PATCHES OF SKY

LARX STAYED two nights in the hospital with Aaron, but on Thursday morning school started up again, and he was needed.

He kissed Aaron goodbye early in the morning, eyes bright and shiny and lips soft on Aaron’s temple, promising to come by in the evening with kids in tow.

Aaron was looking forward to seeing the kids again—but dammit. He wanted some time with Larx, because the last two days felt like he was missing something—something big, important, life-changing, but Larx was the only one who knew what it was.

How did that happen? How did Aaron get shot and Larx get the life lesson to go with it?

The thought buzzed through Aaron’s head most of the day as he read from the tablet the kids had brought by the day before and flipped dispiritedly through daytime TV. Larx had authorized him three new movies through the tablet, but he knew he didn’t get to go home until Sunday, and he wanted to save them for a time he wasn’t irritated and pissed off.

Something was wrong.

Eamon stopped by around lunch, and Aaron relaxed for the first time in two days.

“How you doing, son?” Eamon asked kindly.

“Peachy.” Bitterness dripped from his voice and pooled around the bed, but Eamon only laughed.

“Pissed off yet?”

“Bored as fuck. I need to learn to knit.”

Eamon tilted his head back and laughed, and something about the sound pricked Aaron’s antennae. Eamon wasn’t in a good mood either.

“What’s up?” Aaron asked quietly.

Eamon shrugged. “I… I thought I was leaving you with a good house,” he said after a minute. “Next year the election comes up, I shoo you in, and I leave Colton safe and protected. Georgie and I take a few vacations and come home to a good place.”

“This is a good place.” Aaron had to believe it, but Eamon shook his head.

With a sigh he ventured into the room, unzipped his jacket, and sat, knees spread, elbows balanced on knees, hat in his hand. “I… my house is not in the order I thought it was. I thought the town could deal with you as sheriff and it would be not a problem—”

“Second thoughts about me?” Until he said it, Aaron hadn’t realized how much he wanted the job.

“Hell, no.” Unequivocal, Eamon’s denial settled Aaron’s stomach a little. “I just… I guess this is a preemptive apology. I can’t fire Percy Hardesty for you. Dammit—I looked at ways to try, and the most I could do was write an incident report and put it on his record. I can’t demote Warren from deputy to… I don’t know… paper pusher. I can’t sway the next election so that miserable woman Larx has to deal with on the school board can go the fuck away. I… I wanted to leave you a good house. And it’s sound—I believe it to my bones. But it’s not what I wanted.”

Aaron swallowed against the ache in his ears, the lump in his throat. “Nobody can unfuck the whole world at once, Eamon. You did your best. What did Percy do now?”

Eamon laughed a little, his eyes still fixed on his hat. “Your boy said almost the same thing, do you know that? Except Larx—he wanted to know which job would unfuck it quickest.”

Aaron smiled, wanting Larx—the real Larx, not the super sweet, super competent nursemaid who’d been there for two days—next to him again. “That’s easy. His.”

Eamon’s chuckle was a little richer this time. “That’s what I told him.” He sighed. “Right before Percy drew down on him.”

Aaron knew better than to try to sit up quickly, but he did it anyway, and his whole body hurt. “The fuck? Why were weapons even needed?” He fell back against the pillows and caught his breath. “What happened?” he finished weakly.

The look Eamon shot him said important things about how much Larx hadn’t been talking. “Did he tell you what happened the other day?”

It was Aaron’s turn to frown. “He said you found the girl at a train station. Why?”

Eamon stood up and scowled, then whipped out his phone and texted rapidly. When he was done, he sat back down and gave a grim smile.

“Uh….” Aaron wondered what he’d just said to whom—because Eamon was not the semidefeated man he’d just seen. This man was grumpy and irritated and ready to go kick some asses and take some names. “What happened? You guys found her at the train station and took her to CPS, right? Why would Percy even have his gun out?”

Eamon’s chuckle held an edge to it. “Oh, Aaron. Let me tell you the story of a man named Larx….”

Aaron took a deep breath—as deep as he could manage with his healing lung and the cannula, anyway. “I am not going to like this,” he muttered.

“About as much as Larx liked you getting shot.”

“Oh my God—what happened?”

Eamon shook his head. “Son, I don’t know who you thought you were sleeping with when you took on your mild-mannered principal, but I’m telling you, you got a superhero instead.”

Aaron closed his eyes. Superheroes were fun to talk about but had lousy love lives. If Larx’s saccharine withdrawal over the last few days told him anything, it was that Aaron was hospitalized proof.

“Hit me,” he said grimly.

Twenty minutes later the nurse came in because his respiration was elevated and his heartbeat was racing. And he had still not found words.

When he’d stopped gasping for breath, he managed to put a few together for at least one of the thoughts racing through his mind.

“Tell Percy—” Gasp. “—if he draws on Larx again—” Gasp. “—I’ll kill him.”

“Sure, Aaron. That’s the takeaway here.”

Aaron glared at him.

“Aren’t you going to ask why he didn’t tell you?”

Aaron shook his head. He knew why Larx wouldn’t tell him. Aaron was stuck in the hospital, and Larx couldn’t do a damned thing about it. Why would Larx tell him about battered children and an asshole with a gun—two assholes with guns—when there wasn’t a damned thing Aaron could do about it?

Larx didn’t tell Aaron about his day for the same reason Aaron hadn’t told his wife about his days.

For the same reason Aaron had fallen apart when Larx’s arm had been grazed back in October.

Because love should be a straightforward thing, but sometimes it was like a nautilus—a thousand chambers of pain and denial until you got to the heart of the love.

EAMON LEFT shortly after that, and Aaron fell into a restless, fitful sleep. When he woke up, his daughter Maureen was there, and so were Kellan, Kirby, and Christiana.

“No Larx?” he asked, disappointed.

“Told you,” Kirby said, holding his hand out for money.

Christiana dug into her purse, saying, “It doesn’t mean he wanted to see Larx more than you. It means he wants to see Larx as much as you.”

Maureen chuckled weakly, looking strained. “As long as he wanted to see me,” she said primly.

Aaron smiled. “Of course. What brings you home from school?”

“My father. Apparently he got shot. How you doin’, Dad?”

I’m missing my boyfriend, which sounds stupid, because we’re getting near fifty and too old for this boyfriend shit. “I miss home,” he said.

“Well, I’d say home misses you, but mostly I think it’s just Larx.”

Aaron clasped his daughter’s hand. “Larx has been here,” he said. “I’m glad you came.”

“You gotta be careful,” Maureen said softly. “Can’t take chances—Olivia’s gonna make you a grandpa. And she’s going to be right by—aren’t you excited?”

Wow. His daughter. Of course, Christiana had dealt with getting two brothers in the span of a month—but still. Maureen’s reaction to giving her childhood home over to Larx’s daughter was more than he could hope for. “You okay with that?” he asked, crossing his mental fingers.

“Peace Corps,” she said softly. “I think after graduation this year, I’m out of the nest for good.”

That hurt. “I will so miss you.” Tiff was the princess, Kirby was his sarcastic son. Maureen had always been his firefly—practically bright, whimsical, and necessary, a light in the darkness.

“Well, not for a week,” she said softly, kissing him on the forehead. “I’m here to take care of you during the day while everyone else is out.”

Oh. Aaron’s chest felt tight, but in the good way. “I don’t go home until Sunday,” he said. “But God, I’ll be glad to see you.” Then he frowned. “Where will you sleep?”

“In my room, like Olivia did before she was Mrs. Wombat.” Christiana’s chirp made Maureen laugh.

“We’re comparing fathers—it’s become our new hobby.”

“She got the best one,” he said. “Sorry.”

Maureen’s green eyes got shiny. “We told Larx, and that’s exactly what he said. We decided it was a tie.”

Aaron closed his eyes. “Somebody say something not mushy. I’m injured. Take pity.”

“Sure,” Kellan said, sitting at the foot of his bed. “Jaime broke your dog.”

Kirby chortled. “Oh my God, he so did!”

“You will explain that.” But he knew it wasn’t serious.

“So,” Kellan said, bouncing just a little—but Aaron could take it today when the day before it would have been uncomfortable. “Jaime is… well, the dog is his therapy, and that kid has needed a lot of therapy. So Jaime spends hours playing with the dog—in the snow, in the living room, on the porch. They tussle, they wrestle, they cook, they bake—you name it. And Dozer—you think he’s a dog, he can take it, right? ’Cause he’s a baby and he’s got, like, tremendous dog powers of energy, right?”

“Not so much,” Kirby said, pulling a chair out and straddling it. Christiana took Larx’s cot—still set up next to his bed—and pulled off her shoes to sit cross-legged. He felt like the queen bee at a slumber party as Kirby picked up the thread. “So, this is, like, Thursday—three days. This dog has been enduring three days of this shit, right?”

“Course,” Aaron acknowledged.

“Anyway,” Kirby continued, “Jaime got up early this morning and tore that dog up. I’m surprised Jaime could even stay awake in class, because I heard them at, like, six in the morning, and he was running circles in the backyard, and it’s still up to his thighs back there.”

“And we get down this morning,” Christiana said, hugging her knees, “and Jaime is eating his oatmeal and the dog is, like, passed out in front of the door. He’s so whipped he’s even in his dog bed, if you can believe that!”

“That’s amazing.” It was—but this story, his children, was even better. Aaron wanted them to keep talking, keep spilling their energy over him.

“Right?” Christi bobbed without moving anything but her chin. “So we set him up with food and water, and Larx rounds us all up and takes us to school, and we get home and you know what?”

“Hasn’t moved?” Aaron hazarded.

“We checked to make sure he was breathing,” Kirby said—then shuddered. “That was a bad moment. I did not want to have to tell you that poor Jaime played our dog to death. Anyway, Maureen pulled in about ten minutes later, and he didn’t even bark. Just sort of whimpered. Larx made him go outside to pee, and he did, ’cause he’s your dog and he’s good, but Jaime was, like, out in the backyard going ‘C’mon, Dozer! C’mon boy!’ and oh my God!”

“That poor dog, Dad,” Maureen added, eyes twinkling. “I never thought I’d see a dog do this.”

“What?”

“He said no!” Kellan burst out. “Jaime’s going ‘C’mon, Dozer!’ and the dog shook his head, walked up the porch, pawed at the sliding glass door, and waited until Christi let him in. Then he found his bed and just whumpf. Like he was done with this crap, right? Peace. Out.”

Aaron chuckled. “Poor Jaime.”

“No,” Christiana told him, sobering. “It was actually what he needed. Jaime’s been… I guess anxious is the word. Olivia seemed to calm him down when she was there, but she moved out last night, and I don’t think he slept at all.”

“He didn’t,” Kellan confirmed. “He’s on the floor in my room, and I got up to pee last night, and he just freaked out. I had to get down on the floor with him until he stopped shaking.”

Aw. Oh man. Kellan—what a good kid.

“That must have sucked,” Kirby said with feeling. “’Cause you still—”

“Had to pee.” Kellan nodded. “Yeah. That wasn’t comfy. I barely made it after he fell asleep. Anyway, he must have snuck up to go play with the dog this morning, because, you know—”

“No sleep,” Christi confirmed.

“So anyway,” Kirby continued, and Aaron had a moment to marvel. Larx called them his “haiku poem”—and they spoke a family language like they’d been born to it and hadn’t found it the same way Larx and Aaron had found each other.

“Anyway?” Aaron prompted.

“Yeah, anyway, the dog comes inside and Jaime’s a little sad, but he comes inside too, and he sits next to the dog. And we’re all snacking and pretending not to listen but….” Kirby’s voice dropped.

“This was sort of wonderful,” Maureen said, her voice reverent too.

“It was.” Christiana agreed. “He just starts… talking to the dog. He starts off saying he’s sorry he broke poor Dozer, and then starts talking about being broken, and how hard it is to sleep when you’re broken, and how you had to feel safe when you slept. And then he just kept going. We all just sort of sat down at the table and ate, and he just… just kept talking. And I don’t know if he knew we were listening, but his voice got lower and lower, and by the time Larx came downstairs all changed, he was… you know.”

“Asleep,” Kellan continued. “Jaime had just fallen asleep. Crashed. Next to the dog. The dog bed’s pretty big and Jaime isn’t, so they fit. Jaime just spooned the big doofus, and they slept.”

“Oh.” Damn. “Wow.” Aaron felt a little watery after that. “You’re right. That’s amazing.”

“So Jaime didn’t really break the dog,” Maureen added practically. “It’s more like the dog, you know—”

“Fixed Jaime,” Christiana finished. “It was magic.”

“Well, for right now,” Kellan said, sounding resigned. “Unless Larx says the dog can sleep in my room….”

“Knowing Dad, he’s probably already moved the pillow,” Christiana reassured him, and Kellan brightened.

“Awesome! Now I just have to….” He grimaced. “You know. Not step on the dog.”

They all laughed a little, and Aaron suddenly understood. “That’s why Larx isn’t—”

“Here,” Maureen murmured, more comforting than he could have imagined. “He couldn’t leave—he wanted to. We could all see it. But that kid was asleep on the kitchen floor, and happy. He was afraid the kid would freak out if there wasn’t someone he recognized there when he woke up.”

Aaron felt a yawn coming on then and sort of wished he could have the dog as a nap buddy too.

“Don’t worry,” Maureen said, squeezing his hand. “We’re going home soon. We just had to visit.” Her voice tightened. “I needed to see you were okay for myself.”

Aw. Mau. “Be here tomorrow?” he asked, hopeful.

“Until Larx gets off.” The kids all met eyes. “I think you’ll need to see him as much as he’ll need to see you.”

He nodded, reassured. Larx had a lot on his plate—and he had a lot weighing down his heart.

But he still loved Aaron—that hadn’t changed.