Salvation (4 page)

“I never saw it.”

We’d pulled up to a red light, and he
pivoted around in his seat and stared at me with surprise. “Oh! I totally
assumed you were gay. Sorry dude, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable or
anything.”

“I
am
gay.”

“Then why have you never seen Dirty
Dancing?”

I laughed at that. “It’s not actually
mandatory viewing for all gay men everywhere.”

“It kind of
is
,” he insisted. “I
own it on VHS, not that I actually have a player. I’ll have to borrow one from
somewhere so I can show it to you.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because it’s
Dirty Dancing
.
It’s tragic that you’ve never seen it. I think I’ve watched it about a hundred
times.”

“Now
that’s
tragic,” I teased.

“Don’t judge me,” he said with a grin.

“Too late.”

Skye took a corner a little fast, and
the big clock swayed a bit, which made the whole truck weave slightly. “Woops,”
he said, slowing down again. Then he asked, “How long have we been gone? I hope
River’s not mad at us.”

“Maybe ninety minutes? It’s probably
fine, we’ll get back in time to help him clean up.”

We started climbing one of the steeper
hills in the city. It probably had a name, but I hadn’t lived here long enough
to know what it was. Hunter’s apartment and my catering job was at the very top
of the hill.

The grade got even steeper the more we
climbed, and I began to get nervous. I twisted around and watched the huge
clock through the rear window. “This might be a bad idea, Skye,” I said.

“Why?”

“Because steep hills and giant, round
objects are kind of a recipe for—” Before I could say ‘disaster,’ one of the
ropes snapped. Right then, Skye hit a pothole, and the Man in the Moon bounced.
More ropes snapped, and suddenly the huge clock was in motion, easily clearing
the gate on the truck bed. “Oh holy crap!” I yelled, and Skye slammed on the
brakes.

We didn’t have to worry about anyone
rear-ending us, because all the cars behind us were already dodging out of the
way of the huge, rolling object and hitting their brakes, too. The hideous face
leered at everyone it passed, pedestrians quickly grabbing their cellphones to
record the spectacle. More cars swerved out of the way, miraculously not hitting
each other, drivers getting out of their cars to stare after the tremendous
timepiece.

Meanwhile, Skye threw his truck in park
right in the middle of the street and took off down the hill after the clock. I
hurtled over to the open driver’s door and ran after him, even though I knew we
didn’t stand a chance in hell of stopping that clock.

I happened to glance to my left as I
sprinted downhill. Oh, great. Vincent, Nana’s handsome grandson, was on the
sidewalk with a grocery sack, staring at me with a surprised expression. If a
giant sinkhole opened up and swallowed me right then, I would have been
grateful.

The clock was a couple blocks ahead of
us, and I froze and cringed when it shot through an intersection. It actually
had the green light and made it through without incident. I let out the breath
I’d been holding and took off running again.

Finally,
finally
, the Man in the
Moon met his match. He launched into a little park at the bottom of the hill
and crashed into a palm tree, then face-planted onto the lawn
anticlimactically. We caught up to it a few moments later and looked around.
Aside from the tree, the clock had hit absolutely nothing, no people, no cars,
not a thing. When I realized this I dropped to my knees and started laughing,
out of relief as much as anything else.

Skye dropped onto the ground beside me,
and then he was laughing, too. He threw his arms around me and we fell onto our
backs on the grass. “I can’t believe that just happened,” he said when he
caught his breath. “It was like a Charlie Chaplin movie. I wish we’d somehow
recorded it.”

“Lots of other people recorded it,” a
deep voice said. “You’ll probably be on the evening news.” I sat up and looked
at Vincent. Apparently he’d driven Skye’s truck down the hill and was standing
at the edge of the lawn, trying not to look amused.

“Titanic timepiece terrorizes town,” I
blurted, despite myself, and Skye and I burst out laughing again. Vincent
covered his mouth with the back of his hand and cleared his throat. I was
pretty sure he was hiding a smile.

Once we’d calmed down a bit, Vincent
said, “I hate to break up the party, but you’re probably both going to be
arrested any minute for numerous public safety violations. You might consider
getting out of here.”

Skye looked at me and said, “I totally
can’t afford bail,” then leapt to his feet. I followed, and we hoisted up the
clock. Surprisingly, the face was still intact. The only damage was to the
metal frame around the inner workings, which had gone from a perfect circle to
more of an egg shape on impact. That made it wobbly when we rolled it over to
the truck, but we still got it there, and Vincent helped us load it into the
pickup bed and quickly tie it down.

“I’d suggest not attempting that hill
again,” Vincent said once the clock was secured.

“Yeah, no kidding,” Skye agreed. “I’m
going to run this home, then I’ll come right back to get you and River and your
catering equipment, Trevor.”

“How will you get it inside?” I asked.

“I’ll have one of my neighbors help me.
There are some body-builders that live downstairs, they live for this kind of
thing.”

Nana’s grandson turned to me and said,
“If you need a lift, I can take you home in my car.”

“I couldn’t trouble you like that,” I
said, and Skye none-too-subtly kicked the back of my shin. When I shot him a
look, he raised his eyebrows at me and tilted his head to the left a couple
times.

I stared at Skye blankly, and he sighed
and said, “Oh for the love of God! Go with the hottie, Trevor. If you don’t, I
will.” He shot a blatantly flirtatious smile at Vincent, who suddenly looked
nervous. It was surprising and kind of cute, since he’d looked so perfectly
composed up to that point. “I’m
kidding
, sexy,” Skye told him with a
wink. “You kids get back to that party before the fuzz rolls up and throws us
in the slammer! I’m going to make a break for it, in the manner of a cartoon
super-villain. Peace out!” With that, Skye leapt into his truck and started to
take off down the street. But then he leaned his head out the window and
yelled, “Trev, don’t forget what I said about the go-go boy job! I could show
you everything you need to know. Just think about it!”

I gave him a little wave as I watched
him drive off and murmured, “I hope his apartment is all downhill.”

“I hope he’s heavily insured,” Vincent
muttered.

We started up the hill side-by-side, and
I tried to pretend the steep incline wasn’t kicking my butt. Less than halfway
up, though, I had to stop pretending. I flopped down on some stairs in front of
a yellow building and gasped for breath. “Gotta rest for a minute. My heart’s
about to explode,” I managed as I drew air into my lungs. “Go on without me.
Save yourself.”

Vincent sat down beside me on the
stairs. “Save myself from what?”

“I don’t know. I’m too winded to make
sense. Pretend I said something witty and coherent there.” I leaned back so far
that my head was resting on one of the upper stairs. “Wow, this hill was so
much easier when I was sprinting down it.”

While I sweated profusely and gasped for
air like a carp that had been hauled out of the water, Vincent sat beside me
placidly, adjusting the cuffs of his shirt and suit jacket. “I’m Trevor, by the
way. How are you not even a little winded?”

“I spend a lot of time on the treadmill
at the gym. And I already knew your name.”

“Oh, right. You heard Skye say it.”

“Actually, I asked my grandmother who
you were,” he said, his dark eyes on the slow line of cars climbing the hill.

“You did?” He didn’t say anything, so I
said, “I asked about you, too. So, do people call you Vinnie? Or Vin? Vin’s
pretty cool, although my mind automatically goes to Vin Diesel, and I’m not
sure that’s a good thing. I mean, he was hot in Pitch Black, but later on he
made that babysitter movie with the diaper jokes, and I just couldn’t quite
build up a whole lot of enthusiasm for him after that. I mean, it’s probably
just me. He’s still hot, just not, you know,
as
hot. To me.” Oh geez,
and I’d been doing so well on the not rambling thing until that point.

“No.”

“No what?”

“People don’t call me either of those
names.”

“Ah.” Rather than risk another ramble, I
just left it at that. After a few moments, I pushed to my feet. “Alright,
apparently I’m no longer at risk of death by heart explosion. I’d better push
on, since I left my catering partner short-handed while I went off to help his
brother.”

We once again began making our way up
the hill. After a couple minutes, Vincent stooped to pick up a brown paper
shopping bag on the curb, glancing inside before falling in step beside me
again.

“What is that?” I asked.

“Eight jars of Maraschino cherries.
Apparently no one bothered to steal them.”

“Why do you have eight jars of
Maraschino cherries?”

“Because my grandmother wanted them.”

“For what?”

“She got the idea to invent an alcoholic
Shirley Temple,” he said.

“That’s so wrong.”

“I know.”

Half a block later, Vincent asked, “What
did the blue-haired guy mean by that go-go boy comment?”

“The blue-haired guy is named Skye, and
he wants me to come work with him as a dancer in some club. There’s so much
wrong with that idea.”

“So, you’re not going to do it?”

“Uh, no. Go-go dancing isn’t for people
that are shy, awkward and built like a beanpole.”

“That’s your personal assessment of
yourself?”

“That’s
everyone’s
assessment of
me.”

“Not everyone’s,” Vincent murmured. We
reached the apartment building, and he pushed the intercom for Hunter’s
penthouse. We were immediately buzzed in, without being asked who we were.

Once we boarded the elevator, I said,
“You must have driven here, since you offered me a ride. But then why did you
walk to get the cherries?”

“I was trying to kill time.”

“Even if it meant climbing that
horrendous hill on purpose?”

“It’s not that bad.”

“Not that bad? Maybe not if your last
name is Sherpa and you were raised on Everest.”

Right before we entered the apartment,
Vincent said, “I’m glad you’re not considering a job as a go-go dancer.”

“Because I’d make a fool of myself?”

“Because you’re too good for that.” He
headed into the party, leaving me staring after him.

*****

“You have
got
to be kidding me.”

River had just gotten his first look at
the Man in the Moon. It had seemed big when it was outside, but now the clock
looked absolutely enormous crammed into the living room of the small apartment
he and his brother shared. River was rooted in the doorway, and Vincent (our
driver) and I were stuck behind him. I was holding stacks of trays, and they
were getting heavy.

“I’m going to put this stuff in your
kitchen, River,” I said as I squeezed past him and began weaving my way through
the living room. It was a weird maze of old car parts, bits of architectural
salvage, and a lot of rusty hunks of God-knows-what.

“You can’t tell me that isn’t awesome,”
Skye said to his brother.

“Oh, yes I can,” River exclaimed, and
the brothers began bickering. I deposited the stuff I was holding in the
kitchen, then went back into the living room, took the wrapped packages of food
from River’s hands and brought them into the kitchen as well. Nana had insisted
on sending leftovers home with us.

Vincent had come into the kitchen too,
and put down the box he’d been carrying for us. Once we’d returned to the party
he’d stayed close to River and me, helping us without being asked. He didn’t
talk much, but the fact that he was trying to be helpful said a lot about him,
I thought. I was rapidly learning to be at ease around him, even if his
attractiveness was still slightly intimidating.

He stepped into the little alcove that
was meant to house a table and chairs. What occupied that space instead was a
larger-than-life three-dimensional sculpture of a man, made entirely out of
bent and welded mismatched cutlery. “This is surprisingly good,” Vincent
murmured, reaching up and running a fingertip over the perfectly defined
collarbone on the sculpture.

“River told me that Skye goes to
Sutherlin, that private art college, on a full scholarship. It figures that
he’s talented,” I said as I loaded their completely empty refrigerator with
leftovers. When I finished, I turned to look at my companion. He was still
studying the sculpture closely, almost analyzing it, his dark eyes serious as
ever.