Kyle contemplated just turning around and going back to Oa. He felt sick to his stomach and the last place he wanted to be right now was on Earth watching Hal mourn Jillian Pearlman’s death. Especially under the circumstances.
“You okay, kid?” Guy zoomed in front of him, then turned to fly backwards through space as he talked to Kyle. “You seem more broken up about this than I thought, considering—”
“I really don’t want to talk about it, Guy.” Kyle looked away and folded his arms over his chest. They’d received the news the day before from John, that Jill’s plane had crashed. Her ejection seat hadn’t functioned. Probably just a fluke, John had said. A simple mechanical error. Kyle sighed. Or not.
“Come on, Kyle. You can talk to Uncle Guy about anything, you know that.” Guy suddenly grimaced. “Oh God, you didn’t have a thing for her, did you?”
“NO!” Kyle glared at Guy. He’d found “Cowgirl” barely tolerable, for a lot of reasons. Which made this a whole lot harder to deal with, because a tiny part of him wasn’t exactly sad about her being gone.
“Good. ‘Cause that would be kinda weird, having a thing for her when you also want to fuck Jordan. Unless she was into threesomes or something—”
“Guy! Stop. Please.” He was really regretting telling Guy about his feelings for Hal.
“Then what’s the problem? I didn’t even think you liked ol’ Cowgirl. And she was always givin’ you the hairy eyeball, ‘cause chicks can sense when someone’s got the hots for their boyfriends.” He smirked. “I’ve been waitin’ for you two to get in a catfight for a while now, which would have been fucking hilarious by the way. And it probably woulda got Jordan pretty hot, ‘cause you know he’d be into being fought over and—”
Kyle stopped his flight and threw up his hands. “I think I killed her, all right!”
Guy’s eyebrows shot up as he continued on his trajectory away from Kyle. He stopped and flew back. “You what?”
“At the New Years’ party. You know at midnight when everyone gets a kiss? She kissed me.”
“She kissed you?”
Kyle shrugged. “We were all pretty drunk. She probably didn’t even realize it was me.”
“Yeah. Okay. So what’s that have to do with you allegedly killing her?”
“She. Kissed. Me.” Kyle sighed. “And a couple days later, her plane crashed.”
Guy blinked a couple times, brows knit in confusion, then his face broke into a grin and he laughed. “Oh hell, Kyle! You cannot believe that!”
Kyle scowled and shot forward to continue his journey towards Earth. Easy for Guy to say, he didn’t leave a trail of bodies behind whenever he had anything resembling intimate contact with a woman. At least his boyfriend from college was still alive last he heard, so it didn’t seem to work on men.
Guy caught up with him and gave him a nudge with his shoulder. “Besides, even if you do have this ‘Kiss of Death’, Cowgirl doesn’t fit the pattern. You actually liked all the other women.” Then he chuckled. “Unless you can use it for good as well as evil.”
Kyle glared at him. Guy grinned back. “Come on. We’re both thinkin’ it. Neither of us liked her and I’m pretty sure she hated us. And Hal was seriously headin’ down the road of pussy-whipped. Wouldn’t surprise me if he had to ask her fucking permission to wear his GL ring.”
Kyle snorted, trying to hold back the laugh. Hal’s increasingly shorter leash had often been the topic of late night conversations at Warriors.
“See? Maybe you did us all a favor, kid. Even Hal.” He nudged Kyle again. “And you know, he’s going to need some consoling…” He wagged his eyebrows suggestively.
Kyle shook his head. “Right. First off, hitting on someone at their girlfriend’s funeral is pretty sick. Second, Hal isn’t going to be interested.”
“And I’m telling you he’s not as straight as you think he is.”
“How do you know?”
Guy snorted. “You’re not the only one who gets drunk and confides in me. It’s the curse of being a bartender.”
Kyle raised his eyebrows, then frowned. Guy had to be pulling his leg. “He’s not interested, Guy.”
“Are you kidding? Heck, if I didn’t have a gorgeous babe for a girlfriend, I’d fuck you. And I am straight.” He ruffled Kyle’s hair. “You’re adorable.”
Kyle batted his hand away. Guy just laughed and shot ahead of him a little way, then looked over his shoulder at Kyle. “Race you to Earth!”
They were running late so they had to sneak into the church and sit in the back. Hal was sitting in the second row, behind the people who must be Jill’s family. Dinah was sitting next to him, then Ollie and John. And while the minister droned on about what a wonderful person Jill was, all Kyle could think about was ‘Hal looks sexy in his uniform’. Guy even nudged him once during one of the eulogies. “Put your eyes back in your head,” he whispered. “I think the preacher’s starting to suspect there’s gay in his church.”
Then it was finally over, thankfully without Hal getting up to say anything about Jill. They had to wait for him to talk to a long string of people in Air Force uniforms before they finally reached him.
“Sorry, Hal,” Guy said, giving him a quick embrace.
“Thanks for coming,” Hal said. “I know things with you and her weren’t all that friendly, and—”
Guy shook his head. “Doesn’t matter anymore.” He moved aside for Kyle.
“I’m really sorry, Hal. I … I know what it’s like.” He glanced over Hal’s shoulder. Guy was giving him an encouraging smile. Kyle ignored him. “If you ever want to talk or anything…” He shrugged.
“Thanks, Kyle.” Hal stepped forward and wrapped his arms around him.
Kyle inhaled, breathing in Hal’s scent. Oh God… His stomach fluttered and his knees weakened and he really hoped Hal didn’t notice his growing erection.
“You know, maybe I do need someone to talk to.” Hal let go of Kyle and stepped back. “I don’t know her family at all and … well, I’ve never been good with funerals. Want to get out of here?”
Kyle gaped at him. “Uh … Sure.”
Behind Hal, Guy grinned and gave Kyle a double thumbs up.
Kyle lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, not quite believing what had happened.
They had come back to Hal’s place and had the inevitable conversation about Dead Girlfriends and How to Deal With Them. Then Hal told him things had been rocky with Jill for a couple weeks, that they’d broken up the day after the party during a huge fight. Hal felt guilty for not feeling worse about her death, so Kyle had hugged him to console him, and then Hal was suddenly kissing him, and then…
Kyle looked at the man sleeping next to him and smiled. Oh my God, Guy was right!