Saturday, March 31, 2012

Gift of Exile (a Brokeback Mountain fanfic), Chapter 5

excerpt from Chapter 5: Ennis and his new friend David go horseback riding. David tells Ennis about how his deceased best friend, stepbrother and lover Nathan came to live with his family, and Ennis and David discover an attraction to each other. 

“Damn, I’m sorry,” David said suddenly.  “We’re out ridin’ on a beautiful day, and here I am talkin’ about plane crashes.  I guess it’s been on my mind lately, it was exactly 22 years ago last week.”

Ennis thought for a moment.  “Hey, you really ride bareback sometimes, like ya said last night?”

“Sure, when I was growin’ up anyway.  Why, you thought I made it up?”

Ennis gave him a sidelong glance.  “Well, they were kinda givin’ you a hard time about your ridin’ last night,” he said a little archly. 

David took the bait, as he had guessed.  “Well, they’re your horses but I can prove it if you don’t believe me.”  Ennis gestured toward David’s horse, and David immediately started undoing the saddle, struggling with the unfamiliar straps and buckles.

“Here…” Ennis walked up next to him and quickly unfastened the saddle.  Standing on slightly sloping ground their feet touched and their arms and shoulders brushed against each other; and Ennis glanced over to find David already looking closely at him.

When they’d met two nights before they had both been wearing suits, with the conventional dark heavy fabric serving its intended function of smoothing out the slopes and angles of male bodies.  Now they were both wearing jeans, Ennis in the type of snapped cotton shirt he’d worn since his teens and David in a sweatshirt, a garment Ennis had never worn but which suddenly seemed improbably sensual to him.  The sleeves were pushed up slightly, enough to show the light growth of fine dark hair on the wrists above the squarish but fine-boned hands with their short spatulate fingers.  Ennis did not look down, but during their side-by-side rides he had already noticed, with awareness of it only half-surfacing, the compact legs and slightly rounded buttocks.  He suddenly wanted more than anything to slide his hand under the soft fabric and up David’s back and then down again.  His thoughts would have progressed further than that, but the realization in the same moment of his stiffening cock and of David frozen with one hand on the saddle, looking back at him, stopped them in their tracks.

“I’ll do it.”  David’s voice sounded somewhat shaky despite the casual words, but he turned and pulled the saddle off the horse’s back.  There was no anger nor fear nor hostility in his manner, just a hand put out to stop a slowly swinging door from opening any further.

Ennis untethered his own horse, the familiar action dispelling the momentary sense of the world having shifted subtly and of his suddenly being in some alien realm with all signs written in unreadable languages.  He swung himself up into the saddle and David stepped on the high end of the log to vault onto his horse’s back.  “Over t’ that fence and back?” he suggested as they rode back out in the sunlight, pointing to a single tree a hundred yards or so away.  Ennis nodded wordlessly, not trusting himself to answer at that moment, and they urged their horses into a canter.

Shaken as he was, he couldn’t resist glancing over.  David’s legs were clinging to his horse’s flanks as if he were shinnying up a fleshy tree, leaning back very slightly, his pelvis rocking rhythmically back and forth with the horse’s three-time gait.  He glanced over at Ennis and smiled triumphantly: “told ya!”   Ennis nodded, but did not look over at him again until they reached the tree.

read the rest of Chapter 5 at http://talkstocoyotes.livejournal.com/1704.html

Thursday, March 22, 2012

Gift of Exile (a Brokeback Mountain fanfic), Chapter 4


excerpt: Ennis and his new friend David escape the wedding reception to have a drink, and make plans to go horseback riding the next day.


It was still early but Ennis had known the Black and Blue Eagle would be busy. Riverton had grown a little since he and Alma had gotten married but it was a hard time to start a new business there right now, with the economy the way it was and more ranches folding, some bought up by absentee owners. Good times had come and gone, and there were still few other places to go on Saturday night. As he got out of his truck and watched David close the door of his anonymous-looking rental car, Ennis wondered how the hell he’d gotten into this: two men walking into the bar together and wearing suits at that. And one of “them….”

Queer. Say it. David’s cousin Charlene might not be anyone he’d want to spend even a few hours with but she’d made it clear in just two sentences. And he’d never been that, never had anything goin’ with any man but Jack. But Jack had…. You been to Mexico, Jack? … another one’s goin a come up here … some ranch neighbor a his from down in Texas. He walked through the bar making an effort to not look at anyone but threw a longing glance at a table in the corner, wondering if they’d attract less attention there or just look like they wanted to be alone with each other. David slid onto a barstool before he had a chance to find out, too late. Sitting at the bar, Ennis felt like a car dealership spotlight was only ten feet away and shining directly on them.

Hey Ennis, lookit you – almost didn’t know ya wearin’ a suit. Who’s your friend?” it was Vickie, owner of the place since her husband had died, she’d been here more than one Saturday night lately; sometimes out here talking to employees and customers and sometimes going through the tiny office in back, drawer by drawer. “Not friends, ma’am, cousins, as of a couple a’ hours ago anyway.” David answered before Ennis could even react, and it seemed like his Southern accent was suddenly stronger. “Ennis’ daughter got married this afternoon, prettiest bride I’ve seen in awhile. Things were startin’ to wind down, and we just needed somethin’ stronger ta drink than punch with lime sherbet.”

Vickie laughed and called to Roy, washing glasses at the other end of the bar, for two beers. “First ones on the house, nobody’s daughter gets married every day” she said. The searchlight had at least dimmed, more quickly than Ennis had thought it could. “So you’re from out of state?” she asked David.

Yes ma’am, I live in Minnesota now but I’m a good ol’ boy from Georgia. Macon,” David answered. “Never been this far west before.” He pulled a few dollar bills out of his pocket. “Would you have some change? I’d like some music with the beer, don’t seem to have any quarters.”

His drawling voice sounded affable and a little coaxing, but not blatant or aggressively salesman-friendly. He was leaning a little toward her, smiling slowly, eyes narrowed a little and focused on her face, but not getting too close, staying a respectful enough distance so that the impression was more of sociable interest than a conscious attempt to charm. Ennis found it oddly familiar, remembering his short conversation with David’s grandmother earlier. She’d had the same trick in conversation of seeming to pull the other person closer to her, by briefly seeming to draw an invisible and private circle around both of them. Pocketing the change Vickie gave him, David nodded to Roy as he put their drinks on the counter, went over to study the selections on the jukebox.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Gift of Exile (a Brokeback Mountain fanfic), Chapter 3


Excerpt from Chapter 3:  at his daughter's wedding reception, Ennis meets some guests from Georgia and Minnesota and makes an unexpected friend.

They were suddenly joined by a blonde woman of about 30, dressed in a bright pink suit. She smiled briefly at Ennis, a smile that was a notable achievement of both practice and dentistry although he thought immediately of his horses’ teeth coated in white paint. The fruity aroma of the cologne she was wearing was neither too strong nor cloying but it seemed to fit her nevertheless: a piece of delectable fruit still sweet and juicy but a little soft here and there, recently overripe.

Oh here you are, Gramma,” sitting down on the other side of Alexandria, the younger woman didn’t appear to even notice Ennis. “Well, this has been an interestin’ wedding, thank God I wasn’t one of the bridesmaids, what with those dresses, I mean, why in the world would she pick that shade of green? Made Luanne’s skin look like a piece of cheese somebody forgot in the refrigerator –“

Charlene,” Alexandria’s voice a little louder now, “I don’t believe you and Mr. del Mar had met. The bride’s father, Mr. del Mar, this is my granddaughter Charlene.” Suddenly wanting to find yet another escape route, Ennis nodded to her. She looked searchingly at him and he was conscious of his older suit, his weathered skin, the age that he knew had crept closer in the last year. “Well, your daughter is just beautiful, Mr. del Mar, I was tellin’ Curt just a few minutes ago.” She gave him another carefully orchestrated smile to match her voice and apparently dismissing him, turned to Alexandria again. “Can you believe the climate here, all that wind? Just two days and my skin feels like old newspaper.”

I know, dear,” Alexandria said evenly. “It was good of you and your Mama to come with me. I hadn’t seen Curt and Luanne in years, and I’m so glad David decided to come. I haven’t seen him since he moved North.”

Just as well he’s here, if you want to see him. I mean, we won’t be seeing David at his wedding anytime soon, not unless they change the laws and Nathan comes back to life.”

That’s none of your business, Charlene,” Alexandria said in a low, warning voice but Ennis scarcely heard. He looked down at the table, his face feeling too warm and his stomach slightly queasy.

Mama, I need you and Charlene to come with me,” a brisk woman’s voice said. She looked like an older version of Charlene but had an aura of authority about her. Ennis would have been reminded of some of the ladies he’d met at the few church events Alma had talked him into years ago, but all he could see was the man who was with her, the same man he’d half-mistaken for Jack a few minutes ago. “David was telling me the photographer is still here,” the woman continued to Alexandria, “and he suggested we have our pictures taken with Curt and the bride. Three generations.”

Not unless they change the laws and Nathan comes back to life”…. For a terrible moment, the old terror and nausea started to overcome him. One hand gripped the seat of the chair he was sitting on hard enough that his fingers ached; the old slapdown voice, struggling to override his pledges to Jack, started to work its way up: he knows in a minute everybody will know get it away from you now or you’ll catch it, queer faggot it was just Jack… Mechanically, he pushed himself up out of the chair, heard only a few words of the introduction, “my daughter Carol,” a quick handshake and then there was no avoiding it, David with his hand politely extended. Ennis took it briefly and for a moment he could feel every cell of his own right hand, clasping a man’s hand that was so different from Jack’s, a little darker and with short, blunt fingers, oddly like a surgeon’s hands.