Chase the Stars (Lang Downs 2 ) (25 page)

“I
TOLD
you he’d say yes,” Jesse said later when they were back at Chris’s house. Seth had begged to go over to Jason’s house for the evening, and Patrick had repeated the invitation when Chris checked with him, so Chris and Jesse had the house to themselves. Jesse wasn’t complaining. He’d gotten to spend more time alone with Chris after Chris and Seth moved out of the big house, but it was never enough.
“It’s not so much that I thought he’d say no as that I

worried about imposing on him,” Chris explained. “I’m still not convinced I’m not imposing, but we’re committed now, so we’ll do what he said.”

Jesse supposed he could see Chris’s concern, but Chris had no frame of reference. “Lang Downs is the only station you’ve ever worked on,” he said. “You don’t see it because you don’t have anything to compare it to, but even a party like the one we had today for Christmas wouldn’t have happened on any other station I’ve worked on. The grazier might have given us the day off and let us have a barbie at the bunkhouse or something, but it would have been up to us to organize it, to do the shopping, everything. The idea of having the party at the canteen with the grazier and his family in attendance, the idea of the seasonal jackaroos being treated like part of that family, would never have occurred to me until I got here. Now it’s the most logical thing in the world because Caine makes it that way, and nobody who’s been around seemed surprised, so Caine’s uncle must have made it that way, but it’s still special. Lang Downs is special. It’s a place to keep coming back to, summer after summer, no matter what you do in the winter.”

“So I guess I’m worrying over nothing?”
“Something like that,” Jesse agreed, “but I promise not to rub it in. What should we have Kami make for dinner?”
“A good old-fashioned barbie,” Chris said after a moment. “Steaks and lamb and snags, all the good stuff, and all the barbie fixings. We’ll eat in the canteen, but that way it feels like a party with the grill going outside and everyone hanging around celebrating.”
“Seth will love that,” Jesse agreed. “We’ll have to make a trip into town to get him something for his birthday. Even if everyone else just gives him the party, you’ll want a present for him, and I’d like to get one for him too.”
Jesse had seen Seth grow up so much since they arrived on the station. To Jesse’s knowledge, Seth hadn’t played a prank on anyone since he’d messed up Patrick’s toolbox. Instead, at Jason’s side, Seth had blossomed, learning about the station and sheepherding. From what Chris had said, Seth had almost completely caught up in his schoolwork and would be able to finish high school on time during the next school year. “Has Seth talked at all about what he wants to do once he gets his HSC?”
“He loves machines,” Chris said. “I imagine he’ll look for a job as a mechanic somewhere.”
“Do you think he’ll stay here on the station?”
“I don’t know,” Chris replied. “I’ll support him, whatever he decides.”
That was one of the things that made Chris so remarkable as far as Jesse was concerned. He’d learned the lessons of intolerance the hard way and so did everything in his power to keep his brother from the same experience. Seth might not appreciate it now, but Jesse hoped he would see it eventually.

The chorus of cheers rang out in the canteen as Seth and Jason came in. Seth looked so startled Chris nearly laughed out loud. Then understanding sank in and gratitude replaced startlement. Seth searched him out of the crowd and ran to him, throwing his arms around Chris and hugging him so tightly Chris couldn’t breathe. Breathing didn’t matter, he decided, as he held tight to his little brother. “Happy birthday,” Chris repeated.

“You did this for me?”
“With a little help from Jesse, Caine, and Kami,” Chris said. “We wanted your first birthday here to be a special one.”
Seth looked around the room at all the smiling faces, the decorations, the platters of food, and the pile of gifts. “You did it. This is off the hook.”
“Go on,” Chris said, nudging Seth toward the food. “Everyone was waiting for you to get here so we could eat.”

A
S PEOPLE
began finishing their dinner, someone, Jesse never saw who, turned on a radio. He pitched in to help push the tables to the sides, opening the center of the canteen for anyone who wanted to dance.

To Jesse’s surprise, Caine’s mother grabbed Seth’s hand to pull him out to dance. Seth laughed and tried to demur, but Caine had seemingly come by his tenaciousness naturally, and Seth eventually gave in. The dance was more comical than graceful, but it got everyone else out on the floor with them. When the song ended, Molly took Mrs. Neiheisel’s place as Seth’s partner, much to Seth’s embarrassed delight, if the look on his face was anything to go by. Jesse had no interest in women from a romantic perspective, but he could see why Neil—or Seth —would find Molly attractive.

Caine’s mother moved on to Macklin, who danced much better than Jesse had expected. He saw Macklin as more of a loner, not someone who’d spent a lot of time dancing or anything like that, but Macklin acquitted himself quite well.

“Your turn, Caine,” Mrs. Neiheisel called when the song finished. Caine came out to take her hand, but she shook her head and pushed Caine toward Macklin.

Jesse held his breath, not sure how anyone would react to that: Macklin, Caine, or the other jackaroos. Caine laughed and shook his head, but his mother insisted and Neil quickly echoed it. In a matter of seconds, everyone in the room was cheering for Caine to agree and dance with Macklin.

“Fine, you win,” Caine said, laughing as he took Macklin’s hand.
The music started again, and Jesse could tell they’d never danced together before as they tried to figure out who would lead, but it didn’t take them long to find their rhythm.
“You should dance with Chris,” Seth said, appearing at Jesse’s side.
“What?” Jesse said, so surprised that Seth would suggest it that he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“Everybody wanted Caine and Macklin to dance,” Seth said. “Nobody will care if you and Chris dance.”
“Chris and I aren’t….” Jesse waved a hand helplessly in Caine and Macklin’s direction. Panic clawed at him at the very thought. He hadn’t even realized Seth knew about him and Chris, much less that anyone else might. They were friends, sure, fucking around when they had time and energy, but they weren’t together. They weren’t a couple. They didn’t have the kind of relationship that would let them dance together for everyone to see.
“Tell me another one,” Seth said with a disbelieving snort. “Chris’s totally gone over you, and don’t try to tell me otherwise. I know my brother better than that.”
Jesse swallowed hard, looking over to where Chris danced with Molly, carefree and beautiful and so desirable. Jesse didn’t have any trouble admitting his desire for Chris, not that he’d say that aloud. Some things Seth didn’t need to hear. But more than that?
Jesse had never thought in those terms. He was a drifter, and he liked it that way. Eight or nine months of work, then a few months off, no stress, no responsibilities, nothing to hold him down when the next good thing caught his eye. Chris wasn’t that way, though. He was tied to Seth if nothing else, but Jesse had seen the longing in Chris’s eyes for a place to belong. Lang Downs could provide that, not just for Seth but for Chris, giving them both a home and a future they’d thought lost. Chris deserved that. He deserved better than someone who didn’t want to commit past the current season. Sure, Jesse liked Lang Downs. He’d pretty much decided to come back next summer, but that was as far as he’d gotten.
He’d thought Chris was okay with the way things stood in their relationship. Chris had never said anything to suggest he wanted anything more from Jesse than exactly what they had. Seth’s words, though, implied differently.
They implied Chris wanted a relationship, a family, the white picket fence and all the trimmings. The thought clawed at Jesse’s brain, making him crazy with panic. That wasn’t his life, his future. He couldn’t have that. He didn’t want that. He never had.
“So what are we going to do for Chris’s birthday?” Seth asked, interrupting Jesse’s thoughts. “If you won’t dance with him now, we may as well start planning the next party.”
“When is his birthday?” Jesse asked, ashamed to admit he didn’t know.
“End of May,” Seth replied.
“I won’t still be here then,” Jesse said automatically. “The season ends before that.”
“You mean you aren’t staying?” Seth asked. “But I thought….”
He ran away before Jesse could say anything else.
“Bloody hell,” Jesse muttered, going after him, but Seth had disappeared outside before Jesse could see where he went. “Fuck.”
“Is there a problem?” Macklin asked from the doorway.
“No… yes… I don’t know… I….” The crazy roil of his thoughts intensified as he struggled with his need to find Seth and make things right and the warring need to run away while he still could. He could feel responsibilities closing in around him like a net, ready to hold him prisoner until they sucked all the life out of him. He took a deep breath and pulled himself together. “I need a week off. I can’t think here. Everything’s all messed up in my head, and I can’t get it straightened out.”
“Running away never solved anything,” Macklin said.
“I’m not running away. I just need to figure things out, and if I stay here, I’ll end up making things worse. I can’t do that to Chris and Seth.”
“And leaving will be better?”
“They deserve better than me, Macklin. I’m a noaccount drifter with no plans beyond the end of the season. They’re a family. They need someone they can depend on to be a part of that.”
“So be that person.”
“I don’t know if I can,” Jesse said honestly. “It’s not as easy as just making that decision.”
“Actually, I think it is,” Macklin said. “It wasn’t that long ago I was standing right where you are, feeling just as lost and confused. You just have to decide what you want.”
“I only signed on for the season.”
“Contracts can be renegotiated.”
Jesse shook his head. “I just need to think.”
“Be back in a week,” Macklin said, “or you won’t have a job to come back to.”
“Thank you,” Jesse said, bolting for the bunkhouse. He grabbed a bag, dumping things into it haphazardly, and dug out his keys. He hadn’t driven his car since he got to the station, preferring to use the station’s utes out on the rough roads and in the paddocks, but he couldn’t drive off in one of those. Tossing his bag in the boot, he headed toward Taylor Peak and Boorowa.

“H
AVE
you seen Jesse?”
Chris’s words interrupted Macklin’s dour thoughts.
He’d wanted to shake the younger jackaroo and tell him he
was making a mistake, running away like this, but some
lessons had to be learned the hard way.
“Yes,” Macklin said, staring at the taillights
disappearing out of the valley. “He left.”
“What? Where is he going?”
“He didn’t say,” Macklin replied, wishing he had a
better answer for Chris. He should have told Jesse to suck
it up and be a man, but it was too late for that now. “Is he coming back?”
“We’ll see in a week,” Macklin said. “I don’t know
what happened tonight to set him off, but from what little
he said, I think he suddenly saw a future he never knew he
wanted staring him in the face and got scared. If you’ll
take a little advice from someone who’s been where he is, give him some time to figure things out, but not too much time. Sometimes a swift kick in the pants is a good thing
too.”
“Kind of hard to do when I don’t know where he’s
going.”
“Then we’ll have to hope he comes back,” Macklin
said, “or that you can figure out where he’d run to if he
needed to get lost in a crowd for a while.”
“I… I ought to say fuck him and forget about him,”
Chris said, his voice breaking on the words.
“You can do that,” Macklin agreed. “Nobody would
blame you if you did, least of all Jesse, since he already
thinks he’s a ‘no-account drifter’ to use his words. You
can write him off as exactly that, chalk up whatever
happened between you to experience, and move on.
Relationships end, people learn from them, and life goes
on.”
“He’s not no-account,” Chris protested.
“I didn’t say he was,” Macklin replied, smiling a
little at Chris’s defense of Jesse even in the face of Jesse’s desertion. “I said he thinks he is, and that’s why he wouldn’t try to stop you if you decided to forget about
him.”
“Is that what you think I should do?”
Bloody hell, Chris was so young. Macklin wanted to
pat him on the head and send him to bed, but Chris was
asking for his help.
“I don’t know what you should do,” Macklin said
honestly. “I don’t know what’s happened between you,
what promises you made or didn’t make to each other. I
don’t know what you want. I can guess what Jesse thinks
he wants, but I don’t think he really knows what he wants
either right this second. He said he needed to think. My
advice is for you to do the same. While he’s gone, figure
out what you want from him if he comes back. Ideally, but
also what you can live with if you can’t have your ideal.
And if he does come back, you have to talk to him about
what you figured out or all your thinking won’t do either of
you any good.”
Chris nodded slowly.
“Chris,” Macklin said as Chris started to walk away,
“whatever you decide, whatever happens with Jesse, you
and Seth have a home here for as long as you want it. If
that includes Jesse, that’s fine, but you’ve earned your
place on the station and so has Seth.”
The muffled sound that reached Macklin’s ears might
have been a sob, but Chris bolted before Macklin could
figure out how to determine if it was and what to do about
it.
“Are you all right?”
Macklin sighed as he turned to pull Caine against his
side. “It’s a good thing we called off that stupid bet or
you’d never get to top.”
Caine frowned. “Trouble in paradise?”
“Jesse left, and I’m pretty sure Chris is hiding in his
house crying, and I don’t know what to do about either of
those things.”
“I guess we take your advice all along and let them
find their own way, unless they ask for help, of course.” C
HRIS
stumbled into his room, blinded by the tears he was fighting not to shed. He took one look at the rumpled
sheets of his bed and lost the battle.
Jesse had
slept
with him last night. Not fucked him
and then snuck back to the bunkhouse like usual. Just held
him through the night like he didn’t ever mean to let Chris
go. They hadn’t had sex, so mercifully his sheets didn’t
smell of it, but he’d let himself start dreaming when he
woke up this morning with Jesse’s arms around him. Everything had seemed fine between them all day.
They hadn’t spent a lot of time together. Jesse had ridden
out to the north paddock with Ian and Kyle while Chris
worked with Neil and a couple of others closer to home,
but Jesse had been all smiles at breakfast and again at
dinner as they laughed and joked with Seth. Nothing in
any of those interactions had implied Jesse was at all
concerned about anything between them.
Had it been seeing Caine and Macklin dance? Chris
had cheered along with everyone else when Caine’s mother pushed them together. If Caine and Macklin chose to be more open, it could only make things easier for Jesse and Chris if they decided to stay on the station. He hadn’t noticed Jesse’s reaction at all, though, so he had no idea if
it had bothered Jesse for some unknown reason. It didn’t really matter what had set Jesse off. He had
left without an explanation.
“Fuck him,” Chris said, righteous anger welling up
inside him. “If that’s the way he’s going to be, I don’t need
him anyway. I’ve got better things to do than waste my
time on someone who runs away at the slightest sign of a
problem.”
“Chris?”
The sound of Seth’s voice, nearly as distraught as
Chris imagined his own must be, derailed the train of
Chris’s thoughts. “Just a minute,” he called to Seth as he
slipped into the bathroom to wash his face and recover his
composure. He didn’t expect it to keep Seth from noticing,
but it might give him a little more self-control when his
brother asked him what was wrong.
“Hey,” Chris said when he came into the living room
a few minutes later. He took another deep breath,
determined to keep his voice level and his emotions under
control while he talked to Seth. “What’s up?”
“I fucked up,” Seth said, looking at Chris with such
contrition that Chris knew he’d never manage to be angry
at Seth.
“What did you do?”
“I thought you and Jesse were a thing,” Seth said. “I
asked him about helping me plan your birthday, and he
said he wouldn’t still be here then because the season
would be over. I, um, kind of told him you loved him.” That explained the running away. Chris closed his
eyes as he fought the urge to scream at the unfairness of
the situation.
“You probably should’ve let me tell him that first,”
he said when he thought he could speak evenly. “How was I supposed to know you hadn’t?” Seth
asked. “He’s over here all the time. You’re always kissing
and stuff when you think nobody else is around. He slept
here last night. That looked like a couple to me.” “I know,” Chris said with a sigh, “but Jesse didn’t
see it the same way, apparently. He left tonight. Macklin
gave him a week of vacation.”
“Is he coming back?”
That was the million dollar question.
“I don’t know,” Chris said because he wasn’t about
to lie to his brother. “We’ll have to wait and see.” “What will happen if he doesn’t?” Seth asked. “We’ll stay on here and keep working,” Chris replied,
determined to accept that possibility so he’d be prepared if
it happened. “You still have to get your HSC if you want
to go train to be a mechanic somewhere, and I have a job
to do. Jesse’s decisions don’t change any of that.” “What if he comes back?” Seth said, his voice small. “Then it’ll depend on what he has to say,” Chris
answered. “I won’t be with someone I can’t depend on.” “I’m sorry I scared him off.”
Chris pulled his brother into a tight hug. “If he was going to be scared by us, it would have happened eventually. Better we know so we can get over it instead of planning a future with him in it. I’m sorry we messed up your party with our drama.”