Hot As Sin

17

He’s in full blown diva panic mode.

“I almost died!” he shrieks in my ear. “DIED! There were flames everywhere and so much smoke and everybody was freaking out and screaming and—oh!” He throws an arm over his face. “It was just awful!”

I keep my voice low and calm, the way you do when speaking to frightened animals and the criminally insane. “I know, sweetheart. But you’re safe now. Take a deep breath. And please stop squirming.”

Standing next to the pool’s edge, Nico is trying to stifle his laughter at the picture we make. When I shoot him a sour glance, he claps his hand over his mouth, his shoulders shaking.

“You wanna help me out here, brother?”

“Oh, no, my friend. Looks like you’ve got the situation well in hand.” With a snort, he turns and ambles over to the firefighters near the smoking remains of the tent.

“Here you go, honey,” murmurs London to Kenji as I step out of the pool. She drapes the towel over his nude body, tucking it between my arms and his back, making a big production out of fussing over him because it’s obviously what he requires. He watches her through teary eyes, his lips quivering, one of his false eyelashes hanging sadly askew.

When she pats him on the arm and tenderly asks if he’s okay, he bursts into tears all over again and buries his head in my chest.

I try not to sigh. This must be what it’s like having a teenage daughter.

“It’s all right, Kenji. I’ve got you. Let’s get you two upstairs and situated, okay?”

My only answer is a hitching breath and more sobs.

London follows beside me, holding Kenji’s hand, as I carry him through the yard and up the stairs, headed for one of the many spare bedrooms on the second floor where they can take some time to decompress. My sodden boots squish with every step, and my wet jeans are uncomfortable. By the time we reach the top of the stairs, Kenji’s tears have reduced to hiccups and sniffles, and he’s wiping his nose with the sleeve of my T-shirt.

I don’t bother to point out that he’s physically unharmed so there’s really no need for all the melodramatics, because I know it would earn me a scathing dressing down and he probably wouldn’t speak to me for six months. When I come back to visit for Christmas, I’ll still be getting the cold shoulder. So I simply carry him over to the bed and wait patiently as London pulls back the covers and fluffs the pillows. Then I carefully set him down on the mattress and pull the blankets up around his chin, snugly tucking him in, striped pool towel and all.

“London’s gonna take care of you while I go downstairs and check on everything, all right?”

He nods like an obedient child. I look at London for confirmation, and she nods, too.

“Good. Do you want me to have anything to eat or drink sent up?”

After a pause for sniffles, Kenji says, “A glass of milk. And some cookies. Oreos if possible. Or chocolate chip. With nuts. Not walnuts, though. Hazelnuts.” He hesitates, biting his lip. “And…can you please get my sparkly red heels out of the pool? They’re my favorites.”

I press my lips together, hiding my smile. “Done.”

I turn and head to the door. When I’m halfway there, Kenji calls, “Hey.”

I pause, looking back.

With his brow furrowed and his fingers curled into the sheets under his chin, he says in a small voice, “I love you, Nasi.”

“Love you, too, Kenji.”

I leave the room smiling.

To my surprise, I find the catering staff hanging out in the kitchen, calmly packing up their equipment and passing around a bottle of tequila. Everyone freezes when I walk in.

One of them, a guy in his mid-twenties with bad skin and lank brown hair, says nervously, “We were just, uh, cleaning up.”

He shoots a glance to the pudgy blonde girl standing beside him, who guiltily moves the bottle of tequila she’s holding behind her back.

I chuckle. “No worries, guys. Take it easy. I’m just surprised you didn’t run out with everyone else.”

“Oh, gawd,” says the pudgy blonde, clearly relieved I’m not angry to catch them filching booze from the host. “We’ve done enough events where something gets set on fire that it doesn’t even faze us anymore.”

The group murmurs their agreement, and she warms to the subject.

“Last month we did a wedding where the groom and the best man got super drunk and started arguing in front of everyone at the reception about who should’ve really married the bride. They got in a literal d**k-showing contest. After shouting incoherently at each other for a while, they both pulled out their d***s to compare sizes. Not surprisingly, that didn’t solve anything, so next they started rolling around on the floor, fighting, their d***s still out.”

The guy with the bad skin says, “It was totally like those gay wrestling videos on YouTube.”

Everyone stares at him for a moment.

The blonde goes on. “So they smashed into a dining table, toppling it, which sent the candelabra centerpiece flying into the draperies, which went up like a box of matches. And then the ceiling was on fire, and a guest went running through the kitchen with his suit on fire, and it was a total mess.”