Sam, Kyle, and a snowboard

[x-cannonball.livejournal.com]

Set just after this thread ( http://www.livejournal.com/users/x_wildchild/8528.html ). Sam goes out to ask Kyle to kindly stop snowboarding off the roof. In the process, they have a discussion about Kyle's relationship with Jay.


Sam was pinching the bridge of his nose at the first "WOOHOO!" he heard coming from the roof. Reading the journals only intensified his feeling that there was not a way that this was going to end well. Putting on his warm flannel jacket (or his 'flacket' as one of the younger Guthries had dubbed it when they were barely old enough to speak), he headed for the back door. Better to head this off at the pass before Mr. Marko got angry. Mr. Marko wasn't any fun when he was angry.

Stepping out into the snow-covered back yard, he looked upward with his arms folded. "Kyle? Y'all need to cut that out. Mr. Marko ain't gonna look too kindly on ya messin' the roof up," he called upwards.

Kyle was oblivious. One custom-made snowboard that he could use while wearing the custom-made Teva's, a pair of beaten up jeans and a t-shirt and his brand new "coolest thing he'd ever owned in his life ever, except for the snowboard." iPod and he was a happy boy.

The snow was slick enough on the roof that he could get some some decent speed, hit air, and then land with a whump in one of the snowpiles. And then he'd throw the board over his back, and clamber back up the side of the building to start all over again.

On his way back to clamber up the house, however, Kyle was met with a frowning Sam. "Y'all are gonna mess up the roof if ya keep doin' that, Kyle. And then Mr. Marko's gonna get angry. And nobody likes Mr. Marko when he's angry." Especially not Sam Guthrie. He still had bad dreams about the Juggernaut making him clean up the furrows he'd plowed in the lawn while he was having trouble landing.

"Aw man..." Kyle whined, just a bit. "But ... " He looked up at the roof, and then over at the piles of snow he'd been landing in. "But! I get really long air time... " A second glance at the all too serious look on Sam's face had Kyle frown. "Nobody lets me have any fun..." he grumbled.

Sam felt bad for Kyle, he really did. But the downsides to letting him continue were too big. "It's just, if ya keep doin' that, then the roof is gonna start leakin' into the attic, and then the attic's gonna start leakin' into the third floor, and then you're gonna have a lot more angry people than just Mr. Marko."

"This sucks..." Kyle muttered. He looked off in the direction down towards the stables. The stables had roofs, and maybe they weren't as high, but he wouldn't have to be as careful about making sure nobody was under him either.

Sam shook his head as he saw the direction Kyle's mind was going. "Nuh-uh," he said. "Mr. Marko'd still be cranky, and plus you'd have angry horses, and they ain't much fun either." He paused, considering for a moment. Kyle had a healing factor. "Tell ya what," he said. "How about Ah make it up to ya?"

Kyle was halfway to getting ready for a good run of stomping off in a huff, complete with 'accidentally' kicking some slush at Sam, and then Sam had to go and ruin it. "How?" He asked suspciously.

Sam grinned boyishly. "What say I take you for a little lift, see how much air you can grab?" The wiry teenager didn't weight a quarter of what Cain Marko did, so Sam knew he'd have plenty of thrust available to lift him.

That didn't do much to reduce Kyle's suspicion. Sam was Jay's big brother, and even if Paige was okay with Kyle and Jay being... whatever Kyle and Jay were, it didn't mean all the Guthrie's were. "You aren't gonna drop me on my head or anything?"

Sam blinked. "Why would Ah do a fool thing like that?" he asked, totally confused. He thought he had been straightforward about giving Kyle a fun alternative to causing incidental damage to the property, leading to the previously mentioned angry Cain Marko.

"Because I'm, you know, corrupting your brother or whatever." Kyle shrugged. He had to know. It wasn't like the gossip wouldn't go around, and they'd not been anything like discreet.

Sam blinked again. "Y'all are what now?" All right, now he was officially completely confused. Jay didn't exactly confide in his older brother, though he had ensconced himself in Sam's suite a few days ago. He'd said he hadn't wanted to talk about it, though. Sam had shrugged it off and just been glad that his brother trusted him enough as a safe place to go.

"You're making fun of me." Kyle snorted. "Dude, I mean, hello, I practically outed myself on the journals. " He scratched behind an ear, confused. "Paige said we were cute or something lame like that, I figured you were gonna come roast me then or something."

Oh. Well, that explained a few things, actually. Sam rubbed the back of his neck and chuckled goodnaturedly. "One, Ah rather doubt you coerced Jay into anythin'. Two, m' brother's a big boy and his love life is his own business. And three, Ah'd be a little bit of a hypocrite if Ah -were- inclined ta go judgin' ya'll."

Forge had a saying for such a situation as this. "What the who with the what?" Unfortunalty, all Kyle managed was a confused drawling "Huh?" He was confused. Beyond confused, actually, and well into complete "What the fuck?".

"What, you expected me ta beat the crap outta ya for bein' with m' brother?" Sam shook his head. "That ain't what Ah'm gonna do. Jay's been out for a while, so it's hardly a shock ta me, and as long as ya don't hurt him, Ah got no problems." Sam shrugged. "Why'd ya think Ah was gonna go ballistic on ya?"

Kyle shrugged. "Cause, I figure, Jay's all convinced sometimes that anyone with religion hates gay people, and well..." He gestured at Sam vaguely. "With the church and the praying and the God thing. You know. Also? I'm still stuck in the part where you'd be a hypocrite?" Everyone knew Sam had the hots for Alison. It was the big piece of gossip no one ever talked about. So Kyle was confused. And praying that Alison wasn't really a man.

"Just because Ah'm a man who believes in God, and prays, that don't mean Ah'm a close-minded bigot." Sam looked at Kyle a bit more seriously. "The way Ah figure it, God loves us all. God _is_ love. 'These three things remain: faith, hope, and love, and the greatest of these is love.' Or, 'The first and greatest commandment is this: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these." He shrugged. "Ain't nothin' in there about hatin' someone because of the color of their skin, or a twist of their genes. And especially not because of who they might choose to give their love to."

"You should totally tell Jay that." Kyle said carefully. "I don't... I'm no good at, you know, therapy psycho-thingy, but I think he could totally stand to hear it a few billion times." Espically after Tommy. Kyle stifled an urge to growl, just thinking about it, and rested his arms on the top of his snowboard so he wouldn't make fists. "I mean, its not like he's saying "Sam's a big stinky bigot man" or anything, but I think maybe, you know, hearing that not everybody who goes to church hates gay people? He could use the reminder." Kyle paused, scratched his ear, and then added. "And by stinky, I mean, slightly burnt bread."

Sam breathed an internal sigh of relief when it became apparent that Kyle hadn't exactly noticed that he'd changed the subject. That wasn't a discussion he felt like having with Kyle, on top of the fact that it was in many ways ancient history. "Jay's got a lot of anger in him," he said quietly. "He ain't had the easiest time of it in the past few years." Which was a bit of an understatement. "Ah know he and Ah don't always get on, but Ah'm just glad he felt like he could come stay in my room after whatever the heck happened. He wasn't too talkative about it, but Ah'm just glad he trusted me enough to feel safe comin' to stay with me."

"He doesn't hate you or anything." Kyle said absently. His -feet- were cold, now that he could think about it, now that he wasn't convinced Sam was going to launch him into space. He balanced on one foot, to take a look at the other one. Well, it wasn't -blue-. Just ... cold. Still.. "So, no dropping me on my head, right?"

"Absolutely no droppin' ya on your head," Sam promised. "Unless ya'd like to have a try at me droppin' ya with your snowboard from about fifty feet, like Ah was originally offerin'."

"That's what I meant!" Kyle said eagerly. "I just needed to check, because, I'm pretty sure I can't heal a smashed up head, you know?" He wasn't gonna -try- either. Bruises and scrapes were one thing. Jay hitting him with a chair was another thing. Regrowing his brains was a third thing entirely, and he wasn't risking it. He needed those.

It was occasionally refreshing and de-stressing to deal with someone so straightforward. "Gotcha. Let's not find out whether ya can or not." Sam grinned.

Kyle was halfway to re-adjusting the straps on his snowboard before he looked up, grinning toothily. "Works for me. I get air, I get no head-drops, you get no pissy baby brother. Win-win situation."

This, he thought, finishing up the adjustments, was going to be a -wicked- drop. Totally wicked.