"I understand. You have this whole other life and I'm not part of it," Chance said. "I knew you were here temporarily, but I fell in love with you anyway. It happens." He let go of Brody's balls and sat up on his knees. He leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. "We'll be okay."
"Damn, baby! I didn't expect to fall in love with you either," Brody said. And he punched the pillow as hard as he could before pulling Chance by the back of the head toward his face and shoving his tongue into his mouth so hard, their teeth knocked together.
A moment later, Chance pushed him away and got out of bed. He dressed quickly despite his shaking hands. He tried to keep smiling for Brody's sake, but it wasn't possible. He could barely force his fingers to hold the buttons on his shirt without fumbling. "No long goodbyes," he said, when he picked his car keys up from the nightstand. "Let's keep this simple."
Brody smiled. He was still in bed and still naked. "We'll keep in touch, baby. This isn't the last time we'll see each other."
Chance stared at him for a second and shrugged his shoulders. "C'mon, Brody," he said. "You know damn well we'll probably never see each other again. Sometimes it's just not meant to be. We live in two different worlds. I'm still struggling to build a career as a chef and I need my job at the market to do that. And you're a career naval officer where there are rules about moral obligations and this thing called 'don't ask and don't tell.' You could be discharged for this, and you have too much at stake to get mixed up with someone like me, I don't want to complicate your life."
As he spoke, something inside him changed, and it occurred to him that instead of feeling sad and pathetic, he suddenly felt strong and wise. He wasn't looking forward to begging the old man for his job back, but he knew he was doing the right thing by letting Brody go back to his life with a clear conscience.
Brody sat up on the edge of the bed and patted his legs. "At least sit down on my lap and kiss me goodbye."
But Chance shook his head and crossed toward the door. "Ah, well, if I do that, you'll have my pants down around my ankles in a minute, I'll be wearing high heels, and my legs will be in the air over your shoulders. No long goodbyes." He opened the door and held the doorknob for a moment. Then he looked Brody in the eye and lowered his voice. "Take care of yourself, man."
"You too, baby," Brody said. He stood from the bed and faced him, then smiled and said, "One more thing. Say my name again. I like the way you do that."
Chance laughed. "Take care of yourself,
Brody
." Then he took a deep breath and stepped outside onto the dock.
The sky was clear that afternoon and the lake was almost as blue as Brody's eyes. When he was halfway up the stone stairs that led to the house, he heard the sound of an engine starting. He turned and looked back. Brody was standing next to the boat wearing sweatpants, and he looked up and waved before untying the boat from the dock, jumping inside and pulling away. The small, clear waves he left behind parted and drifted off in opposite directions, and Chance walked back to his car alone.
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Dan Pratta was behind the deli counter, leaning over the meat slicing machine, with a butter knife—his idea of a tool kit—in one hand and a dish rag in the other. Thankfully, there were no customers waiting for deli meats, because Dan hadn't had to worry about fixing the slicing machine since Chance had started working there. It was also obvious he had been working the market alone on Sunday. The counter was littered with scraps of meat and cheese, there were splashes of mayonnaise on the wall, and the salads hadn't been turned over since Chance had left the previous day. His eyes were focused so intently on the blade that he didn't even bother to look up when Chance walked in through the front entrance. There was no loud Italian music blaring from the
loudspeakers over the front door.
It was a slow afternoon for a Sunday in August, and all Chance could hear were the clinks and clanks of the butter knife hitting the slicing blade, which he knew wasn't broken at all. It only needed to be cleaned properly because Dan had probably jammed something like hard salami in the back. The part-time cashier was reading a tabloid newspaper on the counter, but she was so interested in the latest affairs of some celebrity that she only smiled at Chance for a second and went back to her reading, which was fine with Chance.
He jiggled his keys and Dan looked up at him. The old man said, "Oh, it's
you
." And then he looked down at the screwdriver and tried to shove it behind the blade.
"You have to turn it upside down," Chance said. "There's probably a piece of meat stuck in the back. It's not broken."
"Oh," he said, and rested the tools on the counter so he could turn the machine around.
This was the first time Chance had ever gone against the old man's orders about something that didn't involve touching his ass, and it was awkward. There had been that time when the old man had slipped into his bedroom in the middle of the night and tried to get into bed with him. One minute Chance was sound asleep, and the next he felt someone's hand on his ass and hot, sour breath on his neck. Another time, Dan tried to give him a blow job while he was napping naked on the sofa during a snowstorm when the market was closed. But all this had happened four years earlier, when he'd first started working and living there, and both times Chance had set the record straight—that he'd walk around naked after hours, but no physical contact of any kind—with such bluntness that he wasn't sure how Dan would react to a normal disagreement about taking a few hours off on a Saturday afternoon. He took a deep breath and clenched his fists so he'd be prepared if Dan threw him out again.
Dan reached behind the blade and yanked out a huge chunk of head cheese that he'd probably jammed there himself the day before. He had those crooked, stubby little fingers that curled inward with age. He hadn't showered for a while, and if Chance went any closer, he knew he'd have to breathe through his mouth to avoid the rotten onion smell.
"What do
you
want?" the old man asked.
"Ah, well..." he said. "I'd like my job back."
Dan laughed and shook his head. "So you lost your contest and now you coming crawling back." He laughed and shook his head.
Chance hadn't expected the old man to welcome him with open arms. He'd expected to have to beg. "I just want my job back, is all." He stared at the floor and spoke with a clear, even voice. He could have argued the point that he'd actually won second prize. But he didn't think it would matter much to Dan.
"And how do I know this won't happen again?" Dan said. "That you won't go running off tomorrow after a bag of magic beans or some other silly idea in your pretty head?"
Chance lowered his head and shrugged. He didn't think begging would be this difficult. He was almost ready to give the old bastard the middle finger, but he knew that would be a mistake and he would wind up homeless and jobless. That thousand-dollar check wouldn't get him very far either. So he reached down and tugged his dick a few times while Dan stared at him. "I'm not going anywhere for a very long time. I just want my job back."
Dan stared between his legs and smiled. "Tell you what, I'll take you back on a trial basis with a few conditions: One, that
you
start scrubbing the floors every single day until I think they are clean enough, and two, that you sit on my lap naked every night for one hour." He raised his right eyebrow and folded his hands below his waist. "These are my conditions, for now." He wasn't joking either.
The boldness of his second condition left Chance standing there speechless. He didn't reply. Their standing agreement was that there would never be any physical contact between them other than an occasional quick, cheap feel. Then Dan added, for the sake of clarity, "Nothing more than sitting on my lap naked. I'll keep my hands on the arms of the chair. You only have to sit there for one hour every night and wiggle around a little."
"I'll scrub the floors every day," Chance said, while he clenched his fists behind his back. "I'll even scrub your truck once a week. But I'm not sitting naked on your lap." Dan was probably bluffing anyway. Dan liked his naked ass, but he also liked the way Chance cooked and made money, which was far more important. But Chance didn't call his bluff out loud.
Dan pressed his lips together and considered. "Okay, no sitting on my lap, but
you
still have to take off your clothes when you're upstairs, and I want my truck scrubbed and cleaned once a week. That's a good idea." He smiled viciously. "It's not such a bad deal, if you ask me."
"If that's what it will take to get my job back, fine."
"That's it?" Dan asked "No 'thank you', or 'I'm sorry', or anything?" He pressed his finger to his chin and frowned. "You don't sound grateful."
Chance closed his eyes and inhaled through his nose, controlling his temper. "I'm sorry for yesterday. Thank you for taking me back." He spoke quickly and looked down at the floor, and the words seemed stuck in his throat.
The nun stepped into the market carrying a small shopping list, and Dan threw his arms in the air and greeted her with a gigantic, insincere smile. Chance went behind the deli counter and put on his apron so that he could fill her order and finish working what was left of the day.
Monday morning, he felt overwhelmed by a painful tug in the pit of his stomach, even worse than the lump he'd had in his throat the previous night. It was partly because he didn't want to be there anymore. Everything in Dan's market suddenly took on a distressed, dreary appearance. And though he knew he would not be there forever, and he'd work as hard as he could to get out, for the time being he was again trapped and helpless. because the worst part was knowing he wouldn't see Brody again. Getting back together with him on Sunday after being mad at him for over a week had frayed his emotions and taken him on a wild ride he hadn't expected. It might have been better if he'd actually remained mad and let Brody go back to Europe without ever seeing him again. Watching Brody drive off in the boat on Sunday afternoon reminded him of the time they'd made love in the dark cove, with Brody's large, strong hands wrapped around his waist protectively. Chance wondered if he'd ever be able to forget him.
He went into the barn first thing that morning, hoping to find a new batch of squirrels so he could continue to torture the old man. When he opened the door and looked into the cages, he raised one eyebrow and smiled at the sight of four brand-new squirrels resting in silence. When he sprayed their bushy tails lightly with orange paint, Chance made a wish that maybe Dan would take them even further away this time so he'd be gone at least two or three days in a row.
When he went back into the kitchen to prepare his one-ofa-kind meatloaf (the secret ingredient, along with ketchup
and
mustard
and
diced hearts of palm, was one tablespoon of plain old table sugar to each pound of meat ... the sugar did something that made people beg for more) as the special for the day, he found a sense of peace in his cooking. Slicing the onions and cracking the eggs took his mind away from the sound of Dan snoring and farting at night. Grating the stale bread into crumbs and inhaling the smell of freshly crushed garlic made him stop thinking about the way Brody had shoved him against the shower wall and pinned him there so hard, he could barely breathe. He took a deep breath and smiled when he pressed his palms into the raw meat and mixed the ingredients together. He even tossed a pinch of salt over his shoulder for good luck.
By the time the small loaves of meat were cool enough to be covered and placed in the wooden bowl for the customers, he was so involved in displaying his work that he actually jumped back when Sarah walked inside and shouted, "I smell the best meatloaf in the world cooking." She was chomping on a piece of bubblegum. Her lips smacked together and she blew a bubble so large, she had to scrape gum off her lips with her long red fingernail. She wore tight white shorts and a black-and-white polka dot T-shirt.
He lifted his arms in the air and shrugged. "I guess I'm back."
"I won't say I'm glad, because you don't really want to be here," she said. "But I'm not totally depressed to see your face either. When I thought that I'd have to work here without you, I was ready to start job-hunting myself."
He placed the wooden bowl on a slight angle at the edge of the deli case and crossed the room so he could see if she had enough cash in the drawer. When he slipped behind the counter, he asked her, "So what's going on with you these days?" He didn't really want to hear about Sarah and her boyfriend, but he figured if he asked, then she pry for details about his lost relationship with Brody. He didn't want to talk about it, He wanted to push his feelings for Brody as far back as possible and forget them.
"Well, wait until you hear this," she said. She plopped her purse under the counter and put her hands on her hips. "Mike asked last night if I would consider anal sex." She didn't even take a hesitant breath, but rather blurted this information out casually. She studied one chipped red fingernail.
"He asked
what
?" He was partly shocked by the declaration, and also because Dan had left only twenty singles in the drawer; he'd have to get her some money.
"If I would let him do anal sex with me," she said, and then reached around and pointed to her rear end. Her voice was still loud. Most women would have leaned forward and whispered such a thing, and some wouldn't have mentioned it at all. But Sarah was so pleased, she could barely catch her breath.
Chance stepped back and put his hands in his pockets. "What did
you
do?"
"I told him I'd ask you about it first," she said. "I'm not trying to get any details about you and Brody. God forbid. I just want to know what it's like, is all. You know, in a general sense."
"You told Mike that I'm an expert on anal sex?" he asked. He was silently glad she hadn't used phrases like,
take it back door
or
take it in the ass.
You could never be sure what was going to come out of her mouth next.
"I didn't say you were an expert," she said "I just said I'd ask you."
"What did Mike say?"
"He said it was a good idea. That you probably knew all about anal sex. By the way, Mike thinks you have a great ass; he told me so." She shrugged her shoulders and smiled.
"Well, tell Mike I'm flattered," he said, "but I'd rather not discuss this sort of thing." He had to wonder why Mike was checking out
his
ass.
"Ah, c'mon. I know he's going to ask me to do it tonight, and I'm not sure if I want to."
He stared across the room at the barrel filled with long pepperoni sticks and smiled. "I'll give you some brief advice. But I'm not going into details. It might hurt a little at first, but eventually you'll be backing into it." He pressed his hands on the counter firmly and smiled. "And that's all I'm going to say."
"So you like it? Does he have a big one?" she asked.
He winked and placed his index fingers in front of her face about a foot apart. "I liked it with Brody, but I don't know about anyone else."
Her eyes grew wide and she whistled back. She was about to ask him another question, but they both stopped talking when a piercing scream came from the back door of the market. They heard another scream, more violent than the first, and ran out the back door toward the barn, where they found Dan standing over four trapped squirrels. He was moaning, "I don't believe this," over and over, slapping the sides of his head with his hands.
"Oh my God!" Sarah said. "They can't be the same ones you took to Maryland. That's impossible." She bent over to stare at them and blew another bubble. One of the squirrels jumped back.
Dan slapped the side of his face. "You silly girl. Can't you see it's not impossible? These
are
the same squirrels. I tell you, it's a fucking miracle. Or maybe they think I'm-a their father. Who knows?" He grabbed her by the elbow and pulled her back a couple of feet. "And don't pop-a the gum like that. You scare the poor things."
Sarah pulled her elbow out of his hand quickly and stepped back. When Dan sounded like he actually cared about the squirrels, she raised an eyebrow and pressed an index finger to her bottom lip.
Chance pretended to be concerned: His teeth were clamped together and his eyebrows were pointed down. But on the inside, he was laughing and jumping up and down. Dan was convinced they were the same squirrels. "Where will you take them now?" Chance asked.
"I have to think about it," he said. He was scratching the back of his head, staring at the traps. "Maybe they are never going to leave me."
Later that morning, Dan didn't announce that he was putting them into the back of the truck to take them somewhere far away. He simply shuffled around the deli counter while Chance was slicing turkey breast for Betty Shack, and said, "I set them free behind the barn. Looks like they are gonna be here a long time. Just like
you.
" He waved his arm and laughed, then crossed through the kitchen and went out the side door, kicking an empty box Chance hadn't moved yet into the alleyway.
Chance felt that tug in his stomach again when he heard the side door slam shut, followed by a lump in his throat that wouldn't go away no matter how many times swallowed.
In the late evening, when the market was closed and the shades were down, Dan came downstairs from his nap to check the register. Chance was already naked by then, and he pulled out an aluminum pail and a large sponge so he could scrub the floors on his hands and knees. But Dan slammed the cash drawer shut and pounded his fist on the counter. "No.
You
don't clean those floors now.
You
scrub the floors in the morning, after you fill the bowl with the special of the day."
"But there will be customers here at that time of day," Chance said.
"Not that many," he said, "You do it before the lunch crowd comes in. I want the people to see you scrubbing and to see how clean we are here." Then he shoved a wad of cash into his back pocket and went back upstairs to sit in his chair
and flip TV channels.
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