Pyromancer excerpt by Amanda Young

One desperate night, a rent boy hot enough to scorch the motel sheets, and Christian is doomed to burn for love. Christian Ryder is rich and lonely. When the people around him keep dying, Christian forgoes personal attachments. The thought of his Pyromancy hurting anyone else, isn't something he's willing to risk. Tanner O'Bannon is broke and desperate. The recent loss of his father has thrown Tanner into a tailspin of debt he can't afford to pay. Working as a rent boy allows him to pay the mortgage and his college tuition, but it's eroding his soul in the process. Through the machinations of Male Companions - the escort agency for which Tanner works - the men are thrown together. Through a series of startling revelations and danger, Tanner and Christian both face changes. Smoldering embers of desire fan the flames of love, but will it be enough to make Christian overcome his fear of love, or to save Tanner from the fire? Only one thing is certain; both men will burn.

Pyromancy
Publisher: CreateSpace (September 26, 2009)
ISBN-10: 1449527795
ISBN-13: 978-1449527792

Excerpt:

Christian Ryder sat in the dark, slowly stroking his fist up and down the length of his swollen cock. His gaze was locked on the flickering television screen, where two men were in the final throes of orgasm. The brunet top -- his body heavily laden with muscle -- gripped his thick prick around the base and took aim, spraying cum all over the younger blond man’s upturned face. It was a hot scene, one that never failed to get him off.

Until tonight.

As the ending movie credits began to roll across the screen, Christian exhaled a disgusted huff and released his semihard shaft. He reached for the remote control lying next to him on the bed and hit stop on the DVD player. Turning off the TV, he plunged his bedroom into darkness. His frustration mounted as the hollow sound of his pulse pounded in his ears.

It’d been over six months since he’d gotten laid. The last time he’d taken a chance and risked being with someone else, it hadn’t gone so well -- a fucking disaster, really. The end result testing his rigid self-control almost past the limits of his endurance.

The guy he’d picked up and brought home had taken offense at being asked to leave right after they’d screwed, and had thrown a temper tantrum. Not something he’d expected from a six-feet-tall body builder who’d claimed he was only interested in a good time. By the time Christian forcibly removed the man from the property, his body temperature had been dangerously high and his head was spinning.

After that close call, he’d decided it was too dangerous to indulge in one night stands, which left him with little options other than his own left hand. Especially since he already had a self-imposed rule against developing anything long-term or risking the emotional attachment that came with it.

Mixing emotions and sex fucked with even the most normal person’s head. For the people around him, it could mean much more than a broken heart -- it could be deadly.

Security lights from outside filtered through the miniblinds covering his bedroom window in sporadic spurts of light, briefly illuminating his damp and sweaty body lying atop tangled, white cotton sheets. He kicked at them, unraveling himself.

Irritated, Christian sat up. He leaned back against the cool brass headboard and flipped on the bedside lamp. His gaze flittered down to the big, red numbers on his alarm clock. Almost midnight.

Restless and exasperated, he picked yesterday’s newspaper up off the side table and spread it out over his lap. Since jerking off wasn’t going to work for him, maybe he could bore himself to death by reading the paper. It was worth a shot. Losing sleep made control over his curse temperamental.

Page by page, Christian skimmed over the paper until he reached the personal ads. Those babies were like the funny pages to him. Why someone would put an ad in the newspaper, hoping for a good outcome, was beyond his comprehension. Only the ugly and desperate sunk to that level.

He read over a few ads, laughing, until a small square down on the bottom, right-hand corner caught his eye. It was an advert for an escort agency. One that claimed to cater to men of his persuasion: gay men looking for nothing more than a hot body to warm their lonely beds. The agency, Male Companions, promised anonymity and, more importantly, clean bills of health for all their available staff. He never fucked anyone without a rubber, so it was a bit of a moot point, but the words comforted him somehow.

Before Christian realized his intent, the cordless phone was in his hand, his fingers tapping out the number. A feminized male voice answered, saying, “Thank you for calling Male Companions. Nigel speaking. How may I help you?”

Christian opened his mouth to speak and froze. What the hell was he doing? He didn’t want to pay for sex; doing so went against every moral he had. He clicked the off button, hanging up.

He exhaled, relieved he’d come to his senses before doing something he knew he would later regret. His gaze wandered over his bedroom, hovering on the fifty-two--inch plasma TV, the only other thing in there besides his bed and nightstand. Not a single picture or piece of artwork marred the clean lines of the bare, white walls. Whereas the stark sterility of his room usually appeared simple and clean, it now felt barren and depressing, not unlike his personal life.

His hands shook as he picked up the phone and redialed the number.

* * * * *

Tanner O’Bannon sat slumped over his kitchen table, trying to balance his checkbook. Money was tight, his balance down to just above two bucks, but at least he wasn’t in the negative anymore. He couldn’t afford the outrageous overdraft fees the bank charged. The last two charges had forced him to eat ramen noodles for a month. If he never saw another pasta dish in his life, it would be too soon.

Tanner’s eyes blurred as he ran through the figures once last time before flipping the checkbook closed. He folded his arms and laid his head on the cool surface of the mahogany table. He was exhausted, but needed to stay awake for just a little longer. On call for work until three a.m., he couldn’t afford to fall asleep or miss a single phone call. He needed the money too badly to risk losing his job, even if it was one he was ashamed of. Necessity overruled pride.

With heavy-lidded eyes, Tanner jerked his head up and shook it, trying to force himself to stay alert. He rose to his feet, walked over to the sink, and splashed icy water on his cheeks. As he mopped his face with a clean dishtowel, the phone rang. Only one person would be calling this late. Work.

He didn’t know whether to be happy or sad. On the one hand, it meant money; on the other, degradation. His father would be rolling over in his grave if he knew what his only son was doing to pay the debts he’d left behind.

Tanner crossed the room and picked up the phone. He listened for a moment then set it back in the cradle before jogging up the stairs. Upstairs, he hopped into the shower and quickly scrubbed himself from head to toe with citrus-scented body wash. He stepped out and yanked a dry towel off the rack, briskly rubbing it over his hair and skin while he fumbled through a drawer under the sink for lube and a butt plug.

He squeezed a dollop of lube into his hand and ran it over the plug, liberally coating its short length. He reached behind to swipe the remaining moisture through the crease of his ass. The toy in his right hand, he leaned over the toilet and braced his left hand on the back of the commode. He spread his legs shoulder width apart and took a deep breath, trying to relax his muscles as he pressed the blunt rubber tip against his asshole. Due at the motel in thirty minutes, there was no time for finesse. He exhaled and shoved it home, wincing at the sharp burn of his anal ring stretching around the plug.

The things you have to do to make a buck, Tanner thought, as he grabbed the washcloth he’d used in the shower and wiped off the excess lube around the wide base of the plug. He dropped it in the sink and headed into his bedroom to dress.

It was time to go to work.

* * * * *

Waiting inside the modest motel room he’d rented for the night, Christian glanced at his watch for the umpteenth time. Perched on the end of the bed, his sock-clad toes tapped an unsteady rhythm on the cheaply carpeted floor, his body practically vibrating from anxious anticipation.

He was nervously trying to figure out what would happen once the escort showed up. Payment for the guy’s services had already been rendered over the phone -- apparently even hookers took American Express these days -- so at least he didn’t have to worry about having that conversation. Things would be awkward enough as it was.

More pertinent was how things would play out. Was he supposed to strip and get right down to business as soon as the guy got there, or make small talk first? Would he inadvertently break some kind of silent rule if he asked the man anything personal? Could they even exchange more than first names? How would they decide who did what to whom?

He wasn’t stupid enough to think the escort would turn down anything he asked for, but would it be possible for him to tell if the guy really wanted to do it or not? Was it just a job for him, a way to make a buck, or would he really enjoy it? The thought of fucking someone who just laid there and went through the motions repulsed him.

So many unanswered questions floated around in his head he was beginning to get a headache. Sweat beaded his brow, and his knees cantered up and down. Maybe it wasn’t too late to cancel. He could call. Whether they refunded him his money was of little concern. They could keep it; he had more than he’d ever be able to spend anyway.

He didn’t think he could go through with this after all. It seemed too cold, too impersonal. A little voice in the back of his mind screamed, “That’s the point, jackass. You need cold and impersonal. Do you want to be responsible for someone else’s death?”

That thought chilled him. Christian forcibly shut down his memories before they transported him back to a time he didn’t want to visit. He pushed away his reservations and tried to consider why he’d called Male Companions in the first place.

He was lonely. Though he didn’t like to admit it, even to himself, it was the truth. The acquaintances he’d made over the years, at work, on the rare occasions he deigned to go in and check up on things, and at the firehouse where he volunteered, only went so far. During the day, he was fine. It was at night, after a long day at work or returning from an emergency fire call, that the loneliness crept in and haunted him.

He realized that this wasn’t even about sex, not solely. Sure, he wanted to get off, but what he really needed most was simple human contact, companionship. Sadly, that was the one thing he could never allow himself to possess. Attachments meant caring about someone, making himself vulnerable. In essence, losing control of himself. That was something he could never allow.

Christian took several deep, calming breaths. He could do this. He had to. There weren’t any other options left for him. It was anonymous sex or nothing. Though he doubted it, all he could do was hope it would be enough to sustain him.

* * * * *

Tanner arrived at the motel with five minutes to spare. Town had been dead, not a car in sight on his way over. A good thing since old Bessie -- his ten-year-old Mazda -- had sputtered and died twice during the trip across town. It was only a matter of time before the old clunker finally gave out for good.

Part of him wished he’d hung onto his dad’s car instead of selling it when his father was killed six months prior, but at the time he’d needed the money even more desperately than he did now. The debts his father had left behind were astronomical. Even after he’d sold off everything of value besides the house itself, he still hadn’t brought in enough to cover half of what was owed. Hence, the reason for his shady new career.

For the last four months, he’d been working nights for Male Companions as an escort. Selling his body to the highest bidder wasn’t the most respectable line of work, but he hadn’t known what else to do. It wasn’t like he could make enough to cover his college tuition and pay the mortgage, along with making payments on all of the other debts his father had left on his shoulders. He supposed he could have sold drugs; he knew enough small-time dealers. He could have easily bought a little pot and divided it up for resale. Unfortunately, his conscience wouldn’t allow him to do that. Drugs killed people, and no matter how often his buddies tried to convince him marijuana never hurt anyone, he just couldn’t quite believe them. A drug was a drug, plain and simple. Having sex for money, degrading as it was, didn’t hurt anyone besides himself. Besides, it wasn’t like he hadn’t had his share of casual sex along the way, just like everyone else. The only difference was now that he got paid for doing it.

Or so he tried to convince himself as he hustled through the motel lobby toward the service desk.

Though he’d been told which motel to go to and given a name, he hadn’t been given a room number. Which meant he had to go to the desk and ask, something he dreaded every time he was forced to do it. He always imagined the clerk knew exactly who he was and why he was there. It was humiliating.

He rang the bell and waited, tapping his fingers on the hard surface of the beige counter. A bored looking blonde, somewhere around his own age of twenty, sauntered out the back room, long, blood red fingernails plastered over her widely yawning mouth. Her eyes lit up when she saw him. “Oh, hello.” She smiled. “Can I help you?”

Tanner groaned inwardly. He was used to being hit on by women, but that didn’t make him any more comfortable with it. “I’m supposed to meet a friend here.” Damn, what was the name he been told to ask for? Chris…or Christian? “His name is, um, Christian, Christian Smith.” God, he hoped that was right. The last name was easy. It was always Smith. People had no imagination.

The smile on the girl’s face dimmed a bit as she turned to the computer and began to type. Silently, he watched her, wondering how she could type at all with those god-awful nails in her way.

She nodded down at the computer screen and then glanced over at him. “I’ll have to call up and ask permission before I can give you any information.” She turned away from him and picked up the phone. From over her shoulder, she said, “It’ll be just a moment.”

“Sure,” he mumbled, his eyes scanning everywhere and nowhere. He just wanted to get to the room, do what he was being paid for, and go home. Afterward, he would be one day closer to financial solvency. One trick closer to owning the home he’d grown up in, free and clear.

He listened as she quietly spoke with someone, her side of the conversation consisting of mainly “yes, sir” and “uh-huh.” Finally, she hung up and faced him.

“Mr. Smith says to send you up. He’s in room 204.”

“Thank you,” he uttered, already striding away from the desk. There was an elevator, but he bypassed it, choosing the stairs instead. He jogged up them quickly, without breaking a sweat, and shoved through the entrance door onto the second-floor hallway.

The walls were adorned in hunter green wallpaper with a burgundy trim. The floor was carpeted in the same deep shade of green. The minute details were absorbed as he hustled to the end of the hall, glancing at room numbers along the way. Room 204 was on the right, near the end.

He stopped outside it and took a breath, giving himself a mental pep talk. You can do this. Just keep your eyes on the prize and get through it, same as always. It was no different than picking someone up at a club. No different at all.

He raised his clenched fist and knocked, his gaze dropping to his feet. Beginnings were strange. Some men wanted him to come in and bend over, take it up the ass like a good little whore and leave, while others wanted to make polite chitchat first. Out of the two, he wasn’t sure which he liked best. Probably the fuck-and-run guys -- at least those assignments were faster.

He was still wondering what tonight’s call would be like when the door swung inward. Tanner looked up, and higher still, craning his neck back to gaze into the eyes of his client for the night. The standard greeting he recited to each of his johns died in his throat.

Saliva pooled in Tanner’s mouth. Fuck. The man was easily six and a half feet of yummy muscle and lean, bottled sex, dwarfing his own five feet eight stature.

Tanner’s brain turned to mush as all the blood in his body drained south and squeezed into his cock, making his balls draw tight inside his Levi’s. His gaze cruised from the man’s tousled, short black hair to his socked feet and back up, absorbing all the details in between. Brooding eyes, square jaw, broad shoulders, and trim hips -- every inch sex incarnate and designed to entice a man like Tanner to his knees in supplication.

The man was exactly the sort of guy who got Tanner’s motor running in overdrive. The kind of hunk he would’ve tried to pick up in any one of the bars he used to frequent, back when he actually had a life. A man he would’ve happily fucked for free, under other circumstances.

Except this was business.

A sheet of ice fell over Tanner, cooling his ardor, easily putting him back in his place. He wasn’t here on a social call. He was here to fuck for money.

Tanner schooled his features into a smile he’d carefully rehearsed in front of the mirror at home. It was supposed to look seductive, but something about the tight feel of his skin stretching out over his cheekbones told him it fell flat tonight. Oh well, he thought ruefully, another night, another dollar.

He met the big man’s gaze and held it. “I’m Tanner. The agency sent me.”

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All Lost Things excerpt by Josh Aterovis

In All Lost Things,the third book of Josh Aterovis' award winning mystery series, Killian Kendall's life is changing faster than he can keep up. He's graduating from high school, breaking up with his boyfriend, and starting a new job with a private investigator. He's barely settled at his new desk when his ex-boyfriend calls with a desperate plea for help. He wants Killian to prove his new boyfriend is innocent in the shockingly violent murder of his abusive father. Killian reluctantly agrees to take the case, little knowing how complicated — and dangerous — things will become before it's over.

On the home front, Killian's surrogate parents decide to buy a historic mansion and turn it into a bed and breakfast. The house comes with a rich history...and maybe a ghost or two. Killian doesn't want to believe in such things, but he's quickly becoming convinced that something terrible happened to the home's original owners. The century-old mystery both terrifies and tantalizes Killian. In the end, he may be the only one who can uncover the truth.

All Lost Things
PD Publishing, Inc. (October 1, 2009)
ISBN: 978-1-933720-70-8

Excerpt:

I ran upstairs and opened my door to find Asher sitting on the edge of my bed, looking quite uncomfortable. Kane was sitting with his back to him, playing a game on the computer. I got the impression that they hadn’t said much to each other.

When I went in, Kane glanced up, then turned off the game. “I’ll let you guys talk,” he said on his way out.

I looked over at Asher questioningly. It was weird seeing him in my bedroom again. “So, uh, why are you here?”

“I’m sorry. I just didn’t know what else to do. They arrested Caleb.”

I shook my head in confusion. “Huh?”

“The police arrested Caleb. His picture has been all over the news. Someone on the boardwalk recognized him and called the cops.”

“Right...”

“Killian, they think he killed his dad. It’s horrible!”

“Look, no offense, but what does this have to do with me? Why are you here?”

Asher looked hurt, and, for a second, I felt bad. Then I remembered that he was the one who’d decided to go to another college without informing me, and my moment of sympathy passed.

“I told you, I didn’t know where else to go. I need help.”

“What am I supposed to do?”

“You work for a private investigator. You have to prove that Caleb is innocent.”

“First off, I’m a secretary. It’s not like I’m running around with a magnifying glass looking for clues. Second, and more importantly, how do you know Caleb is innocent? He did run away, after all.”

“I know Caleb. He’d never hurt anyone, let alone kill them.”

“Not even his abusive father?”

“No!”

“So why did he run away?”

“Because he hated the group home? Because he was afraid? I don’t know. I haven’t talked to him since everything went wrong. Just...please, Killian, you have to help. You’ve solved murders before.”

“You know, a few weeks ago, you were mad at me for even wanting to become a private investigator, now you’re asking me to take on a potentially dangerous job. Don’t you find that the slightest bit hypocritical?”

“Call me names, make fun of me; I don’t care. You’re probably right. All I know is I need your help.”

I sighed and rubbed my face. “Legally, I can’t take a case. I’m not licensed.”

“What about your boss?” Asher’s voice had a hopeful tone. He knew he was wearing me down.

“I can’t imagine he’d agree to anything like this. How would you pay him? This is his occupation; it’s what he does for a living.”

“Caleb should be getting insurance money from his dad’s death and the house burning down. He can pay him.”

“You haven’t even talked to Caleb about this yet. How do you know he wants to hire anybody?”

“You think he wants to go to jail for murder?”

I had to concede that point. “Fine. I’ll talk to Novak, but I’m not promising anything.”

“Thank you! Thank you so much!”

“Don’t thank me yet. Novak could very well say no. In fact, he almost certainly will. Just in case, though, tell me everything you know.”

“He was arrested last night on the boardwalk. It was all over the news this morning, along with new information from the police.”

“What kind of information?”

“Now they’re saying he chopped his father up with an ax and set the house on fire to cover it up.”

A surge of dizziness swept over me like a tidal wave, and I fell heavily onto my desk chair. “W-what did you say?” Flashes of my dream came back to me, and I felt bile rise in the back of my throat.

...a blood-covered ax dripping in my hands...

“The news said the body was dismembered before the fire was set. That’s all I know.”

...the split second of fear in his eyes before the ax struck for the first time...

“Killian, are you alright?”

...the feeling of pure hatred coursing through my veins...

“Killian?”

I felt someone shaking my arm and that snapped me back to the present. Asher was leaning over me, a concerned expression on his face.

“Are you okay? For a minute there, you looked as if you were going to faint or something.”

“I...I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah. I’m fine.” I stood up. “I didn’t sleep well last night, that’s all.” I could tell Asher didn’t know whether or not to believe me, but thankfully he dropped it.

“So you’ll look into this? You’ll help me prove Caleb is innocent?”

I looked him in the eye. “Tell me one thing: why does this mean so much to you?”

His eyes shifted away. “He’s a friend.”

“Is that all he is?”

“Would it matter?”

I sighed. “I guess not. Not anymore.”

Asher risked a quick look in my direction. “I never cheated on you, I swear.”

“It doesn’t really matter one way or the other at this point.”

“Killian, I —”

“You know what? I’m really tired. I think I need a nap. I’ll talk to Novak on Monday and let you know what he says. Okay?”

Asher bit his lip and nodded. “Yeah. Okay. Thank you.”

I sat down on the bed and watched as Asher let himself out. What was I thinking? I’d agreed to get involved in the murder investigation of my ex’s new boyfriend. Well, technically, I’d only agreed to talk to my boss about it. I was pretty sure he’d say no, but still... I had to be crazy.

Then there were my dreams. Was it just a coincidence that I’d dreamed about an ax murder and Caleb was accused of killing his father with an ax? I didn’t really believe in coincidences, but the alternative — that I’d somehow foreseen the murder in my dreams — disturbed me even more.

I couldn’t forget my weird dream about Seth, either. He’d warned me something was about to happen that would affect me, and it would be connected to Asher. A chill ran down my spine as I recalled I’d had the dream of Seth the night Caleb’s father was killed.

What did it all mean? Did it mean anything? It was just a dream, right?

As hard as I tried to convince myself otherwise, I knew there were too many coincidences. My head was starting to pound, and I didn’t want to think about dreams anymore. I slipped into the bathroom and took several pain relievers, then went back to bed. It was only noon, but I figured I’d earned a nice long nap.


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As You Are excerpt by Ethan Day

In As You Are by Ethan Day, all bartender and recent college graduate Julian Hallowell has had on his mind the past year is Operation Danny. Julian may have no idea what he wants to do with his life, but he definitely knows he‘s in love with the boy next door: the next door down the hall to be exact, housing his roommate and used textbook store owner Danny Wallace.

While Julian has done his level best to make Danny fall for him, all his hard work has been in vain. Danny doesn’t seem to view Julian as anything other than a roommate and friend. So when new guy in town Andy Baker asks him out on a date, Julian can’t think of a good reason to say no.

Instead, he institutes a Reverse Operation Danny plan, which he’s positive will purge all thoughts of love and lust for his roomie out of his head. He’s ready to move on and start looking for his next Mr. Right, and Andy just might fit the bill. But has he given up too soon?

As You Are
Loose ID (September 29, 2009)
ISBN: 978-1-60737-440-4

Excerpt:

Feather duster in hand, I danced around the apartment shaking my groove thang. Annie Lennox was blaring from the speakers. I shimmied across the wood floors in my socks and yelled out over the music in my game-show-host voice, “With a CD titled Diva, this is the segment of the population to which Miss Lennox was trying to cater.” I shimmied back in the opposite direction. “Who are big nelly queers, Alex?”

Sliding across the wood floors like Tom Cruise in Risky Business, I stopped in front of the mirror, lifted the feather duster up to my face, and sang along with “Walking on Broken Glass.” I thrust my hips, doing my Elvis impersonation, and laughed at myself. My parents both loved Elvis. It wound up being one of the few things they had in common. I'd taught myself to do the wild hip-thrusting dance when I was about eight or nine. Not many things could put a smile on both of their faces simultaneously, but that was one of them.

I shook my hips and shoulders while admiring my ensemble as reflected back to me from the mirror. An old pair of cutoff jeans, an homage to the summer vacations spent at the lake as a kid. They was paired with one of the white wifebeaters I'd stolen from Danny. It had a spaghetti stain from the time Danny and I had waged a food war in the kitchen. Completing the picture: a red bandanna tied around my head like a biker boy.

I thrust my hands out into the air, letting my spirit fingers fly freely as I sang along with Annie about no longer caring for sugar.

“You need to lay off the sugar, anyway,” Danny said from behind me as he kicked the front door closed.

I jumped about a mile off the floor, placing the fisted feather duster over my rapidly beating heart. Danny burst out laughing and walked over to the kitchen counter to set down the canvas grocery bags.

“I'm such a heifer, I know.” I composed myself as I meandered over to the stereo and turning down the volume. “I had a double mochaccino and, like, twelve Hershey's Kisses for breakfast.”

“Great, candy is like crack to you. Now I'm going to have to survive another Julie sugar rush.”

“Don't knock it.” I pointed the feather duster at him. “My little fixes are what keep this apartment clean.” Danny was wearing an old pair of worn jeans that snuggly wrapped around his business, and an old Dave Matthews Band T-shirt.

“You just need another outlet to pour all that pent-up energy into.”

“Macramé…decoupage?”

“No…like fucking.”

Pointing the feather duster toward his delectably denim-wrapped crotch, I asked, “Is there any decision that you don't make with that thing?”

“Which deodorant to use?” he mused, unpacking the bags. “No, wait, I'm pretty sure it was the muscular arm holding the hammer that made me choose Arm and Hammer deodorant.”

“You're hopeless… I sure hope you never suffer from erectile dysfunction. Your whole world would fall apart.”

“Hey!” He spun around with a serious expression. “That's not funny. I suppose you'd consider that some sort of cosmic justice.”

“You reap what you sow,” I said with a big cheesy grin.

“Julie, sex isn't a bad thing. As long as you have two consenting adults and everyone has a good time, who are you hurting? Besides, I've never heard any complaints.”

“How could you? You have 'em out the door before the sweat has time to dry.”

“That's not true.” Danny laughed. “God, you exaggerate.” He sighed and went back to emptying the grocery bags. “Do you want to grab a bite to eat before the reading?”

“Sure,” I said, “or we could just fix something here.”

“I don't think so.” Danny looked at me briefly before sauntering up to me and lightly rubbing his finger over the stain on my shirt. “This is what happened the last time we tried that.”

Goose bumps ran amok over my entire body as he stroked my stain. We stood looking at one another and smiling. He pulled the feather duster out of my hand and set it on the counter behind him, then he picked up the roll of paper towels and Windex, and shoved one into each of my hands. Placing his massive man-hands on my shoulders, he twirled me around, swatted me on the butt, and said, “Get back to work before I have to take you over my knee.”

I stood there for a few minutes mulling over that mental picture. Feeling my cock spring to attention, I thought, Good Christ, I do need to get laid. I nodded my head as I ogled the roll of paper towels in my hand. I decided to clean the bathroom first: kill two birds with one stone.

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The Golden Age of Gay Fiction edited by Drewey Wayne Gunn, excerpt by Victor J Banis

This excerpt from The Gay Publishing Revolution by Victor J. Banis is included in The Golden Age of Gay Fiction, edited by Drewey Wayne Gunn.

The Golden Age of Gay Fiction
MLR Press (September 16, 2009)
ISBN-10: 1608200485
ISBN-13: 978-1608200481

Excerpt:

The rise of gay fiction in the aftermath of WWII coincided with the explosion in popularity of the paperback novel, and paperback books weren’t distributed or sold beside their hardcover cousins in the bookstores of the day. They were distributed along magazines, newspapers, and periodicals and sold mostly in bus terminals, train stations, drugstores, and five and dimes. The proprietors of drugstores, dime stores, et al., gave little thought to the high-mindedness of the literary and library mavens. If the garish covers with smoking guns, lascivious women, and from time to time, a half-naked man could sell books and boost profits, who cared what the critics thought? Cheap books, widely available in nontraditional outlets, made it easier to spread the word.

Contributing significantly to the availability of these choices was a new phenomenon that appeared in the early 1960s and is not often mentioned in the histories of the period, but which had great influence on what was to follow — the paperback bookstore, the very concept of which was revolutionary. By the early 1960s, paperbacks were no longer limited to the outlets to which they had previously been restricted. And it was the publishers on the fringe, the publishers of sex-oriented material, who were leading the charge. In the late 1950s and the early 1960s, a handful of publishers, most of them on the West Coast, had begun publishing and distributing sexy magazines and periodicals, and in time they added paperback novels to their wares. As these grew in popularity, bookstores devoted to them began to open in major cities like Los Angeles and New York. By 1962 most cities of any size had entire bookstores specializing in the enormously popular paperback books. At first, most of these publications were heterosexually oriented, but in time gay magazines and fiction found their way into the mix as well. It was in this different kind of bookstore where the new genre of gay paperback fiction would eventually be found. The gay male could walk into one of these stores and for the first time ever choose books of a kind never before available to him.

The Fall of Valor and The Divided Path were not, of course, the only works of gay fiction. There were others. Sometimes even so-called legitimate novels touched on homosexuality. James Jones’s From Here to Eternity (1951), for instance, had a homosexual subplot, a queer network hidden within the army, though that was whitewashed out of the movie. In Mickey Spillane’s Vengeance Is Mine (1950), tough guy Mike Hammer spends the novel lusting after femme fatale Juno before in the final pages ripping off her dress. Midst the fabric, bangles, and spangles dropping to the floor, it’s easy to miss the mention of foam rubber, but there’s no missing Spillane’s dramatic finale: “Juno was a man.” In all, we were mostly freaks or creeps, alcoholics or molesters.

And the truth is that it’s easy to list the books because there were, alas, so few of them. It especially seemed so at the time, perhaps because in those early days, before the paperback bookstore, they were so hard to find. Often, finding them was a matter of happenstance — as a teenager, for instance, I discovered a copy of The Divided Path on the paperback rack of Campbell’s drugstore in my little hometown of Eaton, Ohio. Ideally, you had a friend in a local bookstore who would let you know when something “of special interest” came available. Even when you found the books, however, it was often difficult to find the homosexuality in them. Sometimes it was so discreet as to be nearly undetectable.

There was a sad similarity to most of these books too. Michael Bronski describes this early gay fiction (in Writing Below the Belt, ed. Michael Rowe, 1997): “Young boy comes to New York, meets people in the theater, gets fucked over, and then commits suicide.” All of it wasn’t that bad — Lonnie Coleman’s Sam (1959) comes to mind as a notable exception — but the description certainly fitted a large portion of what was available.

While the publishing world did not have the sort of Hays Office moral code that the movies of the 1940s and 1950s had, neither did publishing exist in a vacuum. A publisher could do books on any number of sinful subjects: drug abuse, for instance, or rape — or homosexuality. But to do so was to take a certain risk. The essential point for the publisher was that he must not seem to espouse these behaviors nor condone them; to present these activities in a positive light was to invite criminal charges. It must be made clear that these were bad people, doing naughty things for which they must be punished by the end of the book. For gay protagonists, that mostly meant cure or kill. Here, then, is why the possibility of “happy ever after” simply did not exist in that early fiction. To have introduced that kind of choice for the characters would have been seen as approving of or espousing a homosexual lifestyle — a sure invitation to arrest and prosecution.

From the earliest days, writing and publishing gay fiction was dangerous. Editors and publishers were routinely arrested. The story is told that H. Lynn Womack, founder of Guild Press, worked for a time out of a mental institution where he was hiding from the police.

... by the late-1960s I was not only a writer myself, and a very busy and prolific one, but an editor, a writing instructor, an agent, and a publisher. With my partners, employees, students, and clients, I was supplying a very large portion of what was being published in gay fiction and nonfiction. Not until I looked back some years later was I able to fully appreciate the impact that we had on the publishing scene of that time. There was a joke in the industry then that the gay publishing revolution had mostly occurred at my kitchen table, and there was more than a grain of truth in that. It was a rare afternoon that did not see several of us consulting around that table. It was exciting, if a bit exhausting.

We were a motley crew. Jim Westlake’s exposé Prison Confidential (1969) had to be smuggled out of the Ohio State Penitentiary, where he was an inmate at the time. Since then there have been other writers writing from prison, but at the time this was sensational stuff.

Lance Lester (Cruising Horny Corners, 1967) was George Davies, a writer for the Disney people, who, as another sideline, did stories for a series of underground pornographic comic books of Mickey, Donald, et al. — gosh, didn’t the Disney folks want to find out who he was! George also wrote a hilarious spoof of the Loon books, Fruit of the Loon (1968), as Ricardo Armory.

What’s really important in all this, though, was not my success nor that of my writers, but that the genre of gay publishing had arrived — gay paperback publishing, at least; the hardcover publishers were slower to get on the bandwagon, though they got around to it in time. Suddenly, gay fiction went from being under the counter to occupying entire walls in bookstores — even entire bookstores and, eventually, entire publishing houses.

In the decade leading up to 1966, when my first gay books were published by Greenleaf, there were probably no more than two or three dozen genuinely gay novels published. In the decade following, there were thousands — probably no one can say with any certainty how many — some say as many as ten thousand, though the actual figure is almost certainly less than this; still, the very fact of that perception in itself says something about what happened. For the most part, these books were free from the burden of tragic endings or the limitations of genre. Perhaps the most dramatic change of all was that we were now free to write about gay people and the lives they really lived.

Not all these books, of course, were published by Greenleaf Classics, but many of them were. It was indisputably Greenleaf and its editor Earl Kemp who had led the way, who had opened the doors. So, yes, we had brought about a true revolution in gay publishing — and for the most part in that interim between 1965 (and more significantly, 1966) and 1969, which is to say, before the uprising at Stonewall. While historians treat gay political history as Before Stonewall and After Stonewall, in the publishing revolution it was mostly Before Greenleaf and After Greenleaf. Or more accurately, Before Earl Kemp and After Earl Kemp.

By writing at such length about the contributions of Earl Kemp and Greenleaf to gay publishing, I may be giving some false impressions which I should perhaps correct: Earl Kemp was and is heterosexual. Greenleaf was never exclusively, nor even primarily, a gay publishing house. For all the enormous numbers of gay books that they published, gay material nevertheless remained by far the lesser part of their total output.

Greenleaf was established by fantasy and sci-fi wunderkind William Hamling and New York literary agent Scott Meredith, though Meredith remained throughout a very silent partner.

Though the new publishing house justified its existence by printing paperback editions of classic novels, the intent from the beginning was to jump into the then-blossoming sexual revolution. Of course, they wanted to make some money by doing so, but there was also a conscious desire, certainly on the part of Earl, to contribute to what they saw as some fundamental and large-scale changes in American society.

Homosexual material was not a major goal for the newly established Greenleaf. Nevertheless when Earl Kemp bought The Why Not, he saw that novel as a way of advancing gay themes, a worthy frontier for their censorship battles.

The Guild Press and DSI were the first two publishing houses devoted exclusively to publishing gay works, but as victims of aggressive federal harassment both had suffered checkered histories, and by the early 1970s both were gone. In 1975, Winston Leyland launched the Gay Sunshine Press in San Francisco, and in 1977 in New York, Felice Picano launched Seahorse Press. What is significant in the efforts of Leyland and Picano is that they were able to venture into this realm with relative impunity without the fear of prosecution and possible imprisonment that haunted Lynn Womack, Earl Kemp, and the rest of us only a few years before. And that is due, of course, to those others, in particular Greenleaf Classics, who, regardless of their heterosexual primacy, had fought the battle to legitimize gay themes.

And it is due as well to all the many writers who made possible the kinds of books eventually offered by these newer publishers.

But that battle was still being fought in those years between 1966 and 1969, and we were just beginning to appreciate what was being won. It was a heady experience to come out from under the covers, to be able to go into a store and buy not one, but two, three, a dozen books of whatever sort we wanted. Funny books, scary books, cookbooks, westerns, mysteries — they were all there. And so were we. We held hands in these new books — and held hands eventually as we shopped. We walked together in the pages of those paperbacks and marched right out of the pages to walk — and eventually march — together in the streets. We shopped. And cruised. And chatted. And began to perceive that we were far less alone than we had heretofore thought.

And yes, I do believe that it was here, as much as anywhere — among the beefcake covers and the campy titles and the astonishing variety of stories and themes that were suddenly there for us to choose from — that the sense of community, of oneness, first took seed.

The paperback books of the 1960s weren’t just books to those of us writing and publishing them. They were our town hall meetings, where the newly emerging gay community first began to exchange ideas. They were our forum, our agora. They were statements as much as they were entertainment, a message to the rest of the gay world that new choices were there for them, in and out of our books. A message that a generation of gays and lesbians got and shared and that would soon lead to Stonewall and The Castro and the entire gay political revolution.

By the time Golden Sunshine Press and Seahorse Press were launched in the wake of Stonewall, gay publishing had already come of age. Our gay publishing revolution had already been accomplished.

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Man's Best Friends excerpt by P. A. Brown

In Man's Best Friends by P. A. Brown, New Mexico, the land of enchantment, weaves a spell of love around Todd Richards and veterinarian Dr. Keith Anderson as they struggle to make their love work amid terrible loss, betrayal and rustlers and make their dream of a bed & breakfast in Santa Fe a reality.



Man's Best Friends by P.A. Brown
MLR Press
ISBN# 978-1-6082--074-0 (print)
ISBN#978-1-60820-075-7 (ebook)

Excerpt:

"Hold her head. Whatever you do, do not let her up."

I was practically sitting on Sally's head. Horses are funny animals. They can weigh in at over half a ton of nearly solid muscle, yet if you can immobilize their heads, you can prevent them from moving. That's what I was trying to do with Sally's Mark.

My lover, life partner, and best friend Dr. Keith Anderson lay stretched out on the stall floor. He had stripped off his shirt, and normally the sight of his beautifully sculptured bare chest would have had me thinking lascivious thoughts of how absolutely fuckable he was. But right now he was lying flat on his side, covered in straw, and blood, and other unimaginable filth, with one arm stuffed up a horse's ass. Definitely not the thing to inspire lustful thoughts.

I kept my eyes glued on the opposite, fly-specked wall. Normally I'm a pretty tough guy, but the sight of all that blood and writhing animal flesh was doing a real number on my stomach. I could hear a sickening squelching sound, and I wished I could redirect my ears as well as my eyes, but all I could do was to try to think of something else. Golf. Baseball stats. How about them Dodgers?

Keith grunted, and my eyes skated over him, instantly regretting the trip. His sinuous chest was sheathed in blood and straw, and his muscles stood out in stark relief as he strained to turn the breached foal inside our favorite mare. Keith caught my eye and frowned.

"Shit, Todd, you look green," he muttered. But if I was expecting sympathy, I was disappointed. All I got after that was, "Don't you dare throw up."

I ground my teeth together and looked away again.

"That's my baby," Keith said, and I smiled -- until I realized he was talking to the damned horse. "Come on, girl. We just have to get this little guy turned for you to do your job. But you gotta be ready, hon. That's a good girl."

I don't know if it worked on her, but it did a wonderful job of soothing me. Not that I wouldn't rather be anywhere else – grocery shopping, sleeping, enduring an audit of the books for the IRS – but any time I got to be with Keith was a plus in my ledger book. I'd loved the man passionately since I'd first met him a little over a year ago. It had been love at first sight for both of us when I took one of my dogs in to see the new vet. Love at first sight for the two humans, that is, though I like to think the dogs loved him too. It hadn't always been smooth sailing since then; we'd had our ups and downs. But now we ran this picturesque little bed and breakfast, just outside Santa Fe, that was doing very well, and added nicely to the income Keith brought in as a veterinarian, with a mixed small and large animal practice. It had sounded so glamorous when he told me he'd be looking after the equine trade, too. I hadn't realized at the time what that meant. If I'd known it meant middle-of-the-night sojourns up some pregnant mare's birth canal, I might have told him to reconsider -- at least, if he expected me to be part of the package.

Usually I'm not part of the deal. That was an honor that normally fell to our horse wrangler, Darrel, but he was with his own pregnant lady right now, our assistant manager, Mandy. She was having some kind of false labor pains, and Darrel refused to leave her side. So I was stuck with sitting on Sally's head while the love of my life swam in blood and guts and stuff I didn't want to think about. Talk about the end to a romantic evening.

We'd been invited to a posh gig at the home of one of Santa Fe's socialites, Mrs. Emanuel Henry Dominguez. Keith's parents had long been members of the Santa Fe community, and Keith had inherited their social standing. At first the socialites hadn't known what to make of this wealthy, good-looking, gay man, so they had tried to treat him like a bachelor. But Keith would have none of that. Invitations he received that didn't include my name were summarily rejected. The town socialites might have gone along with that, if Keith hadn't been such a big supporter of their favorite causes. As it was, they'd had to reconsider their priorities, and now the invitations to their soirees were routinely addressed to Dr. Keith Anderson and Todd Richards. The expediency of money.

This particular evening had been fun. We had attended the opening of a new art gallery featuring paintings I could actually understand, and a wine and cheese party that had edible food. I was in seventh heaven. After we arrived home, I entertained visions of tumbling Keith into bed for a late night romp when he decided to check up on Sally's Mark.

So there I was sitting on her head, trying not to watch the love of my life climb halfway up inside the mare in an attempt to save her foal.

"That's it. Now you're coming," Keith crooned encouragement. "Push now, girl. You're almost there."

I felt Sally's Mark heave under me, and her entire body went rigid. Then I heard more squelching sounds, and this time when I looked, I saw something wet and squirmy lying on the damp straw beside Sally. Under me, Sally gave a guttural sigh and lay still.

"Let her up, Todd." Keith was busy at the other end when I climbed to my feet and watched Sally heave herself up, shaking straw and lethargy away from her. She swung around to stare at the bloody heap on the floor between Keith's legs.

"Come on, girl. Get over here and have a look at him. How's my girl? Come have a look at your little stud."

Sally stuck her nose down and rumbled something in her broad chest. The little colt that Keith had done a fair job of cleaning up wiggled under his touch.

Keith and I backed away from the pair. It was up to Sally now. She had to bond with her new foal, and give him his all-important first feeding, or all Keith's efforts were going to come to nothing.

We held our breath as Sally snuffled at the newborn. Then she nuzzled it, and it jerked its knobby head up and made a minuscule sound that was barely audible in the big box stall. Sally reacted to it.

She snorted and began nosing the foal in earnest. She licked him vigorously. In turn the foal began to try to get its spindly legs up under it. When the foal actually tottered to its feet less than ten minutes later, I knew we had a winner on our hands.

"And look!" I whispered fiercely. "He's a paint. Look at the chest on that thing!"

The little red and white newborn stood beside its exhausted mother and windmilled its tiny stump of a tail in circles. Its nose was buried between mom's legs, searching for that all-important first drink. We left them to get acquainted, and walked back to the house arm in arm. I was no longer mindful of the crud all over Keith; I was too tired to care, and I felt too damned good over the new arrival. For his part, Keith was as depleted as the mare, and just as exhilarated.


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Like Coffee and Doughnuts excerpt by Elle Parker

In Like Coffee and Doughnuts by Elle Parker, Dino Martini is an old-school P.I. in a modern age. Sure, he may do most of his work on a computer, but he carries a gun, drives a convertible, and lives on the beach. Best friend and mechanic Seth Donnelly will back him in a fight, and there's not a lot more Dino could ask from life.

Until his world is turned upside down.

A dangerous case and a new apartment are just the start. His friendship with Seth has turned into a romance, only Dino has never had a boyfriend before. Can he handle this sudden twist? Just as he begins to believe it's possible, he loses Seth in more ways than one...

Like Coffee and Doughnuts
Lyrical Press (May 18, 2009)
ISBN: 978-0-9824170-5-8

Excerpt:

When I went into Ed's Garage looking to get backup from my friend Seth, I knew immediately my job was going to be harder than I'd thought. Seth and his latest "date," a blonde with short spiky hair and pretty legs, were tangled up on top of a red Ford Torino necking like the world was coming to an end. Neither one of them had a shirt on, but she wore a black and pink polka dot bra. She also wore a pale green skirt under which Seth's hand had disappeared. My timing wasn't good, but I was glad I hadn't come any later.

She saw me first and gave me a pretty smile, apparently not too disturbed by a stranger walking in on her fun. Seth was doing something to her neck that might have been kissing, but reminded me of the way he ate.

She prodded him and said, "Hey, we've got company."

When Seth raised his head, he looked surprised, but that quickly changed to irritation when he saw who it was. He didn't need to say a word for me to know exactly what he was thinking.

I smiled. "I thought you had to have the hood up to do a tune up."

"Not when we start with me first," he said. "Don't you have someplace better to be?"

"I'm sorry, I had no choice. Believe me, I did not want to do this, but duty calls."

"Tell duty to call back in about an hour, Dino." He went back to what he'd been doing.

"You're Dino?" the girl asked, lighting up. "I've heard about you."

"Dino Martini, at your service," I said. "Nice...bra."

"Thanks." She grabbed a fistful of Seth's hair and pulled him up to look at her. 'Don't be rude to your friend. He's obviously here for something important."

"He's here because whatever job he's got going this evening involves a high likelihood of him getting his ass kicked." He turned to look at me. "Am I wrong?"

I shrugged. "Hard to say with a case like this, but I don't like to take chances."

"What now?" Seth looked defeated already, which was good, because it meant this wouldn't be nearly as difficult as I'd thought.

"Cheating wife," I said. "You know how those can be."

"Yeah, yeah, all right."

Seth Donnelly is about five foot seven, has an unruly mop of carrot colored hair, and although he's thirty-three, he often acts like he's twelve. He's my mechanic, but he's also been a good friend for a lot of years, and there's no one I'd rather have next to me in a fight.

He slid off the hood of the car and told the girl, "I guess I'm gonna have to catch you some other time."

"That's okay," she said, climbing down and pulling her shirt on. "I have to get to work anyway. Can you look at my car tomorrow?"

"Sure, bring it by after three."

She gave him a quick kiss, got in the Ford and drove out, turning left, toward the beach. I was willing to bet she worked in one of the tourist bars down in John's Pass.

"Sorry about that," I said, turning to Seth.

"No sweat. Buy me dinner and we're square. She's cute enough, but her brother's the one I'd really like to nail."

I shook my head. "You bring a whole new meaning to the word 'sleaze', you know that?"

"Oh, come on, it's not like that. She knows. She's just in it for the fun and the free service on that wreck she drives. Did she look especially brokenhearted to you?"

"No," I admitted. "I can't say that she did."

"So tell me about the case," he said, grabbing his shirt off the workbench.

"Not that much to tell. This guy's had me following his wife for a while, and I finally caught her cheating on him with a long haul trucker. Turns out she's been meeting up with all kinds of them off a website called The Hot Trucker's Hookup."

"No shit, are you serious?"

"Yep."

"Sweet deal for the truckers, man. They can line up something everywhere they stop."

"That's pretty much the idea," I said. "They've got quite the little community on there."

I had followed Amy Ware all the way out to Florida's Interstate 75 and wound up spending an afternoon playing "Peeping Tom" through the ground floor window of a cheap hotel. On my fifth pass, I nearly swallowed my cigarette. She had her guy trussed up in a horse's harness and reins with the thing in the mouth and the whole nine yards, and she was ridin' him for all he was worth. I took easily fifty shots of that.

I'm kind of a mix between the old school P.I. and the modern "private investigator," which means I do my fair share of computer searches and background checks on top of the more traditional tailing of cheaters and mystery solving. But I drive a Mustang convertible, I carry a gun, and I live on the beach.

Well, close to the beach.

You are what you drive, they say, and I am a 1966 model of stylish sophistication with a sporty rakishness and a lot of muscle. Instead of Vintage Burgundy, though, I'm your average Italian color, and I have maybe a moderate amount of muscle. When I was a little younger, I had the classic Italian greaser look going on. Now I don't have quite enough hair on top to pull it off, but I'm told I still look pretty damn good.

I named the car Matilda because of her white ragtop, which makes her look like an old lady. She is, without a doubt, my most prized possession. I bought her eight years ago, after an especially lucrative case, and while she was in pretty good condition to begin with, Seth and I restored her to the level of perfection she exists in most of the time these days.

Outside, Seth dropped into the front seat next to me. He looked in the side view mirror and scrubbed his fingers through his hair. That's what passes for styling for him. He plucked his sunglasses out of the collar of his shirt and slid them on. It never fails to impress me how he can make slovenly look good.

"You goin' in carrying on this one?" he asked.

"I don't think so," I told him. "This guy is money. If he gives me trouble, it's going to be of the fist swinging variety, which is why I wanted you along."

"Are we gonna run it the usual way, then?"

"If you expect to be fed."

Certain people do not take bad news well, and if they can't lash out at the object of their anger, they'll often take it out on the closest thing available. I generally happen to be sitting across from them at that point, and I've learned to take precautions.

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Look Away Silence excerpt by Edward C Patterson

Martin Powers wanted an ironing board for Christmas. Instead, he got . . . Matthew Kieler, a non-returnable gift, but a gift that kept on giving. Chance encounters are sometimes the ones that most change our lives. He sold Matt a tie, but got more in the bargain - more than most people would want and more than anyone deserved. Although these lovers may not have had the pink American dream, they had it better than most, even as they faced a crisis that would change us all.

Look Away Silence by Edward C Patterson is a romance set in the time of AIDS, when ignorance could spell trouble and often did. It encompasses the author’s experiences in volunteer community service and personal friendships during a tragic period in American history. The novel is dedicated to the Hyacinth AIDS Foundation, the NAMES Project and to the author’s own fallen angels. "Mothers, do not shun your children, because you never know how long you have to revel in them."

Look Away Silence
Publisher: CreateSpace (July 17, 2009)
ISBN: 1448651929

Excerpt

Chapter One

Folding

1

I am a child of Christmas. Some people are Easter-kids. Others get fired up over the Fourth of July or wax poetic for Arbor Day. Not me. Christmas has always been the focus of my year, because everything that has been good in my life has come down from the sparkling Yule Fairy and wrapped up in bows and striped paper. As little children, we wish for many things at Christmas — trains, bikes, Legos, baseball gloves and some, like me, asked Santa for an ironing board. Now that would bode well and never shock, except my name is Martin and not Martina, and . . . it quite put my Grandpa off his Monday Night Football. My mother was cool with it, otherwise she would have bought me a GI Joe and insisted I dig trenches and drop fake bombs over the chenille. However, I wouldn’t have minded a GI Joe either, a fact my mother also sensed. So it was an ironing board for me. Vivian Powers’ sissy boy was devoted to Christmas from that day forward. I knew there was a Santa Claus and his linen closet was impeccably arranged.

Across the folds of time and through the tumble-downs of Christmases over the years, I found all my requests fulfilled. When I was old enough to find true love (or so I thought it true love . . . I mean, every time it was true love), it was at Christmas. That was the year I had drunk too much eggnog and awoke in a stranger’s bed — a stranger who unwrapped me like a party favor and gave me the most wonderful Christmas gift of all. In hindsight, the ironing board was better.

Despite the exciting sensation of joining with another soul, I learned fast that such passion was like the sea at ebb tide. I know about the sea. I live by the sea, here in Long Branch where the tide comes in and then sucks out a bit of the Jersey shore, a bit like my first passionate experience. Metaphors are not my forte. I should stick to laundry. I saw then true love for what it was — as false as Ru Paul’s D-cup. It didn’t last past New Years Day. And yes, my heart was broken. I cried and cried like a bride left at the altar. However, I was a lucky boy — still am. I have a mother like no other. She sat me down, dried my tears and said, “Marty,” (I hate being called Marty, but mothers can’t be corrected — at least not mine).

“Marty, he was a stranger. Didn’t know ya and didn’t want to know ya.”

Still, I loved what’s his name (funny how I forgot his name . . . Frank. Frank . . . that’s it. I remember his face, his hands and his hot breath in the night, but I still need to squeeze the corners of my mind for his name). My heart was shattered. No amount of Vivian Powers’ insightful advice could bring me around. However, my mother is a straightjacket case at times. Nothing controls her. The few words of advice that she has given throughout my life have stayed with me. So I remember exactly what she said, because it echoes every time I fall in and out of love, whenever Christmas turns into Easter.

“Marty, he was a stranger. Didn’t know ya and didn’t want to know ya. Just like ya father. None of them are worth the spit they splatter. But always get at least one thing from each of them, and you’ll have enough carfare for the Path line to the city, where you can find a better one. In your father’s case, I got you, Shithead.” (She’s so endearing that way, but I’d rather be called Shithead than Marty).

Of course, Viv (I never called her Mom or Mama or Mother dearest — her choice) was never a proper homemaker. She knew to buy me an ironing board, but only so I could do her ironing. My dad, the mysterious Mr. Powers, gave me my name, which I thought to change from Powers to Jones, because Jones fitted me better. He hadn’t stayed around to top the tree with the fairy angel, but I never cared. In fact, Viv told me she wasn’t sure who my father was as there were three candidates for the month. All the men in my life were defective, except one. They were all either druggies, old men, flaming queens, drunks, or just lumps on my pillow, except that one; and he . . . well, perhaps he was the most defective of all, because I’ve never really found my way out of Christmas with him, even though Good Friday has come and gone.

Perhaps I’m the defective one. Perhaps Viv was wrong and I’m the one not worth the splatter. I can’t help it. I have standards. Men have taken a gander at me (not bad looking . . . me, that is. Not an ounce of fat, and that without a gym bunny schedule), and picture me in some interlude — some Act One in their own play. Unfortunately, Act One is always followed by . . . well, you get the drift. Sometimes they hear me sing (and I’m a veritable Lorelei — first tenor and soloist with the Jersey Gay Sparrow Chorus). Whatever it is, they end by worshipping at my shrine — the well-pressed sheets from my sacred iron capped by perfectly fluffed pillows. Morning always brings a different light. At night, they are Tom Cruise. At dawn, they transform into the bell ringers of Notre Dame. The grand consolation is that every year brings another Christmas and another handy appliance — Vive la Viv, my manicurist mother, who brought home lovelier men than I have ever nabbed — and those without an iron board to entice them.

Despite my gifted voice and inclination for housework, I couldn’t live my life under my mother’s wing. She scarcely noticed me, her little shithead, who, as I got older, got under foot. I had to close my eyes more than once to her tumbling over the threshold with one or, dare I say, two male companions, who had likkered her up and thought they had her at a disadvantage. Little did they know. They may have had their frolic, but always get at least one thing from each of them, and you’ll have enough carfare for the Path line to the city, where you can find a better one. I supposed some day that I would have a little brother or sister and learn to change diapers, scrub bassinets, and all the other happy chores that motherhood brings. But no. Viv just managed a collection of diamonds, pearls and emeralds. They were gaudy things, not to my tastes or I’d have pinched a few. However, as time went on, and I graduated from Red Bank High School, there were more than a few hints from the maternal maw that I should get to college, or a job and, by all means, into my own hermitage, such as it is. The suggestions were subtle in the mornings over coffee and English Muffins. “How’s the job hunt coming, dear?” In the evenings — those hazy evenings a la Viv, the point was sharper. “You’re still here, Shithead?” In any case, college was out. Couldn’t afford it and no one that I ever knew got a degree in laundry. I could have pursued my vocal training, but that would preclude that I had vocal training to begin with, which I hadn’t. I was the youngest member of the Jersey Gay Sparrows, and while the Chicken Hawks often were on my tail, they were also jealous queens seeking to push me aside and away from the prime solos. So I did what any respectful young man that had more than a foot out of the closet would do. I went into retail.

2

Christmas and retail are friends, as close as Marley and Scrooge. In the sprawl of Eatontown Mall stood paradise — a Christmas chaos called Abraham & Straus. I bought me a suit and got me an interview to swim in the rarified air of departmental retail duties. I saw myself as the perfect go-to person in the linen department. I could live my life in thread count and percale — heaven on earth. There’s nothing like the aroma of fresh linen — clean and mountainy, with a promise to bless the chest, to caress the shoulders and snuggle the toes with its gentle static-free cling — an adoration well beyond that of the Magi. However, to my disappointment, the management of the store saw me more as a behind-the-counter type in the men’s department amidst a sea of ties and pants and shirts and sweaters. So instead of my Elysian Fields of Canon and Burlington Mills, I was lost to the Forest of Arden — Men’s wear.

Retail didn’t pay much, but within six months, my mother awoke to an empty kitchen and asked her question no more. I found an apartment — not very classy, but it had possibilities. It was a first floor back dealie with a rear entrance and a small courtyard. I couldn’t see the ocean from my window, but I could smell the clams when they ripened — not the most encouraging aroma, but it was my stink and it stunk just fine for me. It was private for when I had my little heartbreak evenings, when the stink was worse than rotting clams, but that too was my stink. I was also within walking distance of the nearest gay bar — The Cavern, which would be a blessing if I didn’t visit it so often, donating my meager income to the latest assortment of fruity refreshments of the adult kind. I was an adult now (barely), so what better way to exhibit that fact than to imbibe a bit, and more than a bit. After all, it was just a stagger across the street, through the alley, along the beach and into my courtyard palace.

So I thrived, after a fashion. Then came Arthur — Arturo, a stunning man, who wandered home with me one night and never left. Well, Christmas be damned, he did leave, but not fast enough. He stayed for six months, two of which were quite nice actually. He didn’t work, so I left my daily bed unmade; and he would be off spending my money at the Cavern by the time I arrived home. It was fine with me. I joined him, and then we’d laugh and play volleyball and run about naked on the beach (after dark, when neighbor eyes were dimmed to see us). However, Christmas came to a close after a sixty-day period, like an expired Library book that I forgot to return. Arturo had another little addiction other than Appletinis and beer. Meth. He was not a Methodist, would that he was, and I am not judgmental when it comes to another man’s predilections. However, when the cost is visited upon my bank account and the benefits of the bed fade, I usually become as mad as Queen Mab. My scant income could not compete with his habit. Therefore, he augmented his income with a better-heeled married man who made him his little lunchtime tidbit. Dinners went to a leather daddy who lived in Asbury Park and would pick Arturo up on the corner and redeposit him back there like clockwork. My evenings were spent listening to snores. So we argued.

Arturo turned out to be a mean son-of-a-bitch. He trashed my place one evening, and when I threw him out into the courtyard, he howled like a cat — my neighbors stirring to call the police, who showed up at my door wondering why a young swishy thing like me would even consider letting a bum like Arturo be my roommate. (We did the roommate thing on the police report). The next day, I took off from work and called my sister, Russ — a fellow ironing board surfer, who was also a Gay Sparrow and worked in retail. Together, we packed Arturo up and showed him the door. He was more docile in the mornings — pleading even, but Russ was born with a steel corset. He deposited Arturo on the sand without as much as a z-snap. I was glad to know this tough little baritone from the Tuxedo store — fiery charm in the declarative and a fine connoisseur of dust ruffles and dainty hand towels. I decided to live alone from that day forward. After all, I’m my mother’s son and had to do her proud. But then, Christmas came along and ...

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