“Yes. Although, when I first came to this country from Switzerland, Aunt Elsa still had the farm. I was getting up at five thirty to milk cows back then.”
“Ouch.” Warren gave an exaggerated shiver. “I’ll take a nice cushy office job.”
“It does suit you better.” Stefan reached out, barely brushing the thin skin at Warren’s wrist with one work-rough finger. He set the bottles in the sink. “I will open the door.”
Stefan let him out the back, into the velvet dark night. There was a waning half-moon in the sky, bright enough to navigate the mown grass of the lawn. As Warren reached the hedge, he looked back and saw the kitchen light wink out in Stefan’s house. For no good reason, he lingered, watching, until the softer light behind the thick bedroom curtains also was extinguished. Feeling pleasantly tired and sated, and warm despite the cool of the September night, he turned away and walked the fifty paces to his own front door.
That night set a pattern for the next three weeks. Not every night, but more often than he would have expected, Warren found himself crossing the lawn between their houses in the evening dark, after his mother had gone to bed. He would tap on the back door, his breath coming a little faster as Stefan pulled it open, smiled, and ushered him in.
Sometimes they talked first, over a beer, or cider, and once a glass of water since Stefan had nothing else in the house. Warren wasn’t sure of Stefan’s finances, but didn’t dare offer to pay for his share of the refreshments for fear of offending. He went and bought a crate of bottles the second week and took to bringing a pair over with him, to share.
As time went on he tentatively shared bits of his life as well, stories of his father who’d died too young from the effects of gas in the trenches in the Great War. He told Stefan about friends he missed, a few still living in Philly but most off somewhere in the fighting. He even talked a little about Charlie. A fraction of his pain eased as he shared memories of the harum-scarum boy he’d grown up with.
Stefan was a good listener, although he didn’t talk about Switzerland at all and rarely said more than a word or two about his own family. Still, he shared stories of his first years in America, with rueful humor over his own errors and misunderstandings. Warren didn’t push for more. Many men had painful pasts they chose not to share, especially men like the two of them. The conversations were warm and satisfying, the evenings full of a camaraderie he’d never quite had before. Then gradually their eyes would meet, pauses would lengthen, and desire would push the words aside until they climbed those stairs to Stefan’s room.
As sweet as those nights were, sitting talking, with anticipation sharpening the flavor of hops and malt, he liked even more the ones when Stefan locked the door, checked the curtains, and then dragged him into a hard embrace. Stefan had kissed awkwardly at first, but he was a quick learner. Nothing went to Warren’s head faster than to be pinned against the door by Stefan’s hard body while Stefan’s mouth opened his and plundered it. Eventually they would hurry upstairs and fall into bed, more at ease with every encounter.
The first time he persuaded Stefan to fuck him was sweet, hot comedy. Stefan put him on his hands and knees, but they didn’t line up right, and then his shorter leg gave out under the force of Stefan’s thrusts. They fell onto the mattress, coming apart with a tug that made both of them wince. He rolled on his side and they resumed, but Stefan’s inexpert reach-around tied them in a knot. Warren was half laughing, half cursing with frustrated need by the time he got Stefan busy fucking and set his own hand to pleasure himself instead.
But the next time . . . The next time had been glorious.
September 30th was a Saturday. Stefan worked only a half day, and when the wooden-backed truck rolled up in front of his house shortly after noon, full of tired, dirty men, Warren was waiting. Stefan vaulted out of the back with an exchange of insults that sounded friendly enough. The truck rolled away, and Stefan looked at Warren. “You need something?”
With Mrs. Cleveland weeding her flowerbed across the street, Warren avoided any innuendo. “I thought perhaps you might be planning a trip to the hardware store for glass?” He gestured at the still-boarded windows. “If so, I wouldn’t mind a ride. Mr. Tolliver keeps the store open until two on Saturdays.”
Stefan looked at him sideways. Warren tried to appear innocent. He was pretty sure that Stefan was getting the run-around on those windows, and each time Warren looked at that punched-face front of the little house, it made his blood heat. “I need some supplies myself. Paint. A board for the eaves in the back. It’ll be too big to carry on the bus.”
“You have no car?” Stefan had told Warren that he’d inherited his great-aunt’s Studebaker, garaged down the street, but they hadn’t talked about what Warren had.
“Not a car, no.” When Stefan just stood there, Warren added reluctantly, “Just Charlie’s Indian Chief.” Which he hadn’t looked at, much less ridden, since coming home. He wasn’t sure he could ride a motorcycle, although Charlie had taken him on it a few times, Warren clinging on, riding pillion behind his younger brother on a seat not really meant for two. “It’s not the vehicle to carry lumber on.”
“No. I can imagine that would not work.” Stefan eventually nodded. “All right. Would you like to come in and wait while I get cleaned up?”
“Sure.” Warren followed Stefan around the house to the back. “Don’t you use your front door at all?”
“Not often.” Stefan let them in with his key.
The kitchen was warm in the midday sun, and dim behind the closed curtains. Warren was beginning to have other ideas. “Or we could just stay here.” He stepped close behind Stefan, smelling the sweat-rich scent of his skin. Funny how perspiration could smell so rank on a bus full of strangers, and so appetizing from a man you wanted.
Stefan moved away, turning on the water at the sink to wash his hands. “Will it keep you from dragging me to Mr. Tolliver’s store another time?”
“Am I that transparent?”
“Yes.”
Warren sighed and stepped back further. “Go get clean, sir, and we’ll brave the lion’s den.”
Stefan gave him a thin smile and headed up the stairs. Ten minutes later, they left the house, with Stefan carefully locking up, and walked down the street. Neighbors were out, busy with garden chores as fall moved on apace. Most of them waved to Warren or called a greeting. He noticed that Stefan got a cool look or a nod of the head. He bumped Stefan’s shoulder lightly with his own. “I’ll have to get Mother to throw a little neighborhood party, have everyone in. I bet your Great-Aunt Elsa wasn’t a social woman.”
Stefan shook his head. “We moved here when she sold the farm, finally, after she turned eighty-eight. She had a dear friend nearby, but otherwise she did not socialize. And we did not go to church.”
“Ah, yes, that would be considered quite suspicious.” Warren glanced around the gravel parking lot as they turned off the sidewalk. “Which is yours?”
“There.” Stefan pointed to a dusty black hard-top Studebaker. “The question is, will she start?”
The answer turned out to be yes, but only with some coaxing and a lot of hand-cranking. They’d each had a go at the crank by the time the engine coughed and consented to turn over. Stefan called out the window, “Quick, Warren, jump in before she stalls.”
Laughing and dusty, Warren scrambled into the passenger side, and Stefan pulled out of the lot. “I should stop for gas. I brought my coupons.”
Warren glanced at the A sticker on the windshield. “Will you have enough to last you? I didn’t mean to commandeer your whole ration for my trip.”
“Given that I have not taken her out in a month, I think we can safely use a couple of gallons.” Stefan pulled into the station and stopped at the second pump. The gas jockey was a young woman, which still caught Warren by surprise. She took the coupons, pumped their three gallons, and washed the windshield cheerfully.
As Stefan pulled out his wallet to pay her, Warren noticed that the
leather billfold shook in his hands and he fumbled the money. When the woman went to get their change, he said softly, “Problem?”
Stefan didn’t look at him, seeming to ignore the twitch and jump of the muscles in his forearms and, Warren noticed, in his strong thighs beneath his trousers. His jaw tightened, spasmed, relaxed. He stared out the windshield and took a short breath, then another.
Warren reached out a hand, but didn’t quite touch. He wasn’t sure what to do or say. After a moment he said tentatively, “Are you all right? Should I, um, drive?”
Stefan was silent.
“Can I help?”
Stefan’s next breath was softer and slower. After another few seconds, the tremors died away, and he glanced at Warren. “No. A minor seizure, I think. Very small. It comes on me sometimes, like this. Almost always short. Of no consequence.” He held his hands out, steady and normal as if nothing had happened, and took a deep breath. “There. Done.”
“Are you sure?” It had been a brief thing, and yet seeing Stefan shaken against his will made Warren tense, angry at no one in particular, and nervous.
For a second, Stefan looked at Warren, and there was a darkness that might have been fear in his eyes, but then he smiled. “Nothing is ever sure. But the fits are rare and I do not expect another.” The woman came over to Stefan’s window, and he took the change from her without fumbling. “Thank you.” He turned back to Warren and managed a smile. “You can drive, of course, if you are afraid.”
“I’m not scared,” Warren muttered, slouching in his seat. “Although I’m surprised you still have a license.”
Stefan shrugged and reached for the starter. “No one has stopped me so far.”
Warren was tempted to be the first, but with his bad leg for the clutch and his three whole times behind the wheel in the last ten years, he couldn’t outweigh Stefan’s easy confidence. He sighed. “All right.”
Stefan gave him a softer look and added, “I usually feel it coming on. If I were driving, I would pull over.”
This time, the car did start back up without a crank, and they made it to Tolliver’s Hardware in good order. The tone of the trip took a further nosedive the moment they walked in the door. Tolliver was behind the counter, while his teenaged nephew showed a customer the selection of saw blades. Both of them looked up at the sound of the bells on the door, then looked away pointedly with similar sour expressions. The kid went back to loudly explaining the difference between tooth shapes, while Tolliver picked up a cloth and wiped the countertop.
Warren strode forward, with Stefan hanging back at his shoulder. “Hey there, Mr. Tolliver. I used up everything you sold me two weeks ago, and I’m back for more.”
Tolliver looked up warily. “What can I do for you this time, Mr. Burch?”
Warren pulled out his list. “I need one piece of one-by-four, about eight feet long. A box of penny-nails. White paint, if you have it.”
“I’ll have to look in back for the paint. It goes out the door as fast as it comes in.”
“That’s all right. We’ll look around a bit.”
Tolliver called, “Jerry? Keep an eye on these guys while I step in back.”
“Yes, sir,” the boy said.
There was a stack of glass panes and reclaimed windows in the far end of the shop. Warren led the way over, pulled his paper tape out of his pocket, and knelt. “Stefan, you tip them, one at a time, and I’ll measure.”
Stefan said nothing, but did as he was bidden. Warren worked through the stack until he’d found a pair that were the needed dimensions. One was four panes, one six, where Stefan’s old windows each had a big single glass. Still, there was a war on. These could be fitted in the old frames, for now. He eased them out of the stack and brought them to the counter under the kid Jerry’s watchful eye. Stefan helped stand them to lean upright by the register, then went to wait by the door, looking out the shop window at the street. The light caught his hair, turning it white, and sharpened the angle of his jaw. Warren had to pull his attention away.
Tolliver came out a moment later with a can of paint. “You’re in luck. We got some in. And I set the piece of one-by out front for you. I had a nine and a six, cut down from the twelves. I gave you the nine-foot.” He glanced down at the windows. “Those too?”
“Yes, please. And the nails.”
Slowly Tolliver went to the fastener drawers and took out a box. When he came back, he leaned closer to Warren and spoke softly. “You shouldn’t hang about with the likes of him.”
“Why not?” Warren managed not to change his tone. “He’s doing me a favor with a ride home.”
“Maybe. But your father, may he rest, fought the Huns, and it destroyed his health. What would he say, seeing you taking the part of another Kraut, in the midst of war?” He nodded at the two waiting windows.
“Stefan Koehler is Swiss,” Warren said. “Not German. My mother’s seen his passport. And he’s been in this country for years. Switzerland is neutral. He’s my neighbor.”
Tolliver lowered his voice still more. “No insult to your mother, but she’s hardly a judge of forgeries, is she? I heard,”—he glanced at Stefan and then away, dropping to a whisper—“I heard that on her death bed, his aunt admitted the man was German, said she brought him from Germany to help on her farm. One of the orderlies at the hospital swears to it. And that orderly was at the front in 1918, so he should know a Kraut when he sees one. Hell, you just have to listen to Koehler speak.”
“They speak German in Switzerland,” Warren pointed out.
Tolliver shook his head. “Mark my words, they’re going to find out one day that he’s been spying. Planning for the invasion, no doubt. But it won’t happen, because those murdering German bastards are on the run now.”
“Why would anyone spy out here in the middle of Wisconsin?”
“We have our war industry, same as anywhere. But the war’ll be over soon. I don’t care what they’re saying about Arnhem. It’s a setback, no more.”
“He’s Swiss,” Warren repeated.
Tolliver shrugged. “That’ll be six dollars and twenty-five cents. I assume he’ll help you carry things to the car.”
“I’m sure he will.” Warren counted out his coins, one by one, onto the counter. “He’s generous and helpful that way. Including with his car.”
“That’s how they get you off guard,” Tolliver said. “You take care now, Mr. Burch.”
Warren fumed, mostly silently, all the way home and through the hour it took to remove Stefan’s old window glass, dismantle parts of the frames, and fit the new ones in. It eased him a little, when they were done, to see the front of the house fresh again, windows whole around the white door. He passed the jar of nails back to Stefan. “Just needs some paint on those frames.”
“Yes. Perhaps later. If I offer you a beer now, will you throw it at me or drink it?”
“Huh?”
Stefan smiled. “That scowl. I lived in fear for every nail you drove.”
“I’m not mad at you. Damned, close-minded, intolerant . . .”
Stefan touched his shoulder. “Come inside, have a cold drink. It will be all right.”
Warren went with him to the shed, setting the hammer in its place on the tool board. “How can you be so calm about the way Tolliver talks about you?”
“What can I do?” Stefan shrugged. “Getting angry will not make me seem less of a threat. I am used to it now.”
“And that makes it better?”
“Best to let the insults pass by, I think. One can become accustomed. When someone speaks harshly of Nancy-boys, fruits, fairies, does it make you rage like this? Or have you worn that reaction off by now?”
Warren actually had to think for a moment. “I guess I’ve learned not to react, in general. If someone called you that, well, I’d still want to push their back teeth in.”
“So I have learned not to react to other things.” Stefan leaned closer, not touching, even here in the dim interior of the she
d, with the door standing open. “Come inside, share a drink, and perhaps we can distract each other from the inequities of the world.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Warren sighed. “You’re far too self-controlled.”
“You can make me lose control.”
“And your English is too damned good; I have the college degree, and you come out with inequities.”
“Too pretentious?” Stefan laughed. “The Swiss are believers in the value of being a polyglot. From when I was very small, my mother would speak to me each day with a different language, in turn. At first, it was confusing, and my father thought I was stupid because I learned my native German so slowly, but then I caught up. I learned the words together in all the languages.”
“Seems like a good method.” Warren closed the shed door behind them and followed Stefan across the grass. “Your father didn’t approve?” There had been a note of strain in Stefan’s voice, and it hadn’t escaped Warren’s notice that although Stefan occasionally spoke fondly of his mother, he rarely, if ever, mentioned other family.
“No. You understand, the twenties and thirties were a hard, hard time, in Europe as well as here. We were quite poor at times. My father had a narrow view of what made a successful man.”
“Did they fight about it?”
Stefan flashed him an odd look, but said, “My father did not take much interest.” There was clear finality in the statement. A moment later, they were inside the kitchen, and Warren was thoroughly distracted from both family history and prejudice for a long, satisfying time. Even the drinks came much, much later.
The sound of breaking glass carried through the dining room window as Warren sat at his mother’s table, enjoying her chicken and dumplings. They both looked up, startled. For a moment, Warren wasn’t even sure what he’d heard, and then another crash and laughter made it clear. He shoved his chair back from the table, ignoring his mother’s squeak as their water glasses slopped onto the white linen.
The front door was closest. Warren rushed through the house, glad that he hadn’t removed his shoes. He plunged down the front steps, his hand skimming the rail, and swung toward Stefan’s. This time he could see the three men clustered on Stefan’s stoop. One of them was all too familiar, his memory so recently refreshed. “Jerry Tolliver!” he bellowed, breaking into a run.