26. Chapter 26
Chapter twenty-six
Chuck
Three days later and Chuck was thrilled with the shower, once he got approval to use it. I was stupid to ever be weird about upgrading . The water pressure was better than he could ever remember in this place, and the combination of the sprayer nozzle and the oversized rainfall head felt like running naked through a car wash. But in a good way. It was like he was being blasted cleaner than he’d ever been in his whole life.
He hadn’t given the nozzle attachment a run through its paces. He’d definitely thought about it, but hadn’t quite been able to pull the trigger. Maybe Friday night. That was when he and Robinson had agreed to…meet up. He’d still tested it to see how it worked. It was a gentle spray, and the temperature was just as controllable as the rest of the shower, so it seemed like all was in order.
Of course, he still had to tell the boys. Not the details, obviously, but he needed them to be aware they’d be home alone again. On the plus side, after they survived his last date, that didn’t fill him with nerves the same way it had before. The downside was, that left room for a lot of different nerves to slip into place.
Robinson had an idea of him undressed from whatever dreams he was having. Chuck was fully aware he wasn’t going to live up to that idea. He kept in-shape enough to get by, but he also wasn’t exactly taking the time to work out. He sat on his ass, managing data for eight hours a day, then came home and helped his sons do homework sometimes, watched TV, and went to bed. He had some paunch and some softness that he certainly hadn’t when he got together with Andrew the first time.
That thought hit just as he was stepping out of the shower, and it was such a shock to his system, he almost fell over. Are those…the same thing? He’d never really considered that possibility. Not seriously, at any rate. But when his brain was simply running on autopilot, there he was, comparing Andrew and Robinson. His husband to a casual fling.
Or maybe not so much of a casual fling after all. That was a problem for another time. When he wasn’t naked and dripping all over the nice, clean floor, and when he didn’t need to prepare his kids for their hermit father going out on his second date in a week.
He got changed into PJs, and his eyes landed on the box of photo albums still left unopened, unexamined. He needed to bust into them, but it was so much. They felt impossibly heavy, even simply sitting there in his closet, so he slid the door shut and hoped that, at some point, they wouldn’t seem like such a massive hurdle to overcome.
He headed downstairs. The boys were all piled into the living room on blankets and pillows and Chuck groaned as he forced himself down. God willing I can get back up off the floor after this . It was sad. He was forty-three years old, but sitting cross-legged on the floor sure seemed like the last stupid mistake he’d ever make. Man found dead on floor. Too old and out of shape to get back up after he sat down. In lieu of flowers, send donations to the Why Did You Get on the Floor You Stupid Fuck Foundation.
One he was settled, Colby passed him the big popcorn bowl and a plastic cup. Chuck filled up, then sighed. “All right, before the episode starts, I want to talk with you boys again.”
Ryan snorted. “Told you he was going out with Robinson again.” He held out his hands to his brothers. “Pay up.”
They grumbled, but they each handed over five bucks.
Chuck cleared his throat. “Am I supposed to approve of that?”
Nick shrugged. “I can afford it. I didn’t think there was enough time left for you to go on another date before he left.”
“I can’t afford it.” Colby sighed. “I just wanted in on the action.”
“In on the action.” Chuck shook his head, glad the lights were dim so his smile hopefully wasn’t so obvious. “Did I take you to a casino and forget about it?”
Colby cackled, but didn’t say anything more on the subject.
Ryan, however, tossed the fives back to his brothers. “The satisfaction of being right is enough for me.”
Chuck rolled his eyes. “Focus. I am going out with Robinson. Friday night, after we’re all back home. I’m going to leave you pizza money, and I expect you to be responsible young gentlemen and go to bed at a reasonable hour. The weekend is still going to be chock full of work on the house.”
Ryan’s posture stiffened. “You’re going to be out late?”
Don’t put it together. For the love of god . “I might be. I have to wait until everything’s done around here, and Robinson has his own stuff he needs to do. So if we end up talking late or something, I want to know that you boys aren’t going to be grumpy buttholes in the morning.”
“Talking…” Ryan turned his gaze back to the TV screen, even though there was just a menu on there. “Hope you two have a good talk.”
Of course Ryan had his suspicions. He was old enough, and even though Chuck had no actual clue, he had a sneaking suspicion that he and Danielle were not just study partners. Not that he would ever ask. He and Andrew had done the sex talk with all three boys, so they were all as prepared as they were going to get. But if any of them were going to clue in, it was probably Ryan.
“It’s the weekend, though,” said Nick. “We’re really supposed to go to bed early like that?”
Any change of subject sounds awesome right now . “Listen. I’m not going to be home. I don’t have security cameras posted. As long as you’re all in bed when I get back and you don’t act all grumpy and bent out of shape on Saturday, how would I know when you actually got to sleep?” He reached across to the box they were using as a coffee table and grabbed the remote. Now that they had the TV back up on the wall, they had a bunch of their family shows to catch up on. “All right, we settled in? Good to go?”
He didn’t wait for them to answer. Or more, he didn’t wait for Ryan to make any other snarky little remarks. He may have clued in faster than Colby or Nick, but if Chuck let him make those kind of remarks, the other two would connect the dots eventually.
It wasn’t guilt holding him up as much as just…no one was going to have a good time if he had to explain to them that he was away getting his rocks off.