Chapter 6
Miles
Monday morning brought a pounding headache, and a phone that chimed nonstop when I turned it back on.
All of Avery’s art stuff was safely locked in the storage unit, and after her long conversation with Rachel that I’d offered to cover the phone bill for, Avery had slept like the dead for going on eight hours.
I, on the other hand, had been up and down all night, restless with the what-ifs and wishing I’d said something to Logan before he vanished into the night.
Most of the missed calls and texts on my phone were from media people.
Clearly, some kind of video of the scene at the golf club had gone viral.
I hoped Avery’s dad seemed as shitty in the clips as he actually was, but I didn’t have the energy to go look.
I drank my coffee and scrolled through my lists, swiping left on text after text, until I hit one from my father.
Or rather, a chain of six from my father.
Crap.
The last one was a bit passive aggressive.
Dad: ~ Call your mother. You know she worries.
Translation, Dad was worried. He knew I’d call him back, not Mom. She still worked at the hospital and her shifts were erratic, which meant a call was taking a chance on either missing her or waking her, something I avoided except in extreme circumstances. I let Mom call me, which she hadn’t.
Putting Dad off never made things better, and while it was still early, my folks were on the east coast, three time zones later. I drained my cup, refilled it from the pot, and dialed.
“Miles.” Dad answered right away. “What kind of mess have you gotten into this time?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” I hedged.
“This woman, your fiancée. There’s video out there of her saying she’s a lesbian. It sure doesn’t look good.”
I sighed. “She is a lesbian, Dad. She’s engaged to my best friend, Rachel. You remember Rachel?”
“The singer with the guitar?”
“The rock musician who’s currently on tour in Japan, yeah.”
Dad hmphed. “Then why did you two pretend to be engaged? What are you playing at?”
“If you saw video, you saw her father, right? The bigoted asshole? Avery was scared of him, and he was holding her artwork hostage. I agreed to be her beard for a little while, until we could get her art to safety and she could leave his house.” I hadn’t precisely agreed, but that was between me, Rachel, and Avery.
Maybe Logan, if I ever got the chance to explain all this to him. If he ever cared enough to listen.
“And is she safe now? Do you need me to come out there and play the furious father-in-law?”
All my irritation at my dad vanished with that question, because he was making a serious offer.
Dad might not understand why I was ten times more interested in guys than women, or why I had to come out publicly, ever, but he’d supported me.
When he’d heard about my engagement to a woman on social media, he’d still supported me.
If I needed someone in my corner, Dad would be there.
Probably saying the completely wrong thing, like a verbal bull in a china shop, but he would mean well.
“I love you, Dad,” I told him. “But no, I think I have any intimidation I need handled.”
Dad laughed. “I guess. Sometimes I still forget what a grown man you are.”
I’d gotten my size from Dad, though he’d never played pro ball.
When I was a little boy, he’d been a mountain of a safe space, even when he pushed me constantly to be the best. One time, when I was being bullied at the playground, he made those high school kids run with just a glare and folded arms the size of dinner hams. I could imagine, even with his bad back, Dad would step up to Winters and obliterate him, if I asked.
“I’m thirty-seven and two inches taller than you, so yeah, fully grown. ”
“Part of being a parent, Son. You never stop worrying. So what are you going to do now? This seems like a mess. There’s all kinds of speculation out there about you and Avery and what kind of scam you’re pulling. I can’t imagine your school board’s pleased.”
“I haven’t heard from them,” I hedged, although there could easily be a message or call buried in the crap I hadn’t looked through yet. “I’ll figure it out.”
“I hope you do. Well, you know where to find me if you need advice.”
“Yes, Dad.” This was not a situation that would benefit from my father’s advice, but he meant well. “Thanks. Give my love to Mom and tell her not to worry.”
“Right. I will.”
Avery came yawning into the kitchen as Dad signed off. “Hey, Miles, do you have—” She spotted the coffeemaker and made gimme hands. “Ahhhh, yes, caffeine, come to me.”
I waved her to a stool at the island, poured a big mug full, and handed it over. “How are you?”
“I’m…” She sipped her coffee, her eyes unfocused. “I don’t even know. This week has been ridiculous. A week ago, I was living at home, hiding in my art, and waiting for Rachel to get home from her tour. Now?” She shook her head.
“Unsettling?”
“That, yeah. And, you know, some stupid little part of me hoped Dad wouldn’t live down to my worst expectations. Just this once.” Her voice shook at the end.
“I’m sorry, Aves. I can’t imagine how rough that must feel.” Dad hadn’t embraced my gayness right away, but I’d always felt like he was trying to understand. I couldn’t imagine a parent saying the things Avery’s father had screamed at her.
“Well.” She drank more coffee. “My art’s all safe, right?”
“In the storage locker till you decide what to do with it.”
“I feel weird. Today’s the first day in years that I don’t have the studio waiting for me, if I need to get out of my head and create something. I’m not sure what to do with myself.”
“We should check around town, see what kind of space we can rent for you.” I’d have done that already if I’d had more than a few days’ notice. “Maybe you can go through listings online while I’m working, and then after school, we can check out likely candidates.”
Avery slid off her stool and came to me, laying one slim hand on my chest. “I feel so bad for how this all worked out. There I was, all noble about not taking your money, and now I’m taking your money and your reputation. I feel so stupid.”
“As long as you don’t get noble and decide to leave your art locked in storage till you can afford to do something else with it on your own.”
“I really should.” She tugged the lapel of my heavy shirt straight. “But if I try to wait a month without my art, till Rachel comes back, I’ll go insane. It doesn’t have to be a big space, though. I can work on smaller pieces for now.”
“We’ll see what we can find.” My phone chimed, then rang. I turned it back off and set it face-down on the island.
“Don’t you have to get that?” Avery asked.
“Nope.” I went to the fridge. “Right now, I’m going to make us both breakfast. While I’m eating, I’ll take another look at the gazillion messages.”
She flinched. “We went viral, huh?”
“Sure looks like we did.”
Avery pulled out her phone and began scrolling.
“Are you sure you want to look at that shit?” I popped bagels in the toaster and got out cream cheese. Today was not the day to cook anything that demanded my attention.
“Huh.” Avery turned up the volume on her phone in time for me to hear her “I don’t care who he fucks” line loud and clear. She stabbed at the screen. “Yep, viral.”
“Your dad will look like the asshole, not you,” I reassured her. “Hey, might even be a selling point for your art. ‘Help the woman escape her overbearing father.’”
“I don’t want pity-buys!” she snapped. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to yell at you. I know I need to make some money, but—”
“No, I swear, you don’t. Not right now. I was joking, but I guess it was too soon.”
“Uh, yeah.” She gave me a “duh” eye-roll and went back to her phone. “Nothing from Dad. I don’t know if that’s bad or good.”
“Good, I assume. You don’t want to hear from him, do you?”
Avery took a beat too long to say, “No, I don’t.” After another minute of scrolling, she set the phone aside. “I need to say a big thank-you to your friend. What was his name, Morgan?”
“Logan.” I kept my tone casual.
“I’m glad you have that kind of friend, a guy who you can call and say, ‘Hey, I need this crazy-ass thing,’ and they say, ‘Sure, be right there.’ I’ve never had someone like that.”
“Rachel.”
“Well, she loves me, so that’s not the same thing.”
It was, a year ago. I shrugged. “Sure.”
“Funny I’ve never heard you talk about him before.” She peered up at me.
“Rachel knows him. Logan moved up to Tacoma about a year ago, and we kind of drifted apart, but he’s back in Eugene now.” I thought I’d phrased that perfectly.
“That’s great. And he’s still the kind of guy you can call to direct movers for a mutual friend he doesn’t know.”
“Yeah. That’s Logan.” I had a crashing moment of déjà vu— a time two years back with Rachel sitting right where Avery was now while I told her I’d met a guy, and she might not get to meet him any time soon because he was gun-shy about coming out, but I knew she’d really like him.
Rachel had tilted her head almost the way Avery did now, trying to figure out what I wasn’t saying.
Rachel had asked, “Do you love him?” and I’d said, “No, but I think I could.”
Avery asked, “Can you tell him how much I appreciate the help? I hope I meet him again soon and can say something more coherent than sobbing on your shoulder.”
“I’m sure he knows,” I told her. “I’d have been crying too, if my dad said that shit to me.”
She snorted. “No, you wouldn’t.”
“Yeah, okay, only because toxic masculinity has been beaten into me since an early age.”
Her snort turned to laughter. “You have been hanging around Rachel, haven’t you?”
“Constantly.”
Avery got a more calculating look in her eyes. “Logan’s pretty cute, and kind of your type. Is he by any chance into guys?”