Homecoming for Beginners

Chapter 13

IT WAS after dinnertime when they finally got Theo sprung from the hospital. Ty took a moment to say a silent prayer of thanks that Ollie was driving, because his brain had been experiencing total paralysis for the past three hours.

Ollie had kissed him.

Not, like, a chaste kiss of gratitude or anything either. Well—okay, so the first kiss had kind of felt a little bit like shut up , but in a good way.

The second one had tasted like the rest of Ty’s life.

But could he have his cake and eat it too? (Put a pin in that cake thought for later.) When the school year was almost over and Ty’s bereavement leave was almost up and he was expected back in Chicago?

Could he leave and keep Ollie?

Could he keep Ollie and stay in this messed-up town, where people treated him like a delinquent because he couldn’t be the son his father wanted?

And what about Theo? Until today Ty would’ve held out hope that Theo would accept him into this little ready-made family with open arms. Ollie would never put his own wants before Theo’s, and Ty would never want him to, but—

“How come the police are at our house?” Theo asked from the back seat, and Ty’s mind spun off in a totally different direction.

Ollie put the car in Park—the police cruiser was blocking the entrance to the garage—and he and Ty exchanged looks. “I’ll get Theo settled, while you…?”

Ty sighed. Based on probabilities alone, the cops were here for him. “Yeah.”

At least the weather was nice enough that he didn’t have to feel the slightest bit of guilt not inviting them inside.

Ty closed the car door and made his way over to the two uniforms sitting in their squad car. They got out as he approached, and he was surprised to recognize Jake Robinson on the passenger’s side .

The other cop was a fortyish woman he didn’t know. She had her hair pulled back in a severe bun, and her sharp green eyes seemed to bore right into him as she approached. “Tyler Morris?”

Well, at least she wasn’t reaching for her gun. “That’s me.” He glanced over her shoulder. “Jake.”

Jake offered a pained half-smile. “Ty.”

“My name is Sergeant Rosewater. Is there somewhere we can go to talk?”

They’d sent a sergeant out here for this? Ty glanced from her to Jake and then back. “Patio’s pretty comfortable this time of year.” Plus it wasn’t located inside his house. Ty didn’t have anything to hide from the police, but he wasn’t taking chances.

Besides, on the patio Ollie and Theo wouldn’t be able to eavesdrop. Ty didn’t have anything to hide from them either, but that didn’t mean the whole scenario wouldn’t be upsetting.

“So,” he said when they had settled into his dad’s conversation set. “What brings you out here, Sergeant?”

“I’d like to take your statement about the incident at the grocery store on Tuesday.”

Oh hell no. Ty schooled his face into neutrality. “The incident? You mean Mrs. Sanford’s heart attack?”

Rosewater exchanged a glance with Jake. “That’s correct.”

“I gave my statement to the paramedics on the scene,” Ty said. “Jake was there. He can tell you.”

“I did,” Jake muttered.

Rosewater’s expression remained neutral. “Regardless, we’re here to follow up with inquiries into a potentially suspicious death. This is just routine.”

“Sergeant.” Ty leveled her with his most jaded and over-it stare. “I have been a licensed paramedic for four years. Don’t insult me. Mrs. Sanford’s death was in no way suspicious, and if this is routine, the Suffolk police force are either spectacularly incompetent or ridiculously overfunded. As I’ve said, I gave my statement on the scene. If you’re looking for anything more than that, it’ll have to wait until I call my lawyer.”

Rosewater might as well have been made of stone for all the reaction that got him. Jake tried to give Ty a commiserating look over her shoulder .

It didn’t take a genius to figure out what was going on—not with Alan Chiu on the town council, and not with the way things ran in Suffolk. Ty didn’t realize people still got run out of town. Part of him wanted to find it funny. Hell, part of him did . This was Connecticut in the twenty-first century, not the old west.

“Mrs. Sanford’s body has been sent to the medical examiner’s office for autopsy.”

Was he supposed to be scared? “Where they’ll confirm she died of natural causes, specifically a heart attack,” Ty said levelly. “Sergeant, I don’t know what you’ve heard about me, but I can guess who has a bug up their ass that I haven’t skedaddled like a kicked dog. If Alan Chiu wants to round up a posse, let him. It’s not going to change the truth.”

It was only going to make Ty’s last couple weeks in Suffolk miserable. But hey, once he left, Chiu could declare victory over the godless heathen and go back to his self-important life.

That finally got a reaction out of Rosewater—the hint of a twitch around her mouth. Ty had worked in emergency services long enough to recognize the signs of local politics at play.

Jake cleared his throat. “You weren’t on duty as a paramedic,” he said, gaze fixed carefully above Ty’s right shoulder. “So no investigation into your professional conduct can be made.”

Ty knew that.

“However, the paramedics called to the scene will also be questioned as to why the response to the call took so long.”

“Were they supposed to break the laws of physics?” Someone was playing some kind of stupid game here.

“There will be a town hall meeting on the topic next weekend,” Rosewater continued. She was looking over Ty’s shoulder too. Were they trying to weird him out or something? Or—

From behind him came a fluttering sound. Jake and Sergeant Rosewater ducked. Ty didn’t understand why until a sudden breeze wafted through his hair as a shadow passed overhead.

Something struck the deck between him and Sergeant Rosewater, and Rosewater stumbled back a step.

Ty only avoided the blood spatter out of sheer luck.

He stared at the headless rabbit. He’d done some poking around online after Ollie mentioned the habits of the birds in his childhood. This particular bird was a hawk, he thought, and not an owl. Apparently some birds of prey preferred brain matter and would discard the rest of the animal.

He raised his gaze to meet Rosewater’s. “I think that bird wants you to get off my lawn.”

Jake was biting down on a smile, but Rosewater only sighed and handed him a folded piece of paper. “Details of the inquiry,” she told him. “Your presence is requested.”

You are cordially invited to jump into the frying pan , Ty thought grimly. “I’ll call my attorney.” He turned away to go back into the house. “I trust you can find your own way off my property.”

He was pretty sure he heard Jake’s muffled laughter as he reached for the door.

What a day. First Theo’s medical emergency, then Ollie giving Ty a heart attack with that kiss, and finally the fuck-you-ever-after of cops on his doorstep. Ty wanted a beer and a mind-wipe.

No. Ty wanted another kiss. Several dozen more kisses, to start with, and progressively less clothing with each one. Although a quiet Friday night in, watching network TV squashed on his couch with Ollie and Theo would make a pretty good consolation prize. Too bad Theo wasn’t talking to him. And Ollie had to put him first, of course. Ty had a shitty day, but he was a grown man. Theo had a major medical and emotional trauma and was only eight. Not to mention Ollie probably needed to be with his kid right now.

But maybe after Theo fell asleep they could have that conversation. Ty still didn’t have any idea where it might go , but sometimes he didn’t know what he wanted until he said the words out loud.

He toed his shoes off by the door and slunk through the house to the kitchen, where he poured himself a glass of smoothie from the fridge. He’d eaten too much questionable junk from hospital vending machines today, and he felt gross. He didn’t hear Theo and Ollie, so they were probably having a quiet father-son talk with the door closed somewhere. Maybe Ollie could figure out how to get Theo to forgive Ty, and then they could indulge in Ty’s pathetic watching-TV-as-a-family fantasy.

He finished his drink, put the glass in the dishwasher, and then tiptoed toward the bedrooms .

Ollie’s bedroom door was open, the lights out, bed made with military precision. Ty crept toward Theo’s room, straining his ears for the sound of voices.

Nothing.

He kept his own bedroom door closed, not because he valued his privacy but because he felt like he should, with a kid who wasn’t his in the house. The empty bedrooms had their doors closed too. Then Theo’s, open a few inches with light spilling out into the hallway, even if it was still silent.

Ty knocked softly and peered in.

Ollie and Theo lay on the four-poster bed, fast asleep, Theo curled in toward Ollie’s chest like an opening parenthesis. His fingers were clenched in the fabric of his father’s shirt. Even on that big bed, even cuddled up together, they somehow managed to take up all the available space. It was hard not to feel like it was some kind of metaphor.

Ty rubbed his sternum like that might remind his heart to keep beating. Then he padded down the hallway to the linen closet and pulled out a couple throw blankets. It was supposed to get cold tonight, and Theo and Ollie had passed out on top of the covers.

He covered each of them with a blanket, turned on Theo’s desk lamp, and flicked off the overhead light. Then he returned to his own bedroom and sat on the bed with his face in his hands.

What the hell was he going to do?

TY RAN out of the house on Saturday like his ass was on fire.

He’d slept fitfully the night before. Between talking to the police and not-talking with Ollie, he couldn’t get his brain to settle. Add in his anxiety over Theo’s silent treatment, and he didn’t think anyone could blame him for leaving the house before Ollie and Theo woke up. He walked to the school to retrieve his truck.

The whole thing backfired on him when he returned home to find a note on the kitchen table. Gone to Cassie’s to help set up for Mel’s birthday party. Talk later?—Ollie X .

“This is just mean,” Ty said out loud to the universe. It was one thing for him to avoid his own problems and quite another for the universe to take the decision out of his hands. Now that he couldn’t have that talk with Ollie right now, it was the only thing he wanted to do.

Instead he had to attend an end-of-year cookout with his coworkers, pretend his heart wasn’t wherever Ollie was, and hope desperately that he wasn’t being too greedy, grasping for more when Ollie had already given him so much.

What if Ollie changed his mind?

Ever since his chat with Ollie the other night, the atmosphere in the house felt charged. Ty kept catching Ollie looking at him. It was driving him crazy. And it felt unfair—he’d just managed to convince himself he could be Ollie’s normal platonic friend he lived with, at least for a few months.

Ty could not be Ollie’s normal platonic friend if Ollie was going to look at him like that.

Hell, Ty wasn’t sure he could move back to Chicago if Ollie kept looking at him like that.

For the first time in over a decade, it felt like someone looked at him and saw someone they liked. Someone they wanted to build a life with.

Unfortunately Ollie seemed to want to make his life in a town that had ground Ty’s self-worth into dog shit and then used a stick to scrape it off their shoe. Plus, Ollie had never once mentioned being attracted to men. That would’ve come up, right? So maybe Ty was imagining things. Or maybe Ollie had an incipient sexuality crisis on his hands. Did Ty want to get involved in that? (Dumb question. Ty would absolutely be all up in Ollie’s sexuality crisis, lending a hand or mouth or dick or whatever body part the situation called for.) And on top of those issues, they had Theo to consider. Ty was by no means a parenting expert, but he was pretty sure his dad dating right after his mom died would’ve sent Ty into an absolute rage tornado.

He couldn’t be responsible for turning sweet, sensitive Theo into a seething ball of angst. That would do terrible things to his karma. It was bad enough he wasn’t talking to Ty right now.

“Hey,” Peggy said from across the picnic table. Around them, the not-quite-end-of-school-year staff party ebbed and flowed. This year Jason Kim was hosting; his family had a fruit farm with a small event space. Ty would’ve loved it if he could convince himself to take any of it in.

Maybe he and Ollie should come back here with Theo.

Maybe Ty shouldn’t count his chickens before he asked if they wanted to peck in his yard. Or something .

Peggy continued, “This is supposed to be a party, and not the pity kind.”

“Yeah,” Henry put in, knocking his elbow into Ty’s. “Cowboys don’t cry. What’s going on?”

For a moment Ty didn’t know where to begin—Henry might maintain there was no crying in baseball, but he infamously cried at graduation every year, and also Ty wasn’t a cowboy; he didn’t even ride the lawn mower.

At least the question knocked him out of his Ollie-and-Theo spiral.

And then Peggy said darkly, “This better not be about Alan Chiu.”

Henry’s expression went thunderous. “Is he still giving you a hard time?”

Oh good—a whole new pile of anxiety. “That asshole.” On the other hand, no need for Henry to get worked up. He should watch his blood pressure. Eliza would kill Ty if she lost a second husband. “I mean, he’s trying to run me out of town, naturally. Cops showed up at my house last night to get a statement. Didn’t take a genius to figure out they were there doing his bidding. I told them I wasn’t talking to them without my lawyer.” Which—fuck. Ty took out his phone. “So I guess I have to call your wife. Again.”

The sun returned to Henry’s face. “I love my wife.”

Peggy caught eyes with Ty and just barely rolled them before returning to the subject at hand. “So anyway, what, Chiu’s trying to pin Mrs. Sanford’s heart attack on you or something?”

“That’s my guess.” If not legally, then at least in the court of public opinion.

“What does this guy have against you?” Henry wondered. “Did you seduce his wife or something?”

“I haven’t even been in town in over a decade,” Ty protested. Then, just to be sure, “Wait, who’s his wife?”

Peggy rolled her eyes. “Let’s take it as unlikely that you randomly ran into this woman in Chicago and slept with her and he somehow found out about it. And since I’m assuming sixteen-year-old Ty wasn’t in the habit of sleeping with people old enough to be his parents—”

Ty recoiled. “Ew.”

Even Henry looked a little green. “Let’s forget I suggested it.”

If only it were so easy.

“The point is,” Peggy said, “why’s he hate you so much?”

“I don’t know. I’d understand it if I benched his kid or something, but Peter’s the best player on the team. It’s not like we’re going to hamstring ourselves worse than we already are.” The closest game this season had been a 6–3 loss. “Maybe he’s mad I have more money than he does. Well, the estate. It’s technically not mine yet.”

Henry and Peggy exchanged looks again. “It’s not the craziest theory I’ve ever heard,” Peggy allowed.

“No,” Henry agreed, narrowing his eyes. “What’s weirder is that it’s getting to you.”

Ty squirmed under the scrutiny. “It’s not weird to hate it when people try to run you out of town.”

“Ty, believe me, we’re all aware of how, uh….” Henry faltered.

“How desperate you are for people to love you,” Peggy supplied, and reached for Ty’s hand across the table when he tried to put it over his face.

Henry opened his mouth like he might amend the statement, then carried on instead. “But that never bothered you when the people who didn’t like you were assholes.”

Peggy picked up a potato chip and used it to punctuate her sentence. “You loved pissing off assholes. Actually, I know for a fact you still love pissing off assholes, because I’ve seen you book it for the copy machine whenever you see Jenny coming”—Jenny Darel had despised him as a teacher and made sure he never forgot it—“and I’ve heard you whistling afterward.” She crunched the chip, licked salt from her thumb, and then seemed to think for a moment. “Something’s changed, though, and I don’t blame you if it’s different with Alan Chiu…. What’s Ollie think?”

And just like that, the innocent topic had circled back around to the place Ty’s brain always ended up lately. What did Ollie think? Did Ollie think he’d made a horrible mistake last night and want to let Ty down gently? Did Ollie think it was a problem that people in this town hated Ty for no discernible reason?

It definitely was a problem. Currently it was a problem because it was making Ty’s life annoying and running up his legal fees, but it could become a problem that made Ollie think twice about wanting to be the constant Ty built his life around. A problem that made Ollie not want to kiss him again.

Ty deflated. “Ollie doesn’t know yet.”

“Oh.” The way Henry said it had the hair on the back of Ty’s neck standing up. Just… knowing. And smug. Dare Ty even say patronizing .

“Oh,” Peggy repeated in the same tone, meeting Henry’s eyes. “I thought it was a weirdly political agenda that had you looking at that apple tree like it could unravel the mysteries of the universe, but—”

“It’s Ollie,” she and Henry chorused.

Ty needed better friends. Friends who wouldn’t do this to him. “Shut up,” he hissed. He didn’t need the whole faculty knowing what a disaster he was. Aside from Ollie and his students, they were the only people in town who actually liked him.

“Oh please,” Peggy said. “Sweetie. Everyone knows already. You moved the man in with you after meeting him one time. You’re a walking lesbian joke.”

That didn’t seem fair. There hadn’t even been a U-Haul involved. “It’s not like that,” Ty protested, his face flaming because it was exactly like that and he hadn’t even known it until a few days ago. “And it was twice.”

Henry snorted. “Whatever you say, Ty. So why haven’t you told Ollie about the thing with Chiu? The latest thing, I mean.”

Because I would rather talk to him about kissing me some more. “Because he and Theo had a long day yesterday. They were asleep by the time I kicked Jake and Sergeant Rosewater off the back porch. Still out cold when I left this morning.”

Peggy and Henry did that look-exchange thing again. Peggy leaned forward. “Asleep where?”

“In bed!” Off their smirks, Ty huffed and added, “ His own bed , guys. Or actually Theo’s bed, because they fell asleep on top of the covers while I fended off Chiu’s dogs. Metaphorically speaking. If I’d woken up with my arms full of that beautiful man this morning I would not be at this stupid party.”

“You tucked them in, didn’t you?”

Ty was going to give Peggy so much shit if she went out to lunch with Jason. She’d never know what hit her. “Can I plead the Fifth?”

“Have you talked to him about his feelings?”

Could they go back to talking about how everyone hated Ty? That seemed like more fun. “You said cowboys don’t cry two minutes ago and now you’re asking if we’ve talked about our feelings ?” When Ty was agonizing over the fact that they hadn’t had a chance to talk about their feelings? That was just mean .

“Talking is not the same as crying,” Henry said patiently. “You’re mooning, but you’re also happier than I’ve ever seen you, small town politics notwithstanding. So why haven’t you asked said beautiful man if he wants to join you in bed?”

Peggy turned an incredulous look on him before returning to Ty. “Maybe don’t open with that.”

“How many queer men have you dated?” Ty asked, because in his experience that was how it went a good 50 percent of the time.

She threw a grape at him.

“No, she’s right, though.” Henry leaned over, picked the grape off the ground, and wrapped it in his napkin. Probably concerned a dog might come along and accidentally poison itself. “You wouldn’t want Ollie to think you just want his body.”

Ty could not believe he was having this conversation with his former coach and a friend he’d barely spoken to since high school. Life came at you fast. “This is great, you guys, but your concerns are so… basic. Surface-level stuff.”

Peggy and Henry exchanged looks. “So what are you worried about?”

“Okay, well, for one thing, I’m supposed to go back to Chicago in less than two weeks.” He ticked the items off on his fingers as he went. “Are we really going to start a relationship long-distance? What are the long-term implications of that?”

Peggy opened her mouth, but Ty went on before she could answer.

“Or, what if Ollie decides his family sucks as much as mine did and we decide to make a go of it in Chicago? And then it doesn’t work, and we’ve uprooted Theo for no reason?”

“Uh, Ty—”

“And Ollie resents me forever for driving a wedge between him and his family?”

“Ty—”

“They hate me, by the way,” Ty went on. Was that the third finger or the fourth? “So, like, imagine I stick around here instead of going back to Chicago. I’m independently wealthy now.” He shivered as though someone had walked across his grave. Probably his dad’s ghost. “Like, I could do that and stay here with Ollie. But everyone here loves him as much as they hate me. What if everyone decides he’s guilty by association? And then the teachers start treating Theo like a criminal—”

“I think you know us a little better than that by now,” Henry said, but Ty kept talking over him.

“—and he doesn’t get into college, and he ends up broke and living in a rat-infested apartment in New Haven, addicted to scratch-off tickets?”

Ty ran out of fingers on the first hand.

“Were you planning on writing him out of your will?” Henry said. “Because I know how much that house is worth, kid.”

Hunching his shoulders, Ty stared at his paper plate. A carpenter ant had scaled the side and was investigating his potato salad. “Or what if Theo isn’t ready for Ollie to date, and he gets upset because he thinks I’m trying to replace his mom? He’s already mad at me because I made him go to the hospital. Or what if he is ready and I’m a shitty stepparent? It’s not like I had a great example to follow.”

Peggy reached across the table and put her hand on top of his. “Hey, come on. You’re great with kids.”

“Plus,” Henry broke in, “you need to make up your mind on how far in front of the horse you’re putting the cart.”

Peggy plucked a strawberry from her plate. “Henry’s got a point. I mean, maybe you should kiss him first.”

Ty had always had fair skin. Right now he could feel the flush rising up his neck to gradually fill his face, like a real-life cartoon.

Peggy dropped the strawberry. “Wait, you already kissed ?” Ty buried his face in his hands. “Excuse me. Here we are trying to give you a pep talk and you’re withholding critical information .”

“Well it’s not like I can just go around telling people Ollie kissed me , Peggy. I don’t usually enjoy outing people. Especially when I don’t even know if they’re into guys.”

“If he kissed you, that’s probably a pretty good indicator.”

Guys who had been married less than ten years should be less smug, Ty thought.

“Let me guess,” Peggy said. “You haven’t talked about Ollie kissing you either.”

He pushed his plate away so he could fold his arms on the picnic table and lay his head on top of them. “We haven’t had five minutes alone together since it happened. ”

“So I’ve got a wacky question,” Henry said. “Let me know if it’s too out-there.” He paused for dramatic effect and then said, “What the hell are you doing here, Morris? Go get your man.”