Excessica Anthology BOX SET Winter by Edited by Selena Kitt Page A

but doesn't get
further because Ronnie leans heavily against him as the door opens fully, and
they tumble inside.
    Spencer
apologizes as he tries hastily to clear space for them. He glances at Brad, who
was always so proper and orderly: Brad is standing there looking at it, and the
immensity of the mess starts to sink into Spencer, weighting his arms and his
fingers—it's harder to move them now, and he can't hold onto anything; he
feels the magazines and clothing and whatnot he'd picked up slip through his
hands to spill on the floor once more. He bends down, but his damnable fingers
won't work; the towel he's reaching for won't stick to them, and gravity
reclaims it. He tries again, his face hot with the blood rushed to his head
from having to stay bent over, from being like this , and he wants
nothing more than to get away, except they're at his place and it's only one
room and he has nowhere to go...and then fingers brush his, curling into
terrycloth as the towel lets itself be picked up.
    Spencer unbends.
Towel in hand, Brad smiles. "Why don't you get the beer?" Brad
suggests. "We'll keep straightening up in here."
    In the
kitchenette, Spencer stays with his head in the fridge until the blood has
calmed from the surface of his skin. By the time he gets back, Brad and Ronnie
are sitting on the sofa they've uncovered. Spencer folds himself onto the
floor. "There's space with us," Brad says, but Spencer says he likes
it down here and Brad doesn't insist. Spencer hands each of them a can, which
they clink in toast before taking the first sips—and then, just as
Spencer has been fearing, nothing happens.
    Then it's worse
than silence, as conversation so often is. It's bad in a way Spencer forgot to
anticipate, because now Brad is holding up the cover of the DVD in the player
and saying, "I love their stuff. Have you seen the Personal Trainers series?"
    "Seen
it?" Ronnie says. "He owns every volume." Ronnie grins
unabashedly, and Spencer is afraid he is going to suggest they watch one right
now.
    To forestall
such a disaster, Spencer finds himself blurting, "So you play in the
Symphony."
    Brad turns to
him. "That's right." Silence looms threateningly, but Brad steps into
it with ease, dispersing it as he talks about the piece they've started
rehearsing for the winter season opening, what Brad loves about Tchaikovsky and
what he doesn't. He talks about music for a while, and Spencer listens.
    Then Brad says,
"Do you still play?" He slides off the sofa onto his knees, reaching
to hover at the edge of the oboe case half-buried beneath a pile of miscellany.
"I'm sorry," Brad says as he brings his hand back to himself. "I
just happened across it while we were picking things up. I didn't touch it,
though."
    "No,"
Spencer says. "I mean, I don't play anymore." He waits for Brad to
say the same thing everyone does, about what a shame, a shame that
is—but Brad only nods.
    "What do
you do?" Brad asks conversationally. Just casual, polite conversation, but
Spencer realizes there's no way to avoid the shame.
    "I sleep,
mostly," he confesses. "And go to the convenience store."
    "And watch
porn," Ronnie chimes in.
    Brad nods again
without taking his eyes off Spencer. "So are you." He hesitates,
curiosity and gentility seeming to war in him until he comes to a compromise of
discretion: "A recluse?"
    "Sort of,
yeah." If there's a word for what he is, Spencer doesn't know it. He means
to leave it at that, but finds himself going on, describing the nuances of his
situation, telling Brad things like how he pays his bills by pirating porn and
anime, and which brand of instant noodles he prefers, simply talking to him.
It's always been easy to talk to Brad, easy to say things to Brad. Well, easy
to say some things, if impossible to say others.
    They've been
talking for a while when a stuttered snore reminds them of Ronnie's presence.
They turn to see him sprawled on the sofa, one foot draped over the back, the
other dangling off the armrest, a