Page 16 of Refraction

Calvin laughed. “Just knock when it gets here.”

“Right on.”

“There.” He went back into the bedroom. “All set. Have to keep up your strength after all.”

“Yessir.” Tucker was sitting on the windowsill, naked as the day he was born, staring out at the snow. For a moment Calvin wished he actually could draw, because that was a beautiful sight.

Calvin joined Tucker, leaning close to the man’s back. He opened his robe and tried to tuck it around them both, but it barely made it past Tucker’s shoulders.

“Beautiful, right? Peaceful?” The city was so different in the snow. The sidewalks were nearly empty, and the street noise was muffled like it was under a heavy blanket.

“Never seen anything like it. It’s like the moon, like a Christmas card or something.”

“Like the moon….” Calvin looked out at the street, at the little divots in the snow left by hurrying feet and the tire tracks in the street blurred by the wind and new snowfall. “I never saw it like that before.” He ran his hands over Tucker’s chest. “I’ve never been to Texas. What would you show me if you took me there?”

“Oh Lord, there’s a question, honey. You could explore your whole life and not see half. I live in Central Texas, out in the hill country, and we’d go to the Balcones, see the escarpment, and walk the Edwards Plateau. Then we could go to Barton Springs and swim. It’s gorgeous out at my place. I got a nice piece of land—fourteen acres.” Tucker’s face softened with what Calvin assumed was love.

Calvin had never even heard of any of those places. He leaned around to catch Tucker’s eye and give him a smile. “Sounds so beautiful.”

As their eyes met, Calvin’s heart started to pound again. Just like on the subway platform, just all of a sudden, thumping against his sternum and echoing in his ears. Even in the shadowy streetlight, the blue in Tucker’s eyes went right through him.

“It is. It’s a good place.” Tucker reached up and cupped his jaw, drew him close, just breathing with him, in and out, slow and steady.

It didn’t stop his heart pounding, but it calmed the piece of him that was panicking and trying to understand what the hell was wrong with him. “Is it just me?”

“This pull between us? And know you’ll wound my soul if you pretend that wasn’t what you were talking about.”

Oh. Oh God, Tucker’s words… that truth was heartbreaking. “I couldn’t pretend if I wanted to. I just… I don’t understand it.”

“Honey, if there’s one thing on God’s earth I understand, it’s that I don’t understand shit.”

Calvin looked at Tucker, letting his head tilt a little to one side, and then laughed softly. “I don’t know if that makes me feel any better, but at least I’m not alone.”

“Come back to the bed before you freeze.” Tucker stood and drew him back to the covers, pulled him down and wrapped him up.

Hewascold. Shivering, and he hadn’t even noticed. He let Tucker take him in, hold him close, rub his back to warm him up—things that proved this was real.

Calvin pointedly ignored the practical voice that was insisting this could only be real for a couple of days. Tucker lived in Texas. He had fourteen acres waiting for him. Even if he got that studio for a week, he had a home he loved, and he’d be going back to it. And Calvin had a shoot on Monday and who knew what after that, and if he got the Calvin Klein contract, that might take him to LA.

Tucker settled him, one hand solid against his hip. “Tell me about you. Your favorite song.”

“Oh wow. Um.” Calvin listened to a lot of music. It was always on—everywhere he worked, his phone on the subway, in the bars at night—but… his favorite? “‘Heroes.’ David Bowie.”

“I know that one!” Tucker sang a few bars in a totally respectable baritone. Okay, that was unexpected and wonderful.

“Yes. That one. Doesn’t everyone know Bowie?” He kissed Tucker under his chin. “You. Your favorite.” He already knew he would probably have never heard of it. They didn’t play country at his photo shoots.

“You promise you won’t laugh?”

“No.” Calvin laughed.

“Butthead. It’s ‘Genie in a Bottle.’ I love that silly song.”

“What?”What?Calvin did laugh, only not for the reasons he’d been expecting. “I know that one! I thought for sure you’d say some country song I’d have no hope of knowing. Oh, I do love Christina. Also?Hot.”

“I know, right? There’s just something so sexual and fun about it.” Tucker grinned, and suddenly he looked so young.

“Okay, favorite… superhero.”

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