For Keeps

48. Zip your lip.

{Angel}

Angel held up her hands. "Stop." She pled with Pat with her eyes. "Pat. Just--zip your lip, okay? Our boss can't be gay. You signed the same thing I did--you know he can't."

Pat was blinking over and over again, like he was replaying the past months in his mind. "Is his brother gay too?"

Their eyes went to Cary Douglas; the big man's flannel-shirted form was easy to pick out from a table full of chatty women with identical silvery perms and one bemused elderly man.

Angel exhaled. "Ugh. No, I very much doubt his brother is gay too. This is Jon's church. He can be himself here. But you could muck this all up if you don't--just be cool."

Pat put his fingers over his mouth, a wide-eyed. "I tried to set him up with my cousin, Rebecca." His laugh was a little hysterical, as he glanced at Tiffany. "Well crap. I'm an idiot."

He blinked back at the two men beside the piano. Kurt's tangerine-tipped fingers were picking a melody they couldn't hear over the noise of the room, Jon's hand resting comfortably on his shoulder, Jon's eyes closed as he sang. There was no mistaking the warmth of the glance Kurt gave Jon through his colourful bangs as he joined his voice to his.

"Kurt Visser is a lot. For Jon," Patrick said. "I mean, he's so..." He threw his hand out in an expressive gesture humorously reminiscent of the queer man. "Outgoing? And quite...good looking. I feel like? Am I right?" He checked with the women and Evan at his table.

All three answered, "Yes," in unison. Tiffany's eyes danced with amusement at her partner's discomposure. "Maybe Kurt likes to be with someone who's a good listener," she teased. "I know I do."

"Jon is good looking," Angel said defensively. "Just because he's not tall."

Pat looked alarmed. "I'm not--I mean, sure, Jon is good-looking too." He laughed again, pink to his hairline. "Tiff, save me here."

Tiffany shook her head, pressing her lips together as she laughed at him with her eyes. "You got yourself into this, Pat."

"I think they make a nice match," Evan said wistfully. Light glinted off his massive windshield glasses as he looked around the room. "Is there a singles' group here?"

Angel tugged her hair up higher, exasperated. "OH-kay, moving on. They could just be friends. They could just be--two men hanging out. Jon could have a cuddly side. None of us know. Can we just leave it?"

They left it, but Pat's eyes wandered over to Kurt and Jon numerous times as they finished their lunch.

When everyone was full of soup and buns, a crew of industrious middle-aged men folded the tables and rolled them away, and a wide assortment of elderly people and young adults like themselves set the chairs in rows arranged in a rough half circle like a choir loft.

The choir director who had made the announcement in service ("Y'all can call me Miss-T") had added a pair of red sequinned finger-less gloves to his ensemble and he waved these about moving everyone into their sections by part. As an alto, Angel found herself next to Evan again, on the edge of the tenor section, and he gave her a shy, sideways smile.

"This evening is going to be a bee-yoo-tiful potpourri of song offerings," Miss-T sang out, seating himself (herself? Angel was no longer clear on the pronoun) at the piano bench. "My lovely assistant is passing around your music."

This apparently referred to Cary, carrying a stack of binders in his tattooed arms.

"We'll be singing carols you're probably all familiar with." Miss-T clasped their glittery hands under their stubbly chin. "Our children's choir will come on and do a piece, as well as yours truly and then--" Miss-T's teeth flashed in a grin. "--for our grand finale, we have a very special performance by our own Mister Kurt Visser."