A Prairie Dog's Love Song by Eli Easton

Author:Eli Easton [Easton, Eli]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2013-12-05T16:00:00+00:00

BEN WENT to fetch a towel to clean them off. And then Joshua pulled him back into bed and cuddled Ben against his chest. Joshua felt a sense of peace he hadn’t felt in days, not since he’d heard about the blowout in Nora’s Diner. It was gonna be all right.

He felt a tiny catch of doubt. Wasn’t it?

“Come home, Ben,” Joshua said, gripping Ben’s arm a little bit tighter.

“And then what?” Ben asked quietly.

“What’d ya mean?”

“I mean, what’s gonna happen if I do? You and me gonna sneak around and do this on the side once in a while?”

Joshua thought about it. “More’n once in a while,” he teased.

But Ben shook his head and pulled away. He sat up. His face was serious as he thought it over.

“If I am…. No, I guess I can’t argue about it. I’m gay.”

“Okay,” Joshua said carefully.

“And if I’m gay, then I’m gonna be that. I don’t want to be sneakin’ around and hidin’ it.”

Joshua frowned. “Ain’t nobody’s business.”

Ben picked at the sheet, not meeting Joshua’s eyes. “But you hide it. Lord, Joshua. I had no idea, and nobody knows you as good as Chet and me.”

Joshua tried to find the right words to explain how things were—how they’d always been. “It’s like… prairie dogs.”

Ben quirked an eyebrow at him.

“You see the holes. ’N’ you know the dogs are around, even if you don’t see the dogs themselves.”

“What the hell are you talkin’ about?”

“Gay. Cowboys. They’re there. Like a lot of single cowboys, they go into Billings once a month, only they ain’t there to see women. There’s no point in flingin’ yourself around in public, ’s all.”

Ben looked confused. “But why would you wanna do that?”

“Do what?”

“Only have what you really want once a month? Go around actin’ like somethin’ you’re not?”

Joshua grunted. “Easier, ’s all. People have fixed notions. No point buckin’ ’em.”

Ben looked forlorn. “I shouldn’t have to choose between doin’ the job I love, and bein’ in the place I love, and bein’ with the person I love.” He sighed and looked Joshua in the eye. “But I reckon I do. I can’t go back there. It’s not just the porn. I—I have to be myself, live out loud. And I have to be able to be proud of what I done and who I am. And I can’t be that in Clyde’s Corner. Folks there will never accept me.”

Joshua felt a cold numbness in his chest as the words sank in. He could see in Ben’s eyes that he meant it. Joshua had thought them making love would change everything, that all he had to do was stake his claim. Now he realized it wasn’t so. Point of fact, it might have just made things worse. Because if he couldn’t have Ben now, it would kill him.

He sat up and took Ben’s hands in his. “Do you hafta live quite so loud?”

Ben nodded seriously. “That’s who I am, hoss.”

Joshua sighed. That simply wasn’t possible, and that was okay. It was worth what you had to give up, to live like they lived.

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