The Brilliant Boy Billionaire - 49. Revelation

The week in Chicago had passed all too quickly, and although I’d seen and done everything I’d intended to see and do, I couldn’t help but feel I’d barely scratched the surface. The trip home was my third time driving the Tesla more than its range on a single charge – and with unusually high temperatures and humidity. I didn’t even attempt to maximize my range by driving without air conditioning. I drove home on Thursday in order to avoid the worst of the holiday traffic; I also saved paying the higher rates the hotel charged for rooms on the Memorial Day weekend. Not that it would have made much difference in the total bill for the week-long stay, but I didn’t have to be there for the holiday, and it was a matter of principle.

I stopped in Iowa City at a Tesla charging station but wasn’t impressed by the selection of food in the area. A quick check on my phone revealed a Panera Bread less than a mile away on foot. It was my first time eating at a Panera since returning to the States, and I received quite a shock as I perused the menu.

“You don’t have the Sierra Turkey anymore?” I asked as I stepped up to the counter.

“What’s a Sierra Turkey?” asked the teenage boy who was manning the counter. Shit!

A teenage girl came up from nearby and explained to both of us, “We haven’t had the Sierra Turkey in years – not since I’ve been working here. Not since we reopened after the lockdown. We can probably make you one if you want, though. It’s almost exactly the same as the Toasted Frontega Chicken, I think. The only differences are that it’s toasted rather than served cold, there isn’t any lime juice mixed in with the chipotle mayo, and of course, it’s with chicken instead of turkey, but we can do a custom sandwich if you want, or maybe you’d like to try the Toasted Frontega Chicken instead. It’s my favorite sandwich. The new flatbread pizzas are amazing, too.” I had to admit that the flatbread pizzas looked fantastic, but I wasn’t in the mood for pizza, so I ordered a half sandwich of the Toasted Frontega Chicken along with a cup of the Summer Corn Chowder. Both were outstanding, and I had a new favorite Panera sandwich.

I arrived home, just in time to have dinner with the family. Of course, everyone wanted to hear all about my trip, so I hardly got a chance to eat. I was exhausted from driving close to 500 miles and decided to call it an early night. In spite of my exhaustion or perhaps because of it, I tossed and turned for what seemed like hours before falling asleep only to awaken from yet another nightmare less than an hour later. After more tossing and turning, I finally fell back to sleep and slept through until the morning.

Much had changed in the Gonzalez household in the time I’d lived there, yet this was the closest thing I had to a home now. It was my home and probably always would be even when I lived elsewhere, as I certainly would. I owed more to this family that took me in as their own than I could ever hope to repay.

When I first joined the family, I shared a bedroom with Rob for a couple of nights and then with Sammy until I was sent all over the world to help Applazon meet the demand for expanded server access. After we renovated the house and added a couple of bedrooms, Rob and I each had a bedroom to ourselves. Rob had the bedroom next to the new laundry room, and I had the corner bedroom. Both bedrooms had sliding glass doors and were right off the patio and the pool. Henry and Sammy shared the largest bedroom, which lacked a sliding glass door but did have a small side door that provided access to the patio and the pool. When Rob and his fiancé bought a house together and he moved out, Henry took over Rob’s old bedroom. Sam apparently preferred having the largest bedroom over having a sliding glass door. Even though I had offered to switch bedrooms during the two years I was traveling the world, he still chose to stay put, so I still had the corner bedroom.

In the fall, Henry would be going off to college and I’d likely be moving to New York, leaving only Sammy on the lower level. He was finishing up as a junior at Bellevue East High School, and would be a senior next year. Celia had another year to go at the University of Nebraska, and apparently, she was applying to medical school and was hoping to get into one of Omaha’s two medical schools. There was an excellent chance she’d be accepted to Creighton University if not to the University of Nebraska, so it seemed likely she would continue to live at home for at least the next five years unless she got married. Perhaps she would take over the downstairs level once all the boys had moved out. Camilla would return to Notre Dame University in the fall and was planning to go to law school after that. Hillary was finishing up her sophomore year at Bellevue East and would be a junior next year, and Lindsey would graduate from Logan Fontenelle Middle School next month and start as a freshman at Bellevue East in the fall.

This being the Memorial Day weekend, a family barbecue was planned, as usual. What was unusual about it was that it was being held at Rob and Sam’s new house. Because Rob had to work on both Sunday and Monday, the barbecue would be in a couple of days, on Saturday. No wait, the clock indicated it was already after midnight, so it was going to be tomorrow. I was looking forward to seeing Rob and Sam’s house. I knew it couldn’t be nearly as large as Jerry and Fran’s place, but the fact that it had a pool meant it had to be decent. Of course, it might be an above-ground pool for all I knew, so I’d reserve judgment until I saw it. I guess I must have fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew, the sun was shining through the glass door in my room, and the smell of bacon permeated the house.

Getting out of bed, I stretched as I usually did when first getting up. Lapsing back into my usual behavior when at home, I didn’t bother to wear any clothes as I made my way to the bathroom. Henry was shaving at one of the sinks, while Sammy was in the shower. I’d yet to need to shave, but Henry, who was only fifteen, was shaving every day now. Walking up to the urinal we installed when we remodeled, I let loose my stream, then joined Sammy in the shower and turned on the other showerhead just as Sammy turned his off. As I walked by, Sammy grabbed my dick and said, “This porridge is just right,” then added, “You never did tag someone after the last time.”

Grabbing his dick, I responded, “If you wanted to grab my dick, all you had to do was ask.”

“I’ll have to keep that in mind,” he replied as he grabbed his towel and started to dry off. As Sammy exited the shower, Henry entered and joined me, turning on the other showerhead.

I’d always thought Henry was exceptionally good looking and sexy, but after what Franklin had said about him being in love with me, I was looking at Henry in a new light. Franklin was right. I did tend to see Henry as a little kid even though he was only a bit over a year-and-a-half younger than I was. Henry was fifteen, but he looked more like he was my real age than I did. Was I being paranoid to worry that someone would report me for statutory rape if I had a relationship with him? He was more mature than most teenagers I knew, and he was one of the kindest, gentlest souls I’d ever met. He was also undeniably sexy, and he was gay.

All of that said, there was no getting around the fact that he would be in Boston for the next several years, whereas I might be moving to New York permanently. Even if I set aside the issue of his being a minor, how could a relationship work if we were apart all the time? True, New York to Boston was doable on weekends. There was a train, the Acela Express, I think, that made the trip from New York to Boston in something like three or four hours, or I could drive it. Spending eight hours on the road every week would be daunting but not so bad if I took the train. Maybe we could alternate. I could come up one weekend and Henry could come down the next.

What the fuck was I thinking. Commuter relationships rarely lasted. I ought to have my head examined for even thinking it. We should be free to pursue other relationships, be they hookups or something more permanent. I didn’t believe in open relationships, and tying Henry down just wouldn’t be fair. Besides, it might be one thing to be roommates, but traveling eight hours every weekend to be together would make it obvious that we were involved with each other, and it would be impossible to deny that I was engaged in an illegal relationship with a minor. Come to think of it, what was the age of consent in Massachusetts, anyway? In New York it was seventeen, but I thought I’d read that in Massachusetts it was eighteen, but wasn’t that for heterosexual males? The bottom line would still be: we didn’t live in the same city.

“Are you still planning on taking a vacation this summer before you move to New York?” Henry asked as he lathered up. Shit, I’d forgotten he’d asked about going along with me.

“I forgot about that,” I answered, “Much depends on when they want me to start – that is, if they offer me the job and if Columbia accepts me into the Ph.D. program.”

“Of course, they’ll offer you the job. Of course, Columbia will offer you a slot in the Ph.D. program. So, are you still planning to take a road trip, and are you still interested in letting me come with you?” Henry asked.

“You’re working for Applazon this summer,” I asked. “Will they let you take the time off?”

“I’ll be hourly,” Henry answered. “I just have to clear it with Rob in advance,” he clarified. Yeah, Rob was going to be Henry’s boss.

Allowing Henry to come with me was a bad idea. We’d be spending all our time together and sharing a room – or maybe even a bed or a tent – every night. Who knows, I might meet someone along the way with whom to share my tent – or not. The chances of getting together with another gay guy in the middle of nowhere were virtually nonexistent. The biggest city I’d spend any time in would be Colorado Springs. The whole idea of visiting the Rockies, however, was to hike the trails and see the scenery and maybe camp out under the stars, but what was the point if there was no one to share it with?

If I were to take a trip to the Rockies, I’d need reservations, and it was likely that all the better places to stay were already booked. All of the campsites were probably already scheduled to be full, and all of the backcountry permits were probably already issued. Finding fast-charging stations for the Tesla would also be a challenge. There might not be any. There was a lot I’d need to look into.

“Henry, I just don’t know if it’s even possible,” I said. “I’ll definitely look into it, but I don’t even know if there are any campsites left, let alone places to plug in the Tesla.”

“You give me a date and leave the planning to me, J.J.” Henry replied. “I’ll make sure we can keep the car charged up and a roof over our heads – or stars, as the case may be.”

“You really want to go?” I asked.

“You’ve no idea,” he replied. “It’s a chance to go out on my own and to spend time with someone I’ve missed terribly during the last couple of years. We’d better finish up and get some breakfast.”

“Yeah,” I agreed as I shut off the water and grabbed my towel. After applying my deodorant and brushing my teeth, I grabbed a pair of briefs and shorts in my room and put them on, then headed upstairs to get some breakfast.

Checking my phone, there was a text from Jitendra to contact him as soon as I got up. I called him back before I even joined the family for breakfast. As a result, I ended up fixing my own breakfast after I finally got off the phone. Jeff had made the development of a super­conducting motor a top priority, with a goal of being ready to field a full team of cars at next year’s Indy 500. Jitendra and I spent more than an hour discussing concerns the solid-state physicists in Seattle had with respect to the literature on super­conducting motors, nearly all of which was done with conventional super­conducting magnets cooled with liquid helium. I’d read that literature myself and largely discounted the problems reported, as we’d be operating at room temperature and presumably wouldn’t have to deal with them. The physicists felt otherwise and requested that I take another look.

I spent the entire morning looking at the data and doing my own calculations and, unfortunately, they were right. Minor fluctuations in the magnetic field induced by irregular terrain would destabilize the field, collapsing the super­conductive properties of the ceramics. The resulting loss of power would be catastrophic, and even if the ceramic wafers didn’t shatter, it would necessitate bringing the car to a complete stop before proceeding. I had a meeting with an attorney that took up most of the afternoon, during which we discussed the preliminaries for setting up a shell corporation to handle my increasing accumulation of Applazon stock. I also had him draw up the paperwork for incorporating Greg’s bicycle shop. It turned out we could fund Greg’s college education from the tax savings alone, but not Billy’s, let alone his law, medical or veterinary school, so I threw in a half-million of my own money to cover the costs. Once I returned from the lawyer’s office, I spent the rest of the day on the super­conducting motor problem and much of the night, then tossed and turned in bed afterwards.

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I entered the address of Rob and Sam’s new home into the nav system in my Tesla and watched as it pulled up the location and plotted the easiest route to get us there. I was shocked when I found their house was right by Zorinsky Lake in one of the most affluent neighborhoods in the Omaha suburbs. It was nearly right on the lake, too. How could my ‘foster brother’ and his fiancé afford such a place? I realized that perhaps I should reserve judgement until I saw it. In any case, I had Henry riding shotgun and Sammy and Sammy’s girlfriend, Vanessa, in the back. The GPS routed me up U.S. 75 and across Interstate 80. It seemed counterintuitive, as it was the least-direct route, but it was significantly faster, and I found myself driving up 163^rd Street just a half hour later. As we passed one mansion after another, again I wondered how Rob could afford such a place on a data-center manager’s salary. I knew he earned a low six-figure amount, but then I realized I had no idea what Sam did. I knew from our brief conversation that she had traveled extensively around the world, but I didn’t even know if it was for business or pleasure. I needed to spend some time getting to know her.

As we pulled up to Rob and Sam’s house, I noted that it was the smallest house on the block by far, not that it was a shack, by any means. Like the other houses in the neighborhood, it was pretty new. Unlike the houses around it, which were all McMansions with the exception of the one next to it, it was the only single-story house in sight. I recalled hearing that it’s better to have the cheapest house in a good neighborhood than the most expensive house in a crappy neighborhood, but I, for one, wouldn’t care to have neighbors who were snobs. I pulled the Tesla into the driveway, and we all piled out. I immediately loved the way the house was laid out. There appeared to be an attic or a loft, as there was a skylight visible in front. The driveway ran along the entire side of the property, with a two-car garage that opened on the side of the house rather than in front. Unlike most new houses today, the garage didn’t dominate the front of the house, and the side entrance actually made the house look significantly larger than it really was.

I noticed that the outside temperature was already 88°F according to the display in the Tesla. The high was predicted to be at or around a hundred degrees with the humidity to match. It was unusually hot for Memorial Day, and we’d dressed accordingly, wearing only our swimsuits – speedos in my case – and flip-flops or sandals. I had my phone in a wallet case, along with my credit cards and driver’s license. I was keeping them locked up and out of sight in the Tesla and was wearing an Applazon watch so I could keep track of incoming email, messages and calls.

The driveway overlooked the back yard, with a steep stairway that led down to it. Sam waved at us from below, so we all bypassed the house and headed down the stairs to the pool deck. The house was evidently built into a hillside with the basement level leading out to the back yard and the pool deck. One of the coolest parts of the house was an octagonal-shaped cupola in the back corner next to the driveway. Both floors of the cupola had windows on all sides, making for what I was sure were bright and airy rooms. The back yard and pool deck were themselves on a terrace, well above the surrounding land and the lake itself. Shaun and I had undoubtedly walked right by the corner of this house when we hiked the lake trail but didn’t even notice it. As with the Gonzalez family home, the land directly behind the house was heavily forested. A second stairway continued on down to the lakeside trail. There appeared to be a deck off the main floor of the house; there was a stairway leading from it down to the pool deck, too.

Sammy and his girlfriend, as well as Henry, each gave Sam a hug and exchanged pleasantries. And then Sammy grabbed his taller but thinner, lighter and younger brother and threw him into the pool, getting us all a bit wet in the process. Henry retaliated by throwing not Sammy but Vanessa into the pool. All three of them ended up in the water, and Sam and I ended up more than a bit wet, but it felt good in the day’s heat.

“I love the layout, Sam,” I said as I approached her and gave her a hug. “I look forward to seeing the inside.”

“It’s not nearly as large as it looks,” Sam replied. “The garage makes the house look bigger because it opens to the side.”

“Yeah, I figured as much,” I said. “You have, what, three bedrooms?”

“Good guess, J.J.,” she replied. “Three bedrooms and two-and-a-half bathrooms on the main floor, with a loft upstairs that doubles as a guest room and home office. There’s an open kitchen with a breakfast nook in the octagon and a great room with a fireplace where the chimney is. You can see the wraparound deck, with the kitchen, great room and master bedroom all leading out onto it. Downstairs on the pool level, there’s a mud room, a home theater, and a rec room, as well as my workshop and the laundry room—”

“Your workshop?” I asked.

Laughing, Sam explained, “My ‘husband to be’ can lift heavy boxes and delegate someone to exchange a data server, but can he replace a wall switch with a dimmer? Not without shorting the whole circuit to ground. Can he install a new kitchen faucet? He’ll do a fine job if you don’t mind hot water coming out when you open the cold valve or having water pouring out onto the floor. When it comes to anything involving tools, he’s inept. I, on the other hand, was the only girl in a family with four boys, and I wasn’t about to be outdone by my brothers. I love handiwork.”

Laughing, I responded, “I didn’t exactly have much choice growing up when it came to helping out with the handiwork. My so-called father taught me a lot about how to handle simple repairs and how to paint. When I was old enough, he put me to work over the summer helping him to paint houses to put food on the table. Even before then, he expected me to pull my own weight, such as it was. The trouble was, I was an uncoordinated runt. Our shack was heated by a couple of wood stoves, and no sooner could I wield an axe without chopping off my nuts than he had me chopping wood right alongside him. He claimed he wasted more time supervising me than it would have taken to do all the work himself, but he insisted I earn my share of the heat.”

Laughing hysterically, Sam responded, “Without chopping off your nuts? I like that! I’m going to remember that one.”

Realizing once again that I had no idea what Sam did for a living, I asked, “I didn’t get a chance to ask you before, but what do you do?”

“I’m an electrician,” Sam replied.

“Really!” I exclaimed. “Every electrician I’ve ever met before was a man. My so-called dad taught me some wiring basics, but of course I couldn’t tell you what’s required to meet code. It’s so cool that you’re an electrician. I’m impressed!”

“Why should it be so unusual?” Sam asked. “Why shouldn’t it be common for women to be electricians? It’s no more physical than cleaning toilets and a hell of a lot easier than nursing, and it’s really straightforward.”

“I hadn’t thought of it before, but you’re right,” I agreed.

“That’s actually how Rob and I met,” she continued. “My firm has the contract with Applazon for the data centers and the delivery station. We met when I did some upgrades to increase capacity in the data center. Rob was one of the first men I ever met who wasn’t intimidated by a woman electrician.”

“Sounds like it was fate,” I exclaimed. “Now is there anything I can do to help?”

“I think Rob and I have it covered,” she answered. It was then that the girls arrived, followed by Jerry and Fran. While hugs were going around, I was suddenly grabbed from behind and pulled into the pool. The laughter told me it was Henry, so I turned around and dunked him. We ended up wrestling in the water until we risked embarrassing each other, as we were both hard.

Sam brought out a pool basketball and hoop, and we played a couple of games of pool basketball while Rob and Jerry got the grill going. We had a blast, and it helped keep us cool as the outside temperature continued to climb. Then Rob announced that the food was ready, and on getting out of the pool, there was no getting away from the heat. The food looked wonderful: hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken breasts, baked beans, potato salad and coleslaw. I grabbed a little of everything and grabbed a Heineken from the ice chest Rob had set out.

I sat down at a table under the deck because it was shaded from the sun, and Henry joined me. The moment I took a bite of the burger, I knew there was something different about it. Not that it wasn’t tasty. In fact, it was perhaps the best hamburger I’d ever had. There were seasonings I’d never tasted in a burger that really complemented the natural flavor of the meat, and the grilled onions I’d added, added to the excellent flavor. The meat was done perfectly, too – a bit red in the center, but otherwise thoroughly cooked. It was a juicy, nearly perfect hamburger, yet the texture wasn’t quite right.

“Do you notice anything strange about the hamburger?” Henry asked.

“I was just about to ask you the same thing,” I said. “Not that it isn’t delicious or anything. It just seems different. It tastes and chews like a burger, but the texture of the meat is different from what I was expecting.”

“I think maybe you put your finger on it without realizing it,” Henry suggested. “I think that maybe this isn’t meat at all.” Then calling out, Henry asked, “Rob, is this an Impossible™ Burger or something?”

“Shit!” Rob cursed. “Sam and I had a bet going that none of you would notice that the burgers and hot dogs aren’t real meat. Obviously, I lost.”

“Maybe you did, but I think the rest of us won,” I responded. “I just returned from visiting my first boyfriend, Greg, who lives in Springfield, Illinois. He’s given up eating all red meat because it causes heart disease and colon cancer. His dad died last year from Covid because of a congenital heart defect and an artificial, aortic heart valve—”

“IHSS?” Henry asked.

“You got it on the nose,” I confirmed. “Anyway, eating red meat has nothing to do with congenital heart defects, but it made him think about his own health, and as he put it, he’d rather not eat his fellow mammals. With a burger this good, why kill poor innocent cows if you don’t have to? The texture takes a little getting used to, but the flavor, if anything, is better than the real thing. Besides which, raising cattle contributes significantly to climate change.” When everyone started clapping, I realized that perhaps I had been grandstanding a little bit.

“For what it’s worth, I agree with you, J.J.,” Henry chimed in. “I hear Impossible Foods is working on simulating things like steak and prime rib, too. That would be amazing.”

“Don’t expect your family to go along with it,” I said.

“I’ll just have to be sure my boyfriend feels the same way you do,” Henry responded. “Speaking of which, could we talk about the trip?”

“Don’t you think it’s premature?” I asked. “We don’t know what my schedule is going to be like, you know. I might have to return to New York for more interviews or go looking for an apartment. I haven’t heard anything at all since the interviews, though. I’ve had no contact since I sent thank-you notes to everyone. Maybe I’m not getting the job after all—”

“It’s been, what, two or three months?” Henry interrupted.

“Three months next week Friday,” I replied, “and I was on the road for half of that time, but I didn’t hear anything, and I was in email and phone contact throughout that time.”

“When you say you were in email contact, did you mean personal email or corporate email?”

“Personal email,” I replied. “Accessing my corporate email requires a secure connection, and while on my trip, except for the time I spent working on super­conducting motor designs while in Indy, I didn’t bother. There wasn’t really any reason to check.”

“Wasn’t there?” Henry asked.

“Surely they’d have sent me a text if they wanted to contact me,” I countered.

“Do you have your phone here?” Henry asked, “Can you access your corporate email from your phone?”

“It’s a corporate phone,” I replied. “Of course, and of course, I left it locked up in the car and have my watch with me, but it doesn’t access the corporate server.”

“Why don’t you check your email now,” Henry suggested. “There might be something important that can’t wait.”

“On the Memorial Day weekend?” I asked of no one in particular. “You can’t be serious.”

“Why don’t you humor me and check?” Henry suggested.

“It’ll just be the usual corporate drivel I get all the time,” I replied, “but I’ll check anyway.”

I left my plate on the table and plodded up the steps to the driveway, where I found the Tesla parked right where I left it. I reached for the car door, but shit, the car was unlocked. How could I have been so stupid? The car locked itself when the phone was no longer there. I was going to have to reprogram the car to use my watch instead. In any case, nothing was stolen, but next time I might not be so lucky. Grabbing the phone, the car locked itself as it was designed to do as I walked away with my phone in hand. Plodding down the steps, I rejoined Henry at the table and opened my corporate email.

Scanning through the list of messages, it was indeed all the usual junk, but then I spotted a message from Grace Ingram, dated more than a week ago, just after I’d left Indy. I opened it and started to read it aloud.

Dear J.J.,

It was a pleasure to meet you and to explore opportunities for you to join our group. At first, I had my doubts that someone so young could handle the responsibility of directing a new department or to interact with your peers in a productive manner. I was pleasantly surprised by your maturity at such a young age and with your accomplishments. I had significant reservations about the last-minute consideration of an applicant who was foisted upon us by the upper echelons of corporate management. We had been considering other, external candidates for the directorship and were close to making an offer to one of them. However, after having a chance to meet with you and to discuss our research interests with you, it quickly became evident that you are by far the best candidate. Your intimate familiarity with hardware, your successful development of the hardware that we will be using and your proven track record of acquiring new knowledge in the time it takes most of us to read a newspaper made it clear you will be a fully functional member of the team and not just a corporate plant.

Please contact me at your earliest convenience. I realize you’re traveling at the moment, and it might not be convenient to return my contact. If you can, please respond with a quick note to this email, but otherwise please call me over the Memorial Day weekend or any time thereafter. There is much to discuss, and if you’re interested in the position, I would like to move quickly to formalize the arrangements. Of course, we are prepared to offer a recruiting package appropriate to that of a senior-management position in the New York City area. I understand you have been or will be contacted separately by the chair of the computer-science department at Columbia University and are being offered a position in their Ph.D. program. Of course, we will provide the flexibility for you to pursue your Ph.D. in artificial intelligence. We understand that there is much you will need to do before your move to New York and that you might wish to take a vacation before you begin your work here. However, we would appreciate it if you could begin your new position by Labor Day at the latest.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Grace

“Oh, my god!” I exclaimed.

“Told you,” Henry responded. “And while you’re processing that, I have something to discuss with you, too.”

“What is it, Henry?” I asked.

“While you were traveling, I got a message from the graduate program at M.I.T.,” he began. “The bottom line is that I decided to do my Ph.D. there, in part because they had one of the foremost groups on computational mathematics in the world. I plan to do my Ph.D. in computational mathematics. Indeed, recent advances in quantum computers from some whiz kid at Applazon have made it possible to solve a number of problems that could never have been solved before.

“So, the long and short of the message was that the entire department of computational mathematics is gonna be moving to NYU. I’m not sure if it was more that the group was unhappy with how they were treated at M.I.T. or if they were offered a better opportunity in New York, but NYU is building a state-of-the-art lab in Manhattan complete with a new super­conducting supercomputer.”

“That’s a quarter-billion-dollar machine,” I observed.

“Apparently, Barlow himself is donating several machines to the most prestigious universities in the world, or so I was told,” Henry explained. “M.I.T.’s getting one, too, so that wasn’t the reason the whole fuckin’ department decided to leave.”

“That would explain how Columbia is getting one, too,” I added. “My guess is that M.I.T. was giving the department short shrift – expecting them to support the ambitions of the more prestigious departments at the expense of their own. Being a small fish in a big pond only means being eaten alive. At NYU, they’ll be allowed to shine.

“So, what does that do to your plans? Are you still planning to go to M.I.T. in the fall?”

Shaking his head, he answered, “What would be the point? However, part of the recruitment package from NYU includes provisions to bring all of the graduate students with them. I wasn’t sure if that would include me since I’m just getting started, but I’ve been offered the option of transferring my matriculation to NYU along with the rest of the students.”

“Are you planning to do that, Henry?” I asked with just a hint of obvious excitement in my voice.

“I’d like to, but I wanted to talk to you first, particularly with how I feel about you. Being in the same city as you opens up opportunities, but it could become uncomfortable, too. I have to be honest with you. I love you, J.J. I guess I’ve loved you since you first moved to Omaha. I’m going to lay all my cards on the table. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. If you don’t feel the same way or think you could feel the same way, I might need to reconsider whether or not it’s a good idea to move to New York.”

“Wow,” I replied in shock. Did I feel that way about Henry? Even if I did, was it even possible for us to be together? I’d had some time to think about how I felt about Henry, ever since Franklin told me how Henry felt about me, and I was coming to realize that I’d loved him every bit as much since we first sat down and worked together on his algebra homework. The thing was, I’d always seen him as being off limits. For one, he was too young and another, he had his own boyfriend. Henry was waiting for me to say something, and so I replied, “I’ve had other relationships.”

“As have I,” he countered. “I really thought Darren would be the one, and he might have been had I not met you and had he not been so fucked up. I had a couple of relationships on the rebound, and I think you know I used to get together with Sammy now and then. The fact of the matter is that I’m hopelessly in love with you, and if we’re both in New York, I don’t think I could stand it if you hooked up with other guys. You’re the most beautiful guy I know, both inside and outside, but it would be sheer torture if I saw you going after other guys. I’d hafta go someplace else.”

“Are you suggesting we live together?” I asked. I was thrilled with the idea of living with Henry. God, I’d thought Henry was the most amazing boy I’d ever known from the moment I met him. He was incredibly attractive and sexy, and he was perfect on the inside, too. He was a perfect ten and then some, but a relationship with him would be illegal. Would anybody care? Seeing the two of us together, most people would think we were the same age. If anything, Henry looked older than I, so where was the risk? Yet if the authorities found out about us, it had the potential to lead to the discovery that I had stolen another kid’s identity.

The rational part of my brain couldn’t help but take over my thoughts, and there was no way we could be anywhere near each other without becoming involved, and that was fraught with peril, at least until he was seventeen. Henry was only fifteen and would not be seventeen until a year from September. There was no way I could hold out that long. I was only seventeen, but legally I was nineteen and an adult. As an adult, I couldn’t become involved with a boy who was less than the age of consent. In New York, that was seventeen.

“You’re about to come up with an excuse, aren’t you?” Henry interjected. I nodded my head; he was absolutely right. “You’re afraid of being accused of having sex with a minor. You’re afraid of being arrested for statutory rape. You’re so paranoid of losing everything, that you’re gonna sabotage our chances of ever getting together just to protect yourself.”

“You’ve no idea what it’s like,” I countered. “I’ve been in juvie before, so I have an idea what losing your freedom is like, but this would be a thousand times worse. I’d be treated as an adult and go to prison for years, and when I get out, I’d be a registered sex offender. And then there’s the very real risk that my crime of identity theft could be discovered, and then I’d go to federal prison, at least until I reach the real age of eighteen. But what if they tried me as an adult? It could be decades before I get out.

“It’s not just to protect myself, Henry. I can’t believe you’d think that. Yeah, I’d get the worst of it, but I know you, Henry. You’d feel guilty. You’d put your whole life on hold. That wouldn’t be fair to you. I can’t expect you to wait.”

“You are such an idiot,” Henry replied. “I love you, and I’ll do whatever it takes to be with you. Yeah, I’d wait for you if you went to prison, but I wouldn’t risk you going to prison in the first place. I’d even abstain from sex if that’s what it takes. Fuck, I waited for two years while you traveled all over the world, hooking up with who knows how many guys, even as my own life with Darren was falling apart. Of course I’d wait for you, for as long as it takes. I’d even get my own place as a precaution, but that won’t be necessary ’cause you misread the statutes.

“The federal consent laws were written before the age of majority was eighteen. The age of consent is defined as the age at which a minor can consent to sex with an adult, age 21 or older. By the time you’re supposedly twenty-one, I’ll be seventeen and we can either get married or wait until I turn eighteen. However, the laws regarding minors engaging in sex vary by state, and in New York, so long as two kids are within four years of each other in age, the cases aren’t prosecuted. Even based on your inflated age, we’re three years, nine months apart. You don’t have to believe me. Look it up.”

“You can count on me doing that,” I replied. “In fact, I’ll do it now.” Opening my phone, I did so and, damn, he was absolutely right. Ironically, a kid under the age of sixteen couldn’t consent to sex at all, even with a minor in most of the country. Yeah, right. Try to enforce that. However, New York did allow for sexual relationships between minors if they were within four years of the same age. It wasn’t legal, but it wasn’t criminal, either. Henry was absolutely right, but did that mean I was free to love him? I really did love him, but after keeping my distance for so long, was I ready to let him in?

The tears began to fall, and soon there was a torrent and I was in Henry’s arms, and he was crying, too. The one thing that was certain was that if I didn’t, we’d both be miserable. Finally, I pulled myself together and came to a decision. It might take time to build a relationship with him after all that had happened, but then relationships were like that. No matter what, we had to try, so I kissed him. I kissed him deeply and with that, the walls I’d built over the last few years began to fall away.