Grumbling something under his breath, Adrian carried the painting to the study and placed it on a chair sitting against the wall. He moved to stand next to where Ben sat in his office chair and tilted his head to examine the art more closely.
“If you walk to the other end of the eastern paddock and turn to look left, that’s where this scene is. Or well, without Gav, of course, but….” Adrian gestured with his hand, still staring absently at the surreal image.
“Okay, found it.” Ben kept his tone quiet, as if not to break Adrian’s reverie with his bad news.
Sighing, Adrian tore his gaze off the painting and pulled another chair to sit next to Ben. When Ben turned the laptop to show him the article, Adrian read quietly, then began to shake slightly.
“Yup, definitely him,” the words came out choked. “‘Tattoo of a dragon on left shoulder’,” he quoted the text. “I drew the initial design for it.”
When Adrian moved to the words describing the extent of damage to the body, that the head injury was severe enough not to have left much to identify and a photograph couldn’t be released for the general public, the shaking got so bad Ben turned in his chair and wrapped an arm around the wide shoulders that trembled even in his embrace.
“Do you want me to make the call? You can talk to them once I get it started.” Ben gestured at his cell he’d put on the table before he began the search.
Adrian nodded but didn’t move away from leaning on Ben’s shoulder, so Ben took the cell with his free hand and pushed in the numbers at the end of the article.
To Ben’s surprise, the cop investigating Gavin’s case believed them when they said they’d just come across the article and thought the John Doe might be Gavin. Adrian explained his relationship and when prompted, described the tattoo he’d designed for Gavin. He also told the cops to look for his information in the foster system, and then asked if the body was still in storage somewhere.
It turned out they had cremated Gavin a few weeks after it became evident there would be no one to claim him. The ashes were still kept, mostly because the officer in charge hadn’t given up hope. He agreed that once final identification was done, based on the fingerprints in the foster system’s files and the ones taken from the body, he’d make sure the ashes were released to Adrian.
Adrian ended the call after making sure they had one another’s numbers. Ben took the phone from his shaky fingers.
The lights flickered on and off again, but this time with some sort of finality.
Adrian turned to look at Ben and smiled sadly. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Ben returned the smile and didn’t pull away when Adrian leaned even closer.
Their lips met in a chaste way, but the kiss lasted for a while.
To Ben’s utter surprise, he didn’t freak out and even leaned to chase Adrian’s mouth when he pulled away.
“So you’ll come back?” Adrian smiled.
“Yeah. Yeah, I suppose I will.” Ben, knowing he appeared dazed, managed to answer.
“Good.”
***
Two months later they’d seen each other a handful of times. At first it had felt a bit weird to use the guy he was crushing on—and boy did it feel weird to use that word at thirty-seven years of age—as a sounding board for his emerging gay identity.
One day they were both in Lexington on business and had lunch together.
“How about you?” Adrian asked, having just told Ben about how he’d figured out he had feelings for other boys quite early.
“Well, I’m a late bloomer, as you know,” Ben said, grinning. “But I’ve actually thought back lately. I think I had male crushes as young as fourteen, maybe fifteen. I just didn’t know or want to think of them as such.”
“How come?” Adrian had once told him he was the product of a hippie “love is love” type of parenting.
“It wasn’t okay around here back then. We lived in a smaller, even more backwards town. I saw what the couple of kids we had that people assumed were queer had to go through….” He sighed. “And there was my dad. He was a bit of a homophobe.”
“How do you feel about this now, though?”
They hadn’t really talked about their relationship or the implications it might have to their personal lives. That seemed to be what Adrian was really asking.
“Now… I don’t know. I’m a private person. Would sort of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ work for you at first?” he asked hesitantly. He didn’t want to blow this, but he wasn’t ready to wave a flag in a parade, either.
“I’m in no rush, Ben. I promise.”
