Bird Came Down

Daddy, daddy, do you miss me?

The way I crawled upon your knee

Those childish games of hide and seek

Seem a million miles away

Scott sang as he pulled off the highway and into town.

No one knew he listened to Christian music. No one knew he screamed it at the top of his lungs while driving. But then no one knew he was gay, not even his brother, until a few weeks ago. He stopped when the light was red, but it was green right away and he made a left turn for Matt’s house.

Jennifer Knapp was just the fucking best singer in the world. She could wail and he could wail with her, though he wasn’t sure how his wails sounded. And then she told everyone she was a lesbian, and they just don’t have Christian lesbians. She disagreed, but her label didn’t. Well, she paid the price and Scott had never paid a price in his life.

“Only I did….” Scott murmured. All the time you avoided paying the price, you ended up paying anyway.

There's a place in the darkness that I used to cling to

It presses harsh hope against time

In the absence of martyrs there's a presence of thieves

Who only want to rob you blind…

Scott pulled into the driveway, sitting in it while Jennifer sang:

So turn on the light and reveal all the glory
I am not afraid
To bare all my weakness knowing in meekness
I have a kingdom to gain
Where there is peace and love in the light, in the light
Oh I am not afraid!

Scott was whispering, “There’s a place in the darkness that I used to cling to…”

When there was knock on his window.

He blinked and saw Matt. Matt opened the door and sat in the passenger seat beside him.

“Who’s she?” he asked.

Scott turned it down. “Just music,” he said.

“Can we talk?” Matt said.

“In the car?”

“I guess. As good a place as any.”

Scott turned off the music and said, “Do you not want me to come into your apartment? Is it about last time?”

“No,” Matt said fervently. Then, “Yes. It is. But not the way you mean.”

“Okay,” Scott nodded.

“You’re my best friend,” Matt said. “And… I don’t regret what happened. I’m glad it happened,” he said earnestly. “I just wanted you to know that… If you want it to happen again, I’m good with that.”

Scott blinked at him.

“I mean, unless things with this Felix guy are—”

Scott shook his head.

“It’s over between me and Felix.”

“What happened?”

“I told Joey about us getting together last time I was here, and Joey told Felix.”

“That shit!”

“No, man,” Scott waved it off. “It’s complicated. It’s really complicated. Only, not anymore. Because Felix let me go.”

Both men looked at their laps and they sat in the car in silence.

“I know I’m not Felix,” Matt said. “I know that… I kinda lost that chance—”

“I think I did too.”

“But… I am here,” Matt said. “And… whatever you want to happen this weekend… I’m cool with it. Alright?”

Scott nodded his head.

“You wanna go inside, now?”

“Yeah,” Scott said.

Joey was working on a radiator that morning when he realized that his email account had five messages from Craigslist, and one was from the guy in the Maron Arms.

—Hello— he wrote back, and few minutes later, he had a message:

—Text me—

-Hello

-Who is this?

Joey typed: the guy from Craigslist.

-Cool. What are you down for.

-I’m down for whatever.

-Me too. When are you ready?

-I’m ready right now. I just need to get to where you are? The Maron Arms right?

-Yeah. I gotta let you in, though.

Joey thought about this, then texted:

-Don’t worry about it. What’s your apartment number?

Apparently the guy wasn’t going to worry about it. He just typed:

-712.

-I’ll be there in twenty.

When he got to the Maron Arms he remembered 712 was on the east side. Maron East had been built a few years after the west and middle, but it seemed older and shabbier. The first floor smelled of marijuana, and the freight elevator ground up the seven stories jecking and jerking at the fourth and sixth floors. Joey had never just met someone on here, and he trotted to 717 with a mixture of fear and anticipation.. He rapped on the door and was answered by:

“Well!” Rule said, a predatory smile crossing his face.

“Hello,” Joey said in a shallow voice.

“Are you coming in or just standing out in the hallway?”

“Coming in I guess,” Joey said.

He did, and Rule shut the door behind him.

“So what brings you… here? Shouldn’t you be on the other side of the U?”

“No,” Joey said, his eyes hitting the floor, and then rising up to meet Rule’s face.

“That’s all over.”

“Oh,” Rule said. His couch was in the middle of the living room, and he motioned for Joey to sit down on the couch beside him.

“You thirsty?”

“Not really.”

“Hungry?”

Joey shook his head.

Rule thought for a while, and then he said, “You smoke?” making a sign as if rolling a joint.

“No. Not really?” Joey said.

“Look,” Rule said, “I’m trying to be, how do you say…? A good host?”

Joey nodded.

They sat a little longer, and Joey looked out of the window to the courtyard. Finally Rule said, “You wanna see something?”

“Sure?”

So Rule stood up in his basketball shorts and a wifebeater, his arms crossed over his chest. Then suddenly he took off his shirt, and his shorts and stood there in fetish underwear, his penis hanging half stiff in a harness. Joey’s scrotum tightened and his dick stood up, pitching a tent in his shorts.

“That’s what I like to see,” he moaned when Rule bent down and squeezed his dick.

“In that case,” Rule told him, pulling the strings that made the underwear fall off, and going down the hall, “you might as well drop them draws and follow me.”

For a moment Joey stood dry mouthed and confused, and then from the bedroom he heard Rule call, “I’m ready.”

Joey unbuckled his belt and his cargo shorts, heavy with his work tools, dropped to the carpet, followed by his underwear and then his tee shirt. Naked, he came.