Page 63 of Shades of Henry
“Not according to him!” Henry would have shaken him, but God, that black crap was all over his body. “Maybe he’s here because you’re the only dude he wants to do!”
“Oh God!” Now Zep was almost in tears. “What am I gonna do? I don’t want him to go off and do other dudes!”
“Well,firstyou wash that shit off your hands,” Henry told him. “Then go change. When he gets back, you ask him if he wants to move in and pay rent, and maybe you two can be exclusive so you can stop talking Curtis into your bed, where he feels like the third wheel.”
“Sorry, my man,” Zep said automatically.
“It was cutting into my studying,” Curtis said, a note of apology in his voice.
“Bummer.” Zep sighed. “Sorry about the waxing you’re about to receive, Randy. I should have maybe tested it out first.”
Zeppelin went back inside, and Henry looked at Curtis. “Could you go get me a trash bag and rip it down the side? We need something for him to stand on so all this shit can get thrown away. It looks like it’ll choke pigeons or kill fish or something. We need to contain it.”
“Yessir.” Curtis turned toward the door, and Henry had a sudden thought.
“Where’s Cotton?” Because that would have made matters fucking perfect in chaos—if Cotton had been there to cry in sympathy as they hard-waxed poor Randy.
“He’s on the schedule today,” Curtis said. He frowned. “You know, he hasn’t had a date in a month. That’s pretty awesome. That shit was killing him.”
Well, good. They had one guy who wasn’t falling apart, bully for apartment 126C.
“Fantastic,” Henry muttered, and Curtis took the hint and left. For a moment, it was just Henry and the perpetually horny kid who seemed to have one goal in life.
And now it was two.
“Randy?” Henry said into the quiet left to them. “What were you thinking?”
“Breaking out—”
Henry shook his head. “Sweetheart, the last couple of months you’ve been running around like a headless chicken. You’re like, ‘I want to bang all the things and then wank all the things and now, it’s why not try all the things?’ What’s wrong? What’s going to happen if you stand still?”
Randy gaped at him. “I… uh.” He swallowed and two big tears rolled down the glossy stuff across his cheeks. “Do I have to talk about it like this?”
Henry looked around them. Everyone else was busy. “You have about five minutes to center yourself and take a deep breath,” he said softly. “Five minutes to figure out what all this activity is about, so you can find a quiet place to go when we start ripping your hair out by the roots. Use your time wisely.”
Randy swallowed. “I can’t ever go home,” he said hoarsely. “I… I just don’t want to think about that.”
Okay, then. “I can’t ever go home, either,” Henry told him. “Not to my parents’ house. Not to the military, which was my home for nine years. Not to my abusive ex-boyfriend who happens to be married to my sister. I can’t go back.”
Randy sucked in a big breath of air. “Oh my God! Really?”
“Really, really. But you know what?”
Randy shook his head. “No.” More tears rolled over the mask, dropping off his chin as clear as if they’d been coming from his reddened eyes. God, this shit was gonna suck to peel off.
“This is my home now. And I’m going to work really hard not to shit the bed while I’m here. You understand what I’m saying?”
Randy nodded, more tears following the first batch. “I’ll remember that,” he said gruffly.
“And another thing.” Henry hated to bring this up, but, well, there were things Randy needed to know. “Use the pool at the gym from now on and not the one here. They use baking soda and not chlorine. I think that’s why your skin’s been so angry. Buddy, you’re surrounded by guys who have made skincare their priority. One of us has got to have the answer.”
“Doh!” Randy squeezed his eyes shut. “Oh my God, you know, you’re totally right, Henry. That’s probably the answer.”
“Glad to help.”
At that moment the door burst open and Billy came out with the ibuprofen and water, Curtis followed with the trash bag, and Henry figured Fisher would be back with the green aloe goop before they were even halfway done.
For Randy’s sake, it was time to get a move on.
