Page 4

HARRY

I read the first message and my heart raced with excitement. Dean was home!

I read the second message and muttered to myself, “Why did he invite Madeline? What’s she gonna do, jump out of a fucking cake?”

I typed back, nervous and thrilled and trying to keep from throwing up at the idea of seeing Dean for the first time in a year. “Sure. Sounds good. Be great to have Dean back home for a while. Absolutely no need to make a big deal out of my birthday. It’s nothing. I actually forgot too,” I lied. I inhaled and added, “No need to invite Madeline. I’m sure she has plenty of school assignments to catch up on. The three of us can just hang, you, me and Dean. That’d be great.”

I hit send…

Then I looked back at the message.

“Jesus, that was way too long. Talk about overthinking things, Harry. Just calm down.”

I didn’t calm down.

I tried on every single shirt I had in my closet before realizing I never wore a buttoned shirt to Andy’s place. I put them all back and settled for a plain black T-shirt.

I pulled on my jeans then tried on a nice pair of shoes, then a pair of sneakers, then my boots. “Boots,” I decided, knowing that’s exactly what anyone would expect me to wear.

I stood in front of the mirror and ran my fingers through my hair. I ran the tap, wet my hands and tried to finger-comb my hair into something vaguely fashionable. I pushed it up… Did guys wear their hair up these days? I wet it down… Did guys slick their hair down these days? I scruffed it up into an old man’s version of what Dean had always done with his hair, making it look messy, like I was way too cool to give a fuck.

I smiled at my reflection. “Edgy,” I said approvingly, before admitting to myself— oh, what the fuck would I know?

I backed quickly away from the mirror and did not return to it.

I tucked my T-shirt into my jeans.

Untucked it.

Half -tucked it, belt buckle showing. “Groovy,” I grinned, before telling myself— oh my God! Never ever EVER use the word “groovy” again!

I grabbed a six-pack of beer from the fridge and stepped out the front door. I took a deep breath and told myself, “You can do this, Harry. Just act casual, you’re not about to ask Dean out on a date. Hell, you’ll never ask Dean out on a date. Just be yourself, the same old Harry you’ve always been. You’ve got this. You da man!” After which I told myself— never say “you da man” again. Seriously?

* * *

Ever since Dean moved away, I had tried not to follow his career.

I was concerned it might alter my impression of my best friend’s son.

I was worried it might taint that perfect, unexpected, heart-swelling perception of him that had formed like an out-of-control tornado in those few months between the time he turned eighteen and the time he was whisked away to LA.

I was terrified I might fall out of love with the boy who had suddenly stolen my heart.

So I stayed away from the entertainment news and the social media platforms. I tracked his fame by learning to play his songs on YouTube. He’d had more than one hit in the year he’d been gone. After “Hammer of my Heart” went to the top of the charts, guitar lessons appeared online for songs titled “Knock On My Door,” then “When You Weren’t Looking,” and a particularly moving ballad called “One Soul, One Town,” which had to be written about Mulligan’s Mill… not that anyone in town would know.

The songs were—according to the amateur guitar players teaching me lessons on YouTube—one hit after another.

In the quiet of my house, I learned them all.

And I promised myself, if and when I saw him again, I would never let him know.

* * *

I never knocked when I arrived at Andy’s. When Andy was home the door was always unlocked, and after showing up on his doorstep for over thirty years, I would just let myself in and call out, “Harry’s here!”

I hesitated at the door that day.

Dean was a big star now.

Should I knock now?

Had things changed?

Had Dean changed?

Would I change when I saw him?

I raised my hand to knock.

I hesitated a moment longer.

I took three short sharp breaths and whispered, “You can do this Harry,” and suddenly—

“What the fuck are you doing out here?” Andy had yanked the door open and was looking at me with complete bewilderment. “Did you forget how to open a door? You okay? Harry?”

“Oh, I… um… you saw me out here, huh?”

Andy nodded. “Through the window. Although I wasn’t sure it was you at first. What have you done with your hair? Did you try to…?” He didn’t have the words for “style it,” because styling it wasn’t something either of us had ever done.

I tried to shrug it off. “I know, I need a haircut, right? It’s got a mind of its own when it gets this scruffy.”

My attempt to fake a complete disregard for how I looked worked. Andy nodded again. “Who the fuck gives a shit about your hair anyway?”

I rolled with it. “Who the fuck, right?”

“You betcha. Just bring it on in and give me a hug. I owe you a birthday hug, buddy.” He waved me into his arms. I put the beers down, and when we embraced, we both did the heterosexual slap— one, two, three —that had somehow become a signal between straight men that it was okay to hug, so long as they slapped each other on the back three times while doing it.

While everybody still thought I was straight, I was more than willing to keep up the ritual.

Hell, most days—when I wasn’t fantasizing about Dean—even I thought I was straight.

Being straight is the starting point, right? Society teaches us that’s the bar, that’s who we are, until some of us figure out we’re not. I guess you’re always something… until you’re something else, right? I mean, there was no evidence that I wasn’t straight… and there wouldn’t be until I actually did something that wasn’t straight. And until now, I’d never so much as set foot on the yellow brick road with Dorothy and her friends. So I guess I was just gonna keep slapping men on the back until…

“Harry!”

I turned, and there in the hallway stood Dean.

His eyes lit up when he saw me, and my heart instantly started racing and I had to break my hug with Andy in case he felt the sudden booming in my chest.

Dean looked good.

He looked fucking great.

His hair was longer, thicker, and so was his torso, but not so much that he’d lost his boyish looks.

Immediately I sounded like someone’s grandfather and said, “Well look at you. Haven’t you grown.”

Dean scoffed. “Like, an inch, maybe. But not really. I’m still not as tall as you.”

“Nobody in Mulligan’s Mill will get as tall as Harry,” Andy chimed in. “He’s like a bear in human form. Now get your butt over here and give him a hug,” he said to Dean. “It was his birthday yesterday. You ain’t forgotten how to hug while you’ve been away, have you?”

“Of course not.”

Dean came up to me with arms open wide, and I realized we’d never actually embraced before. There had never been a reason to, except for maybe when he left for LA, but his departure was such a whirlwind that he was gone before I barely had a chance to say goodbye.

Now, as he came toward me, I gulped but tried not to let my anxiety—or the growing bulge in my crotch—show.

Just before he wrapped his arms around me, I was sure I caught a glimpse of nervousness in his eye. His arms were uncertain where to go, one going over one shoulder, one looping around my side, while I tried to figure out where to put my own arms. It was awkward, and embarrassing, and we both ended it quickly with a one - two - three clap on the back.

“Happy Birthday, Harry,” he said.

“Welcome home, Dean,” I smiled.

“It’s good to be back. Things are… quiet here. Nice and quiet.”

“I guess life in the Mill is a little different to life in LA, huh?”

He laughed. “I guess you could say that.”

It was a stilted conversation that trailed off into nothingness.

Andy smacked his hands together and rubbed them, as though he was about to conjure something up, which he was. “Drinks? Who’s thirsty? I know I could use a hair of the dog, that’s for sure.” I held up my six-pack and Andy took it from me, heading to the back room. “Come on, fellas. Let’s celebrate!”

Dean looked at me. “You’re gonna have to forgive Dad’s decorations. He kinda had to make do with whatever he could find around the house.”

“I can’t wait to see.” I gestured for him to follow his dad first. “After you.”

Dean walked ahead of me.

His scent drifted behind him, a fragrance I hadn’t smelled on him before.

His jeans were tight and hugged his ass.

It was impossible not to tear my eyes away from that firm young bubble butt until I stepped into the back room and Andy’s decorations stole my attention.

“Oh wow. Toilet paper.”

“I like to think of them as multipurpose streamers,” Andy corrected as my eyes scanned the trails of toilet paper that had been looped around the curtain rods and draped down from the light fittings. On the table where we usually played poker were chip bowls containing the no-doubt stale remnants of the previous night’s snacks, only now the bowls were wrapped in red and silver tinsel, even though Christmas was half a year away. And sitting beside the pretzels was something wrapped in old newspaper and tape.

“It’s a present. Sort of,” Andy said to me. “Go on then, open it.”

“It’s not a dead fish, is it? It looks like it might be a dead fish wrapped in newspaper.”

Dean snorted. “It’s not a dead fish.”

“Good.” I grinned back at him.

“Don’t get too excited, though. You haven’t seen what it is yet. You might hate it.”

I picked up the parcel and pulled away the newspaper to see a signed publicity photo of Dean inside an old picture frame.

“Please know this was not my idea,” Dean cringed.

“Oh, don’t be precious,” Andy told him, opening beers for me and him and fixing a tequila for Dean. “It’s a great birthday gift. Do you know why? Because one day when you’re bigger than Elvis, that right there is gonna be worth a fortune.” He handed me my beer. “You like it, right Harry? I mean, so what if I didn’t go to any huge effort, right?”

“Dad, you didn’t go to any effort at all. You saw I had the publicity shots in my backpack, then pulled an old fishing photo off the wall and switched the pictures out.”

Andy wobbled his head at Dean. “Well of course I switched the pictures out. Nobody’s gonna pay a fortune for that photo of me pulling a fifteen-pounder out of the river, although Upstream Magazine did pay me a nice fat hundred-dollar check to use it on their front cover. But enough about me and my fishing expertise. The point is, Harry’s not just holding a photo of you; he’s holding stardom in his hands, and that’s gonna be worth something someday.” He handed Dean a glass of tequila. “Maybe when Harry cashes that photo in, he can chip in for your next bottle of fancy booze.”

“You know you didn’t have to buy this for me,” Dean said, holding up his glass.

“I know. But you mentioned you liked it over the phone, and I wanted to make you happy. Just like I wanted to make Harry happy with his birthday present.”

The pair of them had pretty much been ignoring me while they teased each other back and forth, while I stared at the framed photo in my hands, entranced.

“I’m not sure he likes it at all,” Dean commented when he saw me gazing at the picture. “I think he’s in shock. You know, you don’t have to be polite and accept it. If you hate it, I totally understand. It’s a terrible photo of me anyway—”

“I like it,” I told him. I wanted to tell him I loved it, but instead I said, “It’s a great photo of you.”

“You like it?” Dean sounded surprised.

I nodded. “Sure, I do.” I suddenly realized I sounded way too serious, even a little moved by the gift. I quickly shifted the tone. “And I’m gonna like it even more when it’s worth a million bucks.”

Dean laughed. “I wouldn’t hold your breath for that kinda paydirt. But if you don’t totally hate it, then Happy Birthday.”

“Happy Birthday, Harry!” Andy raised his beer, then almost polished off the entire bottle in a single gulp.

“Did I hear Happy Birthday?” called a voice from the front doorway, which we’d left open when I arrived.

Andy quickly wiped a dribble of beer from his bottom lip and called out, “Madeline? Come on in, we’re out in the back room.”

I glanced at Andy and said quietly, “I thought you weren’t going to make a big deal of this.”

Andy pointed to the gift he’d given me and laughed. “I didn’t.”

“I mean, I thought it was just going to be the three of—”

“Madeline!” Andy beamed as she entered the room, a bottle of wine in one hand and a bunch of flowers in the other.

“Hi, guys!” She hugged Andy and handed him the wine. “I brought chardonnay. Don’t hate me, but I think I drank way too much beer last night. I thought I woke up in a brewery in Milwaukee.”

“I love that feeling,” smiled Andy with dreamy eyes.

Madeline turned to me next and handed me the flowers. “And these are for you. My God, I can’t believe we played poker instead of celebrating your birthday. I’m so sorry. Why didn’t you say something? I hope you’re not allergic to flowers. I picked them up from Bud’s. Maggie said marigolden-girls are your favorite. Very rare, apparently. It’s not weird to buy a man flowers for his birthday, is it?”

I shook my head, thinking about the flowers in the vase at home, the ones with Dean’s name on the card… in my handwriting. “Not at all. Thank you, they’re lovely.”

She spun on her heel to face Dean. “And you must be the famous Dean Reeves. I’ve heard so much about you. I’m Madeline. Madeline Montgomery. I’m the new math teacher at the school.”

“So, Mr. Lowery finally retired, huh?”

“Yes. Not surprisingly he took his abacus with him. I think it was the only thing in that classroom older than he was.”

Dean laughed while Madeline spotted the toilet paper on one of the curtain rods, then saw it everywhere. “Are those supposed to be decorations?” she asked Andy, one eyebrow raised. She didn’t wait for an answer. “Classy.” With a wink in Dean’s direction she added, “I bet this is just like the parties back in LA, huh?”

Dean laughed again.