Orin clasped his hand, this time bringing him in for a quick press of shoulders and a thump on the back. “I’m glad. I’m glad about your mother, too. My dad, he’s . . . real easy to like. Sometimes it makes people think that’s all he is. But your mom, she sees him clearly, even the parts that aren’t so easy.”
They smiled at each other, and Alex recognized an ally.
Corbin seemed to be in a good mood. “Good mood” wasn’t something Alex had ever thought to ascribe to him, since the good/bad spectrum wasn’t one that Corbin’s moods seemed to fall on. But this morning, he seemed unusually light, almost buoyant.
When he looked up at Alex and smiled easily, it took Alex’s breath away.
“I found someone for you,” Corbin said. “Maybe.”
“Someone?”
Corbin nodded. “I can show you after, if you want.”
“Yeah, okay.”
At another moment, with another person, Alex would have said Who is it? And Just tell me what it is now. Alex liked to be able to plan ahead. But he found that with Corbin, he loved the way ordinary things unfolded like tiny mysteries. As much as he recognized his desire to know everything about Corbin, he also enjoyed not knowing until Corbin decided it was time to tell him. He enjoyed that something had made Corbin smile, and Corbin would hold it close to him as they baked, until later.
After work, Alex drove them to Corbin’s house. Corbin’s mouth stayed tipped up in the corners, like he was just waiting for something to push it into a full smile.
Snow blanketed Corbin’s yard and garden, and he tramped through it toward the back of the house. As soon as Corbin was there, Wolf trotted out of the trees.
“Where is she,” Corbin asked Wolf. Wolf turned his head toward the trees and barked twice. A few moments later came the sound of cracking twigs and rustling leaves, and a dog shot out of the trees and cannoned toward them. It was medium-sized, with shaggy black-and-white fur, and a goofy, hopeful face. When it reached Corbin, it skidded to a halt and vibrated with excitement.
Corbin held up a hand, and the dog started bouncing in circles, spinning around and around before crashing to the ground dizzily.
Alex laughed and Corbin smiled. He pointed at the dog and said, “I thought she might be right for you.”
Warmth flooded Alex’s chest. Corbin had found him a dog. Corbin had remembered that he might want one, had met one, and thought of Alex.
“How did you know she’d be right?” he asked.
“I just knew,” Corbin said, and it was clear he remembered their conversation in Alex’s kitchen as well as Alex did. “I accidentally named her,” Corbin said, scuffing at the ground. He said it like a name was unchangeable, and Alex realized that to him, it was.
“That’s okay. What’s her name, then?”
“Dreidel,” Corbin said, and held out his hand to the dog. Again, she jumped up and spun in circles like a top before collapsing. This time she looked up at Alex and crooked a paw. He reached out slowly and squeezed the snow-cold paw, then ran his palm over her fur. She shivered with pleasure and splayed out on her back.
“She’s perfect,” Alex said. “It’s the perfect name.”
Corbin bounced slightly on his toes, and his bright smile was so singularly sweet that Alex stood and hugged him. “Thank you,” he said, and Corbin, who’d stiffened at first, softened, letting himself be held. Then his arms came up around Alex’s shoulders, tentative at first, then hanging on tight.
By mutual unspoken agreement, they went inside. Wolf settled near the kitchen door, and Corbin held the door open for Dreidel. She bolted inside, tracking dirtied snow across the hardwood floor, and spun around in excited circles a few times. Corbin spoke to her softly and wiped off her paws with a towel hanging inside the door. Then he grabbed a bowl from the kitchen and filled it with Stick’s food, which Dreidel inhaled.
In the living room, Corbin kindled a fire and gestured for Alex to sit. After a few minutes, Dreidel galloped into the living room. She spun around again, then collapsed in front of the fire, and fell almost instantly asleep.
Corbin brought them hot tea and settled onto the other side of the couch from Alex. He tucked his knees up and cradled the warm cup, letting the steam warm his face.
“Everything for the Chanukah dinner is coming together,” Alex said. “I’ve invited people, and Gareth’s gone through four different menu concepts, but whatever he lands on will be delicious.”
Corbin nodded, relaxing into the couch like he was content to listen to Alex run through all the details. Like he’d be content to listen to whatever Alex had to say.
“I invited Orin.” Corbin cocked his head and wrinkled his brow. “He runs the Art Association. The potter?”
“Oh. Yes, I’ve met him.”
“Yeah, he told me.” Alex spoke casually, choosing his words carefully. “He said you weren’t very impressed with a certain shopkeeper’s jam.”
Corbin nodded immediately. “That jam was horrible. My aunts used to make jam. I know how jam should taste. That tasted terrible.”
Alex smiled at his strong opinion on the matter. “What’s your favorite kind of jam?” He realized that he knew hardly anything about the small, particular details of Corbin’s life.
“Favorite. I don’t really have a favorite. There are infinite combinations.”
“That’s true. You might not even have tasted your favorite yet.”
“Yes, exactly,” Corbin said, and his face fell into an expression that Alex had come to think of as satisfaction that Alex had understood.
“If you had all the ingredients in the world in your kitchen and you were going to go in there right now and make jam, do you know what kind you would make?”
“Mmm.” Corbin closed his eyes like he was picturing every ingredient in the world. “Peach and ginger.”
“That sounds good. Orin said that woman was saying some pretty rude things to you when you left,” Alex said softly.
Corbin’s eyes were narrowed, and his gaze leveled Alex. His voice was sharper than Alex had ever heard it. “Yes. People think I’m crazy. Didn’t you know.” The word crazy snapped around them. Alex didn’t like it, but Corbin was clearly repeating what people had said to him.
“Others too?” Alex asked gently.
Corbin put his tea on the ground and leaned his head back over the arm of the couch to stare at the ceiling. “Yes.”
He was quiet for long enough that Alex thought he would say more. Then he said, “The teachers at school. They thought something was wrong with me. Because I didn’t always pay attention. But I was paying attention. To other things. I was drawing or reading. There were all these rules and everyone knew them, but they didn’t make any sense to me.”
Alex wasn’t surprised to hear that, given that Corbin had grown up outside the context of school. He’d never have learned what was expected of students, or that rules were just edicts kids were meant to follow and often had no discernible logic.
“They would say to read something or fill words in blanks, but . . . why. We all stood up and sat down and raised our hands and walked to the next place, but none of it meant anything.”
Corbin looked so confused.
“Aunt Hilda said that we just had to play along. People were stupid and they needed rules to feel like their lives made sense, so I should just go through the motions until I could get out of there and then I could do whatever I wanted.”
The sweater Corbin was wearing was the same one he’d worn to Alex’s house, and Corbin picked at the loose fibers in the cuff as he spoke.
“I tried to go along with it. But they wouldn’t leave me alone. The other students wouldn’t leave me alone. And the teachers kept asking me things they didn’t ask anyone else. Mr. Bashir sent me to the guidance counselor and she . . . she scared me.”
Corbin turned haunted eyes toward Alex.
“She said I was crazy.”
“She said that to you?”
“Not that word.
But that’s what she meant. It’s what they always meant. They thought I didn’t know, but I knew. She called my aunts and told them I needed tests. That something was wrong with me. They were furious. They said she couldn’t make me. But then . . . I got scared that if I didn’t, then someone might take me away from home.”
His voice was small, and he wrapped his arms around his legs, hugging himself.
“I told the lady I’d take her test. It was . . . The thing was that . . . those questions. It—they scared me.”
“What were the questions?”
Corbin shook his head. “Just questions. They didn’t mean the same thing to me that they’d meant to her. But I knew that if I told the truth she would think she was right. That there was something wrong with me.”
Alex’s heart started beating faster. “Do you think there’s something wrong with you?”
Corbin bit at his fingernails.
“It’s not wrong with me,” he said finally. “It’s just . . . wrong.”
“I’m not sure what that means, Corbin.”
“I can’t tell you because you’ll think I’m crazy too,” Corbin said. He got up off the couch and sat down in front of the fire, both hands on Dreidel, working the tangles out of her fur.
Alex wasn’t sure what to think about that. Corbin felt intensely right to him. There was clearly something he felt he couldn’t share, but everything in Alex told him it wasn’t anything bad or wrong. He thought about what Orin had said. That the tricky part was when someone didn’t know that they could be different than they were. But Corbin did seem to know that there were other ways to live—that most people lived differently, in fact.
“Maybe you’ll tell me some other time,” Alex said slowly. “I’d like to hear anything you might want to tell me.”
Corbin looked at him for a long time, the firelight flickering in his hair like a reflection in obsidian. “You would,” he said finally, and Alex couldn’t tell if it was a statement or a question.
“I would,” he said, just to be safe.
“Maybe soon,” Corbin murmured. “If I figure it out.”
Soft hands ran up and down Alex’s thighs, spreading his legs, and hair whispered against his erection. Alex groaned and looked down to see Corbin’s face between his legs, pink tongue in a wicked point coming out to lick the tip of Alex’s cock. Alex reached out a trembling hand to push back Corbin’s hair, but the second he touched him, the bed disappeared and they were floating. Corbin’s wings, the feathers as ink-black as his hair, spread around him, and Alex felt the air quiver with energy.
The tips of Corbin’s feathers caressed Alex’s ribs and flanks, leaving trails of fire in their wake. Alex’s eyes were glued to Corbin’s face. His eyes were dark with lust, his cheeks flushed, and his mouth a slick fantasy. Corbin’s eyelashes fluttered, and he swallowed Alex’s cock to the root. The pleasure was oceanic, and he came in Corbin’s mouth in seconds, every muscle tensed as pulse after pulse of pleasure spewed from him like lava.
Alex woke with a gasp to sweat-soaked sheets and sticky underwear, his chest heaving with release and the image of Corbin taking him into his body making him groan all over again.
“Jesus.”
He threw his underwear in the laundry and stood naked by the window, gazing out into the dark. Black boughs of fir trees bobbed in the wind, and a light snow was falling, just visible in the circle of a streetlight.
The night before, at Corbin’s house, after the disturbing talk about the high school guidance counselor, they’d moved on to speak of other things. They’d agreed that Dreidel would stay at Corbin’s for the moment, until Alex knew what his mother wanted to do with the house. They talked about what they should serve for dessert at the Chanukah dinner.
The traditional desserts, fried in oil, were a bit heavy for the end of a meal, and they would be things Alex was selling at And Son for the whole holiday season. They debated the merits of something light and refreshing—fruit and cream and sorbets. But though they would be a good counterbalance to the rich dinner menu, they didn’t really have the spirit of Chanukah celebration that Alex was after. Besides, though Gareth’s menu would be rich, it—like everything he cooked—would be balanced, so it wouldn’t feel heavy.
It was Corbin who’d had the idea Alex liked best. It was a deconstructed sufganiyot and Corbin had thought of it because of their talk about jam. They would layer the cinnamon and sugar doughnuts with vanilla cream and fresh jam. Alex could already see how he’d plate it, the jam drizzled over the cream so the doughnuts would stay crisp.
He shook his head. Everything in it led back to Corbin. Even baking was now all wrapped up with Corbin.
Gareth was right. Alex had to tell him. If not for his own sake, then because he was starting to feel uncomfortable being around Corbin in person, when at night, the private Corbin of his dreams caressed and sucked him to ecstasy, and made him come in his sleep like he was seventeen again.
He’d just wait until the next week, see the Chanukah dinner through, and then he’d talk to Corbin. His stomach clenched at how easily the other man could slip from his life if he didn’t feel the same. How easily Alex could be left.
The emptiness he felt at the thought of losing Corbin—of not seeing his beautiful smile, or the way he tugged at his hair when it got in his face, of how he shifted between dreamy distraction and a presence so sharp it drew every ounce of Alex’s attention, of his scent like the wildness of the trees and the wind—was stronger than anything he’d ever felt.
Gareth was chattering excitedly about the menu as they drove to the bakery the morning before the Chanukah dinner. Everything was planned, and he’d do the shopping today. They were both delighted with the pie he’d dreamt up. It would have a crust of shredded, fried potato filled with apples and drizzled with a sour cream—his play on latkes with applesauce and sour cream, and an elegant solution to the problem of how to fry a hundred latkes while people waited to be served.
Gareth was describing how he’d absorb the oil of the potato when they let themselves into And Son and found the kitchen light on.
Gareth shot Alex a look. When Alex had told him how often he’d found Corbin in the kitchen before him, Gareth had said with certainty that it was yet another indication that he liked Alex and wanted to be near him. Alex thought there was something more to it, but didn’t know what.
Alex pushed open the door quietly, and the sight before him stole his breath. Corbin was asleep on the butcher-block prep table in the corner, hands curled under his chin, head pillowed on his jacket. In sleep, he looked as he did in Alex’s dreams. Beautiful, angelic, at peace.
Gareth hung back and Alex went over to him. “Corbin,” he said softly, putting a hand on the man’s shoulder in case he startled and fell off the table.
Corbin blinked awake and Alex’s heart sped knowing that now he could picture what it would look like to wake up next to him. Corbin’s mouth formed a silent Alex, and he sat, knuckling sleep from his eyes.
“I fell asleep,” he muttered.
“Did you come here last night?”
Corbin shook his head. “Early this morning.” Then a smile broke across his face. “I made something.”
He scrambled off the counter and lifted a kitchen towel from a plate. They were sufganiyot, perfectly formed, fried, and filled.
“Wow, they’re beautiful. Were you practicing?”
Corbin cocked his head. “No. They’re for you.” His voice was grave.
“Thank you,” Alex said seriously, though it was a little earlier than he usually wanted to eat. But Corbin was staring at him, eyes wide and hair mussed, with the impression of his jacket creasing his cheek, and Alex didn’t think he had it in him to deny him anything. So he took the doughnut that Corbin held out to him like a communion.
He took a bite and the flavors burst across his sleepy palate. The crunch of cinnamon and sugar, the crisp of fried dough as his teeth sank in, and the bite of jam inside—blueberry, perfect with
the cinnamon.
“It’s perfect,” Alex said, and Corbin’s smile turned everything to joy. He bounced on his toes, waiting as Alex finished the doughnut.
“Do I get one?” Gareth asked. “Or are they special magic doughnuts for Alex’s consumption only?” He winked at Corbin, but Corbin’s face fell and he looked gutted.
He put the towel back over the doughnuts and shook his head. “I’m sorry. But you can’t have one.” His hands shook.
Alex glared at Gareth, who rolled his eyes. “It’s fine, Corbin. It’s fine if they’re special magic doughnuts only for Alex.”
Corbin flinched again, eyes darting around.
“Hey,” Alex said, squeezing Corbin’s shoulder. “Thank you. They’re delicious. I love the choice of blueberry jam. It works perfectly with the cinnamon and it’s less expected.”
Corbin nodded.
“I’m gonna go shopping,” Gareth said, and spun on his heel.
As soon as he was gone, Corbin seemed to relax. He looked at the doughnuts and at Alex. “It’s just . . . no one else can have them, okay? It’s important.”
“Okay.” Alex let the word linger between them, hoping Corbin would explain, but knowing he might not. If Corbin said something was important to him, that was all Alex needed.
“I’m . . . I’m trying to make things so that I can tell you. So I can tell you all the things you keep asking.”
“Is it working?”
The expression on Corbin’s face was naked longing.
“I think maybe so,” he whispered in awe.
As he flipped the sign on the front door from Open to Closed, and taped up the card that said Private Event, Alex was suspended perfectly between a childlike joy of Chanukah cheer and a professional baker’s desire for perfection. He liked the position just fine.
Gareth was putting the finishing touches on all the food and giving exacting instructions to the waiters they’d hired for the evening about how and when each course was to be served.