First Flight (14 page)

“Cheating? Like at a game—no, this is the other cheating. Where you say you’re going to the library, but you go on a date with someone who is not your boyfriend or girlfriend.” Chris watched Jesse, then took his place when the young man went to dry his hands. “Are we setting the table now?”

“Right,” Jesse said, nodding as he opened the cabinet where the plates and bowls lived. “It’s nice to surprise your parents every once in a while.”

“I still don’t understand that. Once you’ve chosen someone and showed them you’re the right one and they show you that they’re right, too, then don’t you stop thinking about others like that?” Chris dried his own hands, then took the plates that Jesse held out.

“Not really, not for humans. But there’s looking at someone and thinking, ‘huh, they’re cute’, and then there’s going over to that person and saying ‘hey, you’re cute, kiss me’,” Jesse said, taking down some bowls and following Chris out to the dining room. “I’m your boyfriend, but that guy who delivers the magazines at the store, mm.”

“But you’re my boyfriend, so you will not kiss him?” He set the plates out in their usual places.

“I’m your boyfriend, I love you, and there’s the little fact that he’s completely straight and married besides,” Jesse said, putting the bowls on the table. “And after Kevin’s freak-out over you and me being
friends
, I am not interested in doing anything like that for real. I’ve never been interested in it, actually.”

“I didn’t think you would.” Chris returned to the kitchen and picked out silverware. He hadn’t even considered the possibility, either. The idea was as foreign to him as shoes had been.

“Good.” Jesse crossed the kitchen and hooked a finger through one of Chris’s belt loops, turning him away from the silverware drawer. “Hey.” His mouth was dry as the other young man looked up at him, Chris’s gaze as direct and serious as it had been the first day they’d met.

“What?”

“I couldn’t. Ever. To do that—I’ve been a jerk before, but to lie to you, like that….” He shook his head, his free hand rising and falling in a futile attempt to grasp the right words.

“I know,” Chris said, the words backed by the quiet strength of his little voice. It had been unerring in its guidance, aside from the misadventure with Desmond’s leftovers.

Jesse rested his forehead against Chris’s, a complicated mess of emotion keeping him silent for a moment. “God, it’s a little scary how much you trust me,” he said at last.

Certainty turned to dismay in the space between heartbeats. “I scare you?”

“No, not
you
, just….” Jesse brushed a kiss across Chris’s mouth, then moved back a little so they could actually see one another. “It’s a good kind of scary. Don’t worry about it, okay?”

“You’re sure?” Chris looked at Jesse, but he seemed to be telling the truth.

“Absolutely. Kevin is bad-scary, this isn’t.” He kissed the corner of Chris’s mouth, then let him go entirely. “Let’s finish setting the table.”

“All right.”

Chapter Eighteen

C
HRIS
was singing to himself as he walked home, a little song he’d made up about Jesse being as good as a liverwurst-and-egg sandwich, when he noticed a car creeping along beside him. It stopped when he stopped; it moved when he began walking again. He stopped once more and bent over, peering through the open window.

“Hi, Christopher,” Kevin said.

“Oh, it’s you.” Chris straightened up and started walking.

“Come on, Chris, get in! I’ll take you where you’re going!”

He stood still and leaned down, trying to stay polite. “No thank you.”

“Jesse told me to come get you,” Kevin said.

“Jesse doesn’t want to talk to you,” Chris said and started walking again. The feeling that Kevin was somehow
wrong
, sort of like his brother Fell-from-tree, grew stronger.

Kevin stepped on the gas and wrenched the wheel sideways, running his car up onto the sidewalk in front of the other man. He got out and sprinted around the front of his car, hands out in front of him. “You’re coming with me,” he said.

Startled, Chris froze and could do nothing but watch him approach. Anger and fear twisted around one another, filled his head and sent cold prickles down his back. This was
wrong
, this was
dangerous
, this was a
threat—

Kevin threw up his hands as a bright flash of light enveloped Chris. There was a metallic clinking and a strange squawk, but the only thing he could see when he lowered his arms was a set of keys and some last bits of ash lying on the sidewalk.

Sings-like-water made a tight circle, then let himself fall out of the sky, toward the man’s head. Grim satisfaction settled in his chest as his claws found purchase in the vulnerable skin, as his heavy bill dove into the hair below and the man cried out. A blow to his side knocked him awry and he jumped away, laboring into the air to circle again.

Kevin ran a hand through his hair and stared when it came back bloody. Kevin looked up, trying to find the bird that was attacking—

So soft, so fragile, this uncovered pale skin. Sings-like-water dug his claws into the rubbery lips, flapping to keep his balance, and darted his head toward the thin skin covering gleaming tasty eyes. He ignored the sounds coming up from under his feet, though they were loud and irritating; all that mattered was driving this man
away.

Kevin flailed at the bird, and when he managed to shove it off of his face, he turned and ran for his car. He left smears of blood on the door as he gained the safety of the driver’s seat.

Frustration mingled with relief as Sings-like-water watched the door slam shut. Yes, the man was closer to going
away
than he had been; however, he was also protected. He made another tight circle, watching, watching. The car started and bumped back into the street, which was good.
Away
was good. The small glimmer of metal on the dull expanse of concrete caught his eye again and he dropped down to land beside it.

His keys! Kevin had not picked them up. He sidled over and closed his foot on them, then hopped, flapped, hopped again and climbed skyward. Sings-like-water aligned himself with sun and wind, taking a moment to savor the sweet joy of flight. The weight of the keys reminded him that he needed to find his… mate? No, they weren’t yet mates. He needed to find his chosen one, his Jesse, who was at the store. The store was…that way.

“
H
ELLO
, raven!”

Sings-like-water peered over the edge of the roof, surprised to see the woman with the pink and brown hair again. She waved, then disappeared under the overhang. He looked around again, but the parking lot was empty of people. He stepped off the metal flashing and fluttered to the asphalt, pausing there to pick the keys up in his beak before hopping toward the big glass doors.

No one noticed him, as he hopped through the doors and into the area where the shopping carts were kept, because there was no one there. He walked up to the second set of doors, which opened for him, and then into the store proper. Oh, the smells! The air was a mélange of scents, most of them enticing. Meat and bread and fish and all kinds of other delicious things—Jesse. He had to find Jesse. Jesse first, and then food.

He had forgotten what it was like to be smaller, to be unable to see from where he stood. There was an advantage to being a bird, though, and he simply flapped up to perch on the top of the number-light of the nearest checkstand.

“Birdy!” A little boy, sitting in a cart, pointed at the big black bird.

His mother, busy with the latest issue of
People
, snapped her gum and said, “Uh-huh.”

“Look, Mama, birdy!” He bounced in his seat and pointed. “Birdy!”

“It’s just a balloon,” she said, putting the magazine back and pushing the cart toward the deli.

He waved. “Bye-bye, birdy! Bye-bye!”

He’d never had so many people speak to him before, at least not as a bird. It was strange, unsettling, but they didn’t seem dangerous. Sings-like-water looked along the row of cash registers, seeking a familiar shape among the straight lines of man-made things. There! There he was,
Jesse
, only a half-dozen counters away.

“Oh my goodness!” Mr. Bunting blinked and tipped his head toward Jesse. “Is that a friend of yours?”

Jesse, who’d had a vague impression of something large and dark passing by, looked up from scanning soup. “I’m sorry, what?”

“There’s a raven behind you,” Bunting said, pointing beyond the young man. “I wonder how it got in here.”

“Cr-criminy!” Jesse turned and looked at the bird, who was indeed perched on the wall separating him from the line for checkstand eight. “I don’t know. I’m sure he won’t hurt anyone, though. Um,” he said, then frowned as he noticed the keys. He held out his hand, nodding as they fell into his palm. “And yes, I know him. As soon as I’m finished helping you, Mr. Bunting, I’ll take care of him.”

“Such a handsome bird,” Bunting said, admiring the glossy shine of his feathers under the lights. “Don’t hurt him.”

“I won’t!” Jesse returned his attention to the man’s groceries. “No, I’ll be very careful with him.”

It was boring, watching Jesse move things from one side to the other. There was food, though, a thick slab of dark red
meat
that went into a bag; a long loaf of bread that was set aside. He knew better than to try to eat things that weren’t his and took the opportunity to preen instead.

“All right, here’s your receipt, Mr. Bunting. Have a good afternoon.”

“Thank you, Jesse. Good luck with your friend, there.” He smiled at the young man and the bird, then took his groceries and left.

“Thanks.” Jesse turned off his light, set out the
Lane Closed
sign, and locked his register before he held out his hands to the bird. “Um, hey. You’re Sings-like-water, right?”

Sings-like-water stepped up onto Jesse’s outstretched arm and nodded, then said, “Yes.”

“Oh, thank God. What happened?”

“Don’t know.” He wished he did, but it was like before: there was light and dark and he simply didn’t know. One moment he’d been a human, the next….
“Bad man.”

“Kevin? Okay. I’ll have to take you home, since you’re not a service animal.” He reached into his pocket and touched the keys Chris had brought him. “Those were your keys, right?”

“Yes.” He crept the rest of the way up to perch on Jesse’s shoulder, doing his best to straighten and order the hair over Jesse’s ear. It didn’t work very well, but that was all right.

“Let’s go find Tanner.”

“So. This bird is yours, he somehow got out of the house, and you have to take him home?” Tanner’s brows were attempting to hide in his hairline.

“That’s the shortest version of it, yeah,” Jesse said. “Look, it’ll take me fifteen minutes, tops. I’ll stay an extra fifteen minutes, okay? I just need to run home. I’ll be
right
back.”

“Please,” Sings-like-water said, turning his head to look at Tanner.

“Uh….” Tanner glanced at the raven. “Okay, fine. But however long you’re gone, you have to stay later. No more than twenty minutes. Make it snappy.”

“Yeah, I swear,” Jesse said, nodding at him. “Thanks. I’ll be back as soon as possible.”

“
O
KAY
, so, there’s some water there, and a snack for you, and, um, things are set in the bathroom.” Jesse shook his head. “Will you be okay, by yourself?”

“Yes,” Sings-like-water said, cocking his head and looking up at Jesse.

“All right. I’ll be home a little after five, okay? I have no idea what we’re going to tell Mom and Dad.” He sighed and ran his hand over the sleek feathers of Sings-like-water’s head. “I’ll see you in a little while, okay? Be good. Don’t set the house on fire.”

“Okay,” Sings-like-water said, nodding at him.

“Right.” Jesse waved and left.

A few hours later, he opened the door into the house from the garage. “Chris—Uh, Sings-like-water? I’m home!” Jesse headed into the kitchen and picked up the dishes left from earlier. He looked toward the archway that led into the hall, surprised for a second at the sight of the large black bird that glided through it. “Hey,” he said as Sings-like-water landed on his shoulder. “How was your afternoon?”

“Okay,” he said, running his beak through Jesse’s hair. “You?”

“Eh, it was a typical Tuesday,” Jesse said, setting the plates in the sink. “I need to go for a drive, and I was thinking about going out toward the tree. Do you want to go?”

He bounced a little at the idea of getting out of the house. “Yes.”

“I bet you’d rather fly than ride with me, huh?” Jesse smiled and touched him. “Which I can understand completely. Let me just call Mom and then we can get out of here.”

“Okay.”

“I’
VE
been trying to figure out what we’re going to tell Mom and Dad,” Jesse said, looking up through the branches at Sings-like-water. “I’m thinking that I’ll tell them
your
parents want to spend time with you, so you’ve gone back home for a few days, until, I don’t know, until you’re back to normal.”

Sings-like-water fluttered down to a lower branch, leaning out and eyeing him. “Stay here?”

“You can if you want,” Jesse said, petulant worry lancing through him. He knew it was kind of silly, to be upset about the whole thing. It wasn’t as if Chris couldn’t survive perfectly well on his own, or that he would forget about Jesse, but…. “Visit your family, enjoy your wings again. I’ll miss you, but it’s up to you.”

Stay? Without Jesse? He could, but it seemed wrong. No, he didn’t want to; he
wouldn’t
. “Home!” Sings-like-water dropped down beside Jesse’s head, then stepped up onto his shoulder. He sank his claws into the fabric of Jesse’s jacket and pinched as much of his hair in his bill as he could.

“Okay, okay,” Jesse said, tilting his head to ease the tension on his hair. “You don’t have to stay here. It was just an idea.” The thought that Sings-like-water would choose him over flying around all day amazed him. “Hey, I just realized that if I leave the window open for you, you can go out whenever you want to.”