Heart on the Run (3 page)

While he was gone the restaurant would carry on, and his absence would be felt by no one. It was a painful truth, one he hoped to change. Someday.

“
Hey! Hey, Chaz! Hold up!”

Instantly, his heart tripped, and his feet nearly followed. How many times had he left
Alimentaire
in the last two years and heard those same words? He caught himself with a palm on the lamppost. That was when he realized it wasn’t Sprocket’s voice behind him. He wasn’t sure if it was relief or disappointment, or the sharp wind that brought a stinging tear to his eye. Scrubbing the liquid away, he turned. “Yeah, Dermot? Do you need some help after all? I can—”

“
No, no. You’ve done your share this week. Percy and Melrose and I will get things all squared away for tomorrow. I wanted to talk to you about your menus. Can you come in early tomorrow morning?”

His menus? He’d almost forgotten… “Yes! Yes, of course I can!”

“
Great. Go on home then and get some rest.”

“
Sure, boss.”

Dermot’s footsteps receded behind him, but Chaz stood there braced against the lamppost, heart racing with excitement. Dermot liked the menus he’d left?

Maybe next week…his dishes would be featured on the whiteboard. Instinctively he reached for his cellphone to share his excitement. His thumb hovered over a number…touched ever so faintly.

Why?

Why had he done that?

But he didn’t hang up… Couldn’t bring himself to do it.

Madonna’s voice rang out behind him with all the fervor of her 80’s self extolling the virtues of her lover and the feeling of regaining her virginity. God, did he recognize that feeling! He'd left virginity behind better than a decade ago, but Sprocket's touch…

“
Sprocket?” Chaz spun around. Sure enough, sometime during his reverie, Sprocket had left Craft Time and was making his own way down the sidewalk. He ended the call and Madonna shut up.

“
Chaz?” Sprocket pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked from it to Chaz. “Was that you?”

“
Yeah.” With any luck at all, the darkness hid the flush on his cheeks. Why had he called Sprocket? Pushing himself off the post, Chaz faced the parking lot and began walking.

Sprocket’s footsteps behind him sounded like a battering ram, fast and hard and angry, as he pushed himself to catch up. “Hey! Hey! Chaz! C’mon.”

You’re an insufferable idiot.

I can’t do this. Not with him.

You’re the one who called.

“
You called me.” Sprocket grabbed his arm, squeezing tight.

Chaz yanked back. They wrestled silently, breath frosting in the air between them for a few seconds before Chaz sighed and slowed down. They fell into step, automatically matching stride and pace.

“
I’m sorry,” Chaz whispered. “I didn’t mean to…”

“
To what? Kick me to the curb like yesterday’s trash? Come and run? It didn’t have to be like that.”

Oh fuck yes, it did.
“I meant that I didn’t mean to call you. My finger slipped.” The lie hurt…just like seeing Sprocket hurt…but the hurt was nothing. Not when compared to what that hurt bought him. Peace of mind. Serenity.

No one weeping at my funeral. No one missing me. That’s the way it’s got to be.

“
Is that a new thing? Like butt dialing and drunk texting? I call bullshit.” Sprocket’s voice was tight and angry, at odds with his normal effervescence.

Chaz shrugged, rolling his shoulders to loosen tense muscles. They were at the lot, his car just a few feet away, and Sprocket’s vehicle was way down on the other side. Chaz hit the unlock button on his fob and his headlights came on. The engine purred to life. “Call it what you want. I meant to call my ma and share some good news.” He wrenched the door open and slid into the driver’s seat before the last words faded on the air.

Sprocket stood there, glaring, arms crossed, feet planted firmly. Chaz shifted gears, clenched the wheel tightly, and waited. It felt like an hour, but could only have been seconds later that Sprocket shook himself, swept a mocking bow, and trotted off to his own car.

***

“
Yo, Sprocks, is that you?”

Sprocket tossed his keys in the five foot urn by the front door. Mason, Sprocket’s roommate and best friend since grade school made the monstrosity special for them at his uncle’s ceramic store in Huntington, a town about forty miles from Parkerburg. Uncle Clay—as everyone called him, relatives and friends alike—specialized in handcrafted pottery. This piece was glazed in a deep glossy blue, and even though on the outside it looked like a huge five foot tall belled out urn, on the inside it only dipped down about six inches, so you could toss your keys and change in there and not have to buy a plane ticket to China to get them back.

“
Earth to Sprocks, come in, Sprocks, can you hear me?”

“
Turn off SyFy. You’ve obviously had enough.” He toed off his sneakers and headed into the kitchen for a double shot of whatever the fuck was available.

Dragging a ladder-back chair from the table to the front of the fridge, Sprocket launched himself on to the padded seat and opened those two elusive cabinet doors that he swore over half the population never used. Mason and he always kept the good stuff up there. It was far enough out of the way you had to work for it if you really wanted it—giving you time to rethink the whole heavy drinking at home issue—but it wasn’t so far away that you had to run to the liquor store at three in the morning when the son of a bitch still hadn’t called you back and you couldn’t purchase a decent shot of tequila.

Except there wasn’t any tequila in there. Sprocket shuffled the bottles around to make sure—Grey Goose vodka half full, some dark rum, some light rum, some spiced rum, Tanqueray gin, cinnamon whiskey. Nothing so grand they’d have to mortgage the house to buy but good enough that the hangover the next day was doable.

But no tequila.

“
Wow, bad day with the buttons and lace?”

Sprocket turned and stared at his roommate. “Where’s the—”

Mason shrugged. “I had Cheryl over last week, remember? And trust me, tequila really does make her clothes fall off.”

Growling, Sprocket reached in and grabbed the Jack Daniel’s Tennessee Fire. “You could’ve replaced it,” he grumbled as he hopped off the chair and twirled it back to the table. He raised his eyebrow to Mason as he sat down. “Don’t stand there debating whether you want to fuck me or fight me, just get me a glass of ice.”

Mason shook his head slowly and whistled, but he did cross the kitchen to get the ice. “You do realize this is your grandma’s kitchen, and she’s looking down at you wanting to slap you silly for the language.”

Even though Sprocket was determined not to smile tonight after being totally humiliated by Chaz, as always, his best friend knew how to get him to grin.

“
Bullshit.” He chuckled. “She’d tell me to take you up on the offer and work out some of my tension.”

“
Oh, so I offered now, did I?” Mason placed two glasses filled with ice on the table.

“
Didn’t you?” Sprocket reached for the bottle, but Mason swooped in and grabbed it out from under him.

“
Now now, you don’t need to be in charge of the libations this evening, my furry friend.”

Sprocket fought it, but the corner of his mouth curled up. “Don’t you dare go and try to put me in a good mood. Everyone has the right to pout once in a while.”

Damn, Mason knew where Sprocket’s emotional buttons were. Didn’t matter whether it was screaming, tears, or laughing, Mason could make Sprocket do it with just a key word or phrase.

This time it was the furry friend endearment.

Sprocket had always been hyper, even as a toddler. His grandmother spent more time chasing him, or deconstructing all the things he tried to build with the cushions and stuff, or simply just standing there listening to him jabber jaw about nothing for thirty minutes straight without taking a breath—her words not his. He had reason to believe Grams liked to exaggerate when it came to her baby boy. But, one thing that seemed to glue Sprocket’s tuchus to the ground and keep him entertained when the adults needed a break…
Fraggle Rock
. His Grams had dozens of episodes recorded from before he was born, and one day she popped a tape in the VCR and the rest was history.

Evidently Sprocket especially liked it when his grandpa watched them with him. From the many, many stories Sprocket had heard throughout his life—half of them repeated by Mason as soon as he’d found out—Sprocket would start on Gramps’s lap, bouncing and clapping, but by the end of the half hour long episode, he would be crawling on his hands and knees, barking like the dog on the show. That was why his grandfather nicknamed him Sprocket, after the big gray dog on
Fraggle Rock
. He didn’t think the name would’ve stuck if anyone but Gramps had come up with it.

Only a select few were privy to Sprocket’s real name, but his boss didn’t even know the story of how he’d gotten the nickname.

“
You’re right, everyone does have a right to pout once in a while,” Mason agreed. “But there’s the kicker, once in a while. Shall we discuss how long your pouting session has lasted?”

Sprocket downed his glass of whiskey in two burning gulps then signaled for Mason to refill him. “I haven’t been that bad…for that long.”

“
No, you haven’t.” Mason poured the fiery liquid into the old-fashioned glass only a quarter full this time. “There was a period that I thought you were finally over it. But you show up tonight and want your fighting liquor. Dude, he’s just not that into you, so fuck him.”

“
No pun intended?” Sprocket sipped the second glass, knowing damn good that there wouldn’t be a third one.

“
Oh, honey, you drill like you’re looking for oil. If you couldn’t win him over with your skills, he
really
isn’t into you.”

“
It’s not even the sex, you know? Even though…just damn…fuck. But we never have to do it again. It’s not like I forced myself on him anyway. He dragged my ass to his place. It’s the friendship I hate losing. People don’t have enough friends in life, to lose even one of them hurts.”

Mason blinked, smirking as he nursed his first glass of Tennessee Fire. “How the hell do you manage to be a callous pig, a horny dog, and a sweet kitten all in the same breath?”

“
No more Discovery Channel either. We could save a lot of money if we nix the cable altogether.”

His roommate gasped. “That was Animal Planet, and bite your tongue…unless you want me to bite it for you tonight?” He raised his eyebrow and drank.

Feeling looser from the alcohol and happier from the conversation, Sprocket shook his head. “Nah, this rig just wants to hit the sheets and get some sleep.” He pushed the liquor away from him and stood. As he passed Mason, he squeezed his shoulder and kissed the top of his head. “Thanks, Mase.”

“
Anytime, honey.” Mason patted his hand. “You may want this guy to still be in your friend box, but not all men are like you. Some just can’t be friends after sex. There really isn’t anything for you to decide here, Sprocket. If he doesn’t want the friend label from you anymore, you can’t force him. And really, would you want to?”

“
No,” Sprocket sighed.

“
Exactly. Personally I think he’s an idiot. Who doesn’t love Sprocks?”

Sprocket laughed all the way to his bedroom. Thankfully, Mason didn’t call him on how hollow it sounded.