The Hat People did find them on Sunday, stumbling out of the bush. Sigmund was feeling okay about it all, though. They’d eaten rabbit and Fantales and laughed around the fire. Then Sigmund had fallen asleep on the rocks, the day’s panic catching up to him. When he woke, he was sore from the ground but less so from his arm. Then Lain had asked if he felt like a badass yet, roughing it in the bush.
Most of the rest of Sunday was spent getting fussed over by doctors and pumped full of ibuprofen for his shoulder. As long as he didn’t try lifting anything heavy, or reaching upward, he was okay.
He did have to sign a lot of forms, though. Waivers saying he wouldn’t sue the company or speak to the press. Lain scowled at his paperwork for a long time before putting his own name down.
“Do you think there’d be money in it?” Sigmund asked, only half joking. “Suing, I mean.”
“No,” said Lain. “And I wouldn’t try. LB’s lawyers are notoriously vicious.”
Sigmund signed.
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They got driven back in a special car, which Sigmund thought was nicer than the bus, even if he did sleep most of the way. The driver dropped him off outside his house, and he waved good-bye to Lain from the lawn.
By the time Sigmund’s keys turned in the lock, the whole trip was starting to feel a long way away.
Apparently he hadn’t been missing long enough to be on the news or anything. When he walked into the kitchen, Dad was busy chopping onions and looked up with an “I thought you weren’t back until later tonight?”
“Yeah,” Sigmund said. “About that.” And he told his dad the story.
He wasn’t sure what reaction he was expecting, really. What he got was a face full of Dad’s oniony apron, and arms crushing him so tight it hurt to breathe.
“Dad,” he said. “Dad, I’m okay, really.”
But David didn’t let go for a very, very long time.
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Tuesday morning, back at work after the long weekend. Harrison had emailed, offering Sigmund the day off. He’d declined. His arm was mostly fine and he wasn’t dead. Besides, he had things to do.
“How was camping?”
Like this.
“I nearly fell off a cliff and died,” Sigmund said. “Then we got lost in the bush and slept overnight on rocks eating Fantales.”
Em didn’t look up from where she was busy fiddling with her tablet, a Pyre Flash. “Mmm. So I heard. A good time was had by all, then.”
Sigmund leaned against the edge of the desk, feigning nonchalance. Em’s cubicle was at the end of the row, wedged between a wall and a window. Their nearest neighbor was at least two desks away and busy throwing a tiny football to someone across the partition.
(now or never . . .)
“Em . . . can I ask you something?”
“Is it work related?”
“No.”
“Well good. I’d hate to have to do actual work at work. Shoot.” She still wasn’t looking up, which made the next part easier.
“How do you know if you’re, you know. Bisexual.”
Em didn’t miss a beat. “You find yourself sexually and/or romantically attracted to both men and women.”
“Oh.” Sigmund thought for a moment. “What if it’s, y’know. Not all men and women, just, like. Some.”
Em did look up, then, arching one eyebrow above her glasses. “Then maybe you’re a two on the Kinsey scale.”
The Kinsey scale. Right. Sigmund had seen the film, the one with Liam Neeson. “What if it’s, like. Just one. Man or woman.” He had Em’s full attention now, which was not helping. She was giving him That Look, the one that made him feel five years old and two feet away from the broken vase. Em was good at that look. Sigmund hated it.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“So what, exactly, happened on your so-called adventure weekend again?”
Sigmund’s cheeks were getting darker and suddenly his shoes were about the most interesting things on the planet. He needed new ones. And jeans, for that matter. And a life.
“Nothing. I mean . . . nothing, really. It’s just, when we were lost, I kinda asked Lain if, like, maybe he’d been. Y’know. Hitting on me.”
“Oh?” Em’s second brow joined the first. “And what did he say, exactly?”
“He asked me if I minded.”
“And do you?”
“I . . . sort of . . . told him I’d get back to him.”
For a while, the only sounds were the staccato tap of Em’s nails against the Flash’s glass, and the distant whooping of the office football game.
“You like him, yeah?”
Another blush. “Yeah. I do. Even though he’s just so . . . weird sometimes.”
“But?”
“But he’s . . . I dunno. Nice to me. Or . . . something.”
“That’s not really what I asked.”
And no, it wasn’t. Sigmund took a deep breath. “He’s . . . attractive. I mean, he is. Isn’t he?” He looked up at her, which, in retrospect, might have been a mistake. Em looked like she didn’t want to be having this conversation, at all. And that was weird, because Em loved giving advice, loved being the Expert.
“Sigmund . . .” Em sighed, looked down at her fingers for a moment, then said, “I don’t think these are questions you need to be asking me, y’know? I think . . . I think if you wanna give things a go with Lain, then do it. But be honest with yourself, and with him. If they don’t work out, they don’t work out. It happens.”
Sigmund nodded, thinking of a too-sharp laugh and big, warm hands. Of brilliant green eyes and the smell of loam and charcoal.
“Does that help?” Em asked after a while.
Sigmund smiled. “Yeah,” he said. “It does. A lot. Thanks, man.” Honesty. If nothing else, he could do honesty.
“No problem,” Em said, and her smile didn’t reach her eyes.
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Lain was slouching in his chair, staring out the window, by the time Sigmund got back to the desk.
“Hey, man.” Not the greatest opening line, but Lain looked up and flashed Sigmund a mouth full of sharp white teeth in response. It was nice, even with the fangs.
“I was gonna go grab a coffee, you wanna come?”
“From the place downstairs, or across the street?”
“Across the street?” The place downstairs always burned the milk.
“Sounds fun.”
They managed to sneak out without Harrison noticing, which always made Sigmund feel a little bit truant. Even if they were adults now and sneaking off-campus for ten minutes for a coffee was hardly the illicit escapade it might’ve been in high school. The air was dry as they left the building, the sun a bright and blinding orb. A postcard-perfect summer’s day by any measure, and Sigmund couldn’t help the smile on his face, even if he suspected it looked a little bit silly.
“You seem happy.” Lain’s expression was caught somewhere between appraising and cautiously pleased.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Sigmund said. “I mean, after Saturday I guess I’m just enjoying being alive and stuff.”
“Yeah, well, you should keep that up, you know. Being alive and stuff.”
The coffee place was a little hole-in-the-wall at the edge of Osko Park. Across the street from LB, but Sigmund had never been sure whether the company owned the land or the city did. Then again, in Pandemonium, maybe there wasn’t much difference.
They ordered—a flat white for Sigmund, a cappuccino for Lain—and stood around in the meager shade while the girl behind the counter fiddled with the espresso machine.
“So . . . I’ve had a think about it,” Sigmund said, after a while. “You know, about what you said on the weekend.” He wondered if he’d managed to convey the appropriate amount of detached cool when speaking, despite his lurching heart.
Lain frowned for a second before his memory kicked in. “Oh, yeah. And what did you decide?” But he was smiling, which Sigmund figured meant he knew. That made it easier. A lot easier.
“I’ve decided I don’t mind.” And then, because he figured part of Not Minding was being able to say it out loud, “If you hit on me, that is. If you want to.”
Lain’s grin could cut glass. “Cool.” He looked like he was going to say something else, except the girl called the order and they went to the counter to collect.
They turned to head back to LB, and before Sigmund could stop himself, he said, “So I was wondering if you wanted to, like, come to DnD on Friday night?” Then instantly felt like the biggest loser in the entire universe.
Lain, apparently oblivious to Sigmund’s desire for spontaneous death, said, “DnD? Which ed?”
“Fourth.” The reply was not, Sigmund thought, doing much to win him any cool points.
Not that Lain seemed to mind. “Awesome. I’ve never actually played. Collected the source books for a while, but . . . I dunno. Never found anyone to run a game with.”
“You should totally come on Friday, then. Em is DM and, like, there’s been this murder in some town we stopped at and because it’s Em, there’s probably, like, some huge, evil conspiracy thing going on. It’s awesome.”
“Sounds awesome,” Lain said, not even lying. “Where is it?”
“It’s in town, but I’ll pick you up. Where do you live?”
And for one single moment, Sigmund almost thought he saw panic on Lain’s face. “Uh . . .”
“Or you can pick me up.” He decided to let it slide, just throw it into the bucket along with all the rest of the Weird Shit About Lain. There were plenty of totally sane, rational reasons why Lain might not want Sigmund to see his place, and what did it matter, anyway, when Lain was smiling at him like that?
“Sounds like a plan. You should email me your address and the time and stuff. Do I need to bring anything?”
By the time they got back to their desks, Sigmund was deep in explanation about the role of THAC0 in second ed and why it hadn’t survived into the modern era. Lain listened attentively and asked questions whenever Sigmund took a breath. And soon—in between explaining hit dice and level modifiers and why it was always better to shoot the horse and not the rider—Sigmund forgot Lain’s weird reaction to the question about his house.