Page 86 of Bobby Green

“Dogpatch is a small-assed town, Reg. He threatened to spread rumors about me—the kind that would keep me from getting work, the kind that would get my mom treated bad. His dad owns the house she lives in—”

“The one who won’t do any improvement on it?”

“That’s the one. So… you know. Every time I went up there… got….” His voice broke. Oh hell. Bobby’s voice broke, like his heart hurt. “Got fuckin’ awful. ’Cause Jessica wanted sex, and then Keith wanted his goddamned blowjob, and my mom was all ‘Baby, go play with your friends!’ and I just wanted to spend time withher. Because coming down here wasn’t that easy, and I just wanted my mom, right? So when I broke up with Jessica, I got to break up with Keith—but he keeps swinging by my mom’s house and saying things like ‘We’ve got to get your boy back up here.’”

“Like hell!” Reg rubbed his stomach. “I feel… oh God. Bobby, he made you?”

“Yeah.” That one word, and it sounded so hopeless.

Reg reached over and grabbed for his hand, and Bobby helped him out. “That sucks.” Oh God. “I mean, that’sterrible. I’m…. What an asshole! I want to rip his nuts off!”

Bobby let out a weak laugh. “Well, you may get to meet him, but I’d rather you not. My mom still has to live in that damned town.”

It was Reg’s turn to grunt. He knew this reason. He got sacrifice for people. But… but this?

“Would she want you to—”

“No—but she doesn’t know I’m gay either.”

“Are you ever going to tell her?” Reg asked, wondering. Who did they hold hands in front of? Not V—not with the way she went off about whoever the people on TV were going off against. Not in public, because both of them were still learning that they could touch at all, much less in front of other people. In front of friends?

It was complicated, and Reg wondered ifthatwas why it hadn’t occurred to him to have a relationship with a man before this. Complicated was way above his pay grade.

“I wanted to,” Bobby said, and something in his voice made Reg ache. “I wanted you to come with me.”

“I… how would I leave V?” he asked. First thing—always.

“I asked Trey and Lance,” Bobby said, but he didn’t sound proud. “I sort of did some work on the apartment for them. They said they could stay with her in February, early. And the snows should be less deep by then, because I don’t have any chains. Does that sound like it would work?”

“You’re asking me?” Reg felt a little bewildered. “Because I have such a rocking social calendar that once you had V taken care of, I might go on a cruise or something?”

“No.” Bobby sighed. “I mean, Iamasking you. But mostly to be selfish. Because I just… I’m going to come out to my mom, Reg. And I’m not doing it because of you, or for you—but you’re who I’m coming back to if it goes really fucking wrong.”

“Well, yeah, of course,” Reg said, without irony. “Because if that’s what you need, that’s what I can do for you.”

Bobby squeezed his hand. “Also….”

It wasn’t like him to hesitate. “Also what?”

“My mom’s a good mom. I just… you haven’t seen a good mom a lot lately. And if she doesn’t freak out at the gay, I thought… you know.”

“You want your mom to… take over for me?” Reg asked, tickled for some reason.

“I want you to feel cared for,” Bobby said. “Even if it’s just for a little teeny bit of time.”

Reg grunted. “Maybe come out at the beginning,” he said practically. “That way, if she seems all nice and then gets mean to you, I won’t get attached.”

“That’s a really good idea,” Bobby said sincerely. And then he did that thing they just agreed they weren’t ready to do in public, but they were in the car so maybe it didn’t matter.

He took Reg’s knuckles to his mouth and kissed them, with just a little bit of tongue.

Reg whined in his throat. That was no goddamned fair. None. They were going to his house to watch TV and read and for Reg to pretend he didn’t want Bobby so damned bad, with a two-and-a-half-day window in front of them where he wasn’t supposed to screw around.

This wasn’t usually a problem. It wasn’t. But Bobby’s hot breath and slick tongue—on his knuckles, of all places—was making him stiff and drooling while he was driving the goddamned car.

He wasn’t going to make it unless he kicked Bobby out of his house for the next two days.

“Want to get some popsicles at Target?” Bobby asked after he relinquished Reg’s hand. “That way we can have dessert and you don’t have to worry about eating heavy.”