osprey_archer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
osprey_archer) wrote2023-08-05 07:22 am
osprey_archer) wrote2023-08-05 07:22 am
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Sleeping Soldier Saturday, chapter 4
One last chapter in The Sleeping Soldier! The book releases in two days, so it's coming right up.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Preorder link
***
A cold wind whipped across the porch as they left the house. Russell closed the front door and locked it carefully, tossing the cheerful comment over his shoulder, “Now that ought to keep out intruders!”
Caleb laughed, his face flushing hot in the cold.
“Though it’s lucky I didn’t lock it before; or I shouldn’t have met you, and that’s the first bit of luck I’ve had in the future,” Russell said, flashing a grin, and Caleb’s flush deepened. Russell locked the gate too, then turned to Caleb. “Here, Freckles, let me take your arm.”
Instinctively Caleb jerked his arm out of reach. “Men don’t walk arm in arm these days.”
“Don’t they?” Russell looked startled. But then the smile was back. “Well, all right then, Virgil. I s’pose I know enough not to run into the street in front of the cars. That’s what you call ‘em, right?”
“Yes.”
They walked slowly down Hill Road, Russell’s head turning from side to side as he took it all in: the street lamps, the shining Christmas lights, the parked cars. Russell stared as a Cadillac backed down a driveway. “I can’t get used to these cars,” he said. “Mr. Huber drove me to his house even, so I’ve been inside one and everything, but still and all every time I see them, they are so much bigger than I expect… As the bride said on her wedding night.”
Caleb barked out an astonished laugh. Russell glanced over and grinned sheepishly. “I am a trifle nervous,” he confessed.
“I guess it’s all pretty strange to you,” Caleb agreed.
They crossed the street into campus, and Caleb began to point out the dorms they passed: Riley, Tarkington, Stowe with its pointed Gothic arches. “That was the first girls’ dorm. They built it in the 1890s. Behind it you can see Stratton Porter, which is also a girls’ dorm.”
“It is so tiny!”
“It only looks small. Actually they built it all the way down the hillside, so all the rooms have views of the Wabash. Or so I’ve heard. Boys aren’t allowed past the lobby.”
Russell grinned. “Oh, and it’s only the river views you’re bitter about missing!”
Caleb avoided the raillery. “There’s the science building to the right, and Main Hall over on the left. And past Main Hall, across the street—that glass building is the conservatory. Right next to it is the chapel.”
“Is it beautiful, the chapel?”
“Do you want to go see? It’s better in daylight, when the sun comes through the stained glass windows.”
“We might as well wait, then. I guess I’ll be spending enough time there.”
The words gave Caleb a jolt. Was Russell that religious? Not that it mattered really…
“Do they have an organ?” Russell asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s something. Good music goes a long way toward making chapel bearable.”
“Oh!” Caleb understood. “We don’t have compulsory chapel.”
“Really?” Russell was astonished. “Lord, the Sabbatarians must be fit to bust.”
“Sabbat—what?”
“Don’t you have Sabbatarians? People who think that on the Sabbath you should only read sacred books, and sing sacred songs, and sit in meeting morning and night?”
“No. I don’t think that’s really a thing anymore.” Caleb was only familiar with the idea from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books.
“Good,” Russell said firmly. “I can’t imagine it’s what the good Lord meant, when he said ‘Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy,’ that people should be miserable all day.”
They passed the cheese grater of a library, and the Union, and the old library, a Carnegie building with graceful sweeping double stairs. “Now this is more like,” Russell exalted.
“It’s going to be an art museum.”
“A whole art museum just for the college?” Russell sounded astonished.
“Yes. I mean, it’s not, you know, Old Masters or anything. Although they’ve got some sketches by Raphael, I think.”
“Sketches by Raphael.” Russell was nearly whispering. “In my time you had to go to Europe to see anything so grand.”
Past the frat quad, they reached the edge of campus. “The gymnasium is a mile off campus, if you want to see it.” In high school, Caleb had been right fielder on the varsity baseball team, but he never went to the gym now. Better not to give himself the opportunity to ogle the guys in the locker room.
“Oh, let’s go,” Russell said. “It’s a nice night, and I need to stretch my legs. Why’s it so far out? Do they want to keep the young sprouts away from the corrupting influence of the rest of you?”
Caleb was puzzled. “What do you mean?”
They had nearly reached the gymnasium before Caleb understood that to Russell, gymnasium was another word for preparatory school. Although the basketball and racquetball courts quickly showed Russell that the gymnasium was now solely devoted to physical education, it took most of the walk back to campus before Russell grasped that Hawkins had no preparatory school.
“Nowadays colleges expect students to come already prepared to work at the college level,” Caleb explained.
“But what if they live way out in the country, far from any school?”
“Everyone has access to high school now. There are free school buses, and they bring students into school even if they live miles out of town.”
“And they just board at school?”
“No. They live at home. They take the bus in every morning and home every night.”
“Lord.” Russell’s eyes widened, then narrowed again, his brow furrowing in thought. “Lord,” he said again, more slowly. “This leaves me in the soup. I can’t imagine I am prepared. Although I guess Greek and Latin can’t’ve changed…”
“Actually,” Caleb said, “Greek and Latin are no longer required courses for graduation. There are lots of different subjects to choose from now.”
Russell stopped walking. He looked at Caleb for a long time, unspeaking, his face drawn, and Caleb saw suddenly how effortful Russell’s seemingly effortless good cheer had been; how lost he must feel in this strange new world.
He knew that Russell had only called him Virgil as a little joke. But in that moment, Caleb accepted the responsibility. He would be Russell’s guide, not just for this campus tour, but for as long as Russell needed him.
Aloud Caleb said, “There are still courses in Latin and Greek, though. It might be good to start with courses where you’re already familiar with the material.”
“Yes,” agreed Russell, with a sigh. “I’ve more than enough to learn outside class.”
Caleb nodded, opened his mouth to explain about majors, and then all of a sudden decided that he’d flung enough new information at Russell for one night. Instead Caleb said, “Do you want to go back to my dorm and get something to eat?”
“Yes!” But after two steps, Russell checked. “Will we be meeting all your classmates?”
“No.”
“Oh thank God.” Russell almost gasped with relief, and then smiled apologetically. “There were boys in the army who came from deep country, real yokels, who had never used forks or worn drawers or sometimes even seen a railway; and boy did they get teased. But at least they had heard of railways. And I know there’s so many things I haven’t even heard of…”
“I’m the only one back so far,” Caleb assured him. “Most people won’t be back till the college reopens, after the new year starts. Well, there are a few student workers who will be back tomorrow to help move the books into the new library…”
His ears were burning. He expected Russell to ask why Caleb had come back a day before everyone else. But Russell was evidently too relieved not to be meeting Caleb’s classmates to fret about such minutia.
Once they reached the Riley kitchen, Russell hawked over the toaster, watching the wires heat to red-hot as it toasted the bread. “I’ll get some jam and butter out of the refrigerator,” said Caleb, suddenly ravenous at the smell of toast. He had missed dinner. “Here, come look at the fridge, Russell. It—”
“Keeps food cool.” Russell’s eyes remained fixed on the toaster.
Caleb was disappointed. He abandoned his plan to flourish the fridge door and just opened it like normal. “I guess Mr. Huber had one.”
“We had refrigerators.”
“You did?”
Russell nodded. He glanced over his shoulder into the crowded refrigerator. “Cleaner than this.”
He sounded pleased to have discovered a corner of the twentieth century that wasn’t immaculate.
“Well, it’s a dorm fridge, what did you expect?” Caleb protested. He had unloaded four jams and a tub of margarine and grabbed a cheddar for good measure. Oh, and here was a Swiss. It didn’t have a name on it so it was free game.
Russell at last came over to the fridge and opened up the freezer. He stepped back. “Where’s the ice, then?”
“Oh!” Caleb understood suddenly. Russell must’ve used refrigerator as another word for icebox, rather as Caleb’s mother used icebox to mean refrigerator. “There’s no ice. It’s cooled by electricity.”
“Of course. Of course. Everything’s electric in the future. The stove too?”
“Yes.” Caleb turned the knob on the burner to show how it worked. Then the toast popped, which made Russell jump. “Oh! It does that. Sorry, I should’ve warned you… Here, let’s put in some more to toast while we eat. I’m starving.”
Three slices in, Russell observed, “You know, it’s not so good as toast from a proper fire.”
“No,” Caleb agreed. He had made toast over a campfire on Boy Scout camping trips, so he knew how good it tasted. “I guess that’s the price we pay for the convenience of central heating.”
“And it’s worth it. Lord, it’s warm in here. I might just go to sleep on the table.”
It occurred to Caleb then that he ought to ask Russell to spend the night.
As they toasted their way through an entire loaf of bread, Caleb struggled with himself. It seemed cruel to send Russell back to the cold Schloss, but it also seemed practically suicidal to let him stay. After all, he’d probably expect to share Caleb’s bed, men did that in the old days, they shared beds and snuggled together, and what if Caleb got a boner?
God, it would all blow up in his face, like with Barry.
The summer after sophomore year, Caleb had taken to biking over to Barry’s house in the evenings, the cool air against his bare legs, the fireflies dancing in the dusky lawns. Barry’s parents were divorced (a fact mentioned only in hushed voices), and Barry’s mother worked the night shift at the hospital, and Caleb got there just after she left, and Caleb and Barry sat on the couch and watched whatever was on TV and ribbed each other and tussled and made out.
That last night it was The Mummy, starring Boris Karloff. Caleb had been playing keep-away with the popcorn bowl, pulling it out of Barry’s reach so Barry had to lean over him to get at it, and Barry was exasperated, laughing, simultaneously swatting Caleb and kissing the side of his face.
Then Barry pinned Caleb down to take the bowl away, and they both realized at the same moment that Caleb was hard.
They both froze. Then Barry drew away so fast that he fell off the couch, and popcorn spewed all over the floor.
“I’ll help—” Caleb started, making a move to pick it up.
“No!” Barry yelled. Then, more quietly, lying: “You better go. My mom’s gonna be home soon.”
“Oh, yeah, my parents are expecting me…”
They never spoke again. And Caleb knew he was damn lucky that was all that happened. Lots of guys would have told everyone, or beaten him up, or—worse—
Russell had been a soldier, a cavalry officer. Caleb knew just how strong he was, could still remember Russell’s powerful arms holding him immobile, Russell’s hard hand over his mouth.
But no, no, that had been a completely different situation. Caleb and Russell weren’t going to be tussling over a bowl of popcorn. And they wouldn’t share the bed either. Caleb would just tell him that men didn’t share beds these days. He could easily accommodate Russell on the window seat. He even had an extra pillow and blanket, still unused, which he had bought just in case his high school friend Greg kept his promise to visit.
Nonetheless, Caleb’s hands were sweaty when he said, “Do you want to spend the night in my room? On the window seat,” he added hastily. “It’s no longer customary for men to share beds.”
“I’d sleep on the floor if it’ll keep me here in the warmth,” Russell declared. He smiled at Caleb, his face bright with pleasure and relief. “Thank you kindly for inviting me. I didn’t like to ask, but it’ll be a sight more comfortable here than down at the Schloss, that’s for sure.”
“Yes. Yes, I thought it would. I was thinking,” said Caleb, nervous again, aware that he was tempting fate. Yet what else was he supposed to do? Banish Russell to the Schloss to get pneumonia? “I was thinking… if you want, you could stay till you can move into your own dorm room. Mr. Huber signed you up for the dorms, right?” He couldn’t have expected Russell to live all winter in that unheated house, surely.
Russell nodded. “Yes, he did. He gave me a bunch of papers about it, with a room number and everything. I don’t remember exactly, but I think it was in Riley.”
“Really!” And suddenly Caleb was grinning stupidly.
“Yes.” Russell nodded, smiling too. “It’s fate I guess. We’re meant to be friends. I knew it as soon as I met you.”
“While you were throwing me against the wall?”
Russell laughed. “Well, maybe it took a few minutes, then!”
But Caleb saw another problem. “Some of the guys will be back tomorrow, though. And you mentioned you wanted a little more time to prepare…”
Russell sobered. He thought about it as he munched a slice of toast. Then he shook his head. “No, I don’t think a few extra days is enough to matter any. No. I’ll stay here, and meet them tomorrow, and when they laugh ’cause I don’t know what a gymnasium is—well, it is funny.” He shoved the last of his toast in his mouth and chewed it in about three bites. “Could you show me—let’s see, Mr. Huber told me, but I’ve forgotten the polite name for it already—”
“The restroom? The bathroom. The washroom. The johns,” said Caleb, and Russell grinned. “Sure, c’mon. I guess you’ve seen toilets in Mr. Huber’s house, but probably not urinals…”
***
Caleb ended up demonstrating the showers, toilets, urinals, and the taps in the restroom, as well as showing Russell all his toiletries: deodorant, shaving cream, toothpaste. He was horrified to hear that Russell generally brushed his teeth with soot, although Russell insisted it worked fine. “My teeth haven’t all fallen out, anyhow,” he said, and bared them at Caleb. Russell’s teeth were a little crooked, ivory rather than white, but certainly they looked strong, and Caleb had to look away from Russell’s mouth.
“Well, anyway, tomorrow we’ll go to the drugstore on Main Street and get you kitted out.” The idea grew on Caleb as he spoke. “There are tons of shops on Main Street. Ayres too, the department store, we could stop and buy some clothes for you.”
“Oh, we don’t need to buy the kit. Mr. Huber bought all this for me, though he didn’t much explain how to use it. I guess he figured it was obvious… It’s all at the Schloss, though, so tonight I’ll just use your comb.”
Caleb tried to think of a polite way to say that this was the most revolting thing he’d ever heard. His face must’ve said it for him, because Russell said, “Oh. I guess you don’t do that nowadays? In my time, if you went out to a farm you used the family comb.”
“Did you,” said Caleb, attempting to sound interested and non-judgmental and, from the look on Russell’s face, clearly failing miserably. “That’s not considered, um. Hygienic, nowadays.”
“Well, I’ll run up to the Schloss to get mine then. And my clothes and the food and everything, I might as well bring it all here. We can look the clothes over and see what we’ll need to get at the—department store, did you call it?”
“Yes, that’s a good idea. Here, borrow my key, and while you’re gone I’ll set up the bed on the window seat.”
Setting up the bed on the window seat just meant fluffing up his extra pillow and shaking out his extra blanket. Caleb washed his face and brushed his teeth and got into his pajamas, too, and was in bed trying to calm his nerves by rereading a bit of David Copperfield (a Christmas present from his grandmother) when Russell called, “Caleb! Where are you?”
“I’m in the only room with an open door, doofus!”
For a split second Caleb regretted that doofus, but then Russell appeared in his doorway, beaming, his round cheeks red with cold. “Doofus yourself,” he said, and then, “I like your room. Are they all fitted up like this?”
“The furniture, yeah. Everyone gets the bed and the desk and the chest of drawers. Most of the rooms don’t have window seats though. And some people decorate more…” Caleb felt embarrassed by the lonely Hawkins pennant on his wall.
But Russell was looking around appreciatively, taking in the rug, the reading lamp clipped to Caleb’s headboard, the book in Caleb’s hands. He gasped and dropped his suitcase and flung himself on the bed. “Do you like Dickens?”
Caleb slammed the book down over his lap, alarmed at Russell’s sudden proximity and embarrassed by his oft-mocked reading tastes. “Yes.”
“I’m so glad people still read him. You never know who will survive. Do you still read—?” He checked himself. “No, I will ask later, I ought to focus on the future now. But will you read me a bit? Just whatever bit you are up to, it doesn’t matter any. Dickens will feel like home.”
Caleb’s heart melted. “Yes, of course,” he said. “Just get ready for bed—I’ve got the window seat all set up.” He gave Russell a little push, as Russell was sitting about two inches away, all but hovering over David Copperfield.
“All right, all right. And then the bedtime story. Lord, I feel like I’m five again. I really do, that’s about as much as I know about the world.”
Russell popped off the bed, and without so much as a by your leave began to strip off, just as he had in the Schloss. This time he didn’t stop at his drawers, either, and Caleb tried not to look and therefore caught sight of him in the full-length mirror, and God, his legs were just as beautiful as the rest of him, his calves as exquisitely molded as his arms, and apparently all that folklore about dick size correlating with the size of feet and hands was just a myth, because Russell’s was beautiful, perfectly proportioned…
Caleb pressed David Copperfield over his own errant dick and stared hard at nothing and thought about deserts, and sand, and scratchy unpleasant things.
“Well, I’m in bed and everything,” Russell announced, and Caleb turned round to see him sitting in the window seat, wearing his pajamas, watching Caleb with bright hopeful eyes.
Caleb read for a long time. At last he paused, and then quietly turned, and saw that Russell was asleep on the window seat. Caleb set the book gently on his bureau, and turned out the reading lamp. Thoughts popped in his head like popcorn kernels, all the inventions of the last century he had yet to tell Russell about: telephones and televisions, movies and motorcycles, airplanes and interstates…
“Caleb?” said Russell, his voice soft in the darkness.
“Hmm?”
“I do thank you kindly for all this. I’m a stranger in your land, and you’ve welcomed me like Lot with the angels; and after I greeted you like a thief in the night.”
Caleb drew his sheet up over his nose. “It’s nothing. I mean, for all you knew I was a thief in the night.”
“Well. A thief died beside Jesus on the crosses at Calvary; and Jesus promised him solemnly that they should see each other in paradise.”
Caleb loved these high-flown speeches in nineteenth century novels, but he’d never had one directed at him in real life, and he had no idea how to respond. At last, quietly, he said, “Good night, Russell.”
“Good night, Freckles.”
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Preorder link
***
A cold wind whipped across the porch as they left the house. Russell closed the front door and locked it carefully, tossing the cheerful comment over his shoulder, “Now that ought to keep out intruders!”
Caleb laughed, his face flushing hot in the cold.
“Though it’s lucky I didn’t lock it before; or I shouldn’t have met you, and that’s the first bit of luck I’ve had in the future,” Russell said, flashing a grin, and Caleb’s flush deepened. Russell locked the gate too, then turned to Caleb. “Here, Freckles, let me take your arm.”
Instinctively Caleb jerked his arm out of reach. “Men don’t walk arm in arm these days.”
“Don’t they?” Russell looked startled. But then the smile was back. “Well, all right then, Virgil. I s’pose I know enough not to run into the street in front of the cars. That’s what you call ‘em, right?”
“Yes.”
They walked slowly down Hill Road, Russell’s head turning from side to side as he took it all in: the street lamps, the shining Christmas lights, the parked cars. Russell stared as a Cadillac backed down a driveway. “I can’t get used to these cars,” he said. “Mr. Huber drove me to his house even, so I’ve been inside one and everything, but still and all every time I see them, they are so much bigger than I expect… As the bride said on her wedding night.”
Caleb barked out an astonished laugh. Russell glanced over and grinned sheepishly. “I am a trifle nervous,” he confessed.
“I guess it’s all pretty strange to you,” Caleb agreed.
They crossed the street into campus, and Caleb began to point out the dorms they passed: Riley, Tarkington, Stowe with its pointed Gothic arches. “That was the first girls’ dorm. They built it in the 1890s. Behind it you can see Stratton Porter, which is also a girls’ dorm.”
“It is so tiny!”
“It only looks small. Actually they built it all the way down the hillside, so all the rooms have views of the Wabash. Or so I’ve heard. Boys aren’t allowed past the lobby.”
Russell grinned. “Oh, and it’s only the river views you’re bitter about missing!”
Caleb avoided the raillery. “There’s the science building to the right, and Main Hall over on the left. And past Main Hall, across the street—that glass building is the conservatory. Right next to it is the chapel.”
“Is it beautiful, the chapel?”
“Do you want to go see? It’s better in daylight, when the sun comes through the stained glass windows.”
“We might as well wait, then. I guess I’ll be spending enough time there.”
The words gave Caleb a jolt. Was Russell that religious? Not that it mattered really…
“Do they have an organ?” Russell asked.
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s something. Good music goes a long way toward making chapel bearable.”
“Oh!” Caleb understood. “We don’t have compulsory chapel.”
“Really?” Russell was astonished. “Lord, the Sabbatarians must be fit to bust.”
“Sabbat—what?”
“Don’t you have Sabbatarians? People who think that on the Sabbath you should only read sacred books, and sing sacred songs, and sit in meeting morning and night?”
“No. I don’t think that’s really a thing anymore.” Caleb was only familiar with the idea from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books.
“Good,” Russell said firmly. “I can’t imagine it’s what the good Lord meant, when he said ‘Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy,’ that people should be miserable all day.”
They passed the cheese grater of a library, and the Union, and the old library, a Carnegie building with graceful sweeping double stairs. “Now this is more like,” Russell exalted.
“It’s going to be an art museum.”
“A whole art museum just for the college?” Russell sounded astonished.
“Yes. I mean, it’s not, you know, Old Masters or anything. Although they’ve got some sketches by Raphael, I think.”
“Sketches by Raphael.” Russell was nearly whispering. “In my time you had to go to Europe to see anything so grand.”
Past the frat quad, they reached the edge of campus. “The gymnasium is a mile off campus, if you want to see it.” In high school, Caleb had been right fielder on the varsity baseball team, but he never went to the gym now. Better not to give himself the opportunity to ogle the guys in the locker room.
“Oh, let’s go,” Russell said. “It’s a nice night, and I need to stretch my legs. Why’s it so far out? Do they want to keep the young sprouts away from the corrupting influence of the rest of you?”
Caleb was puzzled. “What do you mean?”
They had nearly reached the gymnasium before Caleb understood that to Russell, gymnasium was another word for preparatory school. Although the basketball and racquetball courts quickly showed Russell that the gymnasium was now solely devoted to physical education, it took most of the walk back to campus before Russell grasped that Hawkins had no preparatory school.
“Nowadays colleges expect students to come already prepared to work at the college level,” Caleb explained.
“But what if they live way out in the country, far from any school?”
“Everyone has access to high school now. There are free school buses, and they bring students into school even if they live miles out of town.”
“And they just board at school?”
“No. They live at home. They take the bus in every morning and home every night.”
“Lord.” Russell’s eyes widened, then narrowed again, his brow furrowing in thought. “Lord,” he said again, more slowly. “This leaves me in the soup. I can’t imagine I am prepared. Although I guess Greek and Latin can’t’ve changed…”
“Actually,” Caleb said, “Greek and Latin are no longer required courses for graduation. There are lots of different subjects to choose from now.”
Russell stopped walking. He looked at Caleb for a long time, unspeaking, his face drawn, and Caleb saw suddenly how effortful Russell’s seemingly effortless good cheer had been; how lost he must feel in this strange new world.
He knew that Russell had only called him Virgil as a little joke. But in that moment, Caleb accepted the responsibility. He would be Russell’s guide, not just for this campus tour, but for as long as Russell needed him.
Aloud Caleb said, “There are still courses in Latin and Greek, though. It might be good to start with courses where you’re already familiar with the material.”
“Yes,” agreed Russell, with a sigh. “I’ve more than enough to learn outside class.”
Caleb nodded, opened his mouth to explain about majors, and then all of a sudden decided that he’d flung enough new information at Russell for one night. Instead Caleb said, “Do you want to go back to my dorm and get something to eat?”
“Yes!” But after two steps, Russell checked. “Will we be meeting all your classmates?”
“No.”
“Oh thank God.” Russell almost gasped with relief, and then smiled apologetically. “There were boys in the army who came from deep country, real yokels, who had never used forks or worn drawers or sometimes even seen a railway; and boy did they get teased. But at least they had heard of railways. And I know there’s so many things I haven’t even heard of…”
“I’m the only one back so far,” Caleb assured him. “Most people won’t be back till the college reopens, after the new year starts. Well, there are a few student workers who will be back tomorrow to help move the books into the new library…”
His ears were burning. He expected Russell to ask why Caleb had come back a day before everyone else. But Russell was evidently too relieved not to be meeting Caleb’s classmates to fret about such minutia.
Once they reached the Riley kitchen, Russell hawked over the toaster, watching the wires heat to red-hot as it toasted the bread. “I’ll get some jam and butter out of the refrigerator,” said Caleb, suddenly ravenous at the smell of toast. He had missed dinner. “Here, come look at the fridge, Russell. It—”
“Keeps food cool.” Russell’s eyes remained fixed on the toaster.
Caleb was disappointed. He abandoned his plan to flourish the fridge door and just opened it like normal. “I guess Mr. Huber had one.”
“We had refrigerators.”
“You did?”
Russell nodded. He glanced over his shoulder into the crowded refrigerator. “Cleaner than this.”
He sounded pleased to have discovered a corner of the twentieth century that wasn’t immaculate.
“Well, it’s a dorm fridge, what did you expect?” Caleb protested. He had unloaded four jams and a tub of margarine and grabbed a cheddar for good measure. Oh, and here was a Swiss. It didn’t have a name on it so it was free game.
Russell at last came over to the fridge and opened up the freezer. He stepped back. “Where’s the ice, then?”
“Oh!” Caleb understood suddenly. Russell must’ve used refrigerator as another word for icebox, rather as Caleb’s mother used icebox to mean refrigerator. “There’s no ice. It’s cooled by electricity.”
“Of course. Of course. Everything’s electric in the future. The stove too?”
“Yes.” Caleb turned the knob on the burner to show how it worked. Then the toast popped, which made Russell jump. “Oh! It does that. Sorry, I should’ve warned you… Here, let’s put in some more to toast while we eat. I’m starving.”
Three slices in, Russell observed, “You know, it’s not so good as toast from a proper fire.”
“No,” Caleb agreed. He had made toast over a campfire on Boy Scout camping trips, so he knew how good it tasted. “I guess that’s the price we pay for the convenience of central heating.”
“And it’s worth it. Lord, it’s warm in here. I might just go to sleep on the table.”
It occurred to Caleb then that he ought to ask Russell to spend the night.
As they toasted their way through an entire loaf of bread, Caleb struggled with himself. It seemed cruel to send Russell back to the cold Schloss, but it also seemed practically suicidal to let him stay. After all, he’d probably expect to share Caleb’s bed, men did that in the old days, they shared beds and snuggled together, and what if Caleb got a boner?
God, it would all blow up in his face, like with Barry.
The summer after sophomore year, Caleb had taken to biking over to Barry’s house in the evenings, the cool air against his bare legs, the fireflies dancing in the dusky lawns. Barry’s parents were divorced (a fact mentioned only in hushed voices), and Barry’s mother worked the night shift at the hospital, and Caleb got there just after she left, and Caleb and Barry sat on the couch and watched whatever was on TV and ribbed each other and tussled and made out.
That last night it was The Mummy, starring Boris Karloff. Caleb had been playing keep-away with the popcorn bowl, pulling it out of Barry’s reach so Barry had to lean over him to get at it, and Barry was exasperated, laughing, simultaneously swatting Caleb and kissing the side of his face.
Then Barry pinned Caleb down to take the bowl away, and they both realized at the same moment that Caleb was hard.
They both froze. Then Barry drew away so fast that he fell off the couch, and popcorn spewed all over the floor.
“I’ll help—” Caleb started, making a move to pick it up.
“No!” Barry yelled. Then, more quietly, lying: “You better go. My mom’s gonna be home soon.”
“Oh, yeah, my parents are expecting me…”
They never spoke again. And Caleb knew he was damn lucky that was all that happened. Lots of guys would have told everyone, or beaten him up, or—worse—
Russell had been a soldier, a cavalry officer. Caleb knew just how strong he was, could still remember Russell’s powerful arms holding him immobile, Russell’s hard hand over his mouth.
But no, no, that had been a completely different situation. Caleb and Russell weren’t going to be tussling over a bowl of popcorn. And they wouldn’t share the bed either. Caleb would just tell him that men didn’t share beds these days. He could easily accommodate Russell on the window seat. He even had an extra pillow and blanket, still unused, which he had bought just in case his high school friend Greg kept his promise to visit.
Nonetheless, Caleb’s hands were sweaty when he said, “Do you want to spend the night in my room? On the window seat,” he added hastily. “It’s no longer customary for men to share beds.”
“I’d sleep on the floor if it’ll keep me here in the warmth,” Russell declared. He smiled at Caleb, his face bright with pleasure and relief. “Thank you kindly for inviting me. I didn’t like to ask, but it’ll be a sight more comfortable here than down at the Schloss, that’s for sure.”
“Yes. Yes, I thought it would. I was thinking,” said Caleb, nervous again, aware that he was tempting fate. Yet what else was he supposed to do? Banish Russell to the Schloss to get pneumonia? “I was thinking… if you want, you could stay till you can move into your own dorm room. Mr. Huber signed you up for the dorms, right?” He couldn’t have expected Russell to live all winter in that unheated house, surely.
Russell nodded. “Yes, he did. He gave me a bunch of papers about it, with a room number and everything. I don’t remember exactly, but I think it was in Riley.”
“Really!” And suddenly Caleb was grinning stupidly.
“Yes.” Russell nodded, smiling too. “It’s fate I guess. We’re meant to be friends. I knew it as soon as I met you.”
“While you were throwing me against the wall?”
Russell laughed. “Well, maybe it took a few minutes, then!”
But Caleb saw another problem. “Some of the guys will be back tomorrow, though. And you mentioned you wanted a little more time to prepare…”
Russell sobered. He thought about it as he munched a slice of toast. Then he shook his head. “No, I don’t think a few extra days is enough to matter any. No. I’ll stay here, and meet them tomorrow, and when they laugh ’cause I don’t know what a gymnasium is—well, it is funny.” He shoved the last of his toast in his mouth and chewed it in about three bites. “Could you show me—let’s see, Mr. Huber told me, but I’ve forgotten the polite name for it already—”
“The restroom? The bathroom. The washroom. The johns,” said Caleb, and Russell grinned. “Sure, c’mon. I guess you’ve seen toilets in Mr. Huber’s house, but probably not urinals…”
***
Caleb ended up demonstrating the showers, toilets, urinals, and the taps in the restroom, as well as showing Russell all his toiletries: deodorant, shaving cream, toothpaste. He was horrified to hear that Russell generally brushed his teeth with soot, although Russell insisted it worked fine. “My teeth haven’t all fallen out, anyhow,” he said, and bared them at Caleb. Russell’s teeth were a little crooked, ivory rather than white, but certainly they looked strong, and Caleb had to look away from Russell’s mouth.
“Well, anyway, tomorrow we’ll go to the drugstore on Main Street and get you kitted out.” The idea grew on Caleb as he spoke. “There are tons of shops on Main Street. Ayres too, the department store, we could stop and buy some clothes for you.”
“Oh, we don’t need to buy the kit. Mr. Huber bought all this for me, though he didn’t much explain how to use it. I guess he figured it was obvious… It’s all at the Schloss, though, so tonight I’ll just use your comb.”
Caleb tried to think of a polite way to say that this was the most revolting thing he’d ever heard. His face must’ve said it for him, because Russell said, “Oh. I guess you don’t do that nowadays? In my time, if you went out to a farm you used the family comb.”
“Did you,” said Caleb, attempting to sound interested and non-judgmental and, from the look on Russell’s face, clearly failing miserably. “That’s not considered, um. Hygienic, nowadays.”
“Well, I’ll run up to the Schloss to get mine then. And my clothes and the food and everything, I might as well bring it all here. We can look the clothes over and see what we’ll need to get at the—department store, did you call it?”
“Yes, that’s a good idea. Here, borrow my key, and while you’re gone I’ll set up the bed on the window seat.”
Setting up the bed on the window seat just meant fluffing up his extra pillow and shaking out his extra blanket. Caleb washed his face and brushed his teeth and got into his pajamas, too, and was in bed trying to calm his nerves by rereading a bit of David Copperfield (a Christmas present from his grandmother) when Russell called, “Caleb! Where are you?”
“I’m in the only room with an open door, doofus!”
For a split second Caleb regretted that doofus, but then Russell appeared in his doorway, beaming, his round cheeks red with cold. “Doofus yourself,” he said, and then, “I like your room. Are they all fitted up like this?”
“The furniture, yeah. Everyone gets the bed and the desk and the chest of drawers. Most of the rooms don’t have window seats though. And some people decorate more…” Caleb felt embarrassed by the lonely Hawkins pennant on his wall.
But Russell was looking around appreciatively, taking in the rug, the reading lamp clipped to Caleb’s headboard, the book in Caleb’s hands. He gasped and dropped his suitcase and flung himself on the bed. “Do you like Dickens?”
Caleb slammed the book down over his lap, alarmed at Russell’s sudden proximity and embarrassed by his oft-mocked reading tastes. “Yes.”
“I’m so glad people still read him. You never know who will survive. Do you still read—?” He checked himself. “No, I will ask later, I ought to focus on the future now. But will you read me a bit? Just whatever bit you are up to, it doesn’t matter any. Dickens will feel like home.”
Caleb’s heart melted. “Yes, of course,” he said. “Just get ready for bed—I’ve got the window seat all set up.” He gave Russell a little push, as Russell was sitting about two inches away, all but hovering over David Copperfield.
“All right, all right. And then the bedtime story. Lord, I feel like I’m five again. I really do, that’s about as much as I know about the world.”
Russell popped off the bed, and without so much as a by your leave began to strip off, just as he had in the Schloss. This time he didn’t stop at his drawers, either, and Caleb tried not to look and therefore caught sight of him in the full-length mirror, and God, his legs were just as beautiful as the rest of him, his calves as exquisitely molded as his arms, and apparently all that folklore about dick size correlating with the size of feet and hands was just a myth, because Russell’s was beautiful, perfectly proportioned…
Caleb pressed David Copperfield over his own errant dick and stared hard at nothing and thought about deserts, and sand, and scratchy unpleasant things.
“Well, I’m in bed and everything,” Russell announced, and Caleb turned round to see him sitting in the window seat, wearing his pajamas, watching Caleb with bright hopeful eyes.
Caleb read for a long time. At last he paused, and then quietly turned, and saw that Russell was asleep on the window seat. Caleb set the book gently on his bureau, and turned out the reading lamp. Thoughts popped in his head like popcorn kernels, all the inventions of the last century he had yet to tell Russell about: telephones and televisions, movies and motorcycles, airplanes and interstates…
“Caleb?” said Russell, his voice soft in the darkness.
“Hmm?”
“I do thank you kindly for all this. I’m a stranger in your land, and you’ve welcomed me like Lot with the angels; and after I greeted you like a thief in the night.”
Caleb drew his sheet up over his nose. “It’s nothing. I mean, for all you knew I was a thief in the night.”
“Well. A thief died beside Jesus on the crosses at Calvary; and Jesus promised him solemnly that they should see each other in paradise.”
Caleb loved these high-flown speeches in nineteenth century novels, but he’d never had one directed at him in real life, and he had no idea how to respond. At last, quietly, he said, “Good night, Russell.”
“Good night, Freckles.”
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