by A. J. Truman
“Do gay guys do both usually?”
“I don’t know. The ones I’ve been with, yes.”
“How do you guys decide?”
“Coin toss.”
Gideon hung his neck forward. “What? Like at a football game?”
“That was a joke.” Mac was the only one who found it funny. Like, he was actually smiling. One of his nice, floppy smiles. I should not be cataloguing Mac’s smiles.
Mac brushed past him into the sun porch. He took out the dildo and twirled it in his hand like a baton. “I was wondering when we’d have this conversation.”
“What do you mean?”
“Straight guys act grossed out by gay sex, but deep down, they’re curious. My gay friends have all been asked by their straight friends about their sex lives.”
“Do you want to hear about mine?”
“No. I know how hetero sex works.” Mac took another sip of water. “Straight guys think we’re having all this unbelievable, unholy, orgy-tastic sex. Not true. It’s just like hetero sex, minus a few parts.”
“Excuse us for being curious. In seventh grade, we had a whole class about how men and women have sex. There was no gay and lesbian unit. It’s all a mystery. We have no idea what’s it like to have one of those things up…”
“Your ass?” Mac examined it in his hands. “You know, a lot of straight guys are into pegging.”
“Pegging? You mean having one of those up…I’ll pass,” Gideon said.
“It’s not as uncommon as you think.” A smile spread across Mac’s lips that Gideon had never seen before. It was confident and a tad sinister. “You may want to experiment and try it by yourself, even just doing a finger while in the shower.”
“Nope.” Gideon crossed his arms, shutting that down pronto.
“You wouldn’t have to tell anyone. Not even me.”
“I will pass. I will most certainly pass.”
“Trust me, a lot of straight guys do it,” Mac said. “They may not talk about it, but they do it.”
Gideon was afraid to ask Mac how he knew that. “That’s their business. Their body, their choice.”
Mac slinked forward and put the dildo in his face like it was a microphone. “You could always borrow mine. Just wash it after you use it.”
Mac broke into laughter.
“Fuck you.” Gideon laughed, too, and just like that, they were back to normal. Two roommates joking around.
Well, almost normal.
“Would you mind putting it away now?” Gideon asked.
CHAPTER seven
Mac
Delia and Seth waited on the couch while Mac got ready for Cherry Stem. The lone gay club in Duncannon finally realized the economic benefits of having an eighteen-and-up night. Mac flicked his fingers through his hair to get it the right amount of caring without looking like he cared, or in other words, “playful.”
“Hurry up, Mac. You look gorgeous,” she called from the living room.
“One more minute.” Mac gargled some mouthwash.
Delia and Seth curled up on the chaise part of the couch both checking their phones, his arm casually around her. Mac still had to chuckle at how perfectly they worked as a couple.
“Seth, you’re really coming with us tonight?” Mac asked. “You are so whipped.”
“It will be fun.” He turned to Delia. “Right?”
“Yes! I can’t believe you don’t like to dance.”
“Well, I pulled both my hamstrings dancing at my junior prom.”
“Why don’t you do some stretching while Mac finishes getting pretty?” Delia pecked him on the lips. Seth stood up and did leg stretches against the wall.
“I’m actually done.” Mac shook nerves from his hands. It was his first toe-dip back into the gay dating pool.
Delia glanced at her boyfriend, doing quad stretches now. “Let’s give him another minute.” She motioned for them to go into Mac’s bedroom. “So how’s it going living with Gideon? Is he still afraid of catching your gay germs or whatever?”
“It’s going well.” Mac blushed, thinking about their conversation a few days ago. On the surface, things seemed like normal, but Mac noticed little things, like how Gideon put on a T-shirt after he got out of the shower and how he didn’t go near the sun porch or mention Mac’s pile of shit again. At least they were both weirded out by the talk.
“You guys seem to be a good match.”
“What does that mean?”
“As roommates.”
“Right.”
Mac took an extra second to think of him, but then pushed it out of his mind. He’s straight and your roommate. He had to tell himself that several times over. But then Gideon would lick his lips while reading on the couch or brush past him in the kitchen, and Mac would basically need a cold shower. He needed a night out at a gay club more than ever. He needed the distraction. He reached into his pocket and squeezed his four-leaf clover keychain for some good luck tonight. It was a tradition that never got old.
“Ready?” Mac clapped his hands and headed to the front door. Delia and Seth followed.
Before Mac could open it, Gideon beat him to the punch. He swept inside, surprised at the crowd waiting for him when he arrived.
“Hi,” Gideon said to the three of them. “Are you guys going out?”
“We are, but it’s to a gay club,” Delia said.
“You, too?” Gideon asked Seth.
“I’m being a supportive boyfriend.”
“I’ll come, too.”
Mac and Delia traded confused looks.
“You heard me when I said ‘gay club,’ right?” Delia asked him.
Gideon nodded.
“So it’s a club for gay guys. And a supportive boyfriend.”
“Are you banning me from going?” Gideon asked, totally unfazed by Delia’s salient points.
“No. Of course not. The more, the merrier.”
“Great.” Gideon went into his room to change. Mac and Delia communicated telepathically with more looks and arched eyebrows and nervous laughter.
“He probably doesn’t want to be alone,” Delia whispered. She mouthed Beth.
“I can stay and hang out with him,” Seth said.
“No need.” Gideon yanked his door open. He wore a black button-down shirt with rolled-up sleeves and jeans. Mac had a feeling the guys at Cherry Stem would take to his “straight-acting” appearance. He was finding himself susceptible.
“And you guys are awful whisperers. I want to go. It’s a great place to meet girls.”
“What?” Mac asked.
“Gay bars are filled with straight girls. Every girl I dated loved going to them. They don’t have a worry in the world about being hit on by guys. Their defenses are down. And there are no lines for the bathroom.”
“You’re annoying them in the place where they don’t want to be annoyed,” Delia said. “A gay bar is a sanctuary where a girl can dance in peace.”
“It’s our sanctuary,” Mac said. “You are a guest. But it’s our safe space.”
“Everybody’s safe and sound!” Gideon grabbed his coat from the closet. He passed Mac his own. “But when the music is pumping and the drinks are flowing and they’re surrounded by guys who want nothing to do with them, these girls will want somebody to swoop in and show them a good time.”
Delia pretended to vomit. “And yet again, the straight white guy exploits a minority’s sacred ground for his own personal gain.”
“I’m not exploiting anything. I’m not stopping anyone from having fun. In fact, I’m clearing the way for you.” Gideon pointed at Mac, who turned red from the attention. “I’m taking one for the team. Or two if I wind up having a really good night.”
“I’m glad you think so highly of us deadwood,” Delia deadpanned.
“Shall we go?” Seth said, pointing to the door.
“We shall,” Delia said with an eye roll reserved for Gideon.
Mac locked up behind them. They rumbled down the stair
s to the street. Gideon waited for Mac.
“How will I know if a gay guy is hitting on me?” He asked.
“If he shoves his hand down your pants, there’s a pretty good chance he’s hitting on you.”
Φ
Mac didn’t want to shut his eyes when he got inside Cherry Stem. He wanted to absorb it all. Every strobe light. Every thumping beat. Every poster on the wall. He felt so grateful to be here. It made him think about where he came from in West Virginia, where he had to keep his desires a secret. Or at least he tried to.
Now he was in a building filled with probably hundreds of them. Hundreds of available guys who he could openly be into. He wouldn’t have to think about the one straight guy in the room. When they got into the club, Delia found her sorority sister Lorna, a girl whose red hair was a good primer on her vivacious personality. She was flanked by other sorority sisters and gay friends and made the introductions. Mac couldn’t keep track of all the names, but he’d met Henry and Nolan plenty of times before. Mac introduced them to Gideon, who told all of them he was straight right off the bat.
Gideon suggested they all dance together, guys and girls, in a widening circle. Gideon needed to dance in a group in order to show he was straight. Two guys dancing together meant they were gay. Group meant friends. These were the byzantine laws for straight guys at dance clubs.
For a straight guy, Gideon knew how to dance. Mac spotted some other obviously straight guys at the periphery of the dance floor. None of them made an effort.
Henry and Nolan grinded against each other and gave each other pecks on the lips. To the untrained eye, they looked like they had just met tonight, not like a serious couple.
“PDA much?” Gideon snarked.
Nolan pulled away from Henry. “You’re on our turf now. Get used to it.” And he went back to running his hands across his boyfriend’s body.
Gideon shot Mac a look, nodding his head at the lovebirds, as if to say “Isn’t this a bit much?”
“Like Nolan said, it’s our turf,” Mac responded proudly.
The next song came on, and Gideon went back to dancing. Mac kept his eyes on the room, on the other guys, not on the one next to him wiggling his very cute butt.
Straight. Roommate. Cold shower.
He didn’t dance like straight guys Mac had seen. Seth was pretty much stepping left then right, no rhythm. Gideon didn’t seem to be scoping out the room for girls. Maybe that was part of his strategy. Mac soaked in all the attractive, available guys around him.
“You’re staring,” Gideon said.
“What?”
“You’re not going to get anyone if you’re gawking at them.” Gideon danced closer to Mac so he didn’t have to shout. “If you want to check someone out, glance at them for a few seconds, then look away. Do that a few times and see if they start checking you out. And close your mouth when you dance! It’s the same as chewing food.”
Mac clamped his lips shut and properly checked out a few guys in his vicinity, counting in his head for a few seconds before looking away.
“Are you counting the seconds in your head?” Gideon asked.
“How did you know?”
“Because you are concentrating awfully hard for dancing to a remixed Adele song. And your mouth is hanging open like a Venus fly trap.”
Mac hung his head. Guilty. Single. Lost cause.
Gideon massaged his shoulder, which Mac enjoyed a bit too much. “Just enjoy yourself. Don’t think so hard. People want to hang out with people who are having fun.”
The next song came on, and Gideon challenged them to dance like no one was looking. If Gideon could sway his hips and wiggle his butt, then so could Mac. He stopped caring and enjoyed himself, just as Gideon wanted.
Their friends left for the bar, but Gideon stayed put. So did Mac. The space between them narrowed. The hairs on Gideon’s arm brushed against Mac as their fingers came dangerously close to making contact. His musky cologne flitted up Mac’s nose, sending all the blood in Mac’s body to one central, inappropriate location. Thank goodness it’s dark in here! Gideon wasn’t following the byzantine rules for straight guys in dance clubs, but he didn’t seem to care.
Mac danced a little closer. He didn’t stop himself from looking Gideon up and down, taking in details like the pull of his chest against his shirt and the curve of his thigh in his tight jeans. He didn’t hold himself back from meeting Gideon’s heavy eyes, which stared right back at him with an intent that nearly made Mac punch a hole in his pants.
Fuck.
Their upper arms rubbed back and forth. Mac’s pinkie grazed Gideon’s thumb, which flicked in reaction and massaged back. Gideon licked his lips and that feeling Mac had at the party freshman year roared back into his chest. Plus a huge boner.
He wanted to man up and kiss him, but he remembered last time. He tried willing Gideon to make the damn move. He didn’t know what percent this was. Maybe there was an experiment in here about straight guys seeming gay when surrounded by other gay men.
A guy in a cowboy hat and flannel shirt had other plans, though. He snaked his arms around Gideon and grinded him from behind. Gideon’s eyes bulged out of his skull like he’d just been dumped into a garbage can full of rats.
Mac pushed the guy off Gideon with more force than he planned.
“He’s straight!” Mac shouted through his tightened jaw.
The guy surveyed who he just grinded and shot Mac a skeptical look. Gideon was a petrified piece of wood.
“He is,” Mac said firmly.
“Then why the hell is he here?” The cowboy slapped Gideon on the butt and went back to his friends.
Gideon still didn’t move. Mac wondered if he was having a heart attack. Mac’s dad used to tell him if he threw rocks at a beehive, he was bound to get stung. And if you danced at a gay bar, you were bound to get your butt slapped.
“You okay?” Mac asked him. Gideon ran off.
Mac searched for him on the expansive dance floor. Smoke machines went off, puffing out smoke across the room. He tried to make him out among the clouds. He sidestepped couples as he weaved through the heart of the floor. It was no use calling out his name. The music was too loud to hear anyone unless they screamed in your ear.
He thought he saw a recognizable tuft of unruly blond hair. But the smoke cleared, and Mac couldn’t have been more wrong.
The tuft of unruly hair belonged to a guy grinding against his ex-boyfriend. The guy leaned up and kissed Davis’s prominent chin, then his lips. Mac wanted to move, but he was caught in a web of embarrassment. The awkward moment would not release him until he received complete degradation.
“Mac?” Davis gave him a half-wave, just as unsure as Mac as what to do in this situation.
Some part of Mac’s brain had taken over manual controls. This was fight or flight, and Mac wished he could literally fly away. He didn’t know where it came from, but he gave Davis a buoyant smile and a military salute.
A military salute?
Mac got the hell off the dance floor, bobbing and weaving around guys actually having a good time. He found Gideon on line at the bar.
“You’d wig out, too, if gay John Wayne put his boner against your ass,” Gideon said. He immediately changed course when he saw Mac’s face. “What happened?”
Mac had a jumble of possible answers lodged in his throat. “I’ve been replaced.”
He shared his encounter with Davis, salute included.
“Where the hell did that come from?” Mac asked.
“Well, you know when people are in extreme situations, their brain can pick up skills and languages immediately? Maybe you acquired military-style fight training the second you saw Davis.” Gideon shrugged. “Or maybe you just freaked out like a normal human being.”
“I like your first answer.”
Gideon got them bottles of water. They went outside to the smoker’s courtyard and found a corner not shrouded in cigarette smoke.
“He wasted no time,”
Mac said. “How long do you think they’ve been dating?”
“Since ‘Like a Prayer.’”
A guy in a pink tank top asked them if they had a light, and scowled when the answer was no. “The smoker’s lounge is for SMOKING!” The guy screamed with an unlit cigarette in his mouth.
“You know what he said when he broke up with me? I’m too needy.” Mac hated that Davis’s words stuck in his head. “What does that even mean? How is it wrong to want to be around your boyfriend?”
“That was just code for ‘I don’t want to be around you anymore.’”
Mac took a sip of his water. His eyes narrowed into slits. He was onto the anger stage in grieving. “Our time together is now firmly in the past for him. Why do guys move on so fast?” He looked to Gideon for an answer.
“Do you want a polite friend answer, or can I be honest?” Gideon swished the water in his bottle.
“Please be honest,” Mac said, although he wasn’t sure if he wanted to hear it.
“Guys know they’re going to break up with a girl, or guy, well before she knows it. The girls I’ve dated, I get this niggling voice in my head that says this relationship is not the one. You try to see yourself with this person, and your stomach twists in knots when you think about that future. No couple ever has that realization at the same time. Somebody’s always first. Once I have it, the relationship is done in my mind, even though I have to go through the motions a little bit longer. It’s like senioritis. So Davis had that realization before you. There’s no shame in losing.”
Mac looked out at the smokers, all enjoying their night. “Was that supposed to make me feel better?”
“No. You wanted me to be honest.”
The smoker finally got his stupid light and waved it at them in victory. Mac gave him the finger. He’d never flipped somebody off. It was nice. He should do it more often.
“Did you really feel that way?” Mac asked him. “About girls you dated. Your stomach twisting in knots?”
“Something like that. It’d always start out hot and heavy. I liked that.” He quirked an eyebrow. “But then in the quiet moments, when we would be laying on the bed together or when we ran out of things to say, this alarm would go off in my head.”