The Colors of Hate - 25

Given the fact Dean wouldn’t show up until well after suppertime, Kirby and Reid decided to stop on the way to the apartment to pick up something to eat. “Enough for the three of us,” Kirby had stated. “We can nuke his when he arrives, if he’s hungry.”

Once they were at Kirby’s apartment, with their meals in front of them and Kirby’s safely stashed in the refrigerator, Reid said, pretty much out of the blue, “You like him.”

“Dean? Sure. Don’t you?”

“Yes, but that’s not what I meant and you know it.”

Kirby took a bite of his chicken before answering. “I’m… attracted to him.”

“Any idea if he feels the same?”

“Not a clue. After only a couple of days, most of which have been spent trying to determine if he might have killed Ms Westcott… Well if you were him, would you be feeling anything other than defensive around me?”

“From what I’ve seen he doesn’t act defensive. He did open up to you about something he’s probably never told anyone else he knows. And it was before he saw Jones’s picture in the paper.”

“That’s because I called him on the fact he’s gay and closeted, and pushed him to make him tell me why.”

Reid thought about it while twirling some spaghetti around his fork. “No. He could have made up some other excuse. He told you because he trusted you.”

“I suppose. But that’s no reason to think he might like me on some personal level, and you know it.”

“What I know is he watches you. This afternoon he couldn’t keep his eyes off you. When you told him he should leave he was hurt, and I think it’s because it was you who said it. If I had, he’d have just accepted it as a given.”

“You’re reading things into things, Reid.”

Reid started to reply, realized he had a huge ball of spaghetti rolled on his fork by then and shook his head in dismay. After starting over, and then eating the smaller amount, he finally said, “Just don’t back off. You can’t do anything until the case is closed but afterward…”

“Afterward what? Even if, and you know it’s a big ‘if’, he finds me interesting, he sure as hell isn’t going to let anything develop. Not when he’s so afraid of his father and what he would do to him.”

Reid smiled. “You might be surprised. When you care for someone, things look different. It might do you both a lot of good to own up to your feelings and go ‘public’, so to speak.”

“You…” Kirby waved his fork at Reid, “are definitely putting the horse before the cart.”

“I think that’s ‘cart before the horse’, and maybe I am. Nonetheless, don’t discount what I said.”

“We’ll see.”

Silence reigned for a while as the two men finished their supper. But Kirby had a pensive look on his face which led Reid to believe his friend might just be considering the idea. Reid hoped so. In his estimation Kirby needed to find someone he could truly care for.

Being a true romantic, although he’d have denied it if asked, Reid believed that everyone should have someone to love, and be loved in return. Perhaps, for Kirby, Dean would be the one, if they both were willing to give it a chance.