by Rick R. Reed
She flung a pillow at him. “Yes! You cramp a girl’s style.” She stood. “Rob’s gonna swing by to pick me up in an hour or so. I need to get a move on.”
“I’ll look, sis. And I’ll send out resumes. I promise. I’ll show you the proof when you get home on, what, Sunday night?”
“Monday, actually.” She grinned, and he could see the anticipation in her eyes. “It’s a holiday. Remember?”
Cole had forgotten all about President’s Day. Why should he recall a holiday? Hell, he barely could tell weekdays from the weekends lately. Everything merged into one undistinguished and unremarkable day.
“You don’t have to show me proof. I trust you.”
“Oh, but I do. And you’re right. I need to find something. And something better than retail.”
Abruptly, she leaned down and kissed his forehead. “I love you,” she said softly.
“Me too,” he said back. He reached up to touch her hair.
He watched as she disappeared into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. Cole picked up the want ads and glanced at them for a moment. Then he threw the paper back on the coffee table, picked up the remote, and lay back, settling in for another episode of Golden Girls. He had all weekend to answer help-wanted ads, right?
He waited for an hour after Elaine left to load up the one-hitter and to pick up the telephone.
Chapter 11
IT WAS when Tommy called the phone sex line for the third time that he actually forced himself to go through with it. Third time’s the charm. The previous times, in the yawning space of ten minutes, he’d hang up on the second ring, heart pounding, a little line of sweat at his hairline. This is stupid. This isn’t me. I’m better than this. But all week long, that full-back-cover ad on the Gay Chicago he’d brought home from the bars the previous weekend taunted him. Not only was the shirtless, stubbled, brown-eyed hottie in the ad mouthwatering and hard-on inducing, the ad for the 976 number promised he’d have more hookups than he could handle. Guys just like the one the ad pictured were impatiently waiting for Tommy D’Amico to get over his nervousness and make that call.
He could smell a ripe aroma coming from his pits as he was connected at last. Somehow he’d managed to never have this phone sex experience before, never dared to. He met his hookups the old-fashioned way—after staring at them across a crowded bar for hours until they finally showed mercy and came over and said hello.
But damn it, he was horny. And it was snowing outside—hard. The flakes were fluffy and huge, enough to make blurs of the slow-moving traffic outside and the poor pedestrians who tried to hurry through the snow and wind, heads bent low. It was actually very pretty—if you were inside.
The weather forecasters were saying that tonight, with the windchill, all of Chicago might shiver through double digit subzero temperatures. Tommy likened getting on the phone sex line to ordering a pizza—which he’d already done, earlier, from Giordano’s. With both, he’d get his pepperoni. He grinned.
Plus, he had the place all to himself for the weekend, with Dora at her parents’ way out in Wheaton until Monday afternoon.
There was no reason not to give the phone sex line a try.
And now he gave out a little frightened yelp as a deep-voiced man answered, beginning his spiel. Of course it was only a recording, which relieved Tommy a bit. The butch voice told him that he’d reached the “manline,” a place to “mainline” all his steamiest fantasies with the hottest guys around. Presumably, they were all just waiting behind the shield of this recording.
There were two options for connecting—one involved providing a credit card number and would get the user “unlimited cruising” for up to twenty-four hours for the bargain-basement price of $9.99. That was still too much for Tommy, who knew full well he might just hang up after a few seconds on the line, especially when the second option was a free sample line, which limited his connections and how easy it would be to get into the rotation of other guys. He shrugged and pressed two for the free option.
The signal was busy. You get what you pay for. He hung up, went through the process again; still busy. He repeated the process once more. Again. Finally, on his sixth attempt, when he was about to fork over the ten bucks, he was connected.
Immediately he was hooked up to a rotation of short recorded messages, made by guys who all had one thing in common—every one of them, it seemed, strained to deepen their voices and to use terms like buddy and dude to get across that they were macho men. Tommy would have thought it was funny, if he weren’t so desperate himself.
He’d done the same thing when he recorded his own message. “Hey, buds, laid-back, good-lookin’ Italian American here with a fat uncut seven and a half inches, five around, looking to get a little piggy tonight. Decent bod, five feet six inches, moderately hairy. Mostly bottom, but versatile. What are you up for?” He’d had to restrain himself from giggling the whole time he recorded the message, and in fact, it took him three tries before he could actually go through with it—you should pardon the expression—with a straight face.
It seemed like the line was an endless loop, though, of “hungry” “piggy” “nasty” and “insatiable” bottoms, like Tommy, which made him wonder if he’d ever find a match or if tops were a myth—like unicorns.
Hope forced him to stay on the line for a lot longer than he really should have. He listened to the same messages over and over. After a while he recognized the voices and could almost repeat their pitches word for word. Finally a new voice emerged, this one a little high and breathy, but at least he said he was a “total top,” despite the effeminate cast of his voice. Tommy wondered, “Should I?” and then just couldn’t bring himself to punch the pound key, which would allow for the option of talking live.
He was about to hang up when a strong possibility came on. “Hey there, just a regular guy in Ravenswood looking to cut through the bullshit and meet up for a solid connection. Good-looking, mostly top, dark hair and eyes, nice dick, height and weight proportionate. Not in this for conversation, just get it up, get it off, and get out. No strings. Can host or travel. Party friendly, weed only.”
Tommy wasn’t much for partying, but he liked the sound of the guy’s voice, which seemed naturally deep and masculine. And in spite of his emphasis on a no-strings-attached encounter, he sounded like someone Tommy felt like he could have a beer with afterward. That is, if an afterward was even in the offing.
Before he could punch pound and request a live connection, though, the rotation moved on. Tommy had to wait a full ten minutes for the catalog of horny male voices to run through again before the man he hoped was his Mr. Right Now emerged again. Tommy was certain he’d lose him in that time span, especially with the ratio of bottoms to tops.
He punched the pound button as soon as he heard “Hey there” and recorded his message: “Hey, man, I like what I hear. Hot redhead bottom in Edgewater looking for just what you’re offering tonight. You willing to travel? Hit me up, okay?”
The message sent. And then Tommy waited… and waited. He figured the guy didn’t like the sound of his voice, didn’t like redheads, didn’t want a bottom—just like almost every other guy on this line tonight, it seemed. But after an interminable five minutes passed, a voice told him, “You have a connection.”
Tommy got a short recording that made him smile. “Yeah, man, I like what I hear too. And I love a hot redhead. And I can travel. Let’s make this happen.” The facilitator told him to press one if he wanted to talk live. He did.
“Hey,” Tommy said, kicking himself inside for not thinking of a more provocative opening.
“Hey,” his new friend said back, relieving Tommy, at least from worrying about his lack of wit.
The guy went on, “So what are you up for?”
Tommy nearly burst into laughter, because the first thing that came to his mind was Parcheesi. And then a good old-fashioned quilting bee. Maybe a big bowl of chocolate ice cream. He had to pinch himself to undermine the giggles t
hat bubbled up inside. “Just looking to hook up. Horny.”
“Sounds good, man. You lookin’ for company?”
“Yeah. You want to come over?” What is wrong with me? This guy is a complete stranger. He could be a pervert. A serial killer. A Republican. You’re not just gonna invite him into your house, are you? That’s nuts!
“Sure. Address?”
Oh Lord, what do I do now? The good boy in Tommy, the one who respected his mother, the one who was always punctual and gave regularly to charity, told him to hang up right now. If he wanted sex, he could brave the snowstorm and go out and get it. A short ride on the “L” would take him to the bathhouse on Halsted if he wanted a quick and easy connection—or many, many quick and easy connections, some of which would even respond later to penicillin, if he was lucky. Or he could go to Roscoe’s and pick someone up or get picked up. In spite of his shyness, he seldom had any trouble procuring male companionship.
With his finger hovering over the button that would disconnect him from “regular guy,” he stared out the window at the cone of snow coming down hard outside in the light from the streetlamp.
He gave the guy his address. The guy told him he’d be taking the train on account of the weather, but that he should be there inside an hour.
Tommy regretted his decision the whole time he showered, cleaned himself inside and out, and straightened up the apartment, including a quick change of sheets. He hoped against hope that maybe the guy wouldn’t even show up. Then he could throw some porn in the VCR, jack himself off, and be done with this nonsense. Sleep.
But after about an hour had passed, the buzzer rang. It startled Tommy so much, he actually gave out a little scream.
When he opened the door, Tommy sucked in a breath. “Oh my God,” he said without thinking. “It’s you.”
Cole blinked and then smiled at him with that sexy grin of his. He made no attempt to come in, just stood staring back at Tommy, hands at his sides. “I thought you sounded familiar.”
Tommy said, “Me too,” but he was lying. If he’d known it was Cole, he wasn’t sure what he would have done. He’d spent the tail end of fall and all of this winter trying to get over the guy. He’d fallen hard for him—inexplicably, painfully, a real-thing kind of love. And ridding himself, or so he thought, of that encumbrance was the most painful and daunting work he’d ever done. He thought he’d wiped out the fierce feelings Cole had evoked in him, but there was seldom a night when Tommy had fallen asleep or a morning when he’d awaken without seeing that beautiful face in his mind’s eye. He hated himself for it. The guy isn’t interested in you. He’s got a cargo hold full of baggage were just a couple of the common-sense reminders he gave himself on a regular basis.
But there was a reason Tommy had called the phone sex line tonight. There was a reason his bar hookups, one-night stands, even proper dates all died on the vine. And that reason was standing right in front of him, snow rapidly melting from the furry flap-eared hat he wore, the cheeks above his dark sandpaper stubble a bright red from the cold.
Tommy was amazed how much could go through his head in just a couple of moments. He honestly didn’t know what to say, so he simply stood back, making clear by body language that Cole should come in.
There was an awkward pause as Cole stood there in front of him, dripping on the little Persian rug Dora had found at the Brown Elephant thrift store on Halsted. A clear, sensible voice inside of Tommy told him to let Cole warm up and then explain that this wasn’t going to work. Maybe he could even offer the guy cab fare to get home since he’d gone to the trouble of coming across town.
But even as he had these sensible thoughts, he knew he wouldn’t act on them. He couldn’t. He was helpless in front of this man. “Let’s get you out of those wet things.”
“Thanks.” Cole removed his shearling coat, his red wool muffler, his furry hat—handing each in turn to Tommy, who hung them up in the front closet. Tommy stood waiting while Cole hopped around, getting out of his black boots. Tommy procured a newspaper from the coffee table for Cole to put them on. Otherwise Dora would have a fit when she got home to see the salty snow stains on the hardwood.
Tommy shrugged when Cole stood before him in jeans, flannel shirt, and woolen-stockinged feet. This was obviously a situation neither of them had anticipated, even if Cole had really thought Tommy’s voice sounded familiar. It was a nice thought, but he doubted it. Normally, if there was a normal for this situation, Tommy would have turned things immediately sexual. After all, fooling around was the aim for both of them. There were a thousand other things each of them could have been doing on a cold Saturday night aside from throwing caution—and dignity—to the wind on a phone sex line.
Tommy thought he needed to be more of a host and less of a horndog. After all, he wasn’t really sure he wanted to get into bed with Cole. Oh sure, his libido would beg to differ, the half a hard-on he’d had since he opened the door to Cole would beg to differ, but the truth was Tommy had a self-protective streak when it came to his heart, and he knew, if only in his mind, that sleeping with Cole again would very much be like ripping a scar open. He’d made little progress in getting over the guy, but he’d made some. He wasn’t sure he wanted to ruin that. So he said, “You want something to drink? A beer?” Without waiting for an answer, Tommy turned away and went into the living room.
Cole followed. “That sounds good.”
“I have Bud Light. And there’s a bottle of vodka in the freezer if you want some.”
“Cool. How about a shot of vodka with a beer?”
“Party hearty,” Tommy said, without much conviction. He told Cole to grab a seat on the couch and went into the kitchen to get the drinks. He was surprised his hands were shaking a little as he removed the beer and vodka from the fridge. Somehow he managed to crack open a couple of bottles of beer and to pour a juice glass half full (or was it half empty?) for Cole. No way was he doing anything stronger than beer. Tommy needed a clear head. He wanted to make a smart choice.
Would his heart allow him?
He returned to the living room to find Cole on the couch, rolling a joint. “Smoke?” He looked up at Tommy and grinned.
“Nah, man. I haven’t done that stuff since college. All it does is make me hungry… and then fall asleep.” Tommy set the beer and shot down before Cole. “But don’t let me stop you.”
Cole licked the joint shut but didn’t light it. He set it aside on the coffee table. He took a sip of his beer, and Tommy noticed something that touched his heart and gave him a little comfort. Cole’s hand was shaking too.
Tommy sat down next to Cole, took a big gulp of beer that he just barely managed not to choke on, and stared ahead for several moments before taking the plunge and asking, “What are we doing here? I mean, I thought we were done. Not that we ever really started….”
Cole didn’t answer for a long time. Long enough for Tommy to wonder if he’d said the wrong thing. Why can’t I just be like other guys? I should be on my knees between his legs getting busy on his dick. I want that. I need that. But I want too much more. “It’s okay. Stupid question.” Tommy drank some more beer. Maybe I should just ask him to leave.
Cole set down his beer and turned toward Tommy. “It’s not a stupid question.” He paused, looked away, then looked back, locking gazes. “You know what I thought when you opened the door?”
Tommy shook his head.
“I thought, ‘thank God it’s you.’” He sighed. “I’ve been messing around on this shitty phone sex line for the past few months, hooking up way too much with way too many people, a lot of them that I wouldn’t even look at twice if I saw them on the street. Bad on me. And when they leave or I leave, I’m left feeling even more unsatisfied than I was before.”
“Why?” Tommy asked. He hoped the reason was the same for Cole as it was for Tommy, because he just couldn’t get over him. Because none of the guys—and Tommy felt a deep, cutting twinge of jealousy when he thought of these hordes of anonymous
, unfulfilling lovers in Cole’s life—were Tommy.
“I don’t know. Maybe the sex just underscores how alone I really am.” He paused, his eyebrows furrowed together in thought. “It sounds corny. But there’s something weird at work here. I want love, but at the same time, I push it away. To love someone else makes me feel guilty, like I’m cheating, like I’m betraying Rory.” He downed his shot, let out a breath. “I’m talking too much. You don’t want to hear this.”
“No. No, you’re not. It’s just enough.”
They drank in silence for a few minutes. Tension, almost palpable, hung in the air.
Cole nodded toward the window. “It looks like there’s no sign of that snow letting up.”
“Forecasters say we could get as much as ten inches.”
Cole grinned. “Well, even I can’t promise that much.”
The quip made them both laugh, probably much harder than the situation warranted. When the laughs slowed to a trickle, like the final pops of popcorn in the microwavable bag, Tommy looked seriously at Cole and said, “I’m glad you’re here.”
Cole opened his mouth to respond, but Tommy cut him off.
“I’m also not glad you’re here. Does that make any sense?”
Cole eyed the joint on the table, and Tommy could see the want in his eyes, but he left it alone. “Yeah, I suppose it could—make sense. Why don’t you explain a little more just to confirm that I have the right idea?” Cole settled back into the couch, arms spread across the back and his legs also spread wide. The image before him was enough to make Tommy just want to straddle him. Talk was overrated, anyway.
But Tommy thought for a moment and did what he guessed was the right thing. “Last fall? When we met? I really liked you, man. A lot. Couldn’t get you out of my head. I’d wake up in the morning thinking about you. I talked endlessly to Dora about you, about the future I imagined and where things could go with us. So much so that she told me that if I took the word ‘Cole’ out of my vocabulary, I wouldn’t have anything left to say.” Tommy smiled, and his gaze darted down to the floor. Heat rose to his cheeks.
