Al had made it his mission to take out the taco sauce.
“Hm,” Al said, unconcerned. He gathered up his sauce packets, stuffing them into the paper sack that had become their trash bag, and lay down beside Jude, mirroring his pose. They stayed like that in silence for a minute or two.
“Can you see your planet from here?” Jude asked, breaking the silence.
“No, it is too far away.” Al pointed to his left and added, “It is in that direction, though.”
“I don’t know how you can possibly know that. I get lost even when I’m using my GPS.”
“I am aware of this,” Al said gravely. He had experienced Jude’s lack of directional ability on more than one occasion. Jude chuckled. They lapsed into a peaceful quiet again, until Jude worked up the courage to turn his head and look at Al.
“Hey,” he said softly. Al looked back, his every-color eyes intense, but kind.
“Yes?” he asked, equally as soft.
“Thank you. For what you said at the restaurant, I mean. No one has ever defended me like that before. It… it meant a lot.”
“I meant the words that I said. However, I do apologize for mentioning mating when you asked me not to. I was feeling anger and spoke without much thinking.”
“That’s fine,” Jude said with a smile. “It probably scandalized my mother, which is awesome, so I’m cool with it.” A shadow of something crossed Al’s face, and Jude frowned. “What is it?”
Al twisted his mouth the way he did when he was having a hard time finding the right words to explain something that would have been simple in his own language.
“My species on my planet,” he began after a beat, “sometimes when we touch others, we can feel what the one we touch is feeling. It is just one of many different kinds of telepathy we use, but while many of the kinds require us to practice before we can be much good at them, we are born able to do this type. It is how our mothers and fathers know how to care for us when we are babies, and how our young come to learn the ways of the world and our place within it. But humans are not as easy to read with touch telepathy. I cannot read most humans very deeply, but sometimes, during the ritual of hand shaking, I can feel little bits about them.” He shook his head with a grimace. “And I did not feel enjoyment at what I felt when I shook your mother’s hand.”
“That bad?” Jude asked, even though he was still processing the fact that Al was telepathic.
Al nodded. “She does not feel much happiness, and detests many things.”
“Like me?” Jude asked with a self-deprecating laugh, but Al shook his head.
“No, not precisely. The detestation inside of her was not aimed at you. It is just… she feels hate for almost all things indiscriminately. There is too much pain and sadness in her life for there to be any one cause, and when I touched her hand, I felt that sadness, too.”
Jude didn’t know what to say to that. It was a novel concept for him to think that all of his mom’s verbal and emotional abuse over the years could have been a form of deflection. Not that it excused it, but at least it meant that maybe he wasn’t as fucked up as she made him feel.
“Also your brother is a homosexual,” Al said casually.
Jude bolted upright.
“I’m sorry,what?” he said, suddenly manic, as Al grabbed his forearm to keep him from toppling right off the car. “What did you just say about my brother?”
“Be careful,” Al admonished, setting Jude back in place.
“No, you can’t just say that and not explain.” Jude poked Al in the chest with an accusatory finger. “Spill the beans. What’s going on?”
Al shrugged. “When I shook his hand, he had feelings of attraction toward my human form, and then quickly after that he had feelings of guilt because of this attraction. I could feel it was a common occurrence. Once that emotion was under control, however, a new one took its place. He felt jealousy at you, and many, many feelings of desire to have a life like yours. He felt sadness, too. But I did not feel too much sympathy for him, because he also had feelings that reminded me of my brother. He is mean for fun and feels enjoyment when he receives attention, even at the detriment of others. This is like my brother, and my brother is not my favorite.”
“No,” Jude said with a smug grin, “I’myour favorite.”
“Yes,” Al said simply, without a single trace of irony. “You are.”
Jude had expected Al would be flustered, but Al was no such thing. He looked at Jude with adoration, not ashamed or bashful in the least, and Jude had to clear his throat and look away, lest he start to feel things he shouldn’t feel.
“I cannot fucking believe my brother is a big homo,” he said to change the topic. “This whole time he’s been giving me shit for it when in reality, he was just jealous.”
“Yes. He felt a lot of jealousy at your relationship with me and very, very strong attraction toward me.”
“Well,” Jude said, dragging his eyes up and down Al’s body. “I can’t say I blame him.”
