after his catheter was removed and he was helped to the toilet and then back to bed, after he fell back against the pillows and clung to Justin while he remembered which way the earth spun, he caught sight of Justin’s dad trying to disappear on the corner of the couch. He was burning holes into The Economist, trying to look as if he was reading.
Wes took a few deep breaths, squeezed Justin’s hand, and hauled himself—slowly, delicately—into a sitting position. He squared his shoulders. “Mr. Swanscott?”
“Hmm, yes?” To his credit, Justin’s dad acted like he’d just been greeted in an airport lounge and all that mortifying examination business hadn’t happened. “Wes. How are you feeling?”
Wes tried to smile. Half his face still felt like it was falling off. Brass knuckles had knocked on his cheekbone a few times, but that guy had eaten them in the end, when Wes flung him off and put him in the dirt. “Mr. Swanscott, this isn’t how I wanted to meet you,” he said. Was his voice shaking? “I imagined something very different. But…” He picked at the thin hospital blanket. “Thank you for being here. It means a lot to me that you are.”
“Please, call me Nick. I’m here as long as you need me.” A frown crossed his features before it smoothed away, a practiced move. “Will your dad be here soon? It’s a long trip from West Texas, so I know he can’t get here as quickly as I could.”
Wes shook his head. “He’s on the cattle drive right now. He and a bunch of other ranchers move their herds from West Texas to California for the winter. Out to those feed lots in the Central Valley? I couldn’t even tell you where he is right now.”
“Does he know?”
“I sent him a text. Told him I was hurt and gonna be a few days in the hospital, but that I was going to be fine.”
Nick arched an eyebrow at him. “That’s not a comprehensive assessment of the situation.”
He had that caved-in feeling again, like his ribs were crunching around his heart. “He can’t afford to make the trip. And I am going to be okay. I don’t want to worry him.”
“Your dad is going to worry about you no matter what. That’s the job.” Nick sat on the end of Wes’s bed. “You are going to be okay. You’re right about that. But I think your dad will want to know what’s happened.”
He fiddled with the edge of the blanket. He cleared his throat. “I um. I wanted to tell you about me and Justin, Mr. Swanscott—”
“But I wanted to see your face when you saw who he was, Dad,” Justin said, interrupting. “Wes wanted you to know.”
“It’s all right.” He clasped Wes’s ankle through the bedclothes. “I understand. You boys had a lot going on this semester. You didn’t need the stress of meeting a parent on top of that.”
“I want you to know, Mr. Swanscott, that I love your son. I’m in love with him, and I’ll love him for the rest of my life. Hopefully he lets me love him for the rest of his life, too.”
Justin grinned. “That’s the plan.”
“Wes, I’ve watched you play football for three years. I thought you were pretty damn incredible before my son fell in love with you. Now Justin has told me stories about the two of you together, and if I thought you were a good guy before, that doesn’t compare at all to how I think of you now. You treat my son right. Hopefully he’s treating you right, too.” Nick winked. Wes chuckled, and Justin squawked. “I don’t think I could imagine a better man for my son than you.” He covered Wes’s hand in his own. “It pains me to say it, but even if you were an Aggie, I’d be proud to know you.”
High praise indeed. The Aggies were Texas’s most reviled rival. “I can count to ten, Mr. Swanscott. I promise, I’m not an Aggie.”
Justin’s dad laughed. “I hope you both are happy with each other for a long, long time.” Nick let go of Wes’s hand and smiled at them both. There was an echo, though, around him, something Wes caught hold of. It reminded him of his dad after his mom died, the way he’d bounced around in a life made for two, suddenly become one.
Later, after he’d lain back and closed his eyes, and he was hovering in the twilight of