Lonely Hearts (24 page)

The thought of swallowing all this crap made Elijah nuts. “So what
do
I say if a reporter jumps me? ‘No comment'?”

“We'll work up an official statement. I can tell you now, though, it's going to be a terse recitation of the facts. Basically you redirect their attention. Your father wanted to kill you for being yourself. They can spin all they want, but no court in the world will let him off. I doubt there will be a trial. This will play out, and he'll do a plea. And then he's done and gone from your life.”

Elijah wanted this over so much he ached. He hugged himself and sank into his chair. It was plush and expensive, and it reminded him of the
other
issue eating at him. “Is this going to be expensive, coming to you for help? I have a lot of the fund left, obviously, but—”

“This is free, hon. Bob's taking it on pro bono. Some of it is because the firm doesn't like the optics of Aaron's dad's involvement in the campus security's failure to stop the shooter. But honestly a lot of it is Bob wants to help make sure your dad doesn't get away with it. His daughter is in high school, and she's lesbian. This hits home.”

Elijah didn't know what to say, so he went with, “Okay,” and “Thanks.”

Walter winked and stood, ready to show him out of the building.

They passed Aaron's dad's office on the way. His door was open, and he sat at his desk, arguing intently into a telephone.

That's the guy who threw Aaron out.

Aaron never talked about his dad if he could help it, and when he did, he tended to make his jaw so tight you could barely understand him. It had to be weird, having such a horrible history between them and trying to move past it.

Elijah wondered how pathetic it made him that after everything they'd done to him, even though he wouldn't take them back for a mountain of apologies and ten billion dollars, sometimes Elijah was sad he'd never see his parents again. Not so much them, but knowing he would never have family again. There wouldn't ever be another awkward holiday meal. There would be nothing. As if they were dead and gone, like Mark. All because they couldn't handle who Elijah wanted to fuck.

Halfway to the White House, he started to feel weird. He tried to push it down, but it wouldn't go, and in the end he gave up. He drove the Tesla straight to Pastor and Liz's house. She took one look at him through the screen door, melted and pulled him into her arms. “Oh, sweetheart. Come inside and let me wrap you in a blanket.”

Elijah did.

Chapter Twenty

The Monday before choir tryouts, Baz ran into his first reporter. It was one news van at the edge of campus on the way to the house, but it was a tabloid, and they had a video camera as well as a still. They peppered Baz with questions about his uncle and his mom. He was walking with Giles and Mina, and they asked Giles if he was Baz's boyfriend. Baz hustled his friends toward the house, speed-dialing Stephan, but before they got out of earshot, it came.

“Sebastian, in 2006 you were brutally attacked in a politically motivated bashing. Do you expect your uncle will make LGBT rights a headline during his tenure as Attorney General? Do you resent that he hasn't done enough as Senator, and do you expect your mother will do more? How much does your assault affect their policy? Would you categorize it as a significant event for either of them, or are they the reason you don't address it in public?”

Mina tripped, and Giles swore under his breath and started moving Mina faster, though he shook while he did it. Baz unlocked the door and whisked them into the house, locking the door behind them, thanking whatever god listening there were no additional reporters on the lawn of the White House.

Yet.

Within an hour Stephan had security talking Baz's housemates through
So You're Being Stalked by Reporters 101
, and while that went down, Baz allowed himself a moment of hating this, wishing he were somebody else. He indulged in a few rolls of nausea as his long-term memory reminded him how exquisitely awful this could get.

Then he called Elijah. “Babe, where are you right now?”

“Walking through the skywalks by the chapel. Why? What's wrong?”

“Reporters have arrived.”

“
Shit.
For you or me?”

“Me, but they're hot to find my boyfriend. I'm sending a car to pick you up, and I'll text you the driver's number so you can tell him when you're coming outside. Put the number in your contacts and keep it close. I want you calling it every time you leave school grounds or the house. Tell Lejla it's the same for her. And Lewis.” Baz ran a hand through his hair. “Security is here now, and I'm assuming a staffer is already on the way to give everyone in the White House media training. Probably Giselle. I'm calling Stephan next to see if Mom has any direct instructions.”

There was a pause. “You're not calling
her
? Or your dad?”

Baz hesitated too. “Um…no, I'll never get through to her personally if things are blowing up this much, and God only knows what Dad's up to. Why?”

“I'd figure going to DEFCON 4 would merit the personal touch.”

Baz wanted to point out this was more a level 2, maybe 3, but an edge in Elijah's voice told him to hold this observation back. Threat level wasn't his point. The boy without parents was saying,
Um, where the fuck are your parents?

It made the conversation with Damien and Marius at the noodle bar echo more loudly in his head. He did his best to shove it off. “Yeah. Well, that's not the Acker or Barnett way.”

“Huh. Okay. Well, it's only another half hour until Lejla is off work, and then I'll call for a ride for us both.”

“Be safe.” Baz wished Elijah could come now, but he really did need to wait for Lejla. God, this crap was a pain in the ass.

“Baz?”

“Yeah, baby?”

“I want you to hear what I said.”

Baz opened his mouth to say he'd heard, then realized he hadn't. “Tell me again.”

“I will be there. For you. And if you don't phone me every time you bump your ass on DEFCON's second cousin, I will be very pissed off.”

The cold, hard knot in Baz's chest warmed and unfurled. “Message received.”

The reporters lingering on the fringes of his existence weren't horribly disruptive to Baz, but he could tell they bothered his housemates a lot. Once Mina was late for class because she couldn't get through the crush. Aaron got jumped in line at the noodle bar. Everyone had to call the security team before they so much as walked out with a bag of garbage. Lejla and Elijah switched from smoking on the patio to climbing onto the fire escape in Baz and Elijah's bedroom, which Elijah complained was a real pain in the ass. Lejla used it as an excuse to curtail her cigarette use earlier than planned, but Elijah was stress-smoking. When people couldn't find him, they usually discovered him leaning against the iron rail, huddled in the open-topped canvas tarp structure Brian had rigged for him in an attempt at maintaining privacy.

They couldn't go out easily either. Lejla was a confirmed homebody in every available moment, and Brian also was content to hole up in the White House whether or not there were reporters on the lawn, but Jilly, Mina, Aaron, Giles and Elijah were clearly feeling the strain. Baz didn't like it, but he didn't know what to do about it.

One night he was sitting with Aaron and Giles at the kitchen table going over an Ambassador routine when the distinct sound of a bass beat filtered from somewhere in the house. They frowned at each other as they tried to figure out what was going on.

Giles jerked his head at the door to the kitchen. “It's not coming from Lejla's room. She doesn't have a stereo. But it's not the living room either.” On their way to investigate, they ran into Sid and Brian coming in from the other direction, equally puzzled expressions on their faces. Standing together in the living room, however, it was clear where the sound was coming from: the ballroom.

The White House had been the centerpiece of a rather splashy country estate one hundred and thirty years ago, and as the lady of the house had fancied herself a high-society hostess, she'd had a small but not insignificantly sized ballroom built behind what was now the garage and Jilly and Mina's apartment. A set of narrow stairs led from there into the kitchen on one side and the ballroom on the other, but there were also a set of now-somewhat-rustic French doors leading from the far corner of the living room into the party area. A sound system had been installed in the west wall, and auditory evidence made it clear it was currently in use. Playing, Baz noted as they came closer, RuPaul. At full volume.

“What's going on?” Aaron shouted over the beat.

Baz opened the doors. The bass throbbed in his chest as he peered into the murky semidarkness of the room. The lights near the stage were on, but that was it. Elijah and the girls danced with abandon beneath the spotlight. When Elijah saw Baz, he grinned and stumbled over, laughing as he tripped on the air.

Elijah reeked of alcohol, weed and cigarettes, and the rakish smile told Baz a full Xanax had been consumed as well. “Hey, sexy. Want to dance?”

Mina cast an apologetic glance at Baz. “He stumbled up our stairs drunk, high and teetering on the edge of a panic attack. I can't explain how it led to this exactly, but it seems to be working, so we're going with it.”

Elijah looped his arms around Baz's neck and blinked up at him. “I partied without you. Sorry.” He ran a fingernail down Baz's nose, staring at the trail as if it were the most mesmerizing thing he'd ever seen.

Baz scanned Elijah's face carefully. “What drugs did you take, honey? How much?”

Elijah bit his lip and frowned, as if engaging in difficult thought. “I ate your pot brownie. The whole thing. Took a whole Xanax. And one of your oxycodone.” He hiccupped and giggled before tracing a clumsy circle around Baz's lips. “Actually, I had two. Washed them down with Oban. Then I wasn't nervous anymore. Wanted to dance.” He cupped Baz's crotch with a lascivious grin. “Dance with me, lover.”

Aaron glanced worriedly at Baz. “Is he going to be okay?”

“We're pouring water into him.” Lejla produced a bottle and passed it to Elijah, nudging it to his lips. “We figured the dancing would help too. Sweat it out.”

Baz was aware of a distant wave of guilt, knowing exactly how much of this episode had come from
his
bullshit. Now wasn't the time for that, though. Right now he wanted to chase the last of the shadows out of Elijah's eyes. Smiling, he ran fingers through Elijah's hair. “I'll always dance with you, baby.”

They did—for hours. All of them. Awkwardly at first, everyone worried about Elijah, but as it became clear he was okay, especially if they kept moving, they gave in to the beat and helped their housemate dance out his demons. Elijah led them without flagging—he was an Elijah Baz hadn't seen before. Laughing. Wicked. Uninhibited. More relaxed than the night they'd been high in Chicago. Light, almost carefree, if you could ignore the way sometimes you could see him climbing on top of his fears. His drug cocktail led him onto the stage, into the arms of everyone in the room, and over and over again in front of a cold mic so he could lip sync to his favorite songs.

Sometimes Aaron or Mina would sing along, but while they were actually making noise, Elijah never let a single note pass his lips. He kept striking poses and demanding Brian play “Sissy That Walk”. As the party wore on, people let go. They danced like they were the center of a throbbing crowd. They whooped and pumped their fists as Elijah took center stage, peeling off his restrictive layers until he was the kind of unleashed id Baz had a difficult time dragging to the surface.

“You need to let go.” Elijah slipped his hands into the back of Baz's jeans. “Don't worry what other people think of you.”

“I don't worry,” Baz told him, but Elijah shook his head.

“You keep trying to do what you think you should. With your internship. With your mom. You keep trying to find the right life to grow up and live.” He squeezed Baz's ass. “Stop it. Just be you. Sebastian Percival Acker. He's the best guy in the world, and don't you be ashamed of him. Tell anybody who doesn't like him to fuck themselves. Do what you want. Do what feels right.”

Baz took a fistful of Elijah's shirt, right over his ass. “Right now it feels right to dance with you.”

Elijah grinned and pressed their groins together. “Then let's dance.”

They did, until the wee hours of the morning. Baz forced one last bottle of water into Elijah before rinsing him off in the shower and pouring him into bed. Unfortunately this didn't stop the inevitable groan of misery at five in the morning, right before Elijah hurled into the bucket Mina had placed by his side of the bed. He vomited again at the toilet, where Baz camped out with him for a full half hour.

Elijah whimpered as he rested his forehead on the side of the tank. “I'm going to die. I'm seriously going to die.”

Baz rubbed his back. “Too many drugs, baby. Next time find me, and I'll walk you through a better cocktail.”

“Couldn't stop freaking out. Didn't want to bother you. Hate bothering people.”

“I hate it when people I care about don't bother me when they're in trouble.” Baz swatted him lightly on the ass. “You find me from now on when you get this low. Got it?”

Elijah nodded, then moaned in the way that told Baz he needed to drag his boyfriend's head over the bowl again. Eventually they were able to make it to bed, where Baz held Elijah tight as he shivered.

“If it's any consolation, you were glorious.” Baz stroked Elijah's hair, smiling. “I wish you could find this part of you without substance abuse.”

“Sometimes I think I maybe could, when I'm with you.”

Baz stilled. Something shifted deep in his heart, and he ran a hand down Elijah's back. “Oh yeah?”

Elijah didn't reply because he'd fallen asleep.

Baz held him close, letting the confession ring in his heart, taking him into his dreams.