Nothing but Smoke (Fire and Rain) (16 page)

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Nicky wished he had Michael’s skill for lifting his nose in the air, answering in a cold, hard voice that told people to go fuck themselves, but all he could do was mumble at the floor like a coward.

Father MacKenzie looked him over, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Maybe you don’t. But I’m sure that boy does.”

A car motor sounded outside, and Nicky knew without looking that Michael was leaving. The floor fell out from under him, and if Father MacKenzie was still talking, Nicky didn’t hear it. All he understood was the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears as the awareness sank in that Michael was gone.

“Nicky?” Father MacKenzie snapped his fingers like he was trying to get Nicky’s attention.

Nicky ignored him, digging in his pocket for his phone. Maybe if he texted…offered to meet Michael somewhere. Maybe Nicky could smooth things over so Michael’s pride wasn’t quite so injured.

His phone buzzed in his hand.

Ignoring the priest’s raised eyebrows, Nicky read the text from Michael.

Heading out to grab some lunch. Will bring you back something. What do you want?

Nicky’s eyes filled with tears. He didn’t want anything, just for Michael to come back. Michael didn’t have to care about him the way Nicky cared about Michael. It was enough that Michael didn’t leave for good.

Anything’s fine. Whatever you like.
Nicky hit send, then couldn’t stop himself from adding,
You’re awesome. Thanks! I’m so fucking sorry.

It wasn’t what he wanted to type. Shit, Nicky would have said,
I love you.
But if Michael was overwhelmed already my Nicky’s neediness, Nicky getting dramatic wasn’t going to help.

No worries,
Michael replied.
Just tell me when he’s gone.

Nicky knew how much it cost Michael to say that, even as a text message, so he replied right away.
Sure thing.

“I’m going to say goodbye to your mother. I’ll visit once she transitions to All Saints.”

Nicky bobbed his head. He hated that things would be on bad terms between him and Father MacKenzie now. The priest wasn’t a cruel man. If anything, he was a good person.

“Thanks.” Nicky hoped his expression conveyed his gratitude and not the fact that he could have punched Father MacKenzie in the face.

By the time Michael and Nicky had loaded the boxes in the cavernous trunk of the Town Car, the hottest part of the day had passed, and Michael had all but shucked off his annoyance over the priest encounter.

I’m doing this for Nicky… Being a friend…

That had been his mantra all day, especially when he’d pulled out of Nicky’s driveway fully intending to head back to the University District. A boyfriend? No, he couldn’t be that. Michael would
never
put up with the looks that priest had given him. Not even for a guy he cared about.

Nicky led his mom in wobbling footsteps down her front stairs. Michael should have looked away. He’d learned in his short time with Lydia that she didn’t like Michael noticing how sick she was. She’d frown when she coughed in his presence, and always waited until he was out of the room to ask Nicky for help.

Nicky opened the passenger-side door and offered it to his mother, but she shook her head.

Maybe her priest had warned her off him, Satan spawn that he was. Michael fiddled with the volume on the radio, trying to distract himself from the thought. Lydia had been perfectly nice to him, polite, welcoming.

Of course, she might have acted differently if she knew he was gay, but… He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw her face in the backseat. The pain crinkling the edges of her eyes. Cheeks so hollowed out they seemed blue. Maybe she was homophobic and maybe she wasn’t, but Michael would never find out the answer. Not unless Nicky decided to come clean with her. And honestly, Michael didn’t even know if he wanted Nicky to.

“You ready?” Nicky slipped into the passenger seat. His smile was more like two lips pinched together and his eyes resigned.

“Yeah. Mapped it out on GPS and everything.” Michael started the tedious process of backing the monster sedan out of the driveway. A couple hours after the worst of the traffic, he still had to wait a minute before he could coast, like a ship set free of its moorings, backwards into the road.

“Thanks for driving.” Nicky sighed. He looked over his shoulder, which caused Michael to glance in the rearview again.

Nicky’s mom had tears in her eyes. She wasn’t wiping them away, either, just letting them roll down her cheeks to pool on her upper lip.

Michael was glad he was driving, so he had an excuse not to watch.

“I remember when your father bought this car for me.” Her voice quivered and was full of phlegm and feeling. “He was so excited.”

Nicky’s chuckle was watery, but Michael couldn’t bear to look his direction to find out if Nicky was crying as freely as his mother. Michael couldn’t afford to give in to emotion along with them. He needed his vision clear to drive.

“Yeah, remember how we went to Olympia that day, just because it had air conditioning?”

Nicky and his mother went back and forth like that, reminiscences and stories that let Michael think his own thoughts about how the last twenty-four hours had been some of the most intense in his life. Maybe the most intense. And how he’d resolved not to tell anyone he and Nicky were dating.

The hospice center was twenty minutes from Nicky’s house, located on a bluff surrounded by evergreens. It wasn’t close to any businesses, only some warehouses spaces, which must have made the location affordable.

They took Nicky’s mom inside, Michael feeling more like a third wheel than ever while Nicky filled out all the paperwork. The staff took Lydia to her room, and Michael busied himself carrying boxes and unpacking things that a few hours ago he’d bundled up safely.

“You’ve been so nice to help Nicky out with all this,” Lydia said to him from her bed where the staff was fussing to make sure it was at an angle to her liking and the right distance from the TV.

“Um…thanks.” Since the showdown with Lydia’s priest friend, Michael had been trying to say as little to her as possible. Part of him worried that at any moment she’d ask him if he was gay and fucking her son.

But although one of the nursing staff—a guy who was in fact clearly gay—gave Michael a half smile, Lydia continued as if nothing was amiss between him and Nicky. “He’s worked so hard. And I know it’s not easy. A boy his age. Maybe he can go out sometimes now that he doesn’t have to be home so much. You could introduce him to some girls.”

The gay nurse, or nurse’s aide, or whatever his position was, snorted lightly, and Michael hoped like hell that Lydia hadn’t noticed.

“Yeah. I’ll make sure he has some fun.” He met her eyes. They’d dried since the car, maybe a side effect of the aggressively cheery surroundings. The walls were pale yellow, soothing and light like a sunrise, with wallpaper trim that managed to look homey without being completely kitsch.

One of the aides, not the gay one, got to work arranging and unpacking Lydia’s stuff, and Michael hated to admit it, but he was relieved.

“Hey.” Nicky ducked his head in. “Can I talk to you for a sec?”

“Sure.” Michael slipped out of the room and into a hallway that was robin’s-egg blue. As pleasant as the color was, it didn’t quite cover that the place smelled like a hospital.

“Listen.” Nicky spoke in low tones, his face half hidden by hair, which as far as Michael could tell he hadn’t cut since Michael had first met him. “Um…it’s only family and a short list of friends who are allowed in my mom’s room. I could ask her to add you, but she’s had so much going on today…”

Michael let out a long breath through his nose, trying to shuck off his annoyance. He’d spent the whole damn day helping Nicky pack, called in sick to work, which he’d never done in his life. Now Michael was getting shoved out the door like last week’s garbage.
Nice.
“It’s fine.”

The gay aide chose that moment to pass by, smirking and giving Nicky an appraising once-over.

Michael glowered at the guy. For fuck’s sake, Nicky was moving his mom into hospice care. What kind of asshole would be cruising Nicky at a time like this?

“I’m gonna say good night to my mom.” Nicky wiped his nose. He went into his mom’s room, leaving Michael in the hallway. Though Nicky was only gone a few minutes, it was long enough for Michael’s annoyance to dig deeper, getting under his skin and into his bones. When Nicky finally came out of the room, Michael found he didn’t have any words of comfort to offer.

“You want to go?”

Michael nodded. “Sure.” He followed Nicky outside to where the sun was starting to set. As much as Michael knew he should take Nicky’s hand, or rub his arm, or even give him a kiss, once they were driving Michael couldn’t bring himself to reach across the armrest.

“Are you going to stay over again tonight?” Nicky stared out the window, the random passes of streetlights flashing over his pale skin.

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” Michael held his breath. It wasn’t that Michael was mad, so much, or even hurt, but he needed space. Or maybe time. He needed to get back in control and to a place where he didn’t feel like he was being dragged over hot coals. “I mean, I can if you want, but maybe it’s best if I stay on the couch.”

Michael could do that much. Be a friend to Nicky tonight, since that was what Nicky probably needed. Just a steady presence so he wouldn’t be alone.

“Yeah, right,” Nicky scoffed, his gaze focused on something out the window. “Maybe you should go home instead then.”

Michael pulled into Nicky’s driveway, having parked his rental car on the street. The night was cool, blowing in the upper edge of the Town Car’s windows. Nicky sat shadowed in the front seat like that night in Seward Park, but so different it might have happened last century instead of a few weeks ago.

“Nicky…” Michael tried to get control of his temper, when all he wanted to do was lash out. “I’m not going to leave if you’re upset.” Neither was he going to let Nicky treat him like shit, but Michael stuffed those words deep so he wouldn’t say them out loud. “I get that you may need—”

“And what about what you need?” Nicky nailed Michael with a glare.

Michael shrank in his seat, taken back by Nicky’s anger. Annoyed that Nicky was suddenly and inexplicable turning the tables when Nicky had never once in all of this asked what Michael wanted. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He heard his voice rising and wished he could keep it under control. “I’m fine. The day was a little intense, but—”

“Jesus. Forget I said anything.” Nicky opened his door, letting air rush into the musty space. He moved to climb out, but Michael caught his arm.

“For fuck’s sake. Don’t be angry.”

Nicky yanked his arm away. “Don’t tell me what to feel.”

“I’m not.” Michael rubbed his face. A headache throbbed at the base of his skull, and after the day they’d had, he couldn’t unscramble his thoughts well enough to be eloquent. “I’m just trying to be your friend.”

Nicky’s glare could have melted paint off walls. “I don’t want you to be my friend, asshole. I never did.” With a slam of the door, Nicky stormed toward the door of his house.

Michael watched him go, unsure whether to follow or to drive home. Nicky turned on lights in the hallway, and then the living room. And Michael could have sworn he heard something crash inside.

He got out of the Lincoln to head back to his own car. The air had cooled enough to be chilly, and Michael rubbed his arms under his borrowed shirt sleeves. Michael’s clothes were still at Nicky’s place. Hell, his messenger bag, computer and toothbrush were in there too.

Michael had to go back, but he could more easily imagine walking into a den of lions. What did Nicky want from him? Michael had done everything right. He’d been the good guy—unlike the letch at the nursing home or the priest who’d stared Michael down like he was a piece of shit on the sidewalk.

Michael was in the right. So why was he standing outside in the dark, listening for the next thing Nicky would break, or waiting for Nicky to come outside and scream away on his motorcycle on some death ride?

His phone vibrated in his pocket, and Michael groaned to see Henri’s name flashing on his screen. Michael wouldn’t have answered it except he’d mortgaged Henri’s goodwill for a day off. A lot of good it had done. Nicky seemed even more upset now than he had that morning.

“Well, hello, man of mystery.” Henri’s voice was jovial. He was probably out at some bar with Logan.

“Hey, Hen. Listen, thanks. You really helped me out earlier. Seriously.” He couldn’t begin to explain, and Michael was pretty sure he didn’t want to try. “But I can’t talk right now.” Michael watched as Nicky turned on what seemed like every light in the house. What was Nicky doing? Crying? Drinking? Nicky shouldn’t have been Michael’s responsibility, but somehow in the last twenty-four hours, it felt like he was.

The house drew Michael like a magnet, and he wondered what lay inside. Shouting, maybe? Angry looks? Down to the very marrow, Michael knew what else was waiting…a real relationship.

Maybe that was the reason Michael didn’t want to go in there. He couldn’t make love to Nicky like they were soul mates and act like they were just friends in the morning.