All too soon, however, Jude’s cellular telephone began playing a loud, gratingly whimsical tune. Jude made his cellular telephone make this noise on purpose as a means of rousing him from unconsciousness at a specific time. Al had pointed out that it would be less abrasive to simply tell himself the proper time to awaken before going unconscious, but Jude had informed him that humans were not able to tell time without the assistance of external devices, especially during unconsciousness, which Al found to be very inefficient and had privately made him feel worry that their offspring might inherent this very stupid trait. Humans were bad at many things, but time was among the worst of them.
“Mmblrrph,” Jude mumbled, blindly patting Al’s arm without opening his eyes, searching for his cellular telephone.
Al knew the exact moment Jude became aware of their compromising position, because he suddenly tensed up. Al knew this meant that he was about to—yep. Jude hastily untangled himself from Al’s body, leaving Al to feel cold, both externally and—somehow—internally as well.
“Ha, sorry about that,” Jude said in his sleep-drunk voice as he reached over to his bedside table and snatched up his phone. “I didn’t mean to crowd your space like that.”
Al did not bother to mention that he would have felt pleasure if Judehadmeant to impede on Al’s personal space. In fact, he wished quite strongly that that was the case, but just as he’d done the day before, and the day before that, and the one before that as well, Jude had shut down the notion that he would ever feel desire to touch Al on his own accord again. It hurt something vital inside Al’s heart each and every time.
“I don’t feel bothered by your unconscious actions,” Al assured Jude for the seventh time. It was becoming difficult to not sound exasperated as he did so.
“Right, well…” Jude rubbed the nape of his neck and cleared his throat. “Sorry anyway.”
His face was flushed across his nose and cheeks, and Al wanted to lean over and press his lips to the warm skin and insist,again, that he need not apologize, but of course he was not allowed to press his lips to any part of Jude anymore.
Without another word on the subject, Jude got out of bed—fast enough that Al couldn’t help but feel a little offense—and began rifling through the clothing on what he called his “laundry chair,” which was where he haphazardly tossed any article of clothing he didn’t feel desire to put in its proper place. Al understood. He had his own version of a laundry chair back on his home planet.
“Are you coming with me to campus today?” Jude asked, sniffing a t-shirt. He made a face and tossed the t-shirt back into the pile. He selected another one and pulled it over his head, hiding the sweet, modest swell of his stomach. Al didn’t miss the way he tugged at the bottom hem of his shirt to conceal his bump, and though he tried not to feel hurt by this, it stung a little. Ezra had explained to him that it was not common for human males to produce offspring, and suggested that perhaps Jude was simply attempting to avoid being asked questions with answers that would reveal too much, but Al knew that Jude hid—at least in part—due to feelings of embarrassment and shame, and Al felt sadness that Jude would feel that way about his own offspring.
“Yes,” Al answered, sitting up in bed and watching Jude pull on a pair of loose-fitting pants over his boxer shorts. “A vital piece of equipment for my communication device is supposed to be arriving today. It is very inefficient how you humans deliver items from one place to another, by the way. You have the necessary resources to produce increased vehicle speed. I do not feel understanding for why your species does not utilize this.”
Jude stiffened minutely at the mention of Al’s communication device. If Al were being truthful, he had mentioned it on purpose in hopes of garnering this reaction. Jude always acted tense when Al talked about returning home and, perhaps out of a feeling of spite—an emotion that was not his usual—Al felt the desire to make Jude feel discomfort, reminding him that he was the one who was insisting on Al leaving in the first place. There was a part in Al somewhere thatwantedJude to feel unhappiness about it, because he did too.
“Yeah, well, you know how us humans love inefficiency,” Jude said lamely, like he’d been going for a joke, but it had fallen flat. “How, uh, how close are you to finishing that thing, anyways?”
The question caught Al off guard. The communication device inevitably came up in conversation now and then, but it was rare for Jude to ask for details. They treated the topic like tiptoeing on broken eggs, or whatever the idiom was. Al still struggled with malapropisms.
“I do not have the proper figures to provide an exact timeline,” Al said, looping and unlooping his lanyard around one of his fingers. “If I were to make an estimation, I would say that it will be completed near the time of your delivery. I will, of course, assist you with the birthing process, but do not feel worry—you will not need to be in the company of me or our clutch for a prolonged length of time after that.” His voice came out considerably harsher than he’d intended, and Jude noticed.
“Al, that’s not why I asked. I’m sorry, I was just—”
“It is all right,” Al cut Jude off, suddenly ready for the conversation to be concluded. Al was not a person who felt anger with frequency, but being reminded of Jude’s disregard for him and their offspring was driving him to it.
“Al—” Jude tried again, but Al didn’t let him.
“I believe I will wash my human body with your indoor rain,” Al said, louder this time.
Jude sighed. “You know it’s called a shower.”
“I prefer language to be—”
“Specific. Yes, I know, I was just teasing. I like that about you. It’s cute.”
Al, who was in the process of getting out of bed, paused with the blankets he’d just pulled off his legs still clutched in his hand. He blinked at Jude, who grew red under the scrutiny. That flash feeling of anger happened again. Perhaps Jude’s mixed signals were affecting him more than he was letting himself believe.
“I will return in approximately eleven minutes,” he muttered, getting the rest of the way up. He sidled past Jude, bumping his shoulder accidentally, and was hit with a sudden spike of Jude’s shame upon impact that was so strong, Al was able to feel it through the barrier of his t-shirt.
Good,he thought, surprising himself with his own feeling of bitterness.
He headed to the bathroom without another word, and if he cried a little while washing himself in the indoor rain? Well, that was nobody’s business but his own.
* * *
Corbin was waiting for them outside of the student union, where he always waited on days in which he and Jude shared a class. By then, Al’s feelings of anger had simmered down into a vague feeling of sadness he couldn’t seem to shake, which gave him reason to believe that his anger might have been a fabrication on the part of his mind to protect him from the depth of his grief.
Al did not like feeling anger, and he did not like it especially when it was targeted at Jude, but grief wasn’t much better. It tended to make his human body cry, and crying gave him a headache, so there was no winning, and it was terrible.
Consequently, Corbin’s bright and sunshiny disposition was like a slap to the face. Why did Corbin get to feel happiness when so much in Al’s life was going wrong? That fabricated anger flared again, just enough to cause Al to feel annoyance. He did not like how irrational it was making him. He was a much better being than this.
