Define Boink Page 2

  As I settled into the car, Troy said “Thank you. Out of all the homeless people who come in—we call them squatters—he’s the only one I’m afraid of, and I mean physically, gut-deep, afraid of. But he won’t bother me tomorrow…”

  “Oh? Why not?” I asked, starting the car.

  “I forgot to set the timer, and I forgot to bring the keys out with me.”

  With that, we laughed all the way home.

  * * * *

  “This is nice,” Troy said, looking around the barely furnished living room and dining room. “It looks like it wants a family, with two kids and a dog.”

  “It was nice with just two men who—well, never mind; that’s over now. I’ll be happy to be out of it tomorrow.”

  “But where will you go?” Troy asked, putting his pack on the dining room table and fussing with one of the zippers.

  I shrugged. It was stupid of me, and maybe self-pitying, but I had made no plans at all. There was a couch in my office; I guess I’d go there. I guess I wanted an excuse to feel sorry for myself.

  “You didn’t tell me about your job yet.”

  Troy pulled a bottle out of his bag. “Ta da! Dad’s best brandy! Do you have any cups left here? No? No glasses? Not even a couple of dog water bowls?”

  We ended up sitting at the table, taking turns sipping from the bottle. We still had coffee, which we put in the fridge, to heat up in the morning. Little did we suspect how hung over we’d be by then. We put the snacks in the fridge for morning, also.

  “Okay, my job,” Troy started. “I’m going to be an outreach counselor at Children’s Hospital. Glorified social worker, I suppose, but it’s what I want to do. I’ll be dealing with several other agencies as well…”

  “You’ll be dealing with me!” I exclaimed. “Plus, my own office is only a mile or two beyond there, so I can take you to work!”

  “Will you take me home, too?” Troy asked coyly, reaching for my hand, running his fingers lightly over my palm. “If we ever find a home? Your car’s too small to sleep in, and the back seat won’t quite fit for…other things. And my car,” he added bleakly, “Is out of my reach in the junk yard. I don’t think it even has a seat anymore.”

  “I’m sorry,” I offered, turning my hand over to hold his. Our eyes met, and I gave him the bottle. “Remember, sip, don’t gulp,” I said, “It’s expensive.” That made us both laugh.

  As it worked out, that was as close to love as we got. We got stupidly and happily drunk, and I doubt we could have done anything sexually if we’d wanted to, which we did, or at least, I did. But it didn’t matter. We curled up on my sleeping bag together in a tangle of arms and legs, and woke up about half an hour before I was to show the house to the realtor once more. We had very hurried showers, packed up the empty bottle, dressed in our same clothes, and by the time the realtor came and I gave him the last round of paperwork, we’d had our coffee and breakfast and were on our way to the car.

  “I’d better call my ex-boss,” Troy said, yawning. “I’ve lost better jobs than that, though I’m sorry I didn’t do better.”

  “They can’t all be tens,” I said.

  We got in the car and headed off to the highway. As I drove, I got to thinking. Troy was sitting quietly, biting a nail absent-mindedly. His hand was shaking. He must have been pretty damn nervous about starting his new job today. Which reminded me, he wasn’t due to start until after he’d quit his other job, and today was to have been his last day at the Mug Shot. I shrugged. It was a holiday, and all hell broke loose in some kids’ lives on holidays. Early or not, they could use him, and being understaffed as holidays usually are, they’d be glad to see him. I’d go in with him and ease the transition and even take some blame for any confusion. It was good to know people in high places.

  “Oh, duh! I’m so stupid!”

  I almost laughed. Looked like Troy had just caught the conundrum of starting work at his new job early. Then I did laugh and patted his leg. “They’ll be glad to see you. They’ll think their paperwork was wrong, not you, honey.” Ooh, how did that slip out? I had to stop thinking of him as another of my kids, or I’d never be able to, er, how had I put it? Fuck his brains out. Or something like that. To reassure myself, I asked, “How old are you?”

  “I’m twenty-three, why?”

  “I thought you were younger.”

  “That’s not always been a blessing.”

  “Never mind. The kids will adore you and think you’re one of them, and your coworkers will adore you because you’re a cutie.”

  “Cute. I hate being cute. I wanted to be studly, and manly, and shit like that.”

  At least b, traffic was light, and I turned on the radio to something soothing, classical; might as well fly my non-freak flag early. Troy’s phone rang, and it was the opening bars of Beethoven’s Fifth, and I grinned.

  Before he could say hello, a voice squawked out full blast. “Goddamn you to the bottom of a pirate’s piss-filled sea, where are you? Who was that ham-fisted drunk waiting for last night’s stale cookies? He punched me in the nose and then broke the fucking window! The cops came, and now I’m at the hospital getting my face fixed up. This is all your fault, you belly-crawling, slime-shitting, snot-nosed little…”

  “Oh, that’s my ex-boss,” Troy whispered.

  The phone voice screamed, “You’re fired, you micro-pricked, primitive little Neanderthal…”

  He turned his phone off and looked around to see if he could throw it out the window. Instead, he tucked it back in his pocket.

  “Put in on vibrate, get some fun out of it!” I blurted. He stared at me, then broke up, and we almost crashed from laughing so hard.

  Long story short, I got him to his job, talked to the people I knew, explained a bit, and, yes, they were glad to have him because like anywhere else, some of those who could not get the day off had called in sick. I left him and went to my own office, telling him I’d pick him up around four.

  I was whistling happily as I went into my office. The phone was ringing, and I grabbed it up and said, “Yo!”

  It was my realtor. “What is this, some kind of joke?”

  I’d handed him the papers about an hour before, and the house had been in order.

  “I don’t understand. What’s wrong?”

  “Everything!” he said. “The basement is full of sewage. Your garage has homeless people in it who won’t leave, and they were smoking weed. When I turned the stove on to test it, the oven caught fire. Someone had stuffed it full of paper towels! This isn’t funny, Clement, or should I say Clem. I can’t work with you like this. The fire department was here. I had the prospective new owners coming in this morning and had to cancel. Then the police came, and I had to explain why I was even there and why the dopers were in the garage! Didn’t you fucking check anything? Burn in Hell, asshole! The sale is off,” And he slammed his phone down.

  I had an image of Derrick, sneering and laughing with whatever friends he might still have. I sat at my desk, well, dropped half dead into the chair, put my hand over my eyes, and wondered what in hell I should do. Then the phone rang again, and it was a case I had to take. The police were bringing a fourteen-year-old boy in to be cleared for a safe house, or a foster family, or the hospital. God help me, I hoped he needed to go to the hospital. My first thought had been of Troy; that Troy would know what to do. Fourteen years old; no holiday for him; it was barely breakfast time. Luckily, my closet was full of snacks, more snacks, juice boxes, and stuffed animals. I’d make some decisions, sign a few papers, fill the kid up, and take him where he needed to go. Poor kid. I hoped he didn’t think he was too old for a teddy bear. Hell, I could have used one myself, right then.

  When they brought him in, my heart melted. He was still in his pajamas, and one eye was black and swollen. Okay, hospital. He was biting his lip so hard, it had bled, but there were tear tracks down his face, anyhow. Well, he’d tried. The cops left, and I pointed to a chair.

  “Have you eaten?” I
asked.

  Of course, he didn’t answer. Kids that age, not only did he feel he had to be all manly and strong, but, if he admitted any weakness, he’d probably act the way he felt, which was usually about six years old. So, I grabbed some cookies, gave him half, and opened the other half for myself. I grabbed two stuffed animals, one a dog, the other a cat. I raised one eyebrow. He took the cat, first, and then the dog, too.

  I’m not a normal, well-trained therapist. I’m not just a mis-classified combination of roles but also a renegade. I ate three cookies at once and said, “Cookies and pets are better than people because…”

  I expected silence, but you never know. The boy had dirty blond hair, longer than currently popular, bright blue eyes, and I suspected I knew something else about him, too. Call it a sixth sense.

  “Pets and cookies don’t care if you’re gay.”

  “I’m gay. But I don’t have a pet, not anymore. He didn’t give a shit, oops, one way or another.”

  “My dad did.”

  “Some fathers suck. Mine did.”

  “You shitting me?” His eyes were wide with surprise.

  “A father is just one person. You are one person. One person is just as valuable and wise as another. If you take the label, in this case, Father, off a person, would you value his opinion or even want to be around him?”

  “Well, let’s just say he’s blown his chance at father of the year!”

  “Let’s finish this up and take you to the hospital. You’d be surprised how gay friendly it is there; and you’d be surprised to know how un-alone you are.” I had to add, “And I really like how brave you are to come right out and tell me. Good for you.”

  His smile was my reward. Well, actually, getting to see Troy was going to be my reward, which made me smile.

  I had a few minutes to think while driving, as the boy played with the radio and stuffed cookies in his face. The condo had been put into my name when we divorced. I’d paid Derrick his share of any expected profit upfront. So now that it was apparently off the market, I was completely liable for whatever the hell loss might be accrued. On the plus side, however, I had a place to live if I didn’t mind a basement full of sewage. I made a mental note to call Ace Super Clean, A.K.A. We Suck, which most of my neighbors called Shit Be Gone, but they did good work. And golly gee, a whole garage full of potential new friends, right? And I suddenly remembered where I’d put all the linens. They were in a couple of boxes in the trunk of my car.

  Okay, long story short. We did indeed see Troy and the other social workers, neither the boy’s nose nor his eye socket was broken, and there were no temporary foster homes available. So, at five P.M., there were three of us in my car, plus two stuffed animals, more cookies, some clothes for the boy, and the two boxes of linens in the trunk. We got to my house, I picked the bill off the dining room table that Shit Be Gone had left, and we ordered pizzas and soda. I peeked out the side window into the garage, but the doors were open and it was empty. I hadn’t even thought of parking in there because whatshisname had always used the garage, and I had parked on the street. I closed the garage doors so the unofficial tenants wouldn’t return.

  We settled down to wait for the pizza, deciding to make the beds up later.

  The kid shocked me by asking, “So, do you two, like, boink each other?”

  “Does the liquor store deliver?” Troy asked hastily, blushing madly.

  “What did you do all day at the hospital?” I asked, not missing a beat, trying not to giggle out loud. I wanted so badly to say, “Define boink,” and watch the kid turn purple. Or maybe he wouldn’t.

  “Well,” here the boy, whose name was Alex, almost jumped with excitement and his one good eye sparkled. “They brought in these little kids, like six years old and four years old or something? And they were both crying their eyes out and all beat up. And while the nurses were poking around, I kept reaching out and holding their hands, and I had both the stuffed animals, the cat and the dog, and I gave them each one to hold, and they started sucking their thumbs, so I did, too, only I pretended to bite myself, and they almost laughed, so I did it again and…”

  This blitz went on uninterrupted by Troy or me until there was a knock at the door. Alex wound down, and I went to the door.

  “Pizza, that’ll be thirty-six fifty, and is this your dog?”

  It was my dog. I gave the kid two twenties and tried to both shut the door, greet my dog—my dog—and not drop the pizzas.

  Alex shouted, “Yay, you got me a dog!” and Troy took the pizzas to the table.

  If I hadn’t been smiling so hard (and so wickedly), I might have felt lonely, but it was the holiday, we had food, and I had my whole, new family around me. They certainly come in different forms, all right, and sometimes you don’t ever find out how.

  Apparently, I’d given my boy my dog, and the way Troy was looking at me right then, I think I knew what I might give him later. After all, my condo only had two bedrooms, right? It looked like the boy and dog would be in one, so…what does boink actually mean anyhow? Well, I guess we’d think up something.

  * * * *

  We ate the pizza, bitched among ourselves that we had no ice cream, fed the crusts to the dog, made the beds, and went to our rooms. I could hear Alex talking to my dog. Now the history of my dog is quite interesting.

  Derrick got him a week before we met, so, technically, it was his dog. But Derrick teased the poor thing so much and so heartlessly, even naming him after some porn star, that when the dog met me and knew I was going to be around, he made himself over into my dog and would only answer to the name I gave him., Unfortunately, I named him Kahakaloa after a place in Hawaii I wanted to see. More about that later. However, it was an awkward name and got shortened to Kak, which Derrick pronounced Cock (after his porn star, I presume). So, it was kind of a compromise, if a bad one.

  I didn’t want to tell Alex this was not only my dog but that he answered to Cock, so I let Alex think it was now his dog. (If Derrick showed up, I’d fight him to the death to keep it that way. Funny the things you will do for someone else that you wouldn’t do for yourself.) So, I was half listening to Alex talking to the dog and what he was saying. Now, the dog is sort of a cross between a collie and a yellow lab and both looks like a retriever and acts like one.

  “I shall call you George,” Alex said, “Only your real name is in Mexican, so when I call, it will sound like Whore, hey, or wait, is it Hey, whore? Never mind. We’d better stick with George. I don’t know a lot of Spanish, and, if I don’t get back to school, I won’t ever know any more. I suppose I could Google it if there’s a computer here. I don’t suppose there is because these guys are old geezers. Don’t get me wrong, George, I love them a lot, but they are clueless. Anyhow, oh, look how soft your ears are. I love you so much, I’ve always wanted a dog…”

  As I started to tune him out, giggling to myself over Hey, whore! Alex said, “This is just between you and me, George, but I don’t know if I’m really just gay or if I really want to be a girl. Don’t you dare tell anyone, okay?”

  And about then, the other old geezer, Troy, came out of the shower naked, and we started trying to figure out how to boink without making any noise.

  If you must know, we figured it out three or four different times during the night.

  THE END

  ABOUT EMERY C. WALTERS

  Emery C. Walters was born Carol Forde, a name he soon knew didn’t fit the boy he was inside. Transition was unknown back then, so he married and then bore and raised four children. When his youngest child, his gay son, left home, Emery told Carol that she had to step aside, and he fully transitioned from female to male in 2001.

  Emery worked in county government and as a college writing tutor before retiring. He and his wife Robyn, herself raised mistakenly as a boy, live in Hawaii where they combine snorkeling, scuba diving, and volunteer work with activities to boost LGBT rights and awareness.

  Interested in Ninjutsu, both land and underwate
r photography, and writing, Emery can usually be found writing, reading, or sailing on his imaginary pirate ship.

  Emery’s 2010 first published novel, Last Year's Leaves, is an intense story of recovery from abuse and loss, finding love, and coming out whole. The book is laced with his trademark humor. His recent publications include four other coming of age novels involving coming out and overcoming obstacles as well as two books of short stories. All are humorous and filled with hope. Drystan the Dire, Emery’s Welsh pirate ancestor, shows up at times to help the heroes and annoy the villains. Emery currently has two more novels in the publishing pipeline.

  Between them, the Walters have eight adult children, umpteen grandchildren, and one great grandchild, none of whom can do a thing about the genetic material handed down to them—their gift to the future. So there. More information can be found online at ftemery-theemeryboard.blogspot.com.

  ABOUT JMS BOOKS LLC

  JMS Books LLC is a small queer press with competitive royalty rates publishing LGBT romance, erotic romance, and young adult fiction. Visit jms-books.com for our latest releases and submission guidelines!

 

 

  Emery C. Walters, Define Boink

 

 

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