Vestige

-Vestige-

-Chapter One-

He looked down at the traffic as it eased along the highway, the wind blowing through his hair and lightly rifling the collar of his jacket. The headlights of the cars blinked out of existence, one by one, followed shortly by the red glow of the taillights. Everything from this height seemed meager, insubstantial, and the man supposed that that suited him just fine. He had been feeling a little meager himself these days. He had been feeling more and more like a marionette, with his arms and legs controlled by invisible strings.

The last few months had been perhaps the most thrilling of his life. And so why was he standing there, high above the city, ready to jump and put an end to everything? The answer was simple, and was currently standing behind him, pleading with him.

“Caleb… Caleb, come back from there. Please. Don’t do anything stupid.” Caleb heard footsteps echoing across the cement, and he teetered on the edge of the wall, risking a look back at the man, his eyes stern yet horribly weak.

“Don’t come any closer to me, Felix,” Caleb ordered as he scooted along the wall and let the tips of his sneakers jut over the side. “Don’t.”

Felix paused, a few feet away from his lover, his dark features obscured by shadow. All Caleb could see of him was the outline of his body; a lovely body, a body that he had enjoyed exploring. A body that had eventually driven him here, to this ledge, above the blaring traffic. “Ah, amante,” Felix murmured, “Please come down from there. You don’t want to do this.”

No, he didn’t want to do this. But neither had he wanted this curse placed on him. He supposed, looking back, that he had known the moment he and Felix had met that the man would eventually be the end of him. But he had gotten lost in his deep, dark eyes, and there had been no breaking his fall.

Caleb tilted his head back, looking up at the stars, which seemed almost close enough to reach out and touch at this height. “Do you remember what you told me?,” Caleb asked suddenly, speaking to the man as though they were lying in bed together, and not standing forty stories above the ground. “Do you remember what you told me about the stars, Felix?”

“They, they burn for you and me,” Felix whispered, and his voice sounded choked. “It’s still true, Caleb, please come down.”

“No,” Caleb whispered, moving closer to the edge. There was a strange dichotomy inside of him; he felt light enough to simply float away, and yet there was a heaviness in his heart, an anchor, tethered to the man behind him. He closed his eyes and felt warm tears trail down his cheeks. “No, they’ve stopped burning,” he finished in a dusty murmur, before letting his body fall forward.

“Caleb!”

<~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~**~>

“Caleb.”

“Hrm?”

“Caleb. I know you haven’t been getting much sleep lately, but it’s pretty rude of you to fall asleep when I’m talking to you.”

“Sorry, sorry.” He leaned back in his chair, pushing his fingers through his wavy blonde hair. The little café they were in was quiet and still, as though the entire world had stopped turning just to fix a glare on him. Caleb Bennett didn’t think it was such a heinous crime, falling asleep when your sister was rambling. “Go on with your story, princess.”

His sister huffed and annoyingly drummed her fingers on the table. The tips of her polished nails clicked and clacked until Caleb offered her a grievous groan. “I give, I give! Just go on with your story.”

As his sister opened her mouth to continue, a waiter swooped in beside them, polished and curt, demanding their orders. “Coffee for me,” Caleb said, fixing the man with a quirked eyebrow and a cool stare, “Black. Nothing fancy schmancy.”

The waiter bristled silently at the remarks, a touch of color spreading across his cheeks. He managed to keep his composure as he took the lady’s order and stalked away. “Honestly,” his sister breathed when the man was gone, “What’s gotten into you?”

The answer to that was, not much, but Caleb bit his tongue and kept his illicit comments to himself. Dorothy Bennett was not the type to find such banter amusing, and he wasn’t in the mood for one of her prima donna episodes. Though the words were the truth, and explained his sour disposition. His last boyfriend had been over a year ago, and after the smoke had cleared after that particular train wreck, Caleb had sworn he would never return to the shady, confusing world of relationships.

But he was beginning to grow lonely, which explained why he was sitting in the little café with his sister on a bright, warm Sunday morning instead of lying tangled in sheets with a lover, reading the paper and eating breakfast.

“Just a little tired,” Caleb finally explained to her, favoring her with his patented ‘woe is me’ stare.

“It’s not my fault you insist on keeping that job of yours,” Dorothy said to him, and one of those long, painted nails pointed at him seriously. “You know how I feel about you working for that God awful paper.”

“The Mesa is not a God awful paper,” Caleb argued, “Just because it prints the facts and not that right-wing conspiracy theory bullshit you love so much, doesn’t make it any less of a distinguished paper.”

Dorothy’s eyes widened, and her hand went to her throat as though he’d lunged at her from across the table. Her lips were poised to spill venom, but luckily, the waiter returned with their orders, dropping Caleb’s coffee cup in front of him and giving him an icy glance.

“The bullshit,” Dorothy said, when the waiter had, once more, returned to his roost, “Is not the point. The point is they work you like a slave, and for what? You barely have enough money to afford that little apartment of yours.” Her lips thinned as she spoke of where he lived, her eyes rolling up as if she had suffered some kind of heat stroke.

“My apartment is fine and so is my pay,” Caleb challenged, “If you want to get into this, Dot, I’d be more than happy to, after I’ve had some sleep.” He stood up from the table and dug through his wallet, throwing a five down.

“Caleb,” Dorothy whispered vehemently, eyes darting around the café. It was empty, but her refinement was still suffering some egregious damage. “Sit down.”

He looked at his sister, and felt a momentary weakness. She was a pretty woman, slim and attractive, wrapped in fine lace and silk and glittering with expensive trinkets; but she was a hard-nosed, vicious woman. She had a way of cutting right to the quick, of exposing all of his fears and faults and baldly mocking them. Her tongue was sharp, and the circuit that ran between it and her brain was nonexistent. He loved her, but he had always resented the hell out of her.

“Not today, Dot,” Caleb told her softly, “Just not today. I’ll see you later.”

“Caleb,” Dorothy called after him, standing from the table. He might have stayed with her, but once more she peeked around the café, more concerned for her own image than her little brother. He walked briskly down the sidewalk, sure that she wouldn’t chase after him.

His apartment was only a few blocks away, but after the morning he had had, he decided to make a little side trip. Most men his age would have swerved into the nearest bar and drowned themselves in liquor and the glow of a jukebox. Or they would have found themselves in some sleazy strip club, knocking back beers as sweet faced girls danced in front of them.

But Caleb wasn’t most men. His relaxation came from a charming bookstore tucked away from the street. The Dust Jacket was small and cozy, a tribute to the bookstores of his youth. There was no pimply faced teenager behind the cash register, no counter off to the side where one could buy coffee, no broadband or wifi so that patrons could surf the web.

Only shelves and shelves of books, and comfortably overstuffed chairs, and an old man standing at the register, lo and behold, reading. A copy of The Mesa, actually. Caleb could see his picture, fuzzy but unmistakable, beside an editorial. He smiled nervously and offered the man a shrug.

“You’re a left-wing sonofabitch,” the old man laughed, “But you’re always welcome here, Caleb. Have a seat.”

Caleb sighed and accepted the offer, collapsing into one of the overstuffed chairs and rifling through his hair agitatedly. His sister always managed to get under his skin; he wished she would stick to her champagne and cotillions, and leave him be. “Rough day?,” the man asked him, sitting across from Caleb and fixing him in his kind, rheumy eyes.

Caleb sighed and scratched his head, “Yeah, you could say that.”

When he had first happened upon the store and taken a look inside, Caleb had felt like an intruder in the small, comfortable world. In this city, a man like him was uncommon. He was a large man, broad-shouldered and with a mile of leg, fair skinned and tow-headed. There was a curl to his hair as well, which added to the mystique, he had been told. Of course, that had come in the wee hours of the morning, with his lover naked and resting on his chest.

Caleb’s father had moved to the town during the height of his success. A rich land developer, Michael Bennett had turned the struggling city into a sprawling metropolis. Many of the newer buildings bore his name, which, Caleb supposed, was the main reason he had been hired at The Mesa to begin with. His name had preceded his talent, which had been a bitter pill to swallow, considering how many years he had spent studiously determined in the field of journalism. Had he known he could have mentioned his father, he could have spared himself a few bouts of carpel tunnel.

The store had charmed him at once, and he had made it his sanctuary. This was where he came when his life was careening out of control; if Caleb considered how often he was in the store, he might have reconsidered the course of his life.

The owner, Vicente Morales, an old Mexican man - like most of the people in the city - had taken to Caleb instantly. They would sometimes sit together in the evenings and discuss politics, occasionally debate heatedly; but things never spiraled out of control like they did with his sister. The man was easy-going, always smiling, and Caleb found it impossible to be angry with him.

“My grandson has had a hard time as well,” the man explained, in his slow speech, “His mother passed away just last year.” The man paused to cross himself, bowing his head slightly, before continuing. “He came to me just last month, no where to go, no job, no money. He’s working for me now. You should meet him, the two of you could trade your sob stories.”

“Very funny,” Caleb returned dryly.

“Felix,” the old man called, struggling up from the chair and turning in the direction of the backroom. “Felix, come out here.”

Caleb had heard people describe breathlessness, and as a journalist, rational and cynical, he had dismissed it as romantic fluff. But that was just what happened to him when he laid eyes on the man; struck by two very intense realizations. The first, that he had never seen anyone more beautiful in his life, and the second, that the man would quite possibly be the end of him. This latter realization was distant and passed quickly, but the first lingered as the man stepped nearer.

The first thing he noticed about Felix Morales was his smile, slightly crooked and boyish. Then his eyes, dark, almost black; what Caleb would describe as devastatingly lovely. His hair combed back from his forehead, the sleeves of his leather jacket pushed up high on his arms, he looked like some kind of street punk, looked as though he should carry a switchblade in his boot. But the eyes and the smile betrayed him, they were both soft, filled with cheer and sweetness.

“Don’t shout, abuelo,” Felix murmured, and Caleb compared his voice to molasses, dark, smooth and slow. A sexy voice, but then, it belonged to a sexy man. It had been a while since he had responded to someone so suddenly and hotly; he relished the warmth in his chest as Felix’s eyes moved to him.

“This is Caleb Bennett,” Vicente began.

“The writer,” Felix finished.

“The journalist,” Caleb corrected, and then flushed at his own arrogance. The first impression he wanted to make was not that he was a stuck up rich boy.

Luckily for him, Felix seemed to take the correction with a grain of salt, nodding almost sagely. “Right, the reporter, with The Mesa. You did that column a few weeks ago about gay marriage, and how the politicians in Washington are masking their homophobia and ignorance behind a mask of righteousness.” Felix laughed, “I enjoyed that very much.”

“Thank you,” Caleb murmured.

“Felix is a musician,” Vicente said, sounding almost conspiratorial.

“A struggling musician,” Felix chuckled, scratching at his head almost nervously. Caleb was relieved to see it wasn’t just him with a few butterflies. “Not exactly playing at Madison Square Garden, you know?”

“A waste of time,” the old man said sadly, with a shake of his head. He looked as if he meant to lapse into a lecture, but the little bell over the door jingled, and he wandered away from them slowly to greet the customers. The two men were left alone with each other; Caleb found the situation unsettling, a little nerve-wracking, but Felix seemed to melt naturally into conversation, becoming quite animated as he told Caleb about his adventures as a musician, playing on the street. “They throw change at me like I’m a dancing bum,” Felix laughed, and Caleb joined him, feeling his butterflies lift away.

There was a sincerity to him that Caleb had not found in anyone else. He was lulled by him, in a strange, confusing way. Listening to him speak, Caleb felt as though he had known him all his life, or as though he had been waiting for him all his life, or some kind of romantic rhetoric that usually would bring a twist to his mouth and acidity to his stomach.

But there was nothing like that when listening to Felix.

“I moved here when my mother died,” he was explaining, and Caleb realized they were sitting together on a sofa in the corner of the store. When had that happened? He didn’t remember walking over there at all. “The money dried up and I had to come here. My grandfather isn’t in the best of health, and I sort of like having someone to take care of.” Felix leaned back on the sofa. He had slipped out of his jacket, and Caleb briefly admired his biceps, before forcing his eyes back to his face.

There was a small smile at the corner of Felix’s lips, as though he had seen the look and encouraged it.

“You write some intense columns,” Felix opined, pressing ahead before Caleb could even comment on his previous statements. “Really interesting, but you’re a little cynical, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

“Not at all,” Caleb flippantly dismissed, though he was a little hurt this gorgeous creature saw him in such a way. He was a cynic, felt he reserved the right to be a cynic, but that didn’t mean he insisted on the label. “Sometimes the truth can look a bit cynical.”

“Is that what they taught you in journalism school?,” Felix asked curiously, “To distrust everyone?”

Caleb blushed, “Not exactly. Just to distrust the one’s who are trying to feed me bullshit. I know when I’m being lied to.”

“Mm,” Felix hummed, sinking further into the sofa, his dark eyes intent on Caleb’s face. Caleb wanted to ask him to stop staring at him as though he was some bug under a microscope, but decided against it. The man could stare at him for as long as he liked, really. He would find a way to bare it, somehow. “What do you think of me, Caleb Bennett? Do you think I’m feeding you bullshit?”

“No.”

“Good. So let me tell you something. Will you listen to me?”

Caleb nodded slowly.

“I’ve been here almost a month, and all I’ve been doing is sitting in this bookstore shelving things, or out in the backroom cataloguing. I haven’t been out a single night since I got here, I haven’t made any friends at all. So, I’d like to be friends with you.”

Caleb was taken aback, he had never met someone so forthright. “Um, okay?”

“I know, we’re supposed to sit here and make small talk for a few more hours. Can we be friends then? Or should I call you tomorrow and we’ll be friends then?”

Caleb laughed, and that made Felix smile.

“I’d like to go out and get drinks later,” Felix told him seriously. There was a hint of something sexual lurking in his eyes, something predatory, and then it was gone. It left Caleb feeling hot and cold, he couldn’t describe it. “Is that alright with you?”

Looking back, Caleb would wonder if turning the man down and walking away would have been better. But thinking of those dark eyes, of those full lips turned up in a smile, of those strong, somewhat aggressive hands on his body, he knew that he had really had no choice. Something had drawn them together that day, a simple act of fate, or a nightmarish magnetic pull, it mattered little. The moment they had seen one another, they had both known, in a corner of their heart, that they belonged to one another.

“Sure,” Caleb agreed, “That’s fine with me.”

That was the beginning of his curse.