Ten

“WHAT DO you want from me, Rey?” Regret left a bitterness in his words; Gus could taste it at the back of his throat.

He wanted to hold on, to hook his arms around Rey’s waist and lean on him. It’d been too long since someone other than his brothers hugged him, and those were fleeting, quick embraces strong enough to suffocate then released before the warmth could reach the cold pit of darkness brewing inside of him.

Rey stepped back enough to feed the coldness, letting the evening air fill the space between them. It was easier looking at his ex-lover draped in spare light and shadows. There was something about Rey’s face, a strength he’d always been drawn to, a steadiness Gus loved to wake up next to. Rey wore his emotions openly, riding his passions and angers with a fluid grace, and when his warm brown eyes grew cold, his words would be sharp and exact, finding weaknesses in an argument with a deadly precision.

“I don’t know. Maybe just for you not to hate me. Maybe just for you to have someone to reach out to.” The admission surprised Gus, and it probably showed on his face, because Rey laughed, a short, quick self-deprecating noise he coupled with a shrug. “Everything I’ve said and felt for the past few days… hell, for the past three years… has been about me. How I feel. What I miss. You’re right. I decided for us. I was so fucking far up my own ass I couldn’t see how… I didn’t get we were supposed to fit into each other’s lives, not you fitting into mine. Yesterday was the first time I understood what I was doing back then.

“I wasn’t in love with you. I mean, I was,” Rey said, catching Gus before he could slide off the wall and stalk off. “Hear me out. Please. I wanted you to fit into something you weren’t. You’re not. I was in love with you, but it was on my terms. You didn’t ask me to learn how to tattoo someone. Or spend the night rolling through parties. I resented you doing those things when I wasn’t around. So yeah, I loved you, but I didn’t see you. I didn’t hear you. I didn’t listen. Not enough. Not then, but I do know you, Gus. I know right now, you hurt and you’re scared. You’ve got a lot of… crap coming into your head in a day or two, and you’re going to want to run, but you won’t. You’re stronger than that, and I’m sorry I didn’t see that strength in you then. I’m sorry I wasn’t strong enough to work things out between us. You’re right, I threw you away. I was a fucking idiot, and I’ve regretted it ever since. You’re worth keeping. The question is, am I good enough for you to keep?”

His throat was closing in, but Gus managed to mutter, “I met my son for the first time today and you do this shit to me?”

“Wasn’t planning on it,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Then I saw you and… I couldn’t not say it. I’m angry still. Hurt. It’s complicated, and at the same time, so damned simple. I did what was right for me without thinking if it was right for you. Even if… you mean that no, I owed you something more than what I gave you.”

Looking beyond Rey helped somewhat. It was a familiar landscape, one he’d watched grow and—he still winced at the divot in the tree at the end of the drive—damaged. It was home. His first home and he was now sitting under a bank of windows listening to his brothers’ muted conversation while the first man he’d loved dug into the scabs Gus wanted to leave alone.

The light was leaving the sky, folding grays into purples, with bursts of tangerine and lemon flaring up as the streetlamps came on. The hilltop park across the street was noisy, a chorus of dogs barking somewhere on the trails, and a pair of young women in yoga pants and bright sneakers jogged past, heading toward one of the walk entrances.

“They separated us, you know?” A couple and two children walked by, but he and Rey were hidden by the copse, a natural cover of shadows, curves, and leaves, and Gus smiled when the smallest girl began to hop up the cement path, bells jingling on her shoes. “I mean, not just Bear and Ivo but me and Puck. They split us all up when they took us from Mom.”

“I didn’t know that,” Rey admitted. “Why would they do that?”

“Because we were already marked as shit. There’s another designation for it. I can’t remember what politically correct words they used, but he and I were marked before we went in. We missed school. We were disruptive in class. Our mother was… our fucking mother.” He swallowed at the thickness forming in his throat, a flash of rooms and chairs going by in his mind. “I didn’t know where anyone went. They don’t tell you, you know? You just get cut off from who you come in with and no one answers any of your questions. So you just stop asking.

“I was in… four foster homes before my mother… before she got a hold of me and Puck. I hadn’t seen him in fucking forever, and when I saw him sitting in the back of the car when she pulled up in front of my school, I didn’t think twice about climbing right in.” Tears threatened, and he blinked, not wanting to break apart. “I was with my brother for almost an hour before she… well, you know.

“After that, it was harder. The social workers argue and snipe right in front of you because you’re nothing—I was nothing—it didn’t matter what I heard or who said it, I was powerless. And I was numb,” he confessed, shrugging. “See, there’s foster homes they… I don’t know the word for it but good ones. The kind of foster family you send a kid to because there’s a chance they’d be adopted or at least, cared for. And those fuckers in those rooms… man, they guard those fucking families like they’re treasure. And yeah, maybe they are. So I sat in a room—could have been the one I was in today when I met Chris—and listened to four social workers go through a list of available foster homes and eliminate the ones I didn’t deserve to go to. Because I was—how did she put it?—wasn’t going to be anything but a smear of shit on society’s ass.”

“You were eight.” Rey’s voice broke, and he reached out, only stopping when Gus shook his head. “You’re not shit—”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong. I wasn’t good enough to be placed in a home with people who… with an actual family. I didn’t know how to act. Didn’t know how to talk right. Didn’t go to school. Got into fights.” Gus risked touching Rey’s shoulder, needing to ground himself with Rey’s warm skin. “Those kinds of placements are for kids who… could be success stories. The ones written up in the news about how they overcame all of the crap thrown at them at an early age.

“Something happens to Jules… to her parents and that’s what Chris is going to deal with. That kind of shit. Because of me. Because of my mom.” His eyes stung too much to see past the leaves, and the night was beginning to swaddle the driveway, leaving them cloaked in darkness. “And when you… fuck… that night, you put me back in that room again, Rey. Sat me back down in that fucking chair and talked over me, making decisions about my life, putting me where you thought I belonged instead of what I needed. So right now, I’ve got to say no. Or at least, I can’t say yes because I can’t trust you not to do that to me again.”

“HE SAID no, Mace,” Rey huffed, falling back into step with his best friend. “Well, no for now. And it sucks because he’s closed up. Not just to me but… to you guys too.”

“You fucked up.” The hill was beginning to steepen, but Mason took the ascent as if it were a straightaway, eating up stretches of pavement. Mason glanced back, slowing his pace to let Rey catch up, infuriating him. “Yesterday. Day before. Back before… three years ago, you didn’t have faith in him. And well, he’s a flake. Less now, though. Jesus, Montenegro, should I get you a walker?”

“I fucking hate you right now.” His side ached, more from the stairs he’d fallen down during their early morning shift. “I can’t do this.”

“Talk about Gus?” Mason turned around, jogging backward. “Or keep up with me.”

Rey slowed to a walk, pressing his hand to his ribs. They throbbed where he’d smacked into a support beam when the stairwell gave way under his feet during an early morning call. It’d been a short drop but enough to bruise. Mason stopped, letting Rey catch up, frowning when Rey rubbed his side.

“Sure the doc cleared you?” He grabbed at Rey’s shirt to lift it, then frowned when he stepped back, holding Mace off.

“Yeah, he did. And don’t… hover.” Rey scoffed at Mason’s halfhearted snarl. His stomach growled, reminding both of them it’d been hours since they’d gulped down sandwiches at the station. “I’ve already got a mother, and yeah, I don’t want to talk about your brother while you’re kicking my ass up a hill.”

He’d not gone into the house, leaving Gus outside but taking the taste of him—the smell of him—home. Insanity or compassion drew him to Gus’s side, to touch his face when he should have given them space to talk, to breathe. The sorrow he’d seen lurking in Gus’s expression moved him, and he’d touched Gus’s mouth before he’d realized he wanted to taste the cherry on Gus’s tongue. He’d promised himself to move slowly, approach Gus only after talking to him, but one glint of silver in the shadows and a ghost-shrouded fallen angel and Rey reached out, itching to bring a smile to a mouth he wanted to fall into.

Even knowing he shouldn’t.

They didn’t talk until they got to the taco stand Mason called as the end of their run. Told to stay put, Rey laid claim to one of the short picnic tables set out on the patio, easing onto one of its benches, then hunching over to relax his too-tight muscles.

It was late, nearly ten at night, but the stand was still busy, a ten-person line wrapped around the neon-orange-painted shack. A tiny Vietnamese woman worked the order counter, shouting back at the two-man kitchen working the grills and fryers, then slinging out completed meals with a handful of napkins and a terse suggestion to try the salsas at the condiments stand next to the end of the shack. A few feet away, an almost pretty young man who could have been her brother or even her son worked the eight-table patio, cleaning with a swipe of the wet rag he kept tucked into a loop on his cargo pants and refilling the salsas when someone complained.

Set in a mixed ethnic neighborhood, the shack’s customers were diverse but definitely hungry, judging by the five bags of food a blond frat boy hefted up off the pick up counter. Insects danced around the old-fashioned large-bulb Christmas lights strung over the patio, large winged beasts doing battle with the glowing yellow filaments. The chilly air was nice on his overheated skin, and Rey debated laying his head down on the table’s gouged-out top when Mason returned.

“You look like you feel a truck hit you.” He slid a platter of tacos in front of Rey, then lay down a disposable silver pan of well-done fries topped with carne asada, cheese, and pico de gallo next to it. “Kid’s bringing us some horchata.”

“You just went up there.” The carne asada sizzled, melting the cheese underneath it, and Rey plucked out a piece, blowing on it as it burnt his fingers. “There’s a line.”

“She likes me, and I left a really good tip.” Mace shrugged. The drinks came on the food’s heels, and Mace’s eyes followed the young man’s progress back through the crowd. “Cute.”

“Young,” Rey pointed out, unwrapping one of the forks he dug out from the pile of napkins dumped on the table. “Like maybe still in high school young.”

“College. Told me he’s majoring in biology, but yeah, way too young,” he rebutted. “Eat and we can talk about Gus. You left without coming in last night, and when he got in, he blew right past me and headed upstairs. How shitty were you to him? Or was it the other way around?”

“I don’t know.” He made a face back at Mason. “Fuck you. It’s not easy. I don’t even know what I’m doing with him. I came over because I thought he… I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking. I just had a feeling he needed someone outside of the family to talk to.”

“There’s no talk. Not with him. We bully him a lot,” Mason agreed. “Okay, so I bully. Bear and Luke cajole. Ivo mocks. Gus doesn’t talk—”

“He talks to me,” Rey interrupted. “And did you ever once think maybe he’s sick of fighting with you?”

“He’s my brother,” Mason pointed out, digging a fork into the fries. “I’m supposed to fight with him. Basic family rules. Gus and I understand each other just fine. The question here is what are you going to do now? You struck out. Walk away or try again?”

“I don’t know.”

“If you ask me, I’d rather the two of you didn’t hook up. It’ll make my life a whole lot easier.” Talking around a mouthful of food, Mace stopped and swallowed. “But that being said, he’s… different. I mean, from before he left. Quieter. And I thought maybe it was because it’s almost that time of year when Gus goes out and broods, but it’s not the same kind of quiet. I get he misses his brother, but he’s got to work through it. He can’t keep beating himself up for what happened that day.”

“He ever talk to you about what happened? With his mom and his brother?” The horchata was cold, brisk enough to bite at his teeth, but it went down smoothly, leaving a faint creamy cinnamon sting behind. Rey picked up a fork and pushed a few fries around, contemplating how much to dig into Gus’s past. “He ever talk about Puck? He never did when we were together. Not a lot anyway.”

“Maybe to Bear.” Mace rested his elbows on the table. “Probably not Ivo. Definitely not me. Why? What’d he say to you?”

“Little bit but, nothing about… he mentioned Puck last night, while we were talking. It fucking broke me inside, Mace,” Rey confessed, putting his fork down. “Now with the kid—Chris—I wonder if he’s worried about doing something—”

“His mom was nuts. Not just having mental issues, because God knows, she had those, but there was something broken inside of her, man. Bear wasn’t a kid like they were. He was old enough to know it didn’t matter how much help she was offered, she wasn’t going to take it. She liked being fucked-up. Got off on it. Gus isn’t like that.”

“There’s a lot of crap rolled up in Gus’s head about her. About being in the system. Even about his brother.” He sighed when Mace shoved the half-eaten platter over to him. “She tried to kill them. Well, tried to kill Gus. She did kill Puck… I don’t even want to think what was going through that woman’s head.”

“Your dad set fire to your house, remember? Same thing. Tried to kill you. Difference is you had a mom who had your back. Gus didn’t.” His friend looked away, but not before Rey caught a flash of bitterness in his expression. “None of us did. Well, none of us had… look, I’m not going to cry to you about how shitty it is to bounce from one family to the next. Your crap gets stolen or left behind because they move you without taking you back to get what you’ve got in a box somewhere. You move in trash bags, and everything’s stuff people toss into a bin, thinking you should be happy you get their old spaghetti stains and torn shirts. And sometimes, you are.

“Bear was lucky. He had a decent family for a long time until that bus driver got drunk and killed his parents. Sure, he ended up in Melanie’s lap, but by then, he was already Bear. Gus didn’t have a chance, man. Neither did Puck or Ivo.” Mace took a long draw from his drink, then set it down on a napkin soaked through with condensation. “The five of us ended up okay. Or at least on our feet and with each other. Maybe in the beginning, it was because we’re queer, and that’s a shitty thing to figure out when you’re so fucking lost as a kid or we just rubbed together right, but we’re okay. Now. I know people don’t get that, but that’s fine. I don’t need anyone to validate my relationship with any of them. Gus might. I used to think Ivo was the most broken one we have, but he’s got nothing on Gus. Ivo’s just weird, and I don’t even want to guess the shit he was given.”

His side began to throb again, and Rey stretched back, trying to ease the ache. The pull helped his ribs but did nothing for the heaviness in his chest. Mace watched him like a hawk, catching the slight wince Rey couldn’t suppress when he straightened. He was tired. They both were. The calls were short today, mostly false, but the last one—the collapsing rotten, soaking wet stairs—was brutal. Digging through a flooded apartment for an old woman’s cat should have been an easy enough job, and it had been before the world slid out from under him. As if the fall hadn’t been bad enough, the old lady complained about her cat being wet when he’d limped out of the wreckage, holding the pissed off tabby for her to take.

“Just to remind you, you’re the one who wanted a run,” Mace said, gesturing with his fork toward Rey’s torso. “Probably was a stupid idea. Nearly as dumb as the one you had to talk to Gus instead of just coming in the house and waiting for him to come to you.”

“Thanks,” Rey shot back. “And he won’t come to me. Shit, he won’t go to you and you think he’ll come to me?”

“What do you want from him, Rey?” The irony of hearing Gus’s words fall from Mace’s mouth wasn’t lost on him. “Do you want him back in your life? And as what? Because a few days ago, you were pissed off at him for being… Gus. Suddenly it’s all puppies and kittens?”

“No, that’s not—” He clamped his mouth shut, sifting through the tangle of emotions brewing inside of him. “He said some things the other day, things that… stuck. I treated him like shit, Mace—”

“Bull. I was there. You treated him fucking great.”

“No, I didn’t.” It’d taken him waking up in the middle of the night and going over the countless bits and pieces of anger he’d nursed during his relationship with Gus, and they weighed on him, growing heavier with each turn of a memory. “I thought I did. I thought… fuck, you and I are closer to living the relationship I thought I’d have with Gus, just without the sex.”

“Love you man, but—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Rey sneered. “You wish I had the hots for you. Hell, I should, you know? You pulled me out of a goddamned burning house, and who gets me going? Your baby brother… who I wanted to be more like me and less like him.”

“Might as well ask a crab to fly,” Mace snorted.

“I’m not saying he didn’t… it wasn’t the right time for us. We really did want different things or at least didn’t know how to say what we needed from each other,” he confessed softly. “I used to get pissed off if he was half an hour late or when he forgot something we were supposed to do or he was going to pick up. I was the only one who had expectations, and every stupid thing was a dock against him. So every time I got after him for something stupid, he drifted further away.

“You’re right. I fucked it all up three years ago, and now I can’t let it go.” Pushing the food away, Rey leaned over, sucking in a breath at another twinge. “Gus doesn’t talk, but he used to talk to me. That’s what I should have been working on instead of… keeping track of how many times he failed this limbo dance I kept forcing him to go through, and instead of raising the bar to help him, I lowered it because I was an asshole.”

“I’m sure that made sense in that cracked little head of yours, but how does that translate to you and Gus?” Mason abandoned the tacos, making a clamping motion toward the slender man working the front to ask for a takeout box.

“I miss him, Mace. I do. He made me laugh, you know. He’s… fearless even when he’s crippled with doubts, he pushes forward because that’s what he’s got to do. I didn’t give him credit for that, and I should have. I loved watching him draw or get into researching something somebody wanted. He talked then. Hell, I couldn’t get him to shut up.” Rey chuckled. “I miss that too. Doing nothing with him. I keep coming back to Gus. When we go out, no one’s him. I’ve just been too stubborn to admit it.

“Right now he needs someone to have his back, and yeah, you guys are there, but it’s not the same, not if he won’t tell you what’s going on inside of him.” Sighing, he rubbed at his face and instantly regretted it when his lower back took up where his side left off. Dropping his arms, Rey said, “So I guess this means I’m going to try to get your brother back, but even if I can’t, he should know I’ll be there for him to lean on. He deserves to know how good he is. That he’s worth… everything. That’s what I want, Mace. I want your brother to know how incredible he is and how thankful I am he’s alive.”