Forever and a Few Short Weeks

 

SAMMY had to test his balance on the way out of the car to make sure he was good to go, but once he could put one foot in front of the other?

Nothing was going to stop him from kissing Cooper again.

He’d heard—of course he’d heard. Cooper standing up to Tino. Telling Tino he was a good man. Sammy had never expected a champion; he’d always wanted too badly to champion everybody else. Big brother—it was his job, right?

But Cooper’s kisses weren’t brotherly in the least.

Sammy got to his room through the darkened house, ducked inside, and stripped quickly for the shower, trying not to think about being naked in front of Cooper, of touching Cooper’s bare skin all over his body.

He only had so much energy left—he wanted to save it all for what was left of the night.

After toweling off and dressing in sleep pants and a T-shirt, he paused for a moment at his end table drawer.

When he’d been seventeen, right before his first prom, a small box of condoms had appeared there. Tino’s writing had flared across the receipt, with “We trust you. Be safe and be kind.” The box had never been opened.

The next year, after he’d spent most of his year at home or in the hospital, sick or recovering, a new box had appeared, this one with “Let’s try this again” scrawled on a Post-it. That box too went into the trash untouched.

The year after, his first year of college, he’d confided to his uncles that he was meeting a young man for coffee. This time, for the Great Condom Expiration Ritual, the note read, “We’re rooting for you, Sammy!”—and it was held down with a small bottle of lubricant as a paperweight. That relationship had ended with only a few kisses—and another box bit the dust.

At twenty, the note had read, “It’ll happen,” and the lubricant had been in a very optimistically sized bottle.

This last May he’d been twenty-one, and the note on his end table had read, “Some. Day.” The bottle of lubricant had been the very pricey kind, in a more modest size.

That’s the bottle Sammy grabbed now. He looked at the box of condoms and bit his lip. No. Not with Cooper. Two clean slates, Cooper and Sammy. That didn’t happen often—a rare and sort of magical thing.

Aware that Cooper was waiting for him, he grabbed the lubricant and ventured out of his room, only to almost run into Tino. His hands came up, and he fumbled the bottle, barely catching it before it landed on the floor with a thump.

And there he was, holding a sexual aid and staring at his uncle Tino with ginormous eyes.

Tino’s eyes were not any smaller. “Uh, Sammy?”

“Yes, sir?” Oh God. He hadn’t called Tino “sir” since he’d passed out at soccer after deliberately throwing his breakfast in the trash.

“Are you, uh, missing something there?”

Sammy stared at the bottle, trying to figure out what was missing with lubrica—oh. “Oh no.” He smiled, because it was magical, right? “We’re both virgins. We don’t really need condoms.”

Tino put his hand on his chest and gaped, and Sammy turned and ran down the stairs, praying he’d left his uncle—and the highly embarrassing moment—behind him.

 

 

TINO stayed on the stairs for a moment, holding his hand to his chest and watching the boy he loved like a son scamper down the stairs to his future. His heart ached, whether from fullness or nostalgia, he couldn’t tell.

With a sigh he turned back down the hall, since his whole reason for being outside Sammy’s room was to see if he was home.

He got back to his bedside just as Cooper’s text flashed across the screen of his phone as it sat in the charger, and he laughed.

“What?” Channing slept shirtless, and he wore his cheaters when he read in bed. He could not have possibly been more adorable.

Tino shook his head, not sure if he could articulate the pain of watching Sammy run down those stairs, happy as a kid at Christmas. “Kids are home,” he muttered, sliding in next to his husband.

“Martin, what is it?” Channing removed the cheaters and set them on the end table next to his Kindle. “You look….” His mouth—his ridiculously soft mouth—turned down at the corners. “Sad. Baby, what’s wrong?”

“Sammy—he’s fine. He’s just….” Just going to lose his virginity with another virgin, and they’re both painfully innocent and helpless, and they’re just going to hold hands and go skipping out into the rain. “Just growing up is all,” he said, when he could get past the swelling in his throat.

He was grateful when Channing didn’t try to jolly him out of the mood. “Yeah.” Channing nodded and leaned back in bed, opening his arm so Tino could snuggle on his chest. Tino did, stroking the hair that had grown there in the last thirteen—almost fourteen—years.

“Cooper’s nice,” Tino said weakly. Cooper was better than nice. Cooper had stood up for Sammy in perhaps the bravest of ways. Tino and Channing were in an almost unfair position of power—not that they’d ever abuse it, but still. It must have been difficult to speak out against the two men who had taken in his foster sister and then offered him a job that would allow them to grow up in the same house.

But Cooper had done it, and he’d done it for Sammy.

“Cooper’s… a work in progress,” Channing said thoughtfully. “There’s some good material there, but I think… I think he’s just beginning to see that the world doesn’t have to be all about basic survival. He can have some things in his life that are just Cooper’s.”

Tino’s laugh felt a little hysterical and highly inappropriate. “You might be right,” he chortled, aware that tears were gathering in the corners of his eyes.

Channing pulled back and stared at him. “What in the holy hell?”

“Sammy,” Tino said simply, feeling the loss of this stewardship keenly. “Sammy is now exclusively Cooper’s. He just ran downstairs with a bottle of lubricant to seal the deal.”

Oh, it was not often he saw his husband’s mouth drop open in complete shock.

Of course, Channing’s shock was usually followed by immediate action.

“The hell he is!” Channing swung his legs over the bed and threw back his covers just as Tino threw himself across Channing’s lap in an effort to keep him in bed.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Tino snapped. “What exactly is your plan here?”

“Sammy! Didn’t you say he’s going to… to….” Channing made motions in the air that, considering what happened in this very bedroom, were both alarming and comical.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing there with your hands, Channing, but if you ever actually tried that on me, we’d both be in the hospital.”

Channing, blessedly, stopped trying to talk with his hands. “But Tino—he’s our Sammy—”

“World’s oldest virgin,” Tino reminded him sternly. “Didn’t you tell me that? Last May, when I re-upped the rubbers in his room? You were, like, ‘Jesus, I hope this stuff gets some play, Tino. I don’t mean to pry, but he’s not a bad-looking kid. You’d think he’d have a relationship by now,’ and I was, like, ‘Butt out of his life, Uncle Channing, because every kid does their own thing at their own time, remember?’ and you were, like, ‘Yeah, but I still worry that you didn’t have any lovers before me and you may have made a heinous mistake when you fell for a handsome billionaire with a small child in tow’—”

“I never said that,” Channing snapped, shoving Tino aside and sliding back into bed to sulk with his arms crossed over his magnificent chest.

“No, but there was subtext,” Tino told him, barely restraining his smile. “Admit it.”

Channing rolled his eyes and then opened his arms again. “You were very young,” he said with dignity.

“So are they,” Tino responded softly. “They’re young and they’re clueless, and unless my mother has taught me nothing, they’re very much in love.”

“Augh!” Channing scrubbed his face with his hands. “It’s that last one that gets me.”

“Yeah,” Tino mumbled, feeling the melancholy coming on again. “Me too.”

Channing pulled him close, breathlessly close, close enough to remember what they liked to do in bed when everybody was asleep kind of close. “We did okay,” he said in the silence.

“I’m still in love with you,” Tino told him solemnly.

Channing closed his eyes. “Until I die,” he said, just as solemn. “I will always be in love with you.”

Tino smiled—and then stuck out his tongue and licked Channing’s nipple, which was tantalizingly close. “Uhm, you know, maybe we should not worry about Sammy. At least, uh, not for the next fifteen minutes.”

Channing harrumphed. “Fifteen minutes? We’ve got longer in us than that!”

Tino pushed up in his arms, until their lips were almost touching. “Prove it, old man,” he whispered, just before Channing’s mouth took over.

New, he thought, as Channing’s lips and hands and body went to work. Every touch is always brand-new.

Maybe that was wisdom he should have given to Sammy, about how he could know love was real.

But then, maybe it was something Sammy needed to find out on his own.

 

 

SAMMY’S knock on Cooper’s door sounded obscenely loud, and he grimaced, trying not to shush it like a little kid. Cooper must have been waiting for him, because the door flew open immediately, and Cooper jumped into his arms, pressing him back to swing the door shut before doubt could ever be a thing.

Ah, his mouth felt so good! Sammy inhaled his kisses, needing more and more and more. He wrapped his arms around Cooper’s waist and held tight, wishing he were stronger, wishing he could be the guy Cooper climbed like a telephone pole and just let ravish him.

But Sammy wasn’t that guy. The most he could do was take charge, kissing along Cooper’s jaw, nibbling on his ear, tugging gently at the lobe. Cooper moaned, tilting his head sideways, and Sammy kept kissing, tasting a little bit of soap but mostly the spice of Cooper’s skin.

With an awkward movement, Sammy pulled away, threw the lubricant on the bed, and then rucked up Cooper’s shirt. Oh, look! Little brown nipples—treats!

Sammy cupped Cooper’s waist in his hands and bent to suck on one, shivering with the joy of tasting another man’s skin this intimately.

“What was that?” Cooper asked, twisting his body so he could look.

“Something we might not need,” Sammy told him, moving to the other nipple to pull it into his mouth.

“Ah! Ah God!” Cooper’s hands tightened in Sammy’s hair, and he bucked a couple of times, hard and fast and not in control in the least. “Why wouldn’t we… oh, geez, Sammy! Why wouldn’t we gungh….”

Oh man, Sammy wanted more! He kept sucking, but he busied his hands over Cooper’s slight but fairly defined body. Sleep pants, underwear, Sammy shoved them both down and kneaded Cooper’s tight, small bottom.

Cooper moaned, spreading his legs a little, probably for balance, and Sammy went to drop to his knees, stopped by Cooper’s hand in his hair.

“You bruise,” Cooper said shortly, blinking hard like he was trying to remember why, oh why, he’d stop Sammy from continuing on. “Let’s do this on the bed.”

“Now!” Sammy begged, pulling his shirt over his head as Cooper finished toeing off his pants.

“Yeah, sure.” Cooper grabbed the bottle of lubricant and pulled the covers down, then turned to look at Sammy. “Why?” he asked.

Sammy paused, his thumbs underneath the waistband of his sleep pants and underwear.

“Why what?” he asked, flushing self-consciously. Oh geez. He was so pale! And he did bruise. He probably had bruises all over his thighs from his performance that night.

“Why wouldn’t we use the lubricant?” Cooper was looking at the bottle like just having it in his hand made him hot.

Sammy cupped his painfully hard erection through his clothes and keened. “Cooper, I’m not going to last that long, are you?”

It was a good thing Cooper was sitting on the bed—naked—because Sammy saw his eyes flutter back a little. He took a couple of deep breaths and said, “Not after you get naked—now get naked.”

Sammy could feel his flush creeping up from his stomach to his chest and even his ears.

“I’m… uh, you know. Not tan,” he mumbled. “And, uh… not musclebound. And….”

Cooper stood in front of him before Sammy even realized he’d gotten off the bed. “Hey,” Cooper whispered, stroking his cheeks with gentle thumbs. “I… I think you’re beautiful, Sam Lowell. I just want to touch you. Like you want to touch me. That’s not so bad, is it?”

“No,” Sam whispered. He shoved his shorts down past his knees, and while he was shaking them off his feet, he closed his eyes and took Cooper’s mouth, sweeping inside with a thought and balancing himself with gentle hands on Cooper’s bare shoulders.

And he realized that they were both bare, all the way to their toes.

He pressed closer, his erection filling with a vengeance, and Cooper ground against him, just as needy naked as he had been clothed.

“The bed,” Sammy begged softly, and Cooper walked backward, pausing only to sit up onto the bed, crawling like a crab until he was smack in the middle, his head resting on the pillows and his legs spread slightly for better access.

Oh, look at him! His skin carried a darker tone than Sammy’s, and his erection… wow. Sammy had tried very hard not to build those things up as the end-all, be-all of an experience with another man, but Cooper’s erection was, well, impressive.

Sammy crawled up the bed, bending his head to kiss the inside of Cooper’s knee, and then the other knee, then kissing up, gentle kisses on Cooper’s inner thighs until Cooper spread his knees and begged.

“Sammy, I’m dying here… just… I’ll stroke it and you can kiss me and… yes!”

Because Sammy wanted it. He wanted to taste it and suck on it; he wanted it filling his mouth and throat. He wrapped his lips carefully around the head, shielded his teeth, and pulled it deep into his mouth.

Soft, soft skin and hard, hard flesh. Augh, it was delicious, and Sammy’s hand shook as he brought it up to grip tight. Cooper moaned, dropping his head back to the pillows and abandoning himself to Sammy’s ministrations.

Sammy vowed to serve him well.

He used his hand and mouth in conjunction, because basic physics dictated that thing was not going to fit in the back of his throat, and his hand could do what his mouth could not—at least not yet. He practiced, awkwardly at first, moving his head and hand in together, but soon, spurred on by Cooper’s shameless, begging groans, he had his coordination down.

Cooper helped—he tightened his fingers in Sammy’s hair and thrust his hips, ever so slowly, until Sammy got his timing right.

He bucked hard, once, twice. The third time Sammy managed to swallow him right down to the back of his throat, and Cooper jammed his hand in his own mouth to stifle a scream as he came.

Sammy was ready for that, ready to swallow, ready to keep sucking until Cooper was dry.

What he didn’t anticipate, couldn’t have known, was that his own erection, tender and aching and digging into the sheets under Sammy’s body, would be stimulated to the breaking point, just like Cooper’s.

Cooper tangled the fingers of one hand hard in Sammy’s hair, and Sammy moaned and bucked, just as Cooper spurted in Sammy’s mouth.

By the time Cooper was done enough to push Sammy gently away, Sammy was lying in a cooling sticky puddle of his own.

“Augh,” he groaned, burying his head in Cooper’s thigh.

“What?” Cooper tugged some more. “Come up here, Sammy, and hold me.”

He sounded lost, and Sammy felt a little lost himself. Sammy scooted up and wrapped his arms around Cooper’s shoulders. They shivered together for a few heartbeats, and Sammy grabbed the blanket and pulled it over both of them.

“But….” Cooper turned into Sammy’s chest and accepted Sammy’s whispers, his reassurance, his tenderness. After a few moments, in which Sammy’s heartbeat stilled to a low roar in his ears, Cooper finally managed a complete sentence.

“But, Sammy—what about you?”

Sammy half laughed. “Cooper… you, uh, came in my mouth.”

Cooper hid his face.

“That was… that was really sexy! I had no idea it was that sexy!”

Cooper peeked out and watched Sammy’s face carefully with those oddly asymmetrical eyes. “How sexy?” he asked, like he was putting two and two together.

Sammy’s turn to hide his face. “That sexy,” he admitted, embarrassed as hell.

Cooper kissed the top of his head, his temple, and finally, when Sammy raised his face, his lips.

“That’s amazing,” Cooper told him, eyes wide. “That’s….” Sammy ground against him, still flaccid but thinking about filling up again. “That’s amazing.”

Sammy gave a tired chuckle. “Well, yeah. But, you know—” He yawned. “—exhausting.”

Cooper yawned too. “Then stay,” he whispered. “Stay. I’ll turn off the light, and if, you know, in the middle of the night….”

“We want to do something like that again…?” Sammy teased.

Cooper raised his eyebrows suggestively. “Yeah. I don’t think that’s a one-shot deal.” He grinned, the expression wicked. “We might even get to use the lubricant someday.”

Sammy laughed, low and sleepy, and Cooper reached over to turn off the light.

“Do you want,” Sammy asked, stopped by a yawn so he had to start again. “Do you want I should get a washcloth?”

“First person who gets up to pee,” Cooper told him logically. Then Sammy felt trembling fingertips on his face that had nothing to do with logic.

“I love you, Sam Lowell,” he said softly.

“Love you too, Cooper Hoskins.”

“Night.”

“Night.” Sammy nuzzled his temple and fell almost immediately asleep.

 

 

HE woke up in the dark, knowing immediately that the other body in bed with him was Cooper’s and that Cooper was kissing his neck.

“Mm….” Sammy was going to ask for the time, but Cooper’s lips were tickling, tantalizing, and he decided that if the house was still dark, he didn’t have to worry about numbers. He turned his head and lowered it, hoping Cooper would raise his face for a kiss, but to his surprise, Cooper scooted down on the bed, his bare skin slithering against Sammy’s deliciously.

He was taking an obvious path, but Sammy had never been on this path, so every kiss was fireworks and perfect chords. He arrived at Sammy’s nipple with a little scrape of teeth, and Sammy moaned softly, kneading Cooper’s dark curly hair like a cat.

“Mmf?” Cooper punctuated the question with a hard suck and the swish of his tongue.

“Yeah, it’s good!” Sammy laughed, and then he gasped, because Cooper used his teeth again. “So good….”

Cooper chuckled, the sound muffled against Sammy’s chest, and then moved to the other nipple. Sammy rolled to his back, feeling vulnerable even as he arched his chest against Cooper’s mouth.

Cooper kept tormenting, kept laving, and then he started reaching.

His hand, delicate and teasing, spread-palmed against the length of Sammy’s cock, was enough to bring a gasp of excitement. Sammy’s hips bucked high, and he stayed there for a moment, trembling.

“Easy,” Cooper whispered. “Down, boy.”

Sammy whimpered but lowered his hips, pressing his ass against the sheets with all his will.

“Better.” The arrogance in Cooper’s voice—when he was never arrogant! But here in the dark he seemed to have control of the situation in a way Sammy had never mastered. “Now I’m going to stroke you, but I want to, you know, suck you too. So tell me if you get close, okay?”

Sammy nodded and then remembered they were making love in the dark. “Yeah,” he whispered. “Okay.”

Cooper kept up that coordinated caress, his mouth on Sammy’s nipples, his hand on Sammy’s erection, not even squeezing, just touching, fingers, palm, fingertips, until the teasing left Sammy breathless.

“Are you going to come?” Cooper asked, almost clinically.

“No, but I’m going to grab myself if you don’t get a move on!”

Cooper laughed, and the sound was like Cooper’s come in Sammy’s mouth—sexy and dirty and awesome.

It sounded even better when Cooper grabbed his cock.

Sammy groaned, loud and unapologetically, and Cooper kept his hand where it was but lunged up to capture Sammy’s mouth with his own.

Oh, this was just as good as nipple play. Sammy opened his mouth and his thighs, helpless, melting into the sheets as Cooper took over and plundered his mouth and milked his erection at the same time.

There was no controlling this situation, no trying to make sure everybody was happy. Cooper was in charge. Sammy simply let himself be pleasured, moaning when it was good, concentrating on keeping his legs spread and Cooper’s tongue in his mouth.

Cooper kept stroking and pulled away from the kiss, panting. “Oh, Sammy, you’re amazing.”

Sammy tried not to whine. “I’m going to come,” he pleaded. “God, Coop, I’m… I’m….” His hands flailed as he gave himself over to Cooper’s stroke, and Cooper let go to grab his hands.

“Easy,” he whispered, calming Sammy like he seemed to take care of all situations—gently, with quiet strength. “’Kay, Sammy, I’m going to suck you now. I want you to hold your hands over your head, okay? Just lace the fingers together—that’s it. Keep your hips flat for me, okay?”

“Yeah,” Sammy breathed, feeling more exposed than he’d ever felt in his life. “I can do that.”

Cooper ran the flat of his hand up Sammy’s thigh, over his hip bone and his stomach, then around his chest. “Good. Now hang in there, okay?”

“Yeah.” Sammy closed his eyes then and allowed Cooper to take over entirely.

Ah! Oh, his mouth! Exquisite! He sucked gently, then explored with his tongue. Sammy tried to give him clues—oohs and ahhs when he felt the flat of Coop’s tongue on his frenulum, little grunts and cries when Coop teased his slit. Ah! He fought the temptation to buck, fought the urge to flail his hands or grab Cooper by the hair. His entire body quivered, but it was Sammy’s job to hold still, and dammit, Sammy could do this!

And then Cooper—very deliberately, very carefully—brushed the bell of his cock with his teeth.

Sammy let out a little sob and bucked hard while Cooper hung on for dear life and stroked Sammy’s shaft while sucking on the bell.

Sammy unlaced his hands and jammed one of his fists into his mouth, muffling a cry of climax while keeping his hands the hell out of Cooper’s way.

Cooper kept sucking, swallowing, stimulating, until Sammy gave a little whimper and rolled over to his side.

Cooper rested his head on Sammy’s thigh and stroked him, from the rise of his hip to his knee.

“Wow,” Sammy whispered, so full of wonder he couldn’t find any other words.

“Wow?” Cooper echoed, his voice full of hope.

“Wow. Seriously. That was wow. Was it wow when I did it for you? Because it was damned wow when you just did it for me. I had no idea anything could be so wow. I mean, I thought sex would be pretty awesome, but that right there, that was made of wo—”

Because Cooper had shoved up again to capture Sammy’s mouth. Sammy tasted himself, earthy and bitter and sexy, and fell into the kiss again, lost in the swirling of Cooper’s tongue and the silk and glide of their naked bodies sharing the same space.

The kiss subsided, and Sammy felt the tug of sleep again. “Cooper? You want I should….” He reached between their bodies and felt Coop’s cock, semisoft and dripping. “Oh.”

“Oh, he says,” Cooper laughed. “Yeah, I came too. Jesus, Sammy—you sort of blow a guy’s mind when he’s blowing your dick, you know that?”

“I have no idea,” Sammy said with sleepy dignity. “I believe I mentioned this was a first for me too.”

“Well, you do,” Cooper told him, snuggling back against Sammy, pushing his face into Sammy’s neck.

“Cooper, should I set the alarm, in case the kids wake us up?”

“No,” Cooper mumbled. “No. Want to tell the world. Would settle for just not hiding it from the kids.”

“Kk. Let the awkward questions begin.”

Cooper’s sleeping chuckle was the last thing he heard before daylight.

 

 

TURNED out, nobody asked any questions at all. Sammy was out the door to run at his usual early hour, but this time, since Cooper didn’t have kid duties on Saturday morning, he took Cooper with him.

Together they panted through the quiet of the suburb until they reached a park in the heart of it, circled around for a mile, and then ran back. They arrived at the house sweaty and pleasantly breathless—and starving.

“Sit down,” Cooper commanded. “I’ll get you juice and some leftovers from last night.”

“No pancakes?” Sammy teased. “After last night?”

“Meatloaf,” Cooper said direly. “And vegetable juice. I forgot to juice you up this morning. If you don’t remember, I need to be your backup.”

Sammy frowned. “I swear I’m responsible for my own health, Coop. You shouldn’t have to do it.”

Cooper tagged him gently on the back of the head. “I want to do it, dork! And I know you can do it, Sammy, but it’s just not… you know. In your skill set. Time is not a thing with you, but I’ll make you take time to eat.”

“I’ll try not to be too much trouble,” Sammy vowed, bothered. He loved Cooper, but he didn’t want to be babied by him. It would really suck if Cooper only cared about him because Sammy was another one of the kids.

“Hey.” Cooper draped himself over Sammy’s shoulders. “I fell in love with you because you were my angel. Taking care of you—that’s, like, a perk. It’s a thing I can do for you to pay back for all you do for me.”

Sammy bit his lip and tried to hold back his shy smile. “I’m your angel?” he asked wistfully.

“The only angel I’ve ever had,” Cooper reassured, kissing his temple.

Oh, that was right—Sammy was Cooper’s first—and not just his first lover. They could take care of each other.

The rumble of a cleared throat had them jerking away from each other in surprise, and Sammy turned to meet Channing’s grim amusement. “Oh no,” Channing gestured, “carry on necking in the kitchen. It’s comfortable for all of us.”

“Don’t be an ass,” Tino muttered. “But beware, guys, the kids are coming, so unless you have plans to dissect your se—uhm, love life, I’d tone it down a bit. No, Cooper, we’re not having meatloaf for breakfast—and you don’t need to cook. Sit down and have coffee. I’m making blueberry pancakes with actual blueberries. Antioxidants, iron—don’t worry, we won’t let Sammy starve.”

Cooper sat down next to Sammy promptly, and they shared a wicked smirk of caught conspirators for a moment. Channing poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down next to Cooper—all the better to pin Sammy with a gimlet glare.

“So, Samford. The car.”

Sammy buried his face in his hands. “Yeah.”

“My mechanic called me this morning. Would you care to explain?”

“I’ve got no words,” Sammy muttered, reliving the horror of coming out from his classroom and finding his car up on blocks, sans wheels, and vandalized to boot.

“That was done at the school parking lot?” Channing asked, gaze flickering to Cooper, and Sammy nodded vehemently.

“Yeah—I walked out of the cafeteria and there it was. I was the last person out too, besides the janitor.”

“Okay, did you call the police?”

Uh…. “No?”

Channing grimaced. “Did you call your boss?”

“No either?”

Sammy knew the sound of Channing breathing in and out through his nose, hard, as though the air pressure would keep him from talking. “I think we should do that this morning, don’t you?” Channing asked carefully, and Sammy nodded.

“Oh yeah, that’s a really good idea!”

Breathe in, breathe out. “Awesome. Now about your car parked at the school—”

“I think he should drive my car,” Cooper said, really fast like he was trying not to lose courage.

Channing’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry?”

“Well, it needs some stuff—brakes, tires, coils, spark plugs, a new exhaust manifold, some weird thing they do to check oil leaks, oil—”

“We get the idea,” Tino said, his mouth twisted into an impossible shape. “Now tell Channing why you think he should drive it to work.”

Cooper blinked like the answer was too simple to even articulate. “Because it looks like a piece of crap and nobody would want to vandalize it. I parked my first car in a way shittier neighborhood than where Sammy works, and nobody touched it!”

Channing put his hand over his mouth and breathed in and out through his nose. And then again.

“I think that sounds like an awesome idea,” Tino said brightly. “Don’t you, Sammy?”

Sammy nodded and smiled encouragingly at Cooper. “That’s really creative,” he said, all admiration.

“Cooper?” Channing said, his voice constricted and thin. “What exactly happened to your first car?”

Cooper bit his lip. “Well, I need to check my forwarded mail. There should be a letter from it.”

Sammy smiled at Tino and Channing, who seemed to be entranced. “Why would the car write you a letter?” he asked, excited about the answer.

“Well, it sort of died. This was right after I got my job with Brandon’s company, actually, and the car died at a gas station, and I couldn’t fix it, and Brandon couldn’t fix it. It was a 1974 Volvo, right? I mean, it was old. And the transmission went out and—”

“Oh God,” Tino muttered. “It’s worth more than the car.”

“Right?” Cooper nodded at Tino like he’d found another ally. “So I didn’t have towing, and I didn’t have the money to fix it, and so I sort of left it there and caught a ride with Brandon until my second paycheck and I could buy the one I have now.”

“You just left it?” Channing asked, mouth working like there was so much more to say.

“Well, yeah. Brandon said they’d tow it eventually, and they did, and we got a letter from the car saying it had been towed and then sold to someone else to pay for the towing. And I thought, ‘Well, that’s good. Maybe they can afford a transmission.’ But then the car wrote another letter, saying it was dead on the side of the road and I should come get it, and I was like, ‘No way, buddy—you went home with that other family. You belong with them!’ and then I got another letter saying it had been sold to offset towing. And it was weird. It was like I hadn’t owned the car for three years, but I kept getting letters from the DMV telling me how it was doing. It felt kind of nice, actually. Like the car didn’t hold grudges.”

Sammy laughed, delighted. He had no idea Cooper was capable of this much whimsy, and he adored it. “That’s awesome! I wonder where it will go next.”

“Well, the last notice was from New Mexico—it’s getting around.”

Channing made a very strange sound, and Sammy turned toward him. “Uncle Channing, are you okay? You sound like you’re getting sick.”

Channing scrubbed at his eyes with the palm of his hand. “Yeah, Sammy. I’m getting a headache. I’m going to go take a painkiller. I’ll be right back.”

He lurched away, and Sammy looked at Tino. “Oh no—will he be okay for breakfast, do you think? The kids should be up any second!”

“I’ll make breakfast,” Tino said weakly. “If I let you two touch it, you’ll be eating meatloaf in New Mexico.”

Sammy chortled and Cooper grinned, his pleased expression telling Sammy everything he needed to know about how hard Cooper had worked on that story to make it funny.

“If we take the car to the mechanic’s today, do you think it will be ready on Monday?” Sammy asked, because it was a really good idea.

Tino pulled eggs and blueberries out of the refrigerator and turned to look at him, his expression falling unexpectedly sober. “Yeah. Of course. Just, I need to talk to your uncle first.”

“About what?” Sammy asked, picking up on Tino’s nuance.

Tino sighed and put the food on the counter, then went to the cupboard looking for the pancake mix. “All things regarding Sammy, mostly. Including….” He paused and looked at the two of them thoughtfully. “Have you heard anything about those touring fellowships?”

Ugh. “Uh, no. We don’t find out until the beginning of April.”

Tino regarded him steadily. “So. Are you planning to go?”

“Well, I was kind of thinking—”

“Yes,” Cooper said suddenly, surprising him. “Yes, he’s going.”

“Cooper!” Sammy laughed, torn between relief that Cooper seemed to understand and dismay, because… because two months!

“No,” Cooper told him, shaking his head. “Don’t… don’t say no because….” He bit his lip and looked at Tino, and then looked back at Sammy, his remarkable eyes wide and calm. “You deserve to go, Sam. You deserve to perform and show kids music and see what it’s like to play in different places every night. You… you said it yourself. You don’t need me as a keeper—and if you and me are going to be you and me, it needs to be strong enough to last two months.”

Sammy shrugged and looked away. “There’s no guarantee I’ll even make the audition,” he said, trying to decide if he wanted to make it or wanted to fail.

“Oh please,” Cooper muttered, looking anywhere but at Sammy. “The only way you could have failed anything at all is if you screwed it up on purpose.”

“I would never!”

Tino gave half a laugh. “No, you wouldn’t, Sammerson. Because the one thing you love most in the world is music.”

“And family,” Cooper added, pursing his lips and looking like he was trying not to cry.

“And Cooper,” Sammy reminded him, voice throbbing with the night before.

“Yeah.” Cooper smiled, and although his eyes were shiny, his smile was sound. “And Cooper.”

At that moment the kids came crashing into the room, led by Felicity, who hugged Sammy good morning first and then Cooper. Letty came pattering out before insisting she sit on Sammy’s lap, and Keenan was at her heels, complaining because she’d taken her pajama bottoms off in the middle of the night and was in the kitchen in her pajama top and underwear and nothing else.

Sammy kept her on his lap anyway and asked the kids about their Friday, and the overwhelming chatter kept him and Cooper busy for the rest of the morning. Channing ghosted in right when it was time to set the table, so Sammy and Cooper really did get a morning off.

Between blueberry pancakes and turkey sausage and Cooper, smiling at him over the table with a secret only the two of them knew, he felt like the world lay at his feet. He only needed to grab Cooper’s hand to claim it.