Making Promises (15 page)

There was none, and Rosie hopped out of the truck (with some spryness, for a woman who claimed to be on the verge of retirement) and gave him a hug.

“It was a good trip home, Mikhail—we’ll see you next week. Don’t forget our number between times, okay?”

Mikhail nodded, feeling awkward, but she had been kind. “I do not usually talk much,” he said apologetically, and Rosie laughed—she and Arlen laughed a lot, he thought.

“Oh honey, we know that. We’re just glad you gave us a chance tonight.” With a little more creaking, Rosie released him and climbed back into the truck, and Mikhail waved as the truck (and its big, smelly burden of terrifying animals) disappeared out the driveway and onto busy Sylvan Road, turning toward Auburn and the freeway.

He trotted through the complex and up the stairs to his second-floor apartment, letting himself in quietly in case his mother was napping. He should have known better.

“You are home,
mal’chik
?” Her voice was raspy from illness, from bad lungs, from many years of smoking thick Russian cigarettes with no filters. She once told him that it was easy to forgive him his addiction to drugs—she had possessed her own.

“Da, Mutti,” he murmured. “Was a good take,” he said, coming into the living room. His mother loved children’s movies as much as he did—

she was watching
The Iron Giant
on their DVD player. It always surprised him to see her so gaunt, wearing a brightly flowered turban to hide the spotted, bald skin of her scalp. Her hair had once been ash blonde—from a bottle as she aged, yes, but he had seen pictures. When she had been young, it had been thick and healthy and very pretty. So had she. Now, not so much—she was merely a bag of bones hiding under the afghan she had crocheted herself. She had once had the sort of energy that would fill a room.

“That is good,” she said tiredly. “One more weekend closer to Mexico, da?”

Oh God, he fervently hoped so. He hadn’t had the nerve to count the money he hid in his sock drawer after his work at the Renaissance Faires.

It would be such a near thing.

“Of course, Mutti,” he said out loud. He had called the travel agency and spoken to her doctors. Everybody had okayed the trip; all he needed was the money. “You just need to live that long—the doctors said it should not be a problem for a tough old cat-woman like you. Listen to them. They are very wise.”

“Phfaw!” Ylena pushed away the notion with her withered hand, the gesture giving a hint to the elegance she had once possessed. “I will live until you have found a woman to care for you. Get off your fat lazy ass and start looking,
mal’chik.
I will be a medical miracle at the rate at which you are doing it, and that could be exhausting.”

“I think I shall remain a lover of men,” Mikhail said archly, coming to give her a kiss on the cheek. “If it will keep you alive, it will be well worth it.”

“I do not mind the men in your bed,” Ylena said with a sigh, accepting his kiss. “But they will not care for you. Could you not at least pretend to like a pretty girl, so she could cook for you?”

“If it will make you happy, Mama, I will look, just for you,” he murmured, kissing her cheek again and hugging her frail shoulders with as much strength as he dared. It was an empty promise; they both knew it.

Ylena fretted, though, that he would be alone when she was gone. She had invested so much of her life into him—she wanted to know he was cared for when it was no longer her task. Mikhail no longer had the strength to argue with her about whether he liked men or women. His mother would always love him, but believing he would someday marry and be cared for eased her mind, and that was what he cared for now.

“Pfaw!” she exclaimed again. “You smell,
mal’chik.
Go shower, then come eat the food the girl left. She was a very nice girl. You should see her.”

Mikhail laughed tiredly. “Yes, Mutti. I’ll think about that.” With that, he took his pack into his bedroom and emptied out his clothes into the hamper. His regular Faire clothes would wash just fine with the rest of his laundry, but the new black shirt would need to be soaked in the sink with some vinegar or it would stain all his other clothes.

Without thinking, Mikhail took it from the pile and held it to his nose. The scented oil was still there, but it smelled like him now and not Shane. Regretfully he set it back down next to the hamper to wash. Then he rummaged in his camping pack and came up with the leather pouch from his belt. Carefully he pulled out the vial of scented oil and the little scrap of paper with Shane’s numbers on it. The numbers were in his phone now—he could throw the paper away.

With fingers that were calm and still, he opened the plain cedar box on his dresser—one of the few adornments in the room, which mostly featured his laptop and a number of posters of his favorite musicians.

Inside it were inconsequential things, things he rarely ran his fingers over or thought of. It was like the box inside his heart, only real, and he rarely opened that one, either.

With reverence, he placed the glass vial in one of the little alcoves at the top—for a woman, it would be for earrings, and since his ear was pierced, he had a few of those too. But this one was bigger, and it fit the vial very well. The number he kept folded and simply laid on top so it Making Promises

would be there when the box was opened. He looked at the inside of the box for a moment and then pulled the vial out, uncorked the tiny stopper, and spread a little bit of oil on the velveteen. When that was done, he lowered his head, closed his eyes, and inhaled gently.

Shane. Yes. There he was, inside the cedar box.

Keeping his mind carefully clear of betraying words, Mikhail replaced the vial to its place of honor, made sure a fold of the paper was weighted by an earring post so it would not fly away, and closed the lid.

He moved slowly as he went to wash that smell off his skin.

What others may want for free… I’ll work for your love

“I’ll Work For Your Love”—Bruce Springsteen

SHANE’S first thought on Monday was that he absolutely could
not
call Mikhail immediately, or he would scare the man screaming back to Russia with his neediness and devotion.

His second thought was to wonder who in the hell was pounding his door down at six- thirty in the morning when he didn’t have to go in until ten and why the damned dogs weren’t throwing themselves at the door threatening to eat the fucker.

He stumbled out of bed in his sleep shorts and not much else, throwing off cats with the covers, and waded through furry bodies, tripping over the little one on the end before throwing open the door.

Deacon was standing on his porch in sweats and a T-shirt and running shoes. The guy took one look at Shane’s gooey eyes and bare feet and said, “You forgot, didn’t you.”

Oh yeah. Shane closed his eyes and said, “
Fuuuuuuccccckkkkkk…

shit, Deacon—come in, have some water or something. Let me put on my running gear, and I’ll be out in a minute.”

“No worries.” Deacon followed him in and while Shane disappeared down the hall, made himself busy by rubbing silky ears and being licked to death by the fearless warriors who had apparently decided he was their god.

Deacon had that effect on people.

As Shane threw on his clothes, the dinner conversation from the night before ran through his brain.
A little late to remember this now, you
think? Quit bitching and find your fucking running shorts, asshole.

Deacon had been the one to suggest it. When he’d come out to get Shane’s key (which he now had a copy of) and to learn about the animals, he’d noted that if they cut through the fields behind their properties, Shane’s house was less than a mile away.

Shane hadn’t thought about it, really—by road they were nearly five miles apart, and he sat on about six acres of spread-out land. Apparently Deacon
had
thought about it—he had a riding mower and had spent a part of his weekend carving a nice little path through the tall grasses between the two houses. After dinner, Deacon asked Shane if he wanted to go running in the mornings, since he could warm up on the way to Shane’s and Shane could cool down on the way back from Deacon’s.

“All the better for him to torture someone else,” Crick had said sourly, passing behind Deacon on his way to the sink with dishes. Deacon had reached a casual hand behind him and brushed Crick’s thigh as he passed, limping slightly on his bad leg and balancing the dishes on his good arm. A light bulb had popped up in Shane’s head.

Crick wouldn’t be up to running after his injuries. He had gotten back up on a horse over the summer and could spend some time riding them, but he was still struggling to work them with his body not up to one hundred percent.

“I’ll still be torturing you,” Deacon said mildly. “But this way I won’t get fat while I’m doing it.”

Crick dropped the dishes in the sink with a clatter, walked deliberately up to Deacon, and swatted him in the back of the head.

“
That
is the most piss stupid thing I’ve ever heard anyone say ever.” He stalked away, grumbling, and Deacon looked at Shane a little sheepishly.

“Don’t look at me,” Shane said, holding up his hands. “I happen to agree with him!” Deacon had put on weight since Shane had first arrived, it was true, but fat was at least sixty pounds away.

“Does that mean you don’t want to go running?” Deacon asked, blushing.

“Didn’t say that!” Shane usually went running on the high school track a couple of times a week. It was lonely and it was boring, but it let him eat chicken-cheese-mayonnaise casserole (which is what Benny had cooked that night) with impunity. Having a running buddy on the country back roads sounded like a definite improvement over lonely and boring any day.

“Good. I’ll see you at six thirty sharp,” Deacon told him, standing up from the table. “Now I gotta go make nice with Crick.”

“Making nice” had taken about fifteen minutes, and when he came back, Shane and Jeff had managed the dishes, and Deacon confirmed their running time. He’d asked Jeff if he wanted to join them, but Jeff had held up his hands in horror.

“Oh honey, no! I do what all metropolitan gay men do—I go to the gym!”

And that had been that.

Shane had come home, fed the dogs, coddled the cats, and fought for sleep for over an hour, trying to figure out the best way to approach Mikhail without scaring him off. He was obviously afraid of big animals—Shane had to try to be the bull in the china shop of the man’s sensibilities, and that’s all there was to it.

And now here he was, pulling his running gear out of his ass and hopping into his shoes as he hobbled down the hall. Deacon looked up from his position on the floor. He was seriously in danger of being loved to death by the dogs, who hardly noticed when Shane skidded in.

“I told you, no worries,” Deacon said, squinting. “We’ve got time.” Shane flushed. “Yeah, but I forgot, and I feel like an asshole. Why don’t you have a dog?”

Deacon shrugged and stood with a reluctant tug on Sophie’s ears.

(Sophie was a Labradoodle—her ears were pretty addictive as fondling material, Shane had to admit.)

“Too many horses. Wouldn’t mind a dog—they’re reliable. Remind me of Crick.”

Shane had to smile as he tied his shoe in a double knot. Of course, for Deacon, all good things came back to Crick.

“How’d you two make nice last night?” he asked awkwardly, and then could have kicked himself when Deacon looked at him sideways and smirked.

“Didn’t figure you for the type to want details.” Shane grimaced and turned red, and Deacon smirked some more—

and turned red too. “I was just wondering, you know….”

“I told him that I liked to run,” Deacon said, turning away and trotting out the entryway. By some miracle, the dogs stayed put, and Shane thought seriously about asking Crick if Deacon would want a puppy for Christmas. The shelter knew him on a first-name basis by now, and it seemed a shame to waste all that mojo on Shane’s dogs alone.

“And…?” Shane stopped at the rail to stretch. He wasn’t twenty anymore, or even twenty-seven. He would, in fact, be thirty-two this coming year—and he needed to catch up to where Deacon was, warm-up wise.

Deacon looked at him patiently and did his own warm-up stretches, just to keep him company, Shane was sure—the guy had already done a mile just to get there.

“And Crick is always telling me I should want things for myself.