17 - Sam #2
Nico was kissing Sam’s neck and must have sensed something was off, because he said, “Hey, you okay?” His voice was tender, concerned.
Sam froze. “Yeah!” It was a lie, but he repeated it, as if saying it again might make it true. “Yeah.” Sam turned to soap up his back against Nico’s front, but the thoughts kept swirling.
Stop it! Get out of your head.
You’re ruining this.
Don’t force things.
Nico’s here with you.
Yeah, because he doesn’t know what a paranoid freaked-out disaster you are.
Bond would not do this.
This beautiful man is right here, his hands all over you!
Sam turned around to kiss Nico, trying to lose himself as he kissed everything.
He’s not wearing his wedding ring. Why?
Maybe he didn’t want it to fall off in all this water.
Come on, Solomon. Focus.
On.
This…
And finally Sam did. Like the water now streaming between them making its own waterfall down Nico’s body, he traced his tongue down Nico’s chest, trailing the faint line of hair down the ripple of his abs.
A low moan from Nico as Sam continued made Sam feel like he was playing the most perfect human instrument. Like if his ukelele was a Stradivarius, and he was finally learning how to get it to make the sounds it was designed for. He could make music. He was good at that.
Sam let himself be totally in the moment as the movement of their bodies synced up.
Hot and steamy and slippery. Fingers rubbing, tweaking, pressing.
Sam played Nico’s body and Nico played him like it was some perfect duet, an orchestra of two.
Everything inside Sam built and built, and he could tell Nico was right there with him…
They held each other tight, tighter, tightest, until at last, now , Sam and Nico released it all at the same moment.
Bliss.
Afterward, they spooned together in a warm tub. Nico’s chin rested on Sam’s shoulder as they caught their breath. But Sam knew they needed to talk. About the maybe end of the world. Humans helping aliens. Or no aliens at all.
Sam got up and wrapped a towel around his waist. He headed to the sink, where he’d set his Dopp kit. He took out his shaving cream and headed back to the warm bath.
Sam let the towel fall and rejoined Nico in the warm water.
“You want me to shave?” Nico rubbed his hand on his scruffy chin.
Sam shook the can of shaving cream and filled his palm with a pile of white foam.
“Oh, you want to shave me?” Nico gave Sam a sexy look.
Sam smirked, then smeared the shaving cream across the green marble wall behind them, smoothing it to a thin white layer. And then, with a finger, he wrote high in the foam:
ALIENS?
Nico shrugged.
Starting on the left, Sam drew a number 1, then a rectangle and near it a circle for the planet Earth. He added an arrow showing Earth was going to hit it.
Sam wrote under that:
INVISIBLE SPACESHIP = ALIENS
OR
NOTHING = HUMAN HOAX
Sam spread a lot more shaving cream on the wall, then drew a number 2. He wrote:
RADIO MESSAGE FROM SPACE
Nico excitedly drew a line through SPACE and wrote EARTH instead. So it now read:
RADIO MESSAGE FROM SPACE EARTH
Under that Nico wrote:
HUMAN!
Sam wanted to know how Nico knew that, but he needed to get it all up on the wall first. In the final space to the right he drew a number 3, and then the No Humans stick figure inside a circle with a line through it. Sam added under it:
HUMANS
OR
HUMANS HELPING ALIENS
HUMANS 100% INVOLVED
They both studied the wall for a minute. Sam knew that thirteenth-floor people were behind #3, but what did Nico know about humans being behind #2? Sam drew an arrow from that HUMAN! to a new word:
WHO?
Nico put up a finger. One minute . He got up and, skin glistening, walked out of the bathroom to the main room.
Sam watched him go, wondering how he got so lucky that he was married to this beautiful guy.
The negative-space letters in the foam were sagging in the bathroom’s steamy heat.
Sam wiped it all smooth so they could keep communicating.
A moment later Nico was back with the bag of their phones. He pulled out his and toggled to a picture of the Person of Interest outside the giant satellite dish. He showed it to Sam, whose eyes went wide in recognition.
Sam wrote in the foam:
NOBLE 1
Nico looked shocked that Sam knew the guy. He quickly stashed their phones back in the bag and tossed a towel over it. He slipped back in the tub to write:
RUSSIAN ACCENT?
Sam nodded.
Nico added a question to the wall:
HOW DO YOU KNOW HIM?
Sam wrote:
I KIND OF GOT A JOB:
SPY
Nico looked amazed, like he hadn’t expected that. But then he wrote:
I BET YOU’RE A GOOD SPY.
Sam felt himself blush at the compliment. But he needed to tell Nico what he knew. He drew an arrow from the word SPY to NOBLE 1.
Nico bit his lower lip. He pointed at SPY, then at himself, and put up two fingers. Me too. He added to the wall:
NOT COFFEE
Sam’s turn to be stunned. But it all suddenly made so much more sense! The travel, the weird schedule, not wanting to go back to school, even Nico’s avoiding making Sam a latte! Sam had so many questions, but before he could start Nico drew an arrow from NOBLE 1 and wrote:
BEHIND ALIEN RADIO MESSAGE
Sam let that sink in. If Nico knew for sure that Noble One was behind the alien radio message, and Sam knew for sure that the thirteenth floor was involved somehow in the No Humans signs—like on that pyramid—then two out of the three pieces of evidence led to Noble One and Keahilani. Sam wrote:
SO PROBABLY NO ALIENS
Nico looked doubtful, and pointed to
NOBLE 1
Sam added WORKS FOR KEAHILANI. That seemed more important than that Noble One was dating her. Sam added more foam to the wall, then drew an arrow from KEAHILANI to the new area. He wrote BEHIND and drew the human stick figure in the circle with a line through it.
Nico mouthed the word: Fuck!
Sam remembered what Keahilani had said that first day when they’d recruited him. It’s why the Director thinks you’re the Knitter. Sam drew arrows from NOBLE 1 and KEAHILANI and wrote:
WORK FOR THE DIRECTOR
Nico ran a hand through his hair as he studied the wall. He touched the words NOBLE 1 and then DIRECTOR, then scribbled:
LAX. RUSSIAN. SAME GUY!
Sam didn’t follow that logic, but then Nico touched Sam’s cheek gently to get Sam to look at him. Nico pointed to himself, then underlined the words Sam had just written: WORK FOR THE DIRECTOR.
Sam realized his mouth was open. They were both working for the same person? On two different teams?
Nico erased everything to the right of the words THE DIRECTOR and added:
= GODEANE
“Shut the fuck up!” Sam blurted, then clamped a hand over his own mouth.
Nico made his mouth move without making any sound: I know!
They looked at the words SO PROBABLY NO ALIENS, then at each other. Nico drew a line through PROBABLY to make it read:
SO PROBABLY NO ALIENS
Sam agreed. He circled NO ALIENS, and looked at Nico. They shared a slight smile. They’d figured it out. Together. There was some comfort in that.
Then Sam realized he had to say something else. He added a fresh palmful of foam to reset the surface, and wrote:
NO MORE SECRETS
BETWEEN US
Sam wiped smooth NO MORE SECRETS and wrote in its place:
THEY GET
So the words read:
THEY GET
BETWEEN US
And then Sam added:
AGREED?
Nico circled AGREED.
Sam spread the foam smooth and wrote:
CAN WE TRUST GODEANE?
Nico responded:
NOT SURE
BUT I WANT TO
Sam looked into Nico’s eyes. That must have been really hard to admit. She’d married them, after all, and she and Byron were the closest thing Nico had to family. Besides Sam.
Sam kissed Nico tenderly and set his lips just by Nico’s ear. “I’m here for you,” Sam breathed as quietly as he could. “Always. Don’t forget that.”
Nico held the back of Sam’s neck and pressed their foreheads together. They breathed like that one long breath. Two. Then Nico pulled back, blinking eyes that were wet with emotion. He wiped the foam smooth and wrote:
WE HAVE TO EXPOSE ALIENS ARE FAKE
Sam added:
WE’RE GOING TO NEED HELP
Nico smoothed the foam and wrote:
WE NEED TO GO
NOW
Sam agreed. He stood and turned on the handheld shower head, spraying away all evidence of their secret conversation.