Page 14 of True North
He didn’t have to wait long. Later that week, he came home from a workout in town, damp in his sweaty clothes and ready for lunch and a shower, and found Misha, in bear form, sitting beside the mudroom steps.
“Hey there,” JT said, trying hard to suppress a goofy smile as he climbed out of his truck. He was happier to see Misha than he had expected. “Gosh, what should I do about this large bear outside my house? Maybe I’d better call animal control.”
There was almost no chance that Misha understood what he was saying, but Misha shifted into his human form anyway and crouched naked on the stoop, seemingly oblivious as always to the cool, overcast weather.
“Where did your clothes go?” JT asked, then shook his head. “Never mind.” He slammed the truck door shut behind him and went around to let them both into the house. Misha stayed huddled on the stoop until JT touched his bare shoulder and gestured him inside, then rose to his feet and shuffled after JT into the mudroom.
JT had stashed the box of clothes for Misha under the mudroom bench, and he dragged it out now and politely averted his eyes while Misha picked through the box and pulled on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. Then he took Misha into the kitchen to show him what had come in the mail the day before.
“It’s a picture chart,” JT said, showing Misha one of the laminated cards he had left stacked on the kitchen island. “See? It’s got all kinds of different foods on it, so you can just point to what you want. Easier than having to use my phone every time, eh?”
Misha squinted at the card and then transferred his gaze to JT. After a moment, his face broke into a shy, lopsided smile. He touched the image of a slice of pizza.
JT laughed. “Yeah, that’s what you always want. I’m fresh out, though. You’ll have to eat whatever I heat up for lunch.”
For once, Misha didn’t seem interested in eating, though. He roamed around the kitchen as JT reheated some chicken and pasta, sniffing at the fake fig tree Kendall had given JT for Christmas last year and looking at the pictures hanging on the wall around the breakfast table. JT had bought this house the summer after his third year in the league, after he had signed a long-term contract and felt too old to keep spending summers under his parents’ roof. Eight years later, he still had most of the same furnishings he’d settled on at the ripe old age of twenty: a teenager’s taste, heavy on the leather and dark wood, things he had thought were sophisticated or badass and looked to him now like someone’s wet dream of James Bond. He couldn’t imagine Misha was judging his decor, though.
He ate leaning against the counter, watching Misha conduct his inspection. He didn’t know for sure that Misha had come back to stay for good, but it seemed likely. All of JT’s schemes that had seemed reasonable and well-thought-out a week ago seemed like total insanity now. Had he actually invited this stranger to move in with him?
Sources said yes.
At last, Misha stopped his roaming and sat down at the breakfast table, his hands folded in his lap. The wordless look he directed at JT said it all: what came next?
JT’s brain sputtered for a moment like an engine failing to start. He didn’t know what came next. He didn’t even know if Misha planned to stay with him for a single night, much less long-term.
The picture cards wouldn’t suffice for this conversation. JT got out his phone. “Do you want to stay here, like we talked about?” he asked, and waited for his phone to translate.
Misha’s brow furrowed as he listened. His eyes darted to JT’s face and away. “Yeah,” he said.
“Okay,” JT said. He was cool; he could play it cool. “Awesome. Well.”
Misha glanced at him again. His shoulders drew toward his ears.
What came next? JT had thought about Misha moving in with him in broad strokes and hadn’t considered the details of daily life. They couldn’t spend all day cooking and eating. JT bought himself some time to think by making a big production out of closing the translation app and plugging his phone into the charger on the island. When no bright ideas immediately occurred to him, he fell back on logistics. Misha would need a toothbrush, and more clothes, and a place to sleep. JT could give him a tour of the house and show him where he could hang out and use the computer. That would eat up at least half an hour, and probably by then some other activity would have presented itself. If all else failed, they could go fish.
“Come on,” JT said, and beckoned Misha to follow.
Seven
Misha didn’t know what JT had in mind as they left the kitchen, and JT didn’t bother to explain and even left his phone behind so there was no hope of them communicating about it. JT’s intentions became clear pretty quickly, though, when he led Misha into the same bedroom at the end of the hall that they had gone into before, where Misha had taken a shower. He hadn’t paid much attention to the bedroom itself at the time, too overwhelmed by everything else that was going on and the sheer novelty of being inside a house after so long in the woods, but as JT began opening the curtains and blinds, he took a few moments to look around.
A big bay window on one wall overlooked the back yard and the lake, and an armchair was positioned there to take in the view. A large bed was made up with white linens and liberally stacked with fluffy pillows. A blue rag rug covered most of the wood floor, offering a soft layer underfoot. There was no clutter in the room, no personal effects of any sort. Even the art hanging on the walls seemed impersonal: landscape shots, a muted abstract painting in shades of blue that matched the rug. This room didn’t belong to anyone.
JT meant for it to belong to Misha, Misha realized as JT turned down the covers on the bed and opened the drawer of the bedside table to show Misha there was nothing inside. The dresser drawers were empty, too, but a closet in the bathroom held clean folded towels, and a drawer in the sink cabinet was filled with individually packaged toothbrushes, unopened tubes of toothpaste, deodorant, hair gel, hand lotion—all the toiletries one could ever want. Misha could use a new toothbrush every day for the next month if he felt like it.
Maybe his expression indicated his thoughts about this show of excess, because JT’s expression turned a little sheepish and he shrugged and said something that Misha assumed was meant to explain the overabundance of miniature toiletries. Misha wasn’t here to judge. If JT thought he needed to have that many toothbrushes on hand, that was his business.
JT led him back into the bedroom and pointed at the armchair until Misha finally got the idea and sat. Then JT nodded and held up one finger to tell Misha to wait a minute. Misha obediently sat in the chair and gazed out the window as JT left the room. He heard JT’s footsteps on the stairs and the faint creaking of the floor overhead as JT walked around upstairs. Outside, a heavy bank of clouds hung low over the lake. Misha could see a sailboat in the distance, its white sail billowing as it caught the breeze.
A few minutes later, JT returned with his arms full of clothes. He dumped everything on the bed and talked at length as he pointed at the dresser and the closet. Misha could pick out a few words here and there—more than he would have expected—but not enough to give him any clear idea of what JT was trying to convey. Surely JT knew that Misha couldn’t understand him, but maybe he simply loved the sound of his own voice.
“For me?” Misha asked, interrupting the flow of too-rapid chatter. The clothes were obviously for him, but he wanted to be sure.
JT grinned at him. “Yeah,” he said, and held up a T-shirt from the top of the stack. It had a logo on it, the silhouette of a hockey player over a maple leaf and an acronym Misha didn’t recognize. A local hockey league, maybe, because it wasn’t the logo for the Toronto team. Misha watched JT’s smile shift as he glanced at the logo, softening slightly. Maybe a childhood league, then.
Working together, he and JT put away the clothes: T-shirts and sweatpants, a hooded sweatshirt, socks, some underwear. All of it was casual, loose-fitting clothing that could accommodate the differences in JT's and Misha’s body types. It wasn’t a huge wardrobe, but Misha didn’t mind wearing the same thing a few days in a row, especially as he planned to still spend at least part of the day in the woods wearing nothing but his bear skin. Where else would he be going? Who was going to see him? He had nobody to impress aside from JT, and JT had already seen him in much worse condition than wearing a pair of saggy old sweatpants.
“Okay,” JT said, when they were done. He wiped his hands on his pants as if they had somehow gotten dirty. Then he smiled at Misha and gestured to the door.