Short Stories

by Lanyon, Josh

  Even her voice had a kind of hire wire whine to it. It hurt my head. I reached for my glass. “No.”

  “Do you think you could find the house again?” Rob asked slyly, looking from Luke to me. “If you had to?”

  “No.”

  Luke asked, with a funny smile, “Would you want to try?”

  * * * * *

  I should have known the weekend would be a disaster when Luke told me later that evening that he would pick me up Saturday at six a.m.

  “Morning?” I said uncertainly, hoping against hope that he’d got the a.m. and p.m. thing mixed up.

  “Well, yeah. We’ll need to get an early start. There’s a lot of ground to cover, especially if we don’t know where we’re going.”

  He was smiling. He had a great smile: his hazel eyes tilted at the corners and his mouth — he had a very sexy mouth — did this little quirky thing. I felt a powerful tug of attraction — something I hadn’t felt in a long time.

  Still, I knew myself pretty well by then, and I wasn’t at my best and brightest before noon on the weekends. Or any day. “Uh…I’m not much of a morning person.”

  “Mornings can be the best part of the day,” Luke said softly, and it was clear he wasn’t talking cornflakes. His gaze held mine; I literally couldn’t look away. My heart did a little flip.

  “Do you have a sleeping bag?” he added.

  “A…sleeping…bag?”

  “We’ll be spending the night, right? Camping?”

  “Uh…probably. Yeah.” Oh. My. God. Did he mean—? Were we going to—?

  “Don’t sweat it,” he said. “I’ve got you covered.” His eyes twinkled. A cop with twinkly eyes? How much had I had to drink? I checked my glass.

  So, yeah, the upshot: I went to dinner at Rob’s on Thursday night and somehow walked out with a date — my first in over a year — for the weekend.

  “Isn’t Luke hot?” Rob demanded, when he called on Friday afternoon.

  “He’s pretty cute,” I admitted, massaging my throbbing temples. I tried to focus on the monitor screen.

  “Cute?” Rob exclaimed. “That’s like saying Tom Cruise has nice teeth. He’s gorgeous! That grin. Those eyes. That ass.”

  “Enough with Tom Cruise.”

  “I’m talking about Luke!”

  I rubbed my eyes. Tried to read back what I’d written. Garbage. I mean, really, who gave a flying fuck about Scenic Hudson?

  “I didn’t even catch his last name,” I said.

  “O’Brien.”

  “Swell. He probably comes from a long line of Irish cops.”

  “Sure, and don’t you know the way of it, boyo,” Rob returned in a tooth-peeling brogue.

  “I don’t think he’s my type.”

  “What are you talking about? He’s attractive, smart, funny — and he has a steady job.”

  “He carries a gun.”

  “He rarely shoots people on the first date.”

  “I may beg him to; he’s taking me camping.” Against my will, I was smiling.

  “Camping?” Rob recovered quickly. “Camping is a great idea. You’ll love camping. Fresh air, sunshine, exercise…”

  “I hate fresh air, sunshine and exercise. I haven’t been camping since I was thirteen.”

  Rob ignored this. He knows me pretty well. “Where are you going camping?”

  “New Jersey.”

  “Jersey?”

  “Yeah, we’re staying with the Jersey Devil.”

  Rob snickered.

  I added, a little uncomfortable because part of the evening — including the part where I’d agreed to go camping — was fuzzy, “I think he just wanted an excuse to get me to take him to the skull house.”

  “You’re taking him to the skull house?”

  My head was really pounding now. I was going to have to take more painkillers. A lot more painkillers. My poor liver. “I don’t think I could find it if my life depended on it. But Luke seems to think it would be fun to try.”

  Luke. His name felt alien on my tongue. Like it was the first word I’d learned in a foreign language.

  “Wow.” Rob’s single word seemed a little inadequate. I’d have phrased it more like…WTF? “Well, for the record,” he said, “he wanted to meet you before he ever heard about the skull house. He loves that column you write for the New York Blade.”

  Against my will, I was flattered.

  “And,” Rob added, “He said you were really cute.”

  “Cute? That’s like saying Marcelo Gomes has nice legs! I’m gorgeous!”

  * * * * *

  At five fifty-nine a.m. on Saturday morning, my doorbell rang. I stared blearily into the peephole. A tiny Luke stood at the end of what appeared to be an inverted telescope. As I studied him, he raked a self-conscious hand through his hair.

  I stepped back, unlocked the slide and the three deadbolts, and opened the door.

  “You’re early,” I said.

  He laughed. He had a very nice laugh. I laughed too, although I was still convinced the weekend was a mistake. It sort of worried me that I was looking forward to it so much. Looking forward to seeing Luke again.

  He really was good-looking: just over medium height, wide shoulders, narrow hips, long legs. He wore faded Levi’s and a white tee-shirt that read, OK, so I like donuts!! The tee emphasized the rock-hard muscles in his arms.

  “Ready to roll?”

  “I guess.”

  His mouth twitched at the lack of enthusiasm in my voice. He nodded to my backpack. “That it?”

  “Yeah.” I gave him a doubtful look. “You said you’d bring the gear…”

  He picked up my bag. “Yep. We’re good.”

  Were we?

  I followed him out, locked the door with shaking hands and tottered down the street to where he’d parked. He unlocked the passenger side and I crawled inside, slumping with relief in the front seat.

  He stowed my gear in the back of the SUV, came around to his side. “Buckle up.” He smiled, but he was obviously serious.

  I fumbled with the seat belt.

  He started the engine and Springsteen’s We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions picked up where it had left off on the CD player. I was a little surprised. I’m not sure what I was expecting. The Stones? The Seeger Sessions was a good sign; hours of “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction” would have been daunting.

  Somehow the close confines of the car heightened my awareness of him. He smelled like he had just stepped out of the shower. There was another smell too, straight from my idyllic childhood — Hoppes gun cleaner. And here I’d hoped I was kidding about his carrying.

  I asked, “Can we stop and get coffee or something?”

  He glanced at me. “Rough night?”

  “Late night.”

  He nodded like that’s what he’d thought. He found a Starbucks and we got coffee and pastries to go — which Luke insisted on paying for. I felt a little better after the coffee and sugar.

  We started talking. It had been a long time since I had to make dating conversation. Maybe the effort showed.

  Luke asked, “How’s the hangover?”

  I glanced at him. “Wow,” I drawled, “you really are a detective.”

  He lifted a shoulder. “Hey.”

  Hey yourself, I thought irritably, but I let it go. He probably didn’t miss a hell of a lot.

  “How long have you been a detective?”

  “Nine years. In New York, detectives are the equivalent rank of police officers.” He added very casually, “I’m a Detective Second Grade now.”

  I gave him another look. He wasn’t a lot older than me in years, but in experience…light-years. “What’s that like: being a queer cop?”

  “I don’t think of myself as a queer cop. I think of myself as a cop.”

  “Sorry. You know what I mean, though. Is it tough? Or are you not out at work?”

  “I’m out.” He drove with one hand on the wheel, very relaxed, and one hand resting on the seat behind
me. My skin felt alive to the possibility of the brush of his fingertips. If he flexed his fingers he could stroke my neck or touch my shoulder.

  “But you’re right. Law enforcement is a macho gig. I don’t go out of my way to stress that I like to sleep with other guys.”

  “Have you ever shot anyone?”

  He laughed. “Why does everyone ask that? You know how rare it is for a cop to shoot someone?”

  “Have you ever wanted to shoot someone?”

  “All the time!” We both laughed.

  When we reached the Garden State Parkway I began to reluctantly dig through my mostly forgotten memories of that long ago summer. My friend, Ricky, had lived outside of Batsto, that much I remembered, but how far outside, I couldn’t seem to recall. Nothing looked the same.

  We stopped for a late breakfast — or early lunch — at a little pub called Lighthouse Tavern and had a couple of thick, juicy “Alpine” burgers and a couple of beers. By then we were getting along pretty well, having discovered that we had a few vital things in common, namely love of Cuban-Chinese food, Irish music, and really, really bad kung fu movies.

  I mentioned digging the Springsteen track on Jesse Malin’s new album, and he suggested — very off-hand — getting tickets for Malin’s Bowery Ballroom concert if I was interested.

  I said, equally off-hand, yeah, I was probably interested.

  I ordered another beer. Luke again declined on the basis of driving. He seemed thoughtful as I finished my drink. “So what’s the deal with you and cops?” he asked.

  “Huh?”

  “Rob said you had this thing about cops. You get nailed for a DUI or something?”

  What the hell was that supposed to mean? I set my mug down and stared at him, instantly offended. But he just seemed curious. “Hey, for the record, just a couple of drinks can put you over the legal limit if you haven’t eaten.”

  “Sure,” he said peaceably. “So that’s it then?”

  “Not really.” I gave him a sheepish grin. “I mean, I guess everyone is a little intimidated.”

  “Some people are turned on.”

  Our eyes met. I said casually, “That too.”

  He grinned.

  * * * * *

  Just outside of a little hamlet we stopped at the one-hundred-fifty-year-old general store and picked up German sausages, smoke-cured bacon and insect repellent. On our way out of the market I noticed a glass-fronted bulletin board. Tacked on top of the faded flyers and browned cards was a recent poster of a smiling girl: Elizabeth Ann Chattam. Twenty-one years old, freckles, brown hair clipped in big daisy barrettes, blue eyes, last seen hiking in Wharton State Forest.

  “Something wrong?” Luke asked.

  I shook my head.

  Historic villages and blueberry farms gave way to cranberry bogs and cemeteries and ghost towns as we wound through the deep oak-pine forest of the Pinelands National Reserve.

  We left the SUV at Parkdale, an old ghost town with only a rusty railroad bridge and a couple of stone foundations to show civilization had ever made it that far. We loaded our gear onto our backs. Luke checked his cell phone. His mouth did that little pensive quirk.

  “No reception?”

  “I didn’t really think there would be.” He put his phone away. Pulled out a compass and then checked the sun. “We’ve got plenty of time before it gets dark. Any idea which direction we should head?”

  I had exhausted my small store of memory getting us this far. I shrugged on my pack, shook my head. “Even if I —” I realized what I was saying, and shut up.

  “Even if you…wanted to?”

  “Hey, this was your idea. I’m just along for the ride.” I caught his expression, played my comment back in my head, and felt myself reddening.

  He grinned that devilish grin.

  We hiked the sugar sand road for a couple of miles, then moved off onto one of the narrower trails.

  I knew Luke was hoping that something would trigger my memories, but Ricky and I had been lost for hours when we stumbled on the house. It could have been just a mile or so in, or it could have been a day’s walk — we had spent a day walking, but that was as likely due to having lost our sense of direction as necessity.

  “Let me know if anything looks familiar,” he requested when we paused to drink from our canteens.

  I gave him an sardonic look, and he grinned back. When Irish eyes are smiling, I thought. I still couldn’t believe I’d let him talk me into this.

  We kept up a brisk pace until it started to get dark. Then Luke set about finding a good spot to camp. I left it up to him. I was out of shape and feeling it. My feet ached, my calf muscles ached, my back ached. I was just glad I’d done enough walking tours in my time to know how to avoid blisters and heat rash.

  I looked forward to sitting down and having a drink. I wished we could have just…gone away for the weekend; I knew a wonderful little historic bed and breakfast in Crown Point. But I didn’t kid myself after miles of splashing through creeks and climbing over logs; the main attraction for Luke was not me; it really was the skull house.

  That was okay. We could still have some fun. I just hoped the ground wasn’t too hard and the night wasn’t too cold. Or wet.

  Luke found a nice little clearing that already had a campfire ring. I was glad to see the campfire ring, glad to have proof we hadn’t traveled too far off the map. It was weird how a few miles could take you so far from civilization. It was like another world out here. He made up a campfire and we spread our bags out. He unwrapped the brats we’d bought at the little market.

  I made my own preparations. “Cocktails, anyone?” I pulled the carefully-wrapped bottle of Bushmills out of my pack.

  Luke raised his eyebrows. “So that’s what was sloshing around. I thought you’d brought an awful lot of mouthwash for the weekend.”

  * * * * *

  We dined al fresco on barbecued brats wrapped in toasted French rolls, washed down by beer and a whisky chaser. I’m not big on picnics or barbecues, but even I had no complaints that night, not once I’d had a chance to catch my breath.

  “What’s for dessert?” I asked, kidding.

  Luke wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. I laughed and raised the bottle, offering it to him.

  He took it, drank, handed it back. He was still smiling at me. Nodding to our sleeping bags lying a friendly distance from each other, he said, “It’s going to be cold tonight. Should I zip our bags together?”

  It took me a second to get it. I felt my face warm, but I tried to sound indifferent. “Oh. I guess so. Yeah.”

  He zipped the bags, turning them into one giant bag, and before long we were stretched out on our sides, not touching, but within arm’s reach. “Where do you come up with the ideas for the stuff you write?”

  “Things I see. Things I hear.” I shrugged. “Stuff strikes me funny, and I write about it.”

  “I laugh my ass off reading that column you do for the Blade. It’s such a kick the way your mind works.”

  I was insanely flattered, although I tried to hide it. I watched him under my lashes to see if he was serious.

  “And you’ve written books?”

  “Two.” I lifted a negligent shoulder. “Travel books, that’s all.”

  “That’s all? That’s amazing.” His smile was genuinely admiring. “Travel books about where?”

  “Italy. France.” I stopped myself from shrugging again. It wasn’t like I was being unduly modest, I just didn’t think it was a big deal. I hadn’t written the Great American Novel or anything. Not yet. Probably not ever, if I wanted to be realistic — which I rarely did.

  It didn’t matter. The alcohol was singing in my bloodstream, and I was the life of the party. And it was a lovely party: firelight and starlight and the wine-crisp night air, the smell of pines and woodsmoke and lube and latex.

  We were lying next to each other on our doublewide sleeping bag, feet brushing, knees brushing, arms brushing. Gradually we shed our clothes as
we passed the bottle back and forth. More back than forth, but then I was more nervous than Luke. He was smiling and relaxed, reaching over to brush the hair out of my eyes as I talked.

  I totally forgot what I was saying. Luke prompted me by asking about the trip to France, and I answered that it would have been better with someone with me — and maybe he should come next time.

  “Oh, yeah? Where are you going next time?”

  “Ireland.” I said at random, guessing that with a name like O’Brien, he might like to go to Ireland.

  He was amused. His eyes sparkled. “When are you going?” He licked his thumb and reached out to circle my left nipple. I caught my breath, tried to catch his hand and press it to my chest. “I might like to come.”

  “You can come,” I promised, leaning over him.

  I ran my hands over the broad expanse of his chest, the wide shoulders…communing. I could feel the warm flush beneath my fingertips, the damp of perspiration. I loved the language of his bare skin, the delicate punctuation of freckles and a tiny velvety mole on his rib cage.

  I liked the contrast of bristly face and hard jaw with the softness of lips and flickery eyelashes. I scooted closer still, savoring the solid rub of our erections.

  “Are you an innie or an outie?” he inquired huskily, his hand resting on the small of my back, pressing me closer.

  I glanced down at my flat belly, and then chuckled, meeting his eyes. I’d never heard it called that. “I want you to fuck me,” I told him. “I need you to fuck me.”

  “Happy to oblige.”

  He was in great shape, and I liked that too. Rock hard pecs, balls of muscles in his arms; what would it be like to be in that kind of shape? There was a lot of strength, a lot of power there. Big hard hands rested on my hips as he helped me ease onto that straight, rigid cock.

  I cried out and I could see he liked it. He liked it vocal. Oh, he was truly Irish with his love of the blarney.

  “Oh, fuck, you feel so good. You’re so big,” I told him, throatily.

  “You beauty,” he whispered.