Americana Fairy Tale

by Lex Chase

  “It’s kind of cute…,” Taylor said. “The witch led us here?” He decided not to have another go at trying to say Idi again, because every time Corentin said it, the name sounded like Eddie.

  Corentin nodded as they stepped out of the truck in unison. “I’ll go see about getting a room.” He checked his wallet and then glanced at Taylor. “I suppose I’ll add this to your running tab.”

  Taylor slumped against the door of the truck and crossed his arms. “I’ll work on being an even cheaper date.”

  Corentin smirked and glanced toward the manager’s office. The slim man with gaunt sunken cheeks watched the two cautiously through the tiny office window. “I’ll be back,” Corentin said. He turned and paced backward so Taylor could see his face. “What should I tell the manager? Should something come up?”

  Taylor blinked widely at the question. His lips parted in a half gape. Corentin couldn’t be serious. Was the manager going to think they were two queers looking for a place to fuck? It wasn’t like that. It couldn’t be like that!

  “I’m your brother,” Taylor spat quickly. “I’m your brother, and we’re on a quest to slay demons together.” He pasted on a bright smile.

  Corentin halted in his steps and narrowed his eyes. “I’d say that’s sarcasm.”

  Taylor placed his hands on his hips. “I’m serious! See if he’ll give us a discount for that story.”

  Corentin snorted. “Ass.”

  Taylor smirked, and Corentin vanished into the office. Once he was out of sight, Taylor flopped against the hood of the truck. “Fuck,” he whined and rubbed his eyes, and Ringo grunted with disdain.

  “Stop that,” Ringo said. “You don’t know where your hands have been.”

  “Yeah, I do,” Taylor came back with a snotty tone. “Apparently in dead armadillo gunk.” He picked at his eyelashes, trying to get the crust off.

  “You’re going to get an infection,” Ringo warned him.

  “Jeez, Dad,” Taylor grumbled and shot a glare at Ringo. “I’ll wash my hands with sandpaper and bleach once we get into the room.”

  The sound of the office door clapping shut startled Taylor. His eyes darted to Corentin, who was grinning like a wicked stepfather.

  “Got a room,” Corentin said a little too happily and waved a key on a plastic tag. “The one by the convertible.”

  Taylor hesitantly glanced across the teepee village and found the suggestive convertible. The three of them beheld the strange building that would be their moment of safety.

  Ringo yawned, and his wings trembled with a stretch. “Man, I’m beat like a hooker.”

  Corentin spit a laugh. “I’m going to have to remember that one.”

  Ringo settled once again on Taylor’s shoulder. Taylor followed Corentin and waited for him to unlock the door to the teepee. They stepped inside their modest accommodations, and Taylor was the first to state the obvious.

  “It’s a single.”

  “You noticed,” Corentin muttered.

  CHAPTER 11:

  EMPTY ARMS AT THE

  WIGWAM MOTEL

  Wigwam Motel, Holbrook, Arizona

  June 6

  TAYLOR RESTED Ringo on one of the bed pillows, and his fairy godfather lazily rolled over, scratching his stomach.

  “I’m getting a shower,” Taylor said and quickly shuffled into the bathroom. In the silence, Taylor pressed his back to the door and slid to the floor. He clamped both hands around the crotch of his shorts and hissed through clenched teeth, “Stop, stop, stop, please, stop.”

  He had to stop thinking about his dream. And thinking about Corentin in that way. Corentin wasn’t even his type! And Corentin’s type was clearly not a raging homo-sheckshual. By all of Taylor’s understanding, Corentin’s breed of redneck was of the misogynistic racist variety. Taylor paused. Was he just telling himself that? Taylor mentally felt around the edges of the dream. He flinched with the dirty feeling.

  Shower. He needed a shower. Now.

  He picked himself up off the floor, then staggered to the tub. The enamel had seen better days, with that lovely rusty ring around it. The shower curtain seemed to be a repository for all assorted natures of DNA. Taylor gingerly touched it in an effort to move it just out of the way enough to turn the faucet. Scuffed up and mottled with rust, even the faucet made him wince. He ripped off a sheaf of cheap toilet paper to use to turn the faucet on. First the water belched into the tub, then after a few rude bubbling gurgles, ran in a steady stream. It wasn’t particularly warm, however. Taylor surmised he didn’t really need a hot shower anyway.

  He disrobed, dropping his clothes in a heap on the floor. But on second consideration, he didn’t have anything else to change into. What he had on his back was it. Like his cum-stained cargo shorts. Yuck. He scooped his clothes off the floor and hung up his shirt on the towel rack. He’d have to do something about his shorts, because they’d smell and get uncomfortably crusty. He chuckled. He would never have predicted how contentious he’d become about cleanliness until he only had one change of clothes for the foreseeable future.

  As the tub faucet ran to get some marginable level of lukewarm, he cranked the faucet in the sink. He let the water run over the crotch of his new shorts and scrubbed them as best he could with the questionable cracked soap bar.

  Corentin knocked once on the door. “Come on, man. Gotta pee.”

  “Hold your horses,” Taylor huffed. “Let me get in the shower first. Great Storyteller Almighty.”

  Taylor hustled and wrung out his shorts. He hung them also on the towel rack and finally hopped into the shower before poor pitiful Corentin could have an accident on the floor. Some self-reliant huntsman he was. Couldn’t he go out back and take a piss on a tree? Of course, there would likely need to be some nature of tree on the premises.

  Taylor jerked the curtain across the tub for privacy and instantly regretted taking a fistful of it in such haste. “Okay! It’s safe.”

  “I heard princesses were prissy, but I didn’t think it applied to male princesses,” Corentin said as he walked in.

  Taylor could see the outline of his body through the haze of the shower curtain. He pushed himself back against the far wall to gain some distance. A small gap remained between the curtain and the shower wall, and he carefully peeked. With a familiar clanking of a belt buckle followed by a zipper, Taylor instead sent his gaze upward to Corentin’s face and his bare shoulders. Corentin had done away with his shirt, and Taylor’s face heated with the view. Corentin was lean, like a panther, his tattooed skin pulled tight over his biceps and hard abs. He finished, flushed, and turned away to zip his pants. Taylor pressed his fingers to his lips at the sight of the rise of Corentin’s tight rear as he shifted to the sink and washed his hands.

  He studied himself in the mirror while Taylor stared through the shower curtain.

  Corentin swung open the door and called behind him, “Don’t use all the hot water.”

  “O-oh-okay,” Taylor croaked, his face hot from gawking.

  The door shut with a click, and Taylor sighed with the relief. He looked down at himself in disappointment. Taylor was filthy from dirt, sweat, and whatever else was lurking in Corentin’s disgusting truck. He turned, reaching for the cracked soap bar. The black grooves in the soap made him reconsider. He reached for the mini Johnson & Johnson shampoo bottle and uncapped it. After a careful sniff, he tried to make sure it wasn’t rancid and questioned if it was possible for shampoo to go rancid. Figuring he would chance it, he scrubbed himself down with the terrible No More Tears formula.

  He breathed one more time, trying to cope with the lukewarm water, and then decided it was time to face the reality of a nasty motel room with a man he didn’t trust who made him blush. He shut off the water and carefully maneuvered out of the shower without touching the petri dish that served as a curtain.

  Taylor considered his clothes. His shirt could use airing out, and his shorts were a definite no. His only option was a towel around the waist.
He didn’t even like that option in high school, let alone in the middle of nowhere with the current company. Ringo was there, though. That made it better. Ringo would save him.

  Covering himself, Taylor took a breath. On a mental count of three, he turned the doorknob.

  And the chill of the overworked window unit hit him square in the bare chest.

  “Fuck,” Taylor gasped and scuttled to the bed. He immediately wrapped himself in the threadbare blanket, which didn’t help at all. He had a string of curses on his tongue when he finally glanced up and saw Corentin.

  More specifically, saw Corentin’s tattooed torso.

  Corentin, on the other hand, busied himself with making notes in his monstrosity of a book. His brow would furrow every time he underlined something with a determined gesture across the page. He seemed not to notice Taylor’s open staring at the intricate black ink of an oak tree drawn in the style of Gustave Doré. The trunk of the tree was a full sleeve with the roots growing from Corentin’s left wrist, and at his shoulder, the branches twisted in a windblown manner across his collarbone, shoulder blade, and a few branches even curled at the base of his neck.

  Taylor swallowed. At least it explained why Corentin was so covered up for June weather. But something was strange about the tattoo. There were seven boughs, but only one had leaves.

  Corentin kept making notes and didn’t look up. His brow furrowed into an even angrier contortion, and he wrote faster. When he apparently ran out of space, he flipped his book to sit horizontally and wrote in tiny print in the margins. He hesitated, tapping his pen on the paper.

  Taylor pulled the blanket higher on his shoulders. The steam from his body captured under the blanket helped in making the chill of the room bearable.

  Corentin scribbled again in his book. He frowned and scribbled in a repeated gesture. He shook his pen with a flick of the wrist and tried again. He grunted and threw the pen. “Fuck,” he said and went fishing in his messenger bag. He feverishly reached around, looked in, and then reached around again. He puffed a sigh and upturned the bag onto the carpet.

  A palm sized bottle of liquid bounced across the floor and Corentin scrambled to snatch it midtumble. He glanced at Taylor and offered a smile. “Hand sanitizer. Can’t go anywhere without it.” He quickly shoved the bottle into a side pocket of his bag.

  Taylor said nothing, merely watching the bizarre display as Corentin poked through the crumpled receipts, hair ties, old cracker wrappers, and various unidentifiable crumbs and wadded-up trash. He also flipped through a collection of condoms in shiny magenta wrappers and printed with hearts and lips. Taylor tightened his grip on the comforter and his face heated. Well, at least they were cherry flavored or something?

  Corentin shook the bag again, and Taylor remained silent.

  As a roll of duct tape tumbled out.

  And then zip ties.

  Taylor’s eyes snapped wide. Corentin had fucking huntsman death tools on him at all times. He shivered and scooted back on the bed. He judged the distance from the bed to the door in case he needed to run at a moment’s notice. Obviously a naked guy running down the interstate would get some attention. But he hadn’t seen any cars on the interstate since they ended up here. He nibbled at his lip. Maybe if he stole Corentin’s truck? That seemed like a good idea.

  “Ah!” Corentin said, clearly relieved he apparently found a pen, and ignored the zip ties and duct tape. He resumed his furious scribbling.

  Taylor finally took his moment to speak up. He tried not to draw attention to the damning evidence on the floor. “I’ve never heard of a huntsman who was a Storyteller too.”

  Corentin held up a finger, indicating Taylor should wait. Taylor pressed his lips together as Corentin read his notes silently. He ran his fingers over his handwriting, mouthing the words. He nodded once and pressed the mishmash monstrous book together, then secured it with the bungee cord. He took a breath, leaning back in the rickety chair. “It’s complicated,” Corentin said.

  Taylor nodded slowly, beckoning for Corentin to continue. But Corentin didn’t explain further than that. Taylor took the initiative. “Um….” Taylor tilted his head to indicate the zip ties and duct tape. “I gotta be honest. Those are kinda freaking me out.”

  Corentin sighed and held the monstrous journal against his chest. “It’s what I do, you know. Don’t worry. I’m not going to use them. I promise.”

  Taylor nodded slowly, forcing himself to trust Corentin while every fiber of his being screamed not to. Ringo was with him. Ringo would protect him. Okay. This is okay.

  Corentin set the strange tome on the desk, and the desk wobbled under the weight of it. He nudged the book into a flush alignment with the desk’s edge. There seemed to be some small ceremonial gesture in doing so. Taylor noticed the quiet reverence on Corentin’s face.

  He turned toward Taylor, and Taylor’s gut clenched. Something was coming.

  “Scoot over,” Corentin said with a smile.

  Taylor stared in horror. “There’s no room.”

  Corentin frowned and gestured to the carpet. “Do you see any room to sleep on the floor?”

  He said it in a tone Taylor did not appreciate. Taylor stood his ground. Corentin was not getting in the bed with him. No way. No how. Especially not with him naked. Especially with Corentin being a huntsman who might or might not kill him. Taylor still didn’t quite believe the part that Corentin had no intentions. Yeah, and the Big Bad Wolf had no intention of raping Little Red either.

  “Porn stars get creative,” Taylor said, frowning. “You can too.”

  “Why are you so difficult all the time?” Corentin asked with a tone of frustration. “We can share the bed. It’s no big deal.”

  Taylor’s heart hammered. He wondered if this was how it happened for girls. Hearing it was no big deal and the second they let their guard down was where it all went wrong. He took several deep breaths, considering his options. Ringo wouldn’t let anything bad happen to him. Sure, Ringo had been next to no help in this whole mess, but if he couldn’t fully trust Corentin, he could trust Ringo.

  “O-okay…,” he said slowly. He shifted in the small double bed, permitting Corentin room.

  Corentin sat on the edge and then kicked off his boots. His jeans stayed on, but that unusual tattoo was bare for all to see. Corentin reclined onto his back and wiggled his toes. So far, nothing seemed out of place. “You know… the teepee may smell funny, and the carpet’s damp, but the bed’s not bad,” Corentin said.

  “Mm-hmm” was all Taylor could manage as he stayed as still as possible.

  “How about some of the covers?” Corentin said, reaching over.

  “No!” Taylor barked and pulled the blanket tighter to him.

  Corentin hesitated. “Sorry?”

  “I’m… I’m…,” Taylor stammered. Finally, he confessed. “I’m naked.”

  “Oh,” Corentin said. But it was clear he didn’t get it.

  “The princess thing?” Taylor said. “Can’t be seen in an inappropriate state?”

  Corentin brightened. “Oh,” he said. He stood and then paced to the chair where his jacket hung. “Do you want my flannel?” he asked, pulling it from the folds of the jacket. “It’s pretty big on me anyway. It might be long enough to cover….” Corentin stopped before saying anything else. Taylor knew something else was coming, but it was quite perplexing that Corentin seemed a little flustered about it. Corentin held out the flannel shirt to Taylor, and he accepted the red-plaid fabric. They nodded to each other, and then Corentin unexpectedly turned around and covered his eyes. “Go on,” he said. “Put it on. I won’t look.”

  Taylor couldn’t help the blush creeping into his features from Corentin’s generosity. Not wasting any time, he hopped from the bed and let the towel drop. He tossed on the shirt and hurriedly buttoned it. A little big on Corentin was right. A tent on Taylor was more true to the fact. The damned thing went down to his knees, and the sleeves went well past his wrists. “Okay,” Taylor s
aid. “I’m good.”

  Corentin turned as Taylor was rearranging the bedding. Taylor glanced up from fluffing the pillows and noticed Corentin had a peculiar, almost dumbfounded expression. Was he blushing? Taylor’s brow furrowed, and he shook his head. He was so seeing things. That’s all it was, or another stupid dream. He had to be asleep right now. No way was this subtle flirting going on.

  Taylor took control and hopped into the bed. “You take that side. I’ll take this one,” he said and rolled over to face the concave wall away from Corentin. He gritted his teeth. You’re turning your back on him, idiot, he cursed himself. He grunted and rolled over at the exact moment Corentin settled into the bed. Oddly enough, Corentin turned away from him. Taylor puffed a sigh of relief.

  Corentin’s chest rose and fell with a long breath, and they lay in silence for several minutes. On the pillow, just above Taylor’s head, Ringo croaked an obnoxious snore for someone so small. Taylor snorted, trying to hold in a laugh. Corentin stiffened, trying to do the same. Both of them spit giggles, trying not to wake him up.

  Corentin reached out to the end table and clicked off the light. In the darkness, he shifted in the bed, and Taylor froze. He braced, sure this was the moment Corentin was going to make his move.

  Instead, Corentin fluffed his pillow.

  Confusion washed over Taylor, but he decided to let it be.

  “Hey,” Corentin said into the blackened teepee.

  “Y-yeah?” Taylor said and regretted how it came out like a squeak.

  “This is really important,” Corentin said. “In the morning, you need to tell me to turn to the blue tab in my book. First thing. Got it?”

  “I guess,” Taylor said to Corentin’s back. He had no idea what his creepy book had to do with anything.

  “Promise me,” Corentin said sternly. “Promise me no matter what happens, you’ll make sure I read it.”

  Taylor didn’t like where this was going. “Should I be sleeping?” he asked. It was a perfectly reasonable question, he figured, lying next to a man ordered to kill him.