What Happens in Cherryvale...

III.

"God damn shitting piece of shit-crap garbage!"

Things were not going great.

In fact, life kind of sucked. Kyle stomped through the University Center student lounge, jabbing the keypad on his cell phone in supreme frustration. L-Cell was a garbage carrier and someone really should've done something about their stranglehold monopoly over the city of Llanview.

He'd really had enough of the stares, too. This wasn't the goddamn library, so everyone could just shove it with their glares and judging faces. He could have his little tantrum if he damn well felt like it.

It really didn't help his mood at all that Housing and Dining was kicking him out over the break so they could do the oh-so-important work of shampooing the carpets in his res hall. When he thought about it, they were to blame for the whole thing. If he didn't need a place to stay, he wouldn't have needed his stupid piece of shit cell phone to work so he could embark on the Kyle Lewis begging tour of 2004.

He thought joining a frat would have prevented these kinds of dilemmas, but, no, the Student Activities Committee's subcommittee on ethics or rules or whatever had to go and put sanctions on the house: one year probation on independent living arrangements. Kyle shook his head at the stupidity. The "house" was pretty much the bread and butter of the frat house concept, as far as he could tell.

Lord knew the idea of "fraternity" didn't seem to mean a damn thing to the guys he'd met in this town.

Guys who just... stopped hanging around and being cool once they found out their friend kinda-sorta wanted to jump their bones.

Guys who he was pretty sure wanted to jump his bones, too, but were too stupid to realize it.

Oh, he knew Oliver was gay. There was no doubt in his mind. It was Oliver's mind that seemed a little slow on the uptake. He wasn't going to try to convince him otherwise, though. It was obviously a lost cause. Oliver wasn't in denial. He was just completely and totally oblivious.

They had actually tried to hang out, once, after The Incident, to watch a 76ers game with a couple other guys. Oliver's idea, so Kyle wasn't going to take the blame for any more manipulations. Plus, witnesses. It couldn't possibly deviate from totally innocent stuff between bros.

Shock of shocks, it did not go particularly well.

Kyle blamed the weather. It had been an unusually dry week for February—global warming at work—and a charge had been building in the air. So, when they both reached for the remote control at the same moment, there was a perfectly good scientific explanation for why, when their fingers accidentally brushed against each other, they both felt the electric shock. Kyle thought it was slightly hilarious. Oliver... not so much. He sprang off the futon with such alarm Kyle would have thought there were fire ants crawling up his leg.

That was almost two months ago. They hadn't so much as shared a glance since then, much less an electrical charge.

Not that it bothered Kyle. It was just another reminder in a long line of how dumb it was to want someone to be there, to forget about independence and self-reliance and all the things that wouldn't let you down. A reminder that he'd survived this sort of dissolution before, and come out okay. Just another of the many hazards of his very excellent life to date. Like crummy cell phones and annoying onlookers. He continued jabbing at the buttons and cursing, hoping it would relieve the sudden unexplained heaviness in his chest.

"What?" he barked when a pair of legs walked into his downward line of vision. An arm shoved something at the general direction of his chest.

"Here."

He looked up from his phone. "Oh." His breath seemed to elude him for a moment. "Oliver." He cleared his throat and glanced around the room sheepishly. "Hey."

"Hi."

"What's, uh, what's up... dude?"

Oliver offered up his arm again, just the barest hint of a smile on his face. "My phone? Do you wanna borrow it? You sound a little... stressed out."

Kyle laughed, and in that one exhalation felt all the weight in his chest float out into the ether. "You don't know the half of it."

He grabbed the phone, turned away from Oliver, and dialed quickly, wanting to get everything settled and taken care of and go on his merry way... away from Oliver and everything about him that was just so... him.

"Hey, uh, Sue? It's Kyle. I was just wondering... You need any work done around the place this week? It's just, I've got some time off school and could maybe come down... Really? Okay. Great! Sounds good. Can you, uh, pick me up at the bus stop? Ah, you're the best. I'll see you then."

Closing the phone, he started to wonder why he'd been freaking out in the first place. Of course there was a person out there he could rely on. People, really.

"Thanks. You're a life saver." He handed the phone back to Oliver, who turned it over in his hand a few times before shoving it in his back pocket.

"So, what's wrong with your phone? Maybe I could take a look at it? I'm pretty good with stuff like that."

Kyle waved his hand dismissively. "No, I know. It's just these phone companies. They get so cranky when you stop paying 'em."

Oliver thrust his hands in his pockets. "So, uh, making plans for spring break, huh?"

"What, were you eavesdropping? Enjoy listening in on private conversations, do ya?"

Oliver took a step back and lifted up his arms in protest. "Hey, whoa! Hey now! Just asking. Jeez."

Kyle dropped his head and smiled, secretly enjoying the random outburst of Oliver-emotion. "Sorry. Sorry. Force of habit. Always looking to accuse. You know me."

"Yeah." Oliver bit his lip and averted his eyes.

"You're right, though. Just making my spring break plans."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. My, uh, my aunt's got this little place outside of Cherryvale where she raises a few horses, so I thought it would be nice, if this crazy warm weather holds, to go out there for a bit. Plus, she's getting old and the work's hard, so I know she can always use a hand."

Oliver nodded. He kicked one foot against the heel of the other.

"So, uh, got any fun plans of your own, Oliver?"

He shrugged. "Iowa. Parents."

"So... no."

Oliver rolled his eyes and smiled, keeping his gaze toward the ceiling. "I guess not. My mom wants me home for Easter, but I dunno. I'm not really interested. They like to do the whole thing, really do it up, and, well, I—" He quickly surveyed the room, as if checking to make sure his mom wasn't hiding behind a couch, spying on him. "Not really my thing I guess."

Kyle's mouth dropped in mock horror. "You've gone heathen?"

Oliver pulled back his head, as if slapped. "No! No. Not really. I just, I dunno." He started kicking his own shoes again. "I guess I just like to spend time with my faith on my own. It feels more... personal that way, you know?"

"Not really, but I can guess." Kyle grinned, amazed the two of them were back to multi-word sentences and doing the whole Chicken Soup for the Soul thing. He reached over and slapped Oliver on the arm, a little too hard—just to make sure it tipped platonic. "You need some alone-time with the Big Guy, huh? Don't like to share?"

Oliver laughed, looking him straight in the eye. "Sure."

"So..." It was Kyle's turn to shove his hands in his pockets.

"Yeah..."

Removing a hand, he slapped Oliver on the arm again, even harder this time. "I'll, uh, see you around I guess."

"Yeah. I guess."

Kyle turned to leave, but stopped when he felt a tug on his sleeve.

"Kyle?"

His gaze traveled down to Oliver's hand on his shirt, then back up into his face. "Mm hmm?"

"You're wrong about Picard." Oliver's eyes sparkled.

Kyle felt his face flush. "I know. I was just messing with ya."

With a final nod, Kyle strode toward the exit, his head down to hide the smile he couldn't restrain, and as the automatic doors slid out of his way and he stepped into the warm April afternoon, life didn't seem to suck so much anymore.

* * * * *
"God damn shitting piece of shit shitty fucking heat wave."

Kyle peeled off his sweat-soaked shirt and hurled it to the ground before giving it a mighty kick.

He wasn't averse to hot weather. Not at all. It was when you combined unseasonably high temperatures with stripping stables and the really unpleasant smell of wood shavings soaked in urine—that was when the universe lost the favor of one Kyle Lewis.

And he didn't remember the feed bags being this heavy before. Maybe the academic lifestyle was making him soft.

Still, he had a roof over his head at night and a stove top for home-cooked meals. There was always a bargain to make in life. Nothing came for free.

He hauled a stack of dirty blankets onto his bare shoulder and trudged out of the stables. He had just thrown them onto the rusted wheelbarrow when he saw a figure approaching slowly from the bottom of the drive.

"Holy... crap..."

Oliver. Here in Cherryvale. Wandering around with a sheet of paper in front of his face, squinting in all directions. Oliver. Jesus. What did that mean? He decided a cool, cautious approach would serve him best. He didn't want to screw up again. Not when things between them were... slightly okay, verging on good.

Cool and cautious, he reminded himself, yet he couldn't stop his left leg from shaking.

He pulled off his baseball cap and wiped the sweat from his brow. Oliver had apparently taken notice of him, and was marching, at quite the clip, toward him.

"Kyle! Hey!" He stopped a few feet away and reached out a hand, then quickly pulled it back and shoved it in his back pocket. "I thought I'd gotten lost. This place is so... open. I didn't know there was anything like this out here. Wow. You're a mess." Oliver looked him up and down, or at least that was probably the intent. His gaze stopped somewhere around his midsection and then went a little hazy.

Kyle sucked in a deep breath, which seemed to revive Oliver's attention.

"How on earth did you find me?"

Oliver rubbed his hands together and smiled, apparently pleased with himself. "You used my phone!"

Kyle tilted his head and crossed his arms over his chest. "What are you talking about?"

"Your aunt's phone number is listed."

"Still not following."

Oliver was practically bouncing. "There's this great new thing, maybe you've heard of it? It's called the internet? Yeah, so all you have to do is type in a listed phone number and up pops any public address information. A quick little search on Llannet Maps, one bus ticket later, and, well, here I am."

Kyle blinked, then swallowed. "You went to all that trouble to find me?"

"Kyle. I typed ten numbers into a search engine and hit 'enter.' It wasn't exactly the Tour de France." He reached out a hand and rested it gently on Kyle's bare shoulder, but drew it back almost as soon as contact was made. The humidity was higher than the last time their skin made contact, but Kyle could still feel some electricity in that touch.

"Then you—you did all that other stuff, and the bus ticket, and—hey, why aren't you at home? What happened to Iowa?"

Oliver blew the air out of his cheeks and began pacing back and forth. "Home... Home wasn't so much fun." He jabbed his finger in the air as his voice rose. "First, my dad left on his fishing trip with the guys and he—he told me he was going to wait for me but he didn't, and then my mom wouldn't stop pressuring me about Easter and—and Becky, and then forcing me to spend some time alone with Becky, who kept insisting that we do things that I really, really didn't feel like doing, and the whole thing was just a mess and it made me realize that I missed... missed being around someone who was... who sees... I guess I just missed hanging out with you—just being us. It's been such a long—" He finally took a breath. "That's—that's more information than you needed."

Kyle laughed. "True." He couldn't resist a little teasing, not with Oliver already so worked up. "So this Becky person? You and she, uh...?" He wiggled his eyebrows and curled the fingers of his right hand in a loose fist, then thrust his left index finger through the hole three or four times.

"God, no! No no no no no!" Oliver stopped in his tracks and waved his arms in front of him, as if warding off evil spirits. "I mean, it's not that I—I don't want to, or—or—or can't! I'm not—not some kind of prude or anything, I just..." He inhaled deeply. "She's not the one."

Kyle stopped breathing for a moment. It took a few seconds for his faculties to return. He nodded his head up and down slowly. "Uh huh. Don't worry, pal. I believe you."

Oliver shifted his weight from foot to foot, bouncing from his heels to his tiptoes, casting surreptitious glances over Kyle's shoulder toward the main house.

"Is your, uh, aunt around?"

"Nah. She's out for... well, pretty much the rest of the day. As soon as this old workhorse rolls into town to start doing the heavy lifting, she likes to take off and have a little... personal time. With her gentlemen friends. At the bar."

Oliver brought his attention back to Kyle. "Does that bother you?"

"Not anymore. When I was a little younger, maybe."

"Did you used to stay out here a lot?"

Kyle paused, choosing his words carefully. "Yeah. I stuck around here pretty much all the time during my junior and senior year. What's with the twenty questions?"

"Just curious. You know, making—making small talk."

"Okay. Whatever you say."

Kyle patted him on the shoulder. Oliver stared down at the hand, then his gaze moved down the arm to Kyle's unclothed chest. He sucked in a shaky breath. "Um..."

Kyle removed the hand and thumbed the stables over his shoulder. "So, you wanna give me a hand, or what? This ain't a vacation, sunshine. If you're staying for dinner, you gotta work for your food around he—mmmfph."

Suddenly Oliver's hands were behind his ears, his insistent mouth moving frantically against Kyle's. Unsteady, they shuffled backward until Kyle butted up against the wall of the stables. Once that stability shored them up, their lips fell into a more comfortable rhythm. More leisurely. More exploratory. More satisfying. Finally, Oliver pulled back.

Kyle breathed hard and squinted up at Oliver's face. "What brought that on?" Not that he was complaining.

Oliver seemed dazed, almost trance-like. He spoke slowly, his eyes still closed. "I dunno. Seemed... okay, didn't it?"

Kyle grinned. "Yeah. That was pretty okay." He remembered their last kiss and chuckled at how okay that had been too, until it wasn't. Best to check the waters first this time, he thought. Make sure he knew from the get-go where he stood. Put things to the test. He took a deep breath, preparing himself for the dust that would be left in Oliver's wake. "Thank God I'm gay, right?"

Oliver remained, dust firmly in place under his feet.

He shook his head and cupped Kyle's cheek. "It's not that. It's just..." He looked toward the sky and exhaled, as if he were about to give a confession. "Thank God you're you?"

Well now. That did it. Kyle felt it safe to declare the waters thoroughly tested. With a curt nod, he granted himself carte blanche to maul Oliver's mouth.