27
Harlow
There came a time, after the sun had set and light had deserted the world, when the small apartment Simon shared with his brothers grew quiet. Conversation died. Bedroom doors opened, then shut. Lights blinked out. The toilet flushed for the final time. While it went on, Harlow lay on the couch and listened.
What a day it had been—and it wasn’t over yet.
Footsteps, unobtrusive, made their way down the hall to the living room doorway. Simon. Harlow recognized his gait now, knew each timid step he took by sound alone. It didn’t stop him from lifting his head to watch as Simon crossed through the shadows, then folded himself onto his new air mattress. He didn’t lie down.
“You okay, Kid?” Harlow asked when Simon didn’t move.
Simon hesitated. “Okay is a good word for it. It’s been a long day. You… wanted to talk, didn’t you?”
“Yeah.” Harlow set his head back down and stared through the night at the ceiling. “I did.”
Where was he supposed to start? After everything that had happened today, to accuse Simon of lying about the conference was a low blow, especially when Harlow knew on an instinctual level that someone as kind and shy as Simon could never have been so deceitful. Perhaps, if he started with the facts, Simon would direct him toward a solution. It’d be better than nothing. Without Simon as a suspect, Harlow had no leads, and after the conversation with Shep and Evie, he didn’t think they’d be forthcoming with details.
“Earlier this morning, I received a call from my privately contracted security team—these are guys I hand-picked, seasoned professionals on my payroll. They accompany Evie and me event to event and help me shut down potential threats before they can become an issue.”
“Okay.”
“Yesterday, after shit went down, I tasked them with figuring out who’d caused the shortage. What they found was troubling. I wanted to talk to you about it.”
“Okay.” Simon cleared his throat. “You’re talking about the… the lights at Geek Out Con, right? How they all cut off at the same time?”
“Yeah.” It had to be all over the internet by now, one sensational article after another. Harlow didn’t want to think about the press coverage. His phone had been a hotbed of activity since Saturday afternoon, and not because the Single Dads were tagging him in every post they could. “It was chaos—a total blackout. Everything went dark. The main lights, the backup lights, even the glow behind the exit signs. And to top it all off, someone fried the security cameras. The fifteen minutes of footage before the outage occurred and the fifteen minutes following it were wiped out—gone.”
“That’s not possible.” Simon laughed, but it was an uneasy, breathy thing that was intrinsically nervous. “The security cameras, I mean, sure—even I could do that. But the power? The backup generator? That’s not something you can kill remotely. You’d have to have someone physically in the room, even if it was in advance, just to plant a device thatcouldbe triggered from afar. Did your guys find anything on the generators? On the breaker box itself?”
“No. Not that I’ve heard of, at least. I suppose it’s possible, but I have no confirmation. All I know is what I told you.”
“Then I don’t know.” Simon sighed. The air mattress squeaked—it seemed he was shifting his weight. The blurry shadow the night turned him into moved, changed, then settled back where it had originally been. “I mean, I’m no electrician… I know about programming and other, you know, computer-related things. I just… I think if they went back and looked, they’d find something. And if they don’t find anything, then it’s my professional opinion that the convention staff already had it removed. That’s a possibility, right? I mean, your guys are privately employed, so it’s not like you’re able to go in there and tell the convention staff not to touch anything until you have an answer. You’re not the police.” Harlow was quiet, so Simon continued. “But, um, you know, that’s just what I think. It’s not necessarily the truth. This is just me rambling—putting brain-thoughts into mouth-words.”
Harlow turned his head. “Did you just say ‘putting brain-thoughts into mouth-words’?”
Simon was silent for a long while before he answered. “… Maybe.”
“That’s… really cute.”
“You… you think I'm cute?” The question was posed in such a soft voice that Harlow was partially convinced he'd imagined it. No terrestrial thing could be so gentle, so understated. No offense lived in those words, no trace of disappointment or reluctance. Simon was pleased to think that Harlow found him cute, and while he'd extrapolated meaning that Harlow hadn't originally intended, Harlow couldn't refuse him his belief.
“I… yeah, I find you cute.” With the lights in the apartment extinguished and the curtains drawn, there was no one to perform for. After the extraordinarily trying day Harlow had shouldered, after the heartache and the fear, there was relief. He let go of the pain and turned his face toward what nourished him—joy. “I think that you don't give yourself enough credit for the brilliant, caring, captivating person you are.”
“I'm… I'm not brilliant, and I'm not especially captivating.” Simon laughed nervously. “But, um, thank you for the compliment. It's not often that I get called anything like that. It’s… it's nice.”
“You are.” Harlow turned his attention overhead. He hadn't heard the air mattress puff its complaint as Simon settled, so he kept listening, waiting for what was to come. “I know that it doesn't feel like it—that the voices of doubt eat at your self-worth and turn your mind against itself—but I swear that I mean what I say. I wouldn't lie to you, Kid, would I? All the years we've worked together, and all the tough times you've helped me through… when have I ever been deceitful?”
No response—a feeling consumed the room instead. Tentatively hopeful, hesitantly excited. Like good news too good to be true—the kind that took reflection and coaxing to believe—the silence digested and assessed what Harlow had said. The feeling grew, fizzling and sparkling in the air, lighting on Harlow’s skin.
He recognized what it was.
Attraction. Anticipation.Chemistry.
In Simon, he hadn't just found a resource—he’d found someone he was excited to get to know better.
Someone who made him feel again.
“I…” Simon paused. Swallowed. “I wanted to… to talk, too. To talk with you, I mean. Like… with words. And, um.” He laughed, even more nervous than before. “God, are you sure you want to stand by that brilliant statement of yours? ‘Talk to you with words.’ I'm so dumb.”
