Digging Deep

by Jay Hogan

  “Whatever.” I cut him off. I didn’t want any more apologies, or any reminder of how embarrassing the whole fucked-up experience had been. “So, are we done now?”

  He never got to answer as all hell broke loose behind us. Two family members grabbed at the poor constable tasked with calming them down, and he hit the floor cupping a bloodied nose. Caleb put himself between me and the ruckus, which did funny things to my stomach, and then directed another constable to hit the desk alarm. Bodies burst from the back of the station, and the whole thing was over in seconds as instigators were handcuffed, and the family dispersed under threat of arrest. They left, muttering drunken obscenities.

  With calm restored, Caleb stepped away and faced me again. “Sorry, you said something?”

  I had? I had. Oh, right. “I said, are we done now?” But in the face of Caleb’s protective behaviour, the words sounded petulant, and I felt like a two-year-old throwing a tantrum.

  “I….” He hesitated, looking like he wanted to say something more but didn’t. In the end he simply nodded. “Yeah, we’re done.”

  Which left me vaguely… disappointed. Stupid. I’d got what I wanted, right? Now I could go home and forget this fucked-up day ever happened.

  I drew breath. “Good, because I’d like to get home.” I stared out the door, shaking my head. “Though I’m not sure how the fuck I’m gonna do that, seeing as how my car is still parked downtown.” I side-eyed him meaningfully.

  He looked almost sheepish. “Ah yeah, sorry about that. I’d offer, but we’re….”

  “A bit short-staffed,” we both said at the same time.

  “Uber?” Caleb suggested, eyes intense above that fucking beauty spot.

  I glared and said nothing, my gaze catching that of the desk sergeant, who was watching us with interest and more than a little amusement. Super.

  Caleb looked a little… rattled, to be honest, and I almost felt sorry for him… almost. Then his teeth caught that juicy bottom lip, and I was immediately transfixed when I should have just legged it out of there while I had the chance. I could fuel a lot of fantasies with those lips and… oh my God, I was sporting a semi. Unbelievable, not to mention fucking inconvenient.

  A recent change in my medication regime meant I was temporarily lucky to manage a slight chub, outside of an extended and very determined dialogue with my hand, so it was all I could do not to unzip and verify the data. My body would adjust in a few weeks―it always did… so far. I covered the traitorous appendage with my jacket instead, and if Caleb noticed, he didn’t show it. That at least removed the temptation for me to palm it and shout hallelujah.

  My nether regions had been a minefield of trivial but irritating issues for a month or so as my Crohn’s had niggled away in one form or another, putting paid to even entertaining thoughts of sexy times. Nothing major, just enough to send my libido on a vacation till things settled, so much so that I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d got a random semi in the full light of day.

  The last couple of weeks had seen things returning to a little more of what passed as my normal, thank God, but rather than being relieved to find I still had the required skillset, I found it vaguely unnerving. Being reacquainted with desire and arousal in the presence of a man who clearly pushed all my buttons only served to underscore the pathetic state of my sex life. Absent libido at least meant no decisions to make, no risks, no rejection, and no mind-numbing, vacant-hole-in-my-bed loneliness, although the latter, with or without sex, was increasingly screwing with my head. Not desiring was a much easier option all round.

  At thirty, there were an appallingly large number of years ahead of me to navigate without a soul mate, and even thinking about it spun me into a black hole. Wanting the sexy man in front of me was a complication I didn’t need, a nest of vipers even on a good day. Getting laid to take the edge off wasn’t really an option for me most of the time either. I wasn’t really that guy even without the Crohn’s. And as for spontaneous sex? Get out of here. I mean, holy fuck, any sex at all could be dodgy some weeks.

  Having Crohn’s added a whole extra level of physical and emotional complication that made casual sex anything but, let alone finding a boyfriend prepared to accept the impact on a relationship. Working around my laundry list of necessities in life could be daunting, even for me.

  Spontaneity? What the fuck was that? Something a young Drake vaguely remembered from preteen years. Nowadays, I was lucky if I didn’t need to plan a damn outing to the supermarket. And no, that’s not a joke. If it doesn’t have a good public toilet handy, I don’t go. Game over. And that pretty much applied to every other event in my life—work, social, whatever.

  Walks, day trips to the beach, even shopping trips to town have pre-scheduled restroom opportunities. And that’s not even starting on the diet restrictions—restaurant menus, what a nightmare—sore joints, painful eyes, weight loss, and a fucking partridge in a pear tree. And then there was the mind-numbing pain. Hours, days, sometimes weeks couch-bound, with cramping and the kind of agony only an ulcerated, bleeding, and totally fucked-up digestive tract can offer. Mouth to arse and everything in between.

  So, yeah, Drake Park wasn’t an easy or a good bet, not in anyone’s books. I knew that.

  Caleb eyed me warily, clearly wondering why I hadn’t left him in my dust already. Join the club. I don’t know why, but I wanted to hear whatever it was he seemed so conflicted about, and so I waited him out. I should have known better.

  “So, I was wondering—” His gaze fixed almost nervously on mine.

  Oh, fuck no. My throat tightened. This I hadn’t expected. Surely, he wasn’t….

  “—if maybe you’d like to get a coffee… sometime… if you want, that is?”

  Yes. What? No. I nearly choked on my tongue. Was he joking? “Are you joking?” He got ten for audacity if nothing else.

  “No, I wasn’t, actually. I mean, you are gay, right? Or have I totally screwed this up?” He threw me a wide, bright smile, hazel eyes running over my face as if he sincerely liked what he saw. In my current affection-starved state, I was tempted… and flattered… and did I mention tempted? But… ugh. I mentally slapped myself sideways so I didn’t fall to my knees and offer to have his children right then and there. Okay, that was an exaggeration… probably. Jesus Christ, I needed to get my head on. Actually I needed to get laid but, yeah, about that, see above already.

  I narrowed my gaze. “No to the coffee, and yes to the gay. But I’m not in the market for a date with anyone, let alone someone who just arrested me, and was then responsible for my near humiliation. Are we clear?” I spun to leave.

  “So, does that mean you already have a boyfriend?”

  I stopped in my tracks. The man was either epically determined or seriously socially handicapped. My money was on the latter. I turned slowly to face him.

  “No, I don’t. Not that it’s any of your business. I’m just not currently dating. And now I have to go. Have a nice life, detective.”

  This time I turned and kept going. It really was best all round.

  Caleb

  I WATCHED Drake leave, and felt something ridiculously close to disappointment, all the while fighting the urge to chase after him and try to change his mind. Those should’ve been horrifyingly good enough reasons to wave good riddance to the prickly bundle of cuteness. He had trouble written all over that beautiful face, trouble I could well do without.

  It had been a while since I’d been turned down so emphatically by a guy. I prided myself on having a pretty good game on the whole, but yeah, it happened once in a while. So why I gave a damn about this particular guy, who the fuck knew? Didn’t change the fact that I was… yeah, disappointed. There was that word again. Caleb Ashton didn’t chase, and he didn’t do nerves or disappointment, not over men.

  I could chalk my interest up to having been a dick and wanting to make it up to the man, but the truth was I had a penchant for dickly behaviour, and looking to apologise for said dickishnes
s had never featured high on my agenda at the best of times. You only needed to ask family and work colleagues and, ah… well, most of the guys I’d dated or fucked… yeah, mostly fucked. It wasn’t that I didn’t do relationships, I just hadn’t met anyone that seemed worth the effort.

  I could say it was down to the fact he was hot, because he so fucking was. Shorter by a good five inches, which admittedly might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but was mine, apparently, he was slender, maybe a little too much so—I felt the desperate urge to feed the man up, and… ugh, don’t even start on where the fuck those thoughts came from. He had elegant hands, long legs, and a cute-as-fuck tight little butt that had my mouth watering. Fine-featured with little to no facial hair, soft creamy olive skin, inky silk hair cut in an asymmetrical style, and liquid brown eyes that sparked with irritation and snarky smarts.

  So yeah, he was hot, but so what? I could pull “hot” most times I wanted without breaking a sweat or having to jump through hoops for it. Or even worse, stoop to actually asking twice. Why this dude had me tied in knots, who knew? I just needed to file it as one of those rare UFO phenomena. An Unrequited Fucking Opportunity.

  Chapter Two

  Caleb

  “OW. WHAT the hell was that for?” I shook my hand, fingers smarting from Carmen’s nail flick. With her ebony hair swept up into some kind of retro beehive, enough make-up and perfume to keep Chanel stocks liquid for the foreseeable future, painted-on black jeans, a lace cropped jacket, and a killer pair of cherry-red heels, Carmen Bendover had dressed down for our semiregular monthly brunch at our favourite bustling Charlie’s Café.

  One of the most popular and successful drag queens to strut her stuff in Auckland’s K Road clubs and theatres, Carmen still called Whangarei home and visited as often as possible. Her Maori family and extended whanau had deep roots in the area and supported the ever-loving shit out of her. I never knew until she sashayed in the door whether I’d be sharing my table with Carmen or her alter ego, the equally gorgeous Daniel Tamati, giving me mere seconds to get my pronoun ducks in a row. I’m quite sure she did it deliberately.

  “I’m just getting in early for the undoubtedly dickish thing you’re about to admit having done, darling,” she purred.

  Whereas Daniel’s voice had a soft sandpaper edge, Carmen always managed a sleek purr. Alongside why we can’t see black matter and who the fuck thought it was a good idea to have an s in lisp, it was one of life’s elusive mysteries. In a slip of common sense, I’d brought her up to date on the whole weekend Drake, arrest… thingy.

  “I didn’t do anything.” I protested weakly, watching my best friend add a third sachet of sugar to her coffee, stirring vigorously. My teeth ached at the mere sight.

  Tabling her spoon with obvious annoyance, she pinned me with a fierce glare, those impossibly long lashes batting ominously. “The fact you even say that only guarantees it’s gonna be worse than usual.”

  Yeah, she was good. “Oh, come on. I’m not that bad….”

  She reached over and flicked me again, harder.

  I jerked my hand back. “Fuck.”

  “Language,” Carmen scolded, returning her attention to the half-eaten eggs Benedict.

  The parents of a young family sitting close by sent me a haughty disapproving stare. I mouthed an apology, which only had them scowling further.

  I glared at Carmen. “No more or I’ll arrest you for assault.” I rubbed the stinging welts.

  She leaned back in her chair and smirked. “Yeah, like that’s ever gonna happen. Your sergeant loves me.”

  I narrowed my gaze. “He loves you because you refused to charge for the Christmas revue last year. Meant he could order more booze.”

  Carmen spun her web of charm over even the toughest crew. You’d think a drag queen in a cop station would be a recipe for disaster, but as usual, Carmen turned out to be an asset no matter what the context.

  She grinned wickedly at the reminder. “Hey, it was a public service. Gotta look after our boys in blue, right? And holy shit, in all honesty, I should’ve been paying them. Damn, but some of those boys are cute, especially that tall drink of water…. Gordon was it? No, Gary. Lordy.” She fanned her face. “Got me so steamed up under my sequins, I had to disappear and retuck at half-time.”

  I nearly choked on the lump of breakfast sausage in my mouth. “Stop right there. I have to work with those guys. Besides, Pete was running interference on any untoward interest in your fishnets that night.” Carmen’s husband was nothing if not overprotective of his spouse.

  Carmen gave a wide dreamy grin. “God, I love that man.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. Twelve years older than his drag queen husband, Pete stood nearly a foot shorter than Carmen in her heels and was about as pale-skinned Pakeha as they came. He had a semi-balding pate and a dwindling six-pack that had long since seen its best years, but the two wore their love in capitalised neon lights above their heads, leaving no one in any doubt what they meant to each other.

  Carmen’s extended family had embraced a wide-eyed Pete Simons with the same warmth and humour they’d shown the young Daniel Tamati when he’d come out to them at fifteen, wearing a dress and heels. Booking their son an immediate appointment for a bra and falsie fitting in a local lingerie shop had answered any and all questions Daniel might’ve had about whether he’d be accepted or not. The rest was drag history.

  Carmen side-eyed me. “Quit changing the subject, Cal. I know you too well.”

  And wasn’t that the truth.

  Wicked smart, as in top 5 percent of the school smart, she’d been my best friend since fourteen when her lips provided me with my first mind-blowing foray into what kissing was meant to feel like. Carmen, or Daniel as she was only known back then, was a force of nature. Hidden behind the school swimming pool, wearing our swimsuits and not much else bar an inconvenient erection on my part, he’d answered more questions than my confused teenage brain had even thought to conceive about my sexuality.

  Some excellent kissing and a surprisingly deft hand job on his part pretty much covered the one and only sexual experience we ever shared, but it cemented our friendship. Even back then we instinctively knew we didn’t “fit” that way, but as friends, we rocked, something we both badly needed at the time.

  Later in life, Daniel admitted that he’d dragged my closeted preteen arse behind that pool with the sole intent of making sure I “owned” myself so I could step up and be his friend. Carmen was about to make her debut in Daniel’s life, and he knew he was gonna need someone at his back. In his words, he liked the potential he saw in me, if I could just get over myself. It was so… Carmen, as it turned out.

  Once he’d “polished my gay up”—his words, not mine—he introduced me to his burgeoning alter ego Carmen (still in development at that stage) and ensured I knew that would be the last hand job I ever got from him/her. Though a little kissing was acceptable since I clearly needed the practice, but only until I’d upskilled enough to satisfy his standards.

  He instructed me to be outside his house at eight the next day to walk to school, warning me not to be late. I was there on the dot and every school morning after that for the next five years. We had each other’s backs in every way two queer, nerdy, angst-ridden, hormonal teenage boys needed.

  “I wasn’t changing the subject,” I griped. “I’m just trying to avoid the inevitable rant I sense heading my way. I’m thirty-six, sweetheart. I don’t need your advice.”

  I barely ducked in time before her Gucci handbag caught my shoulder and the attention of half the café in the process. Thankfully Carmen was well known locally, so most patrons just grinned fondly and went back to their conversations with barely a raised brow. The remaining few disapproving scowls were silenced with one steely sweep of her gaze.

  “That’s exactly why you need my advice, you moron,” she huffed, cutting her toast with military precision into ever decreasing portions as I watched on, fascinated. She then set about lining them up
checkerboard-style and assigning each piece a precise amount of egg, salmon, and hollandaise sauce. “You should know better. Now spill.”

  There was no point arguing. In this acerbic mood, Carmen could strip wallpaper at fifty feet with barely a glance, so I gave up the whole story, including how equally frustrating and delicious Drake Park was and how I needed that shit in my life like a hole in the head.

  “That can be arranged” was her irritated response as she stole half my crispy bacon with two polished crimson talons.

  My turn to swat her hand. “You ordered salmon. You could’ve had bacon.”

  “I didn’t know I wanted it then.”

  “I’ll fade away.”

  She snorted. “Like that’s even a possibility.” She poked my stomach. “I’m doing you a favour… podgy.”

  I slapped her hand aside and patted my hard-won six-pack. “We all know that’s a lie. Besides, I’m not the one who went up a size for last month’s drag revue at Impact.”

  Carmen’s fork paused mid path to her lips, her entire body rigid in her chair, and I caught a cough of amused disbelief from whoever sat behind me. Fuck. Criticising a drag queen’s weight, even jokingly, was akin to juggling Russia’s nuclear arsenal in one hand. What part of stupid had I missed?

  She stabbed the fork my way, and I ducked reflexively. “I was trying out a new set of breast enhancers, arsehole,” she snapped loudly. “I haven’t gained a thing in ten years. This body is a temple. What the fuck is wrong with you?” She spun to the family still finishing their breakfast. “Sorry, my bad.” Then she blew them a kiss.

  They grinned back and dismissed her with a wave. What the hell?

  Grovel time. I reached for Carmen’s hand and kissed her palm dramatically. “I know. I’m sorry. You’re always beautiful and elegant and adorable, and I’m just so privileged to be your unworthy friend….” I dropped my bottom lip and paused to see whether I’d passed muster.