Chapter 18 Jericho
JERICHO
We stop in front of the Carpenter’s house, and I park the bike along the curb.
I wait for Raiden to step off the bike, but he’s frozen behind me.
I thought we were going to wreck coming around the curve because his body didn’t move an inch when I needed him to follow my lead.
I can’t blame him though, I should have explained what his job was riding behind me.
I peel my helmet off and look over my shoulder at him. He’s still tense, holding on around my waist like I’m his lifeline and he’s about to drift out from shore. I rub my palm across his hand, trying to loosen the grip he has on me.
“Come on, Raiden. We need to get off for a minute and walk around.”
He shakes his head, the heavy weight of the helmet distorts his movements and he mumbles something beneath the shield.
“I can’t hear you. Take off your helmet and we can talk.” Another shake of his head and his fingers dig into my stomach harder, refusing to budge an inch. I exhale, giving up the fight.
My phone vibrates in my front pocket, but I can’t move an inch away from Raiden with the tight band he has across me.
“I need to answer that, it could be important. What if it was Queen Elizabeth the Second calling to tell me I’m actually her long lost son and I’m inheriting a lot of money?”
He says something again, and then I can see his annoyed eye roll. He moves his head closer to me, almost until the hard plastic is against my nose. I’m going cross eyed trying to look at him.
Raiden keeps staring and understanding finally dawns on me. I lift my hand and slowly tilt back the visor, showing his pinched together cheeks, slightly flushed and his red swollen lips. He was probably biting on them the whole ride over here, I’m surprised he didn’t break the sensitive skin.
“Queen Elizabeth the Second is dead,” he deadpans, not looking amused in the slightest.
“What if it was Charles then?” My phone has stopped vibrating by now, and if it really was an emergency, whoever it was will call right back or leave a message.
His nose scrunches up and I laugh at the affronted look on his face. “After everything he did to Princess Diana, you would answer his call?”
“For a couple million dollars, probably.”
“When you put it like that..” His grip on me slowly starts to loosen the more he talks, so I keep him talking,
“Would you not take a call from Charles if he was on the other end promising you millions of dollars? You could even be a Prince.” I dramatize the word, flicking a nonexistent lock of hair over my shoulder.
His smile is warm and his eyes twinkle in the fading light of the day.
“You did always want to be a Prince,” I tell him softly, recounting the time he begged me to dress up with him for Halloween, he wanted to be a Prince and he wanted me to be the King.
We never did dress up as that together, the year getting away from us and by the time Halloween rolled around again, he wanted to be something else.
I never forgot it though, seeing him practice his stance and watching him as he placed an imaginary crown on his head while I would sit on the bed and listen to him as he created stories of magical kingdoms.
“I did, but that was so long ago. I was more like a damsel in distress back then. Now I’m the chaotic sidekick who always ends up fucking something up along the way.”
“You’re not fucking anything up. You’re still so young, you can make mistakes as long as you learn from them. You’re stronger and smarter than you give yourself credit for.”
“You give me so much more credit than I deserve, Jer.”
And he’s right, I do. He has done nothing but hurt me.
But everytime, I remember back to the kids we were when we relied on each other.
Holding hands and confronting the scariest things together.
It’s hard to let go of that. My feelings for him fluctuate, but one thing that stays constant is I will always come back to him. No matter how much I want to fight it.
He lets go of me, slowly uncurling his fingers until the material of my shirt is wrinkled from his tight grip.
I turn more on my seat, watching him as he lifts his shaky hands up to the helmet, fumbling with the strap underneath.
“Let me help you,” I murmur, reaching up and deftly undoing it and letting him pull it off the rest of the way. His hair is a mess, some strands sticking flat to his forehead with a trace of sweat and the rest of it is sticking up with the static from the inner material of the helmet.
“I look awful, don’t say anything.” He snaps, but his face softens as he looks at me. He’s realized that it's me he snapped at, the one person who would never say a bad word about him. What has Josh put him through to put him on the defense like this?
“You don’t look awful,” I tell him, genuinely meaning it.
He eyes me curiously, tilting his head to the left a little bit. The diamond stud in his upper cartilage of his ear catches the light reflecting off it and ensnaring me. The delicate curve of the shell of his ear is tempting me to trace my fingers across it.
Liam. Don’t forget about Liam. Your boyfriend who you care for deeply and have been making a life with.
I jerk back, my thoughts reminding me of why getting close to Raiden is a bad idea for more than one reason.
“Let’s go, my mom’s baking cookies and we have to get there as soon as they’re done or my dad will eat them all.
” I leave him on the bike as I swing my leg over and make sure it doesn’t tip from the dramatic loss of weight.
He’s still sitting where I left him, not moving an inch besides lifting his hand up to tuck a stray hair behind his ear.
A mini van pulls up behind me and parks against the curb. “Better hurry before they all get out, we’ll be stuck behind kids and nothing sounds worse than that right now.”
Raiden’s eyes light up with mirth at my joke, and he extends his hand towards me. “Can you help me down? My legs feel tingly. I think if I put a foot down it’ll crumple underneath me.”
I grab his hand, and let him lean his weight on me as he struggles to get off. When both of his feet are on the ground and he’s stable enough to walk, I let go of him. Mourning the small connection we had.
The Carpenters’ house is decorated like Scooby Doo.
There’s wooden cutouts of The Gang, with a maze that trails around to their backyard filled with animatronics that jump out based off of movement.
Raiden jumps a few times, clutching onto the back of my shirt as I guide us through it.
I can hear the group of kids behind us squealing in terror and delight.
Raiden’s face brightens when we’re through the maze and in the backyard where they have painted pumpkins propped along the fence, displaying some of the villains from Scooby Doo.
There’s a couple standing under the pavilion, the two men wrapped in each other’s arms as they gaze at the exuberant decorations. They look so happy.
I think about the couple the whole ride back to my parents, with Raiden gripping on tight to me, the heat of his front pressed against my back. They occupy my every thought until I drop the kickstand and Raiden peels his arms away from me.
I swing my leg off the bike, and help him down. He tugs at his helmet and tries to mirror my actions as I unfasten my helmet. Raiden almost has it undone, so I wait patiently for him to do it. If he needs my help, he can ask me for it.
“Oh my god, I can’t wait to go again,” he says, his voice way too loud in the quiet of the neighborhood. That’s how he’s always been, a star shining too bright for its own good, never knowing when to quit. He’s going to burn out if he’s not careful.
“Well it’ll be a little bit,” I say, walking around and trying to stretch out my limbs.
The ride back was easier than the ride there, but the combination of both of them are wearing on my body.
Raiden wasn’t a bad backpack. He was as natural on the back of my bike as he is while he’s dancing.
Following my lead and trusting me to not let him fall.
“Why?” He furrowed his eyebrows, following me as I walked into the open garage to put his helmets away. There’s a mess of parts surrounding the car with the hood up, one of my dad’s latest projects I’m sure.
“It's still rough to ride a lot, there’s too much pressure that goes on my leg.”
“What’s wrong with your leg? Is it the same issue you were having last year?”
I’m halfway bent over the tote, and I almost stumble head first into it. He still doesn't know? After everything?
A part of me wants to keep it a secret, to keep it away from him and tucked into a nice box. Out of sight, out of mind. I couldn’t bear to see his look of pity.
“Yeah, same issues I was having last year,” I offer up easily.
“Are you staying for dinner? I need to call Liam real quick, but I can meet you inside in a minute if you want to go see my parents. My mom wanted to ask you something.” I lie through my teeth, trying to change the subject and get him away from me before he can see the lies written all over my face.
I’ve been avoiding Liam’s calls today, and he at least deserves for me to call him back.
“Oh, yeah, sure. I know she was asking if I had time to volunteer for the fall fest this year for the library, but we never got to talk about it. Are you going to be there?” The fall fest starts tomorrow and is a week-long event, where they have vendors come from all around to set up.
There’s a small fee to set up and all that money goes towards the library, for renovations or books or whatever else they need.
There’s food, art, crafts, and other miscellaneous small businesses trying to get their name out to the masses.
Last year, Hollis had us dress up as different Marvel Characters and take pictures with whoever wanted them.
Some old lady grabbed my dick through the thin spandex of my SpiderMan costume and I told Hollis I’m not helping him this year.
“Sure will.” By helping my mom sell her homemade baked goods, that way I have no chance of being touched inappropriately by old ladies with walkers.
Raiden’s smile is bright and he nods before leaving me in the garage to call Liam.
Liam picks up on the first ring. “Hello.”
“Hey baby, it's me. You busy?”
“Not too much, just finishing up some charting for the day. What’s up?”
I hear him fumble around with some papers on his desk, the rustling noise coming through the phone clearly.
“My mom’s cooking dinner, do you want to come over and watch Frankenweenie?”
He chuckles but I can hear him closing the desk drawers and the click of a lock before he answers. “Yeah, let me run home and shower then I’ll be over. Can I bring Jojo? She’s been left alone all day and I feel bad.”
“Of course, Ema and Rodney are going to be here and they love Jojo.” The line is silent, not even the sound of the gym in the background so I say “Hello?”
“Is Raiden going to be there too?”
My heart stops, and a pit forms in my gut. The tumultuous feelings growing inside of me. I’m not sure what he wants me to say, or how I’m supposed to approach this subject.
“Jericho?”
“Yeah, sorry. I was trying to put something up in my parents garage. He’ll be here, but he probably won’t stay long.
” I can’t tell from his exhale if that statement relieves him or confirms his fears that something deeper is going on between us.
I’ve never given him a reason to doubt me, or my commitment to our relationship.
But since Raiden has been back, the sense of guilt that I’m holding grows everyday.
At times, it weighs on me, because I think Liam expects more from me than I can give him.
I haven’t even been able to tell the man I love you.
Who wants to stay with someone for so long and still miss out on that deeper intimacy?
Liam has claimed it doesn’t bother him and he’s fine with the path we’re on. But I don’t think I’m fine with it.
I should talk to Liam, to tell him where my head is at. But how can I tell him where it's at when I don’t even know myself?
“Okay, give me an hour and me and Jojo will be over.”
We end the call and I lean back against the car my dad’s working on. An old school dodge challenger that needs some cosmetic updates. I can see where his mind is going, the plans he has carved out for this project. The tray beside the car has the bolts and wrenches on it to tighten them.
To distract myself from the thunderstorm brewing inside of me, I get to work.