Michael nearly gagged on his coffee, he was laughing so hard.
“Um…hi,” said a guy about his age, sort of an earnest, nervous-looking kid. “Oh, my gosh! I love that book,” he said, pointing to
Clicking Beat on the Brink of Nada
. “Have you read it yet?” The boy had preternaturally dark hair and faded green eyes. He was pretty and thin, and he seemed nice.
“No,” said Tristan. “I just—”
“Oh, you won't believe it. He is such a fabulous writer! It's my book for when I'm feeling all emo, you know?” He put his hands in front of his mouth and squealed, “Oh, you have
Chemistr
y
! I've been dying to read that, another emo read, but what can I say?”
“Well, I just—” said Tristan. The boy had a way of using his earnest eyes to advantage that made Tristan want to lean in.
“Love doesn't always have to be tragic, does it? Do you think so? I mean, they always make it seem like love has to end in a suicide pact or something, but I think just having a healthy, normal relationship is possible, don't you?” He sighed.
“Well, healthy is good, of course,” began Tristan when his phone beeped, signaling another text message. He glared at Michael, but looked at it anyway.
OMG! U never get 2 talk again
, it read.
He texted,
ROFL F U
in all caps and returned his attention to the boy in question. “So, do you like to do anything besides reading?” he asked.
“Oh, sure! I'm in a club at school that cosplays Harry Potter. I'm Snape.” He tried to look suitably evil and failed.
Tristan pasted a smile on his face. Someone from the Harry Potter wannabe costume club. This was not good. This was so very, very not good. “What school?” he asked, dreading the answer.
The boy leaned forward. “As soon as I tell you, you'll think I'm some spoiled rich kid.” He pouted. He shrugged and looked as though Tristan was pressuring him for an answer, even though he hadn't said a word. “Oh, all right, I go to Villa Park High.” He grinned. Tristan knew Villa Park High—very rich kids, very permissive parents.
Oh, heaven and all the saints preserve us
. “So that would make you, uh, how old?” asked Tristan.
“How old do you think? People always tell me I look twenty-two.”
“Somebody's completely deluded,” muttered Tristan. “I'm nineteen, and I thought you were about my age.”
“Ha-ha, I'm sixteen,” said the boy, and something inside Tristan went
twitch
.
“Um,” he said, trying to think fast on his feet. “Look, I don't want to be rude, but I'm waiting for someone, and they won't like it if I'm not alone. You know?”
“Oh,” said the boy, now clearly disappointed. “I see, maybe next time, then?”
“Sure,” said Tristan, watching him walk away.
His cell phone beeped that he had a text, and he read it.
Try 'impedimenta!' next time
.
?!
he typed.
R U doing catch and release?
came the next text.
R U going to STOP?
he texted back.
Michael shook his head and mouthed, “Probably not.” Tristan was getting hungry, his stomach not quite used to eating only a rice crispy treat for lunch. He gathered all his hair and held it off his neck for a minute, hoping the cool air would feel good. He was burning up, probably with shame if he thought about it too long, so he wasn't going to.
Tristan chanced a look a Michael at that moment and found those blue eyes watching him. They held a hint of something troubled, and he read concern there and something else. Something obscure that made him feel even warmer than he had before he'd picked his hair up. Tristan dropped it and smoothed it behind his ears, a gesture he knew was dorky, and found he didn't know what to do with his hands. He smoothed them over the pages of his book and worried his tongue bead a little more.
He glanced up to find Michael's mesmerizing eyes on him again and had a very strange thought. It was such a strange thought that it took some time to percolate through all the layers of horror and disbelief that underlay it until it reached Tristan's brain. He looked up again to find the blue eyes still watching, something eerie, something hot and vaguely predatory radiating from them. Seeing his hungry gaze, Tristan did something crazy. Something he had seen Viper do a hundred times when she was bored and she wanted to distract him from whatever he was doing. He raked the front part of his long hair up off his face with one hand, following the curve of his head down until it rested on the nape of his neck. He looked at Officer Helmet from under his lashes, and then he licked his lips.
Pow
. Michael's coffee went right over the side of the table and broke open on the ground with a splat. Tristan stared, dumbfounded, as the man blushed deeply and mopped up the floor with about a hundred of those recycled, brown paper napkins. Michael murmured some self-deprecating comments and sheepishly went back to the counter to refuel. Tristan went back to his books, steadfastly refusing to look up even when he was certain Michael was looking at him. He had no idea what to do with his newfound knowledge, or even if he'd read Michael's awkward behavior right.
Had he read it righ
t
? Well…hell. No way,
no way
was Officer Helmet hitting on him.
Tristan's cell phone beeped.
Why aren't u laughing?
it read.
Why do you call me Sparky?
he sent back. It seemed a long, long time before he got an answer. He even put his phone down, thinking Michael wasn't going to reply.
Tristan's phone beeped at last, and he flipped it open to read,
Not telling you
.
Well, shit.
Michael got up and walked to Tristan's table, taking his former seat. “Well? What's new?” he asked.
“C over Lambda,” sighed Tristan. “Are you a stalker, or what?”
“What,” Michael replied, shaking his head. “I'm just here to drop off my mom's car keys.”
“You have a
mothe
r
?” Tristan asked incredulously.
Michael just looked at him. “Very funny.”
“I, um,” Tristan said. “I have to go.” He picked up his pile of books, including the one Michael was still looking at, and walked away.
“Hey, you forgot your skateboard,” said Michael, holding it up.
Tristan flamed up and returned for it, finding he had a much harder time carrying his load back than he did bringing it to the café in the first place. He wondered if that was because of the heady anticipation he'd felt on engineering the plan, and the sick, twisted way he felt now, watching it go so catastrophically awry. He felt Michael following him, but Tristan refused to turn and acknowledge him.
Officer Helmet was not part of the plan. The plan was about strangers, about someone with whom he could have hot, rabid man-sex. Not someone he knew. Not someone he saw every weekend stalking him at the skate park, trying to give him a ticket. Not someone who made a crusade of trying to protect his head.
If that's even what's going on here
, he thought.
Tristan went to the gay lit section and replaced the novels he'd taken down, a little OCD kicking in as he nervously placed them in alphabetical order by author and then straightened the spines for good measure. He returned the other books, all the while aware of Michael following him at a discreet distance. At last he was ready to bag his plan—
the plan
—for the day, hoping to escape, if not with his dignity, at least with his life.
He reached the enclosed foyer entrance where Borders kept the bargain books, and he thought he was home free until he heard a voice behind him say, “Not so fast, Sparky, I don't see a helmet.”
“I'm just going to walk it home, Officer, I promise,” he prevaricated, turning to find the man standing so close, Tristan's nose bumped his chest. “Ow.”
“I tell you what, I'm sorry I blew your little fishing expedition. Are you hungry? I'm going to eat at Lucille's across the parking lot, and if you want, you can join me. Then I can run you home.” He raised his eyebrows in a question. “It beats getting a ticket, which you surely would. Because I can
make
that happen.”
Tristan's mouth flew open, then closed, then opened again. “That's extortion…that's a total misuse of your authority. You ought to be ashamed.”
“It's just barbecue at Lucille's. Not the movie
Deliverance
, which if you ask me, it could have been. You're lucky I stepped in; you could have ended up getting really hurt, or worse.” He looked grim. “I'm hungry; are you coming?”
“Uh,” said Tristan, whose own stomach had been rumbling for more than an hour. As soon as he hit the parking lot, he could smell the smokers going, the rich mesquite barbecue smell something that teased and taunted him every time he came to this Borders anyway, so he just said, “Well, okay. I'm hungry, and I love that place.”
It didn't take them long to walk across the parking lot and into the loud, smoky restaurant. They were seated immediately because it was between the lunch and dinner rush. Tristan ordered a berry lemonade, and Michael, a Corona.
“You're drinking?” asked Tristan, incredulous.
“It
is
my day off,” replied Michael, amused. “The sandwiches are huge. You want to split a tri-tip sandwich and get some onion straws?”
“Uh, yeah,” said Tristan. Tri-tip was his favorite. “Sure.” He didn't know where to put his feet or his hands or his eyes. A sense of the unreal began to wash over him in waves. “If anyone I know sees me here eating lunch with you, my life is over.”
“Because I'm a cop,” said Michael.
“Well…yeah,” said Tristan stupidly.
“Yet you were looking to pick up some gay guy for an afternoon of what?”
“What? What do you think,
wha
t
? Not that it's any of your business, but yes, that was
the plan
,” said Tristan.
“What about Viper, the goth chick? She's a doll.” Michael grimaced. “Well, more like a voodoo doll, but she'll be cute when she's over the whole blood sport thing.” Michael shot him a searching glance. “You don't really want to change your whole life on a whim, Sparky, and tricking with strangers like that? Can get you dead. It's fun chasing the next rush, but…”