxed and felt there wasn’t going to be a Spanish Inquisition-type barrage of questions from his friend. He had just received a text from Daniel and everything was right with the world. It had just been a simple offer to meet up again that evening with an “
x
” at the end of the message, but it was enough.

It didn’t have to be more. Just to know Daniel wanted to see him again meant that clearly Chris hadn’t blown it with the ‘thank you for finding me’ routine. He just wasn’t ready to say ‘I love you’ when his head was so full of the what ifs in his own life. Daniel hadn’t pushed though, and for that, Chris was thankful. He wanted to spend every waking minute with Daniel, wanted to call him and hear his voice all the time. He was in love and he knew it; only he wasn’t ready for anyone else to know it.

The text had been followed up by a call, no more than twenty seconds of ‘hi’s’ and ‘how are yous?’ but it was a connection that Chris realized he had been waiting for as relief flooded through him. They’d seen each other only once or twice briefly over the last few days, but Daniel had pulled late shifts that lasted way past normal, which meant he spent most days sleeping.

“You seeing Daniel tonight?” Amelia caught him staring at his cell phone and her voice held laughter, controlled maybe, but definite glee nonetheless.

“Uh huh, late though, told me he has… work stuff.” Chris gestured with the cell to cover up the lack of knowledge he had on any details. Daniel hadn’t actually explained in detail what was going on at work that caused this shift to be a long one. He just sounded a little harried on the phone, snapped out something about the Christmas season and situations and double shifts, and then hung up.

“‘Stuff’ sounds kinda important.”

“Said he could make it for a coffee in a bit.” He knew he sounded relieved, but he shrugged the emotion away. Ame knew what he was like and she didn’t answer, just nodded in agreement and filled an order. Chris resigned himself to much more teasing.

It was the kind of morning in Amelia’s when there was no time to take a breath or a break. Time just flew past in a blur of coffee and money and tourists looking for local landmarks. It was Chris’s favorite kind of morning, busy and intense and full of shared laughter with Ame and the other staff. To top it all off, everyone who came into the store seemed so happy, shopping and visiting and bringing cold Christmassy air through the door. Or, he admitted, maybe it was just an extension of his own good mood? Whatever it was, Chris loved it. He had skipped lunch, the clock showed two thirty, and the anticipation of seeing Daniel later started to build.

“Christian?”

In a single second everything ground to a sickening halt. That voice, hearing the two syllables, a harsh end to his name, caused emotions to flood him in a crushing wave. Slowly he looked up, temper coiling within him, his hands gripping the counter, and everything around him blurring as he focused on the owner of that voice. Only one person called him Christian with that censorious tone laced with superiority. The one man who took his heart and his affections and stomped them into the mud. Who lied to him, used him, set him up for the fall.

“Whit,” Chris said. Whitman Hamilton-Keyes III. A formidable presence, in a suit.

A suit on a Saturday?
With his blond hair scraped back and his arms crossed over his chest, he peered over the counter and cast a quick look at the other staff.

“How are you?” he asked, and Chris rocked back on his heels. How was he? How was
he
? Everything that had happened was Whit’s fault. How did Whit expect him to be? “Can you spare some time to talk?” Whit was joking right? Chris was in the middle of the afternoon rush, tourists lining up almost to the door behind Whit—of course he couldn’t spare any time. He attempted to form words, a simple no, gripping tight to the edges of his apron, sudden temper twisting in him, disgust rising in his throat.

“We have nothing to talk about,” he finally managed to say and was proud of how he had said those few words without cracking up or jumping the counter and killing the man on the other side of it. Whit inclined his head in acceptance, made to leave, and then stopped and looked back at Chris with determination on his face.

“Five minutes… or even just one minute…”

Chris felt someone step close to him, looked left briefly, and caught sight of the frown on Amelia’s face. She had never met the other man during all of what had happened at Sacred Heart. Of course she knew everything that had happened, over whisky and beer she had prized it out of him. It had been good to share it. More than good, it had been vital, otherwise he swore he would have lost it completely.

“Everything okay here?” She wasn’t really asking Chris, her words were directed at Whit.

“One minute then,” Chris snapped irritably and then pulled off the apron, indicating Whit should follow him to the kitchen. He ignored Ame, couldn’t even look her in the eye, but thank God she didn’t push. He paused momentarily at the curious faces of the two girls on a break and thought on his feet, taking the stairs to his room.

Whit followed and Chris deliberately shut the door on the outside so it was just them.

To give him his due Whit didn’t flinch when Chris stopped right in front of him.

“You have your minute.”

“I… just… I have a lot to say… one minute isn’t enough time to—”

“Fuck. You.” Chris inhaled noisily and then tried to settle his anger; he needed to be clearheaded to handle this. After that morning in the office, he had left with his future destroyed and his reputation shattered. Carefully he measured his next words.

“In less than one minute the board at Sacred Heart judged me as a predator and finished me. So forgive me for matching that time.” Chris was giving no quarter and Whit blanched.

“I didn’t have any choice. Believe me.”

It was completely and absolutely the wrong thing for Whit to say. Rage spiraled so fast in Chris that it was a fire inside his head. He was finding it so hard not to let his need to physically hurt Whit escape to become actual violence.

“You could have told them the fucking truth.”

“I couldn’t.” Whit was evidently horrified at the thought.

“Time’s up,” Chris bit out in response. He opened the door and stood to one side.

He wanted Whit to leave; he didn’t need to stand here listening to this shit.

“Is there anything I can do for you,” Whit finally said, “as my way of making things right?”

Whit looked genuinely confused. Did he not realize what he had done? Just how much Chris’s career was in the gutter? Was he that oblivious?

“You are joking, right? You know what you need to do. Go back to the school. Be honest. Tell them that it was actually us in a relationship, and that I didn’t act inappropriately with my kids. Tell them the email forwarded to them was from you to me, not from me to a child in my care.”

“I can’t. People will think I’m… Hell. I’m not even gay.” Whit pushed the words out there. He had to have the final word, his voice resonant with disbelief.

Any control Chris had snapped and he saw red. The mist of temper descended so fast there wasn’t time for rational thought and in seconds he had punched Whit back against the wall and then had his hands digging hard into Whit's shoulders.

“You were gay when you were buried inside me, fucking me into tomorrow,”

Chris said. He tightened his grip, Whit trying to push back, a whimper in his throat.

“You were more than fucking gay when you were giving me head.”

“Please… stop…” The word was strangled, quiet. It was nothing in the expanse of the energy and sound inside Chris’s head and he pushed harder. He felt pressure on his shoulder, the force used to pull him off, the curse, and he released his hold, confusion carving through him. Daniel was here? Daniel’s voice was shouting at them, pushing them apart, Chris stumbled back and Whit scrambled for the door, incoherent anger edged with obvious fear.

“Stay here—” Daniel was shouting. No. Talking loud, telling Chris to stay. Chris didn’t have the energy to say anything. He slumped to the floor, adrenaline leaving his body in a rush.
What have I done? What am I?
Daniel was in his uniform. Daniel was here. Chris’s lover was leaving—running out of the room after Whit. Shit. He had no energy left, not one ounce of emotion other than total despair. He didn’t know how long it was, it could have been seconds or hours, everything blurred, but Ame was there, falling to her knees next to him and pulling him into a close hug. Then it was Daniel who crouched next to him, Daniel who was talking.

He was going. Said he was going.

“Don’t go; I need to explain.” Chris managed to force out the plea, regrets tumbling through him as fast as light at the blank look on Daniel’s face.

“Listen—look at me.” Chris blinked, tried to make it more obvious he was listening, Ame gently stroking his arm. Daniel sounded resigned, devastated. “I’m in uniform. This is official. I can’t stay.” And with that, he left.

* * * *

Daniel caught up with the guy that Chris had his hands on just outside the shop.

Tall, dressed in a suit, and shiny rich, he was exactly the type of person Daniel took to avoiding on his trips back home. He didn’t know what the fuck was going on but he knew Chris. There was something happening here and this preppy suit wearing blond was at the center of it.

“Sir,” he said formally, even though what he really wanted to do was lay him flat on the ground with a single punch. What had happened that has caused Chris to lose it like that?

“Whitman Hamilton-Keyes the third,” the man introduced himself. “You saw what he was doing. He had his hands on me.” Whitman was visibly shaken and his eyes were lit with a maniacal gleam. “Asked to leave his school position because he was coming on to minors. And now this. I’ve been physically assaulted.”

Daniel physically took a step back. Left his school? Because of that? No. That was not true. There had to be another reason.

“I need your name, officer,” Whitman ordered. “I want to press charges.”

“Daniel Bailey,” Daniel said. His chest tightened and he looked horror straight in the face. He was a cop in uniform, still on duty. He had a responsibility to serve the community, whoever they were. He shouldn’t be dealing with this situation any less than completely impartially. He pulled his cell from his pocket and dialed the first name on the list.

“Alex?”

“Daniel, hey.”

“Can you get to that coffee shop on Grand Street? There’s a situation.”

Alex paused. His partner would be home by now with his wife and kid, but Daniel had never asked for anything before, and god help him Chris needed help now.

“I’ll be there in ten,” Alex answered. Daniel ended the call and encouraged Whitman back into the coffee shop to sit at the table closest to the door. He began to take notes as Whitman explained. Words like inappropriate communication, homosexual, kids, school, all twisted in his head until he got them down on paper.