by V. L. Locey
I gave him an unamused look. He cocked a dark eyebrow. “At least you didn’t say my dick was small because we both know that’s not the case.” The haughty look on his face disappeared. Yeah, he knew this guy here packed some major cock. “Furthermore, the fact that you’re fucking such a kid is appalling on so many levels. He is literally young enough to be your son. Secondly, no, do not interrupt me—”
“Fuck you, Kye, I’ll interrupt whenever I want. Kirk and I aren’t dating. He’s straight for Christ’s sake. And even if we were you have no right to be acting like you own a piece of me since you forfeited that right about twenty years ago!”
“He’s straight. Ah well,” I said then took a sip of beer. Well, color me embarrassed. “Congrats to him on his heterosexuality.”
He rolled his eyes to the darkening skies. “You’re fucking impossible.”
“No, I’m just trying to get back into your good graces because I want to be with you again.”
His eyes flared. “Are you on drugs? No, I mean it. You must be seriously stoned. There are so many reasons why you and I are never getting back together, but one of the biggest is that you’re not even out!”
“I plan on making a statement soon,” I coughed out knowing that was an incredibly measly reply. “I am.” He snorted and went to stand. “You think I won’t? Watch this.”
I shoved him back down as I stood. Then without a backward glance I bulled my way to the stage and climbed up into the spotlight. The band stopped playing. I strolled up to the lead singer, whispered in his ear, and then was given the mic.
There was a moment when my courage flagged a bit. Then I found Davy at the picnic table under the tree, and our gazes locked. I had to do this to show him I was serious. I was serious, wasn’t I? Yes dammit. I was serious about wanting to win him back and spend my summer loving on him. No man had ever been able to erase him from my mind and my heart. In over twenty years of searching, Davy had kept my love under lock and key.
“Talk or get off the pot, McLeod!”
I snapped out of my revelry. “Shut your pie hole, Mark Peterson!” I shouted back and the crowd guffawed. “I’ll just be a minute. I wanted to make an announcement about something important. I’m gay. Ayup, you heard that right. I’m gay. Have been forever…since egg and sperm met and…well, we’ll skip the biology stuff because the kids are listening but yeah, I’m gay and proud to be so. Right, well, back to the music.”
I handed the mic back to the lead singer and was surprised to hear a round of applause from the crowd. Huh. Not one mean shout or hateful comment was heard as I walked back to the table where Davy sat. He looked shell-shocked. And my beer was gone.
“There.” I sat down beside him and instantly noticed the sly looks we were getting from folks walking past. “I’m serious, David. I’m in this to win. No one has ever loved me like you did, and I’ve looked, trust me.”
He shook his head, his gaze drifting from me to the empty cup in his hand. “We can’t do this, Kye. I can’t do it. I cannot let you in again because you’ll leave. You always leave.”
“No, no, I do not.” His gaze met mine. “Okay, I did once, and never came back but fuck Davy, I was eighteen and scared. I had this chance, you know, a big chance to play hockey but there was this albatross around my neck. I had to make the cut a clean one before someone found out I was gay. If that had come out back then my career would have died before it could get started, you got to understand that much, yeah?”
He rubbed at his nose, a sure sign he was stressed. “I understand that yes, but still…”
“It’s a terrible place to be. Hell, there are gay players in the league now who are hiding it because of the homophobia in pro sports, and that’s today right now.” I rapped a finger to the table. I sensed him weakening and skated in to steal the puck and carry it down the ice for a goal. “So, now I’m out of the game and free to be me, I’m back, and I’m now out and I really want to date you.”
“And then what? If we do start seeing each other again and—no, wipe that stupid happy hound dog look from your face! I said if, not when.” God he was beautiful when he had a temper tantrum. Must be that rich, robust blood from Spain that ran through his veins. I bet even his veins were sexy. Or not. Yeah, probably not. That’s gross actually. “You get Dunny settled and then what? You’re back to Pittsburgh and your life there and where does that leave me?”
That one stalled me for a bit. I’d not thought past this summer and getting Dunny in a better state. Once Dad was up and around, they’d fly up and take over his care until a permanent decision was reached by all parties involved.
“I’m not going back to Pittsburgh.”
We’re not? When did this decision get made? Oh right, the dick is in charge now. Someone call Larry in the Stupid Things the Dick Says Department to try to clean this fucking mess up.
“Uh-huh. Right. I’ll believe that when I see it,” David…Dave…Davy whatever scoffed and stood. I got to my feet as well.
“It’s true. I’m going to buy the studio from Dunny and live there with him so he won’t have to go into a nursing home.”
What the ever-loving fuck? Larry! Larry! Someone get Larry up here now! The dick is in charge. Red alert! LARRY! The dick is buying and selling real estate! LARRY!
Davy stared at me for ages. “I don’t believe you.”
“It’s true,” I insisted.
His perusal of my soul made me edgy. “You show me two solid examples of you putting down roots in this community and I’ll agree to one dinner date. One. And it’s just dinner. Nothing else. Food. Home. No kissing or sex or anything else.”
“Cool! Sure, okay.”
“When I see the deed for the studio in your name, that’ll count as one.”
He handed me my empty cup and disappeared into the crowds. I remained at the table, dumbfounded, as Larry from the Stupid Things the Dick Says Department was looking for rat poison to end it all because there was no way to get out of that whopper that my cock had told and save any kind of face. Poor Larry. He’d seemed like such a nice guy too…
“Okay, so, that was a revelation,” I mumbled, went back to the beer tent, and got a refill. Or thirty. And yeah, I may have spent the night on a boat with people I didn’t know but who were, it turned out, hockey fans and not drug cartel so yay, my life choices were looking better. Well aside from driving poor Larry to snuffing himself out. It was a long, worrisome, rather unsettling ride home. Dunny was out on the front porch holding a big gray goose when I pulled up. I didn’t even ask. I just stumbled around the side of the house to the studio where I showered, threw up in the sink, and fell into my lacy white and pink bed.
The following morning my alarm was a motherfucking goose on my patio making an ungodly racket. Squinting at the frilly sheers on the window, I took note that it was barely light out.
“Shoot me now,” I begged yet no hand of God pulled a trigger. The damn goose kept honking away though. Naked and hungover, I fumbled my way to the sliding door, threw it open with a bang, and whipped a throw pillow at the stupid goose. He/she honked madly and pinched the living piss out of the pillow. Shit. Now Grandma Rose would haunt me. She had probably needlepointed that pillow or something. Stupid goose.
Fearing a ghostly finger wagging, I slipped out into the dawn to fetch the pillow. The goose nearly ripped my dick off, but I did manage to grab the fancy little pillow and race back to the studio, ass shining like a new coin in the first rays of a new day. Once inside with a pane of glass between me and the goose, I did a victory dance with the pillow over my head. Much dick whirling took place. The goose pinched at the glass. I shook my cock at him then proudly made my way to the shower. When I emerged clean but far from sunny, the goose was gone. I spied him/her down on the pond swimming around as if it hadn’t a care in the world.
That was the perfect time to sneak to the house, and so I pounced on my opportunity. Dunny was wearing an old dressing gown with pink posies on it and one sock when I burst through the back
door. His attention was on the damn drone again.
“Okay, what the fuck is with the goose?” I asked, stalking to the coffee pot to pour myself a mug.
“Effie Jones had an extra. Only wanted five bucks for it so I chewed her down to two with the promise of you cleaning her gutters and brought him home. His name is Sampson. He’ll keep those damn cats from pissing on my tires!” He waved a hammer in the air as he spoke.
“What cats?”
“You blind as well as mentally challenged? The cats that come down the road from the Meltwater’s barn and piss on my tires.”
“Dunny, the Meltwater’s barn fell down when I was a senior in high school.”
“Didn’t fall on all them barn cats though did it?” I opened my mouth to reply. “No, it didn’t. They ran into the woods and went feral and now are pissing on my tires every night. Bet old Sampson puts the run into them!”
He cackled maniacally. I shook my head. Jesus and a baby.
“Dunny, you’re not right. Also, don’t be bartering my services for waterfowl, okay? It makes me feel cheap.”
“Ha! My grandson, the two dollar gutter trollop!”
I saw little humor in this whole conversation, but he was quite amused. “Is there any way we can keep the goose away from my damn place? He’s loud and mean as a she-bear in satin.”
“Give you a run, did he? Good, you need to be on your toes.”
“Okay, whatever.” I sighed and pulled out a chair across from the giggling old fool. “I wanted to talk to you about something.” His gaze lifted from the drone to me. “It’s not about the goose.” I planned to make a pillow out of him when I have the chance. Oh. Hey, maybe that’s why he was so mad when I lobbed that throw pillow at him. Probably one of his relatives was inside it. Good. “I’m thinking of maybe moving from Pittsburgh and coming back to Spruce Lake.”
“Yeah, why?” He tapped on the wing of the drone absently, his eyes clear and shrewd. “Got anything to do with that big announcement you made last night down at the lake and the deep conversation you and Dave Aguirre had afterward?” I nearly bobbled my mug but being slick as cat shit and twice as nasty, I managed to only scald a few fingers and not my balls. “Might want to shut your mouth. There was a big old horsefly in here a bit ago.”
“I uhm…” Where the hell were my words? “I uhm…” Dunny sat staring at me waiting. Patiently. Fuck. “Are you disgusted?”
“Disgusted. No, hell, Kye, I knew you were flouncy back when you were a kid. No way two straight boys spent as much time in a tent as you and Aguirre did and not be gay. Also, you left dried spackle on the sleeping bags. Kind of hard to miss that sure sign that you two was up to more than reading comics and talking about titties.”
Heat raced to my face. Dunny sniggered. “So you knew all this time? Did Mom and Dad?”
“Doubtful, they never had to wash man splat off their sleeping bags and borrowed socks. I’m telling you now if you borrow my tube socks again don’t be wiping your spunky-doo off with them.”
“Dunny, Christ alive.” I buried my face into my hand.
“Just saying it’s one thing for a sixteen-year-old gay boy to use your socks for cleaning rags, we all done that when we was young. But for a man of forty to borrow your socks then pump a load all over his boyfriend’s belly and—”
“Okay! Fuck a goose, I get it. Trust me, I’ll use my own socks for clean-up. Not that Davy and I are spurting spackle on each other. He’s mad at me.”
“Ayup, he is, and he got a right to be. You done him bad, Kye. Pass me that glue. I need to keep the rotor in place.” He held out a hand. His fingers curled into claws by arthritis. “Seems to me he run out and took up with the first man he could after you were gone a year or so. Married him eventually. Bad choice. Thought Dave was the smarter of you two, him being in law enforcement and you just cracking skulls.”
“For the record, I went to college so I’m not some illiterate troglodyte.”
“Went to college to learn how to crack skulls and conjugate vowels. Pfft. Waste of good money.”
My headache was getting worse by the second. “First off, you don’t conjugate vowels you conjugate verbs. Also, FYI, that English degree will come in handy when I sit down to pen that autobiography of a famous rich hockey player.”
“Tomato potato.”
“What?” He rolled his eyes as if I were a moron. I mean, I am a moron, but still my feelings are delicate tender things. He could be gentler with them. “My brain hurts. What were we talking about?”
“You not going back to Pittsburgh and being a poof.”
“Ah right. Well, can we use the word gay instead of something so derogatory?”
“Ayup, long as you don’t call me an old man. I prefer the term youth-challenged.”
“Jesus wept, okay fine. That’s a deal.” I was about as lost as a man with a beer-soaked brain could be. “So yeah, I’m thinking of making you an offer on the studio.”
“What would you do with it? You don’t paint.” He took a loud slurp of his coffee and then proceeded to super glue the propeller to the table. “Cock-sucking slob hole! No offense.”
“No, none taken.” It was my turn to do the killer eye roll, but my head ached so badly all I did was wink my eyes, which made Dunny give me an odd look. “As for the studio, I plan to live in it and keep an eye on you so Dad doesn’t have to keep flying up here from Florida all the time.”
He shook a finger at me, one that had a tiny drop of super glue dangling off it. “I don’t need your face here tending me like I was some kind of baby! I’m a grown man.”
“Yup, you are. And you need some assistance which I would be happy to provide since you’re so pleasant to deal with.”
“Fuck off,” he snapped. We took a break in the talking about studios, gays, and geese to make a dash to the Aguirre household for nail polish remover. Mrs. A was not overly happy to see my face, but I did hear her laughing when Sampson chased me back to Dunny’s place. Once we had his fingers unglued, I helped him to clean up for a trip to the barber.
On the way to Pete Butters, who had retired back in the late nineties but still trimmed Dunny’s few hairs in exchange for an afternoon of checkers and talk about Betty Grable’s gams, Dunny brought up the studio again.
“What kind of money are we talking about? For the studio,” he clarified.
I veered to the right to avoid a massive, muddy pothole. “Good question. I think I’d have to do some research online, but I’m willing to give you market value.”
He mulled on that for a bit. “You going to move Davy in there with you?”
How I wished. “We’re a long way from living together. It’s for me, mostly.” And as I said it, I discovered that I meant it, more or less. Buying the studio would solve quite a few problems and would show Davy that I was serious about roots. “I’ve been kind of footloose over the past twenty years someone pointed out. Maybe it’s time for me to be a prodigal grandson.”
“Heh. Give me a million dollars for it and we’ll be good.”
I laughed so hard I had to pull over or risk running into Widow Benton’s lawn and crushing her row of tiger lilies.
“Ah, man, I needed that laugh,” I gasped. Dunny mumbled under his breath the whole way to Pete Butters’ place. We got Dunny inside and seated at the kitchen table. Pete was as old as Dunny, so I worried about his shaking hand and scissors, but Dunny didn’t seem concerned so I left the two gents to their day of games and hot babe talk and headed to town. Everywhere I went I got looks. Not necessarily dirty looks but openly curious ones.
Sitting outside the hardware store on a bench, I watched the American flags snapping, and I sucked down a cold lemonade that I’d grabbed from the cooler as I’d checked out with some screws and a drill. A cordless drill. Dunny’s drill was dangerous. Fucking thing sparked when you used the reverse setting.
I sensed him before I saw him. Davy sense tingling. I rolled my head to the left, and there he sat in his government vehicl
e parked outside the long-closed movie theater. I jogged across the street and rapped on the window. Davy jumped a good six inches. I snickered.
“So, here’s some news,” I said, leaning my beefy forearms on the open window of his deep green ride. “Seems Dunny’s known we were gay since we were sixteen. Also, the news of my coming out seems to be spreading like a bad case of the shits.”
Davy exhaled loudly. “I always thought he suspected we were more than friends. When I came out a few years after you ran off—”
“Left to pursue my dream.”
“Call it what you will, when I came out he wasn’t the least bit surprised.”
“Yeah, he said he knew because we were sloppy spurters and left dried jizz on his sleeping bag and socks,” I said then chuckled. Davy was properly mortified. A fine blush crept into his cheeks. The man was stunning. My fingers needed to feel his skin. Bet it was warm and soft along his belly. It always had been when he was younger…
“My God,” he groaned then pulled his hat down to cover his eyes. I patted his shoulder comfortingly then leaned in to whisper something beside his ear.
“And the town is abuzz over how we had this long, intimate, gay lover type of talk after my moment of glory.” I was on my toes now, my upper half in his SUV. He turned his head so quickly our noses scrubbed. His lips were a breath away. “Maybe we should give them something to really gossip about?”
There was a moment, just a faint second, where I swore he was going to lean in that small bit and kiss me. Instead, he drew back and gave me a shove.
“Get your head out of here. This is a government vehicle and rank civilians aren’t allowed to be inside.”
“It was only my head inside it, and I’m not rank. I showered just an hour ago.”
A tick at the corner of his sweet mouth filled me with a years’ worth of sunshine. I’d almost made him smile. I probably would have floated back to the Tesla if not for the appearance of Officer Justin Timberlake. Petty climbed into the SUV, sat down, and handed Davy a bag from the hardware store filled with who knew what.
