Ralph Three

"You look sleek and well fucked. You tried out Saloon 1?"

Nathan had returned from taking Glen to Georgia Street and was facing Ralph across the bar at the Bourbon Street Pub and eating another early-afternoon breakfast.

"Yes, and you were right."

"You found some closure on the death of your biker lover in there?"

"Yes, found someone almost identical to my lover, Glen, yes. Being with him helped me to say good-bye, finally, to my Glen. The crazy thing was that his name was Glen too."

"So that's two demons put to rest?"

"Two?"

"Didn't the older guy you screwed and screwed and screwed the other night—the domesticated one with the one son who fucked you the night before and the other son he had to bail out of jail—didn't he give you some closure on the death of your professor partner?"

"Yes, now that you mention it, he did," Nathan said. "You should charge money for this, Ralph." He sat back from the bar then and gave a deep laugh.

"Don't need to with the profit margin we have on what you're paying for this breakfast. But are you laughing at my food?"

"No, I'm laughing at coincidences. You mentioned the son Gordon had to go bail out."

"Yeah, so?"

"Glen, the biker I was with last night—the biker with the same name as my biker lover—he's that son Gordon had to bail out. So, that makes a father and two sons—and just them so far here in Key West. What are the chances of that? It's fucking crazy."

Ralph laughed then too. "I'm telling you, it's the keys; it's Key West. The place has its ways with people. You're just being told that this was meant to be—havin' a family affair. So, which one are you going to be with tonight—and the night after that?"

"Ah, a good question," Nathan said. And he had to admit, it really was a good question. Gordon needed him, and, if he'd learned anything from coming to peace with Howard's death, it was that he needed to think of the needs of others more. But he was so comfortable with Gene's give and take and humor-based look at the world. And Glen was just downright hot and dangerous—and horse hung—which got Nathan's juices going more than the other two did.

"If you can't decide, there's always either the Key West way—fuck 'em all and as often as possible. They're a family. You could fuck all three at once even. Or you could go with my method."

"Your method?" Nathan asked after being done chuckling at Ralph's idea of the Key West way.

"Remember?" Ralph said. He took three quarters out of his pocket and laid them on the top of the bar.

"Ah, the coin toss method."

"Yep. What say I flip these on this problem? Here let me mark them on the edge." He took a set of marking pens from under the counter. "They all have the same initials, so let's say green for the one son, Gene; blue for the old man; and red for the tattooed son. Odd one out on the toss on heads and tails is the one you go with."

"And if they all come up the same?"

"We'll get to that if it happens. Oh, and might as well add this one." Ralph took a silver dollar out of his pocket and placed it beside the quarters he'd just marked.

"What's that one for?"

"Well, Nathan, that's for two things. One, it's for that first lover you're still mostly avoiding talking about—and obviously still have guilt about. And, two, look how much bigger and better it is than those quarters. That can only mean it stands for me. You want to cast out all of the demons that brought you to Key West, if this silver dollar comes up heads, indicating that's what you should do, I can take you through those beaded curtains over there. Back to what I call my cave, and I can give you the fucking that first lover gave you. I can do it good enough that you'll come to terms with that experience. But you'll come out of it bowlegged and staggerin'."

"You don't know," Nathan said. But it was a whisper and he'd lowered his head and had his arms hugging his chest, shivering. "You just don't know."

"You said it was a neighbor. A guy ten, maybe twenty, years older than you."

"Yes," Nathan whispered.

"I can be that. He was a big, hulking guy, wasn't he? Lots of muscles, a smooth talker."

"Yes."

"Nuff said about that and also about him being horse hung, right?"

"Yes. Monstrously so. And I'd never been taken before when he . . ."

"What'd he have down there, down in his basement without windows, the walls and floor and ceiling painted black? A sling, I'll bet."

"Yes." Nathan was visibly shuddering. His teeth nearly chattering.

"And he bound you to the sling, your arms and legs running up the chains. And maybe used nipple clamps and ball weights on you. And he fucked you with toys before taking you himself."

"Yes." Barely audible.

"I have all that; I can do all of that. I can give you that if it's what you want. That's what I do with men back in my cave. That's what gets me off. You cross the threshold of that door back there and I'll use you for my own wants just as hard as that man did, and I'll bend you to giving me whatever I ask for and make you feel it's what you want. I'll bet when he was in public, in that neighborhood of yours, he was just the nicest man. Almost as nice as I'm being to you standing here. But get us in our caves and we can be rutting animals, thinking only of our own pleasures, our pleasures being really nasty. I can do that for you, if it's what you want. Make no bones about it, I see you as a delicious morsel that is begging to be eaten up and spit out. A big part of me wants you to want that. To want that from me."

Not a sound from Nathan.

"Is that what your secret is, what your guilt is?—that you wanted all of that?"

A whispered "Yes." Than an audible gulp and Nathan spoke, in a quiet, faraway voice. "I asked for it. I begged for it. I heard about it from my friends in the neighborhood. And when I turned eighteen, I went to him and asked for it."

"How long did he keep you there?"

"A week, no, nine days. My folks were on a car trip out West."

"Is that all? You liked it, is that part of the guilt, in addition to asking for it?"

"I liked some of it. I must have liked it enough. I went back for more of it."

"Until when?"

"Until I was in college and taking drama arts—from Howard. Until I found Howard."

"Is that true? You look like you're holding back. When did it stop with that first guy? Now's the time to let it all come out."

Nathan paused before answering, and it came out in a groan as if it was fighting to stay inside him. "It stopped on the tenth day—when he wouldn't open his door to me. When he had someone else in his house. When I crawled to him and he pushed me down his porch steps with his booted foot and told me I'd grown too old and used for him to want me."

"But you then found something, someone, better? Someone who could make it more than just raw, punishing sex, someone who could show that it could be love?"

"Yes."

"That's not your guilt, son. If anything, that was the guilt of that neighbor. He manipulated you and used you. You were too young and vulnerable to take a guilt like that on for yourself. Your decision to go with that professor broke any guilt you should have had. So, then, heads on the silver dollar and I take you back through the experience."

Ralph perked up to a level of cheeriness then, not paying much attention to Nathan sniffling and still being withdrawn into himself. But thinking about what Ralph had to say, almost on the verge of putting a hand on Ralph's and telling him he didn't want that silver dollar included in the coin toss.

Up the coins went. When they came down, all of the Drummond men's quarters came up heads. The silver dollar came up tails.

"Well, lookie here," Ralph said. Nathan opened his eyes, which he had screwed tightly shut for the toss, and looked at the coins.

"Looks to me like the Key West decision won out on that father and sons. Same as if they'd all been tails. Looks like, as long as you want to do the Key West, you just cruise along with all of them for a while. I do suggest a foursome, though. That could get real spicy."

Nathan was smiling wanly, but his eyes were on that fourth coin, the silver dollar, showing tails.

A bit more gently, Ralph said, "And look at the silver dollar. It's Key West telling you you've guilted yourself long enough and needlessly over that first man. It's telling you just to let that loose. You think you can do that now, or do you want to go back with me in the cave? I'll show you as good and nasty a time as that neighbor ever did. Makes no difference to me. It's what I do with men, and I won't lie to you, I'd sure like to do you that way myself. But it's your decision on whether you want to worry that part of your life anymore."

"Thanks . . . Ralph. I think I'll hold."

"Suit yourself." If Nathan could hear a twinge of relief in Ralph's voice, he didn't let on.

Ralph moved down the bar to pour a drink for another customer then. While he was occupied, Nathan took up the coins and looked closer at them. They all were fakes. All of the quarters were heads on both sides; the silver dollar was tails on both sides.

When Ralph came back, Nathan was smiling, looking a little blanched in the face, but smiling. "Say, Ralph, can I keep these coins—for luck?"

"Yeah, I guess. If whenever you look at them, they remind you of the wisdom of Key West. Will I see you in here for breakfast tomorrow?"

"Naw, I don't think so. I think I'll be taking a bike ride up the Overseas Highway up the spine of the keys to Miami later this afternoon. A couple of wild days in Miami and then back to Key West probably. But then I'll probably check out of the New Orleans then. There's a house over on Georgia Street I'm thinking of buying—if I can convince the guys living in there now to stay. A father and son, but they both seem OK with sharing."

- FINI -