He woke up at 5:00 p.m. when his phone went off and then spent an inordinate amount of time grooming. Usually he just let his hair grow until he couldn’t stand it anymore and then cropped it short. It was past that point now, so he had to run a wet comb through it after he shaved. Then he picked a dress shirt—something decent, green because he liked the color—and hobbled his way into the living room, where Theo was waiting.
Theo had dressed up too.
He was wearing a gold shirt with jewel-colored dragons on it, of all things, and a clean pair of jeans. His hair had been trimmed in the last month, and he smelled of a fresh shower and aftershave.
Spencer eyed him with a combination of suspicion and yearning.
“There were… pink things in my bathroom,” he said, the disgust not feigned in the least.
“Those were towels and a rug, with matching soap,” Theo said. “I borrowed them from Belinda, but we can buy something in dirt brown if you need to.”
“Why? Why do we need pink things in my bathroom? There’s soap, shampoo, a razor, pit-stop—”
“How about you-stop.” Theo rolled his eyes. “Matching soap and a rug around the toilet aren’t going to make your penis shrivel. Did you find everything else you need?”
Spencer nodded uncomfortably. “You dressed up,” he said.
“So did you,” Theo told him, eyes twinkling.
“Why did we do that?” And he wasn’t trying to be smart; he couldn’t understand the impulse; not at all.
Theo closed the distance between them and kissed his cheek, which was damned near the most romantic thing anyone had ever done to him, and Theo did it all the time.
“Because your friends are celebrating that you’re not dead, and it’s respectful,” he said softly. “At least that’s why you dressed up.”
“Why did you dress up?” Spencer asked, and while he actually had an idea for this one, he wanted to hear Theo say it.
“Because I wanted to impress you,” Theo told him, and Spencer actually held his hand to his chest, because it felt swollen or something.
“Why?”
“Because you keep trying to convince yourself not to keep me,” Theo said dryly. “I thought maybe I should sweeten the pot.”
Spencer gave half a laugh and shook his head. “Pot’s pretty sweet already, Woodchuck,” he said softly. “Just trying to give you a chance to run away, is all. No room to run away on the raft. There’s more room here.”
“There is,” Theo agreed, going to the door and opening it. “Which means me staying here is completely my choice. And that includes you. You know, in case you were wondering.”
Spencer grunted. “That much, I seem to understand.” With a heave, he started pushing himself forward on the crutches, being careful to minimize the stress on his leg. His side had healed decently in spite of the infections that he’d finally beaten off with a club. His leg, on the other hand—well, the doctor hadn’t been shitting around. He was just going to have to keep using it, brace and all, in spite of the pain, but he had to admit, the walk between his trailer and the big house—a half mile at most—had never seemed so long. Colonel, who normally would have been running circles around him while he trotted the path, must have sensed something was up. He stayed at Spencer’s side at a steady pace, and Spencer felt like crap because he was apparently letting even his dog down.
He was sweating by the time they got there, and Theo eyed him critically.
“You go inside. I’ll be back in a few.”
“Where are you going? You can’t leave me with all these people by myself. You don’t know what they’re like!”
Theo laughed and knocked on the door before opening it. “He’s here, guys! I’ll be back in five.”
And Spencer looked through the door to see Elsie and Josh bearing down on him at speed.
“Ack!” he cried, only kidding a little. “Oh my God, look at all the people!”
He’d even seen their vehicles as he’d come down the slight rise from his place. It just hadn’t occurred to him that there were so many of them until they were all crammed into Oscar and Belinda’s space.
“Well, you should enjoy remembering how to be a human being,” Elsie said, giving him a kiss on the cheek while juggling Caden on her hip.
“I human just fine,” Spencer protested, and then Elsie backed up and he found himself in a full-body hug from Josh, the only man he respected enough to give Elsie to since he wasn’t up for the job.
Josh was shorter than he was—around five-nine—but still taller than Elsie. Tanned, with sandy brown hair and California boy good looks, Spencer’s first thought when he realized Josh had been their assigned council in the Air Force had been, “Oh shit, we’re doomed!” But Josh had proven to have a core of steel—the airman who’d ended up unconscious before Spencer had arrived had wanted Spencer to rot at Ft. Leavenworth, and his father had been pissed. Josh had done his homework, though, playing hardball and finding evidence of at least three other assaults the piece of shit had been involved in. Yeah, Spencer had quit because the court-martial had seemed rigged from the get-go, but Josh was the one who kept him from being railroaded into prison out of hand.
“No,” Josh said, looking him up and down. “I think you still need help to human. I mean, I thought Glen and Damien would have helped, but they’re assholes too, so no dice.”
“Wait till you meet Theo,” Elsie said, nodding excitedly. “He’s great at giving human lessons. Where’d he go, anyway?”
“I have no idea,” Spencer said. “He got here, said, ‘Back in a sec!’ and ran away. Apparently I’m a nightmare human student, and I terrified him back into the trailer.”
“I doubt that very much,” Glen said, joining the throng around him. He clapped Spencer on the back and Spencer tried to suppress a wobble—that walk had taken more out of him than he liked to admit.
Glen saw it, though. “Okay, all, let’s let him sit at the dining room table, and then we can bother him.”
Glen cleared the way, and Spencer found himself sitting, a cold beer in front of him, and everybody he cared about surrounding him, chattering fiercely.
And it was funny. He’d never really thought about it before. He’d worked so hard being there for Glen and Damien, having Elsie’s back, being grateful to Josh and to Preston, and truly loving Oscar, Belinda, and their toddler who ate everything, that he’d never, not once, realized what he might mean to them.
But sitting in the middle of all that noise, he realized that he actually meant something, something important, and that put salve on a wound he didn’t know he had. He’d left his home so angry—and reasonably sure his parents wouldn’t want a fucking thing to do with him after he’d gone.
He’d written them the obligatory postcard, letting them know he was graduating with his wings, and he hadn’t even gotten back a congratulations. He’d realized he’d been right. He didn’t matter. He’d made it clear he wasn’t following his father’s belief system and… well, that had been the end of it.
But that hadn’t been the end of these people here. These people, in this house, seemed to care about him no matter how much he snarled, and he looked around almost desperately for Theo, because he suddenly realized what Theo had wanted to tell him—and he got it.