If you're looking for an adventure in the morally grey, and a crash course of the human condition, this is the story for you! What is good and evil? Where is that line drawn, and who decides that? Packed with humor, danger, feels, and awkward relati...
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Nathan was exhausted in the morning, but his eyes still snapped awake at seven am like clockwork. He'd done so every day since he'd been pulled out of school and tossed into jail. He didn't have school, but his body still wanted him to go. Why couldn't he just sleep in? Groaning, he turned around in bed to find Ian's empty. He sat up and looked at the clock on Ian's stand to read six forty-five off the red-lit numbers. Where was the guy this early in the morning?
Grimy from the day before and desperate for a shower, he grabbed some clothes out of the dresser and rushed to the bathroom. Ian had been nice to him the night before when he'd been genuinely frightened, but he didn't trust the man as far as he could throw him if he was naked and vulnerable.
It took some of the relaxation out of it, but Nathan cranked the water until it steamed and soaked until it washed the tension out of his muscles. Last night was a jumble of feelings that he couldn't quite make sense of, but he had the day to figure things out. Without school, a job, or anything to do really, he had all day to himself. The freedom was nice, but also a bit overwhelming.
After showering and throwing on some clothes, he crawled out of his room. There was an aroma wafting up the stairs that made his mouth water. Warily, he tiptoed down the stairs, expecting Ian at every turn. It wasn't until he entered the kitchen that he found him. Nathan heard him first, whistling as he flipped some food in a pan with a spatula.
"Morning, Nat. Hope you were warm." Ian flicked him a smirk, and Nathan glared. "Relax, sit down. I know you're away from home and that you've never had to make your own food before, so I'm putting together breakfast."
"Really?" Nathan plopped on a stool at the counter and watched Ian as he turned the burner off and filled three plates. "Thank you," Nathan said as Ian set one in front of him. It was some sort of weird breakfast dish the Nathan couldn't make heads or tails of.
"It's paella, though I tweaked the recipe. It's a European dish. Rice, meat, beans, and I like to put potatoes, onions, and eggs in it. It's some American bastardization of what my mother used to make for me when I was younger."
"You cook?" Nathan asked as Ian lifted a paper to read while he ate.
No one read the paper anymore. Nathan half expected to find a pair of eye holes in it so that Ian could stare at him, but the paper seemed whole.
"I am so hungry."
At the sound of Rick's gruff voice, Nathan turned into a brick on his stool and further whitened when the man parked himself right next to him. With an ice pack on his head, he leaned on the counter and pushed down Ian's paper so that he could see him across the counter.
"I had the weirdest dream last night that you mail ordered yourself a boy on Amazon and that Donovan clocked me over the head with one of my empty beers," Rick said seriously before glancing down to Nathan.
