Free Valley of the Dudes by Ryan Field

weekend outfit, it looked as if Lance taken
     
a wrong turn in New York and wound up in the middle of nowhere. Rush honked the horn a couple of times. When Lance saw him, he picked up a
     
black leather bag and jogged down the steps. He passed by two teenage girls and smiled.
     
They stared at him for a moment with wide, adoring eyes, smiled back, then ran down the
     
platform giggling and poking each other in the ribs.
     
Lance opened the back door and threw his bag on the seat. Then he went up front
     
and sat in the passenger seat. Before the car door was even shut, he leaned over and
     
kissed Rush on the lips. It wasn’t just a peck either. He put his arms all the way around
     
Rush and kissed him and inserted his tongue. It wasn’t a long kiss. “You look hot like
     
that,” he said. “I like the knitted cap look. It makes you look dangerous.”
     
Though the train station was empty because it was Saturday morning, there were
     
still a few people around. Rush looked back and forth; his hands were still locked behind
     
Lance’s neck. There were three rough-looking teenage boys with skateboards staring into
     
the Jeep, watching Lance and Rush make out in broad daylight. Their eyes were wide and
     
their mouths were hanging open. Rush pushed Lance back and said, “We’re not in New
     
York anymore. We can’t do things like this in public.” Then he lowered his voice on
     
purpose, punched his chest a few times, and said, “We have to act like real men.”
     
Lance lowered his eyebrows and gave Rush a look. “What did I do? It was a kiss.
     
I didn’t put my hands down your pants.” He turned to the right and saw the teenage boys
     
staring at the car. When he smiled at them and waved, they grabbed their skateboards and
     
ran to the other side of the train station. “I only kissed you,” Lance said. “What’s wrong
     
with these people? If you were a woman and I kissed you like that in public, no one
     
would give it a second thought.” Rush smiled. Lance had always lived in New York. When he traveled, he went to
     
places like Paris, London, and Hollywood. He knew as much about small-town life in
     
America as Rush knew about auto mechanics. “But I’m not a woman, and this is what it’s
     
like in small towns. Men don’t kiss other men like that in public,” he said. “They don’t
     
even kiss each other on the cheek. Usually, they just shake hands and call each other
     
‘buddy.’”
     
Lance shook his head. “How on Earth do other gay men live in places like this?”
     
Rush put the car in gear and backed out of the parking space. “It’s not all bad,” he
     
said. “It’s like everything else in life—you focus on the good, and learn to live with the
     
bad.”
     
After that, Rush drove back to the family home and parked up front so they
     
wouldn’t have to walk all the way around from the garage. When Lance saw where Rush
     
had grown up, his jaw dropped and he said, “This place is looks like it’s part of the
     
English countryside. The property is wonderful. The house is classic and there’s so much
     
space. It must have been a wonderful place to grow up.”
     
Rush smiled and shrugged his shoulders, then reached into the back seat for
     
Lance’s suitcase. “It’s home,” he said. “The house has been in my family for generations.
     
It’s part of me. No matter where I go or what I do, this will probably always be home.”
     
Lance stared at the front door and rubbed his jaw. “I can see why.”
     
On the way inside, Rush started to tell Lance the history of the house, and how it
     
had been part of the Underground Railroad. But by time they reached the second-floor
     
hall and Rush pointed to his bedroom door, Lance’s arms were around Rush’s waist and
     
his jaw was buried in Rush’s neck. Lance placed one hand on the small of Rush’s back and the other behind Rush’s head. While he sank his teeth into Rush’s