“All right, now. Who wants a piece of this delicious cake I made?”
She carved out thick slices and handed them to us on blue china plates. Oscar took one bite and closed his eyes, moaning as if he were in the throes of passion. I took a bite of my piece, and I couldn’t blame him for it.
“Oh my God,” I murmured as I chewed, covering my mouth so nothing would escape or be visible between my lips. I paused to enjoy the rich, fudgy taste of it before I swallowed. “Irene, this is—this is—like Heaven.”
I licked my lips and cut another piece off with my fork, getting some of the icing this time.
“Irene, this is your best cake yet,” Clarence declared. “Is this why you wanted to buy the imported chocolate?”
“Clarence, you knew when you married me that I had expensive tastes.”
Clarence rolled his eyes, but he was glowing with pride. “Ain’t that the truth.”
Irene shrugged and ate some of her piece.
“Oh my. Yes, it is good. When’s your birthday, Oscar? I’ll make the same cake for you if you like.”
Oscar stopped chewing and swallowed, then screwed up his face.
“I think ’tis in August.”
We stared at him.
“What? Does a fella need to know the exact date?”
It did seem strange that he didn’t know it.
“I suppose not,” Clarence said, the first to get o’er the shock. “Why don’t you pick a day, and we’ll celebrate it then.”
“Sure, okay. How about August tenth? That’s easy to remember,” Oscar said, side-eyeing me to see what I thought of that.
I smiled and inclined my chin. “August tenth it is, then. Good to know.”
I reached o’er and placed my hand on top of his, squeezing softly. He turned his palm up and squeezed back.
* * * *
By the time the siding and shingles went up, t’was the end of May and the spring social was only two weeks off. The house was finished, and we had started arranging our furniture—what little we had—about the various rooms. We graciously accepted donations of a few items no longer needed by the Trelawneys and Carson and Tim.
Every time I climbed the narrow stairs to the second story bedrooms, I was amazed to have such luxury. Part of me regretted that the dirty, stolen money we’d taken from Spook and Whitlaw had paid for this place, but another part of me decided t’was fair to use it for something good. Those nasty fellas had wrecked most of my life—and Robert’s, too. So, I felt t’was bringing some kind of balance to the universe when Oscar and me used it to make a comfortable life for ourselves. It gave me the chance to make restitution for all those things I’d done. I planned to be a decent man—a responsible citizen who helped his neighbors and loved his partner until the day he died. I could only hope that God would feel that t’was enough.
We’d put a single cot into the second bedroom, but the main bedroom had our big wooden bed frame in it, and a little desk at one end, where I could sit and go o’er the accounts. We’d extended the stove pipe from downstairs so it passed up through this room now, and next winter it would keep us almost as warm as it had when we’d slept downstairs. And there was a proper fireplace in the living and dining room with a sturdy brick chimney.
T’was a good, strong house, and we were lucky to have it. In our cozy bed upstairs one night, I asked Oscar why he didn’t know his own birthday.
He shrugged and tried to distract me by sliding his hand under the covers and circling my cock. That technique tended to work, but not this night. We’d stopped wearing our union suits now that the weather was warmer, and t’was nice to be able to access each other’s parts so easy.
But I took his slim wrist and gently lifted his hand away. He turned surprised brown eyes my way, blinking in confusion.
“Why don’t you know your birthday, Oscar?”
He faltered, his face betraying a mix of embarrassment, frustration and a spark of anger that flared then disappeared.
“I don’t know.”
A cat’s mewling interrupted us, and Sprite landed on the bed beside me, snuggling into my hip and wrapping her tail around herself as she started to purr. I gave her a stroke and turned back to Oscar.
“Didn’t your folks make note of it? I mean, when things were better for you all?”
