24. Chapter 24
Chapter twenty-four
Chuck
The house was…surprisingly calm when Chuck walked in after work. Not quiet or clean by any stretch, and certainly not back together enough to be, like, a comfortable living situation. But compared to how bad it had been, the improvement was undeniable. That fact that the flooring was all in around the living room and kitchen really helped, as did the walls. The counters weren’t all in for the kitchen yet, so the backsplash hadn’t been added, but all the other wall treatment was done. They’d gone with a deep sapphire, which certainly didn’t hurt the sense of calm in the space. It brought to mind the ocean, or deep space. Tranquility, even with plastic sheeting strewn about, most of his furniture still packed away, and rough piles of empty boxes stacked in the corners of the room.
Bunny poked her head through the back door, smiling with soil smeared across her forehead. “Welcome home, honey. Hope you don’t mind, we started a little home reno project.”
“What? I’m shocked. I had no idea.”
She mimed a tear tracking down from the corner of one eye. “I actually don’t think we have any jobs that need your attention for once, so you should just be able to kick up your feet for a little bit.”
“Well, there’s only so many places I can hide out. Someone’ll find me if they need to.”
She patted the door frame, flashed him a thumbs up, then headed back outside. Chuck headed upstairs, taking in the work that had been done. For most of the first week, it had seemed like absolute chaos, and now, as if out of nowhere, things were slotting together quickly. The house wasn’t done, and wasn’t even at a point where he could ‘see the vision’ or whatever, but it was better. It felt like a place that someone could live instead of an active construction zone.
When he got upstairs, he saw the door to the master suite closed. Not normal, but not completely out of the ordinary. What was weirder by a lot was, when he turned the knob and pushed in, something pushed back. A second later, the door cracked open and Evander slid out, shutting it behind him the instant he was clear. “I was really hoping to get this all done by the time you got home. Can I get you to explore the rest of the house for…fifteen minutes? Check in with the boys? Admire my boyfriend’s exquisite work in your back yard?” He grimaced. “I’m sorry. We just…you know, a reveal makes for good TV, and I think you’re going to like this.”
Chuck smiled, then slid off his jacket and draped it over one arm. “I think I can manage.”
“Bless you.” Evander shooed him with both hands, then carefully jostled himself back into the bedroom without opening the door too much again. Chuck had to admit, his curiosity was more than a little piqued, but when he tried to spy through the diminishing crack in the door, he couldn’t make out anything useful.
So he did go see how the boys were doing. Their doors were all open. Their bedrooms had all been painted and had new flooring put in. They still weren’t complete—moving the furniture back and forth every day was probably slowing things down quite a lot—but paint and flooring always made for such a stark difference. Chuck had seen enough of those home design shows to at least pick up that much, but seeing it was a whole different level of understanding.
He rapped on the jamb of Nick’s door, even though he was clearly not busy, lying in his bed and flipping through some manga with…well, Chuck was pretty sure it wasn’t actually pornographic, but the girl on the cover sure wasn’t wearing much clothing. And given that Nick closed it and tucked it under his thigh, it was probably softcore, at least.
Chuck stepped into the room with its new paint job, a pale seafoam green, and leaned against the dresser. “I’m sure you finished up everything already, but it’s my job to check.”
“Yeah. Light homework day.”
“And your elements quiz for science?”
“Hundred percent.” He smiled proudly, sitting up a little higher. “So I can finally stop studying for that.”
It was something his science teacher wanted them all to have down, the different abbreviations on the periodic table, so she had a quiz. They could take it as many times as they needed throughout the year, but they had to get all the questions right. It was a random selection of 30 elemental symbols, so it meant the kids either had to get lucky with the ones she picked or know them all on sight. “Well good job. Anything crazy coming down the pipeline I should know about?”
Nick stopped and rolled his eyes up, then shook his head. “Don’t think so. Mrs. Diaz wanted to make sure we’d all finished up our reading, but that was done a week ago.”
“Good.”
Chuck was ready to step back out into the hallway, but Nick leaned closer. “What about last night? Was it good?”
Should be ready for those questions. “It was good.” He’d arranged one more ride share to go pick up his car, and he was a little stiff—either from sitting on a bench all night with no back support, or because he was too old to be drinking beer all night without consequence—but other than that, he just had good memories. Good memories and the nagging concern in the back of his head that was none of his business—why was Robinson so focused on how he’d screwed up?
But Chuck wasn’t airing any of that to Nick. Or any of the boys. “Go ahead and go back to reading your hot girl comic.”
Nick blushed immediately, which was exactly the reaction Chuck had been hoping for. Then he headed to Colby’s room, which assaulted his eyes straight away. Between Chuck and Evander, they’d managed to talk him out of painting the entire room candy red, but there was still an accent wall on the right side that was a full-on assault. Colby was at his desk, also reading—which was a bit of a shock, frankly speaking—and Chuck almost didn’t want to interrupt if he was actually into a book for once. Still, he had to check in, so he rapped on the door jamb. “Hey kiddo.”
Colby folded down one corner of the page then closed the book. “Hi, Dad.”
“Everything done for the day, or is that reading for school?”
“Everything’s done. I just found this book at the library and wanted to give it a go. It’s really good so far.”
He flashed the cover. The Gethsemane Brigade by JJ Price. Chuck’s alarm bells immediately started ringing, since that sounded a hell of a lot like Christian propaganda, but he kept it casual. “What’s it about?”
“These kids are escaping this, like, weird religious spaceship and trying to avoid mind control.”
Chuck smiled. Crisis averted. “Well, I’ll let you get back to it.”
And, to even more shock from Chuck, as soon as they were done talking, Colby started reading again. I’m going to have to check those out. He would never tell any of the boys what they could or couldn’t read—at least, not at their ages now—but he still wanted to know .
Ryan’s room was as different as possible from the others, not the least reason being that they’d put up wallpaper instead of paint. The walls were hung with blue damask on the top, and black wood wainscoting along the bottom half. It was darker than either of the other two boys’ rooms, but the balance was nice. It felt cozy, not overbearing.
What wasn’t there was his oldest son. His backpack was hanging up on its normal hook, his bed had been made, his desk was strewn with papers and books, but there was no kid.
He headed back out and over to Nick’s room. “Hey, Ryan made it home, right? Didn’t burst into flames or anything.”
“Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the spontaneous combustion.” He rolled his eyes. “He was helping install the toilet, and then I don’t know what happened after that.”
“Who taught you to be such a smartass?”
“Dad-Drew.”
“Fair.” Chuck went into the upstairs bathroom. That, at least, looked pretty complete, with the fixtures all in place, including a toilet with one of those fancy flush buttons on the back instead of a handle. Chuck didn’t particularly care, but Robinson had sold him on the push button flush being better for the environment. Something about using less water. And Chuck had to admit, it looked a lot sleeker and more put-together.
“Hey, you saw it.”
He turned to see Robinson climbing up the stairs. Chuck nodded and tried not to smile. He still looked great. “Yeah. Surprised you managed to get it put in, considering how blitzed you were last night.”
“Tipsy. Maybe drunk for part of it.” He shrugged. “Plus Ryan lent a hand. He helped me put the toilet in, grilled me about our date, then headed off to do his homework.”
Chuck nodded, but a tiny pit of anxiety hardened in his stomach. “Well, he’s not up doing his homework, so any idea where I’d find him?”
“Oh yeah. Sorry. He said he finished and he wanted to help. So he’s down with Danni. We’re getting the kitchen set up, but I left some tools up here, and I think she sent him out to the contractor van to grab a plumbob.”
Chuck blew out a long breath. “Good.”
“Don’t worry. I’d have called you if one of your kids went missing.” He slipped around Chuck and darted into the bathroom, coming back with a heavy-duty wrench. Then, when he started talking again, his voice was lower. “And I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable at all last night. My lips were a little bit loose.”
Chuck shook his head. “No. It was fine.” Just thinking about it, Chuck could feel himself stiffening and thickening up down there. “I was flattered you’d want to see me shirtless. Or in your hotel room.”
Robinson shook his head. “God. I really was just running at the mouth.” He clucked his tongue off the roof of his mouth a couple times. “But, since you bring it up…since we’re both sober, would you want to head back to the hotel one night?”
Chuck blinked, cock hardening further and the pit of worry in his stomach being replaced with…something animal. Clawing to get out, and get at Robinson. “Umm. I mean. That’s also flattering. I mean…wow.”
“I know it’s forward.” Judging from the unique apple-red shade of Robinson’s entire face, that was true. “But, I don’t know. I don’t want to beat around the bush if we don’t have to. Not very long left here, and I’d be kicking myself if I didn’t shoot my shot. Metaphorically.”
Chuck nodded. “I…yeah. This weekend? Is that good? I mean, if that doesn’t work for you, it’s just that I have work, and I don’t want to leave the boys alone again so soon.”
“That’s fine, yeah.” Robinson laughed, shaking his head. “Change your mind if you want to any time. Zero pressure, zero consequence. But man, I’m looking forward to that.”
He bounded downstairs, taking them two at a time, and even though Chuck knew he should follow and check on Ryan, like he had with the other boys, he needed to take a second and calm himself down. His pants didn’t leave a lot to the imagination when he had a hard-on, and he wasn’t sure when he’d be able to get into his bedroom to change into something a little more modest.