Gold Standard

by Kyell Gold

  “Rrrrrryeah.” I swallow, try to push away the connection between what my paw is holding and the beautiful muzzle in front of me as he leans forward to kiss me again, tenderly. The passion is still there, the awareness of our unbroken intimate contact, but it’s restrained, exhausted.

  “So you just made love to another guy,” the fox says to me. “Sounded like you liked it, too.”

  I’m too mellow right now to be provoked. “Whatever,” I murmur.

  “You done this before?”

  I shake my head, and that seems to satisfy him. He kisses my nose. “Well, you were damn good. I’m gonna go clean up for a few minutes. If you’re not here when I get back…that’s okay. Just want you to remember this.”

  Remember?! I tense again and can’t repress a moan as he slides off me, his rear squeezing my sensitive cock exquisitely and finally releasing me. My tail sweeps the bed contentedly.

  He’s gone for a while, during which I trace the patterns of the water damage on his ceiling and drift off into a pleasant haze. I consider leaving, but the post-orgasmic bliss is too nice to ruin it with activity.

  When he comes back, he’s wearing boxers and nothing else. I peer at him curiously. How could I have mistaken him for female? He’s walking differently, acting differently now that the secret is out. Tail still arched, but it’s not swinging as much; his hips don’t sway. It’s almost like he’s a different fox, like I was just fucking his sister. But his eyes are the same bright blue, and his smile is the same when he sees me on the bed, and this time it’s a genuine sweet smile, or else maybe my addled brain isn’t capable of seeing smugness. “Want to get that shirt off?” he says softly, and I nod. He helps me with that, wipes off my stomach and cock with a soft cloth, and put my boxers back on, and then says, “I don’t have anywhere else to sleep.”

  I wave a paw, not caring. He slides into the bed and spoons back against me, that fluffy tail between us, my sheath pressed up against his rump. I let my arm flop across him because there doesn’t seem to be anywhere better for it to be. And then I’m asleep.

  Five in the morning. I wake up from a dream that I just fucked another guy and find him next to me, his tail tickling my arm. Cold panic grabs me. I get out of bed without waking him up, find my clothes folded neatly next to the bed, and take off. I dress in the hallway and go down the stairs as lightly as I can.

  Nobody else has to know, he said. My thoughts are in a whirl as I walk down three streets without seeing them, finally finding a landmark in the dim pre-dawn light and heading for my dorm.

  Damn right nobody else has to know. If he tries coming around the team, blackmailing me…he better not mess with me. Or what if he comes around wanting more? Shit! I clutch my head in my paws. I’ll deal with that when it happens. I’ll tell him he’s got the wrong tiger. I’ll pretend not to recognize him. I’ll help my teammates beat the crap out of him. Well, no. A couple guys got kicked off the team last year for beating up some queer. Okay, so we’d make sure not to get caught, that’s all.

  What the hell did he think he was doing, anyway? Didn’t he know I’d be furious? What if I’d taken a swing at him? I could’ve ripped his balls off right there. I could’ve broken his jaw. Little fucking fox, trying to put one over on the big stupid tiger. Well, just let him try again. Let him fucking try.

  I stalk into the dorm, tail a-twitch, paws balled into fists. Five-twenty a.m. The ‘roo at the desk recognizes me, doesn’t ask for ID. Good thing. I’d probably explode at him. I get back to the room I share with Randy and thank god he’s still asleep. I can smell the thick scent of his come in the room and I guess he got a nice handjob, because I can smell the bitch, too. I throw myself down on my bed and try not to let the scent remind me of the fox.

  To avoid Randy’s inevitable question about the fox, I pretend to be asleep when he gets up and gets dressed. But we have practice that day, and no matter how much I try to stay to the other side of the field, he catches up to me finally.

  “Hey, how was that vixen?” he says, as we take a breather in between plays. “Hope you got better than what I got. She was all okay to jerk me off, but I couldn’t get her to open up. Frigid bitch.”

  I jerk, my body coursing with a brief memory of last night’s pleasure again. Aftershock: third one since leaving the fox’s place this morning. New sensation for me. “Nah, she was just a tease. How did you know?”

  “Eck.” He jerks his muzzle to the coyote, who’s watching us with the combination of hunger and envy that characterizes a good backup. He’s only a frosh; he’ll be starting when I graduate for sure. Jason seems to like being on the bench. Probably he’ll stay there.

  “Yeah, she was just…I walked her to her place…got a kiss…” I trail off. And another kiss, and another… “Uh, that was it.”

  Randy laughs. “De-nied!” he says, and thank god coach grabs us to run a play because I wouldn’t be able to laugh with him.

  As it is, I get pancaked twice in practice. Once when I get hit with another aftershock, and once when I look up at the sky and see the bright blue of a passionate stare. The second time, coach tells me to hit the pine and taps Eck, not Jason, to take my place.

  I’m paranoid in the shower that I’ll get a hard-on looking at the other guys, but I don’t. Same as it ever was. None of them turn me on one bit. I flutter back to anger at the fox. Somehow he tricked me into getting aroused by him, when I’m clearly not gay.

  To prove it, I call up the memory of a sweet cheerleader I screwed last week and jerk off in the shower that night in the dorm, panting and leaning against the wall. I clean up my spunk, kicking it down the drain, and feel satisfied that I didn’t think about the fox once. That’s about the last moment of satisfaction I get for a while.

  The following week is an absolute nightmare. I wake up in bed hard Monday morning and I think I smell him in the room, but it’s only the residue of a dream I don’t remember. That I was dreaming about him and waking up hard worries me a bit, but I can’t stop thinking about him. I try to get angry again, but I can’t see the smugness any more. I just see that sweet smile, feel that tightness around my cock, that soft muzzle of his, the way he pressed into me while we

  (made love)

  fucked. I sit in class and try to express my memories in abstract doodles, covering a page with them and only realizing when the students around me get up that I have no idea what was covered.

  Tuesday I fail a test.

  Wednesday Randy asks me if I’m in love. I punch him in the stomach. We get into it and I feel better for about an hour. Afterwards, we go out for beers and I’m lost again.

  Thursday I give up on classes and track down that cheerleader. I figure maybe some good old-fashioned normal sex will get the damn fox out of my mind. She’s a perky raccoon, with a great rack and a great attitude, and she’s a fucking lousy lay. I set a land speed record getting out the door after it’s over.

  Friday I give up and go back to the bar with the guys.

  We’re sitting in our group and the girls are in theirs and the squirrel’s at the bar, alone. I can’t follow the conversation, and eventually the guys stop trying to include me. I wander over to the squirrel and stand beside her, one paw on the stool the vixen—the fox was sitting on a week ago.

  She looks around to see if there’s anyone else there, then gives me the wide eyes again. “Buy a gal a drink?”

  “Yeah.” I signal the bartender. “Shot of Wild Turkey and one of whatever she’s having.” I lay down the money.

  Interested now, the squirrel straightens up. I try not to gag on her perfume. “You went off with that fox, right? Back for something with less bite?” Her prominent incisors show as she laughs.

  I wince. Even the conversation the boys were having about which superhero movie is the best was better than that, and that one consisted mostly of quoting their favorite bits with gunshot noises. “Do you know her? The fox who was in here last week?”

  The bartender sets down my shot, and some ligh
t beer in front of the squirrel. I down my shot before he has a chance to walk away. The squirrel sneers. “No, I didn’t know the stuck-up priss.”

  “Fine. Enjoy the beer.” I stand up and walk out, ignoring her muttered “asshole” and Randy’s “hey, Dev.” For a minute, outside in the night, I worry that he’ll follow me, but maybe he remembers Wednesday and doesn’t want to get into it again. He’d rather be in the arms of one of the two big-breasted bitches at the other end of the bar. I wish that was all I wanted.

  I try to find the row house again, but there are no numbers on the street and they all look alike. I don’t even know why I’m looking. I want to yell at the fox. I want to hold him. I want to grab him by the throat and tell him to get the fuck out of my head. I want to kiss him again. A ferret asks me if I’m lost as I wander from one front porch to another, and I say, “Pal, you don’t know the half of it.” He leaves me alone.

  I find what I’m sure is the right house three times. Each time I stand there for fifteen minutes trying to figure out if the pattern of the peeling paint is familiar or not. I peer at the names on the mailboxes when I can see them, but I don’t even know the little fucker’s name, and they don’t put “little faggot fox” on the listings. Plenty of people come home while I’m looking around the porches, but only one fox, and she is definitely a vixen. For real.

  At 12:30 in the morning I find a cross street that looks exactly the same as the street I’ve been wandering up and down for two hours. I look at all the row houses on that street and find the right house two more times.

  At 1:30 in the morning I go back to the bar and snag the first girl I see who isn’t attached and isn’t the painted squirrel. I take her back to my room and we go at it, and it’s fine. It’s not great. It’s not fireworks. I kick her out at 3, get back to bed and lie there staring at the ceiling. I get the crazy idea that if I bring a pair of binoculars and look through the upper story windows, I could find the ceiling that has the specific pattern of water damage I remember and then I’d know where he lives. I go so far as to check online to see where I can get a pair of binoculars close by, and I realize that I have gone completely around the bend. I’m sitting at my desk at four in the fucking morning shopping for binoculars so I can look for the ceiling of the apartment where I had the only gay experience of my life. Not to mention how crazy I would look walking up and down the street looking through third floor windows. Lion Christ.

  I need to find that fox. I want him out of my head, and one way or another, I’m gonna get what I want.

  Saturday practice is another disaster. I’m running on two hours sleep and coach bumps me down to the second team for the last drills of the day, where I get paired with a frosh backup wideout who is a red fox. He’s not my fox, though; he’s about six feet tall and only has to tilt his head a bit to look me in the eye. Plus he’s got a deep voice. But he has the same slender muzzle, and twice I get caught imagining it sliding over my cock and lose my focus.

  I wait to take my shower until the rest of the team is gone.

  I don’t know what else to do. I retrace my steps from the bar the next day, this time borrowing Randy’s car and finding the right street, absolutely for sure this time. I park at seven o’clock and sit in the car watching the whole street, everyone who comes and goes.

  Eight-thirty. A policewolf comes over and asks if I need any help. I say I’m waiting for a friend from the football team. He checks my ID and leaves me alone. Thank god there are some fans in this town.

  Nine-twenty. Two male foxes show up, laughing and talking. They walk right past my car and go into the building three doors down. Neither one is him. I’m pretty sure. I make a note of the building anyway.

  Ten-forty-three. I sit up in my seat. It’s him. There’s no question. He’s dressed in a trim blue button-down shirt and khaki pants, carrying a worn backpack over one shoulder. No pretense of being a woman now. My claws extend, punching holes in Randy’s seat. I can’t see his expression, but I know he’s got that cocky smile on him.

  It isn’t until he’s halfway to my car that I register that he’s not alone. He’s walking with some tall mustelid, ferret or weasel or something, and damn if the first thing I feel isn’t what the fuck is he doing with that guy? Of course, what I mean by that, I rationalize, is if they go into a building together, it might be the weasel’s place.

  They don’t. They pause at the front of one of the houses. The fox climbs the first stair so he can look his weasel friend in the eye. They talk for a few minutes and then the weasel moves on.

  And that’s the right house, I remember now. That door frame, that old piece of tape on the window. My heart beats faster.

  The fox goes inside. The weasel clears the street and turns the corner, out of sight. I get out of the car.

  I walk to the house just like I live there. Big problem: the door’s locked. I stare through the door. There are names on the mailboxes, but the apartment numbers just go 1, 2, 3. I can’t figure out whether he’s R. Michaelson or W. Farrel. And I can’t get in. No problem. I’ll just go through the fire escape.

  It occurs to me yet again, as I find the hallway window ajar and squirm my way through it, that I am pretty far gone. Fortunately, I’m also far past caring.

  I might not have recognized the building, but when I get to the third floor, I know which door is his. It might have a tiger magnet in it, with the force it’s pulling me to it. I knock before I know what I’m doing, before I’ve figured out what I’m going to say. I can’t wait a minute longer, and besides, I could stand here for another four hours and not figure out what I’m going to say.

  His scent hits me a moment before he opens the door. I get a moment of surprise in his baby blues before he sizes up the situation and relaxes into a smile. “Well. Devlin Miski. How did you get in?”

  I’m thrown off guard by him knowing my name. “Uh. Fire escape.”

  There’s a twinkle of humor looking back at me now. “I see. Back for more, or back to beat up the faggot?”

  I can’t give voice to the maelstrom of emotions in my chest. “What the fuck are you playing at?” I yell, louder than I mean to.

  His eyes flick to the opposite door, and he shrugs. “The jocks at this school crack me up. You’re Division II football, for the love of God. You’re not even in sniffing distance of playing professionally, but you strut around like you own this town. Despite our enlightened culture, you still go around making faggot jokes and beating up queers.”

  He’s talking about that incident last year that everyone’s forgotten about. “I had nothing to do with that! And Coach kicked the guys off the team.”

  “Yeah, well.” He shrugs again. “Getting kicked off the football team. Whoop de doo. I got a kick out of the idea that I’d get one of you in bed, so I could tell my friends about it, maybe give you something to think about.”

  “Just one?”

  Again, the slight hesitation, and now I’m quick enough to see him surprised before he recovers. “Look, whatever you want, let’s get it over with, okay?”

  “I don’t know what I want!” I howl. My claws are out and in, out and in, and my tail is lashing.

  He looks at me and gives me the throaty Lauren Bacollie again. “Well, handsome, come back and see me when you do.”

  He starts to close the door. I can’t let him walk away and I can’t follow him. I can’t sleep with women and I can’t sleep with guys. I’m caught in between worlds and it’s tearing me to pieces.

  I wedge my foot into the door. He backs away a couple steps. I scream at him, “You’ve ruined me for women!”

  We stand and look at each other for an eternity. Slowly, he gets that cocky smile on his muzzle, but there’s a sad sweetness behind it too. “Oh, honey,” he says, and reaches out with those gentle fingers to tickle my chin. “You were never for women.”

  He puts just the slightest stress on the last word. I stare at him. I want to wipe that smile off his muzzle. I want to slap his face, knock him dow
n, make him take it back. I hate his smugness. I hate his scent. I hate the gulf between us, the fact that he’s standing so perfectly in his world, where he belongs, and that I no longer know where I belong.

  I hate the fact that he’s right.

  I step into his apartment and grab him. He squirms in the half-second before I press my muzzle to his, then he melts into the kiss.

  I’d forgotten.

  It’s like a drink of water after a full practice. It’s stepping into air conditioning on a hot summer day. It’s a steaming cup of hot chocolate with frost on the windows. It’s all that combined, times a hundred. It’s passion. It’s fireworks. It’s so good I forget everything, even where I am, until I hear the slam of the door behind me and feel the fox’s leg withdrawing from kicking it shut.

  I look down into his sparkling blue eyes and he’s grinning that smug, cocky grin again. So I pick him up and carry him over to the bed to do exactly what I know he wants me to do.

  Goddamn foxes.

  Secrets

  Of all the stories I’ve written, “Secrets” is among my favorites. I think the jumping around in time confused some people, but I love the device of presenting to the reader the situation before and after one pivotal event, with the event saved for the climax. I think I actually get it to work, here.

  “Secrets” became the second part of “Out of Position,” and it was clear when it was finished that there was a great deal more to write. I explored some events from Lee’s point of view and then returned to Dev’s. The arc that I envisioned for “Out of Position” ended up stretching over two books, then three. This worried me somewhat, because a large part of the story takes place in the world of football, the most mainstream of sports, and I was going to be trying to sell it to a fantasy fandom. SF fans are notoriously scornful of sports and other mainstreamish (“mundane”) activities.