Men of All Seasons Box Set

by R. W. Clinger

  Before I realized it, the kiss between us ended. He sat down with his back pressed against a slab of flat limestone and told me, “Have a seat beside me.”

  So I sat down next to him and felt his right arm wrap around the back of my neck. He pulled me close to him. Kissed one of my cheeks, my lips, and gently pulled away, saying, “Let’s take a nap together. Right here on top of the world.”

  And so we did, side by side.

  Chapter 14: Too Many Martinis

  October 12, 2015

  1:53 P.M.

  Frankie and I had a little too much to drink because she was killer at making martinis. It wasn’t even five o’clock in the afternoon and we were blitzed and chatty. We were stuffed in my attic room, on the bed, side by side. She was keying buttons on her cellphone, checking her email. I was ready for a nap, yawning. Probably at any moment my eyes were going to close and I would pass, entering a dreamland state. I asked, “What do you think of Carl?”

  “He’s terribly handsome, charming, and seems nice. Plus, he knows how to carry a conversation. And he wasn’t shy. You know how I don’t like quiet and shy guys. They scare me. I don’t know if they’re thinking about building bombs, or where to bury bodies.”

  “I’m sure Carl doesn’t build bombs or bury bodies, Frankie.”

  “You never know. We all have secrets. Some are exposed on the evening news while others aren’t.”

  “What else do you like about him?”

  She rattled off a list of positive descriptions of the handyman, starting with his sense of humor, politeness, and how Carl looked her in the eyes when he spoke to her. “None of those things matter, though. What matters is if you like him or not, Micah. You’re the one who will probably be sleeping with him.”

  I laughed, and admitted, “I’m not that type of guy.”

  “Micah, you are that type of guy, though.” She ended her cyber cellphone expedition and placed the cellphone on her stomach. “You always end up liking a guy and sleep with him in less than a month.”

  “You make it sound so horrible. Stop judging me.”

  “I’m not judging you. I’m merely stating the facts. Besides, Carl’s rugged and adorable. I’d probably sleep with him in less than a month too.”

  I joked, “You mean two days.”

  She kicked one of my feet at the bottom of the bed. “I’m not a whore.”

  “Of course you are.”

  She laughed. “Just don’t tell anyone.”

  “Of course not, it will be our little secret.”

  And then our conversation lingered into silence and we drifted away, napping together on my bed, cuddling.

  Chapter 15: Gentle Bites

  August 10, 2014

  The Cupcake Martini: 6 Parts Gin, 1 Part Dry Vermouth, 1 Sweet Vermouth, 1 Lemon Twist.

  How did Tuck and I end up together the next morning, side by side in my bed, tucked in the eaves of the attic room? It’s still a little bit of a blur to me to this day. But throughout time, little pieces of that night started to connect and build a puzzle for me…

  Atop Betner’s Cliff, we woke from our nap to high-pitched cawing overhead as a Broad-winged hawk circled our bodies. The annoying bird was dark brown with white under parts and black margins under its wings as it flew in circles. Groggy-eyed, Tuck asked, “What’s he doing?”

  “He’s just letting us know that he’s around. The bugger probably roosts up here and we’re invading his space.”

  “Is he going to attack us?”

  “I highly doubt that. Hawks aren’t known for getting pissed at humans.”

  “Animals frighten me a bit. I never really know how they are going to act out. Maybe I’ve watched too many horror movies.”

  I laughed at him, stood, and said, “Come on, this adventure isn’t over, my friend. There’s a lot we have to do today.”

  We got up and we started our walk back to town. On top of the cliff, near the southern side, opposite its flat front side, was a spiraling dirt road that was rocky and unsafe for regular-sized vehicles. Owners of the property, the Cottler family (nice people and long-term friends with my family), used ATVs, skirting around the cliff during hunts or pleasurable rides in the natural environment.

  The walk was downhill and treacherous because of all the sandstones, twigs, and dirt. Hand in hand we exited the top of the cliff and swerved to the bottom through the rays of sunlight. Our conversation was about ISIS starting a world war, Hillary Clinton running for President, and racial issues in private police departments. Frankly, we were on the same page regarding all three topics, prevented a heated conversation, and enjoyed each other’s company during the long walk back to town.

  * * * *

  I had a surprise for Tuck, of course. There was an underground jazz club called Cheshire on Beachmont Street. Located in the rear of the jazz club was a back room where one could purchase rare CDs, vinyl, and an assortment of sheet music books. We walked through the empty club, down a short flight of four stairs, and entered a dark room with red lights. A bearded and husky man stood beside a register. I knew his name was Clyde, said hello, and showed Tuck around the small room: CDs to the far-left, vinyl to the right, sheet music, and music-related biographies near the back wall.

  I was not surprised to learn that Tuck knew his music: composers, musicians, strings, and brass instruments. He rattled off facts that I couldn’t relate to, but found interesting, as we walked around the store, thumbing vinyl, admiring CD cases, and picking through books about Jim Morrison, Louie Armstrong, Kurt Cobain, and others.

  Eventually, he came across a rare CD by The Music Chains, an imported album from Japan. The Music Chains were an instrumental- and symphony-based group of six men: piano, tuba, guitar, cello, violin, and flute. According to Tuck, the six men were from Tokyo, were related somehow, and were masters with their instruments. They performed all over Europe, throughout Japan, and had traveled to America once, sharing a three-hour stage performance with New Yorkers.

  After leaving the Cheshire, we decided to have a liquid dinner, which was irresponsible, but well worth our time. Being new to town, Tuck said he wanted to have a drink with me at David’s Fountain, which was a gay bar in the cultural district of downtown Erie. David’s Fountain was a cross between young and old clients with a knack for dancing, seducing each other, and a good time for all men of the world, or at least the tristate area.

  Our chosen drinks for dinner was an arrangement of various martinis. We started with a Tootsie Roll Martini, consumed two Quarter Deck Martinis, and then enjoyed a string of others. The bar was dimly lit, a little seedy with its sticky floor, but was enjoyable because it played the most recent hits by Sam Smith, Taylor Swift, and a rising gay musician from Chicago named Steve Grand, whom we both liked.

  I was not one to dance, but after a colorful rainbow of martinis, one after the next after the next, I was feeling quite the buzz, inebriated, and was pulled to the bar’s wooden dance floor. Once there, we giggled, shook, wavered, twisted, jumped, swung, kicked, and flung in awkward directions to Bruno Mars, Lorde, Lady Gaga, and Fallout Boy. And there, enjoying another martini with him on the dance floor, under a glittery disco ball that not only spun on an axis that hung down from the auburn-hued ceiling, but it also swung from left to right like a pendulum.

  Yes, we made out on the dance floor, kissing and killing time four hours inside the bar, grazing each other’s torsos and cotton-covered cocks, sexually drunk and at play, until we almost couldn’t walk. And yes, he tried to talk me into joining him in the men’s bathroom for a quickie. Cordially, he drunkenly detailed the act for me as some minor ass-licking, kisses to my spine, some hand-work on my dick, gentle bites to my biceps, and latex-protected penetration, but only if I wanted. Unfortunately for him, I wasn’t the type of guy to get busy in a restroom. Strange alleyways, public parks, and abandoned buildings were nothing that appealed to my sexual likings, but sometimes they did occur in my world. That didn’t happen though, at least not that night.
Instead, I wanted to make out with him on my bed and inside my private attic where I could become collaborative with his naked body.

  How we ended up back in my attic room was a mystery to me. I couldn’t remember the walk with him from David’s Fountain to Mill Street, and Tuck couldn’t remember it either. Someone, someway, we had closed the bar, stumbled to our residence, climbed the aluminum ladder, and hopped inside my attic room. I’m not saying it was a miracle, but I’m also not saying that it wasn’t. But what I can say is rather elementary: we were lucky we didn’t get picked up by the Erie police for public inebriation, or had an accident of some sort on our night’s travels, including the climb to my room, of course.

  * * * *

  The next morning we smelled like martinis and sweat. Both of us were naked, but neither of us could remember having sex. Morning woods were saluting us between our legs and our palates were dry. He complained of having a light headache and we whined about minor stomachaches. And then we decided to go back to sleep, long into the afternoon, cuddling each other, trying to nurse our hangovers.

  * * * *

  Another strange thought surfaced within my mind: If you love him, let him go. Go. Go.

  Chapter 16: Miss Kitty’s Ladies’ Canasta Night

  October 13, 2015

  Miss Kitty asked me to help her set up a folded table for her Ladies’ Canasta Night, which she usually held once a month. The buffet table was in the basement and I had to fetch it out of a dusty and cobweb-infested corner. The table was heavy and made of metal, probably dated back to the sixties, and was like carrying a stiff body up the basement stairs and to the dining room area where she wanted it unfolded and dressed for her card playing gatherers.

  I set up the table in the dining room on the far-left side, kicked its legs open, and pressed down on its flat center. Miss Kitty placed a beige tablecloth over the table’s surface and started filling it with bottles of booze, plastic cups, and napkins for the evening at hand. Helping her, the topic of Carl Bascoe came up. She said, “I had a one on one with Carl this afternoon.”

  Of course, I was taken aback. I stopped what I was doing, turned to her, and said, “A one on one?”

  “Yes. He stopped by with a bill for the stairs and door. Your name came up, just so you know.”

  “How and why?”

  She continued placing plastic forks, spoons, and knives on the table, next to a stack of expensive paper plates. “How, doesn’t really matter. Why, though, does. He wanted to know what you thought of him.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I told him that you loathed men, particularly dark-haired ones with muscles.”

  “You’re joking.”

  She waved a hand at me and sniggered. “Of course, I’m joking. I told him the complete opposite. And that you’re single, gay, and need to get the hell out of my house and go on a few dates with a guy like him. I called you mush and depressed, and that you needed a lift in your life by some handsome carpenter who was good with hands.”

  “You didn’t?” I grinned, loving what she was telling me.

  “I did,” she replied, nodding and semi-smiling.

  I also smiled, felt my heart warm with confusion at the thought of going on a date with Carl, and said, “Thank you for having my back, Miss Kitty.”

  “Don’t thank me, young man. Thank the good Lord in heaven for sending Carl your way. I really had nothing to do with it, if you want to know the truth.” Then she pointed to the kitchen and said, “Be a gem and help me bring the foodies out. The ladies will be here in twenty minutes. We have just enough time to finish this table.”

  So we did.

  Chapter 17: He Told Me…

  August 11, 2014

  The Furious Martini: 6 Parts Gin, 2 Parts Dry Vermouth, 1/2 Teaspoon Pernod, 1 Dash Grenadine.

  Things I learned about Tuck Martini on Day Nine of our relationship. The list stretched from the mundane to the most important:

  He liked June because of the fresh beginning of summer. He said that there wasn’t anything better than the sweet smell of the wind and sugary ground. He told me that he could smell the color green. The strange thing about his comment was that I believed him.

  His favorite television show as a child was Friends, watching it every Thursday night on NBC. He had a little crush on Chandler Bing, unable to keep his eyes off the actor.

  His guilty pleasures were romance paperbacks by Nora Roberts, Debbie Maccomber, and Danielle Steel. Sometimes he would curl up with one of his battered books and read half of it one sitting, falling in love with its romantic characters, enjoying all of their happy endings.

  Tuck liked to drive fast. “I’ve had seven speeding tickets in the last four years. I’m surprised the police don’t take my license away from me. Hell, if I were a policeman or judge, I would.”

  Secretly he baked chocolate cupcakes with double fudge icing. “Don’t judge me, but I could eat a dozen by myself.”

  His favorite song in the shower was “It’s Raining Men,” which he knew was a cliché but he really didn’t care. “There’s something about the hot water and a strong spray. I really don’t know what it is, but I always have to sing that song.”

  There were eleven diaries that were penned by the man; one diary per year. Tuck told me that he wrote about his emotions, mostly his likes and dislikes, and he sometimes crafted bucket lists, which consisted of things that he wanted to do, people that he had wanted to visit, and goals that he wanted to reach.

  “I had a cousin named Douglas Bradley who we called Digby. We were sixteen and drinking shots of whiskey in his dad’s garage. Of course we got drunk. And then Digby thought it would be a good idea to drive to an ice cream shop, which was about three miles away. So we climbed into his mom’s Volvo, was laughing, singing, and horsing around while he was driving. Then the accident happened. Digby drove right into an oak tree, smashing his body like an accordion. I lived through it because the impact happened on his side of the car. Otherwise, I would have died with him, right at his side.”

  His mother, Miranda, was codependent and couldn’t live without him. He once told me, “I admit that I’m a mama’s boy. What gay guy isn’t? We love our mothers.”

  He told me he was afraid to die. If he did die, he wanted it to happen quickly, without any fear or pain. “I want to go out fast. I want my life to end with a snap or bang. I don’t want to suffer. Life isn’t about suffering.”

  * * * *

  That afternoon, tucked against him within the smallness of my attic room, he rubbed the tip of his nose on the tip of my nose and said, “What do I have to do to mess around with you?”

  I had my hands on his hips, looked him square in the eyes, and said, “You’ve been with me for nine days now. Give it one more day.”

  “Ten days together and you will finally put out?” He reached one of his hands between my legs and supplied my cock and balls with a gentle squeeze.

  “Day ten and I will change your life,” I said, and gently pulled away from him before an erection came to life and I had an accident inside my cotton khakis.

  “I can’t wait for day ten, Micah. You’re killing me.”

  “I’m liking you,” I responded, reached out, and grazed his chin with a few fingertips. “You make it so easy.”

  He laughed.

  I laughed.

  And before I knew it, we were kissing, tangled together again, and both hard.

  Chapter 18: Carl’s Garage

  October 14, 2015

  Carl lived in an old cement garage that he had converted into what looked like a studio apartment with limited windows and light. Gray bricks comprised the block-like structure. Its two front garage doors were welded closed. A useable door was located on the left side of the building, which was narrow, without a window, and made of wood and steel. Three small windows overlooked a narrow beach and Lake Erie.

  “It’s cozy in here,” I said, taking in the cement floor, low ceiling, and Ikea furniture. To the far
right was a small kitchen area. To the far-left was the bathroom, which was partitioned off with a tri-paneled folding wall that was removable. There was a sofa, coffee table, and seventy-two inch flat-screen with an amazing gaming system. Sarah Graves mysteries were scattered over two shelves next to the flat-screen. Some of the novels were paperback and tattered while others were hardback and looked unread and pristine.

  “Do you want a beer?” he asked over his left shoulder, grabbing one for himself out of his dorm room-sized refrigerator.

  “I’m a martini kind of guy.”

  “Some guys are. I can respect that. There’s nothing wrong with a good vodka.”

  “And vermouth and grenadine.”

  “Exactly.”

  I looked around the single room and observed his life unfold right before my eyes. There were three Michael Stokes photographs on the walls, green vases made out of pressed glass, and a Steve Grand CD sitting on an end table. I saw an issue of Instinct and GQ next to the All-American Boy CD. There was a brass umbrella stand shaped like a weightlifter with barbells, four remote controls on the coffee table, and a hardback book called Spanish Design by Fredrico Banillo, an interior designer. Near the three windows, at the rear of the space, was a shelf with tiny wooden toys that Carl told me he designed himself. One looked like a puzzle cube, two were race cars, and a fourth resembled a monster that was half dog and half dinosaur. The figurines were shaved and sculpted from hand out of balsa, which Carl told me took him over six months to create.

  “It’s not something I do all the time, but when I do, the enjoyment of the process is unbelievable.”

  I wanted to walk over to the small figurines and touch them, but decided it was against my better judgment. Instead, I became distracted because Carl moved up behind me, wrapped his arms around my frame, pressed his center against my backside, and said, “Now I have you where I want you.”

  And I was exactly where I wanted to be.