Revelations

When I woke up, the smells and sounds of breakfast wafted through the apartment and I heard Hutch in the kitchen. I got up, did the morning thing, then stood in the doorway of the kitchen and watched as Hutch set the table for two. He cooked, as he had so often before, but, knowing what I knew, the scene turned far more . . . domestic . . . than it had ever seemed before.

I almost laughed.

Hutch was tall, strong-boned, and really could be described as a man’s man. I, on the other hand, was shorter, rounder, and generally softer. We were supposedly, from what I understood about a gay man’s world, completely opposites for what we were going to be, if even for a short time. But, there was no way I was the female type, and yet Hutch – delicate minded, sensitive, gentle, artist Hutch – was . . . At least stereotypically. But I knew too, that while he was the one with the feelings, he was also the one who repressed said feelings far more than I ever did. Which meant that if there were any chance of him healing, any and all moves were going to have to be made by me.

I startled myself with that thought. I’d never even have thought, as little as twelve hours ago, of doing anything with Hutch other than what we normally did as two straight guys. Yet, here I was, planning on how to seduce the man who has loved me as one would a woman for I had no idea how long. I couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of things and he started, then grinned at me.

“Morning, Starsk.”

He greeted me somewhat cheerfully, and I knew that I could just let everything be normal if I kept my mouth shut. However, like I said before, that just ain’t me. I looked at him for a few minutes longer, and saw that his eyes were puffy and red from the cryin‘ jag he‘d gone on, and he must’ve wondered what happened to get them that way.

If what he said about his dreams was true, then he probably was used to waking up like that. Well, that would stop if I had my way.

“Morning,” he smiled as he served omelets, toast, and juice, and it seemed the most natural thing in the world to me.

Which also made me wonder about my feelings for this man.

“How ya’ feeling?” I asked, and watched his reactions carefully.

“Drained, tired, and kind of weak,” he admitted, and I nodded.

“Doc said you’d feel that way. Dobey’s given us the day off to recover. Stayed with you to see if you’d be all right.”

“Kinda’ gathered that when I saw you sprawled on the couch,” There was an odd catch to his voice that I would have missed if I hadn’t known what to look for, and his smile was soft, and wistful.

It was nice, actually, and I knew I had to barrel on.

“Had kind of a rough night last night when I got you here,” I looked at him and for a brief moment, there was fear in his eyes, then it was gone just as if someone had flipped off a switch. His whole body was tense, even as he casually went to fill the coffee pot.

“Oh? What do you mean?”

“Well, there’s no really easy way to say this, but it began when I asked you thought of me.”

“While . . . while I was under the influence of the drug?” There was the stammer again, but this time I could see he was heading for a real big case of mad, and I didn’t want to deal with that right then, as there were more important things I wanted to talk about. “I thought you knew, Starsk. Why would you ask something like that while I was under the influence of a truth drug?”

“I thought I knew what you thought,” I told him, then knew my next words would send his mind and attention elsewhere, other than my assumed betrayal. “But, I didn’t know you thought I was beautiful.”

However, maybe I should have thought a bit more about how to phrase that. I knew he’d be upset, but I didn’t think he’d go into catatonic shock. I watched as his face drained of all color, he gasped as if he couldn’t breathe all of a sudden, and dropped the coffee pot, where it shattered on the floor. He stared at me and I knew that he sure as hell wasn’t seein’ what he was looking at. He raised his foot to back away from me, and with all that glass around, I knew that was a mistake, and there was no place for him to go.

“Hutch, don’t!” I help my hand up and stepped forward. He froze and stared at me, un-blinking as I grabbed a broom and dustpan and cleaned up the mess as all the while he just stared at me. “C’mon, Hutch. I think you need to sit down.” I went to reach for him, but he ducked away and almost ran to the livingroom, where he put the couch between us.

As if he could get away from me that easily.

“Forget it, Starsk? Okay?” He pleaded. His eyes were wide and though he’d regained some color in his face, the skin around his lips was white and his whole body screamed tension. “It . . . it didn’t mean anything. You know how good . . . good looking you are.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t know I was to you. But, Hutch there’s more. You . . .” I hesitated, then took the whole plunge. “You told me you loved me.”

“I I I . . . do. You’re my best friend,” Hutch desperately tried to salvage the conversation, but I was relentless.

“You told me you wanted to marry me and make love to me.”