Title: Tastes of Home

Writer: Azure K Mello

Part: 13

Rest found here:

Feedback: Please! I wait for it like a trained dog, plus I like to know what people are thinking, it's reassuring. Thank you to everyone who has already sent me lovely note! I know this chapter took forever but the show is sucking right now. Sucking so hard in fact that my muse fell into a black hole, poor baby. Ephram is way OOC in the show itself. He's not an idiot, he's always been the insightful one.

Other notes in prior parts.

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Ephram didn't like that it was Saturday. After tomorrow he would have to go back to school. Jackson went to take a shower and left him alone in bed to get his thoughts together. He had a week, seven days, to bask after that he had no idea what would happen. Hearing the water turn off in the bathroom he stood slowly. Cleanliness and food were at the top of his priorities right now: get clean, get fed, get your life together.

"Shower's yours," said Jackson softly from the door which he shut behind him and dropped the towel from around his waist, "I'm gonna go get something out of my car, I forgot it last night I was too busy seething about Shiny."

"Bright," corrected Ephram.

"I'm well aware of his name, Phram." Jackson said as he stepped into his jeans.

Smiling Ephram said, "When you first came here I was Eff and now I'm back to being Phram? It's nice."

"You were about to kick my ass when I first got here. And I fear you when you're angry." He kissed Ephram with a chaste kiss. "You smell edible."

"I smell of cum."

"Yep," Jackson smiled, he paused, "Are you sixteen yet?"

"As of a week ago. I know what you're thinking. This is legal. It wasn't when I was fourteen though." Ephram smiled at the older boy as he walked to get a towel. "My father won't go to the cops for statutory rape, after all, then he's have to admit to knowing." He laughed, "Go get your "thing" from the car. Then we'll do something later. I could take you to the pinnacle of culture: the mini-golf range."

"You're fucking me," Jackson's voice was flat and Ephram turned back to him with a slow happy look dawning on his face.

"And vice versa."

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"Hi," Madison said upon entering the kitchen. The boy caught her off guard. He was eating a bowl of cereal while standing at the sink. "They've invented this cool thing called a chair."

"And generally I find them to be a novel and useful piece of furniture but I need to go to the mechanic's." He smiled and drank the last of the milk out of the bowl.

"You're leaving?"

"No, I forgot Ephram's peace treaty gift last night. I was too busy getting pissed that some idiot thought he could hit on my boy." She smiled, he didn't like the condescension in her face. He felt badly for his prejudice against her. He couldn't be sure if there truly was arrogance in her look. The fact was he didn't like anything that tied Ephram to the town, she was one of the few things that did. And so he was predisposed to dislike her. Trying to make amends for his unjust thoughts he said, "It's nice that you're here for him. He needs that. He doesn't need a mother, or your advice," he added the second one on a hunch and her slight reaction confirmed his thought. Ephram didn't need anyone to explain life to him, it was one thing he understood unequivocally, "He doesn't need anyone to tell him how to get by. All he needs is someone nearby for when he falls. And I'll be in New York after this week."

Madison nodded, "I know, he doesn't talk to Andy."

That hit a nerve. What exactly had Ephram told the girl? He tried to like Andy, he tried. And he tried to prove to Ephram that Andy wasn't too bad when compared to his parents. . . but then Jeffrey Dahmer wasn't too bad when compared to Hitler. "Oh he talks, he just stops when Andy never listens." Madison didn't get what he was saying. Hadn't she just said that? He saw her confusion and said, "You make it sound as though he cut his father out long ago. It's the other way around. Ephram didn't just decide his father would never acknowledge him, he had to test it."

He put his empty bowl in the sink, "Excuse me." He walked past her and up the stairs. The bathroom door was locked. He pulled an old lock pick out of his back pocket. He fiddled about for a moment and then had the door open and then shut it behind himself. Throwing the curtain back he smiled at his soapy boyfriend, "I'm going to the car now."

"And?" asked Ephram with a confused look.

"And I officially hate this town."