The Understatement of the Year (21 page)

It was hook-up o’clock, because Guerrilla Night was drawing to a close.

We climbed into the truck. When my door slammed, one half of the couple in front of us raised his eyes to check if we were about to run him down. But his partner, a short little guy, grabbed his jacket and pulled him back into the kiss.

Graham sat in the passenger seat, just staring at them.

Rubbing my cold hands together, and still distracted by the argument I’d had with Skippy, it took me a minute to realize where Graham’s thoughts were probably headed. Kissing in public had been lethal to our friendship. And here we were, literally surrounded by men who weren’t afraid to let the kisses fly.

“Welcome to Vermont,” I said.

He said nothing. His eyes were still trained on the couple in front of us. I flipped on the truck’s headlights, which illuminated them. But I couldn’t tell if Graham was really watching, or if he was far away, inside a memory.

Either way, I knew what we had to do. “Come here,” I whispered.

He gave a slow shake of his head. “Bad idea.”

But it wasn’t a bad idea. It was a powerful one. Five years ago, two boys had kissed in a car. And a bunch of assholes turned that moment into a life-altering disaster. But right now, two grown men could kiss in a car. And then go home to play one more game of RealStix like it was no big deal.

I stretched one hand across the seat to take Graham’s. But he wouldn’t look at me, even when I gave his arm a tug. “Come here,” I said. “Or I’m coming over there.” The truck had a bench seat, so it would be easy to make good on that threat.

He looked at me then, a warning on his face.

“It’s just a kiss,” I whispered, rubbing his big hand in mine. “Do this for me.” I pulled him toward me again.

He came
almost
willingly.

Slowly, we eased closer, our eyes locked on one another, until I could feel his breath on my face. I closed the final inches between us, just ghosting my lips over his on the first pass. I saw his Adam’s apple bob nervously. So I was gentle when I cupped the back of his head, pulling him in. I pressed my lips to his, tasting musk and beer.
Mmm…
My kiss was slow. Appreciative.

After several beats of my heart, he relaxed into the kiss, melting for me. I licked into his mouth then. If I was only getting a kiss, I wanted to make it a good one. On the first wet slide of tongue against tongue, Graham made an achy little sound in the back of his throat.

Heaven
.

Leaning in, I wrapped him in my arms. This wasn’t like the frantic, tequila-soaked mashup after the Saint B's game. This time, I could feel us both holding tightly to our control. And even though my body wouldn’t have minded an escalation, we both knew that it wasn’t going to happen. This kiss was all about heartache. It was deep and sweet and sad. My chest fluttered with disbelief that I was holding him, and kissing him. Each moist slide of his lips against mine undid me a little more.

It was possibly the best kiss I’d ever had.

But eventually, the car in front of us roared to life, its taillights bathing the truck’s cab in bright red glow. With the moment broken, Graham eased back, and I let him go. As the other car pulled away and drove off, the sound of its motor faded. We were left alone with our own silence. Graham put his elbow on the window and looked away from me, already lost inside his own head. So I cranked the engine. As I let the engine heat up, I rubbed my own lips together. They were swollen and tender from Graham’s stubble.

I began the drive home. There was a nearly full moon tonight, which lit the snowy fields outside Burlington with an otherworldly, bluish glow.

“Some of that music was pretty dubious,” Graham said eventually.

“Yeah,” I chuckled. “If you want to be queer, you have to be okay with dance tunes.”

“One point for being straight, then,” he said.

I didn’t even reply, because that was such a sad way to think.

We pulled up to Gran’s brightly lit house. Graham looked up at the house, and then over at me. In the dark, he studied me. “Rik,” he whispered. “I had fun tonight.”

“Me too, G.”

He moved then, hitching across the seat to reach me. “One more,” he breathed. “For old time’s sake.” Then he turned my face toward his, capturing my mouth in a kiss.

Stupid or not, I just went with it. If you stripped away all the confusion and the old heartaches, I’d had an almost perfect day. And this right here was pretty much all I’d ever wanted from Graham. I wanted his friendship, and then I wanted him to reach for me at the end of the night. So for those few minutes, I had everything.

The kiss got heated. Graham’s hands wandered over my chest, and I wrapped my arms around his big shoulders. The size of him was a real turn-on.
Hell
. Everything about him was a real turn-on. The more we kissed, the harder I got.

I let my mouth wander down his gorgeous jaw. And I’d begun tasting the skin on the side of his neck when he let out a big, frustrated sigh. Reluctantly I sat back, checking his face.

“We’d better go in,” he said. “Your grandmother is going to wonder why we didn’t come inside.”

Slowly, I passed my palm over the whiskers on his cheek. “G, if she’s not asleep, she’ll just assume we were making out in the truck. And she won’t think less of you for it.”

But we both already knew that didn’t matter to Graham. Without another word, he opened the door and got out. The idea of someone suspecting us was a barrier that he simply could not get past.

When I jumped out of the truck, I had to adjust myself inside my too-tight jeans. My body really wanted to get Graham alone. The problem was, there was no place on
Earth
alone enough for Graham.

—
Graham

The next morning I woke up with a start, briefly confused about where I was. The sun shone through an unfamiliar window. I pulled my phone off Mrs. Rikker’s sewing table and saw that it was almost ten. That wasn’t terribly surprising, because I often slept late. More interestingly, after falling head first into the guest bed at around one in the morning, I hadn’t woken up even once. Weird. Usually I spent part of the night tracing the ceiling beams, going a few rounds with the demons in my head.

Sitting up, I shoveled my drowsy limbs into my clothes. Then I followed the voices into the kitchen.

“He lives,” Rikker said when I shuffled in. He was standing at the counter, grating cheese into a pile on a wooden cutting board.

I cleared my sleepy throat. “Sorry. I slept hard.”

On her way between the open refrigerator and the stove, his Grandmother patted me on the arm. “Nothing to be sorry for. You’re on vacation.” She set a dozen eggs on the counter and opened the carton. “Do you eat eggs, Graham?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Rikker reached over his head and fetched a mug, which he filled with coffee from a pot in front of him. This he handed back to me without comment. Then he picked up the cheese grater again.

I took a deep gulp of the coffee and began to feel almost human. “Can I do anything to help?”

“Just stand there lookin’ pretty,” Rikker drawled. Then he flashed me a wicked grin.

I pulled a face. But
God
, that smile was disarming. When he aimed it at me, I would probably do anything he asked.

Anything except the one thing that mattered. Anything except love him the way he deserved.

“If you boys are here for another two hours, I can send you back with meatballs in tomato sauce,” Grandma Rikker said. She was cracking eggs into a mixing bowl.

“I’m free then,” Rikker said. “What do you think, G? Do we need to leave before noon?”

Sometime yesterday he’d begun calling me “G” again, just like the old days. I liked it. “There’s no rush,” I told him. “I’ll need to grab a shower at some point, but that’s the only thing on my to-do list.”

Rikker lifted his chin toward the stairs. “You can go now. Breakfast will be another fifteen minutes.”

As I climbed the stairs, I could hear Rikker and his grandmother gossiping.

“Was that boyfriend of Daphne’s there? The one with the bar through his eyebrow, who says ‘fuck’ every other word?”

“Bruno?” Rikker chuckled. “Didn’t see him. So maybe he’s out of the picture.”

“Maybe she came to her senses. Daphne’s a smart girl. I always hoped she was just experimenting on him.”

“I hope so too.”

My time in Vermont came to an end before I was ready. A couple of hours later, Grandma Rikker drove us to the rental car place, and Rikker went inside to pick up his reservation. I leaned forward from the back seat of the truck to thank her for having me as a guest.

She swiveled around, squeezing my forearm. “Any time, dear. I wish you boys had more vacation days. I really do. These last few years with John have been such a gift to me.”

I smiled, because you couldn’t look at the love in her watery blue eyes and not smile. “I’m sure it isn’t always sunshine and roses,” I said, trying for a joke. “He probably leaves the toilet seat up.”

“I had two boys before him,” she said, patting my arm. “I don’t even notice anymore.”

I saw Rikker coming outside again with a set of keys in his hand. “I think we’re all set to go,” I said.

But when I went to open the door, she grabbed my hand. “You take care of yourself, Michael Graham,” she insisted.

“I will,” I said.

“And don’t forget to vent the plastic containers before you nuke those meatballs I made you boys. So they don’t explode.”

Chuckling, I got out. “Thanks for everything!”

She blew me a kiss after I slammed the door.

“I want to do that again some time,” I admitted when we were on the road. “Your grandma’s place is so relaxing.” Rikker was so quiet after I said it that I had to wonder if I’d overstepped. “I mean… I had fun. That’s all.”

“I did, too,” he said quickly. “But I think it’s fascinating that you say you were practically climbing the walls at home, yet Gran’s place is like an oasis. Because she’s the only person in the world who probably suspects you of being gay.” His eyes flicked over to give me a glance. “Because you’re visiting me. Not for any other reason. But that’s, like, backwards. No?”

When I opened my mouth to argue, absolutely nothing came out. Because Rikker was right. Most of the time I walked around in a panic trying to act like a straight guy. In Vermont, I spent my time twerking at a queer dance party and making out with my gay friend in his grandmother’s truck. Then I slept for nine hours straight and woke up feeling like a superhero. It didn’t make a lick of sense.

“What did your parents say about my news story?” he asked suddenly. “Did they see it?”

I gave a big sigh. During the days I’d been at home, I’d ducked out of several conversations about those damned articles. “They said people were talking about it at church. That’s where my mother heard about it.”

“But what did
your
mom say about me? Was she, like, shocked or anything?”

“She didn’t seem shocked,” I said slowly. This whole topic freaked me right out. “She asked me if you were okay, and if I thought that Coach handled it well. I told her I thought so. Both things.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.” The truth was that Mom tried to talk to me about it. But I ran out of the room every time it came up. And I sure as hell didn’t tell her about the Saint B’s game.

“What do you think your mom would say to me if I walked into your house right now?” he pressed.

“Um… hello John?” I didn’t like where this conversation was headed. Because it didn’t matter that my parents weren’t bigots like Rikker’s parents. I didn’t want to be their gay son.

“I bet she’d offer me cookies and milk.” He was smiling now, picturing it. “She was always good for a bag of Oreos.”

“Sure,” I said quietly. “My mom is cool. But that doesn’t mean she’d want to walk in on us in the basement. Or explain to her friends at church…” I trailed off. Because the more I spoke, the more obvious it was that I’d thought through all of this. So many times.

Rikker let a couple of miles go by before saying anything. “You know, my parents tried to convince me to go to one of those places where you pray the gay away.”

“Really?”

“I refused to go. But you know what’s funny?” he started chuckling to himself. “You know what they do at those weekend retreats? They cuddle.”

“What? You mean, like, they put you with a girl?”

“Negative. They sit everybody down on the floor in pairs, and make you cuddle a man. They have this batshit theory that gay comes from not getting the right fathering. So if a man holds you all weekend, you won’t crave that anymore.”

“You are pulling my chain.”

He shook his head. “While I do enjoy pulling your chain, this is the God’s honest truth. I met somebody who went to one of those things. He said what he really got out of it was the knowledge that he really liked cuddling men.”

Grabbing the headrest behind me, I laughed. “Best scam ever.”