by V. L. Locey
“Anyone home?” Mario bellowed.
Dan shouted in reply. We found the two men of the house in the kitchen, bent over what looked like a checkbook and a ton of receipts scattered over a countertop. A high chair sat empty in the corner.
“You two are supposed to be at my house,” Mario gave the watch on his wrist a glance, “exactly ten minutes ago.”
Victor shoved himself to his feet. Receipts fluttered off the table to the linoleum flooring.
“I fucked up the banking,” Vic said flatly, leaving us to stare at his back as he made a heated exit.
Dan blew out a slow, long breath while gathering slips of paper from the floor. “Numbers confuse him,” he explained, then shoved the receipts, some checks, and a couple of pens into a drawer. “I’ll go get him moving.”
Off Dan went. I looked over at Mario. His expression said that he was not going to talk about Victor’s confusion.
It was an uncomfortable walk back to Mario’s house. Victor was sullen and withdrawn. Dan kept trying to pull him out of his mood and into some conversation. Mario seemed to be lost in his own world. And I was still trying to figure out if my best friend was ever going to like my new boyfriend.
Truthfully, seeing Sal was about the most wonderful thing ever, even if he did smell kind of cheesy. It was a good smell; rich and wonderfully edible. I wiggled into his side at the island. He smiled at me, then fed me some shredded cheese with his fingers.
“When we get home, I have something I need to give you,” I whispered into his ear.
One slim, dark eyebrow waggled.
I reached out to steal a little more cheese, but Lila saw me and threatened me with a wooden spoon. Her smile made the threat kind of weak. The mood began to lighten as Lila and Sal cooked. Heather, Brooks, and Jack arrived. I could see the frustration leaving Victor’s face as soon as he plucked his son out of Heather’s arms. With Vic now cooing over his boy, Dan’s stressed-out appearance dissipated. I sat at the island, watching my man moving around Lila. They were smooth, like fancy ballroom dancers. I craned my head when the doorbell rang.
“That’ll be the Buttonwoods,” Mario announced as he went off to let them in.
Mike and his cute wife, Yvonne, walked into the kitchen, also carrying wine. Everyone called greetings, and the table in the corner filled up after a leaf was added to extend it. Mario and Dan set the table and poured wine. I sat smiling, listening to the relaxed talk, my attention never leaving Sal. His body was lean, powerful perfection. I so wanted to touch him all over.
“Hey Augie, nice way to handle coming out,” Mike said as silverware was noisily taken out of a drawer.
I turned around on my stool to face Mike. The baby was whining softly, like he might be tired or something. “It wasn’t planned,” I confessed. “It just kind of happened.”
“I’m hearing nothing but good things,” Mike informed me. He looked super casual in a light sweater and dark-blue jeans. Yvonne smiled at me, her soft cheeks glowing a peachy-pink that matched her flowery dress. “The team is quite relieved that all the press so far has been upbeat.”
“I heard a few comments at work when I stopped in to have my bloodwork done,” Sal told us, coming around the island with a bowl of steaming fettuccini in his hands. “One old dude in the lab said he was sick of us gays shoving our agenda down people’s throats.”
“I’m all sorts of up for having things shoved down my throat as long as they’re ten inches long and throbbing,” Victor slung out dryly. Dan slapped a hand over his face, but everyone else roared. “Oh please, like there’s one person at this table who’d object to that.” Mike raised his hand. “Aside from our resident breeder,” Victor tacked on with a wave of his hand at our team captain.
“Speaking of which…” Mike said, and hugged Yvonne tightly to his side. She blushed as brightly as I usually did. “We’re pregnant!”
Everyone got all kinds of happy. Lila cried and hugged everyone. Heather and Yvonne vowed to set up play dates. Wine glasses were lifted and emptied. Yvonne and Victor had sparkling grape juice. Mario bellowed for Langley, Lila’s son, and when the teenager arrived, we all sat down to eat. Conversation was upbeat. Movies, music, and TV shows were discussed. Baby stuff as well. Sal’s hand rested on my thigh throughout the meal.
Dessert and coffee soon appeared. Lila had made a double chocolate cake with peanut butter icing. After my second slice, I made Sal promise to kick me out of bed at six a.m. sharp so I could run. Talk turned to running and lifting weights, and then it moved to hockey. Victor mentioned something about the Toronto team having some trouble with the flu moving through the ranks.
“Oh yes, I meant to ask, but what with the baby announcement, my question got lost,” Lila said, and turned her expressive eyes to Sal. “You said you had bloodwork done? I hope nothing’s wrong?”
Sal shook his head and gave me a look that I didn’t understand. “I go every three months to have my viral load tested.”
You know that saying about hearing a pin drop? Yeah. It was that quiet times about ten. I jabbed my fork into the tiny bit of uneaten cake on the plate in front of me.
“But the good news is that my viral suppression has been maintained for two years now, so I can bump back testing to every six months.”
“Soooo like, what, you have AIDS or something?” Langley asked as he rolled a glass of milk between his hands.
I glanced up from my cake. Everyone at the table looked mortified. Yvonne wiggled away from Sal, who was seated on her right, her hand resting protectively on her flat stomach. That small motion made my heart ache for Sal in a hundred thousand different ways.
“No, son,” Lila quickly interjected into the terrible awkwardness. “I believe that Sal is informing us that he is HIV positive, which is not at all the same thing as having AIDS. I know a fellow performer in the adult arts who became infected. This had to be ten years ago now. She is still just as fit as a—”
Mario stood up, a look that I could not comprehend on his face. His chair sailed back, scraping along the floor and slapping the wall. He stalked out of the back door. The spring squeaked loudly as it pulled the door closed with a crack. Sal’s gaze met mine over the empty plates and coffee cups. I wasn’t sure who I was maddest at. Him or Mario. I pushed myself to my feet and walked out of the kitchen. I heard everyone start talking at once behind me. And then Sal was there, at my side, trying to convince me to stay.
“I’m out of here. You can come home with me or hang out, but I’m not staying anywhere you’re not wanted,” I told him as I burst out the front door.
He fell behind for a moment. When I threw open the passenger door, he hustled around and made sure he slid behind the wheel. I fell into my seat, slammed the door, then chewed on the inside of my mouth for two whole blocks. Sal tried to lure me out of my funk by trying to talk me into learning Spanish.
“It’s good to have a second language,” he told me as he pulled into the turning lane leading to his complex. “And hearing you speaking the dialect of my people with that Canadian accent would be amazing.”
“I’ll think about it,” I mumbled while staring out the window to my right. I heard him exhale dramatically.
We pulled into the complex and parked outside his building. There was little talk until we’d got inside his place. Once the front door was closed, I rounded on him.
“Why the hell did you drop that bomb right in the middle of dinner? You couldn’t maybe have waited for a better time?” I asked, my hands flying around wildly.
“There is no better time, Aug, trust me. I’ve had this thing for sixteen years now. It’s better to get it out and let people deal with it,” he said, then fell onto the couch like a stone.
“Maybe you should have let me ease them into it,” I argued weakly. My anger was fizzling out quickly. I never could hold a head of steam for long.
Sal laughed derisively while plunking his feet onto the coffee table. “Right, like there was ever going to be an easy way to
tell Mario.”
I blew out a hearty breath, ran my fingers through my hair, and collapsed next to Sal on the sofa.
“I’m sorry for Yvonne’s reaction,” I mumbled a moment later. Sal’s hip rested next to mine.
“It’s understandable.” He sounded like he was working hard to sound aloof, but I’d seen the pain in his eyes, however brief it had been. “Now they can all learn about the disease. You and me, we’ll teach them right from wrong.”
“I’m not sure I even know everything about it. What it feels like to have it, or the fear of catching a common cold.” My head dropped gently onto his shoulder.
“I pray every morning that you never have to find out. It’s why we have to be extra careful, even though I want nothing more than to come deep inside you.” He turned his head to drop a kiss on my hair. “That can’t ever happen. I’d die for sure if I infected you. Seeing you wake up and have to face down the knowledge that this thing was lurking inside you would kill me way faster than this disease ever could.”
We sat there for a long time, my head on his shoulder, his fingers interwoven with mine, until he yawned widely. I lifted my head to look at him questioningly.
“Long day,” he said as he rubbed at his eyes with his free hand. “You think you maybe want to go to bed, papi chulo?” He got slowly to his feet, my fingers slipping out of his.
“I’m not feeling like such a pretty boy anymore,” I admitted.
He stepped behind the couch, then bent over it, his hands sliding down my chest, his head next to mine. I sucked in a sharp breath when his fingers flittered over my abdomen, and then again when his lips moved with sinful slowness over my temple. His hands splayed over my trembling stomach. I let my head fall back, eager to give myself to him. Having him want me, and wanting him back, was critical to my ongoing existence at that moment.
“You’ll always be the prettiest boy in New York State in my eyes,” Sal murmured.
He dropped hot little kisses down the side of my face, at the corner of my mouth, and then along my jaw. My hands dove into his hair. His fingers kneaded my flesh, digging into the skin and muscles of my stomach. My balls felt heavy. He whispered soft, sinful, sensual things to me in Spanish. My body was responding as it was supposed to, my cock was growing fat slowly, achingly slowly, but slow was fine. Slow was fucking incredible. Sal was fucking incredible.
“Don’t stop,” I huffed, arching my back away from the couch.
Sal nibbled on my ear, beautiful words in a musical language I didn’t understand flowing over me. His weight grew as he leaned over me further. He pushed a hand down over the front of my pants, brushing against my erection. He groaned and palmed my cock. The sensation was so good I nearly cried out. My hips lifted to push my dick into his hand. His touch was magical. He began rubbing my cock through my pants, slow and hard, until I was close to losing it. A quick movement, and his hand was inside my underwear, his fingers wrapping tightly around my cock.
“Come for me, August. Come right in my hand. Yes, yes, my pretty boy, come for me,” he growled beside my ear, his tongue flicking out to dive into it.
When my cock began to kick, he rolled his tongue around my ear and jerked on me roughly, pumping me hard. A gruff groan rolled out of me, balls contracting, semen soaking my briefs and coating his fingers. He murmured lovely things to me as his long fingers massaged cum into the brown curls at the base of my cock. “Such a beautiful man,” he whispered while slowly extracting his hand from my pants.
Trembling lightly, I reached over my head and back for him. “Don’t you want to get off too?”
“No, I’m going to go to bed. This swing shift shit is kicking my ass.” He kissed me on the forehead, then loped off.
When I joined him under the covers after a shower, he was sleeping, his arm thrown over his head and his legs straight. I tossed my towel into the hamper and slid under the blankets, eager to be at his side. Sal moaned when I snuggled close, but then drifted away. I chased sleep for about thirty minutes before I finally caught it, worry about what the next day would bring making my dreams dark and disjointed.
“Hey, can I talk at you for a minute?” Victor asked as we filed back to the dressing room after morning skate the next day.
I gave him a nod, and we ambled off to his cramped little space by the soda machines. Vic motioned for me to go in while he fed a couple dollars into the machine. I slid into his office feeling a little vulnerable. Vic came in and closed the door, a can of Coke in his hand and a tense look on his face.
“Sit,” he said.
“There’s only one chair,” I pointed out, my gaze on that red can in his hand.
“Then use it,” he replied while pulling his arm out of his blue suit jacket.
I sat as he stripped off his jacket and tie. And while he tapped the top of the soda can and popped the tab, I waited. He drank greedily and then, when his craving was slaked, he lowered the can and settled resolute hazel eyes on me. I was edgy. He had always made me so nervous. He placed his can on the desk, then leaned on the far wall, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Dan and I think you’re a fucking warrior for sticking with Sal.”
That wasn’t what I’d been expecting to hear. I wiggled around in his squeaky chair behind his cluttered desk, trying to think of what to say. I stared at a discarded Coke can lying under his desk.
“They say good goalies are sticky goalies,” I replied, balancing my mask on my leg.
“True, but we’re not talking about rebound control here.” My gaze moved from the empty can to Victor. “I pulled you in here because I wanted you to know that me and Dan are behind you two. Also, I think it’s important for you to know that the team cannot force you to divulge your man’s HIV status.”
“Have you heard that they’re going to?” I could hear the anxiety in my own voice.
Victor shook his head. “No, and even if they wanted to, they can’t. Medical records are confidential. I did some reading last night.” He shifted his weight left to right. “A player who’s HIV positive cannot be barred from playing. They also can’t be forced into mandatory testing. There are laws protecting HIV patients from discrimination. So don’t be worrying over having to reveal that to higher-ups. As long as Sal wishes to keep his status private, he can.”
Relief flooded me, and it must have showed, because he plowed on without missing a beat. “He seems to be pretty open about it, though. But telling friends is different than announcing it to the world. That being said, professional athletes have no secrets—you want to trust me on that one. Some people in the media are soulless sharks. Be prepared for the eventuality of some nosy asshole reporter digging through your trash or hacking hospital computer records if they suspect you’re hiding something.”
“You really don’t like the press, do you?”
The look of disgust on his face was a big clue. “I can count the people I like on ten fingers, Opie. Be happy you’re one of them.”
With that, he opened the door to his office. I stood up, gave him a brisk nod, and stepped into the hall. “Do you have any idea what’s up with Mario?”
“I have no clue what crawled up under McGarrity’s kilt when it comes to Sal.”
“Thanks for telling me all of that.” I met his hazel eyes.
“Yeah, well, I know how mental shit can drag down a goalie. Now you can lift that bundle of shit from your back and hopefully focus on hockey.” He closed the door in my face.
I guessed my bonding moment with the Venomous Pole was over.
The puck. It was all about the puck. Even though I heard the bass drums banging a steady boom, boom, boom boom boom cadence that was followed by every fan in the Rader roaring like a cougar, my attention was locked on the puck dropping to the ice to my left. We were behind by two goals late in the third. Two dirty goals that I should have had. Soft goals. Sloppy goals. Stupid goals.
Toronto had won the faceoff. They were hungry. Starved was more like it. They’d hit the ice fas
t and hard and hadn’t slowed down through three periods. The air in the barn had a bad tint to it. A loss was coming. I could feel it, sense it, see it in the way the team had simply stopped trying. Then, right after the faceoff, Dan Arou stripped the puck away from one of the Toronto forwards and streaked into the Toronto zone. The fan noise grew to amazing levels. There was still time. We’d all seen teams score a couple of goals, bing-bang-boom, and turn a game around.
Every Cougar followed Dan to the opposite end of the ice. I glanced up at the scoreboard, checked out the time remaining, and prayed the team would grab a goal. Just one goal would pump up the team.
They didn’t. Arou was knocked off the puck, and his skates, by one of the hulking Toronto defensemen. Claude Williams, a zippy Toronto winger, and John Detzler, a center for the Canadian team, broke out. My eyes tracked the puck moving back and forth between them as the two on zero raced at me. There was not one Cougar in our end. I was screwed.
Williams passed to Detzler, pulling me left. Detzler shuttled the puck to Williams. There was no way I could get back to the right side of the net in time, but I gave it my best shot. The puck flew cleanly over my left shoulder, and the goal light came to life behind me. The barn grew silent, and the final couple of minutes ticked off without any kind of tangible attempt at a comeback. The 3-0 loss tasted really foul. Worse than banana-flavored condoms. Far, far worse.
The after-game stuff was on autopilot. I gave the media the expected answers to the usual, mundane questions. Then one guy, a rather cute fellow with big, brown eyes and lots of curly red hair, tossed up the question I’d hoped would not be asked.
“August, what can you tell us about your new boyfriend? The guy you kissed at the ballgame in Buffalo?”
It was an innocent question. There wasn’t any evil glow or malevolent gleam in the guy’s eyes. But a thousand bells and whistles sounded off in my head. If they were growing curious about Sal, they’d dig. And then they’d discover he was positive. The press could unravel an athlete’s career with one internet search. I had to handle this now, though, and firmly.
