At forty-three, Jay McGhee doesn't know how much longer he'll be able to withstand the physical rigors necessary for active duty in the Roseville, Indiana Fire Department, but that doesn't mean he's willing to be put out to pasture just yet. For most of his adult life, he's had to place his needs on the back burner, including the fact that he's a gay man in a small rural community. His career is not going to take the same route.
When twenty-seven-year-old Frank Kaplan breezes into town, Jay ignores his immediate attraction to the younger man. After all, he's an old pro at pretending. The long-haired, tattooed drifter shouldn't even be his type, but the friendship they strike up satisfies a space in Jay's life he never realized was empty.
Two men. Two lives in flux.
No regrets.
EXCERPT
The shadow of Frank’s arm lifting his bottle to his mouth caught the corner of Jay’s eye. The tattoo was a black smudge in the darkness, erased into anonymity, but Jay recalled it without fail. He’d watched it, fascinated, while Frank ate. No regrets. It was a young man’s sentiment. Jay couldn’t remember the last time he’d been regret-free.
“Sometimes, I know exactly why my mom must have wanted to get out of Roseville.” The soft rumble of Frank’s voice harmonized with the rest of the night’s music, an ideal bass line to the chirping. “She was probably bored out of her mind.”
“It’s too quiet for a lot of people,” Jay commented, matching his tone.
“You stuck around.”
“I like quiet.”
“And yet, you’re a fireman. I always thought firemen had to be adrenaline junkies at heart.”
It was an astute observation, and not altogether inaccurate. “Or suffer from a savior complex.”
“Isn’t that doctors?”
“Anybody whose job is to save lives has to have one, I think.”
“So what’s your excuse?”
“I already told you. It was better than working at the gas station.”
Frank took another swallow of his beer. “It doesn’t seem like firefighting is a job you just fall into. For over twenty years.”
“You’d be surprised.” He didn’t want to talk about his career, because that would lead inevitably to talk about his future, and therein rested most of his current malaise. “If you’re so bored, why are you sticking around?”
“Who said I was bored?”
“You did.”
“No, I said I understood why she’d be bored. That doesn’t mean I’m bored.”
Semantics. Another young man’s tactic. “What do you do all day out here? Does Olive even have an internet connection?”
“No, she doesn’t, but that’s okay. I hang out. I listen to Grandma’s stories. Work on my book.” He flashed a smile at Jay. “Moonlight as an auxiliary fireman.”
Jay chuckled. “They’d make you cut your hair first.”
Frank pushed it off his face, further exposing his strong profile. “Oh, well, then I guess that counts me out. I look like a douche with short hair.”
Jay sincerely doubted that. If anything, he thought a shorter cut would highlight his features. He might look a little less feral, but it certainly wouldn’t make him less appealing.
Jay took a long swig of his beer. His throat had gone dry, imagining Frank in various incarnations. Though the night cloaked his body’s reactions to Frank’s proximity, he was still all too aware of it himself. The morning after the fire, he’d woken up with a throbbing shoulder and a hard-on, wisps of his dream about Frank lingering long into the day. After tonight, he needed to be more diligent about squelching his fantasies. He knew Frank now. It wasn’t safe anymore.
The inside door opened, spilling a swathe of light between the two men. They turned simultaneously, meeting Olive’s darting gaze.
“My show’s done, so I’m going to head to bed,” she said. “Anything I can get for you boys before I do?”
“No, we’re good, Grandma.”
She smiled at Jay. “You drive safe when you leave.”
“I will, Olive. Good night.”
When she left, the door remained ajar, dispelling some of the mood that had settled between Jay and Frank. Jay didn’t like how it made him visible and set his bottle on the small table next to his chair.
“I think that’s my cue,” he said, standing and stretching. The tape of the bandage pulled away from his skin. It itched, but he’d wait to fix it until he got home.
“You don’t have to go just because Grandma can’t make it past ten.”
Hearing Frank refer to Olive as Grandma made Jay feel old, as well as reminded him of just how young Frank was. Twenty-seven was older than he’d originally thought, but it was still a generation away. A lifetime. His lifetime.
“I’ve got to work on getting the barbecue set up tomorrow,” Jay said. “And my days of all-nighters are long gone.”
“Oh. Okay.” Frank sounded disappointed. He was far enough out of the spilling light from the house to make it impossible to see anything but shadows on his face, but Jay was certain he wouldn’t look happy, even if he could see him. “It was just nice to have company for a change.”
“I told you. You need to come to the barbecue this weekend. You’ll meet more people than me and Tanner.”
“You say that like meeting you hasn’t been worth it.”
“No, I say that like a young guy like you shouldn’t be stuck mostly alone all the time.”
“I don’t mind being alone.” His gaze returned to the front yard. “It gives me time to think.”
“That’s a danger in its own right.”
“You don’t just sit and wonder about the world? Wonder what it is you’re supposed to do, or why certain things happen to certain people, or even how some things work?”
Jay didn’t realize he had sat down again until a cool breeze ruffled the light hairs along his forearms. “Like garbage disposals, you mean?”
Frank smiled, though didn’t otherwise react. “I know it’s self-indulgent. There are better ways for me to occupy my time. But things happen, you know? My brain feels like it never turns off sometimes.”
Actually, he did know. All too well. “That’s when you try and drown it out with work.”
“That would require a real job.”
“And you’re not ready for that?”
“I had one. I walked away.”
That actually surprised Jay. Frank struck him as one of those perpetual students, the ones who never seemed to graduate, working dead-end jobs in retail, who ended up moving back in with their parents because they got surprised life actually expected them to support themselves. Roseville had had a couple of those through the years.
“What did you do?” he asked.
“I worked in small loans for a bank in Toledo.”
“A bank? Really?”
The evident shock in his voice drew Frank’s attention back. “Do I even want to know what you thought I did?”
He snorted. “No, probably not.”
“It’s the hair. People always make assumptions because of the hair.”
“And the tattoos.”
Frank glanced at his arm. “Yeah, well, those are newer. I got those after I quit.”
“Because you broke free from the bondage of a nine-to-five life?”
He meant it as a joke. Frank didn’t smile.
“Reminders.”
And that was it. He didn’t say any more. Jay waited for clarification, or for a change in subject, or anything to dispel the silence, but the mention of his tattoos had muzzled Frank, returning him to the same introspective state that had enveloped them when they’d first come outside to enjoy their beers in quiet. The only difference was, Jay wasn’t interested in getting lost in his thoughts anymore. He wanted to know what was going through Frank’s head.
