If I Must Lane Page 4

  Ian tilted his head, like he was listening to faraway music. “You… you translate, don’t you? You suppress your accent. Why do you do that?”

  Joel shrugged and let his accent coat his voice when he spoke next. “I don’t know, Ee. You get told, you know? They tell you not to sound Mexican or you not get no job. It’s called ‘code-switching’, you just know, you talk Mexican at home and white at school.”

  “But you don’t talk- speak ‘Mexican’ at home.” Ian sounded hurt, and Joel couldn’t figure out why.

  Joel shrugged, wishing he’d pressed “play” so he could get lost in the movie instead. “Unless I’m talking to someone else who speaks Spanish, or I’m at home, I just… I’m just comfortable speaking like this, you know?”

  “Oh.” With that little word, Ian stood up and moved down the hall, and Joel wondered again what he’d done wrong.

  “Ian, hey, Ee? What’s the matter?” Joel caught up with him in the hallway in front of his room. Ian stopped, and Joel stopped short, arrested by the Ian’s hurt, shiny eyes in the dark. “What?” he asked, kidding, “you not like me anymore ’cause I’m Mex?”

  “That’s not funny,” Ian said softly.

  “Then what, pappi?” The endearment came so naturally. He’d been fighting it for months, and now, in the forced intimacy of the dark, it sounded like what he’d wanted to call Ian since they’d met.

  “I thought this was your home.” Ian swallowed and then looked away. “Forget it. I’m being stupid. Let’s go finish the movie. I’ve never seen it before.”

  Joel chuffed out a sigh, and they were standing close enough for Ian to close his eyes from the passage of their breath. He put what he thought was a companionable hand on Ian’s shoulder and squeezed. “Tell you what, Ee. I won’t fight it here, okay? I can’t promise I’ll suddenly sound like I do in my Mommy’s kitchen, but I won’t fight it. It might be sort of a mindfuck, you know. I could suddenly start swearing in Spanish and blow your mind.”

  Ian grinned then, and as always, the expression made Joel’s stomach do a little drop-flutter. He sort of just… forgot… that he’d been touching Ian for longer than American male protocols strictly called for.

  Ian leaned closer. “You’re too good for me, mate,” he said softly, and Joel’s heart thumped in his ears. Ian was wearing a T-shirt tonight—surprise!—but it had been warm, and they’d worked quickly getting the house ready, and he smelled like clean sweat. Like Ian. Earthy, warm, real. Human and kind.

  “You’re a good man, Ian,” Joel rasped. Ian’s face was looming a little nearer, and he was close enough that their chests brushed, and his skin buzzed in anticipation of more contact. Joel closed his eyes and breathed in that earthy, human smell, and he was disappointed when Ian’s warmth suddenly disappeared.

  He opened his eyes and Ian was laughing self-consciously; his smile was the goofy one that said he was laughing at himself because he knew he wasn’t like everybody else.

  “I’m sorry. I know, I know, I probably smell like monkey ass.”

  Joel gasped out a laugh and opened his mouth to say what? To say “No, you’re actually really turning me on?” To deny the monkey-ass thing and tell him they should go watch the movie?

  The fact was, Joel had no idea what he would have said, and right then their little motion-sensitive ghost thing went off, and the last group of kids for the night called out “Trick-or-treat!” from the landing.

  Joel’s hands roamed his own body. His chest buzzed from the remembered contact, his hand tingled from where the heat of Ian’s shoulder had warmed it. His nipples were pointy and sensitive under his pinching fingers.

  His cock was hard enough to joust with.

  His eyes were closed, and in his mind’s eye, he’d stopped Ian, he’d buried his nose in Ian’s throat and breathed deep and licked the skin of his neck. In his mind he pushed Ian back against the wall and ground up against him, tangling his hands in that blond halo of curls and pulling Ian’s puzzled, open face down to his in the dark and opening his mouth for their kiss.

  In real life, he grasped his prick so hard the head was purple and the skin of his palm was skating on pre-come. His thumb came up to smear the thickness of the pre-come over the sensitive head and around the crown, and in his mind, Ian had whirled him around and against the wall and was grinding up against Joel too. In fact, he’d worked his hand down Joel’s jeans and was fumbling for a good hold, a firm grasp, and a stroke so rough it was almost painful—

  Joel gasped and spattered a thick jet of come up against the inside of his underwear and along his stomach and over his chest under the covers. His eyes opened in the dark of his old room, and what he’d been thinking and doing hit his arousal zones, and he shot again and again and again.

  He stopped, gasping, suppressing a groan, panting in the narrow light, so in awe of what he’d imagined to happen that when his cell phone went off next to his bed, it was all he could do not to jump and scream.

  Ian’s voice on the other end of the phone was so welcome, it made him hard all over again.

  “Ee?” Joel murmured, wondering if Ian could hear the sex in his voice. Oh God, what if he could? What if he didn’t want it? A thought intruded on Joel’s panic: maybe Ian had wanted Joel all along? When Ian started speaking though, he sounded so lost that all of Joel’s designs on his roommate’s body faded away.

  “I had to leave her at the vet’s, Joel,” Ian said, obviously upset. “They said she was old, and they didn’t know what they could do for her, and…” deep, shuddering breath, and the obvious suppression of a little boy sob, “… and we may have to put her down tomorrow. I- I just came home and sat, and there’s no one here, you know?”

  Oh God. “I know, Ian. Look, pappi, I tell you what. I’m getting my laptop right now. I’ll find a flight out tomorrow, right?”

  An audible sniff. “Joel, no, that’s wrong. You’re home with your family. I can’t ask you to just ditch out on them for this idiotic albatross you put up with for cheap rent—”

  “Shut up, Ian!” Joel snapped, anger washing over him even as he pulled out his laptop and booted up. “Shut up. I’m with my family, sure, but you’re my home, Ee. You got to know that, right, pappi? You, that damned cat, no worries, right?”

  Another sniff, this one sounding relieved. “You’ll never get a flight out. It’s some sort of holiday, you know?”

  “Yeah, Ee,” Joel replied dryly. “I know. You sit tight. I’ll be out by tomorrow, I promise.”

  Chapter Four

  Melody looked at Joel in bemusement. “Well, that was a damned fool promise to make, estupido! It’s Thanksgiving. Have you not noticed all the damned planes is full? And it’s snowing. It’s not like they gonna get any less full, you know?”

  Joel tried not to roll his eyes. He’d changed his clothes and showered, but the lapse of time hadn’t done anything to make the ticket situation on the computer look any better.

  “Look, Mel, I don’t know what else to tell you. Ian has to put the damned cat down, and the cat was the only reason I thought I could leave him alone in the first place.”

  Melody put her hands on her hips. “Is this the roommate that’s only your friend?”

  “No, Mel,” Joel snapped, a little desperate. “This is the roommate that I’m totally in love with and I’m afraid for, because all he has in the world is me and a soon-to-be-dead cat! And I’m too stupid to hold on to him, and did I mention the dying cat?”

  His face felt taut and cold, and he tried to tell himself that he was overstating things, but he couldn’t. If only…. Ian had needed to know that, if nothing else, Joel would always come home. Even if they weren’t going to be lovers, even if they were never meant to be lovers, Joel had become home to Ian, he’d become time, he’d become Ian’s anchor to reality, and he’d just- just left. Without a “I love you, man,” without a “Look, you know I’m coming back,” without even letting his guard down, even a little, and telling him face to face, “Take care of yourse
lf for me, pappi. You what I’m coming home to, okay?”

  Mel put her hand on Joel’s shoulder and interrupted what he dimly realized was a full-out spin into panic.

  “Easy, Joey,” she murmured. “No worries, right? My ticket, it’s for tomorrow night. I stop in Sacramento. I’ll spend the day trying to get a flight from Sacto to L.A. right?”

  “It shouldn’t be too hard,” Joel said out of a dry throat. “There’s a lot of commuter flights in and out. You should be good.”

  “Yeah,” Mel said, giving him a long hug and a laugh. “Wait ’til I tell the girls at work my brother is gay. I swear, my coolness will shoot up like a rocket!”

  “Yeah,” Joel muttered into his sister’s shoulder, “you got cooler the minute I was born.”

  “I knew that, pappi. You know I did.”

  * * *

  Joel called Ian in the morning and told him when his flight arrived. He called him from the airport and told him when it left and how long it would be in the air. He called when he landed, and Ian answered, “I know you’re here, mate. I’m at the baggage carousel, waiting for your shit.”

  He sounded happy, Joel thought. He hoped it was true; he’d feel like a first-class asshole if he’d stolen his sister’s ticket and left his mother’s home early for a guy who wouldn’t even notice he was there.

  But any doubts he would have had faded away when he saw Ian, slouching near the back of the baggage carousel, looking towards Joel’s gate.

  Joel had the curious sensation of the chaos of the airport fading to a dull swish in his ears, and suddenly, the only person in the world was Ian. He was unaware that he was trotting at all possible speed, dodging luggage, children, and reuniting families, just so he could get there and see Ian smile.

  It was blinding.

  Their hug went on longer than was probably appropriate, but Joel didn’t give a ripe shit, not when Ian was there, warm, needing, and grateful.

  They released, but Ian kept his arms around Joel’s back, and Joel didn’t pull away. “You know,” he said, looking somewhere else, “you didn’t have to do that. You did tell your sister thank you for me?”

  “Tell her yourself. She’s sleeping on the couch for Christmas,” Joel said with a soft smile.

  Ian blinked, befuddled. “Why would she want to do that?” he asked. Together they saw Joel’s bag and moved toward it, Ian’s arm still looped around Joel’s shoulders. Joel refused to comment about the arm. Ian’s casual touch was sustaining him, anchoring him to the world, making all those revelations he’d had about Ian when he was alone in his child’s bed seem real and solid and true.

  “I’ll tell you later,” Joel said, hoping that by then, Ian would still want it to be true. Ian snagged his bag—those amazing muscles managing the entire case without benefit of wheels—and together they headed outside and across the street to Ian’s little Prius.

  When they’d loaded up, Ian hesitated for a minute before turning the keys in the ignition.

  “How’s Manky Bastard?” Joel asked quietly into the silence. It was the one thing Ian hadn’t talked about, and the one thing Joel was pretty sure he knew the answer to.

  “In a vase on the mantel,” Ian replied, his voice catching.

  Joel put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “I’m sorry, pappi. I’m sorry she had to die. I’m really sorry it had to be when I was gone.”

  Ian nodded, looking determinedly to outside his window. “It wasn’t your fault,” he said softly. “I just… I just hope, you know… you don’t… you won’t think….” Ian looked at him, helplessly, waving his hands and sniffling, wiping his face on the back of his hands and looking embarrassed about that.

  “Ian—”

  “I took care of her, Joel. I can take care of another one, honest! I can take care of myself, I swear. I just don’t want you to….” He trailed off, and Joel unbuckled his seatbelt and turned, grabbing Ian’s shoulders and shaking him a little.

  “Ian… pappi, you need to calm down. I know you can take care of yourself. I know you took care of her. Why is this so important? You’re not—” Oh Christ! This thought didn’t even bear thinking about but he had to say it anyway. “You’re not thinking, you know, that you don’t need a roommate no more, are you?”

  Ian shook his head. “No, no, mate. I’m just worried….” Ian’s face crumpled like a little kid’s and suddenly he was sobbing in Joel’s arms. “I just thought the only reason you stayed was because of the caaaaaaaaattt….”

  In spite of himself, Joel found he was laughing quietly into Ian’s hair. “No, Ian. No. I’m not leaving, I promise, pappi. You can’t shake me that easy. Shhh. Shhhh.”

  Ian pulled himself together eventually, but not before Joel got a wonderful muscular armload of despondent Aussie genius.

  “I’m sorry,” Ian sniffled, wiping his face on his shoulder and pulling on his belt again. “You’re going to think I’m some sort of hormonal poofty queen. I’m not like this. I- I think the only times I’ve ever cried in my life are around you.”

  “Lucky me,” Joel said softly, meaning it. “Look, Ee, let’s get home, eh? I’m tired, I been stuck in that tin-can most half of the day, and I probably smell like monkey ass. I want to sit on the couch witchu, talk some.” He wanted to lean on him, stroke his chest, kiss his blond, stubbled cheek, feel his heart under a circling palm. “You know,” Joel finished weakly, “reconnect, right, pappi?”

  “Joel?” Ian said, after he’d started the car and maneuvered to the freeway on ramp.

  “Yeah, Ee?”

  “You know you’re wearin’ your accent on your sleeve, right, mate?”

  “That’s ’cause I’m home witchu, pappi. Don’t ever doubt it.”

  The twenty-minute ride home was pretty quiet after that, the rain that had threatened the skies as Joel landed staving off until they arrived. Eventually Joel was bathed, wearing a pair of sweats and an old T-shirt, and sitting on the couch with a new afghan his mom had sent home with him. Ian grabbed him a soda from the fridge (Joel had taken pains to not keep any beer in there) and sat down on the opposite end of the couch. Together they looked at the little black vase over the mantle on the purple colored wall, and Joel nudged Ian with his bare toe.

  “Can I say I’m sorry again?”

  “No,” Ian replied with a self-deprecating smile. “I might cry again, and that would suck for us both, now wouldn’t it?”

  “Can I tell you I’m really glad to be home?” Joel poked Ian’s thigh again and was rewarded when Ee slid his long-fingered hand up Joel’s calf.

  “I’m glad you’re back.” Ian’s gaze—that spring-blue, wild-sky gaze—was suddenly very sharp and very focused on Joel, sitting back in his worn T-shirt and his gray sweats. Outside, the rainstorm that had threatened since Joel got off the plane suddenly spattered the windows, and Ian looked away from Joel’s searching eyes and turned that way.

  “It threatens to get nasty out there,” he said inanely.

  “No worries, pappi. All we need to do in the next two days is go get milk tomorrow. I got all of Thanksgiving in the cupboards. I even bought some new placemats and napkins and shit.”

  Ian’s next look was simple and direct, pure and full of gratitude. “It sounds nice, but you know. Why? I- I’m dying to have Thanksgiving with you. And Christmas, too, if you must know the truth, but why? You take such good care of me, and I can’t even keep….” He looked up at the mantel, and they both knew how he’d finish that sentence.

  If Joel had expected Ian to simply pick up on all his unspoken cues, he’d been living with the wrong man for the last five months. With a sigh, he swung his legs over, sat up, and then moved in closer to Ian than they usually sat. “I like taking care of you, Ee,” he said into the rain-spattered quiet. “I like knowing you’re going to be happy. I like knowing I’m, you know, your anchor to the world.”

  “I’m a colossal asshole, brother. I’ve got all this high-level shit in my head, and nothing real,” Ian said, rolling his ey
es at himself, but Joel wouldn’t listen to that.

  “No, no, Ee. You’re amazing. You’re smart, and you’re funny. You’ve got a heart as big as the sky, you know that? You don’t need a roommate. You just took me in ’cause I liked the apartment—”

  “I took you in because I wanted to get in your pants,” Ian supplied crossly, and Joel’s grin made Ian blink.

  “Yeah? You never made a move!”

  Ian shrugged. “You don’t swing that way. And besides…” Ian looked at his bedroom, with its king-sized bed and it’s jumbo cluttered computer desk, and then he looked back, meeting Joel’s eyes with a resigned expression. “Everybody I slept with ran away in the morning. I- I’d do almost anything to keep you from running away.”

  Oh God. Joel leaned close and rubbed his thumb on Ian’s lean bottom lip. “Brother, I’ve got news for you,” he said quietly, hoping he could treasure the awestruck, worshipful expression on Ian’s face forever.

  “Yeah?” Ian leaned closer, and Joel could smell him underneath shampoo and deodorant and… was that cologne? It didn’t matter. He still smelled earthy and human and real.

  “I do swing that way. And I just invited my sister to stay with us for Christmas so she could meet you and make sure you were worth her plane ticket. I have no intention of running away from you, Ee.”

  “Why would she want to meet me?” Ian asked, and he was close enough to bump noses with, so Joel did, rubbing the smooth part of his cheek along Ian’s stubbled one, feeling the silk of Ian’s breath on his face.

  “Because I love you, and she wants to welcome you to the family.” It was bold. It was probably insane. But it was the truth, and if Ian kicked him out for it now, Joel would know it was never meant to be.

  Ian kissed him.

  Their lips met, met again, and Joel opened his mouth, letting Ian inside. He tasted like Dr Pepper and… and just like Ian. All of that joy, all of the kindness, all of the earthy humanity, all there on Joel’s tongue for the tasting.