16. Cameron #2
Jed and Todd arrived--too little, too late-- and I shot them an angry glance.
They both stepped closer as if they were going to get involved.
“You can go,” I said. Then, I turned back to Manuel.
“Hey, we best speak in English. My man’s Spanish sucks.
” I jerked a thumb at Finn, who had the good grace to nod.
It felt nice to call him mine. Aloud and all that.
“It really does. I had to have all my lines in a Spanish shampoo commercial that I did a few years back dubbed in,” Finn confessed. That made Manuel throw him a weak smile.
“So, your dad…” I prompted.
“Yeah, he loves the Storm. Beer every game, lots of chest-pounding and all that, you know. He thinks you’re super cool,” he said as he stared at me. “I thought… I don’t know… that he might be okay with me being gay, if he saw that tough guys were too.”
No shit, this was crazy heavy.
Finn looked about ready to weep. “Is this what it’s come to?” he asked after a moment or two of silence had passed. “Are we now chasing down kids and demanding they keep my secret?”
I had no answer for that. Yeah, I guess that was what it had come down to for sure. That felt pretty rotten.
“I’m really sorry. I know I shouldn’t have taken your picture,” Manuel murmured. I ruffled his hair as I studied Finn for signs of what the hell to do now.
“It’s fine. We totally get it. We’ve both been there,” Finn announced to the world, which made me gape. Finn glanced at me. I nodded. “Guess I just came out though, huh?”
“Guess so, baby,” I replied. Manuel sat there between us, his dark eyes darting from Finn to me, as if he had never witnessed two men staring lovingly at each other.
“You know, maybe if we visited with you and your dad, and had a talk with him he’d be okay with hearing you out, Manuel.
” The boy’s jaw went slack. He nodded and blinked as if words had failed him.
“Cool, let’s take a walk.” I rose, offered Finn my hand, and he clasped it.
And he did not let go the whole time we strolled to Manuel’s home four blocks away.
It was a lovely home in a heavily Latino section of town.
Modest, but well-taken care of, lots of love in the house.
You could sense it the moment you entered.
The smells of lunch being made lured us into the small kitchen where three adults—a woman of about forty, a man about the same age, and an older woman of about sixty or so—glanced up at us as we entered.
The older woman at the stove preparing what smelled like some ten-alarm chili, dropped the spoon she was stirring the meat with into the large pot.
It took a few minutes to get everyone calmed down and answer most of their questions.
Finn and I learned that the family was compromised of Manuel, his grandmother, Teresa; her son, Lorenzo; and his wife, Maria.
Teresa insisted we dine with them, so we ate lunch at that small, scarred table that had come all the way from Taxco with Teresa and her husband forty years ago.
Finn dove into the chili with gusto, only to break into a sweat so severe we all worried he might pass out.
Teresa’s chili was not for those with tender tummies.
After a few glasses of milk for my man—that sounded so damn good—we moved outside where it was cooler.
The backyard was small, packed full of flowers and pottery that Maria made in her studio.
Lorenzo offered us some beer, which we politely refused, citing our athlete/actor status. He laughed, then sat in a chair in the shade of a rollout sunshade.
Teresa brought out some iced tea for us, and then, possibly sensing something big was brewing with the males, went back inside.
The soft feminine sounds of the two women speaking in Spanish drifted out an older jalousie window.
It reminded me of home here in some ways.
Yes, my parents had more disposable income, but the sounds of a loving family were the same no matter how many zeroes one had in their checking accounts.
Manuel glanced at me after several moments spent talking about sports rolled past.
I cleared my throat, looked right at Lorenzo—a handsome man with thick dark hair and a fashionable goatee—who met my gaze with slight confusion.
“Your son would like to tell you something,” I said as an opener, before I shifted my attention to Manuel.
The lad fell in on himself for a moment, the weight of what he wished to say a heavy one, but one slow word at a time, he told his father his story.
Lorenzo’s attention whipped back and forth from his son to me, now sitting with my hand on Finn’s knee in an open and possessive way.
I hoped to be able to touch him all the time as soon as we figured out how to proceed. But for now, this was enough.
The women grew silent indoors as Manuel talked.
His father, a proud man, began to tear up when his son told him that he feared he wouldn’t love him if he knew he were gay.
Then, thank all the gods, Lorenzo opened his arms for Manuel.
Finn’s lower lip wobbled as father and son hugged it out, and even though this was not our moment, I felt a large part of it.
Sitting back, trying to be unobtrusive, we smiled at each other when Manuel’s mother and grandmother came through the back door to join in on the hugs.
Sensing it was our time to leave, we stood, thanked them for the food and drink, and slipped out of the front after leaving one of my business cards on the kitchen table. The family would be my guest at the Storm Pride night next season.
Stepping out into the bright LA sun, I glanced over at Finn. He looked as if he were ascending to the heavens his glow was that bright.
“That was amazing,” he said as a bike delivery guy rubbernecked as he passed by, almost running into the back of a sanitation truck idling at a red light. “I can make a difference, Cam. Together, we can make a difference.”
“Yeah, baby, we can.”
I held out my hand, and he took it. We walked back to my car discussing our plans for our future. I liked the word our quite a bit. I planned to use it often from this point onward.