Winter Ball (13 page)

“Hi. My boss sent me here with some Theraflu for you. He’s worried you won’t make it home either.” She handed him a big steaming mug with the company logo on the outside and hopefully a whole lot of super drugged-up goodness on the inside.

“I can take him home,” Carpenter said easily. “I’ll call his boyfriend too.”

Skip paused right before he sipped and looked at Carpenter in surprise, but the nice woman who really didn’t look like his mother at all was striding off already, and Carpenter was looking at him with gentle understanding.

Skip sipped his Theraflu for a few moments, not able to answer that soft, insistent stare.

“This is really working,” he said after a little while. “I can probably finish out my shift and get myself home.” Oh God. He could
breathe
again.

“So I shouldn’t call Richie?” Carpenter said levelly, and Skip risked a glance up.

Carpenter was just… waiting. Not judgy or anything, just waiting.

“I’ll text him when I get home,” Skip said, trying to laugh it off. His head still hurt, and his stomach, and his hands felt shaky as hell. He was still sick—the medicine hadn’t changed that, it had just made it easier to function.

He was going to have to get him some of that, and he was already planning what to buy.

Right as soon as Carpenter stopped waiting.

“You could have told me,” Carpenter said at last, sighing and making to go back to his own cubicle, where an entire row of lights was blinking for him.

“It just happened,” Skip said, surprising himself. “Right before Halloween. It’s… you know.” He laughed humorlessly. “My gentleman caller knows. Richie and me….”

Carpenter grimaced and looked back at him. “You and Richie are still figuring shit out,” he said astutely.

Skip’s face heated even beyond the fever. “You’re very smart,” he said.

Carpenter nodded and smiled, some of the tension easing from the air. “And you’re the only person who’s ever treated me like that,” he said. “If you ever need a friend—”

“I know where you work.” Skipper managed a smile and a wink.

Carpenter gave him a thumbs-up and picked up his phone, and barely, Skip made it through work.

He stopped and picked up some Theraflu on the way home, and some NyQuil, and some green tea and some cider vinegar and some plain old Advil. His head was already aching as he walked through the door, and he groaned. He’d been planning on going running that night, since Richie sort of threw his workout regimen into disarray, and he hated calling in sick. He figured he’d hunker down, drug himself, go to bed, and hopefully wake up the next day feeling better.

He lay under the covers shivering for a while, hoping the medicine would take effect eventually, petting Hazel until drool caught in her smoky black cat beard and texting Richie. Every now and then he fell asleep between texts, and when he woke up Richie would be asking him why he wasn’t keeping up with their show.

Sorry. Falling asleep.

It’s only eight o’clock!

Too much good exercise this weekend. *leer*

Fine.

Did I tell you that guy called today? He thought I was sick and was actually really nice. Sent his secretary down with tea and everything.

His phone rang.

“He sent his secretary down with tea?” Richie asked sharply.

“Yeah,” Skip said, hoping his meds had kicked in and he didn’t sound pathetic. “It was nice. Carpenter got me a company jacket. Don’t worry. I was just going to go to sleep early and I’ll be fine in the morning.”

“He didn’t try to hit on you again?” Richie said, sounding grumpy.

“Mostly he just said I was a nice guy who put up with him and then asked if my girlfriend was taking care of me.”

“What did you say?” Richie asked, sounding upset and curious at the same time.

God, Skip’s head hurt. He had no subterfuge in him. “I said my boyfriend couldn’t take care of me until Friday, so don’t worry.”

“’Til
Friday
!”

“Richie, don’t sweat it!” Skip said sharply. “Look, man. My head hurts, and some sort of night thing I took is making me loopy. I’m going to bed before I start seeing little green men, okay?”

“You call me in the morning and let me know how you are, okay?”

Skip smiled. This beat the hell out of the last time he was sick, before Carpenter started working at Tesko even. Skip was pretty sure back then he could have died in his bed and nobody would have noticed until soccer practice Thursday.

“I promise,” he slurred.

He fell asleep with the light on, curled around the phone. When he woke up at four in the morning, it was because his chest felt like a field of broken glass got married to a box of razor blades and the offspring sprouted in his lungs.

And there was an elephant standing on his head.

By the time Richie called him, he’d managed to drug himself enough to get out of the house, but Richie knew something was wrong. Lunch rolled around and all the drugs Skip took in the morning had a train wreck in his brain. Carpenter
drove
him home in the middle of the day because the Gentleman Caller called and Skip greeted him with “Tech’s Teeth, how can it smell you?” and then put him on hold.

The nice secretary came clipping down the stairs a few moments later with strict instructions not to let Skipper come back to Tesko before Monday.

After driving him home, Carpenter helped him out of his clothes and into bed, laughing gently with him the whole time. “Do we like purple, Skip? What’s our favorite color?”

“We like purple,” Skip said, thinking that sounded like
genius
and wondering where his phone bank was. “But not as much as orange. Richie’s hair is so…
orange
. We’re sleeping together. Isn’t that awesome?”

“Yeah, Skip. What’s really awesome is that you wouldn’t have told a soul if you weren’t sick!”

“I’m
sick
!” Skip told him, horrified. He was bending over, trying to untie his shoes, and then he realized that he’d slid out of them as soon as they’d gotten through the door without letting Hazel out. “I’m
sick
, and Richie can’t come until
Friday
.” He paused, not sure if he and Carpenter had gotten this far. “I’m gay, Clay.” He giggled. “Gay Clay. Good thing
you’re
not gay, or that name would
stick
!”

Carpenter grunted. “Yeah, like I didn’t hear
that
enough in grade school. But I’m glad to hear it from you. How’s it feel?”

Skip tried to consider, but he was wobbling on his feet next to his bed. He liked his bed. It had brass rails on it. So shiny.

“Feels good,” he said, trying to take the gay thing seriously. “Would feel better with Richie.
Everything
feels better with Richie.”

Big broad hands maneuvered him until he was climbing into bed on all fours like a little kid. He got there, facing the far side, and then fell flat and wiggled until his head was up top and his feet were at the bottom.

“How’s Richie feel about it?” Carpenter asked, covering him with his comforter.

“Richie hates it,” Skip said glumly. “This blanket is so soft! I should get another one.”

“I’ll get it,” Carpenter said, still so gentle. “Why does Richie hate it?”

“Richie likes
me
!” Skip clarified, his eyes closing. “But the gay thing is a scary word. Scary scary scary. Richie’s dad is scary. His stepbrothers are scary. Me, I’m not scary. Don’t want to be scary. It’s all so….”

“Scary,” Carpenter muttered, holding his hand to Skip’s head. “Jesus, Skip, for as stoned as you are, you should not be this hot. Do you have a thermometer?”

“In the cupboard,” Skip said.

“Frozen vegetables?”

“In the freezer. Why?”

“No reason. I’ll panic after the thermometer.”

Carpenter disappeared, and Skip lost time.

When he gained time, Carpenter and Richie were having a knockdown drag-out catfight in his kitchen.

Skip lay there in the peace of his bedroom and stroked Hazel, who was curling near his head without pets, so he
must
be sick.

“We’re not putting frozen peas under his armpits!” Richie yelled. “And we’re
not
taking him to the doctor’s. That place probably made him sick in the first place.”

“No, what made him sick in the first place was running around without a jacket in the rain, Richie. I’m telling you, 103 is a bad thing in an adult—”

“But not for Skip,” Richie said, his voice coming down a little. “About three years ago he got sick and the guys from the soccer team came over and took turns with him. He told us he’d spiked fevers since he was a kid.”

Oh yeah! “I’d forgotten that,” Skip told Hazel. “They
were
here that time. That’s nice. I mean, they won’t come again, but it was nice of them to come that one time.”

“What?” Richie said, coming in from the kitchen. “Skip, did you need anything?”

“I’d forgotten,” Skip said simply, smiling at him. Oh, he looked good. His hair was in fabulous disarray from the rain, and he still had the metal brace on his nose, and the black eyes, but still, he looked like an angel from heaven. “I’d forgotten that the soccer team came over that time. I just remember lying here, feeling all alone.” Everything hurt. His head, his joints, his throat, his ears. But Richie was
right there
. “Not all alone,” he said, happy in spite of the misery. “You’re here. And Carpenter too.” He stroked Hazel. “Isn’t that nice, Hazel?”

Hazel drooled and purred in one of her “Gee, it’s good to be a house cat!” moments.

Richie came and sat next to Skip’s bed and stroked back his sweaty hair. “You’re really hot,” he said quietly. “I can see why Carpenter freaked out. But the peas under the arms and the thighs—that’s just….”

Skip shivered. “That would fuckin’
hurt
,” he said with feeling. “Maybe just on the wrists. I think Jefferson did that. Was that Jefferson? Someone did that.”

“That was me, you big moo,” Richie said, laughing a little. “You… you kept asking for me. The guys figured since you and me were pretty tight, I should do most of the nursing. They didn’t know I wanted you to notice me so bad.”

Skip looked at him through sandy eyes. “I did,” he assured. “I… I’d never been team captain before. You just kept telling everybody I could do it. I didn’t want to let you down. That’s how I became Skipper, I guess.”

Richie leaned over and kissed his temple, worry clear on his face as he did so. “We’ll put the frozen food on your wrists and ankles, ’kay?”

“You’ll be nice to Carpenter, right?” Skip said anxiously. “He knows.”

Yeah, that was right, wasn’t it! Carpenter knew the big gay secret, and he didn’t seem to care.

“He’s pissed you didn’t tell him earlier,” Richie said, rubbing a rough thumb on Skip’s jaw. “I tried to tell him we didn’t know.”

Skip suddenly wondered, in the strange lucidity of fever dream, how true that was.

“You ever think we knew?” he asked. “You ever think that just that once, we couldn’t bear not knowing anymore?”

Richie closed his eyes and kissed Skipper’s cheek. “Yeah, why not? I can’t bear not knowing anymore. We’ll go with that. Hang tight, Skip. We’re going frozen food on your ass, okay?”

“Yeah. Thanks for the mushed-up peas….” Skip giggled to himself, and Richie sighed.

A few minutes later, Skip was just trying not to cry with the discomfort of that much cold on his wrists and ankles, and only the thought of that stuff shoved up in his armpits made him whimper and deal.

An hour later, his fever was down to 101.5, and Carpenter let out a ragged whoop of relief.

“That’s awesome,” he said, slumping down on a kitchen chair that he’d dragged into the bedroom. “Man, I saw us dragging him into the hospital and shit getting dire—”

“No hospitals,” Skip said, remembering Richie’s argument that he’d probably caught the bug while in the hospital. It was definitely possible. But worse than that…. “The guys would come visit in a hospital,” Skip said, feeling lucid for the first time in two days. “And I apparently babble.”

Next to him, Richie started to giggle. “Apparently babble? Is that what you said? You apparently babble?”

From his limp sprawl on the chair, Carpenter started to laugh too. “Yeah… did you hear that? He babbles! Who knew!”

Skip closed his eyes against them. “You two are making me tired,” he said with dignity. And then he fell asleep.

He woke up in four hours, his fever spiking again, and Richie was there to give him meds and ice his extremities.

“Where’s Carpenter?” Skip slurred. “Good guy. Needs to play soccer more often. You’ll let him play soccer when they take me away, right?”

“Where you going?” Richie asked, sounding tired and distracted. Well, it
was
three in the morning. “And Carpenter went home. He’ll be taking my spot in the morning.”

“Mm…,” Skip acknowledged. “And I’ll be going to the gay league. They have to have a gay league for soccer, right? If they don’t let us play in the rec league?”

Skip was lying on his back, the bags of vegetables on his wrists and ankles, while he stared at his ceiling and tried to make understandable patterns of his life from what he saw there.

Richie bustled around the room, cleaning the thermometer, replacing the tissues, grabbing the refillable water bottle, probably to fill it with water. He stopped all the activity to squint at Skipper.

“Why in the hell would
you
be going to a gay league when
I
would still be in rec league?” he asked.

Skipper gazed at him unhappily. All this time together and no sex. Being sick sucked. “Because I’m the one who outed us,” he said, thinking it was reasonable. “I didn’t mean to tell Carpenter. I don’t want your dad to know and stop talking to you. I just want you to be able to stay during the week. So I get to go to gay league. Everyone at work knows I’m gay. You can stay in rec league. Nobody needs to know about you.”

Richie shook his head. “Don’t move,” he muttered. He came back with a full bottle of cool water and more meds. “Here. Baby, sit up.”