Chapter Four
THE KID WAS cute. Really damn cute, outside and in. Kelly was shy and quiet and naive and Walter was very, very afraid might be a closet Republican, but everything except for the last part was win. Making him blush was fun too. It was so easy Walter kept doing it to explore the depths of how red the guy could get.
Kelly wanted Walter too, that was clear as day, which was fun because he was embarrassed about that the way he was everything else. Slightly helpless about it, though, which really turned Walter on. He felt as if he could drag Kelly into the bathroom by the pharmacy and blow him right there, and at best Kelly would put up a token we shouldn’t before giving up all those reserved, shy moans for Walter’s mouth. He was a pretty boy too, and no doubt every girl in his high school had been fapping over him and imagining they’d be the one to be shy Kelly’s girlfriend. Fuck, any boys unwittingly sharing Kelly’s closet were right there with the girls, except whatever lucky bastards caught his eye in the locker room.
Now Walter was living with him. Fuck yeah. He could handle some shy pretty boy on tap.
“You know, sometimes I think I shop at Target because of the color scheme,” Walter confessed as they trolled down the aisle. They had a cart full of anti-dust-mite bedding and a new comforter for Walter and were now simply wandering. “It’s horrid suburban hell, but it has nice design, so I don’t mind.”
“Target’s from Minnesota.” Kelly pushed the cart, something he seemed to take great security in. “Headquartered in Minneapolis.”
“Which I heard is now one of the gayest cities in America. Now it all makes sense.” Walter elbowed him. “So, we’re here, we’re queer, and I have a gold card. Let’s trick out our humble abode. What are you feeling? Patio lights hung around your loft? Beanbag chairs that match your lampshade? I draw the line at mirrors on the ceiling, though a few positioned artfully on the closet door wouldn’t hurt my feelings.”
Kelly bit his lip. “It’s fine. Whatever you want.”
Walter rolled his eyes. “Seriously, I have to blow a grand a month before my dad even remembers I’m alive. Here. How about these cute mugs? They say ALOHA. I think we each have to have one, don’t you? And the serving tray to match, naturally.”
Kelly frowned and protested no matter what Walter put in his cart, though Walter thought his roommate secretly loved the pea-green floor rocker, and maybe the mirrored ALOHA tray Walter planned to hang on the wall near the door. Mostly Kelly seemed determined not to be a bother and to under no circumstances spend Walter’s money.
Naturally, this cemented Walter’s determination to pay for dinner.
They ditched the car in the lot, leaving their stuff for the way back, and walked to Moe’s. It had an age minimum of nineteen to get in, but it was still early so nobody gave a shit. They ate on the restaurant side, if the handful of booths and the burrito bar could be called a restaurant. Though as Walter saw Kelly scouring the menu, he remembered the food-allergy thing and felt like a dick. “Shit, I didn’t even think. Can you eat here?”
“I think so.” Kelly was still scrutinizing the laminated sheet. “No cheese and no sauces except the salsa, and I need to double-check everything because I’ve learned otherwise I run too high a risk of hitting the hospital, but they look safe enough. It’s all customized, so it’s actually probably one of the better places I can eat.”
“You can do all the burritos as salad, if you have the gluten thing or just don’t want a tortilla.”
“I thank God on a daily basis I don’t have a wheat allergy.” Kelly stepped forward to order, and Walter found himself hoping to hell that God thanking was ironic. If Cara found out he was living with a God-fearing Republican, he’d never hear the end of it.
As predicted, Kelly had a fit when Walter paid for their meal, though it was nothing compared to when Walter ordered a pitcher of Pabst and two glasses.
“I’m only eighteen.”
“Do not tell me you haven’t had alcohol. I won’t believe you.”
Kelly glared at him. “Yes, I have, but not like this. Not out in the open where anyone can see me.”
“What do you think they’re going to do? Storm in with a SWAT team and haul you off to the gulag?” He glanced at Kelly’s hand, noticed the jewelry and laughed. “Though here’s a pro tip: don’t wear your high school class ring. It doesn’t do you any favors in the age department.” He studied Kelly with a critical eye. “You do look young in general. We’ll make sure it’s a good fake.”
Kelly tucked the ring’s stone into his palm, blushing yet again. “What happens if they figure out it’s a fake?”
“Here? They’ll just take it away. Tonight you’re not going to need it though. If they card us, it’s me they’ll fry for buying beer for you.”
“With your fake ID?”
“Actually, it’s my real ID. I’m turning twenty-two next month. And yes, before you do the math, I’m older than most college juniors. I believe I mentioned my parents’ divorce? Well, let’s just say my mother did not take it well. At all. I was enrolled at Northwestern, and I got about a month in before I withdrew and went home because I had no idea what was going to happen. She did go to the hospital for a while, so it’s probably good I pulled out when I did. I have no idea who would have kept my sister from foster care or worse.”
Kelly looked at him as if he’d confessed to pulling his family from the ocean in some kind of hi-res film moment. “Wow.”
“Not even close to wow. Anyway, when it was all sorted, they asked me where I wanted to go. At that point, nowhere, because I felt so old, but my best friend was here, and she loved it, and I’d visited her and thought it wasn’t bad, so I said this joint. Which brings us to now.”
“Is your friend still here?”
Walter shook his head. “Graduated in August. I’m two years behind my high school peers. Cara and I rigged ourselves a room together midway through my freshman year, and last year I lived with her and her fiancé off-campus, which was great. I was supposed to stay in their place this school year, but the landlord fucked that up. It’s too bad. It’s a great place. I should take you by to see it, since I still have the key.”
“Who’s living there now?”
“Nobody, and nobody will. Bank will try to sell it, which they won’t be able to do because it’s too close to campus. They’ll probably make it a parking lot eventually. Crying shame.”
“Couldn’t you lease it from the bank?”
“Yes, but the college didn’t like that it wasn’t a year lease, which is part of their ‘protect the family’ bullshit, which is really them playing Big Brother. Every now and again when the crazy right-wingers bitch about socialist lefties, they get it right. This would be one of those cases.” He let out a breath and gave up. “Okay, I have to ask because it’s making me nuts. You’re not Republican, are you?”
Kelly looked surprised and a little amused. “Does that matter?”
“Oh fuck, you are.”
Now he laughed. “No. I’m not anything. Neither is my family. We vote in whatever way works at the time. Or rather they do, I haven’t voted yet. Though I know the last few times my family have voted Democrat because of LGBT rights.”
“Because now it’s personal?” Walter sipped at his beer. “Sure, I get that. Well, are you going to hold it against me for being a card-carrying member of the radical left?”
God, the kid had a cute smile. It made his eyes twinkle and made Walter want to suck on his chin. “I think I can live with it.”
“What about religion? I have an atheist card too, and I use it.”
Kelly didn’t seem moved. “I’m Lutheran, but I don’t care what other people believe, or don’t.”
“You going to go to church on Sunday mornings?”
“Probably not, but don’t tell my mother.”
“Fair enough.” God, Walter felt a lot better. He nudged Kelly’s beer at him. “What about wild sex parties? I assume those are on the menu, if we can figure out how to stack people into our—shit, you’re white as a sheet. They slipped an almond into your burrito, the bastards. Where’s that EpiPen?”
“No—” Ducking his head, Kelly stared hard at his plate, color coming back to his face. “I’m fine.”
Kelly was, Walter realized, mortified. Oh. That pale expression was extreme embarrassment. “So no sex parties, huh? The room really is too small anyway, and we’d have to smuggle them into Porterhouse first. Do we go with the old towel-on-the-door routine, or in this century, text message? I’d crack a joke about liking an audience, but I don’t want to see you pass out.”
Kelly pursed his lips, then sighed so hard his shoulders drooped a little. “The thing is, I don’t have sex.”
“What, ever? I didn’t think Lutherans were that harsh.”
It was supposed to make him laugh. It didn’t. “No. I want to. I would love to, honestly, but—” He glanced up at Walter, then away.
Holy. Fuck. First the boyfriend question, now this. “Red, are you trying to tell me you’re saving yourself for marriage?”
“No. I—Damn it.” Kelly took a sip of the beer, which was rather a hollow victory for Walter at this point. “Look, I get that it’s not special to you, but it is to me. You can make jokes about Mayberry and my perfect family if you want, but this is who I am, and I happen to like who I am, so you can just deal. I do want a boyfriend. I do want my first time—and my second, and all the ones after that—to be special. I don’t think that’s impossible, either. I’m not cynical, no. I believe there are good people out there, and I want to meet one of them and fall in love and raise a family. In fact, it’s what I’m going to do, and I don’t care what you think about my wanting that.”
Kelly looked at Walter with so much conviction it would have been beautiful if it weren’t so tragic. Where the fuck the kid thought he was going to find this Prince Charming, even at Disney U, was his first challenge. That he’d find somebody remotely close on his second try—or third, or fourth, or fiftieth—wasn’t the point. That kind of thing didn’t exist.
He couldn’t say that to Kelly, not a single word of it though, because he couldn’t work the cynicism past the lump in his throat he’d gotten from listening to that sappy, stupid speech. He couldn’t be the one to burst that bubble. Because then Red would stop smiling at him, and that would break his heart.
Walter picked up his beer, clinking it against the one Kelly gripped so desperately. “Good luck.”
He meant it too. He also knew there was no way in hell that fantasy would happen, but he hoped Red beat the odds. Fucking shame, though, because obviously the let’s-get-it-out-of-the-way, make-out session he’d been planning on angling for before bed was off the table. He supposed he could live without knowing what Kelly looked like when he came, but it seemed such a stupid waste.
He nudged Kelly’s beer again. “Drink up.” When Kelly didn’t, Walter looked back at him and sighed at the glare he was getting. “No sex parties, okay? I’m not playing monk for you, but I’m not a dog. We’ll work something out. It’ll be fine. Now drink your beer.”
Kelly kept glaring. “You’re mocking me somehow. I can tell, and I don’t care for it.”
“I’m not mocking you. You can do what you want.”
“But you don’t like it.”
“It doesn’t matter what I think, does it? Who knows. Maybe I’m wrong and your way is right.” He snorted and refilled his own glass. “Hell, you’d be number two, because so far Cara’s Exhibit A.”
“Your friend who you lived with?”
“The very same. Engaged to the guy she met here, and they’re off in Northbrook picking out china patterns. Happy as little clams in a sandbar. It’s not even disgusting, which in itself is disgusting.”
Finally, Kelly smiled again. “See? It happens.”
“Yeah. So does a lightning strike.” He held up a hand before Kelly could say anything. “Don’t even start about lightning rods. I get it. I just don’t buy it, and it’s not for me in any event. I’m going to get a good job, screw my way through whatever metropolitan area I live in, then buy myself a boy toy to amuse me in my old age. It’s all arranged. You can Skype me and show me the cutesy baby you and Prince Charming adopted, and I’ll send her extravagant presents. It’ll be wonderful.”
Not just a smile but a laugh. “Okay.”
Walter glanced at his phone. “Right. They’re going to start carding in half an hour, and while the owner might love me, he won’t stand for you not even having a decent fake during rush hour, so chop-chop, Red. We’ll go find you something suitable tomorrow. Unless, of course, you’d rather continue the traditional newbie freshman activities.”
Kelly flipped him off. “I’ll stick with the Cynical Atheist Orientation plan, thanks.”
“Good.” Walter watched Kelly’s throat work as he drained his beer, feeling the beauty of it burn in his groin. Fucking, fucking shame about that sex, because they’d have had to do it twice, it’d have been that good. Whatever. There were plenty of cute freshmen to fuck. It would take him a month and a half just to get through the Grade A’s.
Still, such a shame that the cream of the crop would be one bunk away and holding out for Mr. Right.
Eventually he’ll come around to realizing he’d do better to settle for Mr. Right Now. Walter smiled at the thought.