Feathers

Chapter 1

Brandon Reston noticed the red-shouldered hawk as he drove into the feed store that morning. It dive-bombed his truck in a flurry of wings and yellow talons, almost scraping the windshield. Brandon jerked back in the seat and slammed on the brakes. The bird zipped over to perch on the split rail fence that ran along the property line and kept his horses inside their ten acres of grazing land. It watched him with black eyes, turning its head left and right, then it focused on something in the tall grass beneath it.

Must have breakfast on the run. Maybe one of those big juicy rats who’ve been getting at my feed bags.

Once he unlocked the store, the hawk slipped Brandon's mind. The phone rang as soon as he turned on the lights and the Pro Feed tractor-trailer pulled in. Celeste had left a note on the cash register that she’d be in late because of a dentist appointment. The morning flew away in a rush of signing invoices, counting stock, and ringing up sales for the walk-in customers.

“Sorry I’m late!” Celeste said when she came in just after noon. “Emergency root canal.”

“Are you sure you’re okay to work?” Brandon asked. “Your face is kinda…puffy.”

“I’m fine. The Novocain is starting to wear off. And I’m on antibiotics for the infection.”

Brandon stepped closer. Celeste’s eyes were drawn tight and beneath her blush, her face was pale. “You should go home, sis. Take some pain meds, stay on your sofa and watch Oprah. Go on.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not.” Brandon touched her shoulder. “The truck already came and I’ve got most of this inventory put away already. I can handle this. Go home.”

“Thanks, Brandon.” She gave him a wave as she pulled away in her beat-up SUV.

So much for taking a ride today.

He grabbed the phone—it was hooked to the security system and would buzz if someone walked into the store. Brandon snagged three apples from the mini-fridge in the store’s backroom. When he stepped out the back door, he regretted he didn’t have a saddle in hand. The February sky was clear and cool, a perfect Florida winter afternoon. A light haze lent a fuzzy wash to the landscape. His horses, Nit and Wit, grazed two hundred yards away, their outlines curved at neck and haunch. When he whistled, they raised their heads, then loped toward him with soft nickers of greeting.

“Heya, guys, how are ya?” Brandon petted Nit first. The gelding was adamant about being the first to greet him and he would nip his sister to get her out of the way. They took the apples from him with soft muzzles, teeth crunching. The odor of fresh apples and horse enveloped him, comforting and homey.

If only I had someone to ride with.

Valentine’s Day had come and gone last week. It seemed the road was filled with flower delivery drivers that day. Brandon had seen four of them on his drive into the store. Stan had sent Celeste flowers at the store and they sat there on the front counter, nearly baleful in their cheery colors and soft scents. Even Brandon’s customers seemed to conspire against him; most wore red or pink for the holiday, mock-sighing about the hassle of the holiday, getting reservations for dinner, buying gifts.

I’d love to have someone to buy gifts for and I wouldn’t complain about it.

It had been nearly two years since his father had died, leaving him the store, twenty acres, and a scruffy trailer on the outskirts of Tampa. And heartbroken. Brandon’s mother had died when he was six and this new, adult grief flattened him.

Paul, his lover of five years, left him a few months after his father's funeral.

“I can’t take all this depression, I just can’t,” Paul had said one gray afternoon. Brandon looked up from stoking the logs in the fireplace. Paul’s face was torn, his conflict clear on his golden-boy features. “I’m sorry, really sorry. I know this is a terrible time, but this isn’t working for me anymore.”

Brandon blinked, too stunned to react. He knew Paul was right; there was nothing more Paul could do to make his grief lessen, to make his heart open up again, to take away the pain of feeling orphaned. Nothing.

Brandon set down the poker on the hearth and walked out the door on shaking legs. The keys to his truck were on the kitchen counter, but he couldn’t bear to go back inside Paul’s house, so he push started it. Pushing the weight of the truck which felt lighter than his own heart. He jumped in and popped the clutch. When the engine kicked on, it loosened something twisted inside his chest. He felt warm tears down his face as he drove home.

Now, he took turns riding Nit and Wit. When he left the pasture, the horse remaining would whinny, stamp its hooves, and gallop the fence-line until Brandon was out of sight. It wrenched at him each time it happened, reminded him that he and Paul usually rode four times a week and now he was lucky to saddle each horse once a week.

Alone.

Wit nuzzled him. He arched over her strong neck and hugged her. “How ya doing, baby girl?” He scratched her withers—that oh-yeah-just-right spot for horses—and she nibbled at his hip, her teeth on his jeans.

He saw a flutter of movement to his left. The hawk swooped over the grass, then landed on the fence. It screeched and Brandon noticed it held a mouse in its talons. The hawk jumped down into the grass and disappeared. After a few seconds, it flew up to the fence once more, then looked down. The mouse was gone.

Who’s she feeding down there?

The UPS truck chugged into the drive. It backed up to the door and the driver locked the door, as usual, but when he stepped outside Brandon saw it wasn’t Roger, the regular driver, but a wiry young man, short and slight. The driver spotted Brandon and gave a little wave.

The hawk swooped over Brandon’s head, screaming, its wings close enough to stir a breeze in his hair. The bird hovered near the UPS driver, wings flapping. The driver looked up, his eyes wide open.

“She’s protecting something. Watch out!” Brandon called.

The driver waved his arms gently and the hawk zipped back to the fence. When Brandon stepped closer, he saw the driver’s intense, dark eyes and deep-toned skin.

Whoa. Who is this?

Brandon straightened his shoulders.

The young driver kept his gaze on the hawk and moved towards it. After a few steps through the tall grass, he bent down.

“What’s going on?” Brandon asked. He kept one eye on the hawk. She re-settled on the fence post, fluffing her feathers, her sharp claws digging into the wood. On the ground, a young hawk floundered, emitting squeals of alarm. One wing flapped and the bird flailed through the grass as it tried to get away. The other wing was bloody, torn. The hawk got some lift with one wing flapping, but it mostly scrabbled in the grass.

The young man wore the standard brown uniform, “Ramon” stenciled over one pocket. He squatted, gave Brandon a quick glance, and focused on the bird once more.

“He’s been hurt. Maybe he flew into the barbed wire. Probably didn’t know any better.”

“What can we do for him? I’ve seen foxes around here. He won’t be safe even with Momma Bird around,” Brandon said.

The young hawk wobbled through the grass, screeching, his injured wing dragging beside him. They hopped along with him, arms waving. To Brandon’s surprise, the mother hawk didn’t come at them. She c****d her head, seeming puzzled by the awkward humans.

Ramon took off his uniform shirt and threw it over the hawk. The hawk screeched and flapped its one good wing as it tried to fly away. Ramon grabbed his shirt, twisted it with the hawk in it, and stood up.

“You have a box we can put him in? Something small and dark to quiet him down?” Ramon’s voice was calm but urgent, his breath showing in the cool morning air. Ramon’s n*****s were black and hard, distracting. Brandon had to make himself think.

“In the store, this way.” They walked towards the back door.

The hawk called again and Ramon struggled with the shirt, its sleeves flapping. “It’s okay, little hawk, it’s all right. We’re gonna take care of you. Quiet now, quiet.”

They stepped inside the store’s backroom. “How about this?” Brandon rearranged a half-dozen equine supplement canisters to get a box down from the shelf. “This is pretty small.”

“That’s fine, thanks. Can we take him to a backroom, someplace quiet?” Ramon’s accent was soft, not traditional Mexican exactly, smoother with that just-a-little-off lilt. Brandon recognized the cadence of his childhood—the soft voices of the barn’s grooms as they cleaned out stalls—a comforting touch of safety in the younger man’s voice.

Brandon led the way to his small office behind the stockroom. A few of the stable’s racing trophies sat on the shelves, five years' worth of Bloodhorse monthly magazines in cardboard organizers next to them. A yellowed pile of Daily Racing Forms lay on the floor next to a shabby plaid loveseat, its pillows leaking stuffing and showing wear.

The office had heat and it felt stuffy, too warm to Brandon with Ramon so close by. Ramon’s skin was caramel-brown, soft-looking. His chest was smooth, not a trace of hair between his n*****s. He had one mole on his left shoulder, brown and raised and the sight of that one imperfection made Brandon’s knees go weak.

Brandon shook himself.

“Can I make a phone call here? To the raptor center?” Ramon asked. He put the box on the loveseat, then waited for permission.

“Raptors? You mean like Jurassic Park raptors?”

“No, raptors like owls and hawks and osprey. There’s a rehab center over in Lakeland. I interned there last semester,” Ramon said through a smile.

“Help yourself to the phone. How about a shirt?” Brandon handed Ramon one of his own clean undershirts from the stash he kept on the shelf.

Ramon smiled and tugged it on. “Thanks. Can we use another one to keep him warm?” The shirt drooped off Ramon’s slender shoulders and made him look delicate, almost frail.

“Will a saddle sheet work?” Brandon tugged one from beneath his saddle. The smell of oiled leather puffed out at him and beneath, horse-smell, the smell of home.

“That’d be great.”

They got the navy sheet arranged in the hawk’s box. It peered up at them, its pink tongue out, beak open and panting. They closed the box lid and Ramon carefully cut some air holes with his box cutter.

Brandon sat down and bent down to hear for the hawk’s breathing and kept his gaze on Ramon, not wanting to, but he couldn’t make himself leave the office. He noticed Ramon’s slender neck, the rich tone of his skin, the soft hair on his slim arms. Ramon was about five-six and probably didn’t weigh much more than a hundred thirty pounds.

Easy enough to carry to bed.

The months without a steady lover ate away at him. There had been a few quick encounters down at the beach with faceless men, and a two-week fling with a customer’s house-guest who had ridden the horses– and Brandon– until they were all soaked. He’d spent a few weekends in Atlanta, cruising the gay bars, but it was never enough.

Brandon didn’t hang out at the track anymore; not that racetracks were prime cruising spots for gay men. Most nights he went home alone. Turning thirty had punched at him with the whump of a heavyweight boxer. The stabbing want of youthful horniness had changed for him. Sure, he still wanted s*x. More than once he’d sat in his truck after a blowjob from some anonymous pick-up at the beach or a bar and wondered—is this it? Is this all I can hope for?

Ramon’s voice pierced his musings, its cadence a soft comfort. “They can take him in this afternoon. I’m already off schedule. Do you mind if I leave him here ‘til later?”

“I only know how to take care of sick horses. Will he be okay?” Brandon asked.

“I’ll make him warm as I can, that’s about all we can do.” Ramon shrugged.

“Sure, come back when you’re ready. I’ll try to keep out of the office so he can have quiet.”

* * * *

Brandon spent the afternoon resetting the boot display in between customers. He knew that spring would bring new students to the riding stables along Morris Bridge Road and he wanted to be ready for sales. Five o’clock came and went, but he had three customers in the store, browsing, so he just stayed open. He was happy to get the three hundred dollars of sales from them. When Ramon peeked around the spurs display, Brandon was startled for a second, then remembered the bird.

“I forgot all about him—, sorry,” Brandon said.

“It’s okay. Let’s see if he’s still alive.” Ramon eagerly led the way to the office and stepped in first, but left the light off. Brandon bumped into him in the dimness.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” Brandon said.

Well, not that sorry.

“I want to leave the light off to check him.” Ramon knelt next to the loveseat, then bent to listen at the box. He grinned. “I can hear him breathing. He’s still alive!” His smile was sunny, full of relief and warmth.

Brandon had to smile back. Who knew that happiness came from a hawk? He wanted to give Ramon a hug of affection, of camaraderie after the success, but he stopped himself. He settled for one palm on Ramon’s arm. “I’m glad he made it. It was good of you to take on the rescue.”

Ramon shrugged. “Ah, I’m just a sucker for animals. You should see my apartment.”

Maybe I will someday.

“Let me guess—a half dozen dogs, a dozen cats, and a parrot.”

“Pretty close. No dogs, the landlord won’t allow it, but three cats, six birds, two turtles, a ferret, and tons of fish. I’m in the vet tech program over at JC and we’re always getting animals. Hazard of the job.” Ramon secured the flaps on the box and stepped out of the office. He’d parked behind the shop, the brown box truck squeezed in beside Brandon’s F-150 and a customer’s car. He stepped up into the truck and settled the bird’s box in the rear.

Brandon stood with his hands on either side of the driver’s side door and a flash of hotness arrowed down his torso. Ramon; so gentle and giving, a caretaker.

Celeste’s words after his father’s funeral came back to him—who takes care of the caretaker?

Ramon turned back to him. His gaze moved over Brandon’s arms and shoulders and he wore the faintest grin. “Thanks again for letting me leave him here. Let me buy you lunch one day next week, okay?”

“You don’t have to do that.” Brandon waved one hand, then leaned back inside the truck, just a little.

“I want to, really. I’ll check with you on Tuesday when I drop off again.”

Say yes. Give him a chance.

“Sure, we’ll work it out then. Good luck with the bird.”

“It’s less than an hour over to the rehab center. He should make it now that he’s settled and not in shock.” They clasped hands—the street shake goodbye—and Brandon held Ramon’s slender fingers for a second; cool and hot at the same time. He had to suppress a shiver.