PART 1
It was last year I decided to take my life into my own hands. After 18 years of languishing in Pennsylvania suburbia waiting to get out, I discovered college wasn’t the opportunity I thought it was. I was just repeating all the same patterns in a new place. I hated what I was studying, I hated the people around me, I was definitely sick and tired of the food.
At the end of the year, faced with picking a major I’d be locked into for the next three years, I stood at the psychology administration office door and made a choice. I used the 3,000 dollars I got from working in the school mailroom and bought a shitty rundown car, then drove 1000 miles North until I found a spot I liked. Gallagher, Minnesota, population 230. Known for its walleye fishing in the summer and for the debilitating cold in the winter. I didn’t tell my friends, didn’t tell my parents, nothing. I told my older brother Casey just in case, but he knows the couch-surfing lifestyle and promised to not tell anyone.
It was as simple as that. I got a job working the graveyard shift at the Gallagher Diner and found cheap rent along a local fishing pond. Suddenly, I liked what I was seeing around me. I could look in the mirror and be proud. I definitely didn’t find myself integrated into the community – I was just another fisherman looking for his next catch to the people who lived there their whole lives – but I loved it. I loved working, taking home scraps from the diner, growing food out back. I texted Casey my address and then through my phone in the lake. It felt so good to live for myself, not on anyone else’s schedule.
I spent a lot of time out there doing nothing. Sitting out by the lake, watching people wring walleyes out from the water, feeling it against my toes. Teenagers would drive their parents’ motor boats around and drag their friends on inner tubes. They’d always wave at me when they’d pass. I liked waving back.
I wouldn’t call it lonely, although I guess you could. It was solitary. Except when the landlord would come around to fix my pipes or canoers would get lodged on the shore, there would be no one around for miles. I loved it. I loved being out of the rat race, not having to think about what other people were doing or what they thought of me. And the only other person out there, I came to like.
On one of my daily swims, I spotted my neighbor on the porch of his house. I always knew there was a house about a quarter mile from me, but I never saw anyone coming out of it. He was a rabbit in his 40s, heavier set but in a strong way. He looked like he could have been the most popular guy in school 20 years ago and still had a bit of that charm. His fur was black with the tips starting to gray. His forearms were big. He gave a little wave to me and I smiled back.
After that, I kept seeing him. He’d be fishing, mostly. Sometimes doing the crossword. Sometimes writing. Sometimes just enjoying the view. He’d always give me a warm wave and I’d always smile back.
One day, I came back from the diner to my apartment to see a note on the door. It was a piece of looseleaf paper tacked up with duct tape. I thought it might just be a note from the landlord saying my pipes burst or something, but it was from my neighbor.
“Hey there,” it said. “I thought you might have been a tourist, but I’ve seen you enough that I’m pretty sure you’re my neighbor. You should come over for dinner someday and we can properly introduce ourselves. Give me a wave if that sounds nice. Your neighbor, Bobby.”
The next day, I swam out into the lake and gave him a wave. He looked up from his crossword and smiled.
“Fried catfish?” he called out, his voice low but booming.
“Sounds great!”
“Be over at 6!”
I was really nervous to go over. I spent an hour going through my closet, sifting through shitty clothing I thrifted in college and the outdoors wear I’d picked up since moving to Gallagher.
Sure, people at the diner had a certain brand of small town politeness. They’d squint through my glasses and peer at my nametag, they’d say please and thank you, welcome me to the town. They were polite but they weren’t nice. No one invited me over, told me good fishing spots, shared stories. Bobby was the first man to do that.
I couldn’t deny my attraction to him, and it wasn’t just because I hadn’t been touched by another human being in months. I loved the relaxed way he sat in his deck chair, the way his weight settled, his reading glasses. I always felt limited by my options in college, found myself hoping for a more refined kind of man. Bobby was exactly the kind of guy I’d daydream about, and I was going over to his house for dinner.
I made the trek through the woods over to his house and stood at his door. He opened the door dressed in swim trunks and a tank top. “Hey!” he said. “Thanks for coming over!”
“I’m Aras, by the way.”
“Aras,” he repeated. “Nice to meet you, son. I’m just finishing the catfish, come in, come in.”
His house was nice. Upstairs was a kitchen and dining room space with a nice big ceiling and real wood walls. The house seemed to be powered by a generator that was currently off, heated in the winter by a big fireplace. I stepped over to his grill on the back porch where he was taking breaded catfish out of a pan with big tongs and placing it onto plates.
“When’d you move in?” he asked. “That house was empty all winter. I was delighted to see you over there.”
“Early summer. I moved from Pennsylvania.”
“That so? Is it just you over there?”
“Just me.”
“That’s pretty brave for a young man like you. What are you, 20? Living by yourself in the woods?”
“Yeah, 20.”
He let out a belly laugh. “It’s a good place to be. I moved out here the summer before you to work on my writing.”
“Are you a writer?”
“I’d say so.” He went to his fridge and pulled out tartar sauce he made earlier, and slathered it on our plates. “You familiar with Sci-fi at all?”
“Sanderson, a little.”
“Good, good. I’m a few books into a series called A Sea of Truth? Might have seen it around?”
“Oh, so you’re like an author-author.”
“Enough to buy me a little house. Find a little plot of land to call my own.”
“It’s beautiful out here. I love it.”
“Yeah? What do you like about it?”
“The woods. The water. The sky. All of it. There’s so much time and space to just be.”
He nods. “Couldn’t have said it better myself. People could be a little friendlier, though.”
“Do they still give you weird looks?”
“It’s as if I’m taking it from them, like it’s this secret they share that I’m not allowed to be a part of, that I’m infringing on.”
“Thank you. Exactly. I live here too! I’m not just here to go fishing for walleyes!”
“Well, the walleyes are a nice part of it, but…” He laughs. “Don’t worry. I’m your friend.”
“Thank you. I’m your friend too.”
“Let’s eat up?”
“Yes!”
The catfish was delicious and the company was even better. I didn’t realize how much I missed talking about something that wasn’t what the special of the day is. He went around and showed me all of his books, showed me the birds nests he could see from the porch, stepped into the water with me. We talked about the failures of higher education and the small town gossip we’d heard and stories about his time carrying mail in New York City and working on cargo planes. He sent me home with some bait and tackle and his phone number scribbled on a piece of paper. I admitted I didn’t have a phone and he told me I could just holler through the woods and he’d hear me.
He drove me home since it was so dark. He spent the ride talking about the woods and the things he found in them, but I was in my head, thinking about shooting my shot with him. I had no proof he was gay, I guess, but there was something a little cosmopolitan about him that left me with that impression.
He parked in my driveway and gave me a smile. “Thanks again for dinner, kid. I’m glad someone here is neighborly.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Um. We should fish sometime.”
“We should fish sometime!”
I tried to find the words in me, the courage, anything. Instead, I climbed out of his truck and waved at him from my porch. He backed away and drove off into the woods.
I spent the rest of the night jerking off, imagining him there with me.
Maybe someday.
PART 2
The days after that felt softer, more ripe. It helped that we were reaching the dog days of summer and the tourists weren’t zipping around on their speedboats anymore, instead choosing to laze around on their rental cabin’s back porches while they baked in the sun. Once I got home from the diner, there were hours and hours of sunlight left to enjoy in my backyard, and I often spent those in the company of Bobby.
It was sort of accidental. We developed a good rapport over dinner and were the only two people in tens of miles, so of course we’d become even friendlier. Often I’d be swimming in the lake and Bobby would beckon me over, so I’d swim the quarter mile over. He’d show me a big fish he caught or ask me how my day was and we’d chit chat in the summer sun.
I loved those days. It helped that Bobby had no problem standing in the water in a pair of old briefs and a ratty fishing tee-shirt. I’d spend my days floating in the water in my Speedo, gazing up at him while he showed me how he caught a fish about this long. Meanwhile his shirt would lift up a little and I’d see a little bit of his belly poking out from underneath. He showed no signs of being attracted to me, of being gay beyond all the imaginary things I would make up, nothing. Still, he’d invite me over every day to lounge around with him and that was enough to let my mind go to wonderful places.
We never went inside his house. Maybe he’d send me in to go grab some more bait or some ice pops from the freezer, but the weather was so nice that we spent day after day in the water. Some days we’d talk about life, about buddies from his college days and road trips about the country, and some days we’d just enjoy each other’s presence in the cool water.
One day at the tail end of August, we were hanging out the same as any other day. I was about 40 meters in when it started raining, then all of a sudden started thundering.
“Aras!” he called out. “C’mon, buddy.”
I swam in and emerged from the lake quickly, all of the lake water dripping from my body and being replaced with rainwater. “It’s really nice out there.”
“I’d swim in with you if it wasn’t thundering.”
“Don’t want some fried catfish?”
He laughed. “You wanna come inside?”
“Is that okay?”
“I don’t want you to have to swim all the way back. Come on in!”
Normally, I would just bake in the sun until I was dry, but that day I stood under his porch while he found a towel for me. I wiped off and stepped inside with the towel around my waist. Bobby was at the window, in a new pair of ratty old briefs and a tee-shirt.
“It’s really thundering out there.”
“Shake off some of that humidity.”
He smiled at me. “Feel free to make yourself at home, kid.”
“Thank you.”
I felt a little weird about being in his house in just my Speedo, but he didn’t make anything of it. When we’re outside, it makes total sense, but I felt a little naked there. Regardless, I took a spot on his couch and folded in my legs. He grabbed a radio from the corner and placed it on the table in front of us. “No TV but, uh, I have this.”
He sat down next to me. His couch was soft enough that he sunk in and I was pushed towards him. Our thighs touched a little but he didn’t seem to mind. Bobby was more preoccupied with moving the dial of the radio through sports broadcasts and conservative news stations until he found something good.
“Oh wow,” I said when he landed on a college radio station playing girlie indie rock. I couldn’t help but smile. “I haven’t heard music like this in so long.”
“Really? Not at all?”
“I don’t have a phone, remember.”
“Right, right. You miss it?”
“It’s nice. The diner plays old jazz which is nice but… modern music.”
“Listen to it!”
We took a second just to listen, synth and drums and guitar I hadn’t felt in myself in months. I started shivering a little – I was just in a half-wet Speedo in his cool house with the sky thundering outside.
“It’s that good?”
I smiled. “I’m a little cold.”
“I’m sorry, buddy. I can, uh, get some fire going? Get you one of my old shirts if you want?”
The idea of wearing one of his old shirts did sound very appealing, even if he was a couple of sizes larger than me. I shook my head. “Can you get the blanket?”
“Sure, kid.” I loved watching his butt in briefs as he walked away. “Holler if you need anything, you know!”
He was gone a little longer than I expected. I looked out the window at the thunder outside and let out a little sigh. This was my dream life. Sitting on his couch in my Speedo, nothing to do but listen to the radio.
A little bit later he came back holding a gray blanket. He laid it over me with a grin. “I was looking for something else but couldn’t find anything, so if it smells like me,” he laughed. “It’s from my bed.”
I gave it a big whiff. It did smell like him. Woodsy and warm. “Thank you.”
He sat down next to me again. “Mind if I take a little blanket?”
“Sure.”
He brought a little bit of the blanket over him and my mind goes blank. We’re under the same blanket. I can feel his warmth inches away from me.
“You still cold?”
I wasn’t at all but I still nodded.
“We can cuddle a little?”
I must have had the stupidest expression on my face when he said that. “What…?” is all I managed to get out.
“I’m a big warm bunny,” he smiled. “I have your back, kid.”
“Is that okay?”
“Sure. Here, come cuddle in.”
He raised his arm. There is nothing in this world more inviting than your big bunny friend offering a place to tuck into, so of course I had to do it. I laid my head on his shoulder and let him put his arm around me. He tucked it onto my bare chest. He repositioned the blanket around us and suddenly we were cuddling.
“That okay?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
Thankfully my erection was squeezed tight between my thighs. We sat there for an hour maybe, cuddling, listening to the music, and watching the rain outside. The entire time my head was swirling and he didn’t seem to mind at all.
It was gay what we were doing. Ridiculously gay. Two men don’t cuddle without it being at least a little gay. At the same time, he always felt a little bit like a father to me. Not my dad specifically, but like a mentor figure. He was the guy teaching me life in the woods, how to fish and how to enjoy living off the land. I recalled what he said over and over again – “I have your back, kid.” Maybe it wasn’t gay, maybe he was just keeping me safe and happy. I had no way of knowing.
Eventually, I had to pipe up. “Bobby?”
“Yeah?”
“Can I ask you something?”
“What’s up?”
I paused. “Um. Are you, like… gay… at all?”
He looked at me but didn’t move from his position. “No. Did you think I was?”
“I didn’t really know.”
“Oh. Well. I know you’re gay.”
“I am.”
“I’m sorry, is that an issue?”
“I just wanted to know if there was any other reason you were cuddling me.”
“Oh.” He laughed. “You were cold!”
“So it’s not like… it’s not sexual at all?”
“No. Nothing wrong with that, but I’m not.”
I tried to think through that in my head but couldn’t. I was so attracted to him and so enamored by him and loved his touch so much that I believed he was attracted to me back. It was purely utilitarian. Just to keep me warm in the woods.
“Hey, kid. It’s okay! I’m your friend, okay? If you need to keep warm, I’ll help you keep warm. If you need to cuddle, need someone to talk to… I know it gets lonely out here in the woods, so I’m perfectly happy to be here for whatever you need.”
Whatever you need. That only confused me more. There’s an implication I so badly wanted to draw out of that, that almost made sense. Maybe he’d have sex with me if I needed it. It was almost there but not quite.
I decided to fall back on what I knew. “I like cuddling with you.”
“Yeah? Me too. You’re nice and warm now.”
“Can we keep cuddling?”
He put his other arm around me, folding his paws together around my waist. “Like that?”
“Like that.”
“Remember,” he said. “Holler if you need anything. I’m here for you, Aras.”
PART 3
I was getting antsy around the middle of September. It might have been the end of summer coming around, or the fact that all of my college friends were probably at college wondering where the hell I was, or that my brother Casey hadn’t showed up in his truck to drive me away after three full months in Gallagher. But laying there in the water peeking at Bobby through the window, all of that just faded away.
“Hey, kid! Come in for dinner!”
I lumbered out of the water, toweled off, and made my way up the wooden stairs. He grinned at me and ruffled my fur as we stepped in through the porch door, wearing those ratty old briefs and the fishing shirt he spent the whole summer in. We spent a good couple of hours chatting over a buffet of wild plum and feta salad and baked walleye, working out a plothole in his newest book and discussing all of the upcoming foraging we could do in the autumn. Afterwards we each took a beer and headed out to the porch to watch the last dregs of the sunset.
“Do you miss college?” he asked.
“Mmm.”
“Good response.”
“Do you miss college?”
“Eh. As a society we put so much emphasis into going straight there at 18 years old, which now sitting at 40 seems like such a bad idea.”
“Yeah.” I paused, bringing my legs up onto the deck chair and hugging them to my body. Sitting there in my speedo, a passing flyfisher would think we were father and son. “I miss it a little.”
“What about it?”
“My friends.”
“I thought you hated them.”
“I do hate them.”
He chuckled. “What else?”
“Guys my age.”
“Yeah?”
“It’s just the idea that I could ever…” I started to ramble. “Be loved by someone my age, you know? Like that I could go to college and do the normal college thing and fit in and someone like me would see me and recognize me and want me.”
“Sure. And now that you’re not in college and the average age in Gallagher is 130…”
“I am so relived to be out of the rat race. I hated it. Being social, going to school, being autistic around a bunch of neurotypical people… I just felt like I was a fucking alien every single day. Like everyone else ‘got it’ and I didn’t and because of that there was no one who could look at me and understand me, you know?” I paused. “But at the same time, I can’t help but want to be normal and want to fit in and want to do that.”
“But you like your life here?”
“I love my life here. I love hanging out with you and going swimming and stuff and I guess I should just be happy I get to do this.”
“You can mourn the life you used to have, Aras. That’s all a part of you too.”
I grabbed my tail and started gnawing on the end, a bad habit I never got rid of as a puppy. “I miss my brother.”
“Casey? What about him?”
“I don’t know. The way he scrunches up his face when he’s mad. His stupid girlfriends. He would buy weed for me and stuff. I mean, he was a couch surfing stoner, it’s not like I got a lot of him, but he was the closest thing I had to…”
“Someone to depend on?”
“Yeah, exactly.”
He took a sip of beer. “It sounds like you didn’t have a lot of people looking out for you.”
“I mean, my parents weren’t abusive or anything.”
“They don’t have to be abusive for you to feel like something is missing.”
That made me feel like crying. I tucked my head between my legs.
“Yeah,” I said, trying to hold back the tears. “I do feel like something is missing.”
He put a paw on my shoulder as I let out a couple of choked sobs into my tail.
“Oh man,” I said, trying to catch my breath. “I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry about?”
“I’m being all weird.”
“It’s okay, Aras.” He took a breath. “If you were my son, I would be so proud of you.”
“Really?”
“I think you’re brave. I think you’re individualistic. You’re unique. You’re smart and funny. You’re really good at ironing out sci-fi novel plotholes. And… you’re lonely, and you’re misunderstood, and you came all the way out here just looking for a life that makes sense to you.” He took a swig of beer. “And you’re 20. You’re not supposed to have it figured out, but there should be people who are supporting you. And you never did. That’s why you’re here, because no one was ever there for you. Your parents, your friends. Casey. So, yeah. I’m proud of you. I’m proud that you’re still kicking.”
“Oh god,” I said, sobbing. “Bobby.”
“I know what it’s like to not be understood, to want to get away from it all… to desperately need someone to just look at you and they won’t. And you know what I said. I’m always going to be here for you, just a swim away.”
“Thank you.”
“Of course, kid.”
I rubbed my face in my paws. “Now what, I just swim home?”
He chuckled. “You wanna come in and relax?”
“That would be nice.”
“C’mon in.”
He put the radio on and we took a seat on the couch, the room all nice and warm from a day of sunlight shining in. I didn’t hesitate to lean on him. He put his arm around me and pulled me in close, my head resting on his shoulder and my paw on his tummy.
“So,” he said with a chuckle. “Guys your age? Something wrong with me?”
I nestled myself in a little more, red all over my face. “Yeah, maybe if you were 20.”
“That was a hundred pounds ago, kid. I was hot.”
“Yeah? How hot are we talking?”
“I played soccer in college. Went to the gym every day. You would’ve been all over me.”
I giggled. “What makes you so sure I don’t like you more now?”
“You are all cuddled up in my lap.” He grinned, ruffling the fur on my forehead. “What are you making that face for?”
“What face?”
“You have something to tell me?”
“Nope.”
“Aras, c’mon.”
“I just…” I closed my eyes. “I dunno. I like you a lot now.”
“Yeah?”
“I don’t want you to be 20. I like this here.”
“Am I feeling something pressed up against my leg?”
“Oh my god! Bobby!”
He chuckled. “Go ahead and tell me what you’re thinking before your tail tells me the rest.”
“... You’re not going to think I’m crazy?”
“I mean, I can guess what it is.”
“Okay. Um. Just. I… think you’re really hot… and just in the spirit of you looking out for me… I’ve always wanted to, you know…” I shivered a little bit. “I’ve always wanted you to take care of me, like, sexually.”
He looked at me with wide eyes, then moved his paw to the back of my head. And before I knew it, he was leaning in and giving me a kiss right on the muzzle.
“I can definitely do that, kid.”
“Oh, god, I thought I fucked it up so badly by phrasing it like that. You’re not… weirded out even though you’re not into guys?”
“Mmm, there’s a difference between being into you and wanting to take care of you, you know?” His paw moved down to my chest. “Aaaand who knows? Maybe I do think you’re pretty. Stranger things have happened, right?”
“I ended up a thousand miles away from my home.”
“Right here with me.” He leaned in for another kiss and I just about melted into him. “What do you wanna do, little doggy?”
“Can I… give you head?”
“I would love that.”
I shambled off the couch and got on my knees in front of him, my erection just about bursting through my speedo. His own erection curved to the right in his briefs was intoxicating. I looked up at him and I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Oh, god, what would my dad think if he knew this was what I was going?”
“You don’t need to think about any of that anymore, okay? I’m your old man now.”
