“Fuck me Fuck fuck me fuck me fuck me. Fuck me. Brad! Fuck me!”
He had gotten up to write in his journal, string together lines over lines that would twine into a song. Maybe Nehru had even come into the kitchen to let them be alone. They loved him, so he wasn’t jealous. He knew them both. He’d known them both. He would know them again. He loved both of them, so he wasn’t troubled. And seeing them, he could see what he never saw when he was with them. As Cody had climbed into the bed, half asleep, Brad had murmured, “If we fuck, we fuck.” And now they were.
“Fuucccck Yes! Yes! Oh, God!”
Much like only a few nights ago when Cody had brought them together, he watched with desire the length of Brad’s legs with the hair all down them, his hairy ass round and firm, flexing and unflexing as he pressed himself into Cody. He watched Cody’s ivory thighs wrapped about Brad’s waist, his white hands pressed like claws to his shoulders, running down his long back,. Or he would watch Brad shuttling up and down as he held Cody under him tight, and the bed creaked with fury. He would watch each of his loves as he could not watch them when they were loving him.
Now he heard Cody pleading, his voice high like it never was in the rest of his life, crying, “I love how you fuck me. Come inside of me. Come inside of me. Come in me.”
He would make the second pot of coffee soon enough. Soon enough Brad would say, “Come back to bed.”
As much as he wanted sex, he wanted the solitude of writing. In the afterglow of sex not his own he sat at the table and half drowsed, half meditated over the morning past. He barely heard the tapping of feet, the arms around him, the smell that was mint and wheat bread, pot and cigarettes, that was Cody behind his chair, arms pressing his cheek to the back of Nehru’s head, wrapping his arms around him.
“Come to bed,” he said, insistently. “Come to bed.”
He almost sang it. He could feel Cody’s bare arms, knew he was naked.
Brad drew him under the blankets and they all slept. In the late day, Nehru woke to look at Cody’s snoring back, but turned to feel Brad, half dozing, eyes half closed, his fingers pressing against him.
Halfway through their drive home, the thick white snow revealed sunlight and it looked as if things might clear off after all.
“Wow,” Chris said, “Russell’s got a lot of people parked in front of his house.”
“He’s got a big family,” Cameron noted, and then she said: “What? Dad’s home.”
His car was in the driveway, and he was shoveling a path through the snow.
Chris stopped the car and Cameron jumped out and ran toward her father.
“Cam!” Bill put the blower down.
“Daddy!”
She hugged him so hard she almost dragged him to the ground.
“Who’s with you?”
Cameron waved for Chris to come out of the car, and Chris parked on Breckinridge, then came toward them.
“Dad, this is Chris Knapp. He and Russell and Linh and Freestar have been taking care of me.”
“Good to meet you, Mr. Dwyer.”
Chris offered his hand. He was bigger than Bill, and in some ways even seemed older.
“Good to meet you, Chris.”
“I was staying with Linh,” Cameron said. “Mrs. Lewis invited me to stay with her.”
“What about your mom and David and Aunt Lee?”
“That’s not my home,” Cameron said.
“No,” Bill said. “No it isn’t. This is your home.”
“Is that why you came back?” Cameron asked.
“Yes. Yes it is. Why don’t you and Chris go in there and make us some cocoa, and I’ll join you in a minute.”
“I can’t believe you’re here. I can’t believe you’re here.”
“It’s just us, Russell,” Jimmy said.
“It’s not just you,” Russell imitated his cousin. “You all are my family. And…” he thought for a second before saying it, “You brought Flipper.”
There was a lot he wanted to say. He had hugged Flipper as long as he could when they’d all come to the door, and he wanted to smell that cologne that was always in his sweaters and behind his ears. He felt relief when Flip was at the door, like he could fall into the older boy’s arms and cry, and he didn’t know he wanted to cry until just then.
While they sat in the den of the house on 1735 Breckinridge, Macy shook her head watching the news.
“My God,” she murmured.
The blizzard was burying Chicago and she said, “I know I just called them, but I want to call Mom and Dad again.”
“They’re fine,” Jimmy assured her. “And as long as they stay inside they’ll keep on being fine.”
“This is the first Christmas I haven’t been with my family,” Macy said, and when Jimmy looked at her, she shrugged and said, “You know what I mean.”
“Well, it’s definitely the first Christmas I’ve been without my family,” Flipper said, “so thanks guys for letting me be with yours.”
“Flip Sanders,” Macy said, clapping him on the back, “you are welcome to our terrible family anytime.”
“Hey!” Patti said.
Jimmy left Macy and Flipper to watch TV while he joined Russell, who had returned from choir practice a few moments ago and was waiting to talk. Like any two people who are ready to talk and have much to discuss, and much of that deep down stuff, neither of them said anything right away. Russell went and got a cup of coffee his grandmother Sara had made, and Jimmy went in to get cocoa. They were waylaid by John, Frank and Sara stopping Jimmy and measuring him against Patti.
“I never knew they looked so alike.” Frank said. “You really are my sister’s grandkid.”
“That’s what they’ve been saying for the last twenty two years,” Jimmy joked.
As he and Russell walked out of the kitchen they could both hear Sara saying, “So how does it feel, this whole Thom having another son, thing?”
“Actually,” Jimmy demanded, taking a cigarette from behind his ear, but handing it to Russell, “How does it feel?”
“It feels like…. Well, it feels a lot more complicated that you’re going to believe.”
“No, I get it. You’ve been an only kid. I mean, now, I’ve got two brothers and if I woke up and there was a third all of a sudden…”
“It’s not even that,” Russell said.
“Uh, okay.”
“Do you remember just a few weeks ago,” Russell lowered his voice and looked out of the window as if the window was the most important thing, “when I told you about Jason?”
“Yeah.”
“And you said you knew he wasn’t the thing that was important. That there was someone else who was important to me?”
“Yes, cousin. Yes, I do remember that.”
“Well, the important person was Cody.”
“Cody,” Jimmy murmured then, “Cody. Thom’s son, Cody?”
“Yeah….” Russell murmured.
“Shit.” Jimmy shook his head and took an extra long drag of his cigarette.
“Oh, yeah. Shit indeed,” Russell said.
They smoked in silence for a time, and then Jimmy spoke.
“Well, you know,” Jimmy said, “it’s a good thing you never did anything with him.”
When Russell didn’t reply, Jimmy looked at his cousin.
“What?”
“Don’t make me say it,” Russell said.
“You all—”
“I had sex with him,” Russell whispered. “We had sex right before Dad found out—not found out we had sex. Found out we were—”
“Brothers.”
“Yeah,” Russell said, breathless.
“Oh, my God,” Jimmy said.
Then he said, “Russell, I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not,” Russell said. “And I told him that. I’m not sorry. In fact, I wish I’d never found out. The only thing I’m sorry about is that it can’t happen again.”
