Rainbow Road (14 page)

An idea began worming its way into Nelson’s brain. Kyle had always said Jason was a great kisser. What would it feel like to kiss him now? Sleeping soundly as he was, would Jason even notice?

Jason gurgled a snore, rattling Nelson back to sanity. Was he nuts? He drew a deep breath, trying to calm himself. He’d better get laid pronto and stop lusting after his best friend’s boyfriend or this trip was realy going to turn into a disaster.

Rather than wake Jason from his snoring, Nelson left him alone. He decided it was better to lie awake wanting to clobber the noisy goon than hoping to ravish him.

And with that thought, he somehow fel asleep.

The folowing morning Nelson awoke to find Jason’s sleeping bag empty. No doubt he’d gone to shoot hoops. Although Nelson didn’t envy Jason’s dedication, he admired him for it.

Nelson emerged from the tent, curious how Kyle had made out in the backseat of the car. When he saw Kyle was stil sleeping, he tried to extricate his toothbrush, soap, and towel from the front seat as quietly as possible.

Nevertheless, Kyle blinked awake, groggily glaring at his watch. “I’m so exhausted. I couldn’t sleep out here.” He gazed toward the tent and whispered, “Is he awake?”

“You mean the skank? He’s shooting baskets, I think. I couldn’t sleep either. I kept having to tel him to rol over.”

“Get used to it,” Kyle replied, climbing out of the car. “’Cause I’m not sleeping with him anymore.”

“Kyle, I think you’re overreacting. You knew Jason liked girls when you met him. Just because he hit on some blondie doesn’t mean he’s dumping you. You’re just cheesed off because you can’t control him.”

“You know, I’m realy getting sick of your control crap.” Kyle slammed the car door.

“Wel, you
are
controling,” Nelson said. He grabbed his cel phone and set off for the bathroom, dialing his mom as he walked. Big mistake. She yeled at him for not caling back the previous day after she’d left a message.

Nelson sat on the toilet seat, listening to her rant and wishing he could dump her into the bowl, though not realy. He knew she cared about him or she wouldn’t give him such a hard time.

He stood up from the seat, done with his stinky business, and cupped the phone beneath his chin while he reached for the rol of toilet paper. As he did that, the smal metal phone slipped out from beneath his chin. Immediately, he grabbed for it, his fingers brushing the metal, but he missed.

The phone plunged directly into his morning labors. Plop!

“Damn it!” Nelson banged the butt of his hand against the stal partition. “Damn it!” He stared at the sunken phone at the bottom of the bowl. “Damn it! Damn it!” He stomped his feet, debating. Should he stick his hand in to get it back? How nasty was that? He’d be touching not only his own germs, but those of a milion other people who’d ever … yuck! Besides, he wasn’t about to use that phone again. It probably wouldn’t even work anymore.

As he puled his shorts up, trying to decide what to do, someone shuffled into the stal next door and farted.
Oh, great
.

Out of frustration Nelson reached for the toilet handle. He’d just flush the stupid thing and buy a new one. But what if the phone clogged the toilet and flooded the entire bathhouse?

Besides, with the car repairs and al the money he was spending on this trip, he couldn’t afford to buy a new phone. And this one might stil work. Once before it had gotten wet in a rainstorm—though not this wet.

Holding his breath, Nelson leaned over the bowl and extended his arm, his fingers breaking the cold water.

“Gross, gross, gross,” he muttered to himself, as he deftly plucked the metal phone from its resting place.

He let out his breath and quickly bundled the phone in toilet paper to dry it off. Flushing the toilet, he tried to decide: Now what? Should he wash it?

He couldn’t use it like it was. Since it was already wet, a little more water couldn’t hurt. He carried it to the faucet, soaped it up, rinsed, and held it beneath the hand dryer til it was fuly dry.

Now, the test. As he left the bathhouse, he pressed the ON button and waited. Nothing. He tried again. Stil nothing. After al that? Crap.

At the campsite Kyle and Jason were sitting at opposite ends of the picnic table, eating their bowls of milk and cereal, not speaking.

“Can I use the phone?” Kyle asked. “I want to cal my mom.”

Nelson sat down between Kyle and Jason. Should he tel them?

“It’s not working,” he said simply. “See?” He pressed the ON button again but the phone failed to light up.

“What happened to it?” Kyle asked.

“I don’t know,” Nelson lied.

“Wel, here.” Kyle reached for it. “Let me look at it.”

Nelson lifted the phone away from his grasp. Even though Kyle was pretty good at fixing things, shouldn’t Nelson first tel him where the phone had been? But how could he?

Silently he handed the phone to Kyle.

Kyle puled the battery cover off and set it next to his cereal bowl. “It’s wet. How’d it get wet?”

“I don’t know.” Nelson looked beyond the picnic table, avoiding Kyle’s gaze.

“Nelson, what did you do to it?”

“Nothing.”

“Nelson!” Kyle’s voice rose with annoyance. “Would you just tel me what happened?” Nelson glanced at Kyle, then at Jason, unable to keep his secret any longer. “It fel in the toilet.”

“Oh, gross, man!” Jason bolted up, yanking his cereal bowl and spoon off the table.

“Why didn’t you tel me?” Kyle asked, glancing down at the phone in his hands.

“I washed it off with soap,” Nelson said lamely.

“This is great.” Kyle dropped the phone onto the table and wiped his hands across his shorts. “Not only don’t we have enough money, now we don’t have a phone.”

Nelson stared down at the ground, feeling like a total dumb-ass. How would they manage?

None of the three boys said much after that. Each sulenly roled up his own sleeping bag. They took down the tent and packed up the car.

“I’l drive,” Nelson offered, once they were ready. “Where are we heading today?”

“We’re going to San Antonio, aren’t we?” Jason asked Kyle. “You said you wanted to see the Alamo.”

“No, let’s just skip it,” Kyle replied, climbing into the backseat.

“But you said it’s supposed to be realy cool.” Nelson turned the ignition.

Kyle glared at him straight on. “I don’t feel like it anymore, al right? I want to keep going.” Boy, was he cranky.

As Nelson puled onto the two-lane road outside the campground, he got caught behind a dump truck.

“Don’t folow so close,” Kyle cautioned him.

“But he’s going, like, five miles an hour!” Nelson shifted impatiently in his seat.

“You’re too close!” Kyle insisted.

The next instant, a pebble catapulted from the truck, flying onto the windshield. Smack!

Nelson winced, clutching the steering wheel. The rock chipped the glass and bounced off, continuing its flight.

“Crap!” Jason reached over and felt the inside of the window where the stone had left its mark.

“He cracked my windshield!” Nelson began beeping his horn. “What should I do? Should I stop him?”

“His insurance isn’t going to pay for that,” Kyle said. “I told you not to folow so close.”

“But it’s his fault!” Nelson argued.

Jason shook his head, staring at the dime-size crack. “I just hope it doesn’t grow any bigger or you’re screwed, dude.”

“Asshole!” Nelson shouted at the truck. This was starting to be the suckiest day of his life.

Kyle stared out the backseat window at the receding Austin skyline, angry at Nelson—not for one thing in particular, but for everything: for letting the windshield get chipped, for dropping the phone into the toilet, for insisting they go dancing the night before, and for suggesting this stupid trip in the first place.

And he was even angrier at Jason for kissing Leah. He’d always worried Jason might someday go back to girls. And where would that leave Kyle? Maybe Jason wasn’t The One for him after al. But how could he not be? Kyle had been so certain.

From the instant Kyle had seen him that first day of high school, he’d sensed Jason was going to have a special place in his life. And wasn’t it amazing how Jason had walked into the gay youth meeting? Everything had been so perfect: how they became friends first and then boyfriends. How could Jason betray him like this?

As the car drove westward, up and down the roling hils of central Texas, Kyle felt his heart lurching and plunging. One moment he wanted to shake Jason and the next minute he wanted to cling to him.

In the front seat Nelson puled out a cigarette and Jason turned toward him, glaring.

“Don’t scowl at me that way.” Nelson’s hand trembled as he lit up. “I’m upset about the windshield.” Jason shook his head in disgust and roled down his window. In the backseat, Kyle got blasted by both the hot air from outside and Nelson’s cigarette smoke from inside.

“Put it out,” he told Nelson.

“Huh?” Nelson glanced in the rearview.

“I said,” Kyle repeated, “Put. It. Out. I’m sick of breathing in your smoke. I don’t care if this is your car. I’m sick of smeling like tobacco al the time. You can smoke when we stop.”

Kyle’s heart pounded as he braced for an argument. But Nelson’s face puckered into a pout. He tossed the cigarette out the window, muttering something Kyle couldn’t hear because of the wind.

Jason glanced over his shoulder at Kyle. “Thanks.”

Kyle turned away from him, stil angry, as they reached I-10, where a sign welcomed them to WONDERFUL WEST TEXAS—DRIVE FRIENDLY. After that the landscape became flatter and the sky seemed to grow taler before their eyes. The oak trees got scrubbier, and the ground cover faded from vivid green to pale brown.

Patches of flat nopal cactus began to appear alongside pinwheel windmils.

“It looks like we’re in a cowboy movie.” Jason pointed at a huge flat-topped mesa and turned toward Kyle. But Kyle remained cooly silent, taking in the desert sights without Jason’s help.

“Hey, look!” Nelson exclaimed, passing an RV. “They’ve got a rainbow flag!” He beeped the horn and waved.

Two older guys, one light-complexioned and the other cinnamon-skinned, waved back from the front seats of the RV.

That was just about the most exciting event of the next couple of hours. After awhile the monotonous landscape of washed-out creek beds and recurring mesas seemed like a film background that kept repeating. The interstate stretched boringly ahead of them, cutting through limestone cliffs. And Jason began reading mileage signs: “Fort Stockton 139 miles,” “Fort Stockton 102 miles,” “Fort Stockton 86 miles.”

“Would you stop?” Nelson finaly shouted at him. “It’s like dripping water torture. You’re driving me crazy.” Jason gave a wounded frown. “I need to take a—” He stopped and corrected himself. “I need to use the bathroom.”

“We may as wel stop for lunch,” Kyle suggested.

Outside Ozona a bilboard advertised the Halfway Café, and they decided to try that.

“Yeah, it looks halfway decent,” Nelson quipped as he drove into the crowded parking lot.

Inside, the café wals were lined with a bizarre colection of paintings—of a beagle eating at a bowl, a lone brown horse grazing on a green hilside, and a goat devouring a hat. In the corner hung a photo of the World Trade Center with the caption: PRAY. And at the center of each table stood a single cowboy boot, serving as a vase stuffed with plastic flowers.

While Jason headed to the restroom, Kyle scanned the packed restaurant. Weathered-looking men in jeans, every one with either a cowboy hat, a basebal cap, or hat hair, occupied each table.

“Hi, boys,” said a mint-uniformed waitress. “A table should clear in a sec.”

“I wonder if her name’s Flo,” Nelson whispered.

Kyle ignored him, watching out the window. The RV they’d passed earlier was puling into the parking lot. Once parked, the two older guys climbed out and walked into the café. Their hair was graying and tiny wrinkle lines showed at their eye corners.

“Hi.” Kyle gave them a friendly nod and the men smiled back.

“Aren’t you the boys with the rainbow flag?” the darker man asked and introductions folowed. “I’m Miguel and this is Todd, my partner.” Todd’s gaze moved between Kyle and Nelson. “And are the two of you …?”

“We’re just friends,” Kyle clarified.

“
Best
friends,” Nelson corrected. “His boyfriend is … this guy.” Nelson pointed with his thumb as Jason walked up. Todd and Miguel introduced themselves again.

“Y’al together?” the waitress asked.

Kyle turned to the men. “You want to sit with us?”

After spending so much time around people his own age these past few days, Kyle eagerly welcomed the opportunity to be around adults.

“We’d love to,” Miguel said, and Todd smiled. “Are you sure it’s okay with you guys?”

“We don’t want to intrude,” Miguel added.

“It would be great,” Kyle assured them.

The waitress led them to a freshly cleared round table. Kyle was glad to be sitting with the guys. It took his mind off Jason and Nelson, even though Nelson hardly let anyone else say anything as he recounted tales of the Faerie Sanctuary, Graceland, the Britney contest, the windshield crack …

After the waitress returned and took their orders, Kyle seized the opportunity to jump into the conversation. “How long have you two been together?” Todd and Miguel gazed at each other, smiling.

“Twenty years,” Todd said softly.

“Twenty years today,” Miguel specified, nodding happily at Todd.

Kyle realized that these two guys had been together as long as his parents had.

“This is our anniversary trip.”

“Touring the West.”

“We’ve been planning it for years.”

“Since the first night we met.”

“We talked about our dreams.”

“Twenty
years
?” Nelson’s jaw dropped. “I’m lucky if I can get a guy’s attention for twenty minutes.” Jason moved the boot with the flowers aside to get a better view of the guys. “So, like, what’s your secret?”

“Our secret?” Miguel asked.

“Yeah, you know, for staying together.”