3
Justin packedgroceries in Wes’s new pantry while Wes stocked the refrigerator. Justin was staying that weekend to help Wes get situated in his new townhouse at HeathrowEstates.
Fortunately, the place was furnished, which made their work that much easier. Although, it’d been a hard day when Wes and Justin’s family had sold off so many pieces of furniture from his old life. So many of hismemories.
As Wes lifted a bag of groceries from the cart, realizing it was heavier than he’d anticipated, he struggled. His muscles trembled from the effort, and Justin noticed, saying, “Here, let me helpyou.”
“No, no. I’ve got this,” Wes insisted as he rested it on the floor beside the fridge. “I can take care of myself just as I have all these seventy-seven years, Justin. Been taking care of myself a lot longer than you’ve even beenalive.”
“I’m trying to help, Pops. I don’t want you to hurt yourself. You just had a heartattack.”
“I had a heart attack two years ago, and I’m fine now. And just like then, if I can’t do something, I’ll be more than clear aboutit.”
Justin smiled and lifted his hands, an apparent sign of surrender. “Okay, okay. I get it. Now you want to move the rest of this stuff in yourself?” Justin teased with a playfulwink.
“I guess I can’t give you any grief there because I know you got that attitude from yourdad.”
“Hmmm. And I wonder where he got thatfrom?”
Their smiles came and went just as quickly. Even though it had been a long time since Mike, Justin’s father and Wes’s son, passed, with the memory came a reminder of what was lost, though the sting didn’t hurt as much as it oncehad.
They continued unpacking the groceries in silence—another moment of silence for Mike. And also for Mike’s mother, Becca, because Wes could never think on the loss of one of them without immediately thinking of the other aswell.
Wes finally managed to break up the tension with, “You said Art was your teacher for what again?” Wes remembered the answer but thought it was a good shift in conversation as well as an excuse to talk about ArtCromley.
“My senior American Lit class. And what a strict teacher too. Feel free to give him hell about all those papers he made us write on Faulkner andHemingway.”
“Give him hell? Maybe I should be giving him credit for the reason you made it throughcollege.”
As Justin organized the cans in the pantry, he laughed. “That too. Haven’t you seen him around Winebourne? I assumed you would have, but I guess timing-wise it makes sense. I only saw him when I moved back to Winebourne, and by the time you came back to town, he was already overhere.”
“Seems like one of us was always coming while the other was going,” Wes noted, which wasn’t just true of their adult lives, but of their youth as well. It was strange the way they seemed to always exist right outside of reach of oneanother.
“It’s odd seeing him here,” Justin said. “I didn’t even remember that this is where he’d moved to. I’m sure it was in my brain from some chatter around town, but I’m not great at keeping up with that sort ofstuff.”
“Small, crazy world,” Wes said, taking some meat from one of the bags and storing it in thefreezer.
Justin packed microwavable rice packets in the top shelf of the pantry, then said, “Well, you know,he’s—”
“I know where you’re going with this, Justin, and I’m going to tell you right now that not every gay man is attracted to every other gay man. If you’re trying to hook me up, I can take care of myself just fine. I figured that might have been why you were so pushy about us exchangingnumbers.”
“I was just trying to help a popsout.”
“Pops has been taking care of himself just fine all these years. Although, I can’t say it’s been easy to have a good time when I was couch-surfing at my grandson’splace.”
“Couch-surfing? Please. We gave you the guest bedroom. I’m surprised you didn’t ask for themaster.”
“Should’ve, shouldn’t I? I think you and Erin would have let me get away withit.”
“You should’ve leveraged that power while you had it. As you said, you can take care of yourself now. No, but seriously, I just thought it could be nice for you and Art to catch up. You both grew up in Winebourne. You obviously have plenty to talkabout.”
“It will be nice to catch up with him. He’s always seemed like a niceguy.”
“I can’t imagine how you didn’t spend more time chatting back in the day in a town likethat.”
Wes reflected on their brief exchanges in the past. “We saw each other plenty in grade school, but by the time I was in the sixth grade, that’s when my mamma enrolled me in McRally. So while Art was going to public school, I was in Tennessee except for the occasions and summers when I’d be back, and by then, we were running in differentcircles.”
Despite how little they managed to see each other through the years, Wes remembered the young blond with a bright smile, always laughing or being playful with his friends. He had the most magnificent, wide blue eyes that always seemed to glisten with sunlight, even when he’d see him indoors. When Wes thought that, he was sure his mind was playing tricks on him, as it did sometimes, twisting some common memory into something so much more than it ever could have been…like on that one particular hot Georgia afternoon when Art and Wes sat on a bench in the park, laughing and chatting about the silliest of things. It was a memory he’d thought about on more than a few occasions…one that had, for some reason, left an impression on him, if only because many years later, he had discovered they were both different yet sosimilar.
But before he let himself fall prey to nostalgia, Wes pushed past it and continued unpacking the groceries with his grandson, knowing very well that they still had plenty of boxes they had to empty before Wes was officially movedin.
