Page 13 of His Surrender
I’m an idiot. A selfish one.
“Nah, if he’s as cool as Foss says, I doubt the guy will take it out on him,” Ivan said with a shake of his head. “And if hedoes, then he’ll be answering to me.”
“Easy there, killer.”
He grinned and went back to scrubbing the pan. “How didIget stuck with washing duty? You have the easy job.”
“Being the oldest has its perks.”
We finished with the dishes and wiped off the counters. Ivan then lightly slapped my arm with the back of his hand. “If you’re that worried about it, talk to the guy when you take Foster on Monday. Clear the air.”
“I will.”
Then, hopefully, I’d get out of this funk and move on. There were way too many men in the world for me to get so hung up on one of them.
***
Monday morning, I drove to Ivan’s and got there around six forty. Foster walked outside with his backpack slung over one shoulder and wearing a white-and-blue hoodie with some anime thing on it. Cason would probably know what it meant, but hell if I did.
Ivan poked his head out of the front door, brushing his teeth, and waved at me. I returned the gesture, and he went back inside. His appointment was at eight, but he had to leave early because it was nearly an hour drive away since the doctor he had to see wasn’t in our area.
“Hey, Foss the Boss,” I said, when Foster opened the door.
He smiled at the nickname and slid into the passenger’s seat. “Thanks for doing this.”
“Anytime.” After getting on the main road and going in the opposite direction I’d been heading, the sun blinded me and I had to put on sunglasses. Emery said I looked like even more of a prick when wearing them. He wasn’t wrong.
There were more cars than I expected when we arrived at the school. Most of them probably faculty.
“You don’t have to park,” Foster said, after I snagged a spot up front. “You can just drop me off.”
This will be awkward, but…
“I actually need to talk to your teacher really quick,” I said as casually as possible, glad for the sunglasses shielding my probably tense expression. But kids could smell fear, and Foster was no fool.
He cocked his head. “You seem on edge. Why?”
“Look, I didn’t want to say anything, but I kind of know Remi—er, Mr. Barnett. Not well but enough. I won’t be long.”
Foster stared at me blankly before he curled his nose. “Oh geez. Are you sleeping with my teacher?”
Funny how I didn’t care what anyone thought of my bed hopping—not Emery or the nurses I told my insanely high sexual partners number to—but having my nephew point out my slutty ways made me a little ashamed. If only a little. For most of his life, I’d only visited him during holidays or the occasional birthday since they had lived so far away, and now that he was close enough for me to see every day, I cared what he thought.
“No, I’m not,” I answered.Even if I want to be.
“I’m not judging if you are.” Foster unbuckled his seat belt and opened the door before dragging his backpack from the floorboard and resting it on his shoulder. “I didn’t think he’d be your type.”
“Yeah?” I met Foster around the front of the car and walked with him toward the building. “What do you think my type is?”
He scrunched his face up. “I don’t know. Maybe someone who works out a lot and looks like a model.”
“Damn, Foss. Might as well come out and say I go for shallow men.” He wasn’t wrong, though. Other than Emery, that was mainly the type of guys I banged.
“Not shallow,” he corrected, his eyes widening with panic. “I’d never think that about you, Uncle Jay. I just meant I think you’d go for guys more on your playing field.”
My sexuality had never been an issue in my family. Before I’d come out, I had feared it would be. But I’d worried and spent all those years hiding for nothing. Ivan teased me about it sometimes, but it was always in good fun. I knew how lucky I was. Not everyone’s family was as supportive as mine.
It made me happy Foster felt the same.
