Page 2 of Capturing Perfection

“Drop it, Clay.”

He swiped the book from Logan’s hand. “Look at me, Logan.” He winced when the eyes that only a moment ago had been soft and pliant withhurt,now burned with fury.

“Talk to me.”

“There’s nothing to talk about. You’re gay. You’re going out on a date because you wanna get laid, and you don’t need me anymore.”

Clay moved closer and attempted to pull Logan into his arms, but Logan jerked away and jumped off their lumpy saggy sprung couch.

Logan backed across the few feet of their living, dining and kitchen area with his hands out. “Don’t touch me!”

Clay’s heart shattered at the distrust in Logan’s voice and stance. He knew Logan had issues with homosexuality. He wasn’t a bigot. He was a victim, and all those fears and memories were clearly rearing their ugly head. Clay tried to tell himself that it wasn’t him Logan was running from; it was the past, but that didn’t stop the pain.

“That’s not it at all! Yes, I want to date, and yeah, I wanna get laid. Don’t tell me your right hand doesn’t get tired from time to time. But to say I don’t need you? That’s ridiculous. I’ll always need you.”

“Well, maybe, I don’t want you anymore.”

A searing pain ripped through Clay’s chest as Logan stared daggers at him for a fewseconds,then walked out of the apartment…

After that confrontation, Clay remained in bed for two days, the sheets damp with tears and his thoughts heavy with regret. Logan had never returned to the apartment, but Clay hadhoped to see him at the exam for their Sociological Methods class. However, when he’d arrived and Logan was conspicuously absent,his professor informed him that Logan had pleaded to take the exam earlier that day. Clay came home to find the apartment devoid of Logan's things; his clothes and books were gone, leaving behind an unsettling vacuum. Logan left no note, and Clay knew his confession had turned the love of his only steadfast supporter into hate.

Now, sixteen years later, Logan was back, and the adult who lived with him was a shell of the young man he’d loved. In the month since his discharge, each moment of silence that stretched between them was agonizingly painful. He knew Logan was trying to adapt to his limitations after his injury, but God, Clay missed him.

The ringing of his phone sliced through his melancholy thoughts, startling him from his reverie. Before he lifted the receiver to his ear, he took one last look at the photograph, his eyes lingering on the smiling face captured within.

“Hello?”

“Detective Phillips?”

“Yes.”

“This is Lieutenant Armstrong over in district A-1. We received a call fromHo Yuen Bakeryin Chinatown. It appears that a man by the name of Logan Callen is causing some type of disturbance in the establishment. We ran his name in the system, and it came up that your addresses match.”

Clay stood and looked around his desk to make sure he had his badge, weapon, wallet, and keys. “He’s an old friend crashing with at my place for the foreseeable future. What’s going on? Logan’s not violent.”

Clay crossed his fingers for the small fib. Logan had a nasty temper when pushed, and Clay suspected the things Logan had seen and done in the Rangers would make most people averttheir gaze, like watching a horror film. However, Logan wasn’t violent by nature.

“All I know is that some patron called the police saying Mr. Callen suddenly screamed, and now he won’t speak to anyone or move.”

“Shit. I’m on my way. Can you tell the uniform not to engage? It’s possible he’s having a flashback, or some kind of anxiety attack. They recently medically discharged him from the Rangers because of a combat injury. As far as I know, this is the first time he’s gone over two blocks from the apartment by himself. Also, Logan has a severe hearing loss in both ears, so he can’t actually hear someone speaking to him. I’ve taken up stock in Post-its since he came home.”

“I’ll do what I can, detective, but I suggest hauling your ass to Chinatown as fast as you can.”

Chapter Two

Clay rushed to his vehicle out back. Luckily, he'd snagged a spot when he came back to the station after doing legwork on an investigation that morning. He flew down West Broadway much faster than was safe. The bakery in Chinatown could be as few as seven minutes away from his South Boston station or seventeen minutes, depending on traffic. Clay slammed on the brakes and dodge around clueless driver at Dorchester Avenue intersection.

"Son of a bitch! Get off TikTok and watch what you're doing. I know my black unmarked vehicle blends with other drivers, but that's what the pretty lights and sirens are for asshole!"

Hundreds of feet of train track stretched out beneath him like spaghetti strands on the rail yard. Then Clay made the sharp turn to head toward downtown. To his left, traffic was at a standstill on I-93. Once he turned onto Kneeland, Clay knew things would get tricky. The tighter congested streets fromHudson to Beach meant more weaving and horn blaring. What the hell was going on with Logan?

He'd struggled with PTSD since his return. Clay knew Logan got nervous around groups of people. The night he’d brought Logan home, they’d gone to dinner at what used to be their favorite diner. They hardly spoke, and all the while, Logan's body remained as tense as a coiled rattlesnake.

Last week, after Clay had taken Logan to the VA clinic in Jamaica Plain to get his meds refilled, they’d come home, and Logan had enclosed himself in his room for the next two days. Clay had heard Logan scream out in his sleep at night, but since Logan seemed to resent having to live with Clay again, Clay hadn’t tried to confront him about the obvious nightmares.

Sometimes, it felt as if those screams in the night were the only sign Logan even lived with him. Mostly, it felt as if a ghost inhabited his apartment. The only thing that Clay had gotten Logan to talk about was the cause of his sudden hearing loss. Well, not so much talk as recite.

On the day that he arrived in Georgia to pick up Logan, he received the emotionally flat announcement from Logan himself that a nearby explosion had resulted in bilateral fractures of the temporal bones in his skull. The traumatic fractures he sustained led to a profound and bilateral sensorineural hearing loss, significantly impacting his auditory capabilities. Because Logan had difficulty hearing, he requested that Clay, should he choose to speak to him, enunciate while maintaining direct eye contact so that Logan could lip-read. With a resolute turn of his back, the stoic man silently walked over to the car and got inside. The homecoming was not what Clay had imagined throughout the years, a stark contrast to his dreams, and it became also apparent that he lacked the understanding of the magnitude of Logan's ordeal.

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