Did Jeff get to ask why it hadn’t worked out? It felt like the sort of question you didn’t ask the best friend you hadn’t spoken to in fifteen years. At least not until you’d been reacquainted for more than a few days.
He set the first long strip of rind next to him on the bench and peeled off the other piece. “Okay.”
Carter looked over from skinning his own clementine. “Okay?” he repeated.
For a few more seconds he concentrated on scraping the pith off the first section of fruit. That gave him time to make sure his voice was steady and neutral when he said, “You don’t have to tell me everything.” He popped it into his mouth, then said around it, “Although if I’d found out you had a kid, I’d have been pretty miffed.”
“I wouldn’t keep a child a secret. Jeez, I’m not a monster.”
No, he was a thirty-two-year-old man who saidjeezout loud. Jeff swallowed. “You’re big enough,” he observed, which was on the mild side as far as their banter went, but he was still regaining his equilibrium.
“Ha ha.” He started on the second clementine. “I guess all your relationships are kind of a matter of public record.”
“Not really.” Jeff spotted a seed in the next section and took a moment to squeeze it out. “I mean, I’m out, but not everyone I date is. And even when they are, not everyone wants to publicly date a rock star.” He flicked the seed into the grass. “It’s fun for a while, but people taking pictures of your lunch dates gets kind of old. And then there’s, you know, the fact that there’s a whole class of people who make their money by hinting at scandalous affairs. It’s easier to keep things casual.”
Thatsounded bitter. He shoved the rest of the clementine in his mouth to make himself shut up.
When Carter didn’t say anything even when Jeff had finished chewing, he looked over. Carter was watching him with a vaguely exasperated expression, like Jeff had somehow missed the point. “What?”
He shook his head. “Never mind.”
Then the official scorekeeper blew the whistle to warn everyone the game was set to resume, and Carter stood up. “That’s my cue.”
The game ended in a tie and with Jeff’s fingers smelling like satsuma. On the way back to the park, they drove with the windows down, and Jeff leaned his head against the window frame and watched the sun melt into the horizon. Apart from the wind, the ride was quiet, but inside Jeff’s head it was loud. He wanted a guitar and a microphone and an audience to sing his heart out to. He wanted a pen and a notepad and a barely lit corner of the cabin to pour himself into.
But he didn’t want to look too closely at what came out.
Still, when Carter parked the truck, Jeff looked over and thought, Fuck it. It had been a nice day. He wasn’t ready for it to be over. “You want a beer?”
Carter grinned wide enough to crinkle the skin at the corners of his eyes. “Thought you’d never ask.”
While Jeff rooted out the drinks, Carter set to work on the campfire.
“I’ve got a couple chairs in the back of the truck,” he said. “More comfortable than a log.”
“My ass thanks you,” Jeff said dryly and caught the keys Carter tossed him one-handed.
Carter clearly had more experience building campfires than Jeff, because it was burning merrily by the time Jeff had the chairs set up. They put their backs to the water to keep the smoke out of their faces, and then they clinked their bottles together. “Cheers.”
Carter nodded in acknowledgment and lifted his bottle to his mouth.
A loon called out over the water, and Jeff shivered reflexively and stuck his feet closer to the fire.
“Can I ask you something?” Carter asked when the echo died down.
Suspicious, Jeff paused with the bottle touching his lower lip. “Were you waiting for an opportunity to get me liquored up to ask?”
Carter flicked his bottle cap at him. Jeff caught it. “Be serious.”
Something about the way he said it made Jeff take him at face value. He let the smile fall away from his face. “You can ask me anything.”
There were a lot of difficult questions on the table, but Carter asked one of the easier ones. “Why’d you come back? Why now?”
Jeff thumbed at the top of his beer label. He wouldn’t have been able to answer that honestly earlier in the week—not only because he wasn’t sure but because he wasn’t ready to trust Carter then. Now, though…. “You’ve probably seen some articles about Howl?” he said. “Creative differences, uh, certain band members being intoxicated and belligerent in public….”
Carter nodded. “Sure. I tend to take it all with a grain of salt.”
Saint Carter. “Well, the rumors are not exactly unfounded.” He let out a long breath. “I’m sure it’s come out somewhere that the four of us met in detention.”
