by Morgan James
Ash shrugged and picked up an old knitted hat. He studied the Fair Isle pattern. “No worries. I, uh, had a few moments myself after drama school.” He glanced Remy’s way. Or this morning when he considered his lack of a gig.
“Oh, shut up. Like you didn’t go to the Royal Academy and get the best pedigree an actor can get. Alan Rickman went there.”
Ash’s face heated. “And a lot of people you’ve never even heard of.”
Remy snorted. “As if that would happen to you. You’re too talented.” He wasn’t the first person to compliment Ash’s acting, but his tone was so sincere and vehement Ash believed it.
“Thank you,” he said softly.
Remy waved him off. “I tells it likes I sees it.”
“But, uh, it takes a lot of luck, not just talent.”
“Maybe,” Remy said, but he didn’t sound very convinced.
They continued through the aisles in an easy quiet. At the back of the store, they found an old table covered with and surrounded by baskets filled with small doodahs. Remy leaned forward to look at the basket of scarves and mufflers under the table, and Ash inspected the contents on top. There was a smaller box with ornamental pieces—a fascinator, a tiepin, a cuff link, and a large circular item.
Ash picked it up. It was a ring, only a few inches across, off-white, and made from a natural material. Ash wrinkled his nose. Ivory, maybe? It was finely decorated. Patterns curved around the surface on one side, and on the other were several Chinese characters.
He wondered what it was for. Scarves, maybe? Might work to hold the ends together. Ash flipped it back over, traced the delicate patterns with his fingertips. It was smooth as silk and expertly made. He turned it a few times but found no further inspiration as to its purpose.
A choked noise interrupted his thoughts. Ash looked over. Remy stared at the ring in his hands. “Wha-what’s that?”
Ash shrugged. “Dunno.”
“Oh,” Remy squeaked and then cleared his throat. “Once upon a time, I took a History of Sex course, which was mostly a history of things humans make because of it—art, writing, sex toys.” He looked at the object again.
Ash looked at him blankly. Then down at the… thing. “What, this?”
“I’m pretty sure.” Remy’s lips quivered.
“But it’s a ring.”
Remy pressed his lips together, then unclenched to say, “Yeah. But I’m pretty sure it’s an old Chinese cock ring.”
Ash’s heart stuttered and nearly stopped when Remy said “cock.”
Wait. What?
Ash looked down and noted the width of the opening. It would be appropriately sized to fit some—
Ash carefully but quickly dropped the ring back onto the table, and Remy gave in to his laughter.
Ash’s face burned. Oh God. Why did a clothing store have antique sex toys? Why did Ash have to pick it up? Or Remy recognize it? Buggering fuck!
“You should—” Giggle. “Oh man, your face,” Remy gasped.
Ash continued to burn. Why didn’t floors ever open up and swallow people?
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man so insulted by a cock ring, and that includes my ex with the hair trigger.”
Ash’s mouth dropped open. He stared.
Remy laughed and covered his face with his hands. “Sorry. Just, the look on your face.”
Recovering somewhat, Ash glared. “Dick.”
Remy’s eyes widened. He giggled again, pressing one hand to his mouth to stifle the noise. Appalled at his accidental wordplay, Ash scowled harder, which only made Remy’s laughter worse. His eyes, visible over his hands, were tearing. He looked ridiculous. Ash’s lips twitched, and suddenly he too was laughing—big gasping laughter that shook his shoulders and shut his eyes. For a moment, he could hardly breathe as the hysterics took over.
Lightness filled Ash’s almost-aching belly. It had been too long since he’d laughed like this—with unrestrained childlike abandon. He even forgot to worry about anyone watching.
“Oh God.” Remy wiped his flushed cheeks, and his eyes sparkled.
Ash wrinkled his nose and rubbed his nape, once again aware of his surroundings.
“So….” Remy smiled at him. “You gonna buy it?”
“What? No!”
“Too bad.” Remy picked it up and looked at the price tag. “Hmm, wonder if my old prof would want it.”
Ash’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head.
Remy snorted. “As a lecture aid, not to use, you dork.” He looked back at the ring. “Fuck it. They want five dollars. Totally worth that.” He slipped it around his long forefinger and gave it a spin.
Jesus. Who was this man?
“Ooh, spats.” Remy picked up the black-and-white leather shoes and admired them from all angles. “Darn. Wrong size. Check out the wing tips, though.”
Ash did and wondered if he should mention he owned a similar pair. They’d been given to him by a stylist before a charity event. He never liked wearing them; his feet looked huge. Give him a pair of Chucks or Blundstones any day.
“Right.” Remy sighed and put the shoes back. “Maybe it’s time to head out?”
He bought his cock ring and made light conversation with the clerk—“Yes, it is very pretty. Very detailed. Obviously ornamental, yeah.”—and then they made a dash for the door. They held out until they were stood on the pavement and then gave in to the laughter again as they stumbled away and out of view.
They were still chuckling when they found a store where Ash could buy some souvenirs for his brother and his family.
Remy cast him dubious and judgmental looks as Ash made his choices.
“Really?” he asked when Ash picked up a mug with a picture of a beaver, and the captioni read “I don’t give a dam before coffee.”
Ash smirked. “Really. It’s for Etta.”
Remy laughed. “Far be it from me to argue, but sounds like a dangerous prospect.”
“This?” Ash waggled the mug. “Nah, she’ll love it. Not that she’s not dangerous, mind. She’s tossed me onto the ground on more than one occasion for being a bawheid.”
“Now that,” Remy laughed, “is something I’d love to see.”
Ash winked and headed for the checkout.
“But,” Remy said, as they left the store, “bawheid?”
Ash wondered if he should admit to the Scottish love of balls-based insults. Maybe not. “Bawheid’s an eejit.”
They ambled along aimlessly, and Remy swung his small bag with his antique cock ring back and forth. He did it distractedly, unconsciously, like a kid; it made Ash grin.
When it grew closer to tea, Remy pulled him into a restaurant with “the best wings, dude.”
They settled at a table in the back corner. Ash placed his gifts at his feet. “Right.” He eyed his menu. “What’s good?”
“The wings.” Remy shifted happily, apparently eager, and Ash lifted his eyebrows. “Of any flavor. They’ve got great spicy options, including a five-alarm one, if superspice is your thing. But the barbecue and honey garlic are amazeballs too, if you like something milder.”
“Sounds good.”
Twenty minutes later, Ash reassessed. Wings were a terrible idea. Despite their deliciousness, they had one major drawback. Remy wrapped pink lips around his left thumb and sucked it clean of sauce. It hypnotized. It was disgusting, of course, but Ash couldn’t turn away, even as it made his stomach flip and fill with butterflies and his skin tingle with heat. Apparently, quiet, discreet eating wasn’t something Remy did.
“You enjoying your wings?”
“Huh?” Ash blinked and refocused. Remy’s green eyes danced, and they seemed to sparkle, even in the dim light. Ash hadn’t known anyone actually had eyes that color. No one in his family had anything but muddy brown.
“The wings.” Remy’s lips quirked.
Ash coughed. “Oh, yeah. Veray tasty.” He picked up a wing and waved it in demonstration. Then he took a bite.
Shite!
Fucking buggering bloody hell! He’d grabbed one of the superspice ones. Blinking rapidly, he tried to ride it out.
Remy had suggested they share the sample platter, and Ash had avoided the spiciest, knowing his pale-Scot taste buds might not be up to scratch.
He grabbed a fry and shoved it into his mouth. It helped some… barely.
“You okay?” Remy stared at him wide-eyed and bit his lip.
“Aye,” Ash wheezed and nodded. “I, uh, didnae mean to brave one of those.” He coughed.
For a second, Remy’s shoulders trembled and his lips pressed together. Then he gave up and burst into laughter. “Your face.”
Ash scowled. “I’d like to see you do better.” A fool’s bet, of course.
Remy selected one of the fiery wings, then ate it all in one go. His eyes watered a bit, but he kept on.
Ash pouted. “No fair. We don’t do hot in Scotland.” At least not in the native fare.
Remy arched a brow. “Canadians aren’t much better.”
Ash studied him. He was willing to bet Toronto had as many options as Vancouver for takeout and groceries.
“But I didn’t grow up in Toronto,” Remy countered with delight. “Born in Quebec, and let me tell you, French Canadians don’t do spice.”
“Well, you learned to eat it somewhere.”
Remy wrinkled his nose. “Mom is an excellent cook….”
Ash snorted and regarded Remy for a moment. “If you were raised in Quebec—”
“Oh. I wasn’t. Mom moved us to Ontario when I was a baby.”
“Oh. Here?” Ash tilted his head, curious.
“Nah, further east. I came here to do my master’s.” He shrugged. “Never lived in the GTA before—Greater Toronto Area.”
“I know what it is.”
“You really have gone native.”
Ash snorted and didn’t respond to that. “Do you like living here?”
“Hmm.” Remy licked his thumb clean and shrugged. “It’s all right. I like that it’s big, that no matter what you’re into, you can find something to do any given week. But, I don’t know, I’m not connected to the city. Maybe too much non-Torontonian Ontarian bias,” he laughed. “You may have noticed Ontario is divided: people who like Toronto and everyone else.” He winked.
Ash snorted. He’d learned that within his first year living this side of the pond, even all the way out on the west coast. “You think you’ll stay here after you finish uni, then?”
“Maybe. To be honest, it’s about getting work. Basically I plan to go to whoever is willing to pay me.” He wrinkled his nose. “That’s still months away, though. Right now I have to worry about my thesis. Word of advice, if someone tells you it’s a great idea to write a paper comparing different cultural treatments of werewolf mythology, they’re wrong.”
Ash snorted. “Are you not enjoying it?”
Remy shook his head ruefully even before Ash finished speaking. “I liked the topic—that’s why I picked it—but everyone gets tired of their thesis. And mine might have been a bit overambitious, even after I decided to focus on film and TV. I’ve been consuming basically all I can in the last year, and trying to chart out the various depictions and attitudes.” He shook his head. “Did you know Mexico had a fondness for werewolf films?”
“No.”
“Well, they do, and I’ve watched many an hour of subtitled and badly dubbed movies to see what they have to say on the topic.”
“And?”
Remy grinned. “You gotta read the thesis for that.”
Ash snorted. Silence stretched between them. He ate another fry to occupy his tongue, but it still blurted out, “Was Restraint part of your research?”
“Dude, of course! No way I could talk about recent trends in North American media without including Zvi. Especially since Restraint went more shifter with their mythos, tossing out the moon stuff and focusing on the full shift and blending the human and wolf instincts.”
That had always been one of Ash’s favorite things about the character. Even in the later series, when Zvi had mostly been rehabilitated, he’d still put heavy emphasis on scent when interacting with others and tended to be more at ease when social hierarchies were clear. Half-man, half-wolf, Zvi was never at the mercy of it, never afraid of it. Ash wouldn’t have loved Zvi the same if he’d been a monster.
“He’s a big part of the whole section about using mythical monsters to expose humans as the true monsters. Not sure it’ll make the final cut, but that’s basically what Zvi is about, right?”
Ash inclined his head, his cheeks warming. He said the first thing that came to mind. “Who… what else you got in there?”
Remy munched a fry and considered. “Lately I’ve been focusing on comparatively recent stuff. Rewatched the Oz episodes of Buffy, did a marathon of the ’80s films—Teen Wolf, American Werewolf in London, The Howling—oh, film three of Potter, new Teen Wolf.” He wrinkled his nose. “Some of it’s been fun. Some of it’s terrible.”
Ash laughed. He couldn’t imagine consuming so much TV for research. “Why werewolves?”
Remy took a long drink of his iced tea, apparently considering the question. But surely others had asked him?
“I like werewolves? I mean, there are some pretty great stories out there.” He shrugged. “I guess I liked how in a lot of those tales, they’re born or made different. They can’t help it. And not everyone can see how different they are at first, but no matter how hard they try to blend in, they always know they’re not like everyone else.” He shook his head. “Anyway, there’s a lot of queer comparisons, and when you get a really good story, like Zvi, where his true ‘otherness’ comes from what other people have imposed on him? Well. I could really transfer all my gay angst onto that.”
And there it was again. Remy simply dropping his sexuality into casual conversation, as though he had nothing to lose and no worries about how Ash would react to it.
“Oh.” At a loss, Ash poked at his unused knife.
“Such as it was.” Remy waved a hand in the air. “I mean, not that it didn’t feel big and important, but looking back… I had it pretty good. Whiteish guy in Canada with a loving mom who honestly doesn’t care? I didn’t have too much to worry about when coming out, not compared to others. Still. I had my share of dramatic-sixteen-year-old moments.” He smiled. “Anyway, Nisha and I were big into sci-fi when we were kids, and we were always drawn to the misfit characters.”
Ash stared at him. He couldn’t imagine being so… open. “How can you—? Aren’t you worried about someone reacting poorly when you tell them?”
Remy stared at Ash for a long beat, his expression somber. Then he nodded once, decisive. “Sometimes I definitely hold back. But sometimes you get a feel for people.” He shrugged. “I refuse to be afraid all the time. Besides, I’ve never met you before, but it’s not like I haven’t heard you say some queer-friendly things. Which I guess could have been PR, but I didn’t think so.”
He’d said queer-friendly things? Ash had the urge to cock his head like a bewildered puppy. Sure, he was careful not to sound homophobic, but he stayed away from the topic as best he could. He’d never been very publicly opinionated about anything, really. People didn’t want him to be.
“Still.” He looked away. “What if I wasn’t alright? Aren’t you afraid of being hurt?”
“Sure. Which is why I tend not to announce it on quiet street corners in the middle of the night.” Remy smiled, but then after a beat, he dropped it. “Look. Not all the world is kind, so I’m careful, trust me. But generally speaking, there isn’t much danger—given my situation—for me to tell someone in public in the middle of the day. If you’d reacted badly, I could have walked away, and we’d never see each other again. That would have been it.”
Ash chewed his lip and considered Remy’s open expression. It still sounded so… risky.
Remy stared back, his gaze searching. Wordlessly, Ash shifted his hips and scrunched a napkin.
Fin
ally Remy spoke. “Everyone is different, but…. For me, I know I can probably make things a little easier on others who are less secure than I am. If my saying ‘I’m gay’ means someone else feels comfortable enough to say it back, or if it helps to make it more normal to hear? Well, I’m going to do it.” He shrugged again but didn’t quite achieve nonchalance. “I wish everyone felt comfortable enough to admit it, if it’s true, but until then… I’ll do my best. You know?”
Ash tore a few pieces off his napkin.
Across the table, Remy picked up and gnawed another wing, apparently content to sit in silence. Ash pushed a fry around his plate and wondered what Remy would say if he knew about him.
The Eurhythmics’ “Who’s that Girl?” started playing. Ash jerked, as did Remy. His eyes went wide, and he scrambled to get his hand into his pocket and yank out his phone. He swiped it clumsily and brought it to his ear.
“Nisha,” he said too cheerily. “Hi. How are you?” His tone shifted to tentative. “Oh? Twenty…. That late, huh? … Um, so the thing is, uh, remember how I went to the ROM this afternoon? Well, I kinda—” Whatever her interjection, it made him blush. “What? No! Of course not. I met someone from out of town, and they were kinda… lost. So I gave them a hand, and then I guess I lost track of time.”
He licked his lips, leaving them shiny, and then answered more slowly. “Yes. But that’s not why—” He harrumphed. “It isn’t.”
His cheeks turned pink. “Yes.” He was silent for a long moment. “Yes, tomorrow, I promise. I’ll make it up to you.” He hung up and slid his phone back into his pocket. Then he hunched his shoulders and avoided eye contact.
“All’s well?” Ash asked.
“Yeah.” Remy took a gulp of his Coke. “I totally forgot Nisha and I made plans to meet up for drinks tonight.” He gave an oops face. “It’s a good thing she’ll forgive me after a couple of beers. Also listening to her bitch me out.”
“She owns the Donna wig, aye?”
Remy’s eyes widened a wee bit, and he nodded hard. “Yeah. She’s my con buddy. Well, actually my everything buddy. I’ve known her since we were babies, complete with embarrassing photos of us bathing together.”
