Novelty Accounted For
The first time Lennox kissed Cutter, it started as a joke. Later on he didn't remember the context or even what the punch line had been, but he did recall how Cutter's mouth had stayed closed for a second and then his lips had parted. Lennox had been surprised to get anything but a fist to the gut that he'd ha the chance to taste peppermints and the smoke that Cutter was trying to cover up. Then Neil had come around the side of the building and Cutter had pushed him away as if they'd gotten into an argument and he wasn't willing to listen to Lennox's side. That was common enough between them that Neil didn't do more than blink as Cutter brushed past and he gave Lennox a sympathetic look.
"Cutter's playing at being deaf again?"
"Nah, I just made a point and I think he was surprised." To say that Lennox was relieved that he had a reputation for being slightly off kilter most of the time was an understatement; his expression had to have been odd, at the very least, but Neil accepted it as normal Lennox behavior.
"You got your message across," Neil noted and Lennox agreed, though silently, he wasn't sure if he'd won or lost.
After their kiss, Cutter pulled a typical move and disappeared for a couple of days. If it had happened during the school months, Lennox could have at least counted on seeing him between classes or at lunch. Summer was the time for ranging as far from home as they could get without being too badly missed.
He wasn't sure what he expected Cutter to do, but when he didn't stop by and say something like 'don't know what that was, but just keep out of my face and it won't happen again,' Lennox knew that it was going to take effort to get through to his friend.
When he knocked on the Cutters' door, Mr. Cutter said that his son had been thinking about doing some camping or something and that he didn't know when he'd be back. Of them all, Cutter had the least restriction on his movements; Lennox doubted that Mr. Cutter would even notice that his son was really gone until his chores piled up. The camping excuse was one that had been used before when Cutter needed some time away from the old man and Lennox doubted they'd even talked about it; there was no reason to try and talk to someone who didn't hear you when a brief note was just as effective.
His next stop was Julie's house; she and Cutter dated on and off without either of them being truly upset when they broke up, it was understood around town that they would hook up again in a matter of days. The dramatics of 'those kids' were accepted as part of everyday life, and so long as they didn't have a shouting match in the middle of Main Street where people would gather and pay to see it, the parents and other authority figures let them go on about their business. Of course that worked when everyone was doing what they were supposed to, or were keeping the more objectionable activities under the radar.
Lennox couldn't very well tell one of the parents that Chris Cutter had slipped off into the wilderness in a snit, they would think that it was a joke or launch a search party.
"You'd think I'd learn how to deal with him," Lennox muttered to himself. "That or I'd find someone else in this town who doesn't think that sulking is a hobby." As he hadn't learned any better in the years they'd been friends, Lennox wasn't counting on coming to his senses anytime soon. Although he wasn't sure what, besides the incident behind the cafe was making Cutter act even more flighty than usual, he did have some idea of what tack to take when he finally found Cutter. It mostly involved getting in his face until he got annoyed enough to talk about whatever was bothering him.
Mr. Cutter had a spread of woods around his house and if Cutter wasn't willing to unload to his girlfriend, then he'd probably elected to stay nearby in case he had to do anything that required cathartic physical labor, for all Lennox knew, Cutter might be swimming laps in the freezing lake as some sort of self-flagellation ritual.
Taking into account the amount of time it was probably going to require in order to get Cutter to spill, Lennox packed a bag and set off.
When she was feeling dreamy, Julie waved off Cutter's moodiness as a sign of how deep he was. Lennox, in a moment of candor inspired by an especially potent batch of homegrown mushrooms, told her that oceans were deep, people were just stubborn. Julie retorted that Cutter must have taught him a few things.
A few minutes of walking took him onto a rough trail that extended deeper into the forest. Pausing to get his bearings, he listened hard but didn't hear anything that sounded like Cutter taking on a tree to work off his temper. Lennox didn't want to be the voice of reason that got clobbered with a branch before he made Cutter listen to reason. After that, if he was able to get Cutter's attention, he would find a way to make him talk.
Judging from how long Cutter had stayed away from town and everyone there, Lennox was glad that he hadn't taken Julie up on her offer to tag along and try to get through to Cutter her way. Girls thought that they understood Cutter; most of then didn't push him when he said that he wanted space, and only talked about 'communication issues' when they were fed up with his wandering. Lennox took a different tack with his friend; nobody could make Cutter do something he wasn't wholly invested in and it wasn't worth the aggravation to try.
Instead of forcing the issue when Cutter was guarding against it, he'd learned how to be casual and still acting interested and then reap the benefits. The strategy brought him close enough to make a study of his friend's tendencies, and he'd found that Cutter turned intense when he was ready to do something incredible or merely lend weight to the most everyday events. As he thought back, Lennox recognized that searing look that Cutter had given him seconds before he'd hurried away from Lennox. The memory of his eyes flicking over Lennox's face as though he'd been searching for something that had disappeared was making Lennox uncharacteristically uneasy, and that compounded his annoyance with Cutter.
He had certain ideas about himself, the way he was supposed to act, think, who he should like, and that balanced status quo felt shaky now. Up until this incident he had considered himself to be more grounded than certain people. It wasn't that he was unaffected by the demands of those around him, he just didn't care what they thought about him and simply preferred to do as he felt, observe, and then act without apology. Now he was cautious about how to ask a question because he didn't know how he would be received.
He came around a turn in the trail and found Cutter seated on a downed tree and staring fixedly at something in the distance. When he saw Lennox, he got to his feet. Sweat beaded at his temples as he shifted, debating the merits of striding past Lennox and trying to lose him again, Lennox adjusted his stance to block Cutter's way counting on the fact that if Cutter was paying attention, he would know that Lennox would also grab him and maybe smack him for being stupid. Apparently taking Lennox's position as the warning it was, Cutter stood motionless; hair yanked upwards into tufts, one hand tugging them even higher as he contemplated his next move.
He'd changed since his most recent breakup with Julie. Lennox had noticed how at times Cutter let himself be open when he was with her. But now, it was as if that shell that she'd split with her smile and temper was quickly being built up again. If it wasn't going to be such a hassle to deal with, Lennox might have been impressed with the way that Cutter isolated himself.
"So, I guess you didn't come out here to have a little private time with your girl."
"She's not my girl." The denial was part of the routine they went through every time the happy couple split and Lennox rolled his eyes. "That'll last for about five minutes, and then the two of you will be going back to normal."
He looked around. "Or, if you stay out here long enough you can build a cabin and you can raise your kids in the wilderness."
"We're less than five miles from town, Jim."
"Well, it helps if you visualize your surroundings."
"I'm trying, but you're still here." Cutter put emphasis on the end of his sentence and met Lennox's gaze in that way that meant he was hoping his meaning would be understood.
Rather than indulge Cutter's masochistic streak, Lennox pressed on. "You remember back a couple days ago? We were having a conversation and I tried to get your attention. Instead of reaching some kind of mutually agreeable conclusion, you freaked out and decided to go and get natural."
"I think you mean, get in touch with nature."
Frowning, Lennox patted his back pocket in a search for his cigarettes. "Don't try and change the subject, Cutter."
"I'm not trying to change the subject, did you lose something?"
"Yes you are, and I know I had them on me when I left Julie's."
"You were at Julie's?"
"Yeah, surprisingly enough, she hadn't seen you in a couple days and neither has your dad. Of course, I know that you and your dad never talk, but you at least left him a note so that I knew which direction to hike in." He halted his search long enough to give Cutter his full attention and added, "I find that interesting, since both you and I know our way around here, and you easily could have kept hidden for longer."
"That's interesting? Maybe you need more to do."
"Right now you're taking up most of my time, not that I mind, you can be more exciting than rush hour, but all of this tension you're putting out is keeping me from kicking back and relaxing."
"You don't have to deal with me if it's a hassle."
"I know, you'd rather I just turned around and left you to your brooding."
"I'm not brooding."
"So what do you call sitting around alone in the woods?"
"Thinking."
"Well ease up, you're attracting storm clouds." He grinned and Cutter let out an annoyed breath.
At this point, one of the other guys would have been confused by Lennox, or so annoyed that hey headed home. Lennox would have smiled pleasantly at anyone they passed and counted the effort a success when he'd herded that individual to their doorstep.
Cutter wasn't simple like that, he dug in his heels and stayed put even when he knew Lennox was right. Granted, he only conceded Lennox had the right of it part of the time , but having a thick head and acting deaf only excused so much.
Lennox stared closely at a stump, trying to determine whether he was going to end up with something stuck to him when he stood up, and then took a seat with all the unconcerned ease that he could get away with.
Years of friendship meant that Lennox wasn't the only one who knew a dare when he saw it; Cutter still narrowed his eyes, but Lennox wasn't physically blocking his escape route, so he let it go.
Motioning to his bag he smiled wryly. "You left your cigarettes in my coat again."
"Sorry about that, thanks for picking them up."
"No problem." Cutter grabbed his bag and dug inside, tossing the cigarettes to Lennox.
"Want one?"
"Sure."
With a sense of vertigo, like he was standing at top of a cliff face, Lennox deliberately held out a cigarette but didn't move to hand it over. Acting on a hunch, Lennox waited for Cutter to come closer, watching to see how he reacted to being this close. He didn't balk about taking the couple steps to Lennox's position, but his fingers flexed indecisively before he took the cigarette. The nervous movement was telling, just as the purposeful avoidance of any unnecessary contact with Lennox's skin. Not only was the matter on the table, it was tying up the air and giving them both the jitters.
"Take a seat, we need to finish our little discussion."
"I think you said everything you needed to."
"No, you didn't let me explain." Cutter was still within reach and Lennox stretched out to yank on his coat and pulled him down to sit beside the stump.
Inhaling slowly and twirling an imaginary mustache as though contemplating a puzzle, Lennox stared at Cutter until he shifted uncomfortably.
"Well, explain yourself."
"I kissed you."
"I was there."
"Not for very long, you mind telling me why you tore out of there as if I had garlic for lunch?"
"You kissed me."
"And that's all there is to it? You were disgusted?"
"Right." Cutter tapped the ash off his cigarette and lifted his chin, daring Lennox to disagree, which practically guaranteed that he would, he never missed an opportunity to challenge that 'Cutter knows best' expression.
"There's no way that I'm gonna swallow that line. For one thing, I'm a great kisser, and I've got the references to prove it."
"I don't care about your references, this isn't an interview."
"Look, I get that you don't want to think about this, but I want to know; how long have you been thinking about laying one one me?"
"I've wanted to punch you for years."
"That's funny,"
"Notice that you're the only one who's smiling."
"Sleeping out here really makes you cranky, it must be the lack of a good mattress."
"Are you trying to make me an offer?"
"Have you been listening to me at all?"
"You're not making much sense, so I tuned out you."
"That's not smart, you never know when I might say something important."
"I'm still waiting."
Striking out with words was a technique that Cutter used when he was getting twitchy; if he said something nasty then the other person often backed down. Then he could change the subject with a few stirring looks. If Lennox was anywhere nearby, which he tended to be, he'd just sit back and enjoy how Cutter didn't have to lie so much as he didn't give his girlfriends everything. They got the captain of the team, or the guy who was the town's darling, or the estranged son. All of these pieces were real, but he didn't seem to think that there was assembly required. Now Lennox was seeing another piece; the guy who'd let himself be kissed by his best friend but didn't want to dwell on it.
"I'm not mad at you, man," he said, as if being reassuring had ever really helped in dealing with Cutter. "Really, the only reason I might freak would be the fact that you had a nervous breakdown over one kiss."
"You're okay with this."
"Yeah, so I kissed you, big deal. If I'd known you wouldn't hate it, I'd have suggested it sooner."
Cutter's body language didn't change but his eyes slid to the trail behind Lennox. "What do you want from me?"
"A do-over, see if we can fix this, or get past it if that's all you really want." He smiled from a position of knowing just how many options there were to resolve the problem.
When Cutter kept his seat a minute longer than necessary, Lennox made the move. He got up and crouched down in front of Cutter. There was no sign that he was going to run or get himself clocked for being inside Cutter's space; it helped that they had never gotten into a real fight with one another and Cutter didn't seem to know how to go about starting one. Lennox pressed his advantage and reached up to take Cutter's cigarette. As he leaned in, Cutter watched him, his pupils expanded and his breathing increased, but he was waiting for Lennox to follow through.
The second time Lennox kissed Cutter it was deliberate and when he drew back, Cutter put a hand on his neck and didn't pull away.