SIXTEEN

 

Watching Stephen, Will had never quite been able to be sure. Should he tell him about Jack, about his other father? Will had always had a close eye on his son, and he had seen how he suffered because of only having one parent. Will had done his best to fill the roles of both, but one man could only do so much.

Even a year ago, Will probably would have taken the risk. Jack had seemed sincere enough, and it was probably pretty arrogant to assume that Jack wanted something more from Will than friendship. Will had, after all, made it pretty clear that that wasn’t going to happen, and he was more than capable of continuing to do so.

But this wasn’t last year. It was now. And Stephen had friends, was involved in the church, and generally seemed to be doing much better than he had been for quite a while. He had put down roots in this sleepy little town and seemed less generally discontent than he had been before.

And nowhere did he seem happier than in the church. Although Will could try to deny it, it was undoubtedly true. And Will couldn’t even say that he wasn’t the same way, not because of the church itself but because of who was there.

For a while now, he had allowed Sheila to do as she so obviously wanted and pick Stephen up from choir practice. Her boy Jesse and Stephen were pretty much inseparable, and they enjoyed the extra time together. Plus it meant that Will could try to deny to himself what he already knew to be true. He wanted to be around Judah.

Maybe that was why he had quietly snuck in at the end of the choir practice, sitting in utter silence close to the door. They were practicing in the main part of the church, the sanctuary, Will was almost certain that Jack had called it. The part with the alter, and all of the pews.

It had been since Jack had last insisted that Will had been in a place like this, and he frowned slightly as he glanced around. It wasn’t his thing. He was a man of science. And yet, he couldn’t deny that there was something peaceful about this place. Even given the ruckus in the front, where Stephen was trying to wrangle a horde of kids of all ages, even given the noise and the laughing and the little snatches of song, it was sort of nice, sort of restful, just to sit here.

Judah’s presence was all through this place. Maybe that was it. Whatever it was, Will leaned back and let out a sigh, and as his eyes drifted from his son to Judah, who was sitting nearby with a small, fond little smile on his face as he looked at Stephen, the knots in his shoulders relaxed just a little bit.

Judah adored Stephen. Will could see it. He’d had, from time to time, someone who claimed to be interested in Stephen, but it had always sat poorly with Will because it had so obviously been a way of trying to get at Will. Most notably, Will could still remember a particularly assertive teacher that Stephen had had a few years ago, one who had claimed that she needed extra meetings with Will to discuss Stephen, although Stephen had been doing fine in class and hadn’t been creating any problems.

It had stopped when the woman had outright asked him out, and luckily, Will had been able to tell her the truth. He was gay, and when he bluntly laid that out for her, the meetings had stopped. There had been a few others, too, who had thought they could use a relationship with the son to get to the father.

Judah wasn’t like that. He didn’t even know that Will was there, and yet he was smiling at Stephen, encouraging him with raised eyebrows when the teenager looked over at him. In their own way, Judah and Stephen had a relationship just as strong as Will and Judah did, maybe stronger, since neither of them seemed to need to struggle to define it.

“Shit,” Will whispered, and then he was a little bit amused with himself, not only for actually cursing in a church but also for feeling guilty about it, after. But it seemed appropriate, because right there, watching his lover looking out after Will’s son, Will felt a strange chill deep inside the pit of him, one which had gripped his stomach for a long time, so long that it had become normal to him, start to ease up. Maybe even to melt a little bit.

Judah looked at Stephen the way a father would. And Stephen had never been so happy.

The practice broke up, and Will shook his head slightly, amused. It was, what, seven weeks to Christmas? Six and a half, actually, to be more accurate. And in that time, Judah was going to try to wrangle this group of children into something resembling a play. They definitely had their work cut out for them. The youth choir had been joined by what had to be every child over the age of five anywhere in the area.

Parents streamed forward to pick up their kids, and Will got up and joined the flow. As he did, he caught the startled glimpse of gray-blue eyes, like a diamond flash as they scanned him. At that moment, Judah became aware of him, and Will flushed a little and hoped that no one other than Judah was watching.

The three older kids, Stephen, Ruby, and Jesse, were standing close together, looking a little bit like islands in a sea of smaller children who flowed around them. Someone brushed against Will from behind, and Ben nodded his apologies to Will as he passed him.

“Dad!” Stephen pulled away from his friends and came over to him, which made Will smile a little bit. He had been deliberately trying to let Stephen go a little bit, to have more freedom, and it seemed to be paying off. There had been a time not so long ago when Stephen had seemed more resigned when he saw him than happy.

There was movement to the side of him, and somehow, without even knowing how he knew, Will was aware that it was Judah. Something in him seemed attuned to the beautiful young minister, like the hairs on that side of the body stood on end or something. Whatever it was, it was driving him to distraction.

“I’ll see you on Sunday,” Ben was saying to Judah, his arm slung casually around the girl. Will wasn’t quite sure what the relationship there was. Ben acted like her father, but she didn’t call him that. The family bonds, as far as Will had ever been able to figure out, were actually between Ruby and Ben’s husband Isaac, though even there Will wasn’t sure about the rest of the story.

Still, Ben seemed to be doing the job of father to that girl, and that was good enough for him.

“Hey, Stephen!”

Ruby’s elbow poked into Stephen’s side, and she looked at him meaningfully, in a way that Will might not understand but which filled him with foreboding nevertheless. It was justified, as he figured out about ten seconds later.

“Uh, Dad, do you think we could maybe go to church this Sunday, too?”

The boy glanced at Ruby as he spoke, and in that glance, Will saw a lot. The kid had a crush on her, which was as clear as day, and she obviously returned it. They were almost at the age where they might start dating if their affection carried on.

More than that, though, it got quite a bit more complicated. Behind Ruby, Jesse stood, and there was a strange look on his face that Will understood just a little bit too well. He had felt that unhappy smile tug down the corners of his own lips. The boy next door, Will remembered, had been deeply fascinating to Will, and that had been one of the first signs that Will had had that he just wasn’t into girls.

He remembered when the boy, he didn’t even remember his name now although he remembered his merry black eyes, had brought home a girl for the first time. He had watched, jealousy snapping along his nerves and clenching at his stomach, as they made out in the backyard.

How he had felt back then, that was how Jesse was feeling now, but his eyes weren’t fixed on Ruby. No, he was very obviously looking at Stephen, at his best friend, and Will’s heart broke for the poor boy. Will knew from experience that he had a hard road ahead of him.

But that wasn’t the whole issue, of course. Stephen was there, asking him to go to church in front of half the town, and this was exactly what Will had been afraid of when he’d given permission for Stephen to be involved in the church. Sheila, Ben, all of the children and a lot of the parents, they were all staring at him with varying levels of attention.

Judah was looking. Will was able to tell, even though he couldn’t let himself look into that pretty face, or he might just lose it.

“You’re certainly welcome,” Judah spoke, and Will refused to let his eyes even dart over to the other man. Not for a second. He felt like he was walking on a thin line indeed, and even one foot off could spell utter disaster.

“You can go, if you want, Stephen,” Will finally said, though he honestly hadn’t wanted even that before. But even he had to acknowledge that he couldn’t control his son’s spiritual feelings. He might have wanted different things for him, but then, Judah was a deeply religious man and that hadn’t turned out so badly for him. “Come on, kiddo. It’s late.”

It was like Will’s words released some sort of spell that had been held over everyone in the church. People started to leave, and beside him, Will felt Judah withdraw. It was only then that he realized that he had completely ignored Judah’s invitation, but then, what the hell else was he even supposed to do? When he dared finally to sneak a look over, he saw that it was Judah, now, who wouldn’t meet Will’s eyes.

He’d gone too far, hadn’t he? In his panic, he was driving Judah away more than ever, and things had been awkward enough with this whole Jack thing, too. But it was complicated. What else could he do?

Still, Will found himself in the ridiculous position of trying to catch Judah’s eye as Will and Stephen left the church. But Judah never looked up, focused on cleaning up the front of the church with more attention that the task seemed to deserve.

Was Judah just done with this whole thing? Part of Will had hoped that, once everything with Jack was settled, he and Judah could nail down what this thing was a little bit. Judah’s position in this town, and Judah’s own hang-ups, meant that it would have to be a secret, he supposed, even if he hated it, but that didn’t mean that it couldn’t be more defined.

Now that Judah wasn’t looking at him at all, Will found himself wishing that he would. Wishing that this could work out, that they could have a second chance. But until this thing with Jack was settled, he had no idea how he was going to make that work. So he did the only thing that he could think of to do, and he left the church, with his much-subdued son trailing along in his wake.