Can't Stand The Heat

by Louisa Edwards

  And she realized that she had, indeed, fallen in love with someone she shouldn’t have.

  TWENTY

  His first live show! Jess could feel the excitement bubbling inside him, just waiting for the chance to spill over in a tidal wave of inane babble that would immediately brand him as a total loser from Moronville.

  But damn it, this was a big night for him. He was with the band. Well, sort of. No one except Frankie and Adam knew about it, and Jess himself wasn’t entirely sure what to even call it, but still. There was a big part of him silently squeeing that his boyfriend played the bass in a punk band.

  There was a difference, Jess had discovered as he stared up at the band onstage, between knowing that Frankie was a punk rocker and actually seeing it. Sort of like the difference between Patti Smith’s studio recordings and her live albums. No contest, the live stuff was way better. Raw and emotional, thrumming with heat and life and the untamed fury that characterized the best of seventies punk.

  Jess had done quite a bit of research since that first night at Market. He thought he could now be considered something of an expert on punk music.

  So when Dreck finished their set, and Frankie finished pretending he was going to stage-dive and finally let Jess help him off the platform, Jess felt perfectly qualified to say, “You were fantastic! The show rocked.”

  Frankie was pouring sweat, his normally moon-pale skin red at the cheekbones.

  “Yeah? That’s odd, because we’re usually crap.”

  Exhilarated and giddy with the pulse-pounding thrill of live music, the residual beat of the bass in his blood, Jess couldn’t stop himself from crowding in close. He nudged Frankie playfully in the chest, staring up at the taller man’s eyes glittering in the dim light.

  “Stop it. Modesty isn’t believable on you. You rocked and you know it! That last song, the fast, funked-out version of ‘Blitzkrieg Bop’? That was insane.”

  “Better than the Ramones?” Frankie asked, eyeing Jess keenly.

  Jess laughed and pulled him aside, away from the front of the stage where too many people were still pressed together waiting for the next set. Jess saw Adam setting up out of the corner of his eye and wanted to smile for Miranda. In a second or two, she’d know how Jess was feeling—although if that soul kiss they’d all just witnessed was any indication, she was already flying pretty high.

  “Answer the question, Bit,” Frankie said with a grin. He’d snagged a towel from one of the other band members and was mopping off his forehead and neck.

  “Not better than the Ramones,” Jess decided, taking the towel from him and rubbing at a patch of sweaty skin just below Frankie’s chin. “But that’s a trick question. No one’s better than the Ramones.”

  “You’ve learned your lessons well, young one,” Frankie intoned, his voice harsher than usual from screaming backup vocals. He sounded like he’d just smoked three packs of Dunhills in a row. The rough gravel of it sent a shiver down Jess’s spine.

  “You guys were better than the New York Dolls,” Jess said.

  “Enough of that,” Frankie replied sternly. “Heathen. I’ll make a Dolls fan of you yet.”

  “I dunno,” Jess said, affecting a skeptical head tilt. “They just don’t do it for me. Even if Johnny Thunders is hot.”

  “And famously bent,” Frankie said. There was a sly twist to his smile that made Jess want to lick it.

  “You’re joking,” he gasped. Get it under control, Jess. “I never would’ve believed it of a guy who teased his hair and wore more makeup than my sister.”

  “Mmm. Not to mention tighter clothes and higher heels.”

  Frankie grabbed Jess’s hand, the one still holding the towel to his clavicle, and squeezed his fingers. He had that predatory gleam in his dark eye, the one Jess had come to recognize over the past few days as a prelude to pouncing. Like one of Pavlov’s dogs, Jess picked up the cue and responded instantly with racing blood and shallow breaths.

  Their linked fingers started traveling slowly down Frankie’s chest, grazing over bone and sinew covered only by a thin red muscle shirt with a large yellow banana and the words THE VELVET UNDERGROUND & NICO on the front.

  Jess wasn’t sure if he was moving their hands or if Frankie was pushing them down, but for a long moment he couldn’t do anything other than watch them and feel the soft wrinkle and tug of vintage cotton slip-sliding over hot, sweaty skin.

  They were standing so close together now that their thighs were brushing, denim against denim. Frankie’s eyes flashed and Jess knew with a sudden shock that he was about to get jumped in front of God, Miranda, and everybody.

  Scary, sure, but even scarier was his suspicion that he might not be able to make himself care enough to stop it.

  “Outside,” he said hoarsely. “Please.”

  Frankie wet his bottom lip, slow and obscene. “Sure, Bit. Could use a touch of fresh air myself.”

  Summer had gone into full swing in the last few days, but even the greenhouse effect of all Manhattan’s glass skyscrapers couldn’t trap the heat for long. The sun had gone down hours ago and a light crispness rode the night breeze. Jess shivered as it teased across his overheated skin as they emerged from the bar.

  Chapel was an underground joint, the thick wooden door nearly hidden from the street unless you knew where to look. Jess had been surprised that the Market crew would bother with the forty-five-minute subway ride to the Lower East Side just to get to their favorite drinking hole when there were plenty of dives, complete with peanut-shell-strewn floors and crop-top-clad barmaids, along Amsterdam Avenue just a few blocks from the restaurant. He supposed it had to do with tradition—most of them had been coming to Chapel after dinner service at other restaurants for years—and the fact that lots of the cooks and servers lived downtown or in Brooklyn, so Chapel was on the way home.

  Frankie’s place was close by, a grotty attic apartment he laughingly referred to as “the Garret,” like some bohemian painter in twenties Paris. Jess adored it. Stepping into the Garret was like entering a sultan’s desert tent, all dark and enclosed with sumptuous, if threadbare, material everywhere. Everything from woven Navajo mats to faded Persian rugs covered the entire open space, layering over one another haphazardly and forming a soft barrier between the hard floor and the bare feet Frankie insisted on. There wasn’t any furniture to speak of, but the patterned satin pillows, round overstuffed bolsters, and huge tasseled cushions Frankie had picked up at flea markets cast every Garret activity in the most leisurely, decadent version of itself. Frankie didn’t sit down at a table to eat, he lolled against a pile of velvet. He didn’t lie down on a bed to sleep, he reclined at his ease in a nest of chenille blankets, beckoning Jess to join him. He’d spent many stolen hours holed up in Frankie’s otherworldly den of iniquity, lost in softness, silence, and the newness of everything that happened between them.

  They talked. A lot. Well, Jess talked and Frankie looked amused. But even with the cascade of details that had spilled out over the Garret, Jess still hadn’t talked about Brandewine University, or why he’d run home to Miranda like a wussy little baby. Part of him wanted to tell, and was sure Frankie wouldn’t laugh or judge (he wasn’t a very judgy sort of person), but shame always choked Jess before he could even try.

  There were few lamps in the Garret, and none with bright, fluorescent bulbs. Crazy antique oil lanterns and a table lamp with a Tiffany glass shade were about it. The slanted ceiling sported a grimy skylight, but it let in more ambient city light than moonlight.

  Jess imagined even the sunshine through that cloudy window would be weak and muddy. It was just a guess, though. He’d never actually seen the Garret in daylight. Frankie wouldn’t let him stay the night. Not that Jess had really pushed, since he’d yet to come up with a plausible reason to give Miranda for staying out till morning, but still. There was something about the firm but gentle way that Frankie ushered him out the door every night at the crack of three that made Jess suspect Frankie was less than e
namored of the idea of spending a whole night in each other’s arms. Jess worried about it sometimes, after he got home and tucked into his cold, lonely bed with the boring white sheets and extra-firm mattress. But what could he do? He was still reeling over the fact that Frankie was interested in him at all, on any level.

  Jess might not have a whole lot of experience in these matters, but even he knew better than to push for more. That’d be a good way to make Frankie rethink the whole thing.

  So even though it cracked his heart a little every time he got that subtle push out the Garret door, he didn’t say a word. He wanted to hold on to everything Frankie would give him, for as long as he could. Jess resolutely did not think words like “love,” “forever,” or “partner.” Even “boyfriend” felt like a stretch, so he mostly steered clear of that one, too.

  It was like an ephemeral Uelsmann dreamscape—too strange and beautiful to exist in the harsh light of the morning.

  Now, as Frankie pushed him against the wall beside Chapel’s door, Jess began to suspect another advantage to the bar’s downtown location. On the Lower East Side, no one batted an eye. At anything. Other parts of the city, he and Frankie would have to be circumspect. Hide what they were.

  Things might have gotten cleaned up a tad during the last mayor’s reign of terror, but this close to Alphabet City, that infamous rabbit warren of dilapidated buildings housing hookers, pushers, users, and other disaffected youth, the citywide revitalization project wasn’t as obvious. Jess felt fairly certain that in Chapel’s ’hood, a little innocent smooching wouldn’t ruffle any feathers. Even if said smooching occurred between two guys.

  Besides, everyone he really cared about hiding from was inside.

  So he didn’t protest when Frankie closed the distance between them, sliding one sharp knee between Jess’s legs. The contrast between Frankie’s heat and the cool air was dizzying. Jess’s head spun when Frankie immediately targeted his favorite slice of Jess’s anatomy, the sloping, slender rise of collarbone peeking out from his shirt. By now, days after that first hot lick by the bar at Market, Frankie’s soft kiss to Jess’s sternum was like “hello,” a warm, exciting taste of things to come.

  Frankie set his teeth lightly, testing the resilient flesh, the hard bone. Jess’s knees wobbled.

  “I saw you from the stage,” Frankie whispered, his voice a hot puff of air against sensitized skin.

  “Oh, yeah?” Jess gasped. “What was I doing?”

  Frankie chuckled. “Watching me like a right groupie, all starry-eyed.”

  Jess’s mouth dropped open and his whole body went rigid with sudden embarrassment. Frankie snickered again, and Jess relaxed enough to put his arms around his shoulders.

  “Shut it, you,” Jess grumbled.

  “No, I liked it,” Frankie protested. “Liked seeing your big blue eyes all wide, staring up at me. Your whole sweet body responding to me, just like you always do, but this time from ten feet away. Nearly drove me round the twist, not being able to touch you right then and there.”

  Jess shuddered and one hand moved to cup the back of Frankie’s head as it nudged gently up his neck and across his jawline.

  There was no one in the world like Frankie Boyd. At moments like this, Jess had a hard time remembering his personal moratorium on the L-word.

  “The things you say to me,” Jess muttered, feeling soft lips mouthing his chin, the scrape of teeth against his jawbone.

  “The way you look at me,” Frankie countered. “Ought to be criminal, the way you tempt a poor, law-abiding citizen like meself.”

  “If I were really so tempting, we’d have done more than kiss and grope by now.” The words were out before Jess could censor them. He cringed inwardly, wishing he could call them back. Sound like a slut, much? Which wasn’t actually what he meant by it at all.

  Frankie arched his devil’s brow, looking like a mischievous minion of Satan in the shadows of their alcove.

  “Eager for more, is it? And not very appreciative of the Herculean restraint being practiced by yours truly.”

  Jess ducked his head to hide his flaming cheeks against Frankie’s shoulder. “No,” he said in a muffled voice, “I do appreciate it. How slow we’ve gone. It’s just . . .” He breathed in the heady smell of tobacco and clean sweat from Frankie’s T-shirt. For courage.

  “I know it must be annoying for you,” Jess continued, “waiting around for a fraidy-cat little virgin to be ready.”

  Frankie clucked his tongue and raised Jess’s chin on his fingers to look him straight in the eye.

  “None of that,” he said firmly. “I won’t have you shaming yourself into doing more than feels right and good. Ah, sweet Bit. Don’t you see? It’s only about what feels right and good to you in the moment. That’s all that matters. But you have to listen to yourself, to the beat of your heart and the throb of your blood, to know how you truly feel.”

  Jess did a little wriggle, wanting simultaneously to get even closer and to back up and hide from this conversation that was making him feel so naked and exposed.

  “But how do you feel?” he pressed, desperate for the answer. “I mean, I know you’ve been with lots of people. Not just guys, either.” Jess felt the corners of his mouth pull down unhappily. “I can’t believe you’re not bored to tears with me.”

  Frankie’s eyes burned into his as he pressed deliberately forward into the cradle of Jess’s hips. The taut bulge of denim between Frankie’s thighs shoved into Jess’s lower abdomen, igniting a fire there that took him completely by surprise.

  “Does that feel like boredom to you, Bit?” Frankie whispered silkily in Jess’s ear.

  “No,” Jess agreed, sucking in air. Frankie’s sinful hips swiveled once in a slow, sure rub. Jess was so hard he thought he might die.

  “One look at you does it to me,” Frankie muttered against Jess’s cheek. “One brush of your shoulder or flash of a smile, and I’m done in. You think this kind of reaction is ordinary everyday humdrummery for me? Not likely. It’s been an age since I felt anything like this, and I plan to savor it for as long as it’s on offer. Take your sweet time, Bit. I’m in no hurry at all.”

  Jess panted. Maybe Frankie wasn’t in a hurry, but Jess was starting to be. He tipped his head back against the building and stared blindly up at the sky while Frankie made a leisurely exploration of the area behind Jess’s left ear.

  Time seemed to slow down and speed up at odd intervals. It was like a slideshow—flash of Frankie’s long, tapered fingers dropping to Jess’s waist and burrowing under his shirt to stroke the ticklish skin there—flash of thighs moving together in a deep rhythm, like dancing in place—flash of Frankie’s blue-black hair waving in the breeze, and the sudden soaring realization that Jess could touch it if he wanted, which he did—flash of kiss.

  The kiss stopped the show. Everything racked focus down to the meeting of mouths, cropping the rest of the sidewalk, the noise from the bar behind them, the cars honking from the street, right out of the picture.

  The kiss wasn’t fierce, it wasn’t harsh, it wasn’t demanding. It was . . . searching. Tender. It said things to Jess, things maybe Frankie didn’t even mean him to know, or maybe had been trying to tell him for days without saying the words.

  That kiss, that sweet slide of tongue and breath and lip, convinced Jess right down to his soul that he was wanted. And not only wanted, but cherished.

  Jess’s heart beat with such wild happiness that he almost missed the last frame of the night’s slideshow.

  Flash: an ugly snickering laugh from the sidewalk where a couple of college-aged guys stood watching, shoving each other and pointing at Jess and Frankie.

  The tension in Frankie’s shoulders said he’d heard them, too, but he didn’t make it obvious. He withdrew his mouth from Jess’s with one last luxurious swipe of tongue across his bottom lip, refusing to be hurried.

  Frankie pulled back far enough to catch Jess’s gaze. Framing Jess’s chin in one hand, Frankie said, “All
right, then?”

  Doing his best to ignore the hooting, name-calling pair of hoodlums not six feet away, Jess nodded. He could feel it creeping in again, that sick humiliation in his gut that had driven him for months, ever since Brandewine. Usually being with Frankie overwhelmed every other feeling, including shame, but with an audience of obviously drunk frat boys looking for targets, the shame was definitely back. With a vengeance.

  “Hey,” shouted one of the hecklers. Jess looked over Frankie’s shoulder. It was the taller one, a rangy kid a few years older than Jess, with preppy crew-cut blond hair and small, mean eyes.

  Frankie turned to face them, heedless of Jess’s clutching hands at his sides.

  “There a problem, mate?” he drawled.

  Shit, what is he doing?

  “Come on, let’s just go inside,” Jess said urgently.

  “Now, Bit, s’not nice to interrupt. This gentleman and I were havin’ ourselves a chat. Isn’t that right?”

  “Yeah,” the kid shot back, all belligerent. “We were just chatting about what a couple of queers are doing out in public where normal people have to look at them.”

  His buddy snorted and slugged him in the arm, egging him on.

  Frankie actually laughed. It chilled Jess’s blood; he was terrified that he knew what would happen next. He resumed tugging on the back of Frankie’s T-shirt, trying to edge him closer to the bar door. To Jess’s dismay, Frankie shrugged off his hands and sauntered closer to the frat boys, hands in pockets, the picture of insouciance.

  “Well, my little hooligan friend, if you couldn’t tell what we were doing just now, you must be quite the late bloomer. You’re not half bad looking, though. Be happy to give you a pointer or two, if you’re feeling confused. I’m sure your boyfriend, there, would thank me.”