Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 9

the stove and set the phone on the counter. He splashed water on his face, wet his spiky hair and slicked it back. He made coffee, and cleaned up the dinner dishes that were still in the sink. He was on autopilot, but at least he was moving.
    When the coffee was done, Sean sat on a stool at the breakfast bar. He sat with both elbows on the counter, and gripped his coffee cup with both hands to steady himself. His hands were shaking. He made himself drink the entire cup.
    When he was done, he set down the cup, and picked up the phone. He stared at it for a very long time before he got up the courage to select Jase's number from his contact list, and hit send. He closed his eyes as he listened to the ringing, and hoped that after two years of barely talking to each other, Jase would still consider him enough of a friend to take his call.
    ****
    Bzzzzt. bzzzzt. bzzzzt. bzzzzt. Ugh. Jase Shaw rolled over and fumbled for his cell phone in the dark.
    Who was calling in the middle of the night?
    He looked at the number. Sean. Crap. Adrenaline shot through his body and his heart began to pound. He stared at the phone for a second, his hand poised over the ignore button, but he couldn't make himself do it. He shoved his glasses onto his nose and pressed the talk button.
    "Tag, what the hell? Do you know what time it is?"
    "Jase?"
    "Urrrgh," he groaned as he rolled over and sat up, "Sonofabitch." He yawned "I'm here," he mumbled.
    "Jase, I'm sorry, I know we haven't talked in a while, and I know it's almost four in the morning, but I didn't know who else to call." Jase could hear the hitch in Sean's breath, and his heart tightened in his chest at the sound. "I'm calling because Lisa... she... well we..." Sean took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "It's over Jase. She left us."
    Jase bit his lip. He really didn't know what to say to that. Was this the part where he got to say- I told you so? What right did he have to say anything? He'd said his piece and then some when Lisa had turned up pregnant and Tag decided to move in with her.
    "Jase?" Sean waited. "Jase, are you still there?"
    "I'm here." Jase paused. "Tag," he began, using the nickname he had given Sean on their very first day of freshman orientation, "What do you need?"
    "Can you come over?" Sean's breath hitched again, "Please Jase. I'll tell you everything, but I just...I need to see you."
    Christ.
    You dropped off the planet, Tag. I'm supposed to be Cody's godfather, and in the past twelve months, I only got to see him grow up through pictures on Facebook. Now I'm supposed to drop everything and rush over to see you because Lisa's gone? Instead of laying into him, Jase kept his thoughts to himself. He didn't really have anything to drop either, he reminded himself. He had a little more than a week off before his next show started.
    "Is SHE there?" He and Lisa mixed about as well as oil and water, and if she and Tag were really done, God only knew how awful she'd be. He didn't know if he could take that, even for Tag.
    "No. She's not. She's in New York, in Queens, I think, with Thom and Emma." Thom and Emma were a couple who'd been in the year under them in the music theater program at the Conservatory.
    Wow. That was telling. Maybe that meant it was really over. For Sean's sake, he really hoped so. Jase sighed and looked at the clock. If he left now, with no traffic on the belt parkway to slow him down, he could take I-270 and be there in about an hour. "Okay man," he said, "I'm coming now."
    "Thanks, Jase"
    "I'll see you soon okay?"
    "Kay. Drive safe."
    Jase crawled out of bed and straight into the bathroom to shower. He started the water on cold, making sure he was really up and conscious enough to operate a vehicle. It was brutal, but once he felt awake, he turned the water up to hot, cleaned up, and emerged feeling somewhat human. He dried off, grabbed a pair of ratty jeans and a faded t-shirt from a pile draped on the back of the chair in his bedroom, and dressed. As an afterthought, he grabbed a few changes of clothes, running shoes, his travel case, and stuffed them in a duffel. He grabbed the duffel and his laptop, and headed out to his car.
    Aside from the buzz of crickets and cicadas that always accompanied humid Virginia nights in July, Annandale was quiet. The house that his "Grandmamma" had left him when she passed just after his college graduation, was on a street with rows of identical post World War II brick bungalows. He headed out. First stop,