“I can’t do it,” Mac said, trying for a reasonable tone. “I don’t have time. Every spare minute is going into this case. You know that. And even if I had the time, I’m not the right guy for this.”
“Why?” Tony demanded. “Because you don’t want to be seen around us queers, in case someone gets the right idea?”
Mac winced. “No, of course not that. But my work’s what’s important right now.”
“Yeah, I get it. You have to put all your time into going out protecting the lives of heterosexual blond girls. They’re so much more important than a few gay kids getting beaten up.”
“Two women are dead,” Mac snapped. “It’s not a contest. If a gay kid is dead, he gets all my time too. That’s what I do. I don’t give self-defense classes.”
“Preventing murders before they happen doesn’t appeal to you, huh?” Tony snarled. “Wait until you get killed— then Detective MacLean will have time for you.”
“What is your problem?” Mac demanded. “There are good self-defense instructors out there. Hire one. I’ll even chip in for the cost.” He’d find money in his stretched-to-screaming budget if it would make Tony happy.
“That’s right. You’d rather give us money you don’t have, than show up where someone might discover your deep dark secret. I promised those kids I’d find someone who won’t treat them like lepers for being gay or trans. How many gay-friendly self-defense instructors do you know?”
“Look.” Mac took a deep breath. “You’re not understanding what I’m saying. I’m the wrong person to teach those kids. I’d bet very few of them are my size. I’ve never had a real problem with personal safety, and if I did, the moves I’d use would not be the ones that would work for those kids. I haven’t had any formal training beyond what we got at the Academy. I don’t know enough.”
Tony stared at him, breathing hard, then rubbed at his face tiredly. “Okay. I get that.”
“Listen,” Mac said. “I know a woman detective on the squad. She sometimes teaches women’s self-defense classes. Not formal martial arts or anything, but like rape defense moves and personal safety. I’ll talk to her. Maybe she’d be willing to work with your kids, or knows someone who would.”
Tony nodded. He didn’t look as pleased as Mac expected. “You’ll give me her number or you’ll actually ask her in person?”
“I’ll ask her myself,” Mac promised. He wasn’t looking forward to going up to Mary Liu and asking her to teach a class at a gay teen center, but he could present it as a favor for a friend. It should be fine.
“And will you come to the class and help her demonstrate?”
Mac was taken aback. Tony usually understood a no when he heard it and didn’t make Mac repeat it. “I’ll probably be too busy,” he said cautiously.
“Uh huh. Probably.”
They looked at each other. Mac was tired, and all he wanted was to go to bed, spoon up against Tony’s warm body and get some sleep. But there was a tension in Tony that told him they weren’t done yet.
“It really bothers you that I don’t want to volunteer at the center,” Mac said finally.
“Yeah, it does. These kids are in desperate need of role models. People who can tell them it’s okay to be gay. And I feel like a hypocrite when my own boyfriend feels it’s so not okay to be gay that he won’t even be seen with me.”
“You know why I’m not out.” They’d had this discussion. He couldn’t believe Tony needed to rehash this again, at this hour of night. “You know I can’t afford…”
“Yeah, yeah. I know all your reasons. In my head, I can see why you won’t risk it. But in my gut? It’s starting to feel like a cop-out. It’s fucking 2011, not 1950. If not now, when? Being treated like a dirty secret makes me feel like there’s something wrong with me, and I spent a fucking long time when I came out at fifteen convincing myself that’s not true.”
“There’s nothing wrong with you, Tony,” Mac said softly, reaching for him. “You’re amazingly right.”
Tony dodged his touch. “As long as I’m behind closed doors.”
Mac dropped his hand and sat there, searching for something to say. It was Tony who finally blew out his breath and said, “I’m going to have a shower before bed. I’ll try not to wake you.”
“You… don’t want me to leave, do you?” Mac asked. They’d never had a real fight about this before. Mac realized he’d always set the limits, and Tony had accepted them, with no more than a little wheedling or pouting. But this teen center thing was clearly different from not going out to a movie or a show.
Tony looked at him and there was love and exasperation in equal measure in his eyes. “No, I don’t want you to leave. Go to bed and get some sleep, hon. Midnight is the wrong time to be rehashing this.”
“I’m sorry,” Mac tried.
“Yeah, I know you are, babe,” Tony said. “I’m just not sure that will always be good enough.”
Mac wanted to say he’d change, he’d open up for Tony. He couldn’t even begin to say the words. “Is this going to break us up?”
“Not right now. God, I hope never. But if anything could… I hate being in the closet.”
Mac watched with an ache in his chest as Tony walked away and shut himself in the bathroom. Things had been working fine. All this time, Tony’d said he was willing to live with Mac’s limits. Damn the man for changing the rules on him now. He couldn’t lose Tony. It would just about kill him. But coming out wasn’t any more of an option now than when this… thing they had going started. If Tony couldn’t accept that, couldn’t live with that…
Mac went to the bedroom and undressed for sleep, slowly and carefully, folding each item in precise shapes to give his hands no opportunity to tear and break things as they ached to do. He slid in between the sheets on his side of the bed, put his phone in the charger, and folded back the covers on Tony’s side. The sound of running water came dimly from the bathroom and he turned out the reading lamp on his nightstand. The room remained softly lit by the single bulb on Tony’s side. His pillow felt cool against his cheek. He closed his eyes and breathed the faint familiar scents, listened to the homey sounds. This had become his haven— this and the man at the center of it— and he couldn’t lose Tony now.
§ § § §
Mac tracked down Detective Liu at her desk late in the afternoon. From the look on her face, her day had been no more productive than his own. She pounded on her keyboard as if it offended her. Mac really didn’t want to do this.
“Hey, Liu,” he said. “Can I have a word with you?”
She looked up and shook her thick black hair out of her face. “Why not? Everyone else has.”
“Um.”
Liu laughed. “Relax, MacLean. I won’t bite. Hey, you’re looking good. I hear you have a girlfriend at last. When do we get to meet her?”
“What?” Mac frowned, thrown off course. “Who said that?”