Controller Ch. 05

I nodded and started mixing and mashing until it looked smooth to me. From there the whole meal preparation thing was a big blur. I did whatever Eli or Mary told me to do, and didn't seem to piss anyone off. Before too long we were all seated at the table. A couple of friends from the neighborhood who had no other place to go for the holiday had been invited too.

The food was arranged and everyone settled into place. I waited for them to start passing food, but everyone was sitting expectantly. After a moment Mary held out her hands to the people on either side of her.

"Let's bless this meal."

A quiet ripple went around the table as everyone held the person's hand next to them. Eli slipped his hand in mine and gave me the best smile I'd gotten from him in a few weeks. I glanced around to everyone else, because this was foreign to my world. Mary began and I ducked my head.

"Lord, thank you for letting us be here today, and for all the bounty you have bestowed on us. We thank for you for Eli and Nate's safe travel and pray you take them back to school safe and sound. And we especially thank you for Nate begin able to join us this year, and we hope this will just be the first of many. Lord, stand over the boys and their fragile relationship as they learn to lean on each other like all successful couples. We ask for your blessings. Amen."

I looked up and caught Mary's eye and she winked at me.

The rest of the meal was the most relaxed time I'd had since I'd been a fool. The neighbors were apparently all old friends and loved to tease Eli about his handsome boyfriend, which didn't hurt my feelings at all.

Most stayed long past the meal reveling in their stories. But eventually the room began to clear until Mary and Eli were saying goodbye to the last visitor.

Mary turned to us with a grin. "You boys go on up and relax. Everything's already done down here and I'm headed for bed." She kissed Eli and to my surprise, kissed me too. "Thank you for the help today. I couldn't have done it without your help. Now go, I'm right behind you."

I followed Eli up the stairs, not certain what would happen now. I stripped down to my briefs while Eli was doing the same. He glanced at the game console and then at me. "I'm really kinda tired. You okay with just going to bed?"

I stifled a yawn and then chuckled. "Yeah, that'd be fine."

"Cool, let me brush my teeth, then you can had the bathroom."

I waited while Eli got ready for bed, I went in and wondered where I'd be sleeping. By the time I came back into the room, Eli was in bed with the blankets pulled over him. I waited for a moment, wondering what to do.

Eli caught my eyes and flipped the covers back. "You want to sleep with me?"

My voice caught and all I could do was nod. I crawled next to Eli and settled into the bed. After a few moments, Eli reached over, grabbed my wrist and pulled my arm around us. I spooned against him, and smiled.

The remainder of the weekend went well as Eli seemed to forgive me, or at least give me a chance to make it up to him. By the time we needed to leave to get back to school I was genuinely miss being around her. As she gave us both warm hugs and a kiss on the cheek I could see her eyes were brimming with tears.

I watched through the back window as she stood by the road and waved. Once she'd disappeared from sight, I turned back and let out my breath with a whoosh.

"I love your mom."

"Me too."

####

We had made it back to the apartment early, but were too exhausted to do more than get ready for classes in the morning. We enjoyed some time together and then fell asleep in each other's arms.

Eli woke me when he answered his phone when it was ringing at three in the morning. "Yes, officer. I can meet you there. It'll take me ten minutes to dress and get across to the office."

He paused for a few moments to listen, then nodded his head. "Yes, sir. We'll be there as quick as possible." He ended the call before shaking my shoulder. "The GSA office has been vandalized."

"What do you mean the office has been vandalized?" I asked still trying to wake up.

Eli frowned at me. "What part don't you understand? The vandal or the ism? Did you want to know the source of the word? See, there were these Germanic tribes—"

"Fuckhead. If I want any of your lip, I'll scrape it off my zipper," I retorted, not sure what was going on or why Eli was joking around.

Eli started trying to find his underwear in the piles of clothes on the floor. I watched for a minute before I asked. "Did you want me to go with you?"

Eli stopped and shot me a fierce scowl. "You can't possibly be that stupid that you need me to answer."

I rolled out of bed and grabbed my jeans. I knew there was no use trying to find underwear. Mainly because I hadn't been wearing any. I carefully tucked myself back in and zipped them closed. I snagged a shirt and pulled it on. It was so tight it was obviously Eli's, but by then all I had time to do was slip my feet into a pair of flip-flops and race after him.

I caught up with him a few steps outside the dorm. "Hang on, Eli! Give me a sec."

He paused and turned to me. "Come on. They said it was wrecked."

I nodded and pushed Eli ahead of me and we began to run toward the GSA office. As we rounded the last building, we could see a couple of police cars sitting quietly in front of the building. We slowed to a walk as we got closer. One of the cops spotted us and walked our direction.

He held out his hand. "I'm Officer Perez. You Eli Collins?"

"Yes, sir. This is my boyfriend Nathan. He's also an officer in the group so I asked him to come."

"Of course. No problem." He turned and walked toward the building. "The alarm sounded about 20 minutes ago and the first officers arrived about five minutes later. At that point the building was empty." He stopped and looked at both of us. "They did a lot of damage considering how long they were in there."

I nodded and glanced over at Eli. He looked a little sick to the stomach. I had to agree, after setting our door on fire, I'd hoped that was the last of it. Apparently they weren't finished, or there are a lot more people on campus who were bigoted than I ever realized.

We stepped in behind the officer, realizing I wasn't sure why we'd gotten the call instead of Jamie, he was president of the organization. But this didn't seem like a great time to start asking those kinds of questions. We rounded the corner and my stomach roiled. Spray painted across the door was "Faggots burn in hell!" I looked to see how Eli was dealing with it. His jaw was clenched and I could see the muscled bulge as he ground his teeth.

"Pleasant people..." Eli said.

"We'll be reporting this as a hate crime. There may be some federal agents who will need to talk to you later."

Eli nodded, never taking his eyes from the spray painted words. Then he turned to the cop. "Can we go inside?"

"Just inside the door, I don't think you'll want to go in any further though."

Eli nodded and we stepped inside. The office was totaled. Pride banners of all kinds were torn and thrown on the floor, papers tossed around, drawers strewn around the room, anything they could destroy, they had. Then I realized a foul acrid odor was like a haze in the room. I covered my nose against the stench.

"What is that smell?"

The officer's mouth twitched as his scowl deepened. "We aren't sure yet, but—"

Eli interrupted. "They pissed on everything..."