20
Leland
The afternoon grew a little cloudy, which was good for painting, but it also meant it was hot. By the time they finished two-thirds of the cabin, they’d gone through nearly all the water. The smell of paint was thick in the air, with only a little breeze from the mountains to cool things off. That’s when it got difficult.
Not the painting, no, it was never about the painting. It was about coming up with a way for Leland to be able to spend time with Jamie, to get to know him better. To see if he could figure out what he was feeling, what he wanted.
Jamie, as if he knew, decided to shake things up, and that’s when he took off his t-shirt. The t-shirt was new. It was one of the ones Leland had bought for him, rather than an old one that wouldn’t be missed if it got ruined.
When Jamie put his paintbrush down, bending to balance it on the edge of the can, Leland had no idea that Jamie would curl his fingers around the hem of that t-shirt and slide it up his torso. And just like that, the t-shirt was in the grass, and Jamie’s ribs and slender shoulders and that tiny bit of downy hair on his chest was in full view.
Leland could hardly look away, but now he knew. Jamie already had a farmer’s tan, his forearms dusky, with everything from his neck to his belly button pale as a lily.
Now Leland could see the remains of the bruises from the gate. Now he could see where the tender muscle ran from Jamie’s neck to his shoulder. Now Leland had something to take with him so he could imagine what Jamie would look like laid out on white cotton sheets. The contrast his body would paint, like a dappled young horse, a sunny tan in some places, his arms, or his neck, pale in others, his long legs, his hips, the skin soft over his belly—
Jerking himself back from these thoughts was hard, harder than it ought to be. Hard as the cock in his jeans and certainly nothing he should linger on. Jamie was his employee. He was depending on his job to help him make a new life, which Leland knew he was working very hard at.
The last thing Jamie needed was someone like his boss making eyes at him, leading him on, and leading him on it would be, because what else did the two of them have in common except the job? That was no kind of relationship, and Leland was hardly one for casual hookups. For him, it was all the way or no way.
“Are you okay?” asked Jamie, his hair ashine with bronze in the sunlight, his smile wide, eyes innocent as a new day.
Leland blinked to focus. Jamie came up and reached past him, his breath soft on Leland’s arm as he grabbed another bottle of water. Stirring him up in all kinds of ways, and he had to reach to adjust himself in his thin blue jeans. Jamie did not know what he was doing, and Leland knew that because Jamie looked at him with some surprise, as if he’d stirred himself up at the same time he’d stirred Leland up.
There was no one around. No one would know, save for the cabin and the spring-green prairie grasses, barely stirred and smelling warm in the heat of the afternoon as the clouds gathered over the mountains.
“Jamie,” Leland said, low.
“Yeah?” Jamie asked, which made Leland realize he had no idea what he wanted to say to him. That Jamie should put his shirt back on? That Jamie should stop looking like a mixture of vulnerability and need and wonder at the world, all wrapped in his slender frame, making it so Leland couldn’t stop staring?
They were unequal in terms of power. Leland was the boss. Jamie was his employee. He had his shirt off, while Leland still wore his. That was it, then.
Leland put his paintbrush down and grabbed the cloth over his shoulders to pull his t-shirt off. It was warm, so he used the t-shirt to wipe the sweat from his neck. Jamie’s eyes tracked his movements the entire time.
If he was smart, he would have stopped it right then and there. Maybe he wasn’t as smart as he ought to have been, for he grabbed a bottle of water and drank it slowly, and together they stood there, half-naked, the golden sun on their skins, the faint, warm breeze washing over them like a balm.
Leland watched Jamie watching him drink that water and watched him in return. His gaze lingered over Jamie’s throat as he swallowed, the way his dark hair stuck to his temples with faint sweat. The smile that played over his mouth when he wiped it with the backs of his fingers.
Leland was lonely, that’s what it was, and it had taken this drifter coming on to ranch property to show him that. And now he had all kinds of ideas in his head about taking Jamie out to see the moonrise, when the moon was full, or taking him out at dusk to watch shooting stars come over Iron Mountain. With grit teeth, he forced himself to turn back to the task at hand: painting.
They finished the first coat by the time the wind picked up and grey clouds came over the mountains like soapsuds. It might rain, or it might blow over; out where they were, it could go either way, especially in early summer.
“Let’s start on the second coat,” Leland said. “We might not get done, but we can finish tomorrow.”
“Okay,” Jamie said, as always willing.
As Jamie turned to his task, Leland reached out to sweep away a small butterfly, a yellow and blue one, that had landed on his shoulder. Jamie looked over his shoulder and Leland very gently pushed the butterfly from Jamie’s skin.
Jamie’s whole body twitched as Leland touched him, and it ran through him how much Jamie trusted him. Leland had only touched his shoulder, sure, but as Jamie pivoted on his heel, his eyes had darkened, and Leland had a feeling he would have trusted him with more. Only trouble was, Leland couldn’t trust himself with more than this. Didn’t want to break the trust Jamie had in him.
“Better get painting,” Leland said, meaning it, even if the words came out like he was talking about something else altogether.
They painted, got brown stain on the green grass, on their jeans, and on the cabin, most of it. Sweat grew and dried and itched along the back of his neck, it was just that hot. He stopped for water twice during that last hour, though mostly it was to take a deep breath and a mental step back. Which helped some, though not enough. Jamie had a swath of stain on his belly, though how it had gotten there, Leland did not know.
When they were out of paint, he stopped them, and gestured for Jamie to come closer. The last thing he should do. The only thing he wanted to do.
“What?” Jamie asked, looking up at Leland, his face flushed, a rosy glow of a narrow band of sunburn along his shoulders.
“Paint,” Leland said. Feeling rather like he was about to fling himself off the cabin’s roof, he took one of the cloths, flicked a little turpentine on it, and wiped at Jamie’s belly, back and forth, one way in each direction, then wiped the turpentine away. His breath was coming hard up his throat, and he had to put the brakes on fast. “That’ll fix you up. Let’s head back and get washed up for dinner.”
