Refugees Page 3

  Groaning urgently, Walter grabbed his own cock and stroked in rhythm with his mouth. Fast. Faster. Then Martin cried out and his thick, salty-sweet seed flooded Walter’s mouth.

  Walter swallowed and came with a shudder.

  Somehow they ended up lying on their backs on the soft bed of pine needles, their jackets spread over their torsos for warmth. They held hands and stared up at the green-and-gray canopy.

  Although he didn’t usually need reassurances, Walter cleared his throat. “Was that—”

  “Almost perfect. I would have liked to taste you too.”

  Damned if Walter’s cock didn’t give a little twitch at that. “It’s not always that… explosive,” he said. “Sex, I mean. Sometimes it’s just a wiggle and a jerk.”

  Martin angled himself slightly to rest his head against Walter’s shoulder and neck. “It was such a good thing, sharing ourselves like that. Almost like when—” He stopped suddenly and sighed. “I forgot the shadows for a while. Did you?”

  “Yeah.”

  They remained silent for a long time—ten, fifteen minutes. Walter felt as if he were sinking into the earth. Maybe he really had put a bullet in his brain and the entire encounter had been the last fantasy of splattered gray matter. But no, Martin was here, solid and real, his curls soft against Walter’s skin.

  “There was a war,” Martin eventually said. Very quietly.

  “I know. I was there.”

  “A different war.” Martin coughed a humorless laugh. “Or maybe they’re all the same. We lost… everything. Our home, our families.”

  A year or two back, Walter’s brother John had told him to stop being so miserable. “I seen plenty of guys who were blown all to shit, but you came back in one piece, Wally. And me and Charlie, we came back okay too, so you didn’t lose anyone. Don’t be such a sad sack.” But what John hadn’t understood was that Walter had lost friends and lovers. He’d lost his youth, his innocence, his optimism. And when he returned to Chicago, although his parents and brothers were still alive and well, he’d lost them too.

  “Your family?” Walter asked Martin.

  The answer came on a sigh. “All gone.”

  After discarding several dozen useless words and consolations, Walter squeezed Martin’s hand. Martin returned the gesture.

  Eventually they collected their cast-off clothes and got dressed. They walked slowly back toward the road. Not hand in hand, but close together, shoulders sometimes brushing.

  When the outskirts of the village came into view—a tidy yellow bungalow and its equally neat green neighbor—Martin stopped Walter with a gentle tug of his arm. “Do you like Kiteeshaa?”

  “It seems too good to be true. Are you getting ready to tell me it’s all some kind of joke? Like that television program my mother watches. Candid Camera.”

  “It’s no joke. When we first arrived… things were difficult. Nothing here was familiar. Your people are… very different from mine. But we found this place, and even as traumatized as we were, we could see its beauty.” Martin waved an arm to indicate the hills, the trees, the small growing things by the side of the road.

  “It’s a nice place.”

  “We worked hard to learn your ways. To blend in.” He shook his head ruefully. “We never will, not completely. But our children…. The older ones don’t remember our home, and the younger ones were born here. This is their home. We try to teach them some of our traditions, but they don’t want to learn. I suppose that’s for the best in the long run.”

  Walter remembered his babcia saying something similar when Walter’s mother chided her for being old country. Babcia had been both bewildered by and proud of her American children and grandchildren. And now, if Walter wished he’d learned a little Polish from her or if he ached for some of the foods she used to make, well, it was too late for that. She was gone.

  “You must miss everything so much,” Walter said.

  “Sometimes. But I’ve come to cherish Kiteeshaa too. If I had to leave here, I’d miss it just as much.” He held a hand to his chest. “I think the people and things you used to love, they never leave your heart. But your heart can grow—it can let in the new.”

  Walter’s heart had crumbled to sand and been washed away by bloodred waves.

  They continued walking. A block from the motor court, they met an elderly man with wispy gray hair and a network of deep wrinkles on his face. “Hi, Burt,” Martin said.

  The man nodded pleasantly at them both, but just before they passed one another, he stopped in his tracks, staring. Then his mouth stretched into a wide smile and he laughed.

  Martin blushed a deep red and shot Walter a quick glance. “Burt, don’t….”

  “I know. But good, Martin. I’m glad to see you.” Still grinning, Burt continued on his way.

  Walter looked down at himself and then at Martin to see if there was visible evidence of their tryst. Nothing was obvious. Martin’s hair was a little wild, but it had been that way before. Besides, although Martin claimed that his people didn’t mind queers, surely they wouldn’t be so gleeful about it.

  “What was that about?” Walter asked.

  His face still red, Martin gave an unconvincing shrug. “I suppose he’s happy I’m showing you around.”

  Although Walter didn’t believe that for a second, he didn’t argue.

  When they reached the motor court parking lot, they paused near the office. “I have to take care of some things,” Martin said. “Do you mind?”

  “Of course not.” Walter hadn’t expected to monopolize his time.

  “Can I treat you to dinner next door?”

  “I can pay.”

  Martin set a hand on his shoulder. “You’re a guest, and that means I pay. It’s one of our customs. A good one to keep, I think.”

  Walter was uneasy to have Martin touching him in public, where anyone might see. But he smiled. “All right, then. Dinner.”

  “Six thirty.” And then Martin leaned in for a kiss.

  Walter was so shocked that he froze. That didn’t deter Martin, who moved his lips from Walter’s mouth to his neck and then to his cheek. “Thank you,” Martin whispered. He walked to the office and went inside, but for several moments, Walter remained statue-like in the parking lot.

  3

  Walter wasn’t often faced with open blocks of time, and after recovering from his astonishment over Martin’s kiss, he wasn’t sure what to do with his afternoon. In Chicago, he’d filled empty time with booze, but he didn’t want that now. A shower, he finally decided. Maybe a nap. His adventure with Martin had proved more draining than he expected.

  The first thing he saw when he walked into unit three was a bouquet of fresh flowers placed on the tiny dining table. Three yellow roses, a few fern fronds, and some sprigs of purple stuff he didn’t recognize, all in a milk-glass vase. They definitely hadn’t been there before, and he wondered whether Martin had left them. The flowers made him smile, but even better was the small stack next to the vase. Books. But not just any books: these were Armed Services Editions, the oddly shaped thin-paged paperbacks he and his comrades had so treasured during the war.

  Walter walked closer for a better look. The top book was War of the Worlds. Beneath that, The Earth and High Heaven, and the final book was When Worlds Collide. Walter didn’t know if any of them were particularly to his taste, but that had hardly mattered before. When the crates of books had found his platoon, everyone had been thrilled for a way to pass the long, agonizing hours aboard transport or in gun pits. They’d all shared the little volumes, sometimes even ripping the books into two sections so more men could read at once.

  When Walter touched the worn cover of the first book, a memory flooded him, the images as clear as if they were happening now. He was crouched among ruins with members of his platoon, all of them shivering in the late-winter cold. Overhead, planes buzzed, while antiaircraft shells whistled and burst nearby. Some of the men were smoking cigarettes, but Walter kept his hands in his
coat pockets. Next to him sat LeMay, a fellow medic with a deep Southern drawl, reading a Steinbeck book aloud. Sometimes he had to nearly shout to be heard over the ack-acks’ fire, but nobody minded. As long as LeMay read, they weren’t miserable soldiers so far from home, but instead hard-drinking paisanos in Tortilla Flat.

  LeMay was shot through the neck in a gutter somewhere in France as he crawled to a wounded comrade. Walter saw him die. The man he was trying to rescue died too.

  Walter didn’t realize he was crying until his vision blurred. He angrily dashed the tears from his eyes, grabbed War of the Worlds, and took it to the bed. When he got there, he toed off his shoes and tossed his jacket aside, then curled up under the colorful quilt to read.

  He woke up flailing at an object covering the lower half of his face and ended up batting it to the floor, ashamed when he realized it was only the paperback. He must have fallen asleep with the book in his hands. Oddly panicked, he picked it up, then sighed with relief when he saw it was unharmed.

  With barely enough time for a quick shower and shave, Walter was just putting on his shoes when a knock sounded on the door. He hurried over to open it.

  “Hi,” Martin said, looking happy. And even more beautiful than Walter remembered.

  “The, uh, flowers and the books… thanks. That was nice.”

  Instead of answering, Martin stepped through the doorway and pulled Walter’s head close for a kiss. This time Walter was less surprised. And sure, someone might be watching through the open door, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to care. Not with Martin tasting like mint and sighing happily into his mouth.

  “I like kissing,” Martin said, leaning his forehead against Walter’s. “If you’ve never done it and you think about it, it seems really odd. But the reality is amazing.”

  Honestly, Walter had never given kissing much thought. Maybe he would have if he’d gone without a kiss as long as Martin had. He found Martin’s earnest appraisal charming. “We could always skip dinner,” Walter said, jerking his head toward the bed.

  Martin’s wide smile bloomed. “Can we save that for dessert?”

  Fair enough.

  The Kitee Café was crowded, and when Walter and Martin entered, every person turned to stare. Even the kids. Martin just grinned and gave the room a general wave. They smiled back. It was weird.

  Walter had apparently acquired a personal table, his usual one by the window. As he and Martin sat, Walter tried to ignore the quiet conversations of strangers, positive that most were about him.

  Dorothy bustled to them within seconds and then astounded Walter by drawing a chair to their table and sitting down. Nobody else seemed surprised, though. Not even Martin. She tilted her head and gave Walter a close look. “What makes you happy?” she asked.

  Walter blinked at her, but Martin chuckled. “It’s a question we ask when getting to know someone.”

  “My people usually ask where you’re from or what you do for a living.”

  Dorothy harrumphed. “Not important. Not like happiness. So?”

  He had to think about it for a long time, but nobody hurried him. Finally he sighed. “Peace and quiet. I like each of those a lot. Books.” And then another memory hit him—this one from before the war, when he was still a boy. “Waking up early on a day you know something great’s going to happen, and then just sitting there, savoring the anticipation.”

  She nodded a few times as if she agreed with his answers. And then, hoping he wasn’t breaking any foreign rules of etiquette, he returned the question. “What makes you happy?”

  Oh, that was the right response. She smiled so widely that all her teeth showed, and Martin gazed across the table at him with shining eyes. “Oh, honey,” Dorothy said, patting Walter’s hand, “I love it when people enjoy my food. And I love cats. Such perfect little creatures! I’m happy when they curl up in my lap and purr. And I like it when someone gives an unexpected gift.” She stood. “Now, what can I get you?”

  When Walter hesitated, Martin said, “I’ll have the special, please.”

  She looked expectantly at Walter. “Do you want to see the menu?”

  “No. I’ll have what he’s having.”

  Another response that clearly pleased Martin. A brief nonverbal conversation passed between Dorothy and Martin, she with raised eyebrows and he with a firm nod. She nodded in return before hurrying away.

  “She likes you,” Martin said.

  “She doesn’t know me.”

  “She knows enough.”

  Now, that wasn’t true. Walter knew that if anyone could see past his bland shell to view the real him, they’d be disgusted. The real Walter Clark had been a rotting, corrupted corpse for over five years. Martin would realize that soon enough, if Walter stuck around much longer.

  Walter tried a smile. “What makes you happy?”

  “You.” Martin’s response was immediate and sincere.

  “Martin—”

  “Spending time with you makes me happy. You’re good at… quiet. I like that. And keeping my inn looking nice makes me happy too. I know it’s not much, but I’m proud of it.”

  “You should be.” Walter was sincere too. His little rented cabin was the most comfortable place he could remember.

  Martin answered him with a gaze so intense and heated that Walter glanced around them guiltily and shifted in his seat. It would be clear to even the most casual observer what Martin was thinking about. Hell, now Walter was thinking about it too. He licked his lips and watched Martin’s pupils widen and cheeks flush.

  Then Martin leaned forward over the table. “I know about sex,” he whispered huskily.

  “Uh….”

  “I did some research this afternoon.”

  Jesus Christ. Walter had no idea how Martin would conduct such research. In Chicago there were places a fellow could go, if he knew where to look. Shops that sold books, magazines, and photos geared toward a particular clientele. Bars where men coupled in the shadows and didn’t much care who watched. But Walter doubted that Kiteeshaa boasted similar attractions.

  “I didn’t know there were so many options,” Martin said. Wide-eyed and grinning—a kid in a candy store. “Are any of them as nice as what we did today?”

  Walter’s instinct was to say something dirty and blasé, to come off as a tough guy who didn’t care. It was a persona that had served him well during his casual encounters. But he couldn’t make himself do it, not with a virgin who brought him flowers and books and shared his personal sorrows. “It’s not the mechanics so much as the person. I’ve done a lot of things, Martin. None of them were as sweet as what we did today.”

  Martin’s eyes went watery and his smile softened. “The body….” He cleared his throat. “Bodies are wonderful things. But they’re only decoration. Like a bright coat of paint. The true self is what matters. You know this.”

  “What if the body’s the good part? And the true self is….” He wasn’t sure of the right words. Damaged. Dead. Ugly.

  Martin shook his head. “Just because someone’s been touched by pain, that doesn’t ruin him. I know you don’t like the ocean, so please forgive this analogy, but sometimes I like to walk on the beach. There’s always a lot of driftwood. Whole trees even. They’ve been wrenched from where they were rooted, then battered by water and sand. They look nothing like they used to. But they still have such beauty. The grains of their fibers, the softness of their grays…. And they’re still useful too. Animals use them for shelter. Burt Evans—you met him today—he fashions driftwood into furniture and sells it to tourists in Newport.”

  “That’s… a pretty complicated metaphor, right off the cuff.”

  “It’s something I’ve thought about a lot. Believe me, I’ve drifted a long, long way.” He leaned even closer, his gaze intense enough to scorch. “Walter, there is nothing ugly about you.”

  Walter was still wondering how Martin knew what he’d been thinking when Dorothy arrived with their meals. She gave them each a deep, ov
ersized bowl, then set a small loaf of bread on a board in the middle of the table. “Enjoy,” she said, then patted each of them briefly before moving on to the next table.

  The bread was still steaming and looked wonderful. But Walter stared dubiously at the stuff in his bowl. The stew—if that’s what it was—smelled nice, but it was a weird green color with chunks of unidentifiable purple and orange floating in it.

  Walter’s doubt must have been obvious, because Martin laughed. “It’s a festival food for us,” he said. He followed up with a word that sounded like nothing but vowels, which Walter assumed was what the stuff was called. “Try it.”

  Fine. Couldn’t be worse than some of the slop the Army had passed off as edible, right? With Martin watching closely, Walter picked up his soup spoon, dipped it into the technicolor goo, and took a tiny taste.

  “Oh!” It tasted… well, green. But in a good way, like the first fresh spring vegetables after months of mushy tinned stuff. It was spicy too, although Walter couldn’t begin to identify the spices. It made his tongue tingle, and it warmed him when he swallowed.

  “Well?” Martin demanded.

  “I could live without the texture. But boy, it tastes fantastic.”

  With a smug smile, Martin reached for the bread.

  They both ate second helpings, followed by coffee and berry pie a la mode. Walter’s stomach felt drum-tight, but the meal had been so delicious and the company so wonderful that he didn’t care. He and Martin had chatted nonstop throughout the meal. About little things, like the mutt Walter had owned when he was a boy and the planter boxes Martin wanted to install in the windows of his cabins. But also about big things, like the way Martin’s mother had sung nearly all the time and how Walter had ended up being a medic. That last bit was unusual—he rarely spoke to anyone about the war, and never without his chest going tight and his heart hammering. But tonight, discussing his training with Martin, all he felt was the memory of unease.

  No money changed hands at the end of dinner, but Dorothy patted Martin’s head and stroked Walter’s back. Probably Martin ran a tab; that would make sense. “We’ll see you later,” Dorothy said to Martin, then turned to Walter. “One thing I like about you is your voice, which is nice and deep without being loud. And you don’t seem to mind some silence, either.”