“I remember the big one you dug out of the bank down by the waterfall. Used to keep it in your pocket. Called it your lucky arrowhead.”
Dusty chuckled, revisiting happy days gone by. “I remember. Can’t rightly recall what I did with it, though.” As clear as if it’d been yesterday he recalled slipping the quartz fragment into his friend’s hand, but he held back on saying so. Would it make Seth uncomfortable to know that the two things Dustin had prized the most had left for Chicago the next day?
“You gave it to me. The day before my grandmother took me away.” Seth brought his eyes up from studying the creek bank. A world of pain stared out from their unfathomable depths. “Nana found it and threw it away. Said I didn’t need any reminders of this place.”
At a loss for what to say, Dustin simply replied, “I’m sorry.”
Seth turned away again. “I never had another friend like you. When I first left, I cried and cried to come home. Nana wouldn’t listen. Said this place was evil and I should be glad she got me out in time. I never understood why she hated this place, except for maybe being a city girl born and raised. With her tea parties and bridge clubs, she didn’t have much use for hay fields and wide open spaces.”
“I’m sure you made other friends.” Nausea took root in Dustin’s stomach as he imagined what kind of life and friendships Seth must have in Chicago. Seth had listed “single” on his Internet profile, but not everyone’s idea of single meant the same thing. Did Seth have a boyfriend? Someone waiting for him back home? The hot blond pictured on Seth’s site was a former lover, right? Or maybe Seth liked to keep his options open, had grown into one of those men who liked variety and considered monogamy a bad word.
Personally, Dustin hoped to settle down one day,ifhe ever found someone who met his ever-increasing needs in a partner. Like, “Doesn’t mind when I hang with a whole bunch of fuzzy friends every full moon.” While the passel included several gay members, they’d either paired up by now or preferred a solitary life. And if the mantle of leadership fell to Dustin on a permanent basis, bringing in an outsider would only create discord. Either way, he’d end up screwed. Or rather, not screwed, and the possibility lessened with each added obligation thrust upon his shoulders. He’d only dated a handful of times since he and Andy went their separate ways.
“Not really. My grandmother was terrified of something happening to me and didn’t let me go to other kids’ houses to play. She was persnickety about her apartment and never let me bring anyone home either. You’re the last friend I ever spent the night with.”
For a formerly outgoing child, an upbringing isolated from other kids must have been hell. Dustin viewed Seth with new eyes. “Sounds lonely.”
Seth shrugged, focusing his attention on a seedling pine peeking up from a layer of fallen needles. “I thought about this place a lot. You. Auntie. After a while, the memories weren’t doing me any good anymore and I gave them up, tried to be what Nana wanted me to be.” Seth chuckled mirthlessly. “Listen to me dumping on you. We came down here to remember good times, not for you to become my shrink.” His cheeks stretched into the semblance of happiness, but his eyes, when they lifted enough to make contact, carried pain, deep and cutting. “C’mon, let’s go find the hill we used to roll down.” Off he trotted, but not before Dustin noticed dampness on Seth’s cheeks.
They picked their way across the creek and up the bank, Seth stumbling and nearly falling. Dustin grabbed his arm just in time, hauling him to dry ground and smack against Dustin’s chest. Their eyes met and held, and Dustin found himself unable to look away. The chirping birds hushed, as did the babbling of water and the occasional bullfrog. Dustin didn’t know who moved first, or if Seth would be receptive, but one minute they stood apart, the next they melded, parting their lips, slipping their tongues inside each other’s mouths. Deep, fiery, breathtaking. Seth pulled away first. “I’m sorry…,” he began.
“Don’t be.” Heart pounding, Dustin pulled Seth close again, praying the unexpected kiss wasn’t a fluke. The moment their lips touched every doubt faded, the kiss sweet, unhurried, sending an electric current straight to Dustin’s groin. Seth moaned, the evidence of his own arousal pressing against Dustin’s leg. This time Dustin withdrew, recalling that Seth didn’t belong here anymore, and would soon be leaving. Too much vied for the hours of Dustin’s days without adding a short-term fling. Especially not with someone who’d meant to him what Seth had. Hell, he didn’t even know who Seth was now. The guy might be an ax murderer, though Dustin’s instincts told him otherwise. Nonetheless, the last thing Dustin wanted was another person to turn him away because he didn’t fit conveniently into their life.Love me, love my passel.
“If….” Seth dropped his gaze, then immediately brought it back up again to lock onto Dustin’s. His Adam’s apple bobbed with a hard swallow. Voice barely a whisper, he said, “If you wanted to lay me down right here, I’d let you.” For a moment temptation reared its persuasive head, until Seth added, “It’s been a while.”
The quietly spoken words served better than a bucket of ice water dumped down Dustin’s back. While Seth might be lonely and temptation personified, Dustin had no intention of being somebody’s easy fuck becauseIt’s been a while.
“I… I have to get back to work,” he stammered. “I only stopped by to say hello.” Forcing himself not to look back, Dustin left Seth standing by the creek, literally running away before he reconsidered. He’d nearly cleared the driveway before he wondered if it was too late to change his mind and turn the truck around.
Chapter 7
“WAYto go, asshole,” Seth groused aloud to himself. “You always manage to ruin the moment.” Something about isolation coupled with compulsory Internet deprivation forced him to examine his life. He decided it sucked. Porn and a well-worked right hand marked the limits of his sex life so far this year, except for a quickie or two with Michael a few months back, and the year was half gone.
When was the last time he’d tuned out external clutter enough to even hear his own thoughts? He watched Dustin grow smaller and smaller, and kicked himself first for sharing too much information, and second for offering to drop trou in front of God and everybody. No wonder Dustin ran. Other possibilities occurred to Seth. Maybe Dusty wasn’t out and had simply gotten caught up in the moment, or maybe he had somebody waiting for him in town.Oh my God! Did I try to seduce the dreaded straight guy who somehow manages to send out gay vibes?
He longed for his phone, to send a message to the world far and wide in hopes of hearing someone reply back—if anyone bothered. At the moment, there weren’t enough people in the entire world to keep Seth from feeling alone.
He wound up back at the house, searching for an elusive signal. The front porch yielded up a single bar of connectivity if he leaned way over the railing, holding the phone aloft, while the rest of the house proved a black hole for technology. Damn, why hadn’t he tried from the roof while on the ladder? Nearly desperate enough to perch on the weather vane, he considered the next best thing—the attic.
Up creaking stairs he climbed, the narrow passageway provoking a bout of claustrophobia, until he emerged under the eaves of the roof. The stairwell had seemed a whole lot roomier when he’d been eight. Though not terribly tall now, he did have to duck in places where the roof sloped downward. Eventually the space opened up with enough unused footage to add a bonus room,or a master suite,whispered the part of his brain that occasionally nagged for a partner and something besides a cramped apartment to live in. He recalled his drunken fantasy of a big house, a porch swing, a red-haired lover, and a kid or two. Well, he certainly had the house and swing, but the only red-haired man he wanted obviously didn’t wanthim.He mentally slapped himself in the back of the head, mumbling, “Idiot.”
His footsteps left prints through thick dust in a room time forgot. Grime-coated sheets tented out in the shape of chairs or other furniture. Seth passed too close, knocking loose a dust bunny the size of Cleveland, and immediately doubled over in a sneezing fit of epic proportions. “Damn!” he wheezed, hacking and coughing.
More gingerly, he made a careful circuit of the upper floor, forgetting why he’d come up here and losing himself in a whole attic full of things needing sorting. Maybe he’d luck out, like he’d seen on TV shows, and find a priceless painting or other big-ticket item hiding among the castoffs.
A vaguely familiar, steamer-type trunk summoned him like a beacon, and he knelt on the gritty floor beside the wooden box, holding his breath as he cleaned the top with a sweep of his arm. The hinges squealed in anguish when he lifted the lid. At first he thought he’d found storage for extra linen, but upon moving the shimmery white material sealed in a plastic bag, he discovered the cloth to be a dress—a fairytale creation displayed in a photo in his grandmother’s living room. His mother’s wedding gown!
He wiped his hands on his jeans and carefully removed the plastic bag. Gingerly cradling the elegant garment in his arms, he reveled in the softness of the silk and the slight scratchiness of lace and rows of tiny seed pearls, suddenly missing his mother more than ever. Worried about damaging a cherished heirloom, he placed the gown reverently back in its protective covering, then rummaged through the remainder of the trunk.
A scrapbook yielded pictures of a lovely blonde girl with corkscrew curls, and with the flip of a few pages, he watched her grow to maturity and eventually to adulthood, where she struck many poses with a dark-haired man. Staring closely, Seth recognized the slightly thin lips, the aquiline nose, and hawklike brows, for he saw them every time he stared into a mirror. While he wasn’t gorgeous by any stretch of the imagination, he was very proud to look like his dad, big nose notwithstanding.
The trunk yielded various other treasures: souvenirs of a honeymoon trip to Acapulco, a pair of worn baby shoes Seth supposed were his own. At the bottom of the pile, he discovered a notebook, pages filled with a neat, flowery scrawl, and he settled in to read what he assumed to be his mother’s words.
Shape-shifters exist, though I, like most people, believed they were simply fantasy—until I met one.
His mother was a writer? Wow! Nana never mentioned her writing. And as openings went, what a hook! He turned page after page, immersed in an imaginary world where humans transformed into fourlegged creatures, some able to alter their form at will, others relying on the power of the full moon.
Expecting to read about human/wolf metamorphosis, it took him by surprise to read:With a long, skinny tail and sharp teeth, he didn’t resemble my sweet Aaron in the least.
