Making Promises (48 page)

“I didn’t know GTOs came with oh-shit bars. Crick’s Toyota has a different feature—we call it the hail-Jesus-handle. Do you think they do the same thing?”

Mikhail was forced to laugh too. “I would imagine it’s a difference in semantics only. You know, it isn’t very good for the morale when they grab that thing. It makes me nervous as soon as his knuckles go white.” Making Promises

Benny snorted. “Oh yeah—all you have are white knuckles. I have a blown eardrum. I sweartagod, I was sitting at an intersection with Crick in the passenger seat, waiting for a chance to go and suddenly he turns and screams, ‘
What the hell are you waiting for? A sign from GOD?
’”
Benny shuddered. “He spooked me so bad, I tried to pull out right then—there was a car coming, and
they
had to swerve into the oncoming lane to avoid us, and basically, I almost killed a shitload of people because Crick’s a complete dick.” Benny leaned back and covered her face with her hands.

“And Deacon had to drive Jeff home the last time he took me.” Mikhail stared at her. “It was that traumatic?” Benny shook her head. “No—he brought a hip flask. By the time we were done with the lesson, he was plastered.”

Mikhail couldn’t help it—he started with a smirk and then progressed to a giggle, and by the time Benny had put her knitting down in disgust and gone to get Parry Angel to come in for a snack, he was laughing hard enough to wipe tears from his eyes.

“Oh shut up!” Benny complained as she walked past him, the baby on her hip. Mikhail courteously picked up her knitting and followed her into the house, where she had taken the baby’s jacket and rubber boots off and was putting her into the high chair.

“Why does not Deacon take you?” he asked, trying to get back into her good graces. For one thing, snack today involved little yellow crackers, and he loved those.

Benny sighed. “He did—he’s good at it. But Crick told me that the last couple times he did, he got home, clapped me on the back and said,

‘“Good job, Shorty!’ and then went and threw up, he was so nervy. I
swear
I am not that bad!”

“I believe it.” She was so competent at nearly everything she did—

there was no reason to believe this would be any different. “Why do you think it is so hard for everybody?” Poor Benny—her experiences were starting to make Shane’s white knuckles and clenched-jaw smile sound like no particular trauma.

Benny sighed and got out a banana with one hand while handing Mikhail the box of crackers with the other. Mikhail smiled happily and started eating the little yellow fish.

“I think it’s because they’re all first responders—or they have been—you know?”

Mikhail blinked. His spoken English was
very
good, but he was unfamiliar with this term. “First responders?”

“Nana!” interrupted Parry joyfully, and instead of answering Mikhail, Benny turned to her daughter.

“Are you going to eat it this time or just mash it around on your high chair?”

“Nana! Eat nana!”

“You promise?”

“Pwomise!”

Benny’s lips quirked upward in a smile, and Mikhail would not put any money on the little girl keeping that promise.

“You were saying?” Mikhail prompted after Parry was quiet. Of course, once she got the banana, she started using it to chase the goldfish across the tray of her high chair. It was a charming activity—but one Mikhail was glad he wasn’t responsible for cleaning up.

“A first responder,” Benny continued, “is someone who’s first on the scene of an accident. Deacon and Crick were EMTs—hell, Crick was an EMT in
Iraq
for chrissakes… they’ve seen some really hairy shit, you know? I do something stupid in traffic, and suddenly they’re seeing me in a pile of twisted metal, wearing my toes as a necklace. Jeff, too—he sees the survival aftermath of shit like that. It’s probably why Shane goes all white knuckle on you—although, knowing Shane, he’s probably screaming on the inside and smiling and telling you it’s all good on the outside, a lot like Deacon. I mean, I know why they do it, it just doesn’t make it any easier.”

Mikhail looked at her, chewing his child’s crackers and feeling extremely stupid. Of course she was right. Poor Shane, imagining the worst of things while Mikhail was merely enjoying the power of his car.

He never had let on, either.

“You know,” he said, after he’d swallowed a handful of extremely dry goldfish, “maybe we should switch. You know, have Shane teach you and one of your men”—Deacon, please let it be Deacon—“teach me. They would not worry so much about me, and Shane is very good at keeping his Making Promises

worry inside and his voice level. Maybe if we tried it that way, we will both have our driver’s licenses before fall.”

Benny had turned seventeen in February and would finish her home-study courses in June. She was going away to college in the fall—it was sort of imperative that she get her license, or she wouldn’t be able to come home and visit. Mikhail was hoping to be able to drive to the faires starting in April. He and Shane had heard from Kimmy—she had sounded anxious and distracted but not stoned, so they had both told her to come visit them and looked at each other unhappily. They could not help if she did not ask for it, but that didn’t mean they did not worry. But Kimmy had told them that Mikhail was welcome to come work with the little troupe.

She had implied that Kurt’s arm had not healed, but her exact words were,

“Kurt’s not up to dancing,” so that hadn’t boded well, either. At any rate, Mikhail had his summer job again and this time at full speed, with a couple of exceptions for the children’s recital at Anna’s dance studio, and, of course….

“We can do that,” Benny said excitedly. “But not before the picnic in three weeks. We’ve got too much to do.”

Mikhail nodded, still unsure as to why this picnic was so extremely important to everyone. “So,” he said now, “it is a picnic, with food and dancing and… document signing?”

Benny rolled her eyes. “No, silly—it’s a wedding!” Mikhail shook his head, still confused. “It is a wedding,” he said slowly, “but we can’t tell Deacon it is a wedding. Even though it is his.” Benny laughed and poured some milk into a pink plastic cup to finish up Parry’s snack. “Exactly.”

“I am not seeing why we cannot tell Deacon. Shouldn’t he know he is getting married?”

“He’s been married,” Benny said quietly, her face glowing with the romance of it all. “He and Crick have been
together
-together for three years. If they didn’t split up when Crick lost his fucking mind and joined the Army, it ain’t ever gonna happen. So the paperwork is a common property contract. It’s essentially a marriage contract—it says that Crick is entitled to half of everything, just like a married couple. But you’re not allowed to get married in California. So since we were having the big picnic to celebrate keeping the ranch and signing the paper and,” Benny 298

blushed slyly, “some other things, Crick wanted to say some stuff to Deacon that he thought should have witnesses. You know—since a bunch of us had to pick Deacon up off the floor when he left, he figured we should get to see Deacon get a promise for a happy ending.” Mikhail was stunned. Promises—the ultimate promise. He swallowed, feeling oddly moved. “That’s really wonderful,” he muttered.

“Yeah,” Benny echoed, and then went off into plans about dresses and decorations and Crick’s mystery gift for Deacon, and Mikhail was left following her in a haze of wonder, thinking about promises he’d like to make to Shane. He stopped short while washing up the tray for Parry’s high chair. Benny had taken the baby back for a quick scrub and a nap, and since he was staying for dinner, he’d offered to clean up for her and get the dinner started, and she’d taken him up on it.

It suddenly occurred to him that with his current plan in place, he couldn’t make promises to Shane. He planned to give Shane to someone better when someone better came along.

It had sounded like a good plan at the beginning—Shane was too good a man for him, and that was that. But it was not sounding so good now. Who would take care of Shane the way he would? Who would make him sleep or take care of the furry dragons or love the cats the way Mikhail would?

Who would blow his mind in bed?

Mikhail felt a sudden sense of panic. Nobody—there was nobody out there who would take care of this man the way he could. But he had promised himself… promised that he would not burden Shane with his imperfections, his temper, his damaged, angry soul.

He set the high chair tray back on the high chair and wiped it dry, and thought of the little girl pushing goldfish across the surface with bananas. Some promises, he thought, were made to be broken. He frequently broke his promise to Shane about walking at night—he was not delicate, and he could take care of himself.

But that did not mean he would
ever
break his promise about pushing Shane away using cruelty or by pouring salt into his old wounds again. He’d die first.
That
promise was meant to be kept as no other would be.

The question was, which promise was this one?

Mutti
, he thought,
this is where you would say something wise.

Something like, “Less self-serving poetry and more Russian practicality,
lubime
.” Something that would make me keep him.

But his mother had been dead for more than a month, and as much as he enjoyed wordplay and poetry and may even have believed in heaven, he did not believe in ghosts. Even when he heard her voice in his head, he knew it was just memory and wishful thinking telling him that Shane was all he’d ever need in another person to keep him happy.

He could not trust that voice—it was far too close to what his heart said, and his heart was not the most trustworthy of things.

He turned to start chopping up vegetables for dinner—some sort of chicken thing that Benny got out of a book and Mikhail was looking forward to making—and then, because it was Sunday, Jeff came in, and then Jon and Amy with the baby, and then Deacon, Crick, and Andrew called it a day and came in to wash up. Benny and the baby came back from their nap, and suddenly the kitchen and the living room were full of people who gave a shit that he was there, and he could forget about promises for a moment.

He certainly forgot about them after dinner, as he was sitting down and eating banana cream pie and Jeff sidled up to him for a little chat.

“Where’s your big goofy boyfriend?”

Mikhail glared at him sideways. “Be nice, or I’ll have my big goofy boyfriend knock out your teeth. He would not do it to defend himself, but he’ll do it because I ask him to, so watch it.” Jeff laughed delightedly. “Oh, God, honey—you are just so damned cute! But you didn’t answer my question. Where is he?” Mikhail sighed, and his appetite for pie faded. “He is at work. He will swing by around ten to pick me up and to say hi, and then he will go home and fall down where he stands and go to sleep, because he has to be up in seven hours to go to work again.”

Jeff swore. “Fuck—dammit all to hell! He’s out at work, isn’t he?” Mikhail grimaced. “Calvin said people just sort of assumed after everybody showed up for him when he was hurt. The poor man has his back, you know. Signs up for the same bullshit shifts, rides in the car with him. It is just so… so….”

“So maddening,” Jeff muttered. “So not fair. Not for Shane. Man, all that guy wants to do is be a hero.”

Mikhail put his chin on his hands glumly. Shane was
his
hero. If they could find another job for him, maybe that could be enough.

Jeff patted his back comfortingly. “That’s gotta be rough on the old love life, huh, babycakes?”

Mikhail looked at him sideways and didn’t answer. They did okay.

Well, more than okay—but yes. He was sure they would be having more sex and happier sex if Shane got some sleep occasionally.

Jeff raised a sardonic eyebrow and waited, arms crossed, shit-eating grin of sympathy fixed firmly on his pretty face, for Mikhail’s reply.

Finally the silence got to him and Mikhail said, “I would rather get him to relax and really rest than worry about the sex. With the sex, he has too much to do. It’s all work work work for him—I would just like him to get some real sleep.”

Jeff wrinkled his nose. “Well, it’s not like you can’t go down on him—I mean, you’re okay doing that, aren’t you?” Mikhail’s professional pride was—for lack of a better word—

pricked, and he straightened in his seat and gave a disdainful sniff. “I did this for a living, dammit! I gave the best blowjobs for a six-block radius,” he proclaimed, and Andrew, who had been drawing near them with his pie to sit down and talk, got big, alarmed eyes and backed away.

“Sorry, guys, this is where I draw the ‘straight’ line and follow it!” Mikhail watched him go with reddening cheeks, and Jeff dissolved into giggles next to him. “Oh. My. God.
Please
tell me I can repeat that story. Jesus, that’s better than Crick’s little talk with his doctor.” Mikhail gave his friend (yes, he was a friend now) a disgusted look.

“You may tell whomever you like,” he snapped. “By all means, tell the entire world that I worked as a prostitute when I was younger than Benny—take out a Facebook page if you like.”

Jeff sobered immediately. “I’m sorry, Mikhail,” he said, instantly contrite. “I didn’t know—I was being a jerk and I didn’t get the first part of what you said. Didn’t understand it. Don’t worry—the story stays here in Deacon’s kitchen, okay?”