Page 49 of Color Chameleon
“I don’t remember the number.”
“Because you don’t need it, so your brain let it go.”
“Yeah.”He smiled at Charma, feeling suddenly stronger.He could so do this.
He looked their number up on the web and called it.He didn’t care that it was only just after six.His parents had fucking kidnapped him, he did not owe them a shred of curtesy.
His father answered the phone.“Who is this?”
“Darcy.And you don’t have to say a word.In fact, I’m not interested in anything you have to say.I am no longer your son—you made that abundantly clear.I have a life and I love my life and it doesn’t include you guys and it will never include you guys.And if you ever—ever—send anyone to kidnap me again, I will make you pay.”He had no clue how, but he would make sure it happened.“Do not call me.Do not text me.Do not try to see me.You disowned me, remember?Well, hear this, Frank, I disown you and Gertie—the two of you are dead to me.”He hit the button to end the call, then blocked their number, just in case Frank decided to call back.
“Wow.You just did that.”Charma sounded impressed.
He grinned at Charma, nodded, something heavy that had been on him since the kidnapping seeming to fall away.“I did.I’ve truly closed that chapter of my life.”He thought he had already, but this felt different.This felt better.
“I love you,” Charma told him.
“Yeah, well, I love you too.”
ChapterEleven
Darcy sat on the towel in their almost private bit of the beach, eyes half-closed, loving the breeze that was coming off the ocean and keeping the sunshine from feeling too hot on his skin.He glanced to his right and grinned.Charma was next to him on the blanket, chameleon-ed out and basking like the basking lizard thing he was.He was on the blue and violet portion of the towel, so his skin had gone a lovely in-between shade, for the most part.
It was how they spent a lot of their Sunday mornings.They’d sleep in ‘til whenever, come down to the beach and bask before things got too hot and too busy, then they’d go out to brunch.Where would depend on what the budget was looking like just then, but they’d at least get tacos to eat at the picnic tables.As often as not they’d wind up at a restaurant, though.Today he was feeling like bacon and pancakes.They had biscuits at home because they’d gone to visit Belia and everyone else at the compound yesterday and they never left Mom’s place without bags full of ‘leftovers’.The word had quotes in his head because he was convinced Belia spent the days before a planned visit cooking all of his and Charma’s favorite meals so she could send them home with leftovers that they loved.But tradition was tradition, and the biscuits would taste just as good for supper or even for breakfast tomorrow morning before they each went to their own corners and worked.
A couple guys in camouflage outfits were coming along the beach.They were talking animatedly to each other and they didn’t even seem to notice him sitting on the beach with his chameleon.Darcy watched them, though, until they were out of sight and then he sighed softly, his shoulders dropping back down.He still tensed a little when he saw guys in camo or big old trucks slowing down near him, but they didn’t send him into panic attacks anymore and he was usually able to talk himself down if he was on his own.
He wasn’t on his own today, though.Hell, he wasn’t on his own most of the time.He and Charma were together more often than not, even when they were in their separate work spaces during the weekdays all they had to do was look up and the other one was there across the room.It felt good.
Reaching over, he gently ran his hand from the tip of chameleon Charma’s nose, along his back and all the way to the end of his tail.Charma turned his head and looked at Darcy, so he did it again, then a few more times.
A shadow fell across them, startling him, and Charma zipped into the pocket of his board shorts.Darcy looked up, frowning.
“Sorry to bother you, but you don’t know where the Safety Center is, do you?”
Darcy pointed in the general direction of the place.“It’s about a mile and a half in that direction.Just stick to the beach and you can’t miss it.”
“Thanks.”The guy, and the little girl he was with, went around their towel and when they got to where the waves met the sand, they turned to their left and kept going.
Charma came slowly back out of his pocket, head bobbing this way and then, and then he sort of went blurry for half a second and then he was Charma again.Grinning, Darcy passed over a pair of bright green shorts and Charma slipped them on with practiced ease.
“Who was that?”
He shrugged.“Just some guy and his daughter needing directions.”
“Cool.You wanna go eat or sun a little longer?”
He pondered that, but he already knew what his answer was.“I want to sun a little longer.”It was a truly beautiful day, and he wasn’t in a hurry to make it move any faster.
“Perfect.”Charma lay back down next to him, eyes closing, smile on his face.He was beautiful.Darcy’s lover was a beautiful man and an adorable chameleon.
And Darcy himself was happy.Truly happy.
He raised his face back to the sun, and let its rays and the breeze dance across his skin.
The end
