“He? A guy?” Dante’s voice pitched a few notches higher while his older brother stayed quiet. I peeked around the corner so I could see the expressions on the brothers’ faces. Their eyes and mouths were open wide and both of them wore matching looks of disbelief.
“A pirate too.” Noah was eating up the attention.
“A gay pirate?” Hunter questioned in disbelief.
“Yes, a gay pirate.”
“People weren’t gay back then.” Dante’s statement to Noah was met with a laugh, which Dante didn’t seem to appreciate.
“People have always been gay, Dante. People weren’t able to talk about it back then or they could face a lot of horrible consequences. They lived secret lives or lived in complete denial.” I looked at Hunter and he was looking raptly at Noah. I began to think that these two boys vandalizing the house might have been part of a much bigger story that we were all starring in. Only time would tell what fate had in store for all of us – willing or not.
“So what happened to Elliot?” Dante asked.
“Elijah, moron.” Hunter rolled his eyes in annoyance. “Pay attention.”
“Let’s take a break for some lemonade and cookies and I’ll tell you the story,” Noah told the brothers. I moved back into the kitchen silently so they wouldn’t know I was spying on them. Besides, I wanted lemonade and cookies too. Although, I would’ve preferred milk.
“What kind of cookies?” That Dante kid was a hard sell, but he caved when Noah told him they were chocolate chip. “Okay, then. I wasn’t willing to listen to gay ghost stories for shitty cookies like oatmeal raisin.”
“Love story,” Noah corrected him, “and watch your mouth. Don’t think I didn’t notice how close you came to saying fuck instead of fudge a few minutes ago.”
“Hey! You just said it,” Dante argued.
“I’m an adult.”
“Whatever.” The sarcasm rolled out of the kid’s mouth and I had to quickly wipe the smile off my face when they came into the kitchen.
“Hey guys,” I said casually. “How’s it going?”
“Okay,” Hunter replied. I was sure the kid would rather be just about anywhere else, but I gave him credit for being polite.
“We’re about to get story time like we did when we were babies.” Dante wasn’t as eager to please those around him.
“Show some respect,” Hunter demanded of his brother. I could see how hard he was trying to be the man of the house since his dad passed away. He might’ve been going through a rough patch, but I was pretty certain that he was going to turn out to be a fine young man.
Dante sat down at the table without another word. Noah got the cookies and lemonade and set them on the table. He smiled over at me, shot me a playful wink and pulled out a gallon of milk. I sat at the table and poured myself a glass and sat down to listen to Noah tell the story of Octavius Jones and Elijah McKinney. Just like the first time I heard Noah tell the story, my eyes couldn’t look away from his lips.
“Octavius Jones was the son of an English Duke who fell in love with his valet, Elijah McKinney…”
“What’s a valet?” Dante asked.
“It’s a fancy name for a personal servant,” Noah explained and then continued. “Back in those times, it was quite common for people of their stature to have arranged marriages.”
“What’s that mean?”
“That means mom would make arrangements with the Smiths for you to marry Susie.”
“No fu…freaking way!”
“That’s what happened in those days,” Noah explained patiently. “As the story has been told through the generations of my family, Elijah accepted that Octavius was to marry and planned to remain his valet after the wedding just so he could be near him. Octavius decided that he’d rather give up the wealth and privilege to be with Elijah.”
“Seriously?” Dante wasn’t impressed, but I glanced over to look at Hunter. He was hanging onto Noah’s every word.
“What happened?” Hunter asked, surprising us all.
“Well, Octavius had served in the Royal Navy and had a lot of experience with sailing. He stole a lot of gold and jewels from his family to purchase a passage for them to sail to America.”
“Ballsy,” Dante chimed in.
