by T. J. Klune
And if that wasn’t just a punch in the gut, because what.
“Boom,” Corey said. “Dirty truth bomb just exploded up in your shit.”
“Holy fuck,” I breathed.
“Holy fuck,” Paul squealed. “You were dating him? For real?”
“Um,” Corey said. “That’s what we thought to begin with. Right?”
“I know that,” Paul said. “But it’s really for real.”
“What the hell,” I said to Paul, starting to hyperventilate. “I was dating the Homo Jock King? For real? Paul! Darren was sort of my boyfriend!”
“I know! You were kind of really dating him!”
“You’re right,” Corey said to Vince. “It’s easier just to let it wash over you.”
“You’ll do just fine here,” Vince said.
“But what about the twink?” I asked Paul.
“I don’t know,” Paul said. “But obviously there’s something going on there that we don’t know about.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Like fucking.”
“No,” Paul said. “I don’t think that’s it. Darren has wanted you for years, even if he was a fucking dickbag about it, especially at the beginning. And you can sure as shit bet he and I are going to have words about that, let me tell you. But now that he was finally in the position to get what he wanted, he wouldn’t screw it up by banging the hipster twink.”
I grinned at him. “That’s what I’ve been calling him in my head.”
Paul rolled his eyes. “He probably Instagrams everything like food and his feelings.”
“And buys ironic print T-shirts from thrift stores.”
“And wears chunky black glasses, even though he probably has perfect eyesight.”
“As fun as this is,” Corey said, “if he’s not fucking the twink, then what’s he doing?”
“What did the text messages say?” Vince asked me.
“Like what I said,” I told him. “How much Caleb loved Darren and Darren wanted to munch his butt or something.”
“Okay,” Vince said. “But now what did they really say?”
“Just that they couldn’t meet until after Thanksgiving and Darren didn’t want me to know about it.”
“So, naturally, you assumed it was for fucking,” Corey said.
“What else would it be for?” I asked. “Darren doesn’t associate with twinks unless it’s to nail them.”
“Rule ten,” Paul said suddenly.
“What?”
“Rule ten,” he said. “Darren wouldn’t tell you why he was doing this because of this supposed rule ten.”
“I know,” I said. “And I still don’t understand what that was supposed to be about.”
“Seriously?” Vince asked. “You don’t know? That was the easiest part to figure out.”
We all turned slowly to gape at him.
“What?” he asked. “I knew that right away. It’s obvious. And I know I’m right, because you can’t spell convinced without Vince.”
“Hold out your hand, palm down,” I demanded.
He did.
I smacked the back of it. “Never say something like that again! Now you tell me what it means. You tell me right now.”
“You seriously don’t know?” Vince looked at each of us in turn as he shook away the sting on his hand, the big baby. “Any of you?”
We shook our heads.
Vince grinned. “I never get to know things first. Ha! How does it feel to be kept in the dark, motherfuckers! I’ve got the brains now!”
“Paul!” I barked. “Tighten your leash!”
“Vince, if you tell us, I’ll make sure we do that one thing tonight you always wanted to do to me.”
Vince flushed horribly. He coughed and said, “Are… seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“I almost want to know what that one thing is,” Corey said.
“You really, really don’t,” Paul said.
“It’s where Paul lets me lick his—”
Paul slapped a hand over Vince’s mouth. Vince waggled his eyebrows at him.
I grimaced. “Okay, let’s not get distracted here. What’s rule ten? Why did he agree to do this?”
Paul dropped his hand carefully, as if he still expected Vince to announce what he was going to lick.
He didn’t.
Instead, he said something else entirely.
Vince shrugged. “It’s because he’s in love with you.”
I fell off the chair.
“Oh sweat balls,” Paul said. “That actually makes a shitload of sense.”
“Today is the greatest day ever,” Corey said to no one in particular.
I blinked up at the ceiling.
Moments later, three faces came into view.
“You okay down there?” Paul asked.
“Is he twitching?” Corey whispered to Vince.
“Maybe he’s just gassy,” Vince whispered back.
“System… crash… imminent,” I breathed. “Restoring… to… factory settings.”
“Oh boy,” Paul said.
Wheels, having woken up but not yet had his cart attached, pulled himself along the ground until he could reach me. He grinned that doggy grin and then proceeded to sneeze in my face. He made up for it by licking it back up off my cheeks.
Eventually, Paul helped me sit back up on the chair. “You okay?”
“I don’t know that I am,” I said, sounding slightly hysterical.
“You’re allowed not to be.” He squeezed my shoulder. “It’s not every day that you find out you’re in love with someone.”
“What?” I wheezed. “I thought we were talking about him!”
“Uh,” Paul said. “Sure. That’s what I meant.”
“We can’t talk about me!”
“Of course not.”
“We’re not even close to talking about me!”
“Wow,” Corey said. “I didn’t know a man could go up that many octaves in the space of a single breath. Color me impressed.”
“He sounds like a kangaroo trying to sing an opera,” Vince said.
“How is rule ten that he loves me!” I bellowed. “That motherfucking asshole. How dare he love me and not even tell me!”
“Yeah,” Corey said. “If this is the reaction he was going to get, I totally can’t see why he didn’t tell you.”
“I brought you into this world,” I threatened. “And I can sure as shit take you out of it.”
Corey snorted. “You’re too white to be my mom.”
“Oh snap,” Vince said as he fist-bumped Corey.
In a last ditch effort to save my sanity, I asked, “Then why is Darren all up on that twink?”
“Do we know that that’s the case?” Paul asked. “It sounds to me like there’s just a bunch of assumptions going on here. This whole thing might not be what you think it is.”
“You’re right,” I said. “You’re absolutely right. And there is only one way to clear this up.”
Vince looked relieved. “You’re going to talk to him about this like a mature and responsible adult.”
“What?” I said. “Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. We’re going to find out where he’s going on his date with Caleb, and we’re going to follow and spy on them.”
“Oh my god,” Corey said. “We’ll need disguises.”
“Obviously,” I said. “You can’t go undercover without disguises. It’s, like, the law.”
“This probably isn’t going to end well,” Paul said.
“Of course it will,” I said. “We’ll either see that Darren is a fucking slut and deserves to be hit by a bus, or that he’s pining for me and I will need to sit on his face.”
“Gross,” Corey said. “And also romantic.”
“Or,” Vince said, “we could go with my idea and just talk to—”
“We already voted,” I said.
“We did?” he asked.
“Yes. And you lost.”
“Sorry, babe,” Paul said. “B
ecause disguises.”
“I still think it’d be easier if you just asked—”
“Vince! I have a job for you!”
“Of course you do, Sandy,” he said with a sigh.
“You need to call your brother and find out where they’re going on their date. And you need to do it in such a way that doesn’t invite suspicion.”
“You should probably do it now,” Paul agreed.
“Because what if the date is today?” Corey said.
“And that would just be bad if we didn’t know,” I said.
Vince looked grumpy. “My disguise had better be something really cool.”
“The coolest thing you’ve ever seen,” I promised him.
He took his phone off the strap on his sleeve (bicyclists are so ridiculous) and pulled up his brother’s number, grumbling about how we always did things the hard way.
“Put it on speaker,” Corey hissed before he could raise it to his ear.
“And don’t let him know we’re listening in,” I said.
Vince sighed again, but complied.
It rang three times before—
“Vince. It’s really early.”
And yep. There were still feelings there. Because the sound of his gravelly morning voice did things to my penis.
“Sorry,” Vince said, sounding very awkward. “I just wanted to talk to my bro.”
Bro, I mouthed at Paul.
Homo jocks, Paul mouthed back, because that explained everything.
“You heard from Sandy?” Darren asked, and we all held our breaths. “He disappeared last night and his phone was turned off.”
“Uh,” Vince said. “No. No I haven’t. Why would I have heard from him? I don’t even know him.”
Paul put his face in his hands.
“Huh?” Darren said. “What are you talking about? Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Vince said, looking like he was starting to panic. “I’ve never been so fine. Why are you asking? Are you okay?”
“Sure,” Darren said slowly, and I had the random thought that I could probably jerk off successfully to the sound of his voice alone. Which was a terrible thing to be thinking right at the moment, but there it was. “You know Sandy, Vince. You know him very well.”
“Oh, that Sandy,” Vince cried. “I thought you meant that other Sandy.”
“The other Sandy. Who you don’t know.”
“Right.”
“But you know this Sandy.”
“Sure,” Vince said. “So well. But not too well. Because I already have Paul. And I wouldn’t want to step on anyone’s toes. You know. Since you’re in love.”
I wanted to strangle him.
“Right,” Darren sighed. “I think he’s avoiding me.”
“Oh?” Vince said.
I started waving my hands at him with the universal sign for shut the fuck up or I’ll murder you with my stilettos.
Vince squinted at me. “Tell… me… more?”
NO! I silently screamed at him.
“I don’t know, man,” Darren said. “Just this feeling I’m getting. Sometimes I feel like I’m getting somewhere with him, and then it’s like it used to be when he hated me. I don’t know what I did, but it’s getting worse.”
I mimed to Vince to just hang up the fucking phone, extending my thumb and pinky and putting my fist into my other fist.
He nodded like he understood but then proved once and for all that we could never be charade partners by saying, “Uh-huh, so how’s the sex?”
Paul started choking rather loudly as I paled.
Corey, for some reason, looked like he was having the time of his life. That bastard.
That’s not what I said! I mouthed at Vince.
I thought you meant sex! he mouthed back at me frantically.
“Uh, I love you, bro, but I’m not talking about sex with you,” Darren said. “Especially since I found out that apparently Sandy wants to have an incestuous four-way with us.”
I banged my head on the table.
“Is there someone there with you?” Darren asked.
“Nope!” Vince said. “No one at all. Just me and Wheels and that’s all there is.”
“Where’s Paul?”
Paul did this complex motion with his hands that almost looked like sign language. It lasted for approximately ten seconds and I wanted to warn Paul that Vince couldn’t possibly understand something so complex and was going to make things worse.
“He’s at his parents’ house,” Vince said. “He needed to go help Nana put together a bookcase and then he was going to take her to the flea market.”
Paul gave him a thumbs-up.
I glared at both of them, because he could get all of that, but he couldn’t understand hanging up the fucking phone?
“Ah,” Darren said. “And you thought to call me because….”
“Just to say hi.”
“Really.”
“Sure.” Then his eyes lit up. “And to ask you where you’re going on your date. With the hipster twink.”
“The hipster twink? Jesus, you’ve been hanging out with Paul and Sandy too much.”
“Well, I am engaged to one of them.”
“Right. And he makes you happy, so knock yourself out, bro.”
“Thanks, bro. That’s rad of you to say.”
“Now observe,” Corey whispered in my ear, “the elusive homo jocks in their natural habitat. Their communication skills are somewhat primitive, but their social structure is fascinatingly complex.”
I clapped my hand over my mouth to keep from braying unattractively.
“We’re going out this afternoon,” Darren said. “To that one place we went near Jack It?”
“Poco’s?”
“Yeah, it’s where he wanted to go. His choice, anyway, since he’s the one that paid for me and everything.”
“Uh-huh, and what time will that be?”
“Why?”
Vince’s eyes went wide. “Um. Because?”
“Right,” Darren said. “You sure you’re okay, bro?”
“Yeah, bro. I’m totally cool.”
“If you say so. We’re meeting there at two. And then maybe after, we’ll see how it goes with—”
“Oh no,” Vince said manically. “Look at the time. I have to go to that thing. At the place. With all those people and the Jesus. Church! I have to go to church.”
“What? Since when do you go to—”
“Bye!” And he disconnected the phone. He let out a long breath, cracked his neck, and said, “I think that went well.”
Paul had to hold me back from launching myself at him.
Chapter 21: Slim Trim and the Mystery of the Public Rimjob
“YES, HI, we have a reservation for four?” I told the hostess at Poco’s.
She looked up, a smile forming on her face.
It froze when she saw us.
Not that I really blamed her.
Because of our amazingness.
I, of course, was wearing my Sunday best in the form of a red skirt, black blouse, faux-fur coat, and a hat large enough to rival even the most extravagant at the Kentucky Derby. I’d had to fold it on the sides before trying to walk in through the door. I had on a pair of oversized sunglasses, which covered the top half of my face. I stood and posed in front of the hostess, letting her bask in my glory, as I bunched the fur coat up around my throat, letting my thigh become slowly exposed through the slit in the skirt.
Corey stood next to me, wearing a bright peach suit I’d found in the back closet of the Lair from when the drag kings came to perform. He too had sunglasses that covered his face, mirror shades that showed just how cool of a cat he was. His hair was slicked back into a tight ponytail, the end of which curled around his neck onto his shoulder. I’d found a fake goatee that the lesbians used in their drag king performances to complete his outfit. He made finger guns at the hostess and somehow was able to pull it off. He was so money, and he knew it.
Vince wa
s next to Corey. The moment he’d seen the chaps in the dressing closet in the Lair, he’d been sold on the idea of disguises. Apparently it reminded him of Tierra de Reyes, the telenovela he watched with Nana and Corey. He wore the chaps over jeans, and dusty boots with spurs on the back. His belt had a large buckle on it that proclaimed him the QUEEN OF TEXAS. He also had a traditional serape over it, a Mexican poncho made up of greens, blues, reds, and yellows. He topped it off with an oversized sombrero and the largest fake mustache we could find in the drag king’s makeup kit, the handlebars of which curved in spirals almost four inches on either side of his face.
And last, but certainly not least, was Paul, who decided he had wanted to go full-on drag along with me, just for shits and giggles. Unfortunately for him, nothing I had fit him enough for him to be comfortable, so we’d made a pit stop at his parent’s house and he now proudly wore one of Nana’s muumuus, a great and brightly gaudy thing that Nana hadn’t even batted an eye over when we’d asked for it. It was a floral pattern, green flowers on an orange background. I’d found a wig that Vaguyna had used back when she’d been younger, a large brunette bouffant with butterfly clips on either side. The makeup we used on him was done sparingly, but still enough to feminize his face.
“O-okay,” the hostess stammered. “And what is the name the reservation is under?”
“Esteban Raymundo Moreno,” Vince said in an absolutely appalling (and most likely extraordinarily offensive) Hispanic accent. “It was the name of mi padre.”
“Right,” she said. “That’s good. I can take—you guys are so colorful.”
“No dice,” Corey said, smooth as silk. “Kriss Kross will make you jump.”
“I hate you guys so much,” Paul mumbled.
“I don’t know what’s happening,” she said, sounding even more nervous. “I’ll just show you to your table.”
“Un momento,” Vince said. “We have a… pregunta.”
I really hoped no one was around that understood Spanish to hear him massacring the language.
“You have a what?” the hostess asked.
“A question,” I said, stepping in, clutching my fur coat even tighter because I was glamorous, dammit. “There is a reservation that follows ours at two. A dear friend is coming here on a first date and has asked us to watch out for him. We would appreciate it dearly if you could seat them at a table near ours, but not too close as to cause a… distraction. The reservation is under Darren Mayne.”