Our Humble Little Dwelling

Sorry, this is a bit long. And theres a scene in here with Kyle\'s father that I don\'t really like too much, but he was never important to the story anyway, so...


Chapter 5

Kyle was coming down the hall carrying a box filled with hair magazines and another box full of CDs. He could hardly see over the top box, so he didn’t notice Leo approach him and take one of the boxes for him. “Oh. Um, thanks, Leo.” The boy smiled shyly.

Leo smiled back with his perfect teeth. “Sure.” Together, they walked out the front door to the open trunk of Vince’s dark blue GMC Yukon.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this, Keith?” Geraldine asked her nephew. “You don’t mind Kyle staying with you?”

Keith smiled. “I’m fine with it, Auntie. I swear. It’ll be fun to have him around. Don’t worry.”

“All right.” Keith’s red head, green eyed, aunt said. “You know you can just dump him back here if you ever get tired of him.”

Keith laughed. His aunt was such a worry-wart. “I know I can, Auntie, but I won’t need to.”

Vincent made his way down the hall from Kyle’s old room, carrying his TV. “You mind making an effort to load some of this stuff up?” He asked Keith.

Keith frowned. “I’m carrying the laptop.” He lifted the small carrying case he had strapped across his chest.

Vince sighed and shook his head as he walked out the front door. “‘I’m carrying the laptop’.” He mocked. “The freakin’ laptop.”

Geraldine laughed. “Is that the new love?”

“New boyfriend, yes. We haven’t gotten to the ‘love’ part yet.”

“You think you will?”

“We might.” He watched the object of his desire secure all the items in the trunk, then shut the back door to the SUV. “I have to admit, I really hope we do.”

“Well, what about that Leo fella? He’s a cute little thing. You think something will form between him and Kyle?”

Keith smiled. “Definitely.”

***

“Damn Kyle,” Vincent said as he lugged a suitcase and duffel bag up the stairs to the guestroom, now Kyle’s room. “how much shit do you have in these bags? I swear, you may have more stuff than what we packed at your parent’s house.”

Leonardo came out from Kyle’s room after dropping off the box of CDs, so Kyle could get started on unpacking. “Aw. You’re just pissed about carrying all that stuff because you’re out of shape.”

“Out of shape? Let me show you something.” Vincent dropped the luggage on the carpeted floor, lifted up the sleeve of his red shirt, and flexed his bicep to the size of honeydew melons. “Does this look out of shape to you?”

“Oh please. Have you seen my abs lately?” Leo pulled up his brown shirt, revealing very a defined abdomen. He smacked his belly. “You see this six-pack?”

The men both heard someone make a wolf whistle from behind Vince. “Hubba, hubba.” Keith said smiling with $2 in his hand. “I’ve got two bucks for the first guy to take his shirt off.”

Vincent quickly pulled his shirt over his head, tossing it into Leo’s face, exposing a broad, hairless, light-brown chest, smooth abs, and a jet black trail of pubic hair leading from his navel to below the waistband of his pants. He took the money from Keith’s hand. “I can buy me an ice-cream sandwich with this.”

Kyle came out from his room, hands on his hips. “Would you guys stop horsing around? I’ve still got boxes to unload.” The quartet finally finished bringing in all the boxes and bags of whatever Kyle owned and sat in his room to help put everything in a place.

An hour and a half had passed before their was a knock at the front door. “I’ll get it.” Kyle said as he ran down the stairs two at a time. Smiling, Vincent reached into the bottom of a box and pulled out an unopened box of condoms.

”I wonder where he’d want us to put this?”

Keith chuckled. “Considering their utilizing status, I’d say under the carpet should be a good place….Hell, give ‘em to me, I’ll use them.”

Leo took the box and examined it carefully. “No. We can fix that.”

“No, Daddy! Stop!” The group heard from upstairs. Knowing exactly what was going on, he pretty much guessed it was going to happen, Keith jumped up and ran down the stairs, followed by Vince and Leo. They saw Kyle frantically holding on to the front doorframe as his large father was trying to pull him out the house. “I don’t want to go!”

“Hey, let him go!” Vince yelled.

“Stay out of this, you! This don’t concern you! I’m talking to my son!” Greg said angrily –and drunkenly—as he tried to pull his son out the front door. Kyle’s face showed anger and fear, as he fought off his father to the best of his ability.

“Let go of me! I don’t want to go home!”

“You’re going home, Kyle! You’re not staying here so you can get turned out by your cousin’s lifestyle! I won’t have it!”

Suddenly the said cousin walked past a shocked Leo and Vincent, carrying a .38 pistol. He pointed the gun in Greg’s face. “Let him go.”

Greg paused in his struggle with his son, but never released him. “What the fuck are you gonna do with that gun, huh? You gonna shoot me? You’re gonna shoot your uncle?!”

“I will if I have to. I didn’t like going to prison, but if it’s the penalty I have to take to keep you away from Kyle, I’ll do it in a heartbeat.”

Greg jerked his son towards him. “He’s coming with me.”

“No. He doesn’t want to go with you.” Using his thumb, Keith cocked his gun. “Don’t fuck with me, Uncle Greg. And don’t test my patience. Let Kyle go and get off my property.”

After a moment, Greg finally let Kyle go, shoving him towards Keith. Without looking away from his uncle or lowering his aim, Keith pulled his cousin by his shirt behind him, where he went into Leo’s arms. “Fine! You stay with him then, Kyle! Let Keith corrupt you with his foolish lifestyle and lovers! But don’t you come back home, you hear me?! Don’t you set foot back home.” Greg stormed off.

Once he finally left, Keith lowered his gun and turned to look at his shaken cousin. He held a hand to the back of Kyle’s head as Leo continued to hold the boy. “Are you okay?”

“I’m okay.” He muttered back. Nodding, Keith walked back to the hall closet and placed his gun back in his small safety box, locking it, then went into the kitchen for a can of soda. Vincent followed him.

“Prison? You never told me you were in prison.”

“…” Keith kept sipping.

“What were you in for?”

“Theft, prostitution, resisting arrest, assault on an officer, and drug possession.” Keith felt he’d really said enough, bringing up way too many bad memories that he did not want to relive. But Vince didn’t notice Keith’s displeasure. He didn’t notice the sudden distant look his lover was getting. Vincent wanted to know more.

“What happened in prison? How long did you stay?”

Keith sighed. “Please, Vince. I don’t want to talk about this…”

“Why not? Why don’t you—“

“Because I don’t want to fucking talk about it, Vince!” Keith shouted, immediately regretting how he said it. He saw the look of hurt turn in on his lover’s face and he tried to reach out to him with a hand. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, baby.”

“No. No, it’s okay. Obviously, you don’t trust me enough to tell me, so I’ll leave it alone.”

“No, that’s not it. I’m—“

“Whatever, Keith, okay? Whatever. It’s over now.” Vincent interrupted. Obviously, he was still disturbed by Keith’s outburst of distrust he had in him, deciding to rather be overly passive about the whole thing, instead of pissed off about it. And Keith became aware of that. Changing the subject, Vince asked, “So, what’s your plans for the rest of this Sunday?”

“Um, I have to go to this fabric warehouse with a customer of mine so we can pick out the right fabric to use on her wedding dress. That’ll take a while, more than likely.”

“I’ll get out your way then.” Vince started to walk out the kitchen, but Keith stopped him.

“You’re not in my way. You don’t have to go, Vince.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Can’t you stay the night again?”

“No, I can’t.” Vince got out of Keith’s grip and proceeded to walk out the house. “I’ll call you.” Still too upset to notice anything, Vince walked right by Kyle and Leo and didn’t see the gentle kiss the young men were sharing together. “Leo, I’m waiting for you in the car.” He shut the front door.

***

Leo finally pulled away from the soft, full lips of Kyle after spending long minutes engaged in a deep, passionate kiss. The first kiss was given by Leo. He wasn’t sure how Kyle was going to take the advance, so he opted for a more subdued approach. He couldn’t help himself. He saw Kyle in his arms, holding on to him for dear life, and he didn’t want to let that go. The boy went to HIS arms, when Keith had gotten him away from his father, not anyone else’s. And when he held him, it felt so right, like Kyle fit like a glove against him. As he lifted Kyle’s head and wiped the tears from his pale gray eyes, he thought he couldn’t have looked any more beautiful than at that very moment. Leo had no idea what was going on with himself. He’d never hit the ground so hard for a guy before. Especially not within such a short time of meeting him. He didn’t know what IT was, but he definitely knew there WAS something there.

Kyle knew this too. That’s why he didn’t jump or protest, when Leo leaned in and kissed him on the lips; the kiss was short, only lasting 3 seconds, before Leo pulled back. In fact, shortly after, Kyle grabbed Leo’s neck and pulled him in for a second kiss. This time, it was deeper and more passionate. Kyle really didn’t have a clue what he was doing. He’d never kissed anybody before, not unless you’d count the times where he would practice kissing on his hand, instead he winged it and ended up enjoying himself. They would’ve stayed like that if Vince hadn’t come past and told Leo he was ready to go.

“I’m sorry about that.” Kyle whispered against Leo’s soft lips.

The young brunette caressed the boy’s cheeks, looking him dead in the eyes. “Does it look like I’m complaining?” he kissed him again.

Kyle smiled. “No.” Another kiss. “You’d better go.” Kiss. “Vincent’s waiting for you.” Kiss.

Leo sighed. “Man, did they pick the wrong day to be upset with each other. The very day I choose to ride with him. I really don’t want to go.” Kiss.

“Then don’t.” Kiss. “Go back home, get your car, and spend the day with me.” Kiss.

“You sure you want me to?”

Kyle smiled, blushing. “Yeah.” Then he paused when he suddenly remembered something. “Oh damn it. I forgot, I have to work at the salon today from 1 to 7.”

“That’s okay. Another day. I’m just glad we’re going through with this. I really like you, Kyle.” Kiss.

“I like you too.” Kiss. “Look, you’d better go. Vince is likely to come in here and pull you out the front door by your ears.” They laughed.

“Okay. I’m going.” Leo gave Kyle a final lingering kiss before he backed away from the boy, touching his smooth cheek one last time. “You’ve got my number, right? Call me?”

“I will.”

“Promise?”

Kyle giggled. “I promise. Go, Leo.” He playfully pushed his new ‘friend’ out the door.

***

Two weeks later…

“What do you think about this fabric?” Kelly Turner asked Keith.

“Na.”

She held up another piece of fabric. “How about this one?”

Her designer flipped his hand back and forth in a gesture of ‘So-so’. “It’s alright. A bit too lacy.”

“Okay.” She held up a third piece. “What about this? You like satin?”

Keith’s eyes brightened a bit. “I adore satin. If I actually had enough guts to wear a wedding dress on my wedding day, I’d definitely wear satin.”

Kelly smiled. “Love it that much, huh?”

He nodded. “That much. Though, feel this.” Using his thumb and first two fingers, he rubbed the fabric. Kelly followed suit. “It feels great, doesn’t it?”

“Yes. Wonderful.”

Keith nodded. “But do you feel the thickness? Does it feel thick to you?”

Kelly shook her auburn head. “It actually feels pretty thin.”

“Exactly. Whatever fabric you get, whether it’s for a wedding dress or a plain evening dress, you don’t want thin, cheap fabric. This piece feels great, but you would freeze your little tooshie off on your wedding day.” Kelly laughed. “Let me show you something.”

Keith walked down an aisle of the familiar fabric warehouse to an area where he picked out all his satin materials. He stopped at one roll and pulled out a piece. “Now, feel this.”

Kelly rubbed the fabric and smiled. “Wow. That feels nice.”

“Hell yeah, that’s nice. That’s expensive.” Keith pointed to the material. “Expensive-looking—” He then pointed down the hall back to the fabric they last looked at. “Cheap-looking.” He pointed back. “Classy and chic material—“ He pointed to the other fabric. “Reasonable and shameful.”

Kelly looked at the price of the fabric and almost had to do a double take. “Keith, this fabric costs 80 more dollars!”

Keith shrugged innocently. “Hey. I never said looking classy and chic didn’t come with a larger price tag.”

The young bride-to-be smacked her designer on the arm. “Keith!”

“Look. There is nothing wrong with playing it safe and spending your money wisely. I’m all for stretching a dollar for it’s worth. But this is your wedding we’re talking about, Kelly. It’s your big day. One of the few important days of a person’s life. You don’t go economical on a day as special and personal as this. You pull all stops your wallet can stand.”

Kelly was quiet for a moment, considering what she should do. Eventually, a desire to see the look on her fiancé’s face as she slowly walked down the aisle on the arm of her father with a dress that wowed both him and the guests, overcame her and she smiled. “Okay. Let’s pull all the stops.”

Keith laughed. “Perfect.” There was a cute little tune that stopped as quickly as it started and Keith looked down at his phone that was clipped to his belt. He unhooked the phone. “You go ahead and pick with one of these fabrics you’d like and I’ll come back, okay?” When Kelly nodded, Keith walked off to another aisle and checked his voicemail.

The machine came on.

“Hello. You have five new messages. To hear the first message, press one…” He pressed one. “‘Hey Keith, it’s Kyle. I guess you’re busy with your sewing crap, so I won’t bother you. Just wanted to call and tell you I made it to work okay. Mom came by and picked me up before she went in for work. I will however need someone to pick me up when I’m done here so……pick me up, bye.’” Keith rolled his eyes and listened to the next message. “‘Mr. Agassi, this is Cheryl from Dr. Moore’s office. This call is to remind you of your dentist appointment to have your two wisdom teeth removed this Tuesday. If there’s a need to cancel or reschedule your appointment, please let us know by calling 555-4564. Thank you.’”

“Damn. I forgot about that.” Keith rubbed his jaw. All of a sudden, he could feel his jaws getting sore.

He checked his next message. “‘Rachel? Rachel, baby I’m sorry. That girl didn’t mean anything. You know I love you……I…..what’d you say? Oh. Sorry, wrong number.’” Keith laughed as he erased the message.

“What a sap.” He pressed one for the next message.

“Hey Keith, its Vince. Hit me back when you get this.”

“Vince?” Keith thought out loud. “I thought he was pissed at me.” He pressed one again for his fifth and final message. It was Vince again.

“It’s me again. Look, I just wanted to tell you my boss down at the club has been pretty pissed about everything since his wife filed for divorce. He hasn’t been crazy about me letting you up onto the DJ’s station, so it might be best not to come to the club tonight. I don’t know if you were planning on it or not, but I was just letting you know. Bye.”

Stunned at the message, Keith took the phone off his ear and stared down at it. “He still IS pissed at me. His boss isn’t the one who doesn’t want me at the club tonight, it’s Vincent. That prick.” Keith grew angry. He wasn’t planning on going to the club tonight, rather he was gonna just stay at home and watch his new King Kong dvd. But after hearing that last message, Keith changed his mind. He wasn’t gonna just show up at the club……no, that’s too subtle. He was going to show up and show out.

***

“So David drove me home from the dinner and movie, right—“ Kyle’s customer, Colleen, said to the group of women as he was blow-drying her hair. “He walked me to my door and had the nerve to ask me, ‘You gonna let me come in’?”

Paula, a woman who sat with a relaxer in her head, asked, “Girl, what did you tell him?”

“I told him ‘no’. First off, it was a blind date and he wasn’t that great of a date from the beginning. He actually thought that just because he spent alittle money, he was gonna get some.”

Paula shook her head. “Men have no romance at all nowadays. I had been dating this guy for a few months and we were at my place one night about to ‘do it’, right. Tell me why this fool was planning on going in bareback?”

The women all gasped. “What?” another woman who was getting her hair dyed red from another stylist asked. “Did he forget or something?”

“Hell no, he didn’t forget. ‘I don’t feel you when we have sex’. He’d said to me. ‘I want to feel you all around me’.” The woman rolled her eyes. “What type of bullshit was he talkin’?” the ladies all laughed.

Kyle’s co-worker, Julia, spoke up. “What’s with men? They’re such dogs. Kyle, you’re a male, what goes through guy’s heads?”

Kyle shrugged his shoulders as he started to place hot rollers in his customer’s hair. “I don’t know.”

Julia walked her customer to the sink and began to wash her long blonde hair. “Uh uh uh. Does no one use condoms now days? Was that some type of fad that went out of style?”

“It’s not a fad to me.” Another younger female customer said. “I live and breathe condoms.”

“Diddo.” Kyle’s customer commented smacking hands with the woman next to her.

“I buy a box every time I go get my pack of cigarettes.” The group paused and looked shocked at the thirty something woman with the perm in her hair. “Hell, you can’t never be overstocked or too up-to-date with condoms.”

“Y’all know the saying,” Julia started. “‘No glove, no love’.”

All the women in the salon said jointly, “Amen!” Then they all laughed. Kyle suddenly felt like the odd man out. *Way too much estrogen flowing in here all of a sudden.*

Suddenly, the sound of the door opening then closing brought both Kyle and the other lady’s attention to the new person. Dressed in a red thermal shirt, jeans, and a leather jacket, it was the keen eyed man with the beautiful white teeth…..Leo.

Kyle stopped his working as he watched Leo walk to him. The other women paused in their conversations, choosing to ‘observe’. “Hi.”

“Hey.” Leo leaned in and gave Kyle a kiss. It was a quick, chaste, innocent kiss, but it was more affection Kyle had ever shown to anyone in public. He began to blush. “I talked to your cousin, he told me where you work and when you normally take lunch. So, you wanna have lunch?”

“Lunch?”

“Yeah. I want to treat you today. Anywhere you want to go.”

Kyle shrugged. “I-I don’t know…..”

“Say ‘yes’.” One of the ladies mysteriously yelled out. Leo smiled and Kyle rolled his eyes as the women giggled.

“Yes.”

“Great. Then I’ll see you in an hour? I’ll come get you here.”

“Sure.”

Happy, Leo ran a hand gently down his ‘friend’s’ smooth cheek, then leaned in once again to give him a –this time slower—kiss before heading towards the door. He winked at the smirking women. “Ladies.”

When he was gone, Kyle stood silent with his hand pressed against his lips, eyes still on the front door, while the females made cat calls and whistled.

“Yowsa.”

“Hubba hubba.”

“Goodbye, sweetthang.”

“He was gorgeous.” Julia said to her young co-worker. “Where have you been hiding him, Kyle?

***

“Kyle?!” Keith called from his bedroom upstairs.

Dressed down in his sweatpants and t-shirt, Kyle was in the middle of fixing himself a sandwich. “What?!”

“Have you seen my black shirt?!”

“What black shirt?!”

Footsteps were heard coming down the stairs. Keith walked into the kitchen wearing tight blue jeans, black shoes, a turquoise stone necklace, and nothing else. His black hair was sleeked back into a pony tail. “My new black shirt? The one with the black embroidered designs all over it?”

“Oh. You mean the one you bought today and then left in the living room all day? Nope. Haven’t seen it.”

“You haven’t seen it? Are you sure you…..clever Kyle.” The younger cousin smirked as Keith walked into the den and slipped into his black button shirt.

“Where are you going anyway?”

“To the club.”

“Where? Blue Velvet?”

“Yep?”

“Well, why? I thought me and you were gonna stay in together.”

Keith walked back into the kitchen, finishing the last few buttons of his shirt. “I know. But I need to see Vince.”

Kyle finally finished his sandwich and took a bite. “Oh. So you two are cool again?”

“Not really.” He tucked his shirt into his jeans.

He stopped chewing his food, now confused. “What does that mean?”

”Vincent has pissed me off today and I’m going to make him jealous.” Keith looked down at himself and decided to reopen the first three buttons of his shirt to reveal more of the necklace he had on, but to also show off his smooth and toned chest.

“Ooooookay. Can I go with you?”

“Nope.” The older man kissed Kyle on the cheek quickly then started to walk back to the front door. “Talk to you later.”