by Aiden Bates
In that moment Vinny decides to hitch his wagon to this shooting star.
2. A Rising Star
Lance lands in Chicago by accident. In fact he doesn’t even feel landed, because his parents were wanderers as they raised him, and are wanderers still when they have the money for it, and so Lance knows that everywhere he is will be a temporary stay until he lands in his own grave, and he’s not looking forward to that—that home can wait.
He ends up in Chicago because he was going to school there, college, but within the year his parents ran out of money to send him, or even to buy him a plane ticket back to Jersey, and so Lance told them, “No worries!” Of course there were a couple of worries, like how to find a job and a bed for the winter, but he had half a semester to figure that out, and he did it just fine.
Lance’s parents are modern Gypsies, artists in the wind, a Jack and Jill of all trades. Together they’re sometimes sculptors, doing installations of metal and glass art whenever they want paid, and constant showbiz actors: dad will do any sort of barking or stilt-walking or performing at county fairs, which often takes them all over the place, and mom will play piano and dance, and of course Lance got an act together too as a kid, miming the lyrics of songs played on the radio to entertain people while they waited in line for the bigger acts.
His parents did their best to home-school him, well enough that he did indeed get into a performing arts school, and they did their best to pay for him to go too, but that barely lasted one semester. So at nineteen they tell him, Sorry son, tough year; either come back to us or go out on your own. Lance decides to go out on his own, sure that he can find something better than just tagging along with mom and dad, and so far he’s been right, at least according to all the other stage people he’s meeting, and even the manager at the restaurant where he works. That guy says his place is a family place, wants him to try to entertain the kids, and Lance is fantastic at that, because kids actually want to laugh! All you have to do is give them a reason to do it and they’ll love you. If you make the kids love you, their parents tend to love you too, and Lance makes good tips and considers it all a sort of practice. Talk about groundlings, you know? No one’s closer to the ground than those little ankle-biters, and he knows how to keep them happy.
It doesn’t always work so well on adults, but tonight it did, and everyone rushes to tell Lance all about it: “Great job, you stopped a heckler and avoided a beating, way to go!” Even Mr. Cool, Vinny something-or-other, Lance doesn’t know his last name, but he’s seen him around . . . even Vinny stops to tell him he did great.
“You’re goddamn hilarious,” he says, and suddenly Lance wants to blush and giggle and pull a veil or snap open a fan in front of his face, turn into a full coquette, and so he goes with that. He carries the coquette bit over to Vinny, and instead of being too cool to improv with him, Vinny meets his character and engages.
“If I’m so hilarious, Big Boy, how come you ain’t laughing?”
“Well, what kind of gentleman would I be if I laughed at such a pretty gal as yourself, with such marvelous talent?”
That voice, Lance doesn’t even have to pretend to swoon; he’s heard Vinny sing a bit but he didn’t know that deep, sweet voice could talk too. It sounds like Bing Crosby’s voice had a baby with the soothing sound of the ocean or the hum of the wheels on a long road trip—it’s gorgeous.
“You flatterer, I bet you say that to all the girls!” Lance says, letting his knees go weak in an exaggerated, simpering way, and Vinny comes out of that suave lean he’s stayed in with his arms crossed to catch Lance at each elbow.
“Now darlin’, be careful! I may be a smooth talker, but I’m all talk; some of these other fellas aren’t so catch and release, they’ll be after you!” And just as he says it, after he catches Lance, he lets him go again. Lance starts batting his eyelashes.
“Well then you better not leave me out here alone with all these scoundrels,” Lance says. “I’ll give you a kiss, just one kiss, Mister, if you’ll see me home safely.”
“You’d trust me with a whole kiss?” Vinny says, his handsome face opening up in wholesome surprise, his dark eyebrows high on his forehead. “How could I ever repay you for such a gift?”
The others are laughing at their little bit now, maybe surprised that Vinny would put up with this silliness, maybe it’s actually funny—Lance would love to know. Maybe he could use it, if not with Vinny than with someone else who can play the straight man, start a whole little routine.
“If you want to repay me, just kiss me back,” Lance says, and leans in with his eyelashes flapping and his lips pursed as far out as they’ll go, like an anteater, and he leans towards Vinny expecting him to put up a hand or turn his cheek to catch it—he’s got plenty of time to block this clownish kiss if he doesn’t want it—but he stays still. As still as a bronze statue, and when Lance kisses him the laughing of their cohorts suddenly stops. Lance is surprised. The playacting was a joke, but the kiss was serious.
The cohorts turn away as Vinny and Lance stare at each other. Once they’ve dispersed, Lance can’t hide his nervousness anymore. He’s fearless when he’s pretending to be someone else, so long as that character is fearless, but as himself he’s a gibbering, embarrassing mess half the time. That’s why he so loves pretending.
“You’re pretty good,” Vinny says. He speaks first because Lance feels like he can’t speak at all, breathless, enchanted. “Would you ever want to work with a partner? I’m not a comedian, I’m a singer, but I think anything that makes us stand out will be good for both of us, don’t you? What do you think? If you’ve got any ideas for a routine, I could do it, I can take orders.”
“I think we’d be great together,” Lance says. He doesn’t just mean on stage.
“That’s great, buddy, that’s really great,” Vinny says. He’s excited but he doesn’t show it much, he still looks like a totally cool customer, checking his pockets to make sure he’s got his keys and his wallet before leaving, and saying, “What do you say we go get a drink or something to eat and brainstorm? Or if you’re broke like I am we can just go to my place, or your place, if you’re not tired or anything. Are you tired?”
I certainly feel like I’m dreaming, Lance thinks, but he doesn’t say that schmaltzy line out loud, not when he isn’t performing the coquette. What he actually says is, “I know where we can get something to eat for free, come on.”
He takes Vinny back to the restaurant, where it’s almost closing time and they’re allowed to eat any leftovers that can’t be legally resold. It’s really not anything you’d buy, mostly it’s just edible gunk scraped off the grill and whatever has today as an expiration date from under the display glass of pastries. Vinny and Lance sit down to some burnt egg and meat and vegetable stove hash and some cupcakes with hard bases and somehow gelled frosting—something about the condensation under the lights, it’s both hardened and slick on the outside—but none of it is poisonous yet, and they’re both hungry enough to eat it.
“So what could I do in some kind of act? I can’t really run around like you do, I’m not that creative, but I can sing, like I said, would that help?”
“We could work out something like what we had going just now, the others were laughing. Like a joke of the old fashioned boy-girl act, but with me as the simpleton who doesn’t get that you’re just putting up with me.”
“Is that why they were laughing? Man, we’d have to practice, I didn’t know my motivation.” Vinny starts eating his cupcake and gets blue frosting on the edge of his lip.
“Don’t worry about it, and don’t think too much, let me do all the clowning,” Lance says, reaching over to wipe the icing off of Vinny’s mouth, and then touch-up his hair and brush his shoulder, to illustrate the point. “See you just sit there and stay cool, and then pat me on the head or something like I’m your dumb little brother playing dress-up way too hard. They audience will identify with you, and you’ll make it okay to laugh at me.”
&
nbsp; “I guess you’ve put a lot of thought into this stuff,” Vinny says. He’s done with his food and is now drinking his soda from the cup. It came with a straw in it, but Vinny threw that aside like it was too cutesy for him and drinks it like he would a glass of beer or a cup of coffee, like a man. Lance collects Vinny’s straw and picks up his own and sticks them both over his eyeteeth, like the tusks of a walrus. He doesn’t do more than that, just lets them hang there. Vinny smiles at him, and boy, what a smile. Warm smile, kind eyes, and ringlets in his dark hair that for sure he doesn’t put there purposely, they just tumble out of bed with him. Handsome devil.
When the food is done, they end up walking the same direction, Lance towards home, and Vinny towards the train station. Lance wishes something would make him stop in for the night, but his goddamn train line runs 24 hours, and they’ve already agreed to meet next Thursday in Vinny’s neighborhood where he knows of an empty office to practice something to take on stage, and so there’s nothing keeping him around, and Lance can’t think of a thing to say, so…he takes a chance on the coquette again.
“Say, Mister, it’s awfully dark and lonesome out here at night, and I know a big tough guy like you ain’t afraid, but me, I get scared even with fourteen locks and a whistle on my nightstand, it’s a dangerous city.”
They’re waiting for a car to pass before they can cross the street to where Lance’s building is, so it’s now or never. Lance holds his breath waiting, wondering if Vinny will join in on the joke again, or if he only performs on stage and not everywhere like Lance does, performing his own life.
“Fourteen? How long does it take you to do up all those locks when you get home?”
Lance smiles, and then has to wipe it off his face to stay in character. “Oh, ages, you should let me show you, it’s worse than trying to string up my own corset. Come see, you won’t believe it.”
“Well, alright, lead the way.”
Lance walks upstairs with Vinny behind him—he’s on the third story, and there are only two locks on his door, the one in the knob and the deadbolt, but he doesn’t worry about that now. He just wants to get Vinny inside, and trusts that his showmanship will kick in, since it’s never once failed him in the moment of crisis, when it’s either do something, say something, or quit and walk off. He’s never walked off and he doesn’t intend to start now.
They walk into his place, a one-bedroom that’s more like a closet, but it’s still too big for all of Lance’s possessions, he doesn’t make a habit of owning much since he’d just have to schlep it for the next move anyway, and there’s always another move coming. Vinny watches Lance lock his two basic locks, and looks to Lance to take his cue—is the bit done, or where do we go from here? Lance has an inspiration.
He takes Vinny by the shoulders, and moves him in front of the door, with his back to the locks, and starts using Vinny’s body to play the locks.
“See I always start at the top, with the chain, so no one can push in while I do up all the other locks.” He touches Vinny’s hair, pulling it to the side as if securing a chain. “Then there’s this one,” he says, tweaking Vinny’s nose, “and these two halves,” tugging his ears, “and snapping shut this one,” pinching his lips together, and then he moves lower.
He pokes the places where Vinny ought to have nipples, and then there’s really only one more place to go. He touches Vinny’s fly, undoing the button (lock number eight), then tugs down the zipper (lock number nine), then reaches in to cup Vinny’s junk over his underpants, and even counting his balls they’re still not up to fourteen locks before Lance is at the final destination.
He’s stroking Vinny through his shorts, and Vinny’s letting him, not moving a millimeter, until he says, “Sweetheart, I think you miscounted,” and Lance feels his face fall, wondering if this is his rejection, you misjudged the situation, I’m not that way, I’m not that interested, but instead he goes on saying, “You don’t have enough locks to keep you safe, I’d better stay the night with you.”
“Oh, would you? My hero,” Lance whispers, before leaning in to kiss Vinny with more seriousness than before: no silly pucker, no game, no joke.
This time Vinny kisses him back.
Lance is ready for this night to start careening, he’s ready to be tearing off clothes and pushing and shoving and frenzied, but Vinny’s cool even now. He holds Lance still and kisses him, holding down his arms every time he goes to scramble his hands over Vinny’s body.
When Lance is still, Vinny lets him go, and starts taking off his own clothes and nodding that Lance should do the same. He makes it into a mirror game: your left shoe, my right, your pants, my pants, until they’re both standing there naked, and Vinny holds out his arms for a hug.
Lance wishes he could just melt into this guy. This full-body hug just feels so right, skin to skin, chest to chest, practically heart to heart. Vinny’s hips start to sway against him, like he wants to slow dance. Lance picks up one of his legs and wraps it around Vinny’s lower back, just begging to be swept off his feet. Vinny lifts him up by his cheeks, lets Lance wrap both legs around him and kiss his head and face all over while Vinny walks them both to the bed.
He lowers Lance onto the bed, and Lance has never felt so pleased to be in his own bed, it’s never felt so special. Vinny’s body is as lean and brown as a polished mahogany bedpost, and his cock sticks out like a javelin. Lance knows how he’d joke about it—Italian Stallion, quite a salami you’ve got there, talk about sausage and meatballs—and though the thought of idiotic humor makes him smile a bit, it’s just not a laughing matter right now. Vinny is still smiling though, the tolerant smile of a big brother, of someone who knows better than you about everything, but still loves you enough to teach you.
“How old are you?” Lance asks. Vinny just seems so worldly, he’s got to be older.
“Twenty-eight,” Vinny says. “And how about you?”
“Nineteen,” Lance says.
“Nineteen!” Vinny feigns surprise, even whistles through his teeth, which Lance can’t even do with his lips, and he’s tried to learn. You’d think with all the flexibility he has all over his mug he could at least whistle, but that trick’s in the tongue. “You’re just a baby.”
“I’m old enough,” Lance says.
“Have you done this before, baby?” Vinny asks as he puts a knee up on the bed and bends over to start touching the seam of Lance, the part of him that can be split open.
“Not this, not exactly,” Lance says. He’s just moved around so much and never met anyone who felt special enough to go so far with. They didn’t look at him like Vinny does, they didn’t value him like Vinny does, Vinny who wants to work with him, and learn from him, at least about how to be funny. Lance has kissed and touched and tugged and even sucked once, but never this. His heart feels like a trapped hummingbird.
“Believe me, it feels like it’s from out of this world,” Vinny says as he lowers himself down over Lance, prodding the pucker at his crease with both his hand and his cock, and never pressing too hard. “We’ll take it easy, alright? I’d never hurt you, baby.”
Lance stretches up to kiss Vinny now, and trusts him to do what he says. While his lips are still on Vinny’s, he pops the head in, pops the cherry—it’s a surprise, but by the time Lance realizes it, he’s just grateful he didn’t know it was coming and have time to flinch. Vinny pops it in and out, in and out, just the tip, just to get a transfer of moisture going, and to get Lance loose enough to work in further without hurting him. When the thrusts start to get longer, and Lance can feel them pushing against his insides, opening up a space he’s never quite felt before, he starts to whimper, and to tug on Vinny’s hair for something to hold on to.
“How do you feel?” Vinny asks, turning to kiss the wrist of the hand that’s grabbing his curls. “Still alright?”
“I feel so…full,” Lance says, he can’t really think of another word he wants to say to describe it. It’s a satisfying presence within him, like being
full of a Thanksgiving feast, or warm and tight inside a quilt when it’s cold outside. He feels full, grasped and taken care of.
“You feel fucked,” Vinny tells him, and the dirty word makes Lance’s skin flush, because this is what that word really means, and it’s not so dirty at all: it’s thrilling. “I’ll fill you up, are you ready, baby?” Vinny asks, thrusting deeper and firmer each time, until Lance swears he can feel it at the back of his throat, the way it feels when he’s just about to cry. “You want your insides full of my cum?”
“Oh god, yeah,” Lance whispers, before Vinny sticks his tongue into Lance’s open mouth, and sucks on his tongue as he does it, as he finishes and disgorges his milk into the needy space he’s created. Lance latches his legs around Vinny, and hooks his heels together wanting to lock it in, to keep Vinny and his cock and his deposit all right where they are, a part of Lance for good.
But Vinny won’t have it. After a moment of fading gasps, he starts to pull Lance’s limbs off of him. Lance looks down and realizes that he came without even touching himself, that it leaked over his stomach while Vinny climaxed, which explains why that felt like such exquisite agony. Vinny sees this too, and smiles at Lance, like way to go, kiddo. Lance feels his insides flutter, and wonders if Vinny feels that twitch too before he pulls out.
Vinny walks into the bathroom, and Lance wonders if he’s just going to wash off and leave before he hears water running into the bath tub, and Vinny pops back out to beckon him forward.
“You have a bath tub, my place doesn’t, and I love them. Let’s take a bath, come on.”
That sounds like the best idea Lance has ever heard. He leaps out of bed.
