Daddy [mxm]

4

Since Sammy is coming along on our guys' trip this year, we won't be camping; we'll be glamping, cabin and all.

I'm fuming.

But when Rudy pulls into the station where Bret and I've been waiting after our shift and only greets me, my heart legit somersaults and I forget all about my woes. I know it's probably just because he sees Bret all the time, but I tell myself: you're the only one he sees; he looks forward to seeing you more than his own son.

We pile into Rudy's Ford F-250, and he promptly turns on the oldies. He's particularly fond of Kenny Loggins' Playing with the Boys, and other eighties classics. Bret is clearly suffering, but I find absolutely everything about Rudy attractive just by virtue of it being him, so I sing along.

When I'm not doing that, I'm writing. As someone with a depressed, absentee mother, a dead father, and an impossible, taboo crush on a married man twenty years his senior, I came to understand very early on the importance of finding an escape hatch from reality. Whiling away the hours in a book is how I survived life.

"How's the story going?" Bret intrudes on my thoughts.

"Downhill, and that's a good thing."

"Mm?" Bret quirks a brow. "You always intrigue me."

"I'm writing morally ambiguous characters into a grey world. There won't even be a happy ending - at least, not what the reader's expecting." The reality of my struggles with this unrequited love taught me early on how unrealistic many stories are.

Bret nods once.

"I respect that."

I haven't let him read it yet, because I'm too afraid he'll notice the parallels. The story is a thinly-veiled chronicle of my relationship with Rudy to date.

When I'm not writing, I'm admiring the scenic route. Gorgeous vines climb the tall rock formations that flank each side of the road, and fields of lush, verdant grass stretch luxuriously in the brilliant sunlight, dotted by farms and other buildings. As the countryside gives way to more urban scenery, boating houses and small waterside stores come into view. Tourists mill around carrying shopping bags, enjoying enormous ice cream cones and snapping pictures by waterfalls and flower gardens.

So that Rudy doesn't get tired, I keep him talking by varied means, such as casually mentioning that I like beans in my chilli. I troll him pretty regularly. And Rudy, being a Texan through and through, takes the bait every time, launching into an explanation of how that makes it soup, not chilli.

We alternate so each driver gets one leg of the trip.

Thanks to Sammy, there wasn't enough room in the trunk of the car for all of our luggage, so it spilled over onto the backseat. When it's Sammy driving, Bret and I are squashed together so Bret can manspread like the absolute scum he is. When Bret is driving, I'm crammed in the back trying to sleep with Sammy occasionally tossing her immaculate platinum blond hair over her shoulders and whacking me in the face repeatedly. I spend those hours of the ride with my nose pressed up against the window. This allows me to admire every too-green leaf and crystal-clear lake. A cerulean sky, pure and spotless, shines against a horizon of verdant forest, which I recognize as the forest.

As we near the soaring trees, we follow a winding trail with beautiful multicolored flowers dotting the shrubbery at the side of the path. Further into the woods, cozy-looking summer cottages come into view. Some are still locked up, others have men barbecuing in the yards, women sprawled on deck chairs and children frolicking about, swinging from tire swings and kicking inflatable soccer balls.