The Upside Down Lunch

The Upside Down Lunch

I signed the estimate, left my keys with the service guy, and hurried to catch my ride. My colleague Stuart and his friends were already waiting in a rusted, dented wreck of a Volvo station wagon. I knew the Car Talk guys said these things ran forever but this wagon looked like it had already seen forever.

“Come on Jake,” Stuart yelled from the car. “We don’t want to be late.”

We were going to the state fair today, and it was a two hour drive to the state capital and home of the fried everything on a stick. I hadn’t been to the fair for years, and it seemed like a worthwhile excuse to play hooky from work especially when my immediate superior kept reminding me that personal days wouldn’t roll over to the next calender year. It was time to reacquaint myself with the multitude of hurl and twirl rides and the finer points of giant pumpkins.

I grasped the nearest door handle, but the door refused to yield to my pressure. A man in the back kicked the door and it flung open. He greeted me with an effusive smile. “Welcome to my brother’s chariot. Unfortunately car repair is not one of his many talents.” For a moment I thought the man was going to introduce himself as Biff. He had a fifties style flat top that I’d only seen in movies featuring Biff and his lovely homemaker wife.

“Jake, meet my brother Quill,” Stuart said from the front. “You know my friend Harper, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I said as I slid in the car.

Quill gave me a big smile as I climbed in the car. He looked a lot like his younger brother, the same compact frame with brown eyes and light brown hair except Quill had that ridiculous haircut. Quill must have seen me staring because he laughed and ran his hand over his stubbly locks.

“I went to a masquerade ball and got a bit carried away. Fortunately it will grow.”

Stuart, Quill, and Harper spent most of the drive discussing obscure sports teams that I couldn’t even place in their home cities. Of course for me, anything beyond the Dallas Cowboys or the New York Yankees was obscure. Quill seemed to know an inordinate amount of odd trivia, things like the names of United States rowing team and winners of the Cy Young award, which was apparently some sort of baseball trophy. I spent the time staring out the window, watching the city turn to cornfields and then back to the city again.

We passed a Honda dealer, and Stuart asked me about my car’s service appointment.

“Yeah, I should be able to pick it up when we get back. It’s just routine service.”

Stuart raised an eyebrow but said nothing. I wondered if he guessed that it was an attempt to keep this trip secret from Lawrence, my partner. I’d declined enough invitations that I suspected he thought Lawrence was an eccentric recluse. It wasn’t like I could tell him that I had a curfew and playing hooky was frowned upon. I could hear the lecture already about the importance of keeping personal days for emergencies like the year my mother needed a breast biopsy or when I got walking pneumonia. I forcefully put it out of my mind. I wanted to have fun at the state fair, not worry about impending consequences.

Somehow Quill and I ended up together while Stuart and Harper went off the other way. It was probably the result of Stuart and Harper’s express interest in tractor pulls, demolition derbies, and country western music. I recoiled at the thought of any one of those items, let alone all three together, and Quill evidently felt the same way.

“Please tell me,” Quill said with a laugh and a pleading expression, “that you’d rather walk through the livestock barns than watch car crashes. Plus the good food stands are next to the livestock area. You look like you could use a good deep fried Twinkie,” he said, looking up and down my skinny frame.

“Sure,” I replied, “but I’d rather have a cream puff.”

“Who said we can’t have both? It’s not like we come to the state fair every day.”

That was more than OK by me; I rarely had the chance to enjoy such treats. Lawrence was obsessed with food and would have apoplexy over fried food on a stick. Maybe that wasn’t fair. He made his living as a food writer and was an outstanding gourmet cook, but he just didn’t get junk food. He thought a drive-thru should be visited only once a year in times of extreme emergency.

We walked through the cattle barn, stopping to admire a Holstein with an enormous udder. “Did you know that a good dairy cow can produce over seventy-five pounds of milk a day?” Quill asked, studying her udder with a critical eye. “One of her quarters looks smaller than the other three.”

“Uh,” I muttered. How did you respond to that kind of comment? The closest I ever came to a cow was buying organic milk at the grocery.

Quill didn’t seem to notice my lack of enthusiasm because he said brightly, “Let’s go see the hogs next. They’re my favorite.”

The hogs were housed in long flat barns with massive fans at either end, and smaller ones placed directly in front of many of the enclosures. I had always thought of hogs as fat, pink creatures, but they came in all shapes and colors from the giant Poland China to the small Vietnamese pot bellied pigs.

“Poland Chinas are very popular because they have rapid weight gain and the sows usually produce large litters,” Quill spouted as we were looking at a huge sow with ten tiny piglets around her.

“Did you grow up on a farm or something?”

“No, I have a degree from the Ag school, livestock production.”

“Did you want to be a farmer?”

“No, my parents insisted I get a college degree. I did some number crunching in the course catalogue, and agriculture had the least amount or requirements. So if you want to know how to select your next dairy bull just give me a ring,” Quill said with an easy grin.

“So what do you do with a degree in livestock production?”

“I don’t have a clue. I own a toy store -- Galaxy Toys. We sell the galaxy’s coolest toys.”

He pulled a yo-yo out of his pocket and started doing tricks as we exited the barn into a small courtyard. A small boy, maybe six or seven, trailed after us, his eyes as big as saucers when Quill sent the yo-yo spinning in a large arc in front of him.

“You can’t keep running off, Isaac” a harried mother grabbed the boy and started to shake him.

“Ma’am,” Quill said, stepping forward, the yo-yo still spinning in wild loops. “I think he was distracted by my yo-yo.”

At first she looked frightened but seemed to relax when Quill knelt down and started to show the boy how to throw the yo-yo. He demonstrated something he called a sleeper several times and then handed the boy the yo-yo.

“Isaac, your mom’s right. You need to stay close. This is a big place, and she would be very frightened if she couldn’t find you. You wouldn’t want to scare her would you?”

Isaac shook his head vigorously, still entranced with the yo-yo. I saw Quill pantomime and mouth something at the mother. I couldn’t understand his meaning, but she seemed to and mouthed back an answer.

“Issac, you can keep the yo-yo, but I want you to promise me that you’ll stay with your mom.”

Issac nodded, a big smile on his face. Quill shook hands with the mother and handed her a business card.

“Have a nice day at the fair and write me. I’ll send you a book on yo-yo tricks. Cute kid,” Quill said as the boy and mother were enveloped by the constant flow of people.

“You’re good with them.”

“All my siblings are younger; I got lots of practice growing up.” Quill gave me a small smile, and for a second I thought he was going to ask about my family, but he seemed to change his mind. “Let’s go find those cream puffs. Yo-yoing makes me hungry.”

Quill must have memorized the map of the fairgrounds they put in the paper, or else he had an exceptional food radar because he found the cream puffs in no time. Soon we were stuffing our faces with sugar-laced dough and whipped cream. I scraped the final bits of sugar off my plate and tossed it in the red, white, and blue trash barrel.

“You up for the rides or do you need a minute for your stomach to settle? Nothing’s as good on the return trip.” Quill gave me a wide grin and patted his stomach. “I have a cast iron GI tract. It runs in the family.” When Quill smiled, green flecks danced through the brown of his irises, and his good humor was infectious.

“Rides,” I said, not able to keep the excitement out of my voice.

“A man after my own heart. Have you ridden the new coaster at the Point?”

“I haven’t been to an amusement park since college. Lawrence turns green on the kiddy rides.”

“You should go with Stu and his friends. They do one of those roller coaster pilgrimages every year.”

“I like to take my vacations with my partner, and I don’t think it would be fair to leave him on the merry go round while I ride the coasters.” That was the party line at least. We had the most boring vacation schedule. Every October we went to an island off the coast of North Carolina and looked at the ocean. I think we were the only people there under fifty. At least Lawrence didn’t play shuffleboard.

Quill insisted on buying my ride bracelet. He said it was his pleasure to ride with an adult instead of his little brother, who he had to remind constantly to keep his hands in the car and to not stand up. “You do obey the safety rules, don’t you?”

“Of course,” I said. “I’m an engineer. I inspect things for safety. I know how much force rides can generate.”

“Stu must have missed that course when he was in school, or he’s testing his calculations on his own body.”

We rode everything that didn’t require you to be under three feet tall. Some of the rides flipped so violently that I couldn’t imagine trying to raise my hands as I gripped the bar with white knuckles. We had just gotten tossed about in some contraption that spun in all directions when I almost toppled into him exiting the ride. Quill started to put his arm around my shoulders to steady me, but stopped abruptly as if my shirt had burned him. Instead he put his hand on my arm, like a cop restraining a suspect, and guided me to the nearest bench in the shade.

“Is the sidewalk moving, or is that just me?” Quill said with an easy smile.

“I thought the trees were moving.”

“I think we’ve both had enough spinning rides for a moment.” Quill looked at my face, a slight frown forming on his lips. “You look like you’re frying. Did you put on any sunblock?”

I shook my head. It was a good thing I already had a considerable sunburn, or he would have seen me blush. Lawrence was always all over me about sunscreen. He said I could probably burn in London in January. Quill fished around in his shorts’ cargo pockets, pulling out a packet of gummy worms, an additional yo-yo, and a small tube of sunblock.

“Here put some of this on before you get any redder. I think you’re still going to look like a lobster tomorrow but maybe it won’t hurt as bad. Gummy worm?” he asked as he ripped open the package.

“Not after all that spinning.” I slathered the lotion on, and with his gentle teasing I even got it rubbed in. He was laughing as he watched me. I hated the oily feel of sunscreen, and I always squirmed and jerked away from my own hand when I put it on my face. Lawrence would usually just huff in his Lawrence way, grab me, and apply it in a cool clinical manner.

“I know it’s gross, but it beats sun poisoning,” Quill said, still amused by my antics. “Pass it over when you’re done. I need to put more on my face.” He slathered the sunblock on his nose and cheekbones before putting it pack in his pocket with the other assorted odds and ends. “You game to see the model trains and then lunch?

“Yeah, the trees have stopped moving.”

He stood and for a second I thought he was going to reach out and grab my hand to hoist me off the bench, but instead he shoved his hands in his pockets. The train display was, as he put it, way cool. As a child, I’d had a train that came out annually to run laps around the Christmas tree, but Quill was a model train connoisseur. He explained the merits of different gauges and was completely entranced by the model grain elevators that loaded tiny soybeans and corn into waiting rail cars. He even ran down the display’s guide, an old guy with a T-shirt proclaiming “I do it in H-gauge” and a railroad cap, to ask detailed questions about reproducing or purchasing it.

Quill managed to find a place to eat lunch that served food that wasn’t entirely deep fried in the shade next to a child’s petting zoo. I shoved a twenty in his hand, refusing his offer to buy after he’d purchased the ride ticket.

“You won’t even let me pretend,” he said with a wry smile.

I shrugged, not quite following his meaning but writing it off to his bizarre sense of humor. He’d already made jokes about the petting zoo and that today’s brisket was yesterday’s Bessie.

The rest of the afternoon and early evening passed quickly. We watched some of the draft horse judging, and then caught up with Quill’s brother to watch a Beatles impersonator group. They weren’t going to make Carnegie Hall, but we all had a good time. Stuart wanted to stay and watch the harness racing, but Quill nixed that. He reminded his brother that since he’d closed the toy store today, he’d have to open at nine a.m. for a full day tomorrow, and that despite what he’d done in his misspent youth, he could no longer function on four hours’ sleep. I was relieved because I was already expecting trouble at home, and arriving after midnight wasn’t going to improve my odds of a peaceful evening.

About halfway between the fair and our home destination, we stopped for dinner at what Lawrence calls America’s dining disgrace, a middle of the road chain restaurant. It wasn’t going to win any Mobil stars, but I didn’t think any of us were in danger of getting food poisoning, and it even had a helpful menu pointing out the most healthful items. I figured I needed some brownie points after the cotton candy and ordered grilled chicken breasts with steamed vegetables. Stuart ordered a beer with his burger and onion rings, and Quill expectantly held his hand out.

“Stu,” he rapped out when his brother ignored him.

Stuart reached into his pocket, pulled out his keys, and tossed him to his older brother who neatly palmed them and stuff them in his pocket. I was starting to wonder if his pockets were like the famed aunt’s trunk of the children’s memory game. Instead of in my aunt’s trunk I packed a trombone, a boa constrictor, and whatever, it was in Quill’s pockets I packed a green glow in the dark yo-yo, a packet of multicolored gummy worms, a tube of sunblock, a miniature catapult, an alligator finger puppet, and his brother’s car keys. I’d seen a few other items spill out of his pockets, but I couldn’t remember them all.

“Does this mean you’re buying, Bro?” Stuart joked from the far side of the table.

“Of course,” Quill answered calmly.

The brothers must have seen my look of confusion because Stuart started to explain. “My brother’s super anal about drinking and driving, so if I want to drink, he drives. If I give him the keys without any fuss he’ll buy dinner. It’s a great way to get a free chauffeur and a free dinner,” Stuart said with a shameless grin.

We made it back home all too soon. Lawrence had authorized repairs on my brakes, so he had to know I’d been out of town for the day. I’d turned my cellphone off to avoid hearing him harangue me about missing work, and as it blipped back on, three voice mails from him and one from the mechanic popped on the screen. I deleted all three; I’d heard it all before. I could give the lecture myself about responsibility and commitment.

I pulled my car into the assigned garage spot and took the elevator up to our fifth floor condominium. Lawrence was deep in the massive leather armchair reading A Tale of Two Cities. It was never a good sign when he read Dickens, the Bronte sisters, or Flaubert. A worse sign was the small paddle sitting on the coffee table. To the uninitiated it looked like a miniature cutting board, but I knew what it could do to my backside.

“Jacob, it’s nice of you to come home,” he said dryly.

“Did you have a good day?” I babbled.

“Not especially. I worried about you when the Honda service people said they couldn’t reach you, work said you’d taken a personal day, and you weren’t answering your phone. I feared perhaps you or your mother had taken ill then I remembered that you’d asked about going to the state fair.”

“Stop being melodramatic. I’m sure you didn’t seriously entertain the possibility that I’d been rushed to the hospital. You’re just pissed I went to the fair after you said no. Well, I had a great time, and I’m not sorry. I’m going to take a shower and go to bed. I’m filthy and tired from all the walking.” I turned and headed for the hall and the bathroom.

“Jacob, you’re already in trouble, I wouldn’t make it any worse.”

That tone would usually freeze me in my tracks, but today it set the low simmer that had been burning in the back of my brain for months to full boil. I hadn’t wanted to shout or lose my temper because that gave the ever calm Lawrence the advantage, but I couldn’t help myself. “Fuck you, and your rules! I asked you two weeks ago if I could go, and you wouldn’t bend. I’m tired of always being the one who bends. This is supposed to be a partnership, not a dictatorship.”

“Jacob Allan Wright, corner now.” As always his voice was cultured and calm.

“No.”

“You don’t tell me no, little boy.” Lawrence set his book down and moved towards me far faster than his unruffled appearance suggested. I knew he planned to shoo me into a corner, peppering my hind end with swats to speed my way. He’d done it hundreds of times in the last seven years, and I’d always acquiesced, at first from surprise, then willingly because it made me feel better, but in the last year with resentment.

I fled down the hall into the bathroom and bolted the door behind me. I could hear Lawrence behind the door ordering me to come out. I turned the shower on to block his voice and demands. I’d known things were going wrong for the last year. I tried to tell him that his mind numbing routine was suffocating me -- the first Saturday of every month we went to the art museum, the second Saturday to the natural history museum or other cultural venue. I will die before I will see another Omnimax educational film. Every Sunday the shopping, the cleaning, and visiting our parents. My life felt like the children’s ditty “This is the way we wash our clothes...This is the way we scrub our floors.” Every time I tried to talk to him he said rules couldn’t be negotiated when I wanted to break them or was in trouble. Well, who in the hell wants to talk about rules when you aren’t chafing under them?

I stood under the shower and tasted my bitter tears. I shouldn’t be in trouble. I had the boss’s blessing to miss a day of work; I was home before the wee hours; I played responsibly -- no drinking, semi heathy eating. I tried not to think of the fried cheese on a stick. The hot water tank was drained when I finally stepped out of the shower. I wrapped myself in a bath sheet and sat on the closed toilet lid. Even though I couldn’t hear anything, I knew Lawrence had to be in the hall waiting to pounce. I sat in the bathroom for over an hour, reading the old copies of Gourmet and Epicurious that were tucked into the magazine rack. I read about where to find the best wines on a California vacation and how to make a perfect cake every time. Not that I could remember a word of it afterwards.

I had defied him. I could hear the words in my head. Little boy, your behavior disappoints me. You’ve turned a simple paddling into... I shivered. I was sure outright defiance, refusing to stand in the corner, locking myself in the bathroom, and cursing at him would add up to a penalty that I didn’t want to pay. We were in this mess because it was easier to roll with him than to fight -- admit guilt, a spanking, and a cuddle. But that was the problem; I’d been faking it for a year, maybe more. I wasn’t that junior in college who was going to be in college on the ten year plan if I didn’t get my act together. I went to work, ate three meals a day, collected my dry cleaning, all in all behaved like a sane, rational adult. I tore off a piece of toilet paper and wiped my nose.

I turned off the light and fan, leaving the bathroom in complete darkness, and listened at the door. Silence. I turned the lock and stepped into the corridor. A light shone under our bedroom door, but I went the opposite way into the guest bedroom and locked the door. It was in perfect order. The small bedside clock told me it was after midnight. Lawrence changed its batteries every six months like he did with the smoke detector. The room was determinedly neutral: white walls, white bedspread, generic framed art posters on the walls, and past New York Times best sellers on the nightstand.

I couldn’t say I slept well that night. Lawrence and I no longer slept cuddled together like two teenagers necking in the back of their parents’ car, but I wasn’t used to sleeping alone. I awoke several times when I turned over to empty space and silence. The alarm rang at six thirty while I was busy studying the ceiling fan in the shadows cast from the street. I showered, shaved, dressed, and avoided at all costs thinking about the conversation Lawrence would want to have this morning.

Lawrence was bent over the kitchen counter, whisking eggs in a glass bowl. He was as strikingly handsome as the first time we’d met, dark black hair with vivid blue eyes set in chiseled features. His body was as fit and strong at thirty-three as it had been at twenty-five.

“Jacob, sit down. We’ll talk after breakfast.” He was calm, maddeningly calm.

It was probably his calm that sparked my anger. He was acting as if this were no different from any of my other transgressions. In his mind, this would be fixed with a spanking, grounding, and some tedious lines. Didn’t he understand our relationship needed a wrecking ball not a welder?

“I can’t do this any more!” I shouted at him. I had wanted to be calm and rational, but I was too angry. “I’m going to work.”

I moved to step back out the kitchen as he reached for the wall phone. He was going to call work, tell them I had a personal emergency. He wouldn’t agree to me missing a single hour of work for pleasure, but he’d keep me home to punish me. I wrenched the phone from his hand and threw it, knocking the bowl of eggs to the floor. The bowl shattered, splashing our pant cuffs with yellow liquid. He made a move to grab my arm, but I caught his wrist. “I no longer consent. Do you understand? I no longer consent,” I shouted in his face.

“Jacob, it will be OK.” He was moving towards me; I’m sure to engulf me in a hug.

“It will never be OK.” Shit. I was crying now. I spun on my heels and fled. Down I ran, taking stairs two at a time to the garage. I wrenched my car door open and threw myself into the driver’s seat. Lawrence would come after me. I had to get out of here. I nosed my car out of its slot and exited the garage. I turned deeper into the neighborhood opposite my route to work. In two blocks the neighborhood had turned from yuppie gentrification to abandoned hulks of apartment building and the occasional derelict rolling up his sleeping bag. The tears were making it hard to see. I pulled off the road into an abandoned convenience store parking lot several blocks from home. My hands were shaking as I gripped the steering wheel. I collapsed, resting my head on the steering column, and sobbed.

My tears were slowing as I heard the chipper radio host announce the news on the hour. I wiped my face with a supply of tissue I found in the glove box. I looked like hell. I’d used the excuse of allergies once or twice when Lawrence had spanked me before work; hopefully it would fly today.

Even with my crying jag, I was still early, and the office was nearly empty. I grabbed my clipboard off my desk. I had two bridges to inspect in opposite ends of the county, and the inspection of a new office tower’s super structure. Good I had an excuse to be out of the office today and away from their prying eyes. I didn’t remember much about the sites I inspected. Fortunately both bridges were over shallow streams in low traffic areas because I wouldn’t have wanted thousands of lives to depend on my work. Several times I pulled over and sobbed, almost exhausting the tissue supply in my car. Right at five I called the office and told them since I was closer to home than work I would turn in my reports tomorrow morning. Sometime during that mad haze of a day, I rented a room for the night and secured an efficiency apartment in a building I’d inspected the year before. I wouldn’t be able to move in for two days, but the bed in the chain hotel would suffice.

I needed clothes and toiletries for tomorrow. The next exit was a mall where I could buy everything; but if Lawrence didn’t hear form me, he’d call everyone in the office, my family, and probably even the county dog catcher until he found me. He’d been calling my cellphone every hour on the hour. I pulled off at the mall exit. I would call. If it sounded horrible, I could still buy clothes; otherwise I would go home and pack a few things.

Lawrence picked up the phone before the second ring had been completed. “Jacob, honey, where are you?”

We had caller ID, so he’d known who had called before I spoke. “I’m at the Northtown mall.”

“Why are you at the mall?” I’m sure Lawrence was racking his brain for some reason for my urgent shopping.

“In case I can’t come home.”

“Of course you can come home. We can recover from a tantrum. I love you, Jacob.”

I gripped the phone harder and took a deep breath. “Lawrence, you’re not understanding. I want to come home and get my stuff, but I’m not staying. I’ve moved out.”

I heard a sharp intake of breath and a noise that sounded like a choked sob and then Lawrence’s voice calm and steady. “Jacob, honey,” He paused as if he were trying to gather his emotions. “Of course you can get your clothes, but can we please talk?”

I’d never heard Lawrence plead before and it momentarily softened my resolve but then I felt glad, a sweet revenge that I’d finally succeeded in shaking him. All the time I’d been with him I don’t think I’d ever seen a crack in his armor. “I’ve been trying to talk to you for a year. We’re beyond talking.” I hung up the phone before he could convince me otherwise.

I threaded my key into the lock; but before I could open it, Lawrence pulled the door open. He looked stiff, almost nervous as he stood in our tiny hallway. I could tell he’d been crying, his usual brilliant blue eyes were surrounded by red.

“Are you sure?” he asked. I could tell from the tightness of his jaw that it was taking enormous control to keep his voice steady.

I nodded; I didn’t think I could speak.

“I put the suitcase on the bed. I’ll be in the kitchen.”

I threw a few things in the suitcase: work trousers, Levis, shorts, toiletries and underclothes. I was sure I’d forgotten at least one item. Lawrence usually packed to prevent hurried trips to the all night drugstore for toothpaste.

Lawrence was in the kitchen surrounded by food; he cooked when he was upset, and from the spread of food, he was very upset. Loaves of bread and a chocolate cake, still awaiting frosting, cooled on a rack. Two pots bubbled on the stove, and Lawrence was cutting vegetables into precise matchsticks for a salad.

“I’ll be going; I’m sorry.” I wiped my eyes with my free hand and choked back tears.

He handed me a shopping bag piled with Tupperware and aluminum foil covered packages. “Please come home soon.” I could hear him struggling to control his voice. He turned back to the stove as I let myself out.

The next three weeks dragged past in a blur of confusion and loneliness. Lawrence had tried to call many times and even caught me in the office parking lot several times to talk with me. The final time had been ugly with him leaning over my car with his casual, toppy behavior and me shouting in his face. Stuart had seen the commotion and hurried over afraid there was going to be blood shed in the parking lot. Both Lawrence and I had slunk away in embarrassment, and now our communications were through our lawyers with certified letters. I’d never lived by myself before; first I’d been at home, then at college with two roommates, and finally with Lawrence. I hadn’t realized how dull the evenings were with just the television for company, and how much work it was to maintain a household. I was always out of plates and glasses because they rested dirty at the bottom of my sink. I’d taken up running again to try to wile away the evening hours. I’d run mini marathons in college until my shins and knees thought better of it.

Tonight I ran a new route, circling through the small town square and specialty shops. I stopped to retie my shoes in front of a window filled with tiny soldiers scaling a castle wall. Even though it was after eight, the lights were still on and the sign over the door flashed “Galaxy Toys Open.” A bell tinkled as I pulled open the door.

Quill came out from somewhere in the back, looking rumpled in jeans and a golf shirt, his expression quizzical until he saw me and broke into a big smile. “I guess it was my lucky day to forget to lock the doors. We’re short a player. Come on back; you can fill in.”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but I allowed him to lead me behind the black curtain without resistance.

“Guys this is Jake,” he said to two men who were sitting around a table with a game board on it. They were studying a pile of brightly colored tokens and comparing them to a diagram in the instruction booklet. “The guy on the right is Justin, my baby brother, he’s working here this summer on his college break. The old dude is Steve, game player extraordinaire.” They both gave me a friendly wave. Quill pulled out a chair, handed me a slice of pizza, and tossed a can of soda towards me from the mini-fridge. “Jake here will be our fourth player. He’s an engineer, works with my brother Stu.”

“I don’t know anything about board games,” I said, paling at the intricate lines and tiny spaces filling the board.

“Don’t worry. None of us have ever played this game either. Every Thursday evening we try out new games,” Quill said with an easy smile.

The game involved the development of roads, canals, and railroads to explore and settle the West. There were a ferocious number of rules and pieces but somehow I managed to settle the most territory by the end of the game.

“That’s what happens when we play with an engineer,” Quill joked. “He builds bridges in real life so of course he’s good at pretend bridges.”

Everybody laughed as they started cleaning up and putting game pieces back in the box. “I better get home,” I said.

“Did you run here?” Quill asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, it’s only a couple miles.”

“It’s dark now. I’ll give you a lift.”

I started to argue, but Quill cut me off. “Don’t look a gift ride in the mouth. It beats running back up that hill, and I always stop for ice cream. Games make me hungry.” His tone was light, but a slight glint in his eyes seemed to suggest I shouldn’t argue. Was I reading something into his look that wasn’t there? Maybe I was just hyper sensitive after my experience with Lawrence. In any case, Quill changed the subject and started laughing about his high school experience on the cross-country team. I began to relax and join in his laughter as he told me how he’d bummed rides back to school rather than running the return loop of the workout.

He locked the store and escorted me to his car, which was painted black with Saturn and its rings and moons across the doors with “Galaxy Toys” in silver letters. “You don’t have to worry about losing that in a parking lot,” I said, gawking at the paint job.

“You like it?” he said with a grin.

“Yeah.”

He opened the door, and I climbed in. The car drove like a normal vehicle, no James Bond gadgets in sight. Quill pulled into a Creamy Whip. “Come on. They’ve got the best banana splits in town here.”

Did this man subsist on junk food alone? I’d only met him twice and in that period I’d seen him eat cream puffs, deep fried Twinkies, a corn dog, half of my cotton candy, pizza, soda, and now a banana split. It would take Lawrence two years to eat that much junk.

“Come on,” he said, holding the door open. “They close at ten thirty. Do you want a banana split?”

My stomach protested after four slices of pizza. “No, a hot fudge sundae would be fine.”

He got the ice cream and directed me to a picnic table on the far side of the parking lot away from the teenagers and their dates. He ate a few bites of ice cream and seemed to spend ages staring up and down at me. I was seriously beginning to wonder if I’d left my fly undone, but my running shorts didn’t have a zippered fly. Finally he said, “Stu told me about you and Lawrence. Are you OK?”

How many times had I heard that phrase in the last week since Stuart had refereed the fight in the parking lot? “Fine.” I hoped my tone would signal that I thought it was none of his business. He’d been awfully nice, and I didn’t want to tell him to bugger off.

“Hm.” It had to be the most non committal noise a person could make. “How long were you together, five or six years?”

“Seven.”

“That’s a long time to have to relearn how to live alone.”

He nailed it on the head. I wondered if Stuart had clued him in or he was precognitive or something. I didn’t have an answer for him, so I busied myself mixing the whipped topping with the chocolate sauce.

“Not hungry?” he finally said after I’d thoroughly mixed and beaten the ice cream into an unrecognizable glob.

“Too much pizza.”

“Uh-huh.”

He finished his banana split and tossed his waste along with my now inedible ice cream into the trash. He seemed to be studying me again as he walked back to the table. Now that I no longer had a spoon I sat hunched over the table, plucking at my T-shirt.

“Do you want to come to the country house on Saturday?” Quill asked abruptly.

“Country house?”

“No, it’s not like one of those period pieces on Masterpiece Theater - no Jeeves and Wooster or Lord Peter Wimsey with Bunter. It’s just a farm about an hour outside of town that I bought it with a couple of my brothers. We use it for holidays, and I use it to field test some of my outdoor products. So what do you say?”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on, say yes. It’ll be fun.”

He looked so pleading that I finally gave in and nodded weakly. No wonder he had a successful toy store; his look would have sold the worst curmudgeon the most expensive toy in the shop.

For a split second I thought he was going to kiss me; instead, he ran his hand through my brown curls, which were creeping over the top of my collar. Lawrence would’ve dragged me to the barber shop by now; he liked precision haircuts. “You’ll have a great time; I promise,” he said with another one of his wide grins.

I was hopelessly lost. I couldn’t find Macmillan Street. Or was it Monroe Street? I’d not found any streets starting with M except Maple Street. Stupidly I’d left the directions on the table with the phone number. I was supposed to have been there forty-five minutes ago. A car honked; I’d just pulled out in front of them. I could feel my heart beating faster; I wiped my sweaty palms on the steering wheel. I hated to be late, not that it wasn’t something I did a lot -- well, at least when I was on my own. Lawrence was a stickler for punctuality, and there had been consequences for being late.

I turned down into the square and spotted the toy shop. I pulled into the lot next to a battered hatchback. Hopefully someone had come in to open the store, and the vehicle hadn’t been abandoned by its owner in the nearest deserted parking lot. The door was still locked, the lighted sign off. I pounded on the door and the display window. I saw someone emerge from the back. Justin must have recognized me because he waved and hurried to unlock the door.

“Quill took the day off.”

“I know. I was supposed to meet him at home, but I got turned around,” I said, blushing a dark red.

“Directionally challenged. He always says that I couldn’t find our folks’ garage if it wasn’t attached to the house. I’ll call him.”

Justin flipped open his cellphone, and I heard a quick one sided conversation before he turned back to me and said, “He’ll be here in ten minutes, and he says when you’re lost your supposed to stop, not keep driving in circles.”

Quill showed up two minutes short of his promised ten minutes. Now that I was officially single I let myself admire his looks; the all American boy grows up. He didn’t have the turn your head beauty of Lawrence, but a warmth that made me think of family picnics and corn on the cob.

“I was beginning to think you stood me up.” From most people this would have been criticism, but from Quill it was said in a tone that made it sound like the joke was on him. “I understand you’re directionally challenged.”

“Yeah and I forgot your phone number and directions at home.” I was starting to ramble.

“No biggie. Can I have your cellphone?”

I reached into my pocket and handed him the phone with only a slight hesitation. Seven years of obedience had trained me well; asked in the right tone, I’d hand my wallet to a stranger. He flipped it open and started rapidly punching the keys.

“Here, I put my name, address, and phone number in your contacts. So next time you can call me unless you lose your phone. Is that a problem?” He was smiling as he teased, and I couldn’t help contrast his response to the frigid glare and ear burning lecture that Lawrence would’ve subjected me to for my lateness.

“Big brother’s got you now, no more excuses” Justin said with a laugh.

Quill grabbed a light saber from under the counter and pretended to joust. “Would you impinge my honor, good sir? May I suggest a duel?”

Justin held up his hands in mock surrender. “I take it back.”

Quill bowed and handed Justin the toy light saber. “Don’t forget to call me when you close today.”

“Yes, big brother,” Justin said and rolled his eyes. “I forget to lock up once, and now I have to call him and check the doors while he waits on the phone.”

“It was more than once, little brother.”

Justin stuck his tongue out at Quill. “Go have fun. I’ve got it covered.”

“Thanks, Justin.”

We’d driven maybe twenty minutes, having just cleared the outer belt when my finger tapping and continual squirming must have gotten to Quill. “Do you have to go to the bathroom, or something? You’re fidgeting like a two year old in urgent need of a toilet.”

“No, I’m just not a good car rider.” I didn’t want to tell him that I was still upset about being late. He’d brushed it off like it was nothing, but it was incredibly rude, and I was deeply ashamed. I also wanted to know more about his family but didn’t want to broach the subject. Lawrence had been a very private man, only introducing me to his parents after we were a settled couple. Quill seemed close with his brothers, teasing them and even hanging out with them, but twice I’d seem him maneuver them into doing his bidding, and they seemed to expect it.

“Hm,” came his non committal reply. I had a sinking feeling he’d seen right through my charade. “Do you ever play car games?”

“What?”

“I’ve got five younger brothers. My poor mom and dad would go mad trying to keep six boys entertained in the car. Since I was the oldest, it became my job. I’ll say a name of a famous person. Take the first letter of last name and name another famous person whose first name starts with that letter. Will Shortz.”

“Who’s that?”

“The puzzle editor of the New York Times. You need a name that starts with S.”

“Samuel Adams.”

“Abraham Lincoln.”

“Loretta Swit.”

“Umm...Sarah Palin. I hate to use that name; that woman’s such a wacko,” Quill said with a laugh. “You’re not a Republican, are you?”

“God, no.”

“Good, my middle brother and his wife are big wigs in the local Democratic party. A raving Republican could be awkward. Where were we?”

“You’d just said Sarah Palin.”

“Then it’s your turn.”

“Peter Rabbit.”

“I don’t think that counts. Rabbit is not a last name.”

“Oh, all right,” I groused. “Who made you the referee? Paul Bunyan.”

“Hmmm...I can’t use the blue ox since I nixed Peter Rabbit. Bruce Willis.”

We continued to play until we turned off the main road onto a graveled lane. It was hard to believe we were only a little over an hour outside of the city. Fields of corn and soybeans stretched as far as the eye could see. Occasional houses dotted the landscape, crops encroaching on their tiny lawns. The houses were dwarfed by large, modern-looking aluminum barns painted red or blue with shiny silver roofs. Quill pulled into a drive and unlocked a red farm gate before driving through. After bumping through a series of potholes, we came to a halt before a small white farmhouse.

“Welcome to our country house,” Quill said, hopping out of the car. “I’ll show you around, and then we’ll have lunch.”

The farm had large fields of corn, but it also had a rocky pasture, several old barns, the wood weathered with age a faded chew Mail Pouch painted on one end, and plots of gardens surrounding the house and walks. Plump, red tomatoes sagged from the vines, and tall purple flowers waved in the slight breeze. Somehow it looked distinctly more old-fashioned than the farms we’d passed on the road, more like a farm you’d imagine from childhood stories. A woman in a T-shirt and dusty jeans waved to us from the porch.

“Hi, Emily,” Quill called. “This is Jake. He’s visiting for the day.”

I waved, smiled, and wondered if Emily was a sister.

“Emily and her husband Lloyd caretake the place and do the real farming. We just play here. We mostly grow corn and a little alfalfa for the livestock. We graze some Boer goats to keep the pastures down. They’re a lot easier than cattle. Up over that knoll we have a pond. We’ll have lunch in the sycamore grove. See in the fence row.” Quill pointed to some trees in the distance that looked no different from any other trees. “Let me show you the fun stuff first.”

He led the way into a large, airy barn, swinging open huge wooden doors. “This used to be a tobacco barn. Obviously we no longer have a tobacco plot. Instead we play here if it rains.”

Inside the barn had been converted to a recreation area. Two Ping-Pong tables and a Fooseball table stood grouped together. A dartboard hung against one wall and three round tables surrounded by an assortment of mismatched chairs were clustered together in a corner. The far side was completely covered by a wooden floor made to look like old barn siding.

“We hold a couple of square dances here every fall,” Quill said in way of explanation. He pulled open a door of a large cupboard that was jammed full of games of all descriptions. I recognized the lawn darts and croquet mallets but some of the other items were a mystery to me. “In the other cupboard, we have indoor games,” he said, pointing to a second set of identical cupboards. Quill walked through the barn and opened the second set of doors. At one time they had probably opened onto the tobacco plot, but today they opened onto an expanse of closely cropped grass. A miniature lighthouse and a a herd of spinning pendulums crowded into a corner as if the lighthouse was a crossing guard keeping children in colorful rain gear huddled on the sidewalk. “Our area for outdoor games, including miniature golf. Much to my brothers’ horror, I bought those gaudy spinning things at an auction.”

Quill guided me through the working section of the farm, pointing out the goat barn, the machinery storage, and the older buildings that had been corn cribs, a hog house, and a stable with the enormous iron shoe of a long gone draft horse nailed over the door. Quill, for someone who professed to know nothing about farming until he majored in livestock production gave an animated explanation for every item. We grabbed the picnic items and took a long trek through a path cut in the corn field until we reached a small grove of sycamore trees.

“There’s a spring here, sycamores like water,” Quill said, spreading the blanket out under the trees. He unpacked the basket and pulled out a pile of aluminum foiled packages, some folded into animal shapes. “Peach or cherry?”

“Peach or cherry what?”

“Cobbler of course. It’s my family’s favorite recipe.”

“But we haven’t had the main course yet.”

“Why save the best part for last? It’s much more fun to eat the best part when you’re still hungry.”

“Well, if you put it that way,” I said with a grin. “I’ll have both.”

Lawrence boasted that he’d cooked every recipe in Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. He could make exotic foods with names I couldn’t pronounce and ingredients that I’d never heard of, but the simple crispness combined with the sweet fruit of Quill’s family recipe was heavenly. I polished off the two pieces.

“Good, isn’t it? Don’t get too used to it. That’s the best dish I make,” Quill said with a modest shrug. “The rest of the meal is unspectacular. Do you want peanut butter and jelly or egg salad?”

“PB and J. I haven’t had one since I was a kid.”

Quill had cut the sandwiches to resemble farm animals. I’d seen the technique described in a woman’s magazine, which I was idly flipping through at the doctor’s office, but I thought only Martha Stewart and her cronies would actually do it. He handed me a bag of chips, an apple, and a juice box to round out the meal. Lawrence would have made fun of it as American kitsch at its worst, but I enjoyed it. We ate lazily, lying back and watching a buzzard circling overhead.

Finally Quill seemed to be able to contain his energy no longer, bounded up, and grabbed my hand. “Let’s go play.”

He led me down to the vast play field, and we tried a wide variety of games. The miniature golf was a disaster, but Quill thought it was outrageously funny without truly picking on my terrible technique. Instead he told me about the aggressive, competitive business partner of one of his brothers who became obsessed with finding his ball in the alfalfa because he didn’t want to take a penalty stroke. Quill said that all the guests were pressed into searching for the ball. I hadn’t thought it was possible to have a quadruple bougie at miniature golf, but that’s what happens when you send two balls into the cornfield and one into the alfalfa, and I wasn’t about to search for the ball. I wasn’t much better at lawn bowling or croquet, but at least I didn’t lose any balls.

“Are you any better at horseshoes or corn hole?” Quill said with such a genuine smile that it took away any sting that could have been caused by my abysmal play.

“I’ve never done either.”

“What did you and Lawrence do all summer? Didn’t you have family picnics?”

“I’m an only child, and my parents were older. I read a lot, and I can play a mean game of Yahtzee. Lawrence wasn’t much in to outdoor recreation. He exercised religiously, but that was work, not play.”

“So what do you want to try next? Something easy or hard?”

I had always been bad at sports, picked last in grade school for everything from kickball to lacrosse. With my dad being older, he never played catch or dribbled a basketball with me. Once I was in my teens I’d never had the nerve to ask anyone to teach me to play common sports. Boys were supposed to have these skills, and as a gay teen I was extremely conscious of my ineptitude. I swallowed hard. Quill seemed good at everything but didn’t lord his skills over me. “Can you show me how to hit a baseball?”

“Sure, I’m no Ty Cobb, but I can show you how to hit well enough for the family softball game.”

For all of Quill’s teasing, he was a calm and patient teacher and didn’t humiliate me when it took thirty tries to initially connect the bat to the ball, and this was with a whiffle ball. After an hour, when I was routinely hitting the whiffle ball equivalent of line drives and Quill was panting from chasing them all over the field, he switched to an aluminum bat and a softball.

“This is going to be harder because the ball will be moving faster, but you’ve plum wore me out chasing the blasted thing.”

We played an additional hour, until both our shirts were plastered to our torsos, and I could feel the sting of sweat in my eyes. My shoulders hurt from swinging the bat when Quill caught the ball the for the last time.

“Do you think we’re mad dogs or Englishmen for playing in the noon day sun?” Quill joked as he walked towards the shade and my house. “We keep some extra clothes out here, and there’s a shower. We both need to cool off.”

I was cool and refreshed, sipping on my second lemonade. Lawrence would’ve of approved of the lemonade; it was real, not from a powdered mix, with quarters of lemons bobbing in the pitcher. Quill lent me a pair of cargo shorts and a faded T-shirt from a Monopoly tournament. I put my hands into the large pockets; I was sure when Quill wore these shorts the pockets were chock full of his little treasures, a set of marbles, a Swiss army knife, a game of jacks, and who knew what else. I’d been tempted to stuff my pockets full of the odds and ends that were on the bathroom shelves just to feel fully dressed. We sat sipping lemonade and playing hand after hand of cards until the sun was no longer high in the sky.

Quill seemed to be watching for the sun to reach a certain point because he kept glancing over at the door. “If we leave when the sun is shining through the transom, we can watch it set from the pond.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me up as the light burst through, reflecting on the pine floors.

We walked hand and hand along the narrow path, weaving amongst the fence rows and climbing over several pasture fences as the brown and white goats raised their heads, chewing calmly. Tucked between the tall grass and a grove of trees was a large pond. Two does startled at our presence and darted into the dark shade of the trees.

We walked out to the small dock, the wooden planks weathered and splintered with age. The sun was starting to set in the western sky, a brilliant red orb as the crescent moon rose in the east. Quill stretched down to the bank and plucked two dandelions, their seed heads white and full atop toughened stems. He handed me one and continued to walk towards the end of the dock. A Canada goose squawked its displeasure and with an ungainly flapping rose into the air. Quill blew; the fine, white fluff of the spent dandelion drifted down in the searing air before settling slowly on the darkening water.

He draped his arm, damp with a fine sheen of sweat around my shoulder and blew in my ear like he’d blown the seeds from the dandelion. “Blow and make a wish.” Maybe it was the heat, the smell of late summer, or the dappled sunlight filtering through the far trees, but his voice sounded sultry, seductive.

I blew hard, arcing a white cloud into the air to land silently on the water below.

“So are you going to tell me what you wished for?” Quill asked.

“It won’t come true if I tell you.”

“That’s with shooting stars, not dandelions. Come on tell me. I’ll tell you first.” His face had lit up in a boyish smile as he teased me. “I wished for a dinner date.”

“My pleasure.”

“You sound like a British butler. And what will be your pleasure tonight, sir?” Quill said with a laugh. “And what was your wish?”

“A kiss.”

Quill’s hands came around my waist and he drew me close. Slowly he shifted, and one hand came behind my head. He still smelled faintly of peanut butter. His lips touched mine at first tentatively and then deeper as I leaned into him. My arm slipped around his hips, and we made one continuos circle.

Finally we draw apart, and Quill ran his finger down my face, pushing my bangs back before he traced the outline of my cheekbones and with the lightest touch glided over my throat. I moved toward him, and we kissed again. My hands started to roam lower, and I pulled his shirttails from his shorts. He captured my wrist in his hand.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“I still want my dinner date.”

“Tomorrow.”

My hand was now on his belly. He caught the edge of his shirt and shucked it off. He kissed me again as my hands skimmed along his back. My shirt was added to the pile. He pulled me down, our legs dangling in the water, his touch like fire on my bare skin.

The sky was the dark purple of the early summer night when we finished. Quill was breathing hard, his eyes still bright with passion when he rolled into the water with a loud whoop, pulling me after him.