Page 6 of Love Is…

The stressed notch between Luke’s brows has smoothed; he looks almost tipsy now, leaning into Hal. “Yeah?”

“Fried chicken and mashed potatoes.”

Luke’s arm goes around his waist. “That’s my favorite.”

“I know. I called your mom and asked for her recipe.”

“And she gave it to you?” Luke sounds shocked.

“Only because I’m making it for you.”

~*~

The thing that Hal hates: it took him so long to realize his love for Luke isn’t limited to friendship. Luke knew early, but Hal…Hal didn’t figure it out until the Army.

In the deserts of Afghanistan, in a troop tent full of other men, Hal laid on his cot and dreamed.

He winged back home; shadowy and inconsistent images of his childhood crowded around him, drowning the hot, frightening environs of the present, swamping him with visions of the past. He dreamed of his family, his warm bed…his best friend. Luke, his t-shirt clinging to the sharp contours of his body, his jeans hanging off his slender hips. He licked his lips and gave Hal a look through his glasses that left no mystery as to his intentions. Luke wanted him – Hal couldfeelit.

And in that moment, Hal wanted Luke.

His traitorous brain put him in a bed, at home, on his back, the room dark and close and comfortable around him. He felt a warm weight beside him; smelled a familiar brand of soap, hair product, toothpaste. Smelled skin that he knew as well as his own. In his dream, his eyes opened, and there was Luke above him, sweet, sarcastic, wonderful Luke. His gaze swept Hal’s body. And then his hands. He ducked his head, and his lips were warm and damp against Hal’s.

Shock, and fear, and wonder cycled through him. Luke was kissing him –kissinghim. And it was…good. It wasgood.

He woke with his heart in his throat and his hand down his pants, gasping, trying not to let the men in his squad hear that he was seconds from coming all over himself. He thought, maybe, he’d been moaning Luke’s name; he felt the shape of it on his lips.

“Fuck,” he whispered to the darkness. “Oh, fuck.”

He tried to blame it on a dream, some strange trick of his subconscious. But when he came home, and Luke was real, and solid, and warm in front of him…beneathhim…It wasn’t just a dream. It had never been one.

But he couldn’t be…

He didn’tthinkhe was…

It shouldn’t have taken him by surprise. Once he startedlooking, really looking, he realized that Luke had beenlookingfor a long time, since high school. He thinks now that all his fear, that night on the couch, after he came home from the war, when they needed each other, that fear was sostupid. Such awaste. But it was real, and he didn’t know how to control it back then. How to control himself, maybe.

He feels a sharp pain underneath his ribs every time he remembers Luke’s face that night – the betrayal, the devastation. He can’t believe Luke gave him a second chance; he tries every day to deserve it.

It turns out the secret ingredient in Luke’s mama’s fried chicken is a pinch of cayenne in the flour dredge; it’s balanced by the buttermilk so there’s no spice, only a lingering impression of heat. Hal sets up an assembly line of casserole dishes that ends in the Dutch oven full of oil that’s heated to just the right temperature on the stove. Luke sits at the breakfast bar, watching him with a crooked grin tugging at one corner of his mouth.

“Is this the least healthy thing you’ve eaten all year?” he teases.

Hal pulls a drumstick from the buttermilk, dredges it, dips it in egg wash, and dredges it again. It sizzles when it drops into the oil. His fingers are filthy. “No. I eat unhealthy.”

“Hmm.”

“Sometimes.”

“Right.”

“At least once.”

Luke chuckles and sinks down so his chin rests on his folded arms. His glasses slip and he nudges them up. His skin looks porcelain-smooth under the glow of the pendant lights, eyes bright and pale behind his lenses. He’s so cute, Hal wants to capture his face in his dirty hands and kiss him. He settles for letting the butterflies in his chest take his breath a moment.

He clears his throat and says, “So how’d writing go today?” If his voice comes out a little unsteady, no one can blame him for being breathless in front of his boyfriend when he looks like this, rumpled, and soft, and kissable.

Luke sighs. “Good. Solid, you know. Baby steps, but lots of them.”

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