Chapter 29
When they finished processing him out, Tean left the Bear Lake County Sheriff’s Office with a plastic bag of his belongings hanging from one hand. Wallet, keys, phone, loose change, a DWR pen.
Outside, sodium light washed the parking lot.
Beyond that, the whole world was night, with the mountains like jigsaw pieces lined up against the stars.
There was a post office next door, its windows dark.
Houses across the street, little cottage-style structures that had to be a hundred years old. Welcome to Paris, Idaho.
The white Subaru was parked at the curb, and Jem was leaning against it, still dressed in his work clothes, arms folded against the chill.
There were two steps down to the lot. Tean took them carefully; his whole body ached. When his hand touched the safety rail, the metal was so cold it felt like it sparked against his palm.
Jem hugged him. Of course. Then, he stepped back and examined Tean, hands on Tean’s shoulders like he wasn’t ready to let go of him yet. “You okay?”
Tean nodded.
“That was a stupid question. How are you?”
“I’m fine.” But Jem waited, so Tean swallowed and said, “Embarrassed.”
“Don’t be embarrassed,” Jem said.
He opened the door for Tean like this was a date.
Which, considering the two of them, actually wasn’t outside the realm of possibility.
Once Tean was settled, Jem closed the door and gave it an extra, gentlemanly press, as though making sure it wouldn’t fly open once they got on the freeway.
He started the car. Headlights threw white cones against the flickering gray from the security lights. And they drove out of the lot.
A two-hour drive ahead of them. And the clock said it was almost nine.
Tean leaned back in his seat. “Scipio’s going to be so upset.”
Jem didn’t say anything for several seconds. “Hannah went over to take care of him.” He seemed to consider something, and then he said, “I didn’t tell her why.”
“It doesn’t matter. She’ll know tomorrow. Probably right around the time they fire me.”
“They’re not going to fire you.”
It wasn’t worth arguing about, so Tean closed his eyes.
“Do you want something to eat?” Jem asked.
“No.”
“I said that the wrong way. What are you going to eat so I know you’re not starving to death?”
“They gave me something.” He cut the sentence off abruptly, because he could hear the self-pitying end of it.
But Jem, as usual, heard it anyway, and he sounded almost amused when he asked, “In jail?”
“Yes. In jail.”
“Did you eat it?”
“Yes.”
“Teangela Mackenzie Leon! I let you out of my sight for one day, and this is what happens: trespassing, assault, high treason, lying.”
Which was how they ended up at a Sonic, parked in one of the drive-in stalls, with two corn dogs, cheese fries, chili cheese fries, tater tots, jalapeno poppers, and what Tean thought might be mini corn dogs—much smaller, and not on sticks, but the general idea of battered wiener seemed to be the same.
And he knew what Jem would say to that. Battered Wiener should be the title of our sex tape.
Or Battered Wiener would be an awesome band name.
Or Battered Wiener was my nickname in college.
As he swallowed an oily bite of tater tot, Tean felt his mouth quirk into a smile.
And then he started to cry.
It only lasted a moment. He forced back the tears. He wiped his eyes. He put the remaining half of his corn dog back in its tray, laid his head back, and closed his eyes.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Jem asked.
Tean shook his head.
Chewing noises came in answer. Then the slurp of Jem’s drink—Coke, but with a million add-ins, cherry and vanilla and sweet cream and lime, not to mention the foam cup was the size of one of those Home Depot buckets. And then Jem said, “Can I apologize?”
Tean’s voice was wetter than he would have liked when he said, “You don’t have anything to apologize for.”
“Yeah, I do. I’ve been—” He stopped. “Last night. I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”
“You were worried about me. I wasn’t acting rationally.” Tears stung the corners of Tean’s eyes, and he fought them away again. “I haven’t been acting rationally for a long time. Take today, for example.”
“Of course you’re not acting rationally,” Jem said. “You’re exhausted. You’re hurting. You’re terrified for Daniel. And I was worried about you, but that didn’t give me the right to talk to you that way.”
“Jem, it’s okay. I knew I was doing something stupid. I shouldn’t have left the house last night.”
The sounds of food items being moved around filled the space between them—rustling, crunching, the slide of deep-fried whatever sliding against the paper tray.
“Do you know what I think when I wake up and you’re not there? I mean, it takes me a few seconds to realize you’re gone. After that.”
A horn blatted on the cross street.
“He’s not coming back,” Jem said. “How fucked up is that?”
Tean opened his eyes. Jem was staring down at the food, using his index finger to slide the last onion ring around in its tray.
“It’s not fucked up,” Tean said.
“Swear jar.”
“You literally just said it.”
Jem shrugged. “Rules are rules.”
Tean took Jem’s hand, curling his fingers into Jem’s palm. “You’ve had a lot of people abandon you. Of course there’s a part of you that— Oh my gosh, Jem, I didn’t even think about that.”
What made it worse was that when Jem spoke, his voice verged on apologetic. “I know.”
“What is wrong with me? Seriously? How could I not— I am so sorry. I didn’t—” Helplessness made it impossible to get the words out, but finally Tean managed, “Jem, I should have thought of that. I should have realized. I kept telling myself I was being considerate, not waking you. I never thought about—” He almost said you.
And the shock of that, of hearing himself almost say it, kept him from saying anything else.
“I know,” Jem said again, with a smile that Tean might have called, on someone else, nervous. “But I wanted to tell you because I wanted you to know why I, uh, freaked the fuck out last night.”
“Thank you for telling me. I really am sorry, Jem. I should have thought about how it might affect you.”
Jem nodded. His hand tightened once around Tean’s, a pulse of acknowledgment. Out on the street, headlights and taillights made a red-and-white maze.
“I quit my job,” Jem said.
“What?”
“Today. Like, right when you called.” Jem shook his head, his gaze drifting out toward the night. “Oh my God, Tean, I burned every fucking bridge behind me. It was not good.”
The first question that popped into Tean’s head had something to do with whether they were sitting in a stolen car at that moment. But he set that aside for later, fished for the right question, and came up with “Why?”
“Because I hated it.”
“You did?” The look on Jem’s face wasn’t flattering, so Tean hurried to say, “But you were so good at it.” And that didn’t exactly make things better. “You told me you liked it.”
“I did like it. I mean, I didn’t. I hated it. Obviously.”
And that sentence collapsed into a morose silence.
Tean was sure there was a better, more boyfriendly response, but what came out was “You can understand why that might be confusing, though, right?”
In the darkened interior of the car, with the only light filtering in from the Sonic parking lot, Jem’s grin was a sudden gleam of white.
“I guess I liked it. Or the idea of it. At the beginning. But God, Little Dick was such a little dick. From the very beginning. And I knew I wasn’t going to be able to stand him.
I knew I was going to hate him. And that place is shady as shit, even by my standards.
But selling cars sounded cool, and I was always good at, you know—”
“Getting people to do what you want?”
“Hey!”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
“Well, no. But not you.”
“Really? Because that woman from McDonald’s knows my name, Jem. I saw her at the gas station, and she said hi to me.”
“Oh God, did you say hi back? Because Sheila is the fucking shit, and if she’s pissed at us—”
“Jeremiah.”
“Okay, yes. And the money was good, and we needed the money, and it’s not like I can do anything else, and…
” He scratched his beard, still staring out the windshield.
“I get it. I love you. I want to be with you. And that means having a real job and a real life and not—not the way things used to be. It’s just hard, you know?
I’m not good at it. At this whole…life. And I keep thinking if I fuck up—” He stopped. His throat moved once as he swallowed.
“I love you,” Tean said. “More than anyone else in the entire world. If you don’t want to sell cars, Jem, you don’t have to sell cars. There are so many things you can do. You’re so smart. You’re so good at everything. You can go back to school—”
“Yeah, well, I’m not good at reading, so I’m not good at everything.
” The words had a stiff defensiveness. “And I can’t go back to school because we’ve got a house and mortgage payments and—and bills and shit, Tean.
And believe it or not, people don’t want to hire you if your resume is blank for the last twenty years. ”
“Okay,” Tean said. “What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.” His voice turned wry. “I didn’t get that far.”
A quiet laugh slipped out of Tean.
“I’ll figure it out,” Jem said. “No shady shit, either. I promise. But I won’t let you down. I’ll find a way to get the money—”
“Jem.”
“—and I know you don’t like putting stuff on credit cards, so we won’t do that—”
“Jem.”
“—and Scipio still has to have his treat budget, but maybe, like, not those really expensive pizzles—”
Tean gave his hand a shake. “Jem.”
Jem turned to face him.
“I don’t care about that fucking house. I don’t care about the fucking credit cards. I care about you. I love you. I want you.”
Jem’s eyes looked like quicksilver. His mouth moved once, the tell almost lost in the car’s shadows. In a rough voice, he whispered, “And Scipio.”