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The first time Krem met Mr. Rutherford, he was maybe ten years old, and he and Grim had gotten in a fight with a group of older boys who’d taken to pulling Krem’s hair and calling him a girl.
They’d come out of it on top--because no one fucked with their group of friends, honestly--and Grim had taken Krem back to his place. It had been a long walk in the sticky summer heat, shirts sticking to their backs and the salt of their sweat stinging horribly in their open cuts.
Stitches and his ma could’ve patched them up, but Grim had shaken his head and latched on to Krem’s arm. And when Grim insisted, you didn’t argue.
So they’d made the trip to the Rutherford house, not a mansion like Krem’s dad jokingly theorized, but a quaint suburban cottage with a lopsided porch and a ridiculously full garden.
“That you?” Krem pointed to the colorful rose vines creeping over the house, snorting softly, as ten-year-old boys did when confronted with invasive flowers.
Grim shook his head, one hand on the gate as he stared Krem right in the eye. “My Da.”
The tone could just as easily fit itself around I’ll fight you, and Krem shut his mouth. He followed Grim inside the gate, glancing around at all of the various blooms and vines crowding the Rutherford’s yard.
Which meant he wasn’t paying attention at all when a mabari came charging out to meet them and flattened Krem under her mammoth belly. Grim told him that what happened next were puppy kisses, but it felt more like the beast was trying to drown him in drool.
There had been a quick, sharp whistle, and the dog whined before crawling off of him. And then Grim’s dad was standing over him, all worried brown eyes and awkward smiles. “That’s a hell of a shiner. I hope Petunia didn’t do that.”
That was Cullen Rutherford in a nutshell, really.
The kind of man who named a two hundred pound warhound Petunia.
-
All things considered, it was surprising their parents hadn’t started dating sooner.
For all the times the gang ended up at Cullen’s house for mac and cheese and bandaids, it was amazing that it took them three years to meet. From there, it had been like a trainwreck, but with more flannel and rose petal tea.
Sometimes they’d spend weekends in Bull’s tiny apartment, trying to figure out what sort of dark sacrifice it would take to make the thermostat put out anything but muggy heat and nearly murdering each other over soccer teams (when the shitty tv worked) and Monopoly (when it didn’t.)
Other weekends, they’d sprawl out at the Rutherford house, pitching in with the gardening and trying to see who could sock surf the farthest across the wooden floors. (Bull always won. He had momentum on his side, the cheating bastard.)
No one ever brought up the difference in wealth or social strata. No one gave a shit. Invariably, they ended up on a couch somewhere in between, loaded down with grilled cheese and iced tea and wiggling their toes through the holes in their socks.
And if Bull leaned over Grim and Krem’s heads to plant a mushy kiss on Cullen’s lips, well, they both worked hard. Their kids could forgive a little bit of gross touchy feely stuff.
-
Krem called him Cullen, and Cullen called him Krem.
Sometimes they’d gang up on Bull at Mario Kart, and sometimes Krem would help Cullen out with dinner while Bull and Grim finished up in the garden.
But it was...different.
Bull had taken Grim in as his own almost the moment he’d met him, the same way he did with all of Krem’s friends. But when it came to Cullen and Krem…
He didn’t know what it was, when Mr. Rutherford smiled awkwardly at him and patted him on the back. Like he was scared of something. Not Krem, but something Krem-adjacent.
He told Grim, “Your dad looks at me funny. I think maybe he doesn’t like me.”
Grim shook his head and smiled. “Nah.” He said.
And that was it.
-
By the time Krem is fifteen years old and sitting outside the principal’s office with tears burning in his eyes, Cullen and Bull have been doing the dating thing for a solid while. They spend most of their time at the Rutherford cottage, swapping vintage-soft t-shirts and arguing over what to watch on movie night.
Krem had learned how to get Petunia how to sit and stay, even if she made the most ungodly noises over it, and Grim had turned once-dreaded monthly drug store runs into a terrifying art form.
They’ve all learned each other’s schedules, and Krem knows that Cullen is supposed to pick them up today, in his big old pick-up truck with Petunia drooling and grinning in the back. He knows that Bull is supposed to be working late, and that this is going to mess that up.
He knows that everyone is used to he and Grim and the rest of the gang getting into scuffles, but this wasn’t a scuffle. This was real, and big, and gnawing at Krem’s guts.
He’d hit a teacher. He hadn’t just hit a teacher, he’d nailed that son of a bitch hard enough to feel the cartilage crack. He’d watched the blood spurting out and he’d been so fucking glad.
But now he was here, fucking up Bull’s schedule when they all knew he needed the overtime. He’d have to come in, and sit there while the principal condescended to what they all assumed was some dense oxman in work boots and filthy jeans. He’d smile and nod while they called his son Cremisia and glossed over the fact that the coach had touched him.
That fucker had grabbed him where nobody had any business touching him and told him to go change with the girls and Krem had broken his nose and spit on him and he didn’t regret it at all until he realized that they could expel him for this.
And it would hurt all of them.
So he sits there in the hallway, gagging on guilt and snot and not fucking crying until he hears the tight cadence of cap-toed oxfords on the hallway floor. They stop just inside his line of sight, and then there’s Cullen, copping a squat in a full suit on the dirty floor.
He doesn’t say anything, at first, just loops his hands around the back of Krem’s head and looks him in the eye. There’s a solid few moments of silence before he says, “Bull called me. Are you all right?”
He looks down at his shoes, anger drawing his jaw and shoulders tight.
“I know you’re not all right. Would it make you feel better if I kicked somebody’s ass?”
Krem snorts, and Cullen holds up a handkerchief so he can blow his nose.
“I need you to tell me what happened first, all right? And then we’re going to bust some heads.”
-
Krem didn’t know what he’d expected from Mr. Rutherford, suburban gardening and home-made tea enthusiast, but it definitely hadn’t been the systematic dragging of his high school principal.
Principal McKitrick had barely gotten through Krem’s birth name before Cullen had said, “Let me stop you right there” and promptly set to eviscerating the man with legal precedents.
Did you know and I think the school board will find it interesting and condoning the sexual harassment of students melded neatly into a litany that painted the most delightful look of horror on the man’s pudgy red face.
Krem wasn’t scared anymore.
Especially not when Cullen had turned to Coach Leeds and hissed, “And if you ever treat another child the way you’ve treated my son…”
And he believed him.
-
Krem gets released early from school, miraculously free of consequence. Leeds has been suspended pending investigation, and Cullen wraps his arm around Krem’s shoulder as they head to the parking lot.
Grim carries both of their backpacks.
He looks like some kind of weird, smug turtle with that much shit on his back, but Krem’s not going to start anything.
Cullen says it’s a pizza and ice cream kind of night, and nothing can touch him. Nothing nothing nothing.
-
Bull comes home to the three of them piled up on the couch, Scooby Doo reruns playing on the tv. Grim has Petunia draped across him like a throw blanket, his feet propped up in his father’s lap, and Krem’s head is tucked securely under Cullen’s chin.
Cullen is the only one with his eyes open.
Even the dog is snoring.
Bull smiles tiredly and says, “Is he gonna be okay?”
“He is. The fucker at his school isn’t. I made sure.”
“Damn,” Bull grins. “Wild thing.”
Cullen says, “I think I love you.”
And Grim grunts, “Don’t fuckin’ start.”