The Hideaway Inn

by Philip William Stover

  Kevin explains that he and his husband rebuilt the entire operation. They bought the place at auction and it needed a massive amount of work since the estate had been left abandoned for over a decade. In the kitchen near the dairy he lets me sample the goat cheese made on the farm. Tack spreads some on a cracker for me and tops it with some fresh chives and oregano. There is a creamy explosion of sharpness and comfort in my mouth and I think the cheese is only partially to blame.

  The late June humidity begins to rise enough by early afternoon that the crisp air turns heavy. Kevin takes us out of the kitchen and down the stone path closer to the stream. “This way,” he says, holding up the low branches of a majestic willow tree.

  Behind the tree is an oasis. A lush stream bends around a smooth jetty of rock and the turn forces the water to gurgle as it passes by. Ferns dot the far side of the stream and a cluster of trees create a canopy that filters the sunlight so that the leaves shimmer like emerald stained glass.

  Kevin sits down on a rock and takes off his shoes and socks then rolls up his pant legs before dipping his feet into the water. Tack and I start to do the same.

  Kevin takes a loud breath in and out and then gazes across the stream to the forest. “Shinrin-yoku,” he says as he tilts his head back to soak it all in.

  “Is that the name of those trees?” I ask.

  “No,” he says, taking another breath. “It’s the reason we left finance to come out here. Shinrin-yoku is a Japanese word. It doesn’t have an English equivalent. It basically means forest-bathing. It’s considered a way of healing and Evan needed that. Well, really we both needed that after the pressure of the city.”

  Kevin’s cell phone dings. “Speaking of Evan,” he says, looking at the screen. “Hmm. Hard to believe there is such a thing as a cheese emergency but Evan has just texted to assure me that there is.” Kevin pulls his feet out of the water.

  I go to get up and Kevin stops me. “Don’t let my cheese emergency interrupt you. Stay. Enjoy the trees. A pleasure to meet you, Vince. You’ve seen the operation. You’ve tasted the product. If you think any of our goods are the right fit for your restaurant, Evan would be happy to talk numbers when he returns.” He puts on his shoes as we finish taking off ours. He pushes back the branches to exit but before he leaves, he turns. “By the way, the creek is deep enough here for a swim if you two want to go skinny-dipping. With me and Evan it’s more of a chunky dunk but you get the idea.” He chuckles to himself over his joke, delighted that he has given the pot one last stir.

  I look at Tack and he looks back at me. The air is sticky and thick by our heads but our feet dangle just above the cool rushing water and I can feel the cold on the bottoms of my feet.

  “Are you ready?” Tack asks. I’m not at all but I nod and we both put our feet in the water at the same time. We feel the icy sensation of the water in the same moment. I stifle a sharp yelp and just let the freezing water cool me down and I see the grimace on Tack’s face. We are sharing the experience. No one is swooping in to save the day, no one is in charge. We’re just together, for a moment, in the woods.

  The water creates an uncontrollable sensation. I want to pull my feet out but I fight against the urge and I’m rewarded when the initial shock gives way to the relaxing calm of the cool water. I let my defenses down and close my eyes and try to just be on the side of this beautiful creek with this canopy of green and with Tack. Shinrin-yoku.

  “This feels great,” he says quietly.

  “Agreed,” I mutter back, rolling my head back and stirring the water with my toes.

  My defenses are down so I can’t hold back what’s on my mind.

  “Tell me about your kid,” I say casually. I’m genuinely curious.

  “Sure,” Tack says. “What do you want to know?”

  “Well, is it a boy or a girl?” I ask, my feet still pulling me into a state of relaxation.

  “That’s a hard question to answer,” he says. I open my eyes and look over at him. His mood has not seemed to shift at all.

  “Oh,” I say, realizing the question I thought was the easiest might be the hardest. His eyes are still closed as his face stretches up to meet a beam of sunlight that has found its way through the leaves. When he opens them I turn away, but not as quickly as I might have yesterday.

  “Jules is a wonderful kid. Always has been. Pure joy, happiness and imagination. When they were born we named them James.”

  “After your uncle?” Tack always thought his uncle James was a god. Tack’s mom died in a car accident and James was the only connection Tack had to that side of the family.

  “Exactly.”

  “But you call him Jules.”

  “I call them Jules,” Tack says with a mild correction. “Jules is the bravest person I’ve ever met.” He looks at me quickly and corrects himself: “One of the bravest people I have ever met. They have always loved dresses and tea parties and dancing but also trucks and physical activity. But whenever they would ask their kindergarten teacher at school if they could play with a doll or dance in a tutu, the teacher would force them to start throwing a football or some other hyper-masculine bullshit.”

  I look down at the water with a severe pang of guilt. My entire life is hyper-masculine bullshit now. I know what it’s like to be told you have to act a certain way. My response was to shut down, readjust, conform.

  “So you think Jules is trans?” I ask.

  “They are six. I don’t know. I mean, maybe. I mean, I don’t know. They don’t like being forced into some boy things but they love trucks. I don’t think they understand themselves as a girl but they like to wear dresses. Or maybe they do. I don’t know. They like being called Jules and Jules likes being called they so we do that.” Tack takes a rock from his side and throws it into the stream. “All I know is that I’m not going to force him to be something he isn’t. He’s my kid and I love them and they can be whatever the fuck he wants to be. I don’t want him to feel he has to be anything. I don’t want him to feel they have to be trans or that they aren’t allowed to be.”

  I notice his pronouns slide but I’m very conscious of his effort.

  “It’s just hard. We were talking about the past and I wanted you to know because I always regretted how I behaved but now, with Jules, it’s more than regret I have. I won’t make the same mistakes I made not standing up for you. When I see Jules being stifled I remember how you were tormented. I can’t imagine how hard it was for you and you handled it all on your own. You figured out exactly who you were.”

  Finally I understand what he meant about looking up to me in high school. But still, it’s hard to take in. I hated being teased but I felt like I couldn’t control the things that made me a source of ridicule. Later as I became an adult I was able to erase any aspect of my personality that I thought was a weakness. But talking to Tack about his kid makes me wonder why the categories ever existed. “Jules will figure it out,” I say. They seem more self-possessed at six than I was at sixteen. “It sounds to me like you’re a pretty amazing father.”

  “Does it? When it takes the courage of your little kid to teach you to stop living a lie, I’m not sure I’m up for father of the year.”

  I look over at him and say, “Well, I think you are.”

  His pants are rolled up to his knees as ripples of water dance around his feet. He looks me dead in the eye and says, “Gurl, puhleeze.” He waves his hand behind his shoulder in a pantomime hair flip and we both immediately laugh. I’ve never seen Tack do that before and it cracks me up. The mood changes from serious confessional to playful and winsome. The heavy secret that has kept us both chained to the ocean floor feels like it has dissolved suddenly. I feel giddy with celebration and paddle my feet in the water.

  “Careful, you’re gonna soak me,” he says.

  “Didn’t Kevin say Shinrin-yoku means forest...” I take a dramatic pause “...bathing.
” I sweep my foot across the surface of the stream, covering him in a cool spray of spring water.

  “Heeeey!” he yells and bends over to reach the water with his cupped hand. A wave of icy wetness covers me. The temperature has gone up at least a few degrees since we’ve been in the clearing and while the trees create a stunning canopy of leaves it’s still getting sticky.

  “That feels great,” I say, bending over to scoop some water and pour a handful over my head.

  Tack jumps up and stands over me. “Last one in has to scrub the soup pot after I make chili.” He peels off his tank top to reveal his washboard abs covered in soft patches of blond hair. He puts his hand on the buckle of his jeans.

  “What are you doing?” I ask, pulling my almost frozen toes out of the water.

  “You said it feels great and Kevin said the water is deep enough here for skinny-dipping so you better start taking off those clothes or you’ll have dishpan hands for a week.” Tack opens his pants and his dick just flops out and swings under him. Of course he still doesn’t wear underwear. That’s so Tack. I try not to stare but who am I kidding? I can’t take my eyes off the thing. “Let’s go, Vince,” he says.

  I start taking off my clothes as quickly as I can, not because I’m worried about dish duty but because I don’t want to take off my pants to reveal the boner that’s pointing straight up to the sky like a sunflower searching for light. The water is so cold I know I won’t have to worry once I am submerged.

  Tack is still yanking on a pant leg when I say, “Oh, look—a newborn fawn down on the other side of the river.” I point downstream and across the way. Tack, whose love for animals is borderline obsessive, stops and asks, “Where?”

  I take that opportunity to strip off the rest of my clothes, look for the part of the stream that is the deepest and do a massive cannonball into the water.

  Chapter Twenty

  Tack

  “You sneaky little shit,” I yell at Vince as he treads water beneath me. I pull off the last few inches of my jeans and tell him to watch out. I take a few running steps off the ledge, pull my legs to my chest and jump in a few feet away from him. Under the water I quickly open my eyes and see that despite the cold water Vince still has a significant chubby. Good to know.

  I push myself out of the water and the cold shock slowly becomes a refreshing chill. The sunlight filters through the leaves and it feels like our own private country oasis. I swim back over to the rock where Vince is moored and treading water. I make sure my strokes are long and high so he can see as much of my muscle as possible. I’m not beefy like he is but I know I’m in pretty good shape and I might as well show it off.

  I grab the rock above me and we’re face to face. Naked. I’ve gotten a lot off my chest today and it makes me feel light and open to anything. I kick my legs back and forth underneath me and the frigid cold of the deeper water swirls around my lower body while the humidity engulfs my head and all of the body parts above the water. The contrast almost makes me dizzy. I tread water just looking at Vince. He seems more naked today than he has since he showed up and not just because he isn’t wearing any clothes. The macho bravado that kept him at a distance seems to have weakened a bit. His hair droops over his forehead and he isn’t wearing a fitted dress shirt that has been perfectly tailored to stretch over every thick muscle in his arms.

  Vince dips under the water and when he bobs up he pushes his hair back from his face and the water drips off his thick stubble. He bites his lip and I can tell he is fighting a gentle smile. He loses and the corners of his mouth push across his face. I smile back but I don’t make any attempt to hide it. I let it shine across my face. I want him to know how happy I am to be here with him, for us to be together like this.

  “Thank you, for letting me open up about myself.”

  “No problem,” he says a bit more coldly than I would like. But I can’t let this moment pass without letting him know how much it means to me.

  I want to show him.

  I plunge under the water and let the cold deliver a jolt to my entire body. When I rise out of the water my mouth searches for his and I kiss him on the lips. At first he is tentative. I’m sure it’s a surprise but also not really a surprise. I flash to my hand almost touching his in the truck, the way he looked at me on the side of the road, his eyes through the crack in the door during my first long shower in the suite. As my tongue gently moves against his lips I feel his mouth open. His tongue moves past mine and as soon as we are connected my whole body responds. He turns his head to the side and I turn mine in the opposite direction so we can go deeper. We both have an arm stretched above, holding the rock, and our feet are paddling to keep us afloat. Our mouths are connected. I take my free arm and go to hold him but he dissolves in front of me, dipping down below the surface.

  It feels like I’m waking up from a dream but he appears again. The water drips down his face and off his nose and chin and he looks at me with confusion but I can tell there is a smile growing in his face. He might be fighting it but there is no denying it. Vince and I are locked together finally. I can’t stop exploring his mouth with my own, going deeper inside him and unlocking places I never thought I would explore.

  We tread water facing each other. The sunlight bounces and refracts as it hits the ripples in the stream. A rush of wind rustles the leaves and birds call out to each other in the distance. There is a world of life around us but in this moment all that is in front of me is Vince.

  “I’m glad you decided to move back,” I say. He smiles at me as the sunshine makes the water dripping off his face look like shiny diamonds. Right now he’s just my old pal Vinny. Or maybe he’s more than that.

  “Tack, I need to tell you...” he starts but as soon as his lips start to move mine move closer to his and he stops speaking. He opens his mouth, gently inviting me to kiss him again. This time our tongues are more aggressive. The first kiss was tentative but this one has no hesitation in it at all. It’s a drink of water after a drought, a gasp of air above the clouds. We are so close that if I move my hips enough I could swing my dick against him but I keep my hand on his waist and my groin a safe distance away so I can focus on his mouth.

  I remember he was actually trying to tell me something so I summon my strength to pull my mouth away from his.

  “What?” I ask.

  “What what?” he asks back. I take it as a good sign that the kiss forced him to forget whatever he was going to tell me.

  “Nothing,” I say and kiss him again.

  “Yoohoooo,” I hear from just beyond the trees. “If anybody is naked, now would be the time to get decent,” Kevin yells from a few yards away. “Or not—as you see fit.”

  Vince releases his hand from the rock and dives underwater. I feel his feet push water against my torso and he reappears a few yards away from me, close to the shore.

  “We better get going,” he says, wading out and walking back to where our clothes are sitting in lifeless piles baking in the sun. I can hear Kevin getting closer.

  “Vince,” I yell across the stream. “It’s just Kevin. He’s seen more naked men than an army doctor. He doesn’t care.”

  He scrambles to the rock and uses his tank top as a towel to dry off enough to put his underwear back on. I laugh to myself and smile. I knew he was in there somewhere, the shy boy on the rock, freaking out that someone might see him naked. Vince walks around preening and strutting. I don’t mind it but it’s all a show. Watching him vulnerable and real is such a turn-on, so much more than his bulging biceps and thick thighs.

  “Damn, we missed the show,” Kevin says as he makes his way to the clearing, Evan at his side. They both look at Vince who has managed to yank on both his underwear and his top. The material clings to him like a toga on a Greek statue so even though the show is over there isn’t much imagination needed to see how stunning Vince’s body is.

  “He
y,” I yell from the water. “I haven’t made my exit yet. You might get lucky.”

  Kevin claps his hands and Evan gives him a look before approaching Vince. “Hello, I’m Evan. I apologize for my husband, who sometimes thinks he’s running a burlesque show and not an organic farm.” They shake hands. “Kevin tells me you might be interested in some of our produce and dairy. Let’s head up to the office and see if we can work something out.”

  “Perfect,” Vince says and they head up to the farmhouse.

  Kevin remains standing on the rock, staring at me and waiting for his show.

  “Kevin!” Evan yells from beyond the clearing. Kevin rolls his eyes and walks away from the stream. “Tack, we’ll meet you up there.”

  Alone in the stream, I let the cold water run over my body and push my dick against my thigh. I can feel the head bounce and I can’t help thinking about Vince and how it felt to kiss him and mean it. It was the kiss of two men who know who they are, or at least two men who think they know who they are. Vince’s body is enough for any jerk-off fantasy but I can’t help thinking about his eyes as he was scurrying to get dressed. The laser focus was gone and replaced with an openness that made me want to dive in.

  I lift myself out of the water and crawl onto the smooth surface of the biggest boulder I can find. The surface is hot but not scalding so I let it warm my back as the sun evaporates the water droplets on the front of my body. I can’t stop thinking about the kiss. It was pretty bold of me but as soon as we started taking off our clothes I knew all bets were off. It wasn’t just seeing Vince naked although that was clearly a turn-on, it was also talking with him like we did when were kids. What we talk about is totally different now but the connection is the same and when my hands move down to my crotch I see that my reaction is exactly the same.

  I thought I would never see him again once he left town. Now he’s back and making me have feelings I didn’t know I would feel. Feelings that cracked open all those years ago but I fought so hard to shift. But here they are, rushing out of me like water that’s been released from behind a dam. I’ve kissed enough guys since I came out to realize not many make you feel the way Vince makes me feel. No one has ever made me feel the way Vince makes me feel and I doubt anyone else ever could.