Page 54 of By Any Means

“Shaddup,” Laurie said, still laughing. “And it doesn’t exist yet. It eats at me but only in flashes.”

“Well.” Chary smiled like he’d caught the mixed metaphor and been charmed by it. Whoops. Whatever works, I guess. “Congratulations, anyway.”

“Thanks.”

“Surely, a year isn’t nearly long enough. I mean to say… you must write ten thousand words a month as it is,” he mumbled.

“Eighteen months.” Laurie winked and closed his notebook. “That’s part of the problem. Not all of it.”

“I won’t pretend to understand. I prefer to consume.”

“Capitalist,” Laurie teased.

Chary returned the smile hesitantly, then lifted the book back to his attention.

Laurie eyed the sloping line of vest buttons, the crisp folds of trousers. He liked what Chary had donned today, rich man’s country outfit though it was: laced ankle boots, tight socks that seemed to go on forever; under-the-knee, belted knickerbocker trousers. A tweed vest cinched to impossibility, even after a morning nap, while sitting folded on a picnic blanket.

How did he get a waist like that? Did he corset it?

No, this job was not going to be difficult at all.

“I’m glad you lived, Chary Wright.”

Chary looked up. Laurie watched as he took in the words as flattery toward an end—and dismissed them. But—victory—he put the book back down.

“What is it about?”

“What?”

“Your nonexistent novel.”

Laurie hesitated. Not even Sam had heard details about his scribbling, but Chary had a nose for his lies. “Uh, it’s to be called Jack. About a boy-urchin of Gotham, put to work in the factories, who has no time for adventures, not even to read about them. It’s not especially didactic,” he emphasized, “nor Victor Hugo. It’s just…” He trailed off.

Chary stared for a long while, waiting for him to finish. When Laurie didn’t, because he was incapable of doing so—at least doing the idea proper justice—Chary said, “It sounds like the sort of thing I loved as a boy. Ragged Dick—Horatio Alger?”

That was so absurd, Laurie laughed. “You would think so, wouldn’t you, capitalist? Those Cinderella stories?”

Chary looked down to the picnic blanket, pretty lashes feathery and curled, his bottom lip sucked beneath the other, like he regretted speaking.

“No, all right,” Laurie admitted hastily. “I see your comparison; it’s fair. Sorry. I read those too, years ago. It’s just the book’s not a bildungsroman, nor for boys. It’s only different.”

There were some parallels, weren’t there, in Cinderella stories and what had happened to Chary? The makings of a fairy-tale villain.

The book came back up. “Then I will leave you to it.”

Laurie, regretful and hopeful for all the wrong reasons, kept his pen capped.

Yes: the book sank again. Laurie had to hide his smile. He reclined onto his back, put his hands behind his head against the tree.

“What?” he asked, unable to bear it.

“You really don’t think I killed anyone?”

Victory, la seconde partie.

Laurie snorted. “I’m alone with you in a blueberry field—a barren. Miles from anywhere. Pretty stupid of me if I think you’re capable of murder. Real good opportunity here for ya.” He exposed his neck.

Chary’s eyes followed the line of it; he swallowed. He clearly wasn’t thinking of murder. “Mr. Herbert is just there⁠—”