Crawling Into Bed With Remy Remington

____________

And a Good Book: Oceans Apart

*crawls into bed. *eyes two hulking men* Important things first, are these sheets silk or cotton?

Seriously? I bought them at Target. Who the hell sleeps on silk?

Well, I will admit that the majority of my interviewees prefer cotton. What are you wearing?

What the fuck does that matter?

Seriously? You do know that half the people reading this are hoping for a glimpse of... Oh never mind. What are we snacking on in bed while we read tonight?

The only thing I eat in bed is— *ouch* What the fuck, Miggy? Why’d you hit me on the back of my head?

Miggy: Be nice, querido. Lee is friends with Laura. And in case you haven’t noticed, Havan’s over there in the corner. She doesn’t want to hear what you eat in bed.

What is this nursery school?

Miggy: No, Remy, but people are supposed to be reading this to see if they want to read the book—

Like I give a—

Havan: Alrighty now...*raises hand* um...if I could just pipe in here—just for a second...I'm very interested in what gets eaten in this bed...just saying *winks*

Shhh. Havan! Don't poke him, he might bite... in a not too pleasant way. He's a might touchy it seems. If I open this nightstand drawer, what will I find?

“What?” Oh, hmm… slick, condoms, socks.

Miggy: Socks? Why do you keep your socks—Remy? Your socks are lined up in neat little rows, by colors…

Point, Miguel?

Miggy: Well, it’s just so…organized—

S’the way I like things. That okay with you, Migs? Everything has a place for a reason. Sorry about the interruption, Lee. My housemate seems to think this is the time to bring up personal issues. I’ve got a flashlight, spare batteries, and an extra charger for the phone. My gun goes in here when I’m ready to sleep.”

Miggy: Ay-yi-yi. Wait! Don’t shut that drawer…what is this?

What? Wait...stop, Miggy. Get your hand outta there.

Miggy: What is this, querido? You saved the Father’s Day card Toby gave you? And…Remy? This picture of—

Shut the fuck up, Miggy. Give me that back! It’s no big deal. What else do you want to know, Lee? Because if that’s all, I’ve gotta—

*Eyes Wide* Do you roll up in the blankets like a burrito, or kick the covers off during the night?

Kick ‘em off. Too damn hot here in Phoenix for covers.

Um...Can I put my cold feet on your calves to warm them up?

Can I put my dick in your—

Miggy: Remy!

Don’t worry, Miggy, I was teasing…don’t get your panties in a knot.

Havan: Hey now! *grabs Lee* Oh wait...can we see the panties?

Are you sure you don't want to finish that question, Remy? No? Okay, well, I guess we'll never know, will we? What are we reading?

Oceans Apart is the second book in a four book series. Book one was Continental Divide.

Here’s the blurb for Oceans Apart:

It’s been two years since Lord Jamie Mainwaring and Detective Remy Remington worked and loved their way through their one and only case before going their separate ways. Now Jamie is once again mixing agency business with pleasure as he and his partner, Agent Ryan Whiteside, are assigned to a case involving piracy in the Caribbean. Remy and his old friend Miggy are still detectives, but they’ve gone private in Phoenix. When their biggest client sends them to supervise an unusual diamond transfer, they think their toughest challenge will be maintaining their cover as a gay couple on a barefoot-style cruise.

When murder connects the dots between the two cases, the four men must learn to work together as relationships and loyalties are tested amid misunderstandings and memories on the high seas.

An Excerpt from Oceans Apart, from the night Toby graduated from high school.

“I can’t believe I really did it,” Toby said for maybe the twentieth time since they’d sat down at the table.

Miggy watched the boy…no, he corrected…young man. Toby was still grinning as he reached for another sparerib from the bar tray-sized platter of barbeque that the restaurant served family style. The celebration dinner at Dave’s Family Bar-B-Que had been Toby’s choice; he loved the monster-sized family meals. This was the first restaurant they’d gone to when they’d brought Toby home to Phoenix and it touched Miggy that he’d selected the local home-style eatery to celebrate this milestone. They were making memories together.

Remy reached for a paper towel from the wooden spindle mounted on the table, then swiped at his mouth and fingers. Wadding the makeshift napkin into a ball, he tossed it on his plate. Miggy reached over and rubbed his thumb over a smear of sauce on Remy’s jaw, drawing a raised eyebrow from the big guy.

Shrugging, Miggy grinned. “It wasn’t a good look for you, chulo.” Turning to wink at Toby, he added, “You can dress him up…”

“But you can’t take him anywhere,” Toby finished on a laugh.

The tie Toby had picked for Remy was long gone, tossed into the back seat of the truck as soon as they left the stadium. The open collar and rolled up sleeves might have said casual businessman, if it weren’t for the tanned, heavily muscled forearms and rugged face. His tousled sandy brown gave the impression that he’d just removed his cowboy hat. Of course, Toby wasn’t much better, since his cap and gown had joined the offending neckwear, leaving him in khaki slacks and an Arizona Diamondbacks T-shirt. With their similar coloring, Remy’s hazel eyes and Toby’s green, they often were mistaken for father and son. Miggy was the odd man out with his black hair and dark eyes. He mentally rolled his eyes at himself, acting like they were a real family.

Remy sipped his beer then sat back and looked at Toby with his characteristic half smile-half smirk. “Are you really sure you want to spend the rest of the evening with us Toby? Isn’t there a party or grad night event? I thought I saw a flyer—”

“Stop, Remy. You know I’m not into that shit. Besides—”

“Yeah…we know,” Miggy said. “So, you’ve put this off long enough. What is it you wanted to tell us? You know we have ways to make you talk.” He waggled his eyebrows and twisted his fork in the air.

Toby laughed. “I know, Migs, I know. First, uhm…well, thanks. Okay? Remy, you always sort of blow me off when I try to thank you, but I mean it. You two got me out of the group foster home and brought me out here. I probably would have just been back on the street without you, man. So…uhm, yeah…thanks…” He swallowed hard and dropped his gaze.

Remy and Miggy’s exchanged a quick glance before Remy turned to face Toby. He spoke so quietly that Toby leaned forward to hear over the clatter of the dining room. “Tobes, you and Miggy both know my life started a lot like yours…but I survived and made something of myself. You survived too, and now you’re on your way. Miggy and I…we don’t want you to think we’re done just ‘cause you graduated. Shit. We’re family now, right?”

Toby blinked, almost as if in surprise, but it was nothing to the shock that rolled through Miggy’s stomach as Remy’s words hit home. Family. It was so close to what he’d been thinking minutes earlier. Shaking off his own uncertain feelings, Miggy grabbed Toby’s forearm and squeezed. Remy mirrored the gesture, and once again, their gazes met. Remy gave Miggy half a smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners, as if they shared some secret joke. Remy turned to speak to Toby, but Miggy was having a damn hard time looking away from Remy’s strong profile.

“Listen, we’re all pretty shitty at saying stuff…so give me a break here, Toby. I am thirty-nine years old, and never going to have a kid of my own, but if I did? I’d want him to be just like you. I’m happy to think of you as my son in every way that counts, okay?”

There was a long pause while they all examined their plates. Toby cleared his throat then spoke first, his voice thick with emotion. “Shit, Remy.”

“Hell. What he said,” Miggy added. He tried to put as much feeling as he could into the words. Then he started to laugh. He couldn’t help it. Remy was right, they were all bad at talking about feelings.

~~*~~

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Flash Fiction: Every Note

Well, you might have known that I couldn't make it long without writing to a prompt...And of course, I dragged Havan along with me. This is a rather long flash, but I thought every word was needed. If you find any extraneous, don't tell me!

Prompt: "What are you doing here?"

Every Note

Copyright Jan 2013 © Lee Brazil

"What are you doing here?" Trey rolled over in the bed and pried one eye open. Yep. Jax lounged in the doorway in his usual, come and fuck me I'm home pose. In fact, he'd made himself so much at home that he'd already shed the disgraceful aged sandals he called footwear. Probably left them right inside the front door, where you can trip on them in the morning, Trey thought bitterly, letting his gaze roam hungrily over the lean figure slouched in front of him. Long dyed dark hair had been mussed by the wind, thin lips stretched in a hopeful smile, and damn it...it looked like the man had lost at least twenty pounds on this tour.

"The tour is over. Where else would I be?" Jax shrugged matter of factly.

Scrunching his pillow up and shoving it under his head, Trey sat up and glared, bleary eyed, at his ex, the rising star of the folk rock world. "We broke up before you went on this tour, or did you conveniently forget that?"

Jax rolled his eyes and strolled toward the bed, stripping off his tight band t-shirt and shucking his worn jeans. "That was just you being controlling and jealous. I know how your mind works. You wanted me to think about us while I was gone. It worked. I couldn’t get you out of my mind for the last three months."

If that could be interpreted as meaning that he hadn't been with anyone else, Trey would have scooted over and rolled Jax under him in a heart beat. Unfortunately, he knew better. "Right. In between all the glamour of life on a tour bus, you were thinking about me, about us, about life in a one bedroom apartment just barely on the right side of the tracks." He didn't even try to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. What was the point? Jax wasn't interested in the day to day minutiae of life and love. He wanted the sex, the companionship on his own terms, not the work.

"You painted the living room. The couch is three feet closer to the patio, that's a new coffee table, the plant your sister gave us when we moved in here two years ago seems to have spawned, and the picture of us at your graduation is missing from the end table." Jax knelt at the side of the bed. "Should I go on? I didn't check specifically, but I'd bet my cd's, movies, and books are all missing. The shelves looked a little skimpy. I'd have checked, but I was anxious to see you, you see."

Trey's jaw dropped in astonishment. "How long have you been here?"

"I've been watching you sleep, just for a minute or two. I wanted to store up the memory, just in case." Callused fingers stroked his exposed shoulder, pleading eyes met his gaze.

Trey shuddered. Stay firm, he urged himself. This close, it was easy to see the sparse five o'clock shadow of thin blond hairs, the tiny lines of fatigue at the corners of that pouting mouth. "It's so easy, when you've been away, to think that this is what you want." He argued. "But when you're the one who stays at home, who waits for someone to return, seeing those little reminders every day...It's too much to ask."

"I can't stay here; traveling is part of the job."

Jax sounded as weary as Trey felt. "I know. The music comes first, it always has. When will we come first?"

He realized his mistake when Jax's expression brightened. "So you admit there is a we still?"

Opening his mouth to issue a denial, Trey couldn't find the words to express himself. "Damn it, Jax. There's been a we since you pranced in to pre-school in a purple tutu twenty-three years ago." He ignored the bright flash of white teeth as Jax's smile broadened. "But sometimes, the we that we are isn't good for me. Sometimes, I have to think about me, not us. Just like touring is good for you, and your career, I have to think about what's good for me."

Blue eyes darkened with hurt, though Jax controlled his flinch quickly. "You're saying I'm not good for you?"

"You've never been good for me, Jax. Not even during those purple tutu days." His heart ached at the admission.

Jax reared back from him, eye's widening in shock. "What?"

"I've always stood behind you Jax, even when standing there got me made fun of, mocked, ostracized, beat up. Being your friend, being with you, made it all worth while. But when you're not here, how does that make it a we?" He wasn't making sense, he knew that. But his heart believed every word he said, and from the expression on his face, Jax understood what he meant, even if he didn't understand the mess in his head himself.

"There's always a we, right here." Jax tapped his chest. "You're always with me, every mile on every bus, every minute of every concert, every note of every song. Do you think I could step up on a stage anywhere and have the guts to sing about love, or friendship, or hope, if I didn't have you with me?"

His heart rate picked, up, a slow burn began in the pit of Trey's stomach. "Really? But..."

"But nothing. I told you, it's always you. Nothing ever happens on a tour that isn't just work. I crawl into my bunk exhausted after smiling til two am, and I dream of you, of coming back to you, of kissing you—"

Trey stopped his speech with a kiss, flinging aside the bedclothes to invite Jax to climb up with him, devoured his mouth with a hunger born of denial, of loss. He tore his mouth away briefly to mutter, "I love you." Then swallowed Jax's response with another demanding kiss.