Part 2

The days roll slowly by. Some pass more quietly than others and some more painfully. Ray and I make do, as best we can. We progress by his inches and regress by my meters. But progress we do. And if I sometimes misplace pieces of myself, well, it is never purposeful and always temporary.

I continue to seek counsel, as does my Ray. This oral spilling of our innards, often accompanied by tears, is made bearable by his steadfast presence at my side.

We never have settled the "Ray Ray business", as Ray Vecchio has taken to calling our dilemma. Oddly enough, they seem to have no difficulty determining which of them I am speaking to at any given moment. Ray insists it is something indefinable in the intonation of my voice. My Ray tells me the hairs on his arms stand up when I am referring to him.

In my newly rediscovered mental state, I find that Fraser's old duties are not sufficient exercise for my mind. I have taken to aiding Ray with his cases. I did attempt, a time or two, to work with my Ray. Unfortunately, we soon discovered that we found one another's presence to be too . . . distracting to function in a competent professional manner.

Ray and I work well together. His steady logical approach is a most satisfactory counterbalance to my somewhat more impulsive and sometimes rash style of law enforcement.

My associates at the Consulate, who are not quite sure what to make of the newly confident competent Renfield Turnbull, hide behind polite formality. But their distance is more than made up for by the respect and warmth I find when I look into the eyes of the officers of the twenty-seventh precinct.

And all the problems in the world could not withstand the joy I find in the blessed circle of my Ray's arms. It is curious indeed. My Ray's vocabulary is limited and peppered liberally with colorful phrases. His word choices are often indiscriminate. He considers the rules of grammar, like those of the road, to be mere guidelines -- something to be twisted or ignored at the slightest whim. Yet, when he speaks, his voice weaves a spell from which I find no escape.

He is capable of soothing my fears and raising my passions with a slip of his lips and a trip of his tongue. And that is how I now come to find myself in my present circumstance.

I still do not drive. I suppose that I should find myself as competent at this skill as I once did, a slowing of the reflexes brought on by aging not withstanding. However, I have been quite spoiled by the continued presence of two willing chauffeurs.

My "home, James" of the moment is Ray. We have just completed a very satisfactory round of pool and Guiness -- rewards for another successfully completed case, and a much needed night off for my Ray. I am not certain, but I believe I heard Francesca mention something about getting him to "shake his groove thing."

My thoughts are momentarily distracted by all of the wonderfully Bacchanalian images that phrase conjures up. They then, naturally, return to my present situation, and that which I require Ray's assistance in procuring -- a gift, a special gift for my Ray.

I'm sure he has already forgotten his making mention of it over three months past, but I have not. How could I, when he described it in such vivid detail?

*

We have our good days Rennie and me. Today is one of those, no doubt about that. The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming and there's two hundred pounds of sweating moaning well-built well-hung Mountie flesh pressing me into the mattress.

He just sucked the bejeezus out of me, and then he climbed on top of me and started humping away. He gets it up almost every time we make it now. But this is the longest he's ever kept it up.

He's really starting to lose it. He's making these desperate noises, like this is one race he's going to win. He's making me hot all over again. I know what I want and I want it bad. I want him inside of me. I want him to pound into me, not against me. But I don't know how to tell him. I tried once before, and it didn't work out so good.

We were going at like rabbits one day, and I kind of screamed out "Fuck me!" without realizing it. He lost it all right, but not in a good way. He lost his boner and jumped out of bed like my ass was on fire. He got dressed and went for one of those all night walks of his. I finished myself off and added "fuck me" to the list of stuff I don't say to him.

He stops rubbing up against me. It's gone again. I think it bothers me as much as it does him, but I don't let it show. He throws a pillow against the wall, but he doesn't do nothing to me. He hasn't tried to hurt me since that time in the bar. He tries to climb off of me. I don't hold him. That's a big no-no. I just ask him to stay. He does. He holds me real tight and talks into my neck.

"I'm sorry, Ray. I'm so sorry. I just . . . I thought . . . For a moment I though it was going to happen, and then . . . nothing. I'm sorry."

Chalk it up to total lust, but I get up the courage to say what's been swimming around my brain for forever.

"Rennie, maybe we could try something different next time. I know you don't even like to hear the word, but maybe you could, you know, do THAT to me."

He makes like a human popsicle.

"No, Ray."

"Rennie, I know how it was for you. But you're nothing like that guy. I know you ain't ever topped before, but you wouldn't be nothing like him."

"No, Ray."

"Pretty please with KY Jelly on top?"

"I won't hurt you that way, Ray."

"What if I promised it wouldn't hurt?"

"It always hurts the first time, Ray, even if neither party . . ."

He can't say it, but I know what he's thinking -- even if one guy doesn't beat the crap out of the other guy and leave him bleeding on the floor.

I'm as embarrassed as shit, but I figure I better finish what I started. I close my eyes so I can pretend like I'm alone when I say it.

"What if it's not my first time?"

My eyes are still closed, but I can feel him pull back, and I know he's staring at me. He thinks I lied to him. I didn't, but I'm not too thrilled about saying what I know I got to.

He says just what I knew he would.

"You told me you had never been with another man that way, Ray."

I open my eyes, but I can't look at him. I tell it to the wall.

"You're the first."

He's in full investigative Mountie mode.

"Ray, I'm confused. You say that you've never been with another man, but you're also telling me that you've been on the receiving end of anal intercourse. Are you telling me that . . ."

He can't finish what he's thinking, and it hits me. I start laughing so hard, I think I'm going to bust something. He's looking at me like I got three heads. I start laughing harder.

Finally, I'm out of breath. I suck in a few lungs full of air and tell my favorite pervert that I might have done some wicked things in my life, but I ain't done THAT.

"No, Rennie, I ain't been spreading my legs for no donkeys or nothing like that."

He blushes all the way down his chest. I take two bonus points for that one. The man is so hard to embarrass, sometimes I make myself go all scarlet trying to get him to say Uncle.

"Jesus, Rennie, you're going to make me say it, aren't you?"

He just looks at me. This is so humiliating, it had better get me plowed like a wheat field.

"Stella left me. I think it was the fourth time she left me. I was really pissed that time. She was getting it on with some investment banker, and she made real sure I knew it.

"I was going through her things. I was going to burn them or throw them out or send them to her mom. I hadn't decided which. So I'm digging through her law books when I find it."

"It?"

"A vibrator, okay? She had a vibrator, and I didn't even know about it. It was in a box with some lube and a half-empty box of rubbers. I was so pissed. Not that she had it, but that she didn't want me to know about it.

"I put it on the coffee table and just stared at it while I drank a whole six pack of beer. I finished my last brew and threw the vibrator in with the rest of her stuff. I went to bed to sleep off my drunk.

"I woke up about five hours later, hard as a rock. Stella had been gone for about three weeks that time, and I was wanting it pretty bad. I stretched out and started jacking off, nothing strange about that.

"I was stroking it pretty good, and I started fingerfucking myself, like I had since I was fifteen. Suddenly, it hits me. That vibrator is just sitting in the other room, going to waste.

"My heart started pounding harder than it had been, and my fingers were shaking. I thought, 'Why not?, it isn't like she needs it right now.' I stood up and walked to the living room. I knelt in front of the box I had tossed it into.

"I opened the box and stared at her vibrator real hard. It wasn't anything special to look at. It was blue and about eight inches long, with three ridges running around it. It had a black 'on' dial that was red on the end. I found out later it only took one double A battery.

"So, I stared at it until I memorized it, and my feet fell asleep. I picked it up and took it back to the bedroom. I stopped on the way and grabbed the lube and the rubbers.

"I have not a clue why I put a rubber on it, but it seemed real important. I rolled the rubber over it and globbed a bunch of lube on it too. I laid down with my head pointing toward the end of the bed and put my feet up on our headboard. I spread my legs as wide as I could and slid the vibrator up my ass.

"My hands were shaking, and my dick was leaking. It took forever. I got it about four inches up inside of me and just laid back. I was wore out.

"I stayed like that for a while, just squeezing and relaxing my ass cheeks, getting used to the feeling of something so damned big inside of me.

"The squeezing started to turn me on, so I turned the vibrator on. It was the most in-fucking-credible thing I'd ever felt in my whole sorry life. I couldn't believe I'd gone that long without doing it. I pulled my knees up to my chest and pushed the vibrator as far up my ass as I could get it. Then I jerked off like I was sixteen again. I came so hard, I think the whole building heard me.

"I did it again that night, and two or three times a day for the next week. Stella came back to me, and I put the vibrator back in her stuff. I know she noticed the rubbers were gone and the lube tube was half-empty, but she never said nothing. I figured she didn't care enough to ask. The next time she left me was the last time. She took it with her."

He's still on top of me, but he's up on all fours, so I can't feel nothing but his knees and his arms, where they're touching my sides. I look at the wall the whole time I'm talking, because I figure Rennie's going to be pretty broke up by the whole thing. I get done talking, and he doesn't say anything. It could be worse. He could be laughing.

He climbs off of me and stands by the side of the bed. I'm ready for him to get dressed and take one of his walks, but he just stands there. When he finally says something, it sounds like he's having a hard time breathing.

"Ray."

I hide my eyes behind my hand.

"Look at me, Ray."

I never could say no to him, and the filthy rat bastard knows it. I look at him.

His toes are curled. His fists are clenched. His chest is flushed. He's more beautiful than any man has a right to be. His eyes are hot, and his dick is pointing to the sky.

"Suck me, Ray. Suck my dick. Now."

You don't have to tell me twice. I'm on the floor, on my knees before you can say "flaming bender", going to town. I never done this before, but I spent enough time thinking about it. I don't go for style points. Can't count on this lasting too long, so I just make it as hot and heavy as my virgin throat will let me.

I guess I do okay, because he lasts about ten seconds. He slams his dick into my mouth so hard I think I'm going to lose a tooth. But, I don't mind, because at the bottom of his dive, he does it. He comes. He comes so hard and so fast, he settles that whole spit swallow question for me, before I even thought to ask it.

His dick feels so good in my mouth and his come tastes so good on my tongue, that I kind of forget myself for a minute. He has to pull on my hair to get me to stop making like a sucker fish.

I let him have his dick back for now. He jerks me to my feet and shoves his tongue into the space his cock just left. He pulls back and starts talking about food -- just like a man. Oh well, at least he didn't roll over and fall asleep.

He throws his clothes on and stands there waiting for me. He's bouncing on the balls of his toes. I feel like I've just been hit by a truck -- a really big Canadian express.

I throw on something I find lying on the floor. He makes me take him to a burger joint in the worst part of town. He holds my hand and feeds me fries and stares down anybody that even thinks about giving us funny looks.

Then he makes me take him home and suck his dick again.

I try to get a real good sleep that night, because I have a feeling I ain't going to be getting too much shut eye for a while.

*

Ray slams on the brakes in his typically impatient fashion, and my mind returns to the present.

"Ray, I was wondering if it wouldn't be too much trouble for us to make a quick stop before you take me home?"

"Sure thing, Rennie. Where do you want to go?"

I point at a storefront that had first caught my eye several weeks ago.

"There."

Ray's eyes follow my hand.

"There?"

"Yes, Ray."

"You sure?"

I smile.

Ray makes some very interesting comments about my Ray's continuing ability to walk upright, but he turns the car out of traffic and expertly steals an available parking space from a late model Audi.

He opens my car door for me and opens the store door for me, as well. He takes a final searching look down the street, as though making sure there is no one of our acquaintance in sight. Thus satisfied, he follows me into the store.

*********

I hold the door of the 'Blue Light Pleasure Emporium' open for him and then follow him inside. I wonder if the Queen would shit a Corgie if she knew one of her Boys in Red just walked into the city of Chicago's oldest finest gay porn store like it was the most natural thing in the world?

Stan's warned me about Rennie in full Evil Sex God mode. But this is the first time I've seen him in action.

He looks good, and he knows it. He's wearing a tight faded navy blue polo shirt that shows off more than a bit of his tattoo, those ass-hugging, package-cupping, thigh-caressing button fly's of his and his black lace-up Doc Martin boots. The only thing that ruins the perfect view is the wallet in the back pocket of his jeans.

The only other person in the store is the clerk.

Rennie saunters up to the glass display case that the clerk is standing behind. The poor unsuspecting sucker has his back to us. He's restocking the magazines that are so kinky even a joint like this keeps them behind the counter.

The guy looks like your average Joe -- mid-forties with thinning sandy blonde hair and the first signs of spreading hips. Rennie clears his throat and the victim of the day turns around.

"Good evening. Is there anything I can hel . . . um, help you with?"

I got to give the guy credit. He's pretty cool under fire.

Rennie leans up against the display case and rests one elbow on the glass. He looks into the case and starts casually tracing patterns on the counter top with the index finger of his free hand.

The clerk is hypnotized by the movement of Rennie's finger. Well, he is until Rennie speaks.

"I'm looking for a -- special -- present for my lover. I was wondering if you could help me. If it wouldn't be too much trouble, of course."

Rennie doesn't look at the clerk until he gets to the part about it being too much trouble. Then he raises his baby blues to the guys hazy greys and smiles. It's not your normal human 'just being friendly' smile. It's more like an 'I've just descended from Mount Olympus for the evening, and believe it or not, I find you attractive' smile.

It may be August and a nasty ninety-two degrees outside, but the A/C in here is going full blast. The clerk starts to sweat. He manages to get out a breathless 'Of course', and Rennie graces him with another smile. He quickly scans the clerk's name tag.

"Excellent, Alan. You see, I take great pleasure in keeping my man satisfied. And he can be a very -- demanding -- person. So, it's very important to me that I get this right. But, I'm sure you know all about that."

Rennie waits for a response. Alan swallows and nods. Rennie smiles again and leans over the counter like he and the clerk are sharing a moment.

"I thought so.

"Alan, I'm in need of a vibrator. A specific vibrator. Now, I don't know the brand, but I can describe it to you -- in detail."

Alan has to take a few quick breaths before he can respond.

"Right this way. They're. . . they're on aisle four."

He comes out from around the counter and leads Rennie to the rubber-love section. When he turns around to talk to him, he catches Rennie looking at his ass. The guy's knees start shaking.

"You said . . . You said you could describe it?"

Most of the goods are hanging off of hooks, packaged in clear plastic. Rennie reaches out and runs his hand along the length of one of the vibrators like it's attached to his favorite police detective.

The clerk's face is turning red.

"Sir?"

Rennie answers with a distracted, "Hmmm?" He then brings himself back to the present and starts talking in a voice that would make him rich, if he ever decided to take an extra job as a phone sex operator.

"Ah, yes, of course, terribly sorry, Alan. I was -- distracted. What were we discussing?"

"The present -- the one for your lover."

The clerk's tie is hanging a little off-center. While Rennie's reciting from memory, he reaches out and runs a finger along the underside of the tie, straightening it. The clerk is more than a little hard.

"Right. My present. Let me see if I can remember. . .

"I know that it was blue and had three ridges that ran around the circumference, near the head. It was approximately eight inches long with a black 'on' dial that had a red circle on the end. Does that sound familiar, Alan?"

Every time Rennie says Alan, the guy licks his lips.

Alan reaches out without looking and grabs a box that's sitting on a shelf next to all of the hanging packages. He holds it out to Rennie.

Rennie opens the box and inspects the vibrator closely. When he smells it, the clerk has to grab on to the shelf for support.

He looks at the clerk, and with a completely straight face asks, "How does it taste?"

Alan looks like he's just stepped into his favorite porno and can't decide if that's a good thing or not. What he says can't really be classified as English, but he manages to get across the fact that he has no idea.

Rennie still looks like he's a trial lawyer digging for facts.

"Do you mind?"

Alan, whose eyes are now the size of a small third world nation, shakes his head no.

Rennie takes the head of the vibrator into his mouth. Alan looks like he just might spontaneously combust. He isn't the only one. I make a few subtle adjustments to my pants.

Rennie removes the vibrator and starts talking like the Sun-Times food critic.

"The flavor is noticeable, but not at all displeasing."

He holds the, now moist, vibrator out to the clerk. The clerks takes a hold of it like it's the Holy Grail.

"This will do quite nicely. What charge cards do you accept?"

Rennie strides to the counter that the cash register is sitting on. The clerk stumbles behind him. I slide over next to Rennie and hide my laughter behind the latest issue of 'Ass Master'.

Alan rings up the re-boxed vibrator and asks if there will be anything else. Rennie grabs a bottle of KY liquid and my copy of 'Ass Master' and plops both of them on the counter.

Alan totals everything up and bags it, while Rennie signs the credit slip. When Rennie takes the bag, he lets his hand linger over the clerk's. He gives the poor sap a final 'thank you kindly' and turns to me.

"I'm all done, Lover. Take me home."

Alan notices me, my balding head, big nose and skinny frame for the first time. His jaw hits the floor.

Two can play this game.

"Sure thing, Sugar Pants. Right after we get some batteries for the video camera."

I wink at the clerk. I continue my part in our little play as I usher Rennie through the door.

"You know, Sex Kitten, it wouldn't hurt you to let me be the slave boy once in a while."

I look at Alan one last time, as I step through the door. He's already heading back to aisle four.

If there was ever an ideal time to rob this joint, it would be now. Because I may not be The Bookman anymore, but I'd lay odds that Alan is going to spend the rest of the night in the stock room -- stroking the stallion, with a blue vibrator up his ass.

We walk outside and manage to make it into the Riv and close the doors, before we burst out laughing.

I wipe the first happy tears I've cried, in I don't know how long, out of my eyes and pull away from the curb.

Rennie takes the copy of 'Ass Master' out of the bag and lays it on the back seat of the Riv. He closes the bag and holds it in his lap.

"Ray, do you have access to my Ray's emergency information sheet at the precinct?"

I turn my head and quickly look at Rennie. His face is the very image of innocent Mountieness.

There are times I envy Ray Kowalski, and there are times I thank the Madonna that I'm someone else, anyone else. I think this is one of those someone else times.

***********

It seems like the RCMP and the Chicago PD have something in common after all -- continuing education. Every two years each officer has to take so many classes to keep their law enforcement license up to date.

The academy schedules exciting subjects like 'Advanced Search and Seizure', 'Verbal Judo', and 'Being Sensitive to Cultural Differences'. You have to take forty hours of this crap every two years.

What it usually ends up being is a bunch of guys sitting around for a few hours, bitching about the department, then taking a long liquid lunch before cutting out early. Most of the classes are supposedly eight hours long. So, two or three classes a year, courtesy of Sergeant Jack Daniels, isn't so bad.

Since Rennie has what is considered a hardship tour of duty, they schedule all of his classes at once. Normally, a week of fun in the midnight sun would be something he'd be looking forward to -- a chance to hook up with buddies from his graduating class and break numerous laws they've sworn to protect. But, the last six months have been anything but normal for him.

He moved in with Stan, on the sly, right before Valentine's Day, and the longest they've been away from each other has been when one of them has been on a stakeout -- say twenty hours, tops.

It's the middle of August now, and I still have to sit between them at Cubs games, because it's the only way they can keep their hands off of each other for that long. And I'm not talking about groping either. Although they do enough of that -- I had to have a little talk with Stan about grabbing Rennie's ass while we're at work. I'm talking about sweet romantic touches -- the kind of stuff that'd make you give up your autographed Mickey Mantle rookie card to get just once.

Stan says their therapist told them they should do lots of 'non-sexual' touching so Rennie will feel more comfortable when they do the down-and-dirty. And, let me tell you, did they take the guy at his word.

When they're in Stan's. . . their apartment, they're always holding hands and hugging and kissing. When they sit next to each other on the couch, they leave enough room for the rest of the precinct to make themselves at home. If they're within reach of one another, you can bet that one of them has a hand, or other free body part, attached to the other guy.

If I didn't have such a sweet tooth, I'd probably have died of hyperglycemia by now.

Anyway, Rennie is skating the edge of his two years. So, Sergeant Allen scheduled him for his week of classes and didn't mention it until the deal was done. Rennie didn't have any choice in the matter.

Stan was a good little soldier about the whole thing -- even when Welsh told him there was no way he could get vacation time on such short notice. It wasn't like Stan could tell Welsh he needed the time because he couldn't stand the thought of being away from his Stetson wearing, penis bearing lover for a week.

I dropped Rennie off at the airport yesterday. He didn't think it was such a good idea for him and Stan to say their good-byes in public. After seeing the two of them stuck together like a couple of electromagnetized love birds in their living room last night, I had to agree with him.

He and I just shook hands at the gate and said we'd see each other in a week. It was all very manly. Of course, there were no witnesses to what went on in the Riv on the way to the airport.

I spent the entire ride promising Rennie that I would look after Stan and not let him mope too much -- and yes, I did get Stan's emergency list info, and I had the whole thing planned out. I may not be a Mountie, but he had only asked me three days ago, and even I could remember a promise that long. I told him I had actually thought up a little something extra all on my own.

Rennie liked my idea. We had a good chuckle about it. I walked him to his gate. He didn't say good-bye, because he knew I hated that word. And I didn't tell him to to look in on Benny, because I knew he would. We could read it in each other's eyes.

We've gotten pretty good at that in the past half year. We can finish each other's sentences and sometimes, when the shit's flying, we can look at one another across a crime scene straight out of the seventh level of Hell and just know what each other's next move is going to be. It's the kind of partnership even incredibly lucky cops only find once in a career. I've had it twice now.

I watched him walk down the ramp to board his plane. I shook off a melancholy case of deja vu and headed home alone.

*

Eleven hours and it's already started. I knew it was going to be bad, but for once, Stan exceed even my expectations.

He showed up this morning wearing yesterday's clothes and a full day's growth of beard. Not that he doesn't look like one of my favorite food groups that way, but he's been almost dapper since Rennie took over laundry duty at the Kowalski-Turnbull love den.

He spent the entire morning hunched over his Smith-Corona, catching up on reports he's been too busy to complete -- too busy taking Canadian geography lessons, he said last week. I didn't ask.

He didn't talk to anyone. He barely grunted at Frannie when she put a cup of coffee on his desk, and he's the only one she'll do that for since she graduated from the academy. I wouldn't dream of asking, and we're blood.

Huey made the mistake of sending her for a cup the other day. She brought him an entire room-temperature pot of the stuff. She poured it on his head and followed up with sugar and non-dairy creamer. None of the guys will make that mistake again.

So Stan could've at least said thanks to her. But Frannie just patted him on the shoulder and gave Huey the evil eye -- I think I'd better watch those two.

By lunch time, the entire station was ready to strangle the guy. I yanked him out of his chair and dragged him down to Schneider's Deli for sandwiches and sympathy.

I didn't eat three bites, because I spent the entire hour telling him about my misadventures as a rookie under Sharon's watchful eye. By the time my voice was getting rough, he was almost smiling. But when we returned to the station, he sank back into his blue funk.

I know I wasn't supposed to do it until Thursday, but desperate times call for sneaky measures. I opened my wallet and took a last look at Stan's locker combination -- the one I snagged from his emergency info list. Then I took a box out of the bottom drawer of my desk and casually made my way to the men's locker room. When the room was empty, I opened Stan's locker and slipped my promise to Rennie inside. I shut the locker door and walked back to my desk, whistling a happy tune.

I planned it perfectly, if I do say so myself, and I do. At fifteen minutes before the clock was set to strike rush hour, I asked Stan for the bottle of aftershave he borrowed from me last week, after he ran out of his High Karate, or whatever it was that his mom bought him for Christmas.

He gave me one of his "thanks for the coffee, Frannie" grunts and headed for the locker room. I followed. I wouldn't miss this for one of Ma's Sunday dinners.

He opens his locker and notices the box right away. It would be difficult for even his myopic eyes to miss anything the exact color of red serge. He takes the box and reads the card taped to the top, like the polite birthday boy his mom taught him to be. He doesn't show me the card. That's all right. I know what it says. I watched Rennie write it. It reads:

Detective Kowalski,

Thank you kindly for your generous offer. I do believe I shall be ready for those driving lessons when I return. Please, accept this gift as a small token of my gratitude.

Expectantly,

Constable Turnbull

He tucks the card into the pocket of his leather jacket and opens the box like he's afraid that whatever's inside might bite him. He rifles through the white tissue paper and takes a long look at the not-so-small token. He must be at least part chameleon, because his face turns the exact shade of the box in his hands. It makes me wish for my well-read copy of 'Ass Master' to hide behind. But, I put on a show of innocence worthy of his Mountie.

He closes the lid and stumbles to the door. I stop him as he passes me. I hand him a small plastic package and tell him Rennie wanted me to give it to him.

He takes the twelve pack of double A batteries and nods his thanks. I wish him a good night and send him on his way.

He forgot all about my aftershave. But that's okay. I can get it myself, because his locker door is standing open.

*********

Monday morning. Another Monday morning that I find myself standing, reluctantly, in front of a class of prospective fellow officers.

It never fails to amaze me how much these relative strangers' faces resemble those of my own classmates -- some eager, some bored, some lost, and one or two carefully blank, revealing nothing. It is to that last group that I find myself drawn; for they remind me of myself at that stage of my career.

"Good morning, class, I'm sure you will all be dismayed to learn that Constable Whitehall's wife went into labor this morning. So he will not be here to teach your Defensive Tactics class. Instead, we're going to be continuing our work on the interview process. But first I have a question for you."

My first statement is met with quiet relief. Who, excepting myself, wouldn't prefer a few hours spent lounging in the abject boredom of repetitive classwork over a grueling round of self-defense followed by an even more punishing round of physical training.

A few of my cadets forget their place and greet my last statement with pained groans. I am told they dread my spontaneous questions almost as much as the Academy testing system.

My students are momentarily distracted by the scrape of metal on metal, as the rear door of the classroom is opened and then carefully shut. I am likewise distracted by the unexpected presence of Constable Turnbull.

Ray contacted me by phone last night, informing me of Turnbull's imminent arrival and asking that I look after him. "Anything for a friend" I told Ray, and I meant it. It wasn't as though babysitting Turnbull would be new to me.

Ray has spoken of him often in his letters, regaling me with tales of his prowess as a street cop. I have taken the stories with more than a grain of salt. But, looking at him in the unforgiving fluorescent lights of my classroom, there is a different air about him. It is something in the set of his shoulders and the sweep of his eyes, as he takes in his surroundings. He nods at me and motions for me to continue my lecture.

"What is the one thing each member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police must do every day they report for duty?"

Turnbull smiles in fond memory. This question isn't on any test, but it's asked of every recruit before they graduate. I have never heard of anyone getting it right. Being told the answer is a rite of passage. It is the first of many burdens that police the world over bear stoically.

"I'll give you some time to think about it. Have an answer ready by end of day."

"Now, back to interviewing. This time we're going to discuss ways to deal with difficult complainants."

"Can anyone think of a reason why a complainant would not wish to make a report?"

The answers fall into the usual range of naive, innocent safely sitting behind a desk responses.

"Maybe they're afraid of retaliation."

"Good. How might you deal with this problem."

"Assure them that we'll do everything in our power to keep them safe. Offer to take them to a shelter."

"Next."

"They might be afraid of the police."

"Yes, go on."

"Let them know we're here to protect them. That we don't arrest anyone or use physical force without cause."

"Anyone else?"

"Maybe they think no one is going to believe them. We can just take the time to show them that we do believe them and we care, before we start the interview."

"One more."

Turnbull raises his hand.

"Constable?"

"Maybe they're just drunken drug addicted bastards who are so stoned they can't remember why they called for you in the first place. Maybe they're lying. Maybe they're just mean."

My cadets can't believe what they're hearing. Neither can I, but for very different reasons.

"And how would you respond in this situation, Constable?"

"Well, Constable, that would depend on whether you want the homogenized pasteurized fully-approved Academy solution or the truth."

"I am a great believer in truth, Constable."

He bears down on me, approaching me as though I was the complainant in question. He looms over me, his gun side turned carefully away, and points at me with all four fingers of his left hand, as we are taught to do. He never raises his voice. He speaks quickly, not giving me an opportunity to respond, until he is done with his tirade.

"Shut up. I said shut up. Do you understand shut up? Listen. You called for me. You said you needed the police. Now, do you need me here or not? Because there are people who are waiting for me, and I could be out there helping them instead of listening to the crap coming out of your mouth. So, if you want my help, tell me now. If you're fucking with me, walk away before I throw your sorry ass in jail for Public Intoxication.

"That's what I thought. I'm going to be listening to the radio, for this address. If I hear it come out again, you're going to jail, no questions asked.

"Start walking."

Stunned silence from my cadets -- admiration tinged with a bit of shock from me.

When I was shipped out of Moose Jaw, my superior officer was kind enough to list inability to adapt to an urban lifestyle as the reason. He did not elaborate and explain that most of the difficulty came in dealing effectively with just the type of situation Turnbull presented. I am a student of logic, and all too often, the people one must deal with are not.

My involvement in such situations invariably ended in an impasse between myself and the unreasonable party, necessitating the intervention of a fellow officer better equipped to deal with such unpleasantries. It would seem that Ray's Turnbull has no such problem.

"Class, this is Constable Turnbull, an old comrade of mine. Would anyone like to respond to his handling of the situation?"

Henri Fourtier, a tall, lithe, ruddy cheeked, fair haired youth of twenty-two, recovers his composure first.

"That wasn't very nice."

I look to Turnbull for a response. He says it better than I could have.

"It isn't my job to be nice -- fair and effective, yes, honest if at all possible, mean when the situation calls for it. I'm nice to children, animals, and the elderly. Everyone else has to prove they deserve for me to be nice."

The usually reticent CateLee Pohl pipes up.

"I think he handled the scenario he described very well. There's only so much we can do for someone. Especially if they don't want our help. We're training to be officers of the law, not nursemaids.

"But why did you say you would be honest if it was possible? Shouldn't we always be honest with the public, Constable? If it's all right for me to ask, of course."

Turnbull answers without hesitation.

"In a perfect world, yes, we would be honest one hundred percent of the time. Unfortunately, that isn't reality. Consider the people you will be dealing with, for the most part. Now, in rural areas it may be different, but in urban centers people don't call for you to come to them when things are going well. You're going to see people at their absolute worst. They will be intoxicated, high, scared, unreasonable, and any other negative thing it is possible for them to be. And they will be looking to you to solve their problems or looking for a way to be rid of you as soon as possible.

"For example, you respond to a domestic disturbance involving a married couple. When you arrive on the scene, no violence has occurred. Now, the wife or the husband, it doesn't matter which, states to you that they are afraid that their spouse will become violent if they remain at the residence.

"The moment you arrive on the scene, you become responsible for everything that occurs in that house until the end of your shift, at least. Now you don't have an arrestable offense, both of them have a legal right to be there, and you can't provide personal security for the rest of your shift. What do you do?"

"I have no idea."

"Good answer, Cadet. While you're on training say that a lot. Make your teachers and trainers show you what they now.

"Anyone else? Anyone at all?"

Not surprisingly, no one responds.

"The correct answer is -- you lie. You say anything and everything to get one of them out of the house for at least eight hours. You tell them you'll take one of them to jail. You tell them you'll take both of them to jail. Tell them you'll take the kids away. Whatever it takes. Is it a good solution? Hell, no. It stinks. But, sometimes it's all you can do.

"Then you give the victim information of protective orders, shelters counseling, anything that might help them. It's not the answer you wanted to hear, but it's the only honest one there it."

From the looks on their faces, I can tell that they need a few moments to digest this not-so-pretty truth.

"Why don't we take a short break now? Be back in your seats, ready to learn, in ten minutes."

They file out into the hallway in a subdued orderly fashion.

Turnbull give me a genuine smile and offers me his hand.

"Constable Fraser."

"Turnbull. Please, call me Ben. I'm not your superior any longer."

"All right, Ben. And it's Renfield. Rennie, if you prefer."

The absurdity of the nickname imposed upon him by Ray breaks through the formality of our greeting, and we both relax noticeably.

"So, Rennie," I say, unable to help myself, "how is it that you find yourself with free time? I would have thought that the week of classes they have scheduled for continuing education would be more than sufficient to keep you occupied. "

"Normally, yes, but this morning we're having a class on advanced crime scene investigation. Sergeant Hallandale is the instructor. By my estimate, he should be ready to begin his lecture approximately twenty minutes before we break for lunch."

Knowing Hallandale well, I can only agree with Turnbull's assessment.

"You're welcome to sit in on my class for as long as you like."

"Actually, I'm supposed to meet up with some old classmates this morning. But, I was wondering if it would be possible for us to have dinner some evening this week. I'm certain we shall have plenty to discuss. A lot has changed since you left Chicago."

He catches my involuntary response to the name of my former home. Kindly, he says nothing.

"I'm free Tuesday evening. Does that sound agreeable?"

Truthfully, I am free every evening. Somehow, I cannot make myself admit this to him.

He agrees, and we set a place and time to meet. We shake hands once again, and I tell him I am looking forward to it. Oddly enough, I am.

***********

An unexpectedly strong case of nostalgia makes me select Terry's Place for our meal. It isn't the best diner in town. It is commonly known as Terry's Ptomaine Tavern. But, I have many fond memories of hiding in a corner booth, drinking coffee thick enough to float a boot, with fellow classmates, in an attempt to return to a state of near-sobriety before our Monday morning formation.

Fraser does not question my choice. But I doubt he shares the same memories.

We manfully plow our way through enormous piles of roast beef and potatoes -- another reason for the popularity of this establishment -- cadets will choose quantity over quality every time.

We begin with pleasantries and then proceed to talk our way around every important subject -- everything I wish to discuss with him. But I am loathe to relate my tale over servings of Train Wreck stew and in full view of more than a few fellow Mounties. So I allow our discourse to remain shallow.

When our stomachs are full and our bill settled, I do not give him a choice in the matter -- I simply walk with him as he makes his way back to his barracks. He is, typically, too polite to attempt to dissuade me.

We stroll along in companionable silence until we reach his door. He has barriers miles thick, but he is as subject to a full frontal assault as the next man.

"I'm sorry."

"Excuse me?"

He has no idea what I am making reference to, but he shall soon enough.

"I'm sorry that I tried to kill you -- that I tried to kill Ray Vecchio."

While he is frozen in shock, I take the initiative and step over his threshold into the single room beyond. He looks behind himself and then down the hall, as though he is not certain that the last few seconds occurred. I take a seat in the lone chair and wait patiently.

He stalls for time by placing his Stetson in its hatblock. Mine sits on a desk in my hotel room. When he is satisfied with the tightness of the screws and the set of the block, he sits on his narrow bed.

"I thought it was you. When you arrived for duty, I was sure it was you, but then you. . ."

"Spoke? Then I opened my mouth, and you knew it was not possible for me to have been that cruel capable man?"

He nods.

"It is, as they say, a very long story. And you are going to hear every word of it."

"Why now?"

"Sorry?"

"We worked together for over a year. You never said a word. Why do you choose to apologize now?"

He is gazing directly at me, exactly like the Constable Fraser that I remember from Chicago. But the haunted questioning look in his eyes is new.

It is an unnecessary question, but I find myself asking it regardless. I am stalling for time, delaying the inevitable as long as possible.

"The truth?"

He simply nods.

"I wasn't capable before. I was. . . broken. I'll never be the man I was, but I am getting better now."

"Thanks to Ray."

It isn't a question, but I answer him anyway.

"Yes."

And then I proceed to give him the truth, the whole ugly unvarnished truth. It is a long story indeed, beginning with my first haunted longings for something I had been taught to despise and continuing through my run at the Academy.

It is some time before I come to the meat of the story, but come to it I do.

I take a deep breath and plunge in.

"So, I did everything Sergeant Allen demanded of me, even though I felt foolish the entire time. I had almost convinced myself that I was the butt of some Rookie joke, when a car pulled up to the curb.

"A stunning woman with long brown hair and hazel eyes flecked with green stepped out and hugged me as though we were bosom companions. I returned her embrace uncertainly. She told me that she was glad that I had remembered to get a copy of the paper for her, and that we needed to hurry or we would be late.

"She got back behind the wheel and motioned for me to join her. I did so. She began driving aimlessly around the city. It took twenty minutes for me to become angry enough to ask her the purpose of all of the theatrics.

"She explained that the tasks I had performed on Allen's orders were not important, but the fact that I had performed the correctly, unquestioningly was. It seemed that the entire scenario had been a test. I had passed. She congratulated me and then asked if I would ever consider applying for an undercover assignment.

"I replied that of course I would. It was common knowledge that it was an excellent skill to have listed in one's career jacket file, if one wished to seek advancement.

"She then told me that there was a very sensitive matter of national security that her superiors believed I might be able to help them with. I asked for details. She informed me that I could only learn the exact nature of the situation if I agreed to the assignment.

"Naturally, I accepted. She smiled approvingly at me and offered me a folder that had been sitting between us on the seat.

"The subject of the folder was a notable physicist who, it was believed, was selling weapons technology to foreign governments. It would be difficult to prove, because of his disjointed avenues of acquiring the technologies. His suppliers were a combination of doctoral students, members of the armed forces and current members of the Mafia.

"He would purchase small pieces of information from each group and then put it together to sell to foreign governments.

"I wasn't wise enough to back out, but I was smart enough to ask what my role in the investigation would be. She responded that the good professor was a homosexual, with a known penchant for young men of my height and coloring.

"She went on for some minutes about sacrifices I would have to make, and that I should put aside any personal prejudices or fears and forge ahead for the good of Canada. She assured me that I would not be required to have sex with him, merely keep him distracted -- in a very public place -- while a team searched his home.

"At least, I believe that is what she said. I stopped listening once I understood that she -- the government, in fact -- was asking me to conduct myself as a homosexual. I had been aware of my sexual orientation for some time, but had vowed to never act upon my feelings, for the sake of my family's name and good standing in the RCMP. But, now I was being asked to behave in a manner that I secretly longed for and assured that it would do no harm. In fact, it might do a great deal of good.

"I jumped at the chance. I hemmed and hawed appropriately, making all of the protestations one would expect from a young slightly homophobic man. But, I allowed her to win me over. Well, that is what she thought she was doing. In reality she was talking to herself, and I made no attempts to interrupt her. I needed the time to still the pounding of my heart and calm myself enough so that I would not sound suspiciously eager when I responded in the affirmative.

"He was no magnificent specimen of manhood by anyone's stretch of the imagination. But he was male. At the time that was enough. I read several of his works and discussed them with a physics expert, until I could pass myself off as a student of Master's level mathematics.

"That done, my contact gave me clothes that she said set off the blue of my eyes and the curve of my ass. I looked like a young college hopeful all right. I was wearing the typical unofficial egghead uniform -- a denim button-down, khaki pants and loafers. It wasn't my style at all, but I turned heads. So I decided she must be right about the clothes.

"I was sent to a local intelligentsia cafe that the professor frequented. He didn't show the first night or the next. But the third evening, he walked in and ordered a double cappuccino. He was very charming and self-effacing. As old as he was, he had all of the waitresses stumbling over themselves to please him.

"I allowed him to drink all of his first cup and most of his second before I approached him. I asked if the was the great Doctor so-and-so. He chuckled and replied that he was. I told him that I had applied for the doctoral program for the fall semester and was greatly looking forward to working under him.

"I remember feeling the most delicious thrill of anticipation when we shook hands, and it had nothing to do with the prospect of bringing him to justice. He invited me to sit with him. I used every flirtatious gesture and comment I had perfected on girls and old ladies. It worked.

"We talked for four hours and drank far too much coffee. For four blessedly bittersweet hours I was myself, as I had never permitted myself to be before. I talked and laughed and touched his hand more than was proper. When his fingers brushed my knee under the table, I thought my heart would burst out of my chest.

"Finally, he said that regretfully it was time for him to leave. He asked for my phone number. I told him I would give it to him if he would allow me to escort him to his car. He beamed at me.

"I strolled the half block to his car with my hand on his shoulder. When he turned to unlock the door, I put enough pressure on his shoulder to get his attention. He looked at me and I did it. I kissed him.

"It was chaste, a slight brush of our lips. It was wonderful.

"I gave him a phone number that went to an answering service set up by the department. He promised to call me and then got into his car and drove away.

"I explained the kiss away by saying that I wanted to keep his interest in case the team was not able to complete their search. That way, I could approach him again. I received a commendation for quick thinking.

"He was arrested for treason the next morning. He was murdered, strangled in his cell by unknown assailants while he was awaiting trial.

"I cried for him. I dreamed of our kiss for months. I volunteered for every undercover assignment I was offered, hoping for another chance to be myself.

"Six years later, on my twenty-eighth birthday, I got my chance.

"This part should sound familiar to you.

"A rising star in the Mafia's ranks had been seriously injured in a car accident while on vacation in California. And, in a happy coincidence, I was a perfect match for him -- a veritable doppleganger. The only differences being a goatee and a large tribal work tattoo he bore on his right upper arm.

"The American Federal Bureau of Investigations was working with our government to try and infiltrate this particular group of Mafioso. They managed to keep the news of the young man's accident a secret while they considered their options.

"Someone with the RCMP, I have no idea who, saw a picture of the young man and immediately recommended me as a replacement for him.

"I was offered the job. I accepted it, as I had all of the others.

"I got the tattoo. And while it was healing, I grew a full beard. When my preparations were complete, a very nice man named Chet trimmed my facial hair to match Jason Laurier's exactly.

"I was dressed in a very expensive, well-cut Italian suit, again not my style, and on a plane heading for Monterey, California, less than an hour after my shave."

***********

"While on the plane, I was given a final briefing. It seemed that Laurier was somewhat of a recluse. Most of his time was spent in the small cabin that he had rented. Groceries were delivered to his door, and he rarely ventured beyond the small stretch of beach in front of his temporary residence.

"I remember thinking how odd that seemed, how unlike the mafioso I had dealt with in the past. The American agent that was feeding me the information explained it away as a quirk of Laurier's personality. I ignored my instincts and accepted his explanation. That was the first time I ignored my instincts on an assignment.

"I found out later, years later, that Laurier hadn't been vacationing. He had been running. He was running for his life. I stepped off of the plane on to the tarmac of a small airfield that isn't on any map and walked into a Hell of Laurier's making.

"The first week was pleasant enough. I slept, ate, sunned myself and took long runs along the beach. I even developed a bit of a tan, a first for my Canadian sun-starved skin.

"I called in for his -- my -- usual order to the small store that would bring my groceries. When the delivery boy came to my door, unthinkingly, I paid him with one of Laurier's -- my -- credit cards. The boy commented on my running out of cash. Once again, I was intelligent enough to wonder at the comment, but not enough to act upon my instincts.

"Exactly seventeen hours later there was a knock on my front door. Two large proto-humans in finely tailored suits were standing on the front porch, telling me I was expected at home. My easy acquiescence seemed to surprise them.

"This was the third time the alarm in my head had signaled danger. And for a third time, I ignored my finely tuned instincts.

"Packing my belongings into three rather small suitcases took little time. My two companions carried the cases to the large black car that was illegally parked in front of my small cottage.

"My last conscious decision as a rational human being was to follow those men out of the rare Northern California sunshine, into the darkness that awaited us all.

*

"I recall little of the trip home. It was remarkable only for its ordinariness. We rode on a commercial carrier, first class of course. We were served a bland meal, a decent glass of wine, and several helpings of over-attentiveness from our attractive stewardess.

"We worked our way through customs and the baggage claim. We were met at the curb by another large black car and whisked through the streets of Toronto to an upscale high-rise. My escorts rode with me in a private lift to the top floor penthouse suite.

"I stepped out into a tastefully neutral foyer. My companions lumbered behind, set my bags on the birch floor and returned to the lift. The doors slid shut, and I began to explore my surroundings.

"I knew from my briefings that this was not Laurier's residence. I remember thinking what could be so important that I had been called back from a vacation and taken directly to the boss's private residence.

"I wondered who they wanted me to kill, and if I would actually have to murder someone to keep my cover. I don't remember even asking myself if I could do as I was told. I was as ruthless as they, in my own way.

"I was fingering a fine piece of Baccarat crystal, cleverly shaped to resemble a small sea turtle when slow heavy footsteps and a soft masculine voice interrupted my musings."

"Did you miss anything besides that damned knick-knack?"

"A simple enough question, but I was unable to answer. I was too preoccupied with trying to breathe through my mouth.

"I was on my hands and knees. My nose was broken and there was blood streaming down my throat. I gagged on the blood and then managed to spit out enough to get in a few desperate gulps of air, before I was grabbed by the hair and forced to look my assailant in the eyes.

"He was shorter than I, and softer. He had a decent punch, when there was something large and hard in his hand, but he was an easy target. Renfield Turnbull would have made short work of him, with two fists and little effort, but Steven Laurier didn't dare.

"He might be weak, but he had the entire strength of the Canadian Cosa Nostra to back him. His name was Brock, and he was the boss. He had asked a question, and he expected an answer."

"Did you miss me?"

"I answered yes, and he responded by kneeing me in the solar plexus. Again, I was struggling to breathe. He pulled on my hair once more and force-marched me to a large leather sofa. It seems it's easier and cheaper to clean blood off of leather as opposed to upholstery.

"He stood over me expectantly, as though I should know what I was to do. When I didn't act as he wished, he slapped me -- open-handed this time, thank God. He slapped me a second time and ordered me to strip.

"Up to this point, I had been furiously working on a strategy, a way to extricate myself from the situation without having to harm him physically. Now, I was in shock. Of all the myriad of ways I had pictured myself being able to have sex with a man, violence had never been involved.

"I had a decision to make. I could fight back and preserve my dignity, ruining my mission before it had truly begun, or I could do as he ordered. I chose duty. I chose madness.

"It all felt so very unreal, as I undid each button of my shirt. As I removed each piece of clothing, it was as though I was giving away some small piece of myself.

"When I was wholly exposed, I knelt on the hard wood floor and bent over the cold cushions of the sofa. I heard him remove his belt as I watched my blood slowly drip onto the beige leather a mere inches from my battered face. I thought I was prepared for what was to come. I was wrong.

"Instead of the dreaded warmth of his hands digging into my flesh, I was subjected to the sharp sting of his belt as it raised welts upon my back and then tore open the skin. I didn't count the strokes, so I don't know how many lashes it took to weaken his arm. I do know that I cried out for mercy long before he stopped.

"Finally, he was done with the beating, but he wasn't done with my body. I heard the dull clank of metal on wood as the buckle of his belt hit the floor. He didn't remove his clothes. He just undid his pants and lowered them enough to free his penis.

"There was no lubrication, no preparation, only pain. He violated me and used my body as though I were a whore, bought and paid for. He ordered me to masturbate myself. I did so. I was beyond defiance. I shall never forget the humiliation that filled me as the exquisite fire of orgasm washed over my skin and burned through my entire being.

"He came inside of me with a grunt and a last shuddering thrust. He withdrew from my body and wiped his penis on my discarded shirt. There was blood on the cloth.

"I listened to his retreating footsteps and the sank to the floor. Some time later, I heard lighter quicker footsteps approach, but I couldn't make myself care enough to move. I had no dignity left to protect.

"A gentle hand reached toward me. It was a man's hand. I turned away in fear. But the hand only caressed my hair and then helped my to my feet.

"We never looked at one another. He led me to a shower and allowed me to wash myself. Then he cleaned my wounds and dressed me in the softest of silk pajamas before tucking me into a large plush bed.

"He pulled the covers up to my chin and tried to reassure me."

"Brock's going to Ottawa. He's leaving right now. Said he won't be back 'til Thursday. Just. . . just do what he says. You know he only hits you when you don't do what he says. And he never used that belt on the others. Just do what he says, okay?"

"I made no response. I wasn't capable.

"My benefactor, McGill, sighed and shut the door behind him. I lay awake in that bed all night, not sleeping, not thinking, not crying.

"In the morning Steven Laurier got out of bed, showered and dressed, had breakfast and went on as he had for the seven months preceding his vacation."

***********

I am oddly calm as I allow Fraser -- Ben -- a small glimpse into the past that has made me the man who sits before him. He, on the other hand, is anything but. The normally stoic Constable began fidgeting nervously when I mentioned having my nose pummeled. When I came to the lashings, he began to pace -- from what I hope is barely contained empathetic energy.

Of necessity, I lean toward the stoic myself. So as I finish relating the relevant portions of my tale, I steel myself against his reaction -- on the odd chance that his exertions denote disgust.

"Brock remained in Ottawa for ten days, enough time for my face, at least, to regain some semblance of normalcy. If it was true, as McGill had said, that he had never used a belt on his other lovers, it seemed that once had been enough for him to gain a taste for it. He never again touched my face in anger. It didn't please him to have me looking anything less than perfect when we were in public. But he would use the belt occasionally, then more often than not, until finally the belt wasn't enough.

"He -- we -- graduated to a riding crop. I say 'we' because I too had come to associate the pleasure of sex with the sharp sting of leather and the sharper tang of fresh blood.

"He would alternate between taking me every night and ignoring me for days on end. At the beginning I would live for the times when he seemed to forget my existence. Toward the end I would beg him to come to my bed. I remember shaking in anticipation when he would allow me to kneel before him and fellate him and then mimic fellatio on the crop.

"He preferred for me to come on the end of the crop, as opposed to the end of his penis. When I orgasmed during the beating, entry was much easier for him. Of course, in the weeks preceding our capture, when or even if I orgasmed matter to him less and less. He would orgasm during my beatings at least as often as I would.

"One day, I remember it was a Thursday, I committed some offense in his eyes. He never told me what my crime was, but he avoided me and my bed for almost three weeks. No amount of pleading or abasing myself would satisfy him. I was lonely, then I was morose, when he came to me and offered me forgiveness, in return for one small favor, I was almost suicidal.

"He told me all I had to do was one little insignificant thing - one act so minor it was almost beneath mentioning. I agreed. I didn't ask what needed to be done. I didn't care. But, I think he took great joy in telling me. He considered his control over my mind more pleasurable than his domination of my body.

"When he told me he needed me to kill three men who were trying to take him from me, it seemed entirely reasonable. After all, I couldn't live without him because I didn't exist without him. And if two of those men were police officers, well, what were their lives in comparison to his? I leapt at the chance.

"You know what came next. After you captured us, I was sent to a lovely sanatorium with an excellent reputation. My body mended itself readily enough. My mental state is still a matter of debate."

I admit to a bare thread of hope that relating my shame to him will gain me a small portion of regard in his eyes. I have a great deal of respect for him as a Constable, as well as a human being. I shall never have his clear vision of right and wrong or his purity of soul, but watching him at the Consulate in Chicago all those months ago, gave my muddled brain an ideal to strive for and my troubled heart hope.

Even through the fog that shrouded me, I was able to see his true feelings for Ray. He held the door of the Consulate open for my present partner, and as the lithe Italian passed him, the unspoken hunger in Ben's eyes stirred something within me.

And when I repeated that same simple gesture for my Ray, some months later, the knowledge that Ben, my then idol, could harbor the same supposedly forbidden feelings sent the first small piece of the wall that surrounded my psyche crumbling to fall unheeded at my Ray's feet.

His pacing has stopped, because my flow of words has ceased, no doubt. There is a great deal more to my story. But I did not come here to trouble him with the Devil in the details. I came here as recompense for a favor from Ray, freely given. I clear my throat and take a small expositional detour.

"Ray, ever the resourceful man that he is, had his not inconsiderable sense of justice offended by what he considered the RCMP's poor attempts at rehabilitating my mind. He took it upon himself to obtain a copy of my personnel jacket from what he assured me was an unsecured filing cabinet -- as though the absence of a lock somehow made his actions less of an offense.

"I berated him for taking advantage of the Canadian sense of trustworthiness and the woeful state of the Consulate's office equipment for all of five seconds, before I delved eagerly into the contents of my official record.

"It seemed that Brock's sexual proclivities were common knowledge among those who selected me for this particular assignment. However, they felt it was not necessary to inform me, since they were confident that I could handle the situation appropriately and without any lasting ill effects.

"It was also stated plainly that Laurier had not been on vacation in California. One of the Americans' informants had told the agency of Laurier and Brock's affair and of the physical abuse Laurier had been subjected to. The informant made it clear that my double's trip to Monterey was a desperate fourth attempt to escape.

"My chart states that I spent the first twenty-three days strapped to a hospital bed, thirty-four days sedated, and seventy-two days on suicide watch -- which, at the time, I felt was excessive, because I only tried to kill myself for the first month and only fourteen times. I came close to being successful only once."

I smile in bitter memory and flash him the scars on my wrists.

"All told, I was in the sanatorium for six months. And when I was discharged, the new and improved Renfield Turnbull cheerily accepted his transfer and began his new life in Chicago."

"The file also contained a detailed description of the actions that led to my capture at your hands, my debriefing, a clinical listing of my injuries, transcripts of my counseling sessions, discharge papers, a hot letter of protest from my day nurse for what she considered my premature release, and papers transferring me to Chicago. The last were signed by my father."

It seems the circle of my healing is now unexpectedly complete. In the comfortable companionship of being Ray's partner I found some small measure of redemption, in the blessed heat of my Ray's bed I found love, and now in the warmth of Ben's eyes I find forgiveness.

His sympathetic reaction is what my calculating heart has been waiting for. I offer him a bit of hard-earned wisdom and see the final puzzle piece click into place.

"I did what I had to do to survive. I became who I wasn't to survive. Working undercover is Hell in the best of circumstances. When the assignment is over, no matter how well it went, you aren't yourself. You aren't anyone.

"It is as though you are floundering in deep water, looking for the smallest thing to grab onto, for anything to grab onto. And whether or not that thing you find is what you want or what you need is pure chance.

"I found duty. My Ray found adventure. But they weren't enough. They couldn't be enough. I thank God everyday that my Ray kept going until he found me and fought for me.

"Your Ray found Stella and Florida, but they weren't enough, either."

I find that I have nothing further to say, and just as abruptly as I had begun my story, I end my speech. I rise and leave him to contemplate his demons and his future.

He watches me go without comment or visible reaction. I have said what I could and done what I can. Now there is only hope.

I shut the door to his single room with a quiet click. As I exit the barracks and head out into a pleasant night toward my hotel, my heart lightens and my steps quicken in anticipation of my nightly telephone conversation with my Ray.

***********

Normally, when officers return to Depot for classes, they are billeted in empty barracks. It wouldn't do to have Canada's Finest mingle with Canada's Future. I once asked an instructor if that was to preserve the dignity of the officers or to protect the virtue of the cadets. A wicked half-smile was her only response.

Consequently, courtesy of standard operating procedure and an unusually successful recruiting effort that has recently been implemented in rural areas, I find myself ensconced in what the clerk assured me is one of Regina's finer budget motels.

I must admit that the permanent fog on the bathroom mirror and the lime stains in the bottom of the shower lend a rustic air to my room. However, I fear what the clerk referred to as atmosphere is merely the remains of several packs of chain-smoked filterless Camels and the lingering essence of a rain-soaked Labrador Retriever.

But the bed is surprisingly large, long enough for even my towering frame to stretch out and wide enough to make me long for another body to help me fill the empty space.

I walk past the bed, stripping as I go. I've been in these street clothes for scant hours, but the manner in which I have spent that time has made another -- third shower of the day -- a necessity.

I toss my soiled laundry onto the floor in a neglected corner near the sink in a careless manner that would undoubtedly please and amaze my Ray. I turn the shower knob with the blue dot on full - having already learned that the controls are reversed -- and spend the five minutes it takes for the hot water to reach my shower brushing and flossing my teeth.

When the steam begins to cheerfully fill the small shower, I step inside and allow the pounding stream of water to strike me in the middle of my chest. It is very inconsequential and petty in the greater scheme of the universe, but just once, I should like to experience the joy of standing under a shower, as opposed to next to one.

But wishing and four dollars Canadian will get me a Latte, so I bend my normally unyielding spine and wet my hair thoroughly. I then step away from the water and, as I learned in the Academy when time was something you had to steal, I squeeze a large amount of shampoo onto my hand and soap my entire body, beginning with my hair and face and ending at my toes -- except of course, for my genitals. I save those for last. Knowing my body's assured reaction and knowing that Ray is not here to lend a hand, or a mouth, causes the dread I have already endured twice today to rise again like bitter bile in my throat.

I steel myself against the pleasure and attempt to think of anything other than what my left hand is doing. I am not at all successful. My hand is clinical and efficient. My body's reaction is anything but. My penis betrays my mind and demands attention I cannot give.

Ray's hands on my body are a benediction -- my own a defilement. I cannot feel the slight ridges of the swirls and whorls of my fingerprints upon my penis without also feeling the ghost sting of leather biting into the flesh of my back. The temptation to give in is so powerful it is almost a physical presence surrounding me, demanding my submission. But my Ray will be calling soon.

I struggle against the demons within me and manage a small victory. I will both of my hands to grasp the dials before me. They simultaneously turn the controls ninety degrees clockwise, and I am rewarded with a punishing stream of frigid water. I brace myself against the far wall of the shower and allow the water to pound the shampoo and pain of desire from my body.

I do not leave the shower until my penis is flaccid and my teeth are chattering.

I turn off the water when it and my skin are the same temperature. I step out and head to the metal rods that double as an open closet and towel rack. Before my hand makes contact with a woefully thin white cotton towel, I am distracted by the clanging ring of the outdated beige telephone. With an eagerness that I am loathe to admit to anyone, I stride across the room and leap over the bed to land on its edge and place a shaking hand on the receiver. I take a breath and raise the receiver to my mouth.

My casual, "Constable Turnbull," is met with a disappointed, if somewhat breathy, reply.

"Oh, sorry, I think I dialed the wrong number."

"Ah, terribly sorry."

"No, that's okay. It ain't your fault that I screwed up."

"You really shouldn't be so hard on yourself, sir. People make far more serious mistakes all the time."

"Geez, you're polite. What are you, Canadian or something?"

"Yes, sir. Something like that."

"Boy, that sounded kinda crappy, didn't it? I didn't mean to younk your chain or nothing. I didn't mean it sucked to be Canadian or anything like that. You just threw me for a loop. I'm just having a shitty life is all. Never mind, forget it. Forget I called. Sorry to waste your time."

"Perhaps I could be of assistance?"

"What the Hell do you mean by that?"

"Well, you sound as though you could use a friendly ear."

"Oh, yeah, like you got nothing better to do than to listen to some potty mouth Yank whine about what's got his panties in a bind. What are you one of those guys who run around in those funny pants and big hats and pull people out of ice crevasses for fun? What do they call those guys?"

"Mounties?"

"That's it. What are you, a Mountie?"

"Something like that."

"Oh geez, I did it again didn't I? I shit canned your country and your job. I suck."

"I accept your apology."

"Thanks. Um. . ."

"Yes?"

"Are you really a Mountie?"

"I am Constable Renfield Turnbull of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police."

"Cool."

"Thank you."

"So, um. . ."

"Yes?"

"What are you wearing?"

"Excuse me?"

"You know, what are you wearing? The red suit or the other one, the blue one?"

"Actually, I've just stepped out of the shower."

"Oh."

"Yes."

"So, you're wearing a towel."

"Well I was reaching for the towel when the phone rang."

"The phone only rang once."

"Yes."

"What you're telling me is you're completely naked and wet, and you ran to answer the phone while you were completely naked and wet, and you're talking to me on the phone while you're still completely naked and wet."

"Yes."

"Oh."

*

*

*

"And you?"

"And me what?"

"What are you wearing?"

"Why do you want to know what I got on?"

"I believe it would only be fair -- in the spirit of international relations -- to trade equitable information."

"Oh."

*

"Well?"

"Oh! Right. Well, I got on some pants and a t-shirt."

"Is that all?"

"Yeah, I just got home from work, and I already took off my boots and socks, so, yeah."

"Nothing else?"

"Nope."

"Nothing at all?"

"Nope."

"Not even. . ."

"Nope."

"Oh."

"Yup."

"I'm afraid that you have me at an advantage."

"No, I have you on the phone."

"I mean that it doesn't seem quite fair that I am naked and wet while you are almost fully clothed and completely dry."

"So get some clothes on."

"Regretfully, my clothes are greater than arms' length away from me at the present moment."

"So go get them."

"That wouldn't seem to be a very prudent use of time given the astronomical long distance telephone rates charged by your American companies."

"You got me there."

"Yes."

"So what are you going to do about it?"

"Actually, I was thinking that perhaps you could do something about it."

"Oh?"

"Yes."

"Oh!"

"Yes."

*

*

"Did you hear that?"

"No."

"Well that thing you didn't hear, it was the sound of my T-shirt hitting the floor."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"That's. . . that's a start."

"What? That's not good enough for you?"

"No."

"Okay. Count to five."

"Pardon me?"

"Five. You know -- one more than four -- and do it slow."

"Why five? And why slowly?"

"Five because that's how many buttons I got on the fly of my jeans, and slow just because."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

*

"One."

"Hmm."

*

"Two."

"Ohh."

*

"Three."

"Ahhh."

*

*

"Four."

"Mmmm."

*

*

"Five."

*

"Five."

*

"Five."

*

"Say please."

*

*

"Five. . . please."

*

"Oh, fuck yeah."

*

*

"Are you?"

"Am I what?"

"Are you naked?"

"Yeah."

"Completely naked?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"And?"

"And what?"

"Are you?"

"And am I what?"

"Are you. . . are you wet?"

"Oh, yeah."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

*

*

*

"Whoa, look at the time. Got to fly."

"Stanley Raymond Kowalski, hang up that phone now, and you are a dead man."

"Oooohhhh, I'm soooo scared, Mr. Big-Buffed-Ass-like-a-rock-Mountie-Supremo-sitting-in-a-hotel-room-hundreds-of-miles-away. What are you going to do, send a Kamikaze Caribou to dump a load on my head?"

"Certainly not, Ray. Nothing so odoriferous. I will merely haunt your nights with the agonizing desire to know the end to my monologue that begins thusly: His essence is intoxicating -- his physical being a myriad of flavors and textures that draw me in and make me a willing slave to the pleasures I find in his flesh.

"He stands before me, naked and erect. There is no shame or pride in his bearing. He is as content in the blanket of his skin as I am in the comfort of his arms. But, for now, his arms hang loosely at his sides -- a testament to the trust he has placed in me.

"I circle him restlessly. His body is a garden of unexplored delights, each element promising more pleasure than the last. Such a difficult choice, but choose I must.

"For now I content myself with exploring the lines and angles of the muscles of his back that define themselves even through the ivory velvet he has somehow convinced the Gods to allow him to use for skin.

"I wear my self-control as armor and allow only my fingertips the exquisite pleasure of contact. The callouses of my fingers run, feather light, over the heaven before me. I trace the shadows of muscle and bone -- my eyes transfixed by the show of strength contained only by his skin and gentle nature.

"I draw from him goosebumps and small drops of sweat. When the world has shrunk to the meeting place of our skin, I am rewarded with a sweet moan -- pulled unbidden from the long column of his throat.

"This small evidence of his pleasure wrests my much vaunted self-control from me. I meld my body to his and with my hands upon his beloved head and my fingers in his hair, I bend his neck to my will.

"I lave his neck with my tongue. I worship his body. I attempt to devour him. All too soon, his neck is not enough. I expand my attentions to include the breadth of his shoulders and the length of his spine.

"When his moans are almost continuous, and his finely muscled dancer's legs are quivering from anticipation and lack of attention, I dip lower. Every piece of him has been attended to by my eyes and my hands and my mouth and my cock. Every piece but this one.

"With the powerful thrum of lust sounding in my veins, held at bay only by my higher self's concern for his safety, I take the perfectly formed globes of his ass in my hands and explore deeper still with my thumbs. They are quickly followed by my greedy questing tongue. . ."

*

*

*

*

"Goddammit, Rennie, for a Mountie, you really can be a real ball buster, you know that?"

"I'm sorry, Ray. Is something wrong?"

"Oh no, nothing at all. I'm just standing in our kitchen naked as Frannie at a Fraser family reunion, cranking the old shaft like there's no tonight or tomorrow and you leave me out to dry. Why would anything be wrong?!"

"So, you're changed your mind then?"

"About what?"

"About hanging up the telephone, of course."

"Oh, I see, Mr. No-Sense-of-Humor, I make one little joke about cutting you off and you want to cut me off in the middle of polishing the family jewels."

"Ray, tell me."

"Tell you what? I already told you how hot you got me. Even if I don't understand some of those big words you're using, I get what you mean, and I'm pounding the pole like a Pole, let me tell you."

"Exactly."

"Exactly what?"

"Tell me."

"Tell you what? About how I'm petting the python?"

"Yes."

*

"Oh."

*

"Um, baby, maybe this ain't a good time for that."

"Ray."

"Not that the idea of you listening to me get my rocks off isn't completely hot in a Ma Bell kind of way, but I don't think it's going to do you any good."

"Please, Ray."

"You jack off today?"

"Ray. . ."

"Did - you - jack - off - today?"

"No, Ray."

"Did you jack off yesterday?"

"No, Ray."

"How about the night before?"

"Ray. . ."

"How many boners have you had since you been gone?"

"Ray. . ."

"How many times have you sat around watching your balls turn blue cause you won't touch your own dick?"

"Ray. . ."

"How long have you been gone, Rennie?"

"Ray. . ."

"How long?"

"Sixty-seven hours and fourteen minutes."

"Christ on a. . .Listen, Rennie, I need you to do something for me."

"Anything, Ray."

"I need you to tell me the truth."

"Of course, Ray."

"How many times you look at your watch today?"

"I haven't been keeping count, Ray?"

"More than yesterday?"

"I can't be certain."

*

"Perhaps."

*

"Yes."

"And more than the day before, right?"

"Yes, Ray."

"You're looking at it right now, ain't you?"

*

*

*

"Yes."

"Mother f. . .I knew I shouldn't have let you go."

"Ray, my staying was neither an option nor your decision."

"I know that. That ain't what I meant. I should have just told Welsh I was leaving, and if he didn't like it he could shove it up the old salami subway."

"Ray. . ."

"I know. I know. No lectures right now. I'm trying to think."

"Ray, we were both well aware that our forced separation would be a strain upon my admittedly weak psyche."

"Give me a minute, Rennie."

"Certainly."

"And throw your watch in the circular file."

*

*

"I can't."

"It's okay. That's okay. Just turn it upside down for a minute, okay?"

*

"All right."

*

"Did you turn it?"

"Yes, Ray."

"Good. That's good."

*

"Rennie, you still there?"

"Yes, Ray."

"Listen. When you said anything, did you mean ANYTHING?"

"Yes, Ray."

"Okay, then. I got a little anything I want you to do for me."

"Of course."

"Did you unpack your suitcase yet?"

"Yes."

"Where's that old blue t-shirt that I like so much?"

"The one with the hem that's coming undone?"

"Yeah."

"It's in the dresser, in the lower left drawer."

"Get it."

*

*

"Ray?"

"Right here, lover."

"Is something wrong, Ray? Your breathing sounds labored."

"No, everything's right as rain. Just getting in the mood is all."

"The mood?"

"Yeah, you know, the mood you had me in before I pulled a stroke-us interruptus."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

*

"I. . . I have the t-shirt."

"Good."

"Should I put it on?"

"Nope."

*

*

"Ray."

"Ummm?"

"What should I do with my shirt?"

"Can you hear what I'm doing, Rennie?"

"Yes, Ray."

"When you close your eyes, can you see what I'm doing?"

"Yes, Ray."

"That's what I want you to do with your t-shirt."

"Oh."

*

*

"Spread it out."

"Excuse me?"

"The t-shirt, gorgeous. I want you to spread it out on the bed. Make it nice and neat. Now, slip your hand inside."

*

*

"Is your hand inside, Rennie?"

"Yes, Ray."

"Now whose breathing is labored?"

"Mine, Ray."

"That was one of those reciprocal questions."

"Sorry."

"I'll forgive you this one time, but only if you take the hand that's inside of your t-shirt and wrap it around your cock."

"Ray, I don't think. . ."

"Shhh, listen, baby. No skin on skin -- I promise -- just like when I sixteen"

"Sixt. . ."

"It's my turn to do the talking.

"It was October, and my best friend, Oscar Sullivan was spending the night. I wasn't his best friend, but he was mine. He was one of those guys that could do anything. Everything he tried worked out, every girl he tried put out.

"The weather had been really crappy all day. He came right over after breakfast, and we spent the whole day playing poker in the basement and drinking pop out of my dad's beer glasses. We even snuck a couple of stogies.

"He'd been planning on going to Rachel Houghton's place after lunch. He said she gave the best hand jobs of any girl on our street. Since the only hand on the Ray Kowalski payroll was mine, I had to take his word for it.

"Anyway, the weather got even shittier -- shittier than usual for an October in Chicago. So, he ended up staying all afternoon and all evening too. Mom let us stay up way late to see if things would clear up. At about midnight, she called Oscar's mom and told her that he could bunk with me for the night. Now, I liked Oscar a lot -- a whole lot, but I wasn't too thrilled about him spending the night in my room with me. See, he'd been there all freaking day. That meant I'd missed my late morning jerk off, my early afternoon jerk off and my early evening jerk off.

"If he spent the night, I'd miss my bedtime jerk off, middle of the night jerk off and early morning jerk off. The idea of going a whole twenty-four hours with out taking the old stallion out for a ride made me the poster boy for cruel and unusual punishment. I could see the horror on Oscar's face, when he woke up in the morning and found a pile of smoking ashes lying in the bed next to his.

"But, what's a guy to do, say, "Sorry to send you out in the worst blizzard of the decade, buddy of mine, but you see, I got a boner the size of the Sears Tower, and sleeping in a twin bed two feet from your twin bed is more than my over worked faggily-inclined libido can stand?"

"Mom got Oscar a pair of my dad's sweats and a t-shirt. He was too big to fit into my stuff. We took turns in the shower. I even let him borrow my toothbrush. He was so perfect standing there at the sink with his damp jet black hair standing up in perfect spikes, and his hips swaying to the tune he was humming under his breath as he brushed his teeth to the beat. When he bent over the sink to spit, I got a great shot of his ass. He was going commando so mom could wash his clothes, since he'd have to wear them again the next day.

"We finished getting ready for sleep and jumped into the matching twin beds in the room my big brother and I used to share before he went off to learn how to be a big-shot international business lawyer and family responsibility amnesiac.

"I remember thinking how great it was that I wasn't alone. Even if he was too far away to touch, I liked having him all to myself in the middle of the night.

"It was deadly cold outside and not much better inside. Our muffled laughter, as we quietly joked about girls we liked and guys we didn't, turned into small billows of steam and rose in the air until they disappeared into the rafters of my former-attic bedroom.

"Our voices got quieter and quieter until they faded away, and the even tempo of the movement of air into and out of Oscar's swimmer's lungs pushed me into dreamland.

"I woke up sometime later. The snow had stopped swirling and falling. The hunter's moon was shining through the single window on the far wall of my room. It was so bright, I thought at first that it must be day. I got up to close the curtains and stopped halfway through my still mostly asleep shuffle. Somewhere between bedtime and this time, Oscar had taken off my dad's Bears t-shirt and thrown it on the pine floor, where it was now bunched between the first two toes of my left foot.

"I took a good look at Oscar to make sure he was out for the count. The moon was making weird shadows around his eyes and the far side of his nose, but she couldn't fool me. I had memorized each of his statue perfect features a long time ago.

"He stretched his arms, mumbled something I could only half-hear and turned toward the wall. When he turned, the three quilts that were covering him slipped down to his waist.

"Oscar was black Irish, that's what they call those guys when they come out with anything other than shock red hair and green eyes. The midnight blue light of the moon skittered across the skin of his back, leaving dark patches that showed every muscle and vertebra to it's best advantage. His skin was shades darker than my own fishbelly white flesh, and it glowed in the moonlight like warm clover honey.

"He breathed. He slept. He was so beautiful it hurt my eyes to look at him. Right then, he rolled onto his stomach, and I knew I had to do it. I had to touch him, just once. I had to let my fingers have the memory of his body. I wanted them to have his smell and his sleep sweat deep in the lines of their prints, when I snuck back to my bed and wrapped them around my dick and pretended like they were his fingers, not mine.

"I took the one little step I needed to reach the side of his bed. I swallowed the horned toad that had somehow gotten into my throat and reached out and lightly stroked my flattened palm from his right shoulder down to the small of his back. He didn't move.

"I got bolder and stupider. I kept touching him. I kept running my fingers over his back and finally into his soft too-short hair. I was trying so hard to not breathe hard, that I didn't notice that his breathing had changed too.

"I didn't realize he was awake until one of his hands reached behind him and grabbed my bony wrist. He sat up and turned to face me at the same time. What was I supposed to say? I never had made it to the window and the moon was casting a pretty good sized shadow on the crotch of my sweats -- making my boner -- which was only inches from his mouth -- look larger than life.

"He stared at me for what felt like forever. Then he started pushing me back toward my bed. I knew he was going to beat the crap out of me, and I knew I was going to let him, because I couldn't cry out for help. But, I wasn't going to make it easy on him. So, I struggled with him, but he was too strong for me. He forced me down on my bed on my back. I kept trying to fight him off, but it wasn't doing any good. He started hissing at me to stop, just stop. He finally grabbed me by the jaw and put his knee right against my now fully-deflated cock.

"Then he leaned in and kissed me. With tongue. He had one hand on my wrist, the other on my jaw, his knee was rubbing against my half-hard dick and his tongue was in my mouth. His lips felt so good, I wanted to feel all of him. I reached up with my free hand and grabbed onto his hair. He jerked his mouth away from mine and ordered, "Don't touch me."

"So, I let go of him and took a hold of one of the spokes on my ship's wheel headboard. He kissed me forever, until our lips were bruised and our tongues were cramping. Then he let go of my face and my wrist and sat up.

"He was straddling my knees. He reached out and pulled my sweats down until they were just below my ass. He stared at my dick. He licked his lips, and I moaned. That was the first real noise I had made. It snapped him out of his trance, and he started looking around real desperate like. His eyes found something on the floor. He reached for his t-shirt, and I reached for the headboard with my free hand.

"He wrapped the shirt around his right hand and wrapped them both around my dick. He stroked me off with all of the skill possessed by every sixteen year old hormone warrior the world over. He stared at me the whole time. I was too far gone to care. He'd have a real good rhythm going, then he'd start to shake, and he'd lose it. He wasn't meaning to, but he was stringing it out for a long time, and the more time he was taking, the more intense it was getting.

"When I didn't think I could take it anymore, when I was ready to push his hand away and finish the job myself, he stuck his left hand inside of the t-shirt and pushed one of his fingers into my ass. He didn't put it in very far, maybe a quarter inch, maybe, but it was way too far for my overloaded brain to handle.

"I came like a bandit. I shot my wad into the t-shirt. To this day, I don't know how I kept from screaming. I had white-hot spots dancing in front of my eyes and aftershocks made me jump for about five minutes afterward. Oscar just knelt over me staring at me, with his hand around my dick and his finger moving in my ass.

"When my orgasm was completely over, Oscar unwrapped hand and disengaged finger. He opened the shirt and showed me my jiz. There was a lot of it. He made sure I had seen it. Then he pulled his sweats down and wrapped the shirt around his dick, jiz side down, so he was rubbing my cum into his skin. He jerked himself off like that. I tried to lend a hand, but he wouldn't let me.

"He closed his eyes real tight, and his pearly whites were blue in the moonlight where they bit into his lower lip. He finished himself off quiet as a whisper and climbed off of me. He threw the shirt on the floor and went back to his bed. I think I fell asleep in thirty seconds flat.

*

*

*

*

"Rennie?"

*

"Yes, Ray?"

"Did that noise mean what I think it meant?"

"Oh - God - Yes - Ray."

"Jesus, Rennie, I'm going to. . ."

"Yes, Ray. Please, Ray."

*

*

*

"Ray?"

*

"Ray?"

*

"Ray!"

"All present and accounted for."

"Ray, are you all right?"

"Aside from the fact that I'm lying butt-ass naked in a pool of my own jiz on our kitchen floor, you mean?"

"Yes."

"Then yes, I'm all right. And if you were here, I'd be fan-fucking-tastic."

"That's good, Ray. Thank you, Ray."

"Love you, Rennie."

"Love you, Ray."

"How long?"

*

*

"Fourteen minutes and thirty-four seconds."

"I'll be there by lunch time."

"Ray, you can't possibly. . ."

"Goddammit, Rennie, you're looking at your watch while we jack off. You know what comes next. You'll get that empty fucking smile and start tripping over shit. Then you're going to let people turn you into a human doormat. Then you're going to make yourself forget about me. I couldn't take that, Rennie. I couldn't.

"Ray, I'll be fine."

"You lying fuck. You might be able to sweet talk my mom and dad, but I can always tell when you're lying."

"Ray. . ."

"You're mine, Goddammit. You're mine, and I ain't giving you back! You hear me? If I got to quit my job and stand up on my desk and announce to the whole stinking Chicago PD that I'm taking off for the wilds of Northern Freezovia to suck my man's big wanking penis, I'm going to do it. You got me?"

"Ray. . ."

"Goddammit, Rennie, I miss you so bad it hurts. I can't even use that vibrator you got me, cause it ain't you. I want it to be you. I need it to be you. I'm sick of being the strong one. I'm sick of taking care of everything. I want to fly up there and spread myself out on your bed like peanut butter. I want you. I want you to forget about everything but me and my ass. I want you to do all of those nasty things you can't even think about. I want you to fuck me. I want you to be in charge for once. I want you to take control and kick all of those other people out of our bed. I want you to drag Stella and Brock and Oscar and all of the others out of our bed, and I want you to fuck me. I want you to hold me down and fuck me."

"Ray. Ray, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Please, stop crying, please."

"No."

*

*

"I'll stay with Fraser."

"What?"

"I said, I'll stay with Fraser. His room is rather small, and it only has one bunk, but I'm sure he'll be able to requisition another one. And it's only three more days -- less than three, actually. It is now technically Wednesday morning, and I am scheduled to leave on Friday at eight in the evening. Therefore, it's only sixty-six more hours. I can survive sixty-six more hours much more easily than your career could survive the rumors your coming to rescue me would generate."

"I don't give a shit about the rumors -- or my so-called career."

"I know, Ray, but I do."

"I don't know."

"Things will work themselves out, I promise."

"I mean I don't know about you staying with Frase. What if you do something. . ."

"What if I do something - inappropriate - in his presence?"

"Yeah."

"Constable Fraser is a very understanding human, besides, if he allows me to billet with him, he will be aware of exactly what he is setting himself up for."

"You told him?"

"Yes."

"Everything?"

"Yes."

"Even about the cowboy boots and the Vanilla Pudding?"

"Well, not everything."

"Good. I mean I trust Fraser with my life and all, but there's some things a guy just doesn't want to get around."

"Understood."

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yeah, okay. You stay with Frase, and I'll stay here. But you got to call me and check in."

"Yes, Ray."

"Three times a day."

"Yes, Ray."

"At least."

"Yes, Ray."

"And if you miss one time, just one time, I'm going to do that standing up on my desk thing. . ."

"Ray?"

"Yeah."

"I need you to do something for me, as well."

"Sure."

"I need you to use your vibrator."

"Rennie. . ."

"I need you to use your vibrator, because I need you to be ready for me when I return."

"Oh?"

"Yes."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"You sure?"

"Yes."

"Oh."

"I'm going to go and repack my things now. Fraser has reveille at five am, but I'm sure he won't object to my making use of his floor for the rest of the night."

*

"Ray?"

"Oh, right. Sorry. I was kind of stuck on that whole 'ready for you when you get back' thing."

"No need to apologize."

"You're laughing at me, ain't you?"

"No, Ray, I'm laughing with you."

"If you were here right now, I'd. . . Well I don't know what I'd do, but it would be good."

"I'm sure it would be much better than good."

"Go pack."

"Yes, Ray."

"Good night."

"Good night, Ray."

"I'm sorry about that fit."

"I'm sorry for pushing you that far."

"I love you, Rennie."

"And I you, Ray."

"Rennie?"

"Yes, Ray?"

"Sweet dreams."

"And you."

***********

I have my few travel necessities repacked and manage to check out of my temporary residence in thirty-seven minutes. I realize that it may be presumptuous of me to assume that Fraser will allow me to bunk with him, but I really have no alternative at this point. I promised my Ray, and I seem to have an inborn need to keep all of my promises to men named Ray.

The taxi I order from my room arrives six minutes after I first step to the curb to begin my wait. The driver is East Indian and speaks English beautifully, with just the slightest singing lilt. He is as adept at reading people as most of those who work in service industries for any length of time. He senses my pensive mood and, after asking my destination, remains silent until eighteen minutes later, when we arrive at the Academy's front gate. He speaks quietly to the cadet on guard duty and motions toward me. The young woman eyes me curiously, but waves us through.

Less than two minutes later, my driver pulls in front of Fraser's building. I pay him and tip him well, considering my salary. I step from the taxi and help him retrieve my baggage from the trunk. Fraser meets me inside the front door, dressed only in long underwear and white socks. He takes my duffel from me and answers my unspoken question.

"Ray called."

I nod in understanding and follow him to his room. He offers me his bunk, but I decline. I have yet to completely erase unkind memories of many nights spent with my frozen toes hanging over the end of an Academy bed. I do, however, gratefully accept his proffered bedroll. He sets it up for me, and his wolf and I take a moment to become better acquainted. I had always thought him a beautiful animal, but while in Chicago he and I had little to do with one another.

I sit on the edge of Fraser's bunk and Diefenbaker takes his time approaching me. It wouldn't do to seem too eager, I suppose. He sniffs my hand and decides he likes me well enough to allow me to pet him.

I lose track of time, but Fraser finishes his task quickly enough. I fall gratefully into my nest of blankets and my feet are quickly warmed by the weighty presence of a full grown he-wolf. Fraser chides his Diefenbaker, but I tell him anything that will keep the icicles off of my toes is welcome. He sighs resignedly and retreats to his bunk. I would be hard pressed to tell who fell asleep more quickly.

We awaken as the sun rises on what promises to be a lovely August morning. Rather, Fraser was awakened by the sun. I am pulled from blissful dreams of Ray by the jarring sensation of a large, wet lupine tongue bathing my face.

Luckily, Fraser does not witness this undignified display. He returns from the communal bathroom, fully dressed and ready to face the day, just as I groaningly pull myself from the seductive embrace of warm blankets. He bids me good morning. I cast a bleary eye in his direction, collect my shaving kit and a towel, and head to the showers.

When I return to his room, I find him waiting patiently. I rush through my morning routine and join him for his walk with Diefenbaker. We then stroll to mess and amid a chorus of, "Good morning, sir!" cut to the front of the line. I can tell that this lack of egalitarianism bothers Fraser, but it is tradition that instructors never wait for a meal. Besides, I am grateful for anything that will allow me to get a few moments closer to coffee.

Diefenbaker sits at our feet as we discuss our plans for the day. Mine is full of classes covering topics ranging from useless to the absurd. His morning is to consist of paperwork outlining his cadets' progress. His afternoon shall be filled by babysitting those same cadets while a registered nurse teaches them CPR and basic first aid.

After the events of last night, the thought of spending an evening drinking and reminiscing with old classmates seems decidedly unappealing.

"What have you been getting yourself into lately, Big T?"

"Well, where to start. . .I was raped and sexually abused repeatedly, lost my mind, tried to murder a fellow Mounted Policeman, attempted suicide numerous times, reinvented myself as a harmless buffoon, and am only now rediscovering my abilities thanks to my male, American lover, whom I have solemnly vowed to sodomize upon my return to my duty station. And yourself?"

If not the hit of the party, I would certainly be a topic for discussion over boot polishing sessions for some time to come. And the truly troubling thing is, I don't think I could count on not saying those very words, given my present mental state.

I wonder which is worse, being insane or knowing that you are insane?

I think it must be the knowing.

Fraser and I finalize plans to meet up after class. His room is left unlocked at all times. We decide that whomever finishes first will wait for the other there. We part after my third cup of coffee and his second. He sets off for an exciting morning of deciding the fates of thirty-two of Canada's would-be finest. I have twenty-four minutes and a short walk before my first class. I head for the row of pay phones just outside, to check in with Ray.

Our connection goes through without delay. I begin our conversation with a breathy hello and a warning that I am in uniform in a very public place and he is to behave.

*

Our first full night together goes well enough. Fraser and I share a quiet dinner and an evening full of Ray stories -- stories of my Ray. We continue our ritual each evening. It seems his social schedule is as open as that of his Ray.

On my final night at Depot, I bring along some uninvited guests -- several bottles of slightly above average cognac. I cajole and tease Fraser into sharing a glass. Then I simply take the liberty of keeping the level of alcohol in his glass constant.

We trade stories and do passably well covering old folk songs that have been handed down from class to class for as long as there has been an Academy. He remembers them all and helps me through the rough patches. He even surprises me with a rousing and shockingly accurate rendition of "The Good Ship Venus", bar none the foulest song ever penned by Jack Tars.

As the evening wears on, we relax visibly and his tongue loosens, with often hilarious results. He finishes a risque story concerning Detectives Huey and Guardino, a llama, the Dean of Students at an exclusive girls' school, and copious quantities of pumpkin pie filling. He takes several long draughts of his glass and a single breath and segues into a particularly amusing anecdote concerning himself, my Ray, and a prostitute.

"You see, Ray and I were on our way to our customary Thursday night pizza dinner, to have pizza, and as we were idling at a red light, we were approached by a lady of the evening. I was my usual polite, conveniently obtuse self. Ray however was surprisingly receptive to the young lady's. . . overtures.

"He called her 'gorgeous' and asked what his chances of getting a 'freebie' were. My head whipped around and I stared at him in what must have been a comical expression of disbelief.

"The young lady -- Wanda -- Wanda replied, 'Not a chance.' She winked at me and then offered us a two for one deal. My mind was still reeling over the idea that Ray actually seemed serious. He asked what two things we would get for the price she named, and she replied it was our choice.

"I began attempting to stammer out an indignant question regarding Ray's mental state. He chomped down on a much abused toothpick, grinned at me, told me to live a little, booted his door open and motioned for Wanda to climb over his lap into the almost nonexistent space between us.

"She made herself comfortable. As Ray pulled away from the curb, she placed her hand on my knee. Stop laughing. I removed her hand and placed it firmly in her lap. I moved as close to my door as possible, feeling all the while as though I was in an odd European independent film, and someone had neglected to give me a copy of the script.

"Wanda then focused all of her attention on Ray. I experienced the unique sensation of being simultaneously relieved and mortified.

"Ray smiled winningly at Wanda and asked her if she liked Greek. Stop laughing. My heart stopped and, for a moment, I seriously considered throwing myself from his moving vehicle. I fail to see what you find so amusing, Constable Smarty-pants.

"She replied that she liked anything we had the money for. Ray then stated, 'Money? I thought you said honey. We don't have any money to spare, we're cops.'

"Wanda's eyes got very large and she stated in a pseudo-surprised voice, Cops? Really?' and looked to me for confirmation. I nodded and she stated, 'Wow, what a coincidence, me too.'

"You really should try to breathe. I looked at her confusedly and asked 'you too, what?' She smiled and told me that she two was an officer of the law. I looked from her wide-eyed gaze to Ray's amused face and collapsed in relief.

"They both laughed at the situation, and Ray introduced me to Officer Karen Staisford. She then explained that she was working a prostitution sting and, rather than have her walk unescorted through dark alleys to meet her backup, they would have a plain clothes officer 'pick her up' and drop her off at a prearranged location.

"Looking back on it, I can see how individuals of a certain mindset might "find the whole situation amusing."

He spares me a black look. I attempt to stop laughing. I fail miserably. But my mirth is soon blotted out by the pain in his voice.

"But at the time it seemed cold. I was still trying to feel him out, to accustom myself to his presence. We were new to one another, and I still half-expected him to act like. . ."

He had been going along at a steady clip, and I had been listening closely and laughing when the mood struck. He was a born storyteller, regardless of the opinion of either Ray. But he arrived at the point where his heart would have to take over for his head, and he simply could not make the transition.

"Ray."

"Hmm?"

"You were going to say that you expected him to act like Ray, your Ray."

He barks out a harsh, biting laugh.

"He isn't my Ray."

"And whose fault is that?"

"Well, it isn't mine."

"Then it's his."

"Yes."

I know a chance when I see it. I may never get him this drunk or this honest again. I push him to see how far the both of us are willing to run with this topic.

"I agree. After all, he left you."

"Exactly."

"And when he returned, what did he do? Did he throw himself into your eagerly waiting arms?"

"No."

"No! No, he takes up with another person -- a woman -- your new partner's ex-wife, no less."

"No less!"

"And then he leaves you again."

"Again!"

"He leaves you for a second time, when he never should have left in the first place."

"He left me."

"So what if he was only trying to protect you, save your reputation and your already ruined career?"

He has no response to this small piece of information, but I can see him filing it away. Good.

"And what's a little blackmail from a formidable Federal Agency when compared with true love?"

He is staring at me. I am on one of my Ray's rolls -- a roll fueled by too many glasses of cognac and the desperate glint that has made a home in the back of his Ray's eyes, dulling their former emerald brilliance.

"After all, no one would have paid the slightest notice to the rumors that the two of you were lovers. And what if they did have those pictures published by a local tabloid? Everyone knows photographs can be easily altered to depict anything the photographer wishes. And even if the truth had come out, I'm sure all parties involved would have been nothing less than supportive, the Vecchio family, the Chicago Police Department, the R.C.M.P., all of them."

A sharp, painful light of understanding slowly burns its way through the drunken haze clouding his mind.

"What? Didn't you know? Oh, that's right. How could you know? You left."

He sets his empty glass on his spotless footlocker.

"Tell me."

"What do you want me to tell you, Fraser?"

"Everything."

"Why?"

"Why?"

"Yes, why? So you can sit here, safely away from him and his pain, and decide his fate? He isn't a commodity, something to be placed on a balance scale and weighed, to be deemed worthy or unworthy of your affections."

"I deserve to know."

"And he deserves to be the one to tell you."

I place a hand on his shoulder. He doesn't have the energy to shrug me off.

"Fraser, if I tell you, he'll know. He reads me almost as well as my Ray. He'll look into my eyes and he will know. He will see it in my face when he meets me at the airport. And if, by some chance, he fails to see, I will tell him.

"I can't treat him so poorly. He has earned far better from me, from both of us. It isn't right that he should sit in his small room like one of our suspects, waiting to hear His Honor Benton Fraser pronounce his fate.

"Go to him. Listen to him."

"I don't know."

"What don't you know?"

"I. . .I don't know if I can."

My Ray and I have traveled so far beyond this first painful meeting of damaged hearts that I can smile benevolently at Fraser from the vantage point of my hard won wisdom.

"How can you not?"

***********

Fourteen minutes to go, and I'm shaking like a Chihuahua with a bladder infection. I keep telling myself it's no biggie. It's just going to be Rennie walking through our front door -- like he's done a million times before, and me waiting for him -- like I've done each and every one of those million times -- excepting when our schedules were really out of whack. Of course, I've never been good at listening to logical Ray, and it looks like today isn't going to be the day I learn.

So, I settle for doing my imitation of the Flash. The Flash with Palsy. I'm shaking in our living room, staring at the door like it's. . . Well, like it's the door Rennie's going to walk through any minute. Then less than a nanosecond later, I'm shaking in our bedroom making sure the sheets are still springtime fresh. Then, it's off to the John to do the old breath-armpit-crotch check and make sure I'm still springtime fresh.

Just as I've reassured myself that I haven't violated any personal Environmental Protection Agency regulations, I remember that I forgot to remember to turn the oven on low to keep our gourmet homemade dinners -- that Salzano's delivered less than an hour ago -- warm and free of globs of solidifying butter.

I flash to the kitchen and end up flashing the kitchen. Thank God my jeans are too tight to fall down around my ankles. Because I forgot to remember to rebutton them, and He knows I don't have enough of an ass to keep them from hitting the floor.

I turn on the oven and realize I forgot to stick the wine in the fridge -- the white wine that is. We're having garlic chicken, and I chilled a merlot. It's not like I give anything resembling a rusted teaball about stuff like that. I mean, I'd be just as happy with a fifth of the Monkey as a bottle of merlot, but Rennie actually knows about and, worse for me, cares about all of that red meat, red wine - white meat, white wine crap. Or was it the other way around? Shit. Shit. Shit.

I make a command decision and keep the red in the fridge, but I throw a bottle of white in the freezer just to be sure. I open the fridge to check that I really put the merlot, and not a bottle of lighter fluid or even worse Boone's Farm in there, and Big Ray starts trying to conserve some heat. It takes me a distracted-by-thoughts-of-Rennie minute to realize that Big Ray is trying to tuck and cover, because while I was remembering that I forgot to remember the oven, I forgot that I forgot to remember to button my jeans.

And it only gets more awe inspiring from there. I'm just doing up the second button when I hear the door open. If I was smart, I'd stand where I am and finish the buttons. But I'm me, so I head for the door and what's coming over the threshold. I make it ten whole steps and one more button before I trip on dust or air or something equally large and take a header into the sofa. At least, that's what I would have hit if I hadn't been caught by an equally large, equally hard object -- namely one standard issue, buffed beyond belief appetizer du jour.

He takes advantage of his great skill and dexterity -- and me - and turns us around so we fall on to the sofa, instead of into it. He makes sure I'm on top. He likes it when I'm on top now -- at least when we're face to face.

Since I am, unlike him, a mere mortal, I take advantage of the situation he's put me in and start sliding all over him like extra virgin olive oil on Ma Vecchio's orzo. I know he isn't going to be in any kind of shape to do what he promised, but I don't care. I missed him so bad, all I need him to do is to lay back and take it like the superman he is.

Somebody makes a noise loud enough to be heard over the lust running through my veins and I look up. Vecchio is standing in the doorway, grinning at me like he just caught me with my hand in the cookie jar -- which he did not do. I haven't got enough of Rennie's uniform off yet. . .yet.

He make a truly Herculean effort and refrains from making one of the thousand smart comments I can see running through his eyes. He settles for taking Rennie's key out of the lock and laying it on the table next to the door. He says how he's sorry to see me looking so sick, and he hopes I'll be feeling better soon and don't forget to cough a couple times when I call in to Welsh in the morning. Then he tells me to lock up after him. He waves goodbye to Rennie and shuts the door.

Rennie's still laying under me, but I'm too busy shitting badgers -- big hairy badgers -- to carry on with our carrying on. I was so into being on top of him that I forgot all about the door being wide open. It ain't like I care what happens to my worthless life and worse reputation, but Rennie has a real chance of making something of his career.

Normally, nobody up in FrozenAss would care bit one about what the Chicago PD thinks about Rennie's police work, but Welsh and Allen have been making real sure that the Mothers on the Ship hear all about it.

It turns out that Welsh did the same for Fraser, but somehow none of Welsh's commendations made their way into Fraser's permanent files, at least until Allen found them in the bottom right drawer of the desk he inherited from the Ice Queen. I like to think that Thatcher would never be that sloppy, that her conscience got the better of her - that she felt she had finally gotten her due, what with her promotion and all, and that she was trying to see Fraser got his own second chance.

Anyway what all this means is that Rennie has a chance of going home some time in the future and having more to show for his years of service than some scars he'd rather forget and a lame-assed excuse for a pension. And what all that means is that I have to be real careful not to let my hornies and happy-to-see-hims do anything to mess stuff up for him.

He tries to return all of my liplocks with one of his own, but the Flash is back in action. I'm off of him and cranking the lever on the deadbolt before you can say "hatecrime". And when he follows me to the door to give me a little much anticipated welcome home present, I'm too upset to do more than revert to the Chihuahua jeebies.

Fraser must have been better for him than I thought, because he takes over. I was expecting a complete to the second rundown on his itinerary. You know, "It's good to be back, Ray. Do you realize that I left approximately one hundred twenty-six hours and eleven minutes ago. . ." But he doesn't say anything, well nothing but sweet nothings.

He whispers how much he's missed me and how good I smell, better even than the stuff waiting for him in the kitchen. The whole time he's talking, he's running his fingers up and down my arms, which are hanging at my sides limper than Bob Dole's pre-Viagra python. I'm too upset with my stupid self to even hug him, at least until he starts smooching up on me. He's too damned smart for my own good. Sometimes I think he's been sneaking out when I'm asleep -- working on a night degree in the study of Rays in their natural habitat -- or something like that.

He knows just where and how to kiss me to make me cool down and melt all at the same time. I lean against the door and let him do his worst, and his worst is pretty damned good. He kisses me real soft and sweet, everywhere but my lips. When I try to get him to touch his lips to mine, he moves his head just enough to avoid contact and nuzzles my face and my neck with his nose.

He keeps going like that, real slow and patient; like he has nothing better to do than me, until he feels my bony hands start to work on the belt on his jacket. That earns me the laziest deepest kiss I've had since the last time he gave me a lazy deep kiss. His lips and his tongue go to work, and those electric lines in my brain misfire, and I forget all about that buckle. My hands somehow decide their true mission in life is to make one of those accurate to one millionth of an inch relief maps of the surface of planet Rennie -- just to make sure he's still as big and perfect and big and ripped as they remember him being. He is. I go to work on the jacket buttons.

He pulls back a little and puts his hands over mine. I look him in the eye for the first time in five days. I'm the luckiest stiff on God's green Earth. It's my Rennie looking back at me. He smiles at me and says, "Welcome home, Ray." My face makes like his serge, and he laughs -- but not at me. He never laughs at me, even when he starts talking like Merriam and Webster's love child and has to backtrack to translate for me.

He keeps his hands over mine and keeps on smiling that "I've been having evil thoughts involving you and vanilla frosting" smile. He backs his way to our bedroom. He never stops looking me in the eye. Since he's Rennie, he doesn't trip or stumble. He makes his way to the edge of our big bed and sits on the mattress. The he lays back and pulls me on top of him.

I can tell he wants to make out almost as much as Big Ray does, but he got up at O'Fraser thirty this morning and had a full day of classes before his flight. So, I know he isn't in any kind of shape for more than a quick round of "can I touch you there?", even if his RCMP issue pride would never let him admit it.

I strip me and then him. He's never said anything out loud, but I speak Rennie, so I know it makes him nervous when I've got on more clothes than him. Sometimes his memories are more powerful than his wanting me. I always make sure his clothes are the last thing to go. Heck, the time I heard him moan the loudest, I just unzipped his fly and went to town. I didn't bother with stripping him at all, but that was one of those the mood just hit me Sunday mornings, and this is the end of five days of doing nothing but honing the old Bowie knife and writing, directing and starring in my own personal "Life with Rennie" series of mental pornos.

I peel myself like a banana, and then go to work on his Medieval torture device that's cleverly disguised as an RCMP uniform. Not to brag, but I just happen to have a little degree in the ways of Rennie. So I know that my taking care of his Mountie stuff really turns his crank. I make like a Geisha -- a completely male Geisha -- and slip his shoes off of his feet and onto his shoe tree. I can't believe I'm in love with a guy that owns a shoe tree.

When I free him from his jacket and pants, I take them to the closet and hang them up, real careful like. His shirt has six identical twin brothers hanging in the closet. So it just ends up on the floor. I take a good long whiff of it and toss it over my shoulder. He likes that. He reaches for me but I'm not done yet. His socks join his shirt on the floor, so does his slightly damp, not quite funky T-shirt. His black boxerbriefs -- a gift from Frannie who said one of us should get to watch our own personal Mountie walking around in the things before we kick off -- join the invite only party, after a long slow slide down his long skater's thighs.

He smells like jet fuel, fast food and international airport, but he tastes like himself. I kiss the inside of his left thigh and he sighs. He stretches out and settles in for the long haul. I try out a few of the hints I read about in that Cosmo book Frannie loaned me. The butterfly kisses around the head of his dick don't get much of a reaction, but that "lick him like an ice cream cone" suggestion goes over pretty good, and when I get him so deep that I almost gag, I remember to relax my throat by swallowing. Whoo boy, does that hit the jackpot. He feels my throat muscles working, then I get his entire dick in my mouth. When my lips make it all the way to the bottom, I give myself a mental high-five, and he cracks in a good way. His fingers start gripping the comforter, and I can't be sure, but I think I even heard an "Oh, God!" or ten.

And it's a good thing I don't have his legs thrown over my shoulder, because when he comes, it's so hard and fast his legs straighten out and tense up, and I can't help thinking of how his built thighs would have crushed by skull like an Easter egg. That makes me laugh a little. My laughing makes him moan even more. Score one for Team Poland.

His skin is slick and his hair is soaked. He's sprawled out on our bed like a boneless chicken, and he smell like jet fuel, fast food, international airport and sex. I think he's out for the count, but he flips me like a pancake and starts to return the favor. I'm all ready for a tongue bath, but he's got other ideas. He asks me where "it" is. I don't even try to play dumb -- a role that usually comes naturally.

My sixth cop sense can feel his eyes on my ass as I roll over and reach into the nightstand drawer.

***********

My fingers scrabble around in the drawer. They find Big Blue and the lube. I try to lighten the moment by holding them out in front of me like I just won an Oscar or a Genie or some other b.s. award like that.

But Rennie's only got one car on his mental track and its got nothing to do with humor. He puts his hands on my thighs. His touch is so light, it doesn't feel all the way real. He stares at daddy's little helper for a minute, like he's trying to figure out where to go from here. Finally he makes a decision.

"Show me."

That's a nice sentiment and all, but I've been planning this little trip for a lot longer than he has. I up the ante. I push the vibrator and the lube into his hands. I rub noses with him.

"Do me."

He licks his lips and his cheeks get real pink, but he isn't blushing. I'm ready and he's willing. So it should be smooth going from there, right? Wrong.

Suddenly he doesn't have any idea what to do. He starts to fumble with the lube tube, but he doesn't know where to put the vibrator. So he ends up dropping both on to the bed. He reaches for the lube, but the vibrator starts to fall to the floor. He grabs for the vibrator and snatches it up just before it hits the carpet. This is a good thing because the floor hasn't seen the underside of a vacuum cleaner since he left for parts better left unknown.

He puts the vibrator in the exact center of the bed and lays the lube next to it. Then he moves back and watches them like he expects them to jump up and run away. He realizes he's had an audience for all of this and gets embarrassed. He stammers and blushes and apologizes. It's the first time I've seen him this way -- somewhere between the goof I fell in love with and the stud he presents to the world. If I wasn't already long gone, this little performance would have done it.

I lay the vibrator on his pillow. I open the lube and squeeze some into my hand. I tell him "me first" and start rubbing the lube all over the fingers of his left hand.

We're both on our knees. I ain't sure how well its going to work, but I get this picture of us in my head and I just got to try it out. I tee up to him, so my right shoulder is in the middle of his chest. I spread my knees and reach behind me. I grab his lube slicked hand and put it on my ass.

It doesn't take him long to get things started. He's done this to me before and he likes it. He likes it because he knows I really like it. But he's only done it with one finger. One finger is great and all, but it's not enough.

I'm ready for more before he is. I try to be all understanding and patient and stuff, but my libido and my ass have other ideas.

My ass starts pushing back against his finger, and my libido makes me beg like Dief at a donut shop. I've been using the vibrator like he asked, so I don't need any of this. I'm good to go from the get go. But he needs it bad. He needs me to prove that it don't hurt. And I'm going to do that every step of the way.

He says it makes him hot when he makes me scream. That's okay by me because I don't think I could be quiet with him if my parents were out in our living room. But I'm even more careful than usual to make sure all of my getting lucky noises can't be taken as anything other than the Ray K. stamp of approval.

I guess my performance is up to par. I make what I think sounds like a really enthusiastic moan-groan combo, and finger number two joins the party. I start thinking that this might actually happen. Things have a chance of just going with a natural flow -- no angst or airline food-puking involved. That's almost too much. I start shaking and every single pore on my body opens up. I'm sweating like I'm my own little perfectly contained rainforest ecosystem.

The shaking starts to make Rennie stop. But I put a stop to his stopping idea pretty quick. I moan out, "Oh fuck, don't stop!" or something like that. It ain't Shakespeare, but it does the trick. He starts working on finger number three. It turns out three is the limit to my self control. My hands drop from his waist and I slide down his shaking, sweat slick body and end up on my elbows, with my head buried between my hands. My legs are still working somehow. I stay on my knees, my ass sticking in the air like I'm in heat -- which is entirely possible.

I figure out kind of late that this may not be the best position in the world -- at least for Rennie. It feels fucking fantastic for me. But he's got this whole thing about no domination stuff and being able to see my face. I try to get enough energy and self control from that place I got inside of me that doesn't think of anything but taking care of Rennie. Right before I'm about to push my way back up to kneeling, Rennie folds himself over me crosswise and wraps his free hand around my stomach.

The amazing part of that is I can feel his reinflated boner pushing against my right hip. The less than amazing part of that is that he's holding me still. Still is bad. I don't do still so good. I have to settle for squirming like an eel.

My knees give out and my dick becomes one with the comforter. Rennie's arm gets trapped under me. He freezes for a second, but recovers and just frees himself. He doesn't take his three big, talented fingers out of my ass, but he wriggles around until his mouth is next to one of my very red, very hot ears.

"I'm ready, Ray."

I tell him that "Oh yeah, I'm ready too" and he slides his fingers out of my ass. I roll onto my back and make myself comfortable. I hope this is going to take awhile. He grabs the vibrator and the lube. He looks at them for a moment. Then he smiles at me, virgin shy - which is kind of appropriate all things considered. He holds the stuff out to me. I give him a smile that is as evil as his is pure and take it from him. I slick up the first two thirds of Big Blue real good. I make sure there's enough dry space at the end for him to grab on to. That is one trip to the emergency room I would not want to have to explain to the department's health insurance provider.

How exactly did I get that vibrator stuck up my ass? Well you see, I was out hunting wild game, something all us super macho completely het guys do all the time and. . .

I cap the lube and hand the vibrator to Rennie. I wrap his fingers around it and settle back. He doesn't start up, so I ask him what's up. He get that shy look in his eyes again and then stares down at the sheets. He asks in a real quiet voice if I remember that story I told him about the first time I used a vibrator. I tell him that of course I do. It's right up there with the other three most embarrassing moments of my life, but I smile when I say it. Hell, I'd fess up to anything right now to get that vibrator up my ass. Then he says something about my feet up on the headboard, and I get the picture. It's time for a little trip into Rennie fantasyland. I ask does he want me to turn around, put my feet on our headboard and put on a little show.

He starts and stops a couple times and kind of half-laughs at himself. Then he takes a deep breath and tells me that he wants me to put my feet on his chest and use him like the headboard. So he can see everything. Big Ray had been kind of standing at parade rest, but he hears this and jumps to attention. My heart skips and jumps and then gives one heavy, almost painful thud before it goes back to its regular making-it-with-Rennie pace of about a thousand beats a minute.

I tell him to stand at the foot of the bed. He does. I scooch myself down to the edge of the bed and flash a wicked grin at him while I put one foot and then the other on his chiseled pecs.

I expect him to give me a happy face, but he looks all serious instead. He asks if I'd do anything he wanted. I should answer right away, but I don't. We're both thinking about the scars on his back. The wheels are turning even slower than usual, but I manage to come up with an answer that maybe both of us can live with. I tell him I'd do anything for him that he'd want to do for me.

He thinks about it for a Rennie moment, which is lightning quick compared to one of mine. Then he nods. I guess I passed his latest test, because suddenly out of nowhere, Evil Sex God Rennie chooses this exact moment to make an appearance.

He gives me a smile that makes one of mine look like a Snow White special. He turns the vibrator on. Then he grabs the top of the slicked up end with his slicked up fingers and runs his hand down the entire length. This spreads the lube over the whole thing. I start to tell him that ain't such a good idea. He just turns the dial to a higher setting and puts the vibrator on my stomach, right next to my dick. I'm not too thrilled about this change in plans, but Big Ray doesn't agree with me. He starts to get all happy. Well happier than he already was, which was pretty damned ecstatic to begin with.

Rennie puts both of his hands on my feet and pushes forward, testing my thighs in new and interesting ways. He kisses me breathless. Then he nuzzles my cheek and sets the world arocking.

"I'm ready, Ray."

He just said that a little bit ago, but he didn't mean then what he means now. He pulls back, his hands still on my feet, and waits for the go ahead.

I have a feeling I'm going to need something to keep me from falling off the face of the Earth when it really gets moving. I nod and wrap my fingers around the bottom of the headboard.

He lets go of my feet. He spreads my ass cheeks and slides inside, easy as pie. After all we've been through to get here, a couple of seconds and the start is finished -- no asteroids falling out of the sky, no morality police banging on the door, no trauma, no terror.

Just a long slow push and, oh God, he's in me. And for a second, its like I got super senses. I can feel everything -- his tongue and his teeth and his breath on my knee where he's sucking on my skin to keep from screaming, his hipbones poking into my legs, the front of his thighs pressed against the back of mine, his fingernails leaving little half-moon marks on my ass.

It ain't perfect because its our first time, and his first time, and my first time to boot. It ain't perfect, but its close enough.

He has trouble getting a rhythm down. Then he can't figure out where he wants his hands. And my feet on his chest don't work so good. But I let go of the headboard and pull my knees up to my chest. He digs his hands into the sheets next to my head. This has the added bonus of him leaning forward and pressing the vibrator up against my dick.

The rhythm thing takes a little longer. I tell him to just go steady -- like pushups. I guess that was the missing piece for his whitebread Mountiebred brain. That virginal Canadian caught in the headlights look fades from his true blues. Then they get glazed over like a donut and finally squeeze shut. I keep mine open the whole time. I want to record every second of this for the old mental scrapbook.

He finds a beat he can dance to, and I follow along.

With virgins it's going to pretty much be one of two ways. The first time, they're either going to blow faster than a bullet train or go forever. And that first time doesn't seem to have anything to do with how they'll be from then on. I luck out. Rennie is one of those go forever guys.

When Big Ray can't take it any more, I push Rennie off of me - just enough to get a hand around my dick. I toss the vibrator away and let my fingers do the stroking. I come like one of those guys in a Japanese porno. My back arches so high, I swear there ain't nothing of me touching the sheets but my ass and my head. Little stars go supernova behind my eyes. I speak in tongues and my free hand goes flying. It lands on one of his biceps, and I know my fingers have got to be leaving bruises, but I can't make myself stop squeezing. Then Elvis leaves the building and I sink back into the mattress and do my best impression of a ragdoll -- a sweating, panting, seeing stars ragdoll.

When Rennie feels my ass grabbing his dick, it throws him off his rhythm. But he just rides it out and then start the old in and out again. I'm so relaxed my ass isn't giving him any resistance. He starts to pick up speed. He sounds like a freight train, he looks like a wreck, and he still feels like an amateur. But I got no complaints. And when he breaks down and starts making noises so even I can tell the end is near, I grab a hold of his ass and ride shotgun.

He hooks one of his knees on the edge of the bed and gives a final push. It's real deep, like he'd climb inside of me if he could. He moans out his newfound belief in a higher power and crosses that final frontier. He collapses on top of me, and we spend the next minutes riding out his aftershocks.

His weight starts to be too much of a good thing. I tap his shoulder to let him know we need to turn on our sides. I clench my ass cheeks as tight as I can. He moans and shivers and pulls out of me. We roll to his left and end up with me on top of him.

This time he doesn't look like a boneless chicken -- more like that slime stuff that I used to play with as a kid. The stuff that came in a plastic garbage can and wouldn't do anything but ooze through my fingers.

I hug him and kiss him and tell him not to worry. It will be better next time. He moans. I laugh. We snuggle. Well I snuggle up to him. He hasn't re-evolved back to having arms yet.

All is right with the world -- until a really loud popping sound comes from the other room. It's loud enough to be a gunshot, but its flat and dull, without the sharp crack of a bullet leaving a gun.

Rennie's out from under me in a second and reaching for the unregistered Glock he keeps hidden under his side of the mattress. Just about the time he comes up loaded for bear, I remember something I forgot to remember and head for the kitchen -- laughing the whole way.

***********

Fraser made no overt response to my query, but he appeared to give his new enlightenment as much thought as his alcohol-induced stupor would allow. He looked as poorly as I felt, and I felt like an overworked batch of hand-wrung prison laundry. I replaced the cork on the last bottle of cognac and stowed it in his footlocker. He made no objection. I climbed into my makeshift bed with Dief as a welcome, familiar presence at my feet. Fraser sat at his window, staring into the distance. When I was awakened some time later by a snoring wolf, Fraser was still at the window.

We did not speak of his Ray again. I observed my last day of classes through eyes whose color and texture closely resembled the serge of my dress uniform. Fraser and I said our hangover subdued farewells under the watchful eye of my impatient taxi driver. I suggested to Fraser that he not wait too long before making his decision and offered him a lumpy sofa or hard floor for a bed, if ever he should make his way back to Chicago. His noncommittal response was tinged with a hard edge of much restrained longing.

I seated myself in the back of a taxi that had almost enough legroom to be comfortable and the driver pulled smoothly away from the curb. I did not look back.

*

Ray had promised to meet me at the gate upon my arrival at O'Hare. I was not at all surprised when I walked down the ramp and was met only by the hustle and din of fellow harried travelers. I collected my single bag and waited patiently at the curb until his heavy, ungainly testament to pre-gas crisis American automotive engineering came tearing into the passenger pick up area. He braked abruptly and jumped from behind the steering wheel. He walked hurriedly to the back of the car and unlocked the trunk, cursing and apologizing all the while. He threw my duffel carelessly into the trunk and slammed the lid. He opened my door, ushered me inside and then hurried back to the driver's seat. He started the engine, took a deep breath, favored me with a brilliant smile and welcomed me home.

He did not ask after Fraser. He would wait until we were somewhere that presented fewer distractions than Chicago's public streets and then obsess and attempt to deconstruct each shading in my tone of voice, every gesture and facial expression to find any possibility for hope and then reason upon reason to dash those hopes with cruel uncertainty.

I suppressed my ever-present attraction toward him and smiled in return. I thanked him and asked how the time had passed while I was away.

He informed me that work had been oddly normal, nothing but the most unimaginative garden variety robberies, assaults and murders. Then after assuring me that all was well, he related tales of the steady deterioration of the state of my Ray's wardrobe and attitude.

I am at all times acutely aware of my level of dependence upon my Ray. And so I was gratified to know that, although to a much lesser degree, he was in some small way dependent on me.

I often find myself fearful that the affection my Ray feels for me will degrade into contempt and derision. I obsess about possible scenarios of his informing me that I am no longer welcome in his home. I see him replacing me with men and women of our acquaintance or simply choosing to fill the space I would leave with blessed solitude.

He has never given me reason to form these ideas. When we are alone or in the company of those who know of our relationship, he is always sweetly careful to refer to us as a couple and everything in his possession as ours, yet I am unable to dispel my fears.

The time I spend alone in his small apartment is especially trying on my mental state. I pass much of this time by laundering his clothing, cleaning and cooking. It helps to occupy my thoughts, but more importantly, it serves to show him that I am so very grateful to him for all of his sacrifices and, hopefully, to make me useful enough that he will not soon give in to the desire to ease his lot by being rid of me.

*

Ray can feel me drifting away from the conversational tone of his voice. He lapses into an understanding silence. The level of trust I feel for him allows me to close my eyes in his presence. I float into a much needed doze and am just entering sleep when pleasant images of my Ray appear behind my eyes. My heart races and my blood thrums through my veins. Memories of my promise to my Ray awaken me with a jerk.

Ray asks, with an amused tint to his voice, "Nervous?"

I reply truthfully, "You have no idea."

He nods in understanding, but he truly has no concept, and I am unwilling and unable to convey the magnitude of my fears to him -- perhaps after the fact, but not now.

*

I spend the remainder of our ride to my Ray's home planning my actions with the precision of a latter-day Hannibal. I am not self-aware enough to know if my greatest fear is of losing control of my delicate veneer of civilization or of my Ray willingly ceding control of his body over to me. And so I plan. I shall approach him slowly, cautiously and speak with him just so. I will divide myself into parts, as I have proven adept at doing in the past. I shall will my cautious self to control the actions of my body, and allow only a small selfish piece of me to feel and perhaps enjoy the physical contact my Ray so desperately craves.

Ray insists upon seeing me to my door. It occurs to me that some shadow of Fraser's essence has lingered about me and that Ray wishes to be in the presence of his ghost for just one pitiable moment longer.

Unlocking a door is a laughably easy task, one I have performed often enough that muscle memory ought to provide all of the skills necessary. My hands are shaking so badly that I drop my duffel to the floor and take a deep breath to steady my clumsy hands before my third attempt with the key. Ray angles past me and saves me from myself. He opens the door and ushers me through.

I step over the threshold and my careful, detailed plans are derailed by the welcome sight of my Ray -- the buttons of his jeans half undone -- stumbling toward me, his beloved face lit by an expression of joy mixed with frustration. His normally sure dancer's balance is interrupted by some minor flaw in the flooring of his living room. He trips and my muscle memory thankfully chooses this moment to resurface. I reach him and manage to keep him from striking his head on the edge of his coffee table by turning both of our bodies in a small circle. This action has the added bonus of toppling us onto the forgiving cushions of his sofa. I am momentarily distracted by the intoxicating sensation of his body sliding over mine.

There is no hesitation in his reaction. Before I can ask if he was injured in any way, he is fully engaged in attempting to rid both of our bodies of five days of skin starvation and sexual frustration. This is familiar territory and for the moment I am content to allow him to lead.

We are interrupted by Ray, who cannot be satisfied with placing my bag inside the door and leaving unnoticed. He tosses several smart remarks to my Ray before making good his escape. My Ray jumps up to secure the door, and I make a mental note to repay Ray in kind at some later date.

My Ray has secured his front door, but not his fear-driven imagination. He remains in his entryway with his back to the door, as though the inanimate fiberboard could provide moral support. The shaking of his limbs keeps perfect time with his quick, shallow breaths and the guilt dancing in his eyes.

He has somehow come to the erroneous conclusion that I care more for my career than the comfort of his arms. I am a police officer in blood and bone. Before taking him into my heart, joining the RCMP was the only correct path I had ever had the luck and grace to take in the life my father had so carefully mapped out for me.

The work came easily enough. But the drive and sheer need to succeed were the results of a dark hunger to fill the empty places inside of me. I never allowed myself to have the life I desired. So I sublimated that desire to a craving for the adrenaline that filled my system when I was in a foot chase or ground fight. My craving spiraled into need and finally addiction. The only time I felt alive was when I was working. It was the only time I felt anything. And then I abandoned even that. When I lost the ability to feel, I was able to convince my new self that not only did I not mind the absence of sensation, but that I actually preferred the supposed freedom it provided.

I tripped blithely through the days and nights, certain that nothing could disturb my new found peace or dent my ever-thickening armor. And indeed I almost succeeded. Unfortunately, no matter how unhuman I made my own image, there were certain metabolic functions it was still necessary for my body to perform. And to have been betrayed by my own lungs must be irony on a cosmic level.

It was one of a seemingly endless string of Tuesdays, and my Ray - but he was not then my Ray -- was standing in the reception area of the Consulate. He allowed me to perform the small courtesy of holding the door open for him, just as he always did. He walked past me, out into the deepening twilight and my traitorous lungs chose that moment to draw breath. His cologne and nervous sweat bypassed my carefully constructed conscious self and seeped effortlessly into the small center of my brain that my true self had stubbornly refused to cede. I had allowed him to touch me. Suddenly I wanted to feel. I wanted to feel him.

Addictions can be controlled and contained but never cured. I felt the dreaded, welcome liquid heat of adrenaline pouring into my veins. And I knew that the foot chase and ground fight were on.

It is difficult to say who won what exactly. I goaded him into chasing me until he caught me, and I fought myself into submission. That uncertainty aside, I am dead to rights sure of one thing. I am alive. I am not always, or even often, content. But I am always alive. Whether I am with my Ray or performing a thousand mundane tasks that otherwise fill my days, I am alive. I know that I am alive, because I feel alive. And that feeling is something I would not trade for all of the professional admiration, respect and success in the world.

My heart is confident of my Ray's love for me, but my slowly healing mind cannot help but believe that my Ray's concerns for my career are fed by his aforementioned desire to eventually rid himself of my troublesome presence. A more generous soul has never crossed my path, and I am certain that he believes that bright career prospects will ease my pain at our point of separation.

I do all I can to not trap him anymore than I already have. I therefore do not tell him that the end of us will undoubtedly signal the slow inevitable end of me. When the time comes, I shall not suicide. I could not stain his already wrongly marred conscience. There are a thousand ways for an officer of the law to die, and almost all of them end with an honor guard and a carefully folded national flag for a proud mother to clutch to her grieving bosom.

I spare a few moments of each of our times together looking for the beginnings of our end. I have no doubt that he will mourn my passing. But I also know that he will heal and find another more deserving lover.

He has me for always but I have him for now, and that will have to suffice, I suppose.

I am unsurprisingly successful at my division of self. As I spend long moments contemplating my Ray and our relationship, I am simultaneously able to soothe away his upset at his oversight concerning his now properly secured front door.

When the trembling of his limbs is no longer from fear, but rather passion, I lead him to his bed. He is so unused to my being able or willing to lead us anywhere that his usual attention to the details of my mental state is distracted enough that he does not notice that he is being led by less than all of me. He is never happy when I fragment myself, no matter the positive immediate results. He vastly prefers for me -- for us -- to work through my mental shortcomings instead of bypassing them. But I have kept him waiting for this moment for far too long, far longer than anyone else, most especially myself included, would have been willing to wait.

And so everything in me that is good and noble leads him to his bed, while my darker, baser self watches enviously and wonders how the smooth lines of a riding crop would look nestled in the skilled fingers of his dominant hand.

We arrive at the edge of his bed, and he relieves me of the burden of playing at being the leader. He pushes me gently onto the tidily made covers. He is never less than gentle with me, as though the fragility of my psyche is somehow a reflection of my physical state. Although nothing could be further from the truth, I appreciate the care nonetheless.

His legs are so tightly encased in his half-buttoned jeans that I should not find it at all difficult to believe that he is nothing more than a living statue, cast from molten metal poured directly into the confines of the flattering denim. But he sheds his second skin easily enough, if with a bit more flair than is strictly necessary.

He stands before me, gloriously unconcerned with his own nudity. He recognizes the restrained hunger burning in my eyes and reacts accordingly. He strips me playfully and handles the various pieces and acoutremont of my uniform with a skill born of familiarity. Somehow, he long ago sensed how highly erotic I find his casting off of my public persona to reveal our hidden truths. He draws out the process, carefully straightening and stowing each general issue item before moving on to the next.

Bonaparte himself would be envious of my strategy. It is flawless, but for two details -- two small details that are to prove my undoing. Namely, my Ray's adventurous spirit and, as I am to later learn, Francesca's fortuitous choice of reading material.

He lavishes attention on every inch of my lonely flesh, but his target is apparent enough. When he finally zeros in on my penis, my eyes are clenched shut in anticipation of release. I am befuddled by an odd, almost-tickling sensation around the head of my penis. But this is quickly replaced by the smooth attentions of his rough tongue and then slowly by the slick heaven of his mouth. He does not have the same level of experience as I in such matters; I pray that he never does. But he has proven to be a most enthusiastic student, and has always -- my mind willing -- been all that I could ask or wish. And yet I am caught so unawares by his next act that I find myself -- my two carefully constructed selves -- coming undone. His hand, the hand that has been wrapped around the base of my penis providing a wonderfully distracting counter-rhythm to the actions of his tongue is suddenly withdrawn, and just as suddenly replaced by his lips and his tongue and just a whisper of his teeth.

I passed the time on the ride from the airport to his building anticipating every possible turn of events, yet somehow I never saw this. I have never been so wholly within another person. It is a physical distance measured in mere centimeters, but the psychological difference is that of a bottomless chasm. I can feel my orgasm building. It is the mellow flame of a candle suddenly transformed into the white hot flash of magnesium burning through the murky depths of my soul. I release a small portion of my essence into his mouth. And for the first time, I am freed of my dark desire for long-absent tearing of flesh and letting of blood. I willingly embrace pure pleasure. For an eternal moment I am loosed from the bonds of my illness. There is no conscious thought, only disjointed motion and pure sensation.

When my mind reforms, it does so as a single entity. I dare not hope that the desire to be humiliated and cut to the bone has been exorcised from my being, but for now it is blanketed by my Ray's mouth. There is no room within the confines of my flesh for anything other than the need to have more of my Ray, to have all of him. If there is a way, I shall climb inside of him and live within his skin.

I shake off my body's impending post-orgasmic lassitude and wrest control of our little drama from my Ray. I reverse our positions so that it is he who lays before me, open and exposed. I spread his thighs gently and kneel between them. I proceed to take inventory of his numerous physical charms. When I have earned the attention of each part of his body, I rest my cheek upon one of his too-prominent hipbones and run a calloused thumb over the length of his penis. He makes a quiet sound in the back of his throat that indicates he is content for the moment, but that the moment is doomed to pass quickly.

I close my eyes to look over the precipice of our relationship and with a feeling that is frighteningly akin to joy, I take one step forward and then another.

"Ray?"

"Hmmm. . ."

"Where is it?"

After a hesitation that could only be accurately measured in nanoseconds, he stretches an arm toward the small table that stands next to his bed. I lift my head and free him to finish his journey. He retrieves his thankfully broken-in vibrator and a tube of not new lubricant and entrusts them both to me.

I attempt to handle the situation with typical Turnbull aplomb, but lust and inexperience wreak havoc upon my fingers. I fumble ineffectually with both of my Ray's most beloved possessions. Abashed, I admit defeat. I set his vibrator on the bed and make and ineffectual attempt at an apology, unable to form a new plan to overcome this unexpected obstacle. Ray rides to my rescue. With no pretense and the succinct comment, "Me too," he slathers the little miracle of modern sexual science on my suddenly too-large fingers. He then presses himself to me, spreads his knees, places a comforting arm about my neck and waits without comment.

My stunned hand jerks to life and I caress his ass with my still dry palm before my fingers and I, crudely but accurately, take the plunge. The enthusiastic vocalizations and sweat I coax from his body tell me I am taking far too much time and care with my ministrations, but they are as much for my benefit as his, and I do not think he would begrudge me such a small indulgence.

My Ray's elegant frame begins to quiver and, uncertain of the cause, I cease my attentions to his body. But before I can question him about his physical response, he exhorts me to continue.

Just as I am struck by the thought of how much I envy the fingers of my left hand, my Ray lets loose a particularly arousing moan and sinks forward to rest upon his elbows. I am moth to his flame, and make no show of resistance to this new position. I follow willingly and fold my torso over his arching, heaving form. As a small, unnoticed declaration of my claim upon him, I wrap my free arm around his stomach. His vocalizations roll over my consciousness like waves pounding the shore, and when his traitorous arms rebel, he sinks to his stomach, trapping my arm under his full weight.

My former self screams, demanding freedom. My hard won understanding sees his action for what it is -- not an attempt at control, but a surrender of sorts. It is born only of trust. I pause for a moment to savor this gift, and then extricate my arm so that I might repay him in kind.

My courage bolstered by this small victory, I take the next step. I tell him I am ready for us to proceed.

My penis is not the perpetually demanding embarrassment that it once was, but I have extended our foreplay to such a ridiculous length that I am again almost fully erect. I goad my fingers into sliding from his body with promises of other ecstasies yet to come. He rolls onto his back, not needing to be reminded of the importance I place in seeing his face during such intimate moments.

I take his vibrator and lubricant in hand yet again. I offer then to Ray, in the hopes of avoiding my earlier embarrassment. He accepts them and prepares the vibrator with a liberal coating of the lubricant. He hands me the vibrator and waits for me to do my horrible best.

I take a steadying breath and attempt to return to my original battle plan. I remind him of his long ago confession regarding another long gone vibrator. He smiles and blushes and offers to recreate the scenario he presented in his confession. His willingness to cater to my perverse whims, despite his own apparent embarrassment, endears him to me further and gives me the courage to voice my true desire. I ask him to use my blocky chest in place of his bed's headboard.

He flashes me a wickedly sweet smile and orders me to stand on the floor at the foot of his bed. I obey willingly and am rewarded with the rough soles of his feet pressing into my flesh.

A single drop of sweat slides down his stomach and disappears into the soft cotton of his sheets. I am struck by the near perfection of his skin. He has a few minor scars, each one a badge of honor to his courage. The contrast in the source of his wounds and mine suddenly looms large in my brain and I force him to jump through yet another of the many hoops I have set before him.

"Ray?"

"Yeah, babe."

"Do you love me, Ray?"

"Oh, yeah."

"What about trust?"

"Hmmm. . ."

"Ray. Do you trust me?"

"Sure."

"Would you do something for me then?"

"Anything."

"Anything?"

He had been responding casually, but now his detective's mind takes over. I can see him working furiously to form a reply that we can both find peace with.

"Rennie, I'd. . . I'd do anything for you that you'd want to do for me."

My public life is one of levels and layers of lies, but our relationship is built on small truths. This is never more clear to me than when my Ray speaks of us.

It is my turn to tease. Such playfulness does not come naturally to my, but his response tells me I do well enough when the pressure is on. I ruin his expert job on the vibrator by smearing the lubricant down the small section he purposefully left dry to give me a safe handhold. I turn on the vibrator and place it on his belly, where it hums contentedly, nestled next to its living counterpart. A dull shade of disappointment covers his eyes for a moment, until it is burned away by a bright flame of understanding as I lean in and whisper in his passion reddened ear.

"I'm ready, Ray."

I release his feet, part the cheeks of his ass with my oafish hands and align my penis with his body.

I fully intend to watch him closely as I penetrate his sphincter - to gauge his reaction and feed off of his pleasure. But as my penis is enveloped by the moist ridged warmth of his body, I am lost to the genetically implanted necessity of moving forward, ever forward to seek my release.

Even the enthusiasm of my body cannot fully supplant the sputtering stops and starts that are ample evidence of my inexperience in coital matters. My hips set a steady rhythm and then my penis sends a message to my brain informing it of the abject pleasures of sodomy. My brain is understandably distracted by these attempts at rational thought and the rhythm is lost. This frustrating vignette continues until I feel my Ray's hands, steady enough to fire a semi-automatic with accuracy, press into the yielding flesh of my ass and set rhythm for us both. His experience and enviable ability to simultaneously writhe, scream, undulate and control my thrusting carry us both.

When he is satisfied that I can keep his tempo and frustrated by his own need for release, he lets loose his hold on my ass and pushes the vibrator aside. It falls to the floor, forgotten for the moment.

He takes his pleasure and his penis into his own hands. Not having had benefit of a pre-coital orgasm, he is perilously close to the edge. He greedily strokes himself to orgasm. The resulting syncopated grasp and release of his internal muscles override my underdeveloped thrusting skills.

I ride out the wave of his orgasm and then return to my own clumsy ride. I cannot recall where my hands or my mouth were during this last desperate thrusting and when I come across, small stars burst behind my clenched eyes and I allow all of my mind to follow my body on its rocking, thrusting, falling, coasting ride. I lose control of my arms and collapse in an undignified, jerking heap upon my Ray. He patiently soothes my newly aware flesh with long, comforting strokes of his skilled hands on my quivering back. When my ungainly weight begins to crush his slight frame, he informs me, without benefit of words, that my penis has out stayed its welcome. I withdraw from his body and roll us so that he is now dominant.

We spend several moments floating in a state of post-coital bliss. I am shocked back to full awareness by what I initially mistake to be the firing of a gun at close quarters.

I quickly and carefully slide from under my Ray and reach for the handgun I keep stowed under his mattress. My Ray's delayed response eases my fears and allows my rational mind to remind me that the noise lacked the shark crack of the hammer of a gun lighting black powder.

I collapse in relief and embarrassment onto his bed and leave my Glock resting on my heaving stomach. My Ray comes sauntering into his bedroom, comfortable in his much admired stated of undress, and makes a lurid show of taking a drink from a bottle of off-label, West Coast vintner's idea of champagne. His eyes widen in a show of psuedo-uncertainty and asks, "So was it okay for you?"

I groan, force myself to my feet, replace my Glock in its less than secure hiding place, and walk to his side. He offers me the bottle. I take a decadently large swig of the so-called bubbly and answer in a deadpan, "It's not something I'd care to repeat."

His face falls and I let my smile show. He smacks me on the chest and takes the bottle from me. His tilts his head back, trying to match my swallow. My airplane-dry lips take advantage of his exposed neck.

He pushes me away.

"Whoa there, Cowboy. Big Daddy needs a shower and the John."

"Excellent idea, Ray. Shall we?"

"What mean me, white man? There are some things a guy has to do for himself."

"It's a bit late in the game to feign modesty, don't you think?"

"Hey, I am all over a buddy shower, but I'm covered in spack, and I don't mean on the outside. Get my drift?"

I blush.

"Ha! Made you blush."

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Did not."

This conversation continues as we make our way to the bathroom, where he unceremoniously shuts and locks the door in my face. As I turn away, I swear I hear a final muffled, "Did too."

***********

It's early Thursday evening, and I'm passing my alone time by taking in a little mustn't let Rennie know I'm seeing it TV, making like a sea slug on the new couch Rennie and I went out and got after we ruined our old one during that whole cherry pie filling incident.

I'm sucking down suds and half-watching the bimbo of the week getting damsel-in-distressed by some overinflated overpaid overrated former profootballer who couldn't act his way out of a paper condom. I'm really wanting to fill the old hollow leg with some nutritionally void munchies to go with the intellectually void entertainment being fed to my grey matter by the top rated local network affiliate. But Rennie's due to stick his Stetson through our front door any time, so I'm obeying the newest house rule -- food stays in the kitchen.

The screen flashes to a commercial break. I hit the mute button and change my mental channel, without meaning to.

It's been a couple months since Rennie and me used our own version of the scientific method to prove the Big Bang theory. I still don't know what went on between Rennie and Fraser during their down home Mountie family reunion, but ever since Rennie came back to me, he and Vecchio have this new look they give each other whenever they hook up. Rennie's eyes ask Vecchio has he heard from Fraser and Vecchio's shoot back, "No," and how he isn't the least bit surprised. When Rennie gets his answer, I can see the dial that controls his temper click up another notch.

It's not that I haven't been wanting to change my name to Buttinski, but things with Rennie have been almost smooth sailing, what with him taking over my ass as his new favorite play thing, and it ain't like Fraser's ever listened to my two cents worth. So I've been making like Tiny Tim, tiptoeing around keeping my two lips shut. Besides, ever since Vecchio spilled the three bean salad about his undercover gig, Rennie's been one underestimated overprotective mother hen.

I got to admit I'm still on Big Red's side where the whole star spangled banner crossed lovers thing is concerned, but telling that to Rennie would be like playing with a six foot three inch bonfire and I don't want to be the one to get cut.

I'm just sliding my size ten leather uppers off the coffee table so I can send them to the fridge for the last can of brew when I get a call. The ringer starts hammering and I let my feet do the walking. I pick the receiver up and get a pick me up.

It's Fraser on the other line. He tells me how it's almost the Canadian Turkey day and how he's been "strongly encouraged" to take some of his V time so he doesn't lose it at the end of the year.

He asks if Rennie's offer of our sofa is still good. I tell him the sofa's changed but the offer hasn't. Then I tell him why the sofa's changed, and I believe that whole "hear a pin drop" phone promo because the whoosh of blood rushing to his face comes over the line loud and clear.

He stammers and "now, Ray's" me and it's almost like we're back in the day. He asks after everybody except the body he's really asking after. We're yakking like a couple of Polish grandmothers leaning over our back fences when that pop noise comes across the line. I'm not ready to so long him just yet. I tell him to hang on; I've got another call.

I click over, but I'm wrong. It's not another call. It's the call. Vecchio's talking. I can't make out the words, but it's okay. No, it's not okay, it's. . . understood. Every Mother Father Husband Wife Lover Son Daughter of every cop that has ever been understands that voice. It's the voice that says, "You know that thing that your own personal piece of the thin blue line promised you would never happen? It's happened."

Vecchio tries to give me details -- to tell me which Emergency Department they're at, but I already know. They're at the Public Hospital. It's where all good cops go to die.

I don't tell him goodbye or okay or anything.

The me that jumps on big motorcycles and jumps through bigger windows takes over from the me that pukes and screams like a girl in a rat factory.

I click back over and tell Fraser I have to go -- Vecchio just gave me the call. He says, "Of course," and, "Let me know how it goes," and, "Drive safely."

I might have driven safely, then again, I might not have driven at all. I never could remember a single stop sign or landmark of that trip. I reach the E.D. and make an entrance worthy of an aging drag queen. I burst through the glass doors and land in a sea of blue.

I'm working my way through the noise and stink of a couple baker's dozens of street cops and desk types when Huey snags me by the sleeve of my ratty olive drab Rennie hand me down sweater. He doesn't ask me how I found out about Rennie on my day off. E-mail has nothing on cops for spreading the news.

He tells me they've got a good line on the suspect, but they're going to need my help and we got to head out right now.

I've got two choices and less than two seconds to choose.

Choice one: I pull away from him and tell him that's the love of my worthless life behind that white curtain with the blood spatters, and I could give less than half a pity fuck about the suspect -- that I'm staying right there until I know, until I believe that Rennie's not going anywhere but home with me.

Choice two: I nod my head and follow like a good little round peg in a round hole, normal unbent untwisted man's man cop.

I spare a glance at the curtain and the blood that's now dripping onto the floor. I spare a thought for Rennie's promising career. I tell myself that Rennie is going to be all right and he's going to need his job so he can draw that sorry excuse for a Canadian exchange rate pension when he's ninety. I try to make myself believe it. I rip my heart out of my chest and leave it on the floor next to Vecchio's imported calf skin loafers and the spot where Rennie's blood is starting to thicken and dry.

I roll my round peg ass out to Huey's car and don't listen to a word he doesn't stop saying all the way to the suspect's suspected location.

I didn't know the who, what, when, why and how of where we were riding to. The only think my over stressed under skilled mind could wrap itself around and cling to was the one thing, the one word no one had said.

I was pinning all my hopes to my sleeves with needles made of silence. As long as they kept calling the guy a suspect, scumbag, deadmeat, motherfucker -- anything other than Copkiller -- I knew Rennie was still alive.

I remember more about catching the guy than about the trip to the hospital, but not much. I ended up with a commendation and another award for bravery. Huey told me later that I pulled some officer to safety when the suspect shot him in the groin. Huey also told me that when it came time to chase the guy down, I was ruthless. I just shrugged. I wasn't surprised. It's hard to be any other way when you don't have a heart.

Huey and I cornered the guy -- Crawford "Dollar Bill" Hill - a half-bit wanna -be player who couldn't finish a crack buy on the Home Shopping Network -- in a deadend deadman's alley in China town not fifty feet from Fraser's favorite family restaurant. Huey shook his broad shoulders out -- all ready to get his game all over Hill's sorry ass and Dollar Bill folded. He proned himself out on the pavement and waited for us to cuff him. Huey stood over him, making his decision -- gun or cuffs. Finally Huey hooked him up and left him laying on the garbage covered pavement -- figured he'd feel like he was among friends, I guess.

Huey got on the radio and gave dispatch the low down. Officers started to trickle and then pour in. Huey walked Dollar Bill to a near by squad car and stopped to pose for the local media -- I snagged a still running squad car and headed for Rennie.

When I walked back into the E.D., I stepped into Hell. Things had pretty much cleared out. There were the usual helpless and hopeless sitting and bleeding quietly in chairs as they waited patiently to be seen by sleep deprived, caffeine fueled residents in residence.

There were no officers anywhere. The curtain that had kept my eyes from Rennie was open. The space was newly cleaned and the smell hinted at the much desired, never attained sterile environment.

I froze solid as Arctic soil. I could tell the world was still going on all around me. I could see it and hear it and smell it, but I couldn't feel it. I couldn't feel anything except the worn, scratched floor tiles crumbling under my feet and the sickening uplift of my stomach as I started to fall. A hand pulled me back at the last second -- a small soft hand. Frannie squeezed me like a grapefruit and told me how she was glad I was there; Rennie was worried about me. I wanted her to sit down and pull me onto her lap and hold me while I cried it all better. But the guy who walked me out of this room hadn't changed any in the last four hours, so I couldn't ask her.

Instead I asked her where Rennie was. She led me to the elevator that went to the city's morgue. Only we went up, not down.

We stepped out onto the fourth floor and were surrounded by a bunch of beat cops who were slapping me on the back with their greasy pizza eating hands and shouting for details around the free-to-police deep dish everything-but-the-kitchen-sink special filling their mouths.

Frannie cleared them off of me with her newly earned Officer's Voice and inborn Italian pseudo-sister protectiveness. She told them Rennie had first dibs on my story and since he could only have one visitor at a time, they'd just have to wait.

They shuffled back to their pizza and Frannie hustled me to Rennie's door. She told me to take my own sweet time. She and her partner had door duty and no one -- NO ONE -- but her was going to step in that door until I stepped out of it.

*

I open the door and walk in blind. The lights are real low and I don't know what I'm going to find. I really don't care about him for me. He's alive; that's all I need to know. I'll spend the next fifty years emptying his colostomy bag and sponge bathing him and thank God for the privilege. But I care a whole lot about him for him.

I know he thinks he's only as good and important as the things he does, and to not be able to do those things will kill him from the inside out.

I close my eyes to the dark and turn an ear to where the bed should be. I hear the soft steady beep of Rennie's heart bouncing up and down on the monitor and that's all -- no struggling suctioning whoosh of a breathing machine or humming of a brain monitor or a thousand other death knells.

He's got a bandage around his left shoulder and a tube sticking out of his left arm. His face is clean. There's dried blood all gooped up in his hair. He's not wearing a gown, but the blanket is pulled half-way up his chest. His smooth skin is glowing blue in the light of the heart monitor. His lips are pale and there are big dark circles under his eyes.

I walk over to him, but I don't touch him. I don't know if he wants me to touch him.

He clears his sandpaper throat and takes a sip of the hospital water I offer him. He's just a little too eager to lean back into the raised mattress.

"It was a single shot. It went straight through muscle and exited cleanly. I fell into a pile of refuse. There was more blood loss than there should have been because I resisted when the medics tried to strap me to the gurney. Ray convinced them to transport me without restraints.

I start to cry and start to talk before I can stop myself.

"You look like shit."

His eyes are begging me for something, but my thick as a brick wall brain doesn't figure it out until he asks me flat out.

"How do I feel?"

I'm together enough to remember he might not want my flyweight frame resting on him after his fight with the EMT's. I hang onto the edge of the bed with both hands and lean over and kiss him. His mouth tastes like his Mountie buddies have been using it for a barn, but I don't care. I kiss him and kiss him and don't stop kissing him until his heart monitor starts doing the Cha-cha in triple time.

He pulls back first and scoots over to the far edge of the bed. There isn't a lot of space, but that's okay, there isn't a lot of me. I slip in next to him and make like superglue on his unpunctured side. We've got a lot to talk about and some for me to yell at him about and more for him to yell at me about. But that's for later. Now is for holding and crying and praying, "Thank you, God."

We stay like that until Frannie sneaks in and tells me Welsh called and said there are blank offense forms at the station, sitting on my desk calling my name. I stand up, kiss Rennie and tell him I'll be back. He tells me to be safe. It's something we say each time the other leaves for work, but now the words have new layers of hope and fear.

I give him a promise I have no control over, put on my Detective Kowalski face and step out into the hallway. I give the officers -- who are now working on some cheese danish -- a macho Reader's Digest condensed version of Huey's heroics and head off to live the lie that is my life for one more day.

I break several land speed handwriting records pumping out my reports and reports about my reports and supplements to my reports. I shower in the locker room and change into the clothes hanging in my locker, after smelling them to make sure they aren't clothes I changed out of the last time I needed to change out of clothes at work.

I walk into the Hospital and run into Vecchio. I haven't got the whole story from Rennie, so I don't know if I should thank Vecchio or kick him in his skinny Dago ass. I settle for saying, "Hey."

He's got one of those cardboard drink holders with four large coffees. I ask if he's been demoted to errand boy and he says how anything is better than being in the same room as Rennie's boss and Welsh's boss. I allow as how that's probably a wise decision. We share an elevator and the short walk to Rennie's room, where the brass and Frannie are waiting for us. Both commanders are making all soft and cuddly in front of Rennie, but their edges are hard as steel and their eyes are colder than a well-digger's shovel.

Rennie sees me and tells the room at large that he's needing some beauty rest. Vecchio suggests someone stay with him in case he wakes up and needs anything. I offer up.

The brass eyes me up and down and up again. I snag a chair and eye them right back, daring them to cross me. They walk out and my memory rushes in.

"Fraser."

"What, Ray?"

"Fraser, I was on the other line with him when I got the call. I need to let him know you're going to be okay."

Rennie hits his nurse-call button. A round breasted mattress thrasher who looks too happy to help Rennie to make me happy about her being at his beck and call wiggles her hourglass figure into his personal space and asks what she can do for him.

He flashes killer smile number seventy-four and asks her to get Vecchio. She turns on her heel like a good puppy and goes to fetch him.

When Vecchio pokes his head into the room, Rennie asks him for a favor. Vecchio says, "Sure."

Sucker.

Rennie tells him about my phone call and then tells him to call Fraser. Vecchio's eyes dull down and his spine folds in on itself, just a bit. He doesn't even argue. He's given up hoping. He says, "Sure," again and asks me for the number. I hand him a scrap of paper I keep in my wallet and he leaves us alone.

"What was that all about?"

"Just another little push in what I hope it the right direction."

"Shoving the guy off a cliff, more like."

"Not him, Ray, Fraser."

"How exactly is Vecchio's voice supposed to push Fraser in the right direction?"

*

*

"Oh."

*

"You really are an evil son of a bitch, and I love you for it. You think it will work?"

"I don't know, Ray. But I haven't been able to form a better plan."

"He's coming, you know, for Canadian Thanksgiving. When the Hell is Canadian Thanksgiving anyway? And how come you guys got to have a Thanksgiving? Copycatters."

"Two weeks from Thursday, and I shall ignore your latest insult regarding Canadian cultural celebrations."

"Oh, yeah and what if I keep reminding you? You going to make me pay for it?"

"Quite possibly."

"Oooh, I'm shaking and it ain't from fear. Lay one on me Big Man. Umm. . . Did I mention I brought you my toothbrush?"

*

It doesn't take me too long to find a phone at an abandoned nurses station -- staffing isn't what it used to be. The phone rings twice and a professional courteous, non-Benny Canadian picks up the line.

"Wooten barracks, second floor."

"Yeah, uh, is. . .is Constable Fraser there?"

"One moment, sir, I'll check his room. Whom shall I say is calling?"

"Just get him, will you?"

I hear the phone hit the wall and footsteps walking away. Less than a minute later and he's on the phone. He sounds the same, and I don't manage to not wonder if he looks and smells the same.

"Constable Fraser here."

I don't know what to call him, so I don't call him anything.

"Turnbull got shot once, in the shoulder. It went straight through. He's going to be okay. They're keeping him in the hospital for a couple days for observation -- to make sure he doesn't get an infection."

He doesn't give me anything but silence. I didn't expect anything else. I didn't even hope for anything else. I go to hang up the phone. I hear his voice come over the line and almost hang up anyway, almost.

". . .Ray, Ray. . ."

"I'm here."

*

*

*

"It's . . . good . . . to hear your voice, Ray."

*********

The instructors' barracks come equipped with a single phone on each floor. This particular version is in a small poorly lit space that was tightly retrofitted between what now serve as the men's and women's shower rooms sometime not long after the Second World War. It is damp and hot and smells of lead-based paint and mildew.

I have stood in this very both countless times with one hand on the receiver and the other full of quarters, practicing what I might say to him. I often stand in here for an hour or more, unaware of those who pass by until someone raps politely on the door and asks if I am done with my call.

And I find myself standing here once again, this time a lucky victim of Turnbull's cruel fate.

"It's. . . good. . . to hear your voice, Ray."

I find myself absentmindedly caressing the pay telephone. As though my touch could somehow be transmitted along with my voice and relieve me of some of the burden of voicing my tightly bound emotions.

I hear him swallow and then sigh, but no verbal response is forthcoming. I am tempted to hand up the receiver and replace this fresh raw pain with the now familiar dull ache of loneliness. But memories of my conversation with Turnbull bolster my courage and I plow ahead.

"How. . . how is the weather?"

I make a very poor showing of it, but it is the best I can do. I press my forehead to the phone and pray he understands. Silence is his only response.

There is a polite rap at the phone booth's flimsy door. It is my co-teacher of choice, Corporal Preetish, and it is now three minutes past time for his daily call to his lovely future bride, Dipa.

"Fraser, if it wouldn't be any trouble, I should like to use the telephone."

I plead quietly into the mouthpiece, "Please, Ray." Please, God, let him give me something, anything.

"Constable?"

I resist the desire to throttle the man with my free hand and manage to sound fairly calm.

"One moment, Corporal, if you please."

"Please, Ray?"

I wait for nearly a full minute. I am nowhere near patient, buy my deeply-ingrained stubborn streak is rewarded for being the sometime-virtue that it is.

"It snowed on Monday. But then the thermometer went back up on Tuesday. The snow mixed with car exhaust and turned into black slush. It's still hanging around and it's supposed to get cold again tonight. So the city is probably going to be covered in dirty, nasty, refrozen black slush crap by morning."

The ice in my veins begins to break apart and I smile.

"That's wonderful, Ray."

I can hear Preetish shuffling his immaculate uniform shoes on the well-worn hallway floor tiles. There is nothing more that can be said between Ray and I with a fellow officer so close at my hand.

"I must go now, Ray. I have a superior officer waiting to use the phone."

"Sure thing, I wouldn't want him to beat you to death with all three pages of the Runamuckluk phone book."

His voice lacks the sharp, stinging bite of acrid wit that I long ago came to associate with affection. It now resembles nothing so much as the rasping straw-throated hollow men. But he tried. He is trying.

We are, neither of us, at all good at this sort of thing. But I am emboldened by his favorable response to my first question. And so I chance another.

"May I call you?"

"I'm not sure if. . ."

"I am, Ray. I'm very sure."

"If you want to. I guess."

"I do want to. And I will. I'll call you soon, very soon. Goodbye, Ray."

"Later."

"Yes, Ray, later -- but soon."

"Hang up the phone."

"Yes, Ray."

"Now."

I hang up the phone and open the poorly constructed door in somewhat of a daze. Preetish is by now used to seeing me emerge from this booth in an altered state of mind, but not this particular state.

"Is everything well, Fraser?"

I grasp him firmly by the shoulders and smilingly deliver the news of the day.

"The weather in Chicago is just horrible."

Preetish, a veteran of a long tempestuous courtship with his fiancée understands instantly the source of my happiness.

"I am very glad to hear that, my friend."

"Thank you."

I clap his shoulders again, we shake hands and he shakes his head in amusement as I whistle my way back to my room.

I stop there long enough to gather my coat and Diefenbaker. We walk to a little-used section of Depot grounds and then we run and stomp through the pristine powder snow, full of the joy of being alive.

*

I hang up the phone and walk further down the hall, away from Rennie's honor guard. The HMO that runs this joint is too cheap to keep it fully staffed, so most of the rooms on this wing are empty. I round a corner and duck into a room. I do a quick once over and make sure it isn't being used. Then I squat down with my back to the heavy door, but my bald head in my bony hands and bawl.

When the wells have run dry, I blow my overgrown nose, wash my face in the wheelchair accessible sink, dry it on a musty towel and walk out to put on the show that I have made my life into for one more day.

***********

It's Saturday afternoon and for once, it's actually my Saturday afternoon. Rotating shifts are hell on the body, but this is the payoff -- three actual weekends off in a row every six months or so. Of course, I haven't done any real work since Thursday and probably won't for the next week. Being the virtual-partner of a cop who takes a bullet does have residual benefits. And seeing as how the worst thing Rennie is going to have to show for all of this is a new pair of scars -- matching entrance and exit wounds -- I can sit back and enjoy myself a little.

I'm doing bedside watch with Rennie to give him a break from Stanley "Can I get you anything?" Kowalski's inner mother hen. He's been in a good mood since I told him about my phone call to Canada on Thursday. I guess he's pretty pleased with himself. I don't know how I feel, except maybe scared shitless. But I can't let myself brood over it in front of Rennie. If I start making unhappy faces, I'll have to live through another lecture. And it's bad form to shoot a guy that's still in the hospital from being shot by some other guy. I know. I asked around.

We're passing the time trading dirty limericks. Rennie let it slip once that he remembers everything he ever hears. And after listening to him spout ten poems for each one of mine, I believe it.

"There once was a Greek aviator, with a penis shaped like. . ."

Rennie and I hear the door open at the same time, but I'm laughing too hard and have to wipe the tears out of my eyes to see who the intruder is. So Rennie gets the first word in.

"Hello, Ray."

"Hey, Stan, you aren't supposed to be back here for another four hours. You've got to get some sleep."

"You know I don't sleep good without Rennie there. I can sleep in a chair."

Rennie and I had talked about what Stan did after the shooting. He knew they needed to have it out and soon or Stan was going to guilt himself into his very own hospital bed. He'd spent most of his time since the shooting here in Rennie's room, maybe too much time. I had already heard a few whispers from the officers out in the hallway. I'd warned Rennie about that too and he said he'd take care of it. I wish I knew for certain what his idea of taking care of it was.

"Ray, please go home and get some good sleep. I'm going to be released tomorrow and I'll need you to be awake and healthy to help me around the apartment.

Man oh man, if Stan wasn't here, I would bow to the master. Rennie has his man's number down to the decimal point. Guilt is the only language Stan seems to speak anymore. He's shuffling his feet and looking like he just homered a baseball through St. Theresa's stained glass window.

"Okay, okay, but there's someone downstairs who wants to talk to Vecchio. And I'm not leaving you alone in this wasteland that passes for a city hospital. I'll wait with you until he's done outside."

"Who is it now? I've already made my reports to Internal Affairs and the shooting team and the district attorney and Welsh."

"What do I look like, your social secretary? You want I should get you a cup of coffee and let you chase me around your desk too, Vecchio?"

"Don't tempt me, Stan. I bet those legs of yours would look pretty good in a little mini-skirt and some spike heels."

Rennie really gets off on Stan and me getting along, so he's been smiling through our whole exchange. When I get to the last part, he kind of snickers and Stan turns on him.

"Are you taking his skinny-assed side now?"

"Actually, Ray, I was wondering where we might acquire a pair of spiked heels in your size."

"Har de ha ha. That is not funny. I am not laughing at that."

I leave them to their lovetalk. I make sure the door is shut behind me and that Frannie is the one guarding the door. I wave my good-byes to the now considerably smaller honor guard. I round the corner on my way to the elevators and am suddenly chest to chest with Canada's Finest and finest.

"Ray."

"Fraser."

"Ray."

We stand there like the couple of idiots that we are. And I think we might grow old like this -- Ray, Fraser, Ray, Fraser, Ray -- then we hear a couple of voices coming our way. It's Huey and Dewey. We both know it and we both know, without saying anything, that we don't want to see them just now.

He grabs me by the lapels of my newest off the boat Italian wool winter coat and pulls my into the nearest room. Grace of God, it's empty. He's got me pressed up against the wall. His fingers are still wrapped in my lapels and he's looking at me like he doesn't hate me after all.

He says my name again and tries to kiss me. I turn my head away.

"Don't do that."

"Please, Ray."

"You don't want this. You don't want me. You can't."

"But I do, Ray."

"Not if you knew."

"It doesn't matter. Whatever you did, it doesn't matter."

I shake my head.

"Tell me, Ray. Tell me everything."

I open my mouth to say I can't tell him anything and to just let me go. Before I can say the words, we hear quiet voices muffled by the thick door. He puts his warm hand over my mouth, real soft like.

"Not here."

I nod and he takes his hand away. I want him to put it back.

"I have to see Turnbull first -- and Ray."

He's moved in so close to me that when I nod again, the tip of my nose brushes his cheek. He shivers.

"Come with me?"

"I can't -- not like this. I don't want to see anybody."

"Then wait for me. Wait in your car. We'll go somewhere."

I don't say anything. I've already cried one too many times in this hospital.

"Please, Ray, where can we go?"

How the hell should I know where we can go? We can't go to my place, Ma and the kids would be all over him. He doesn't have a place anymore, not even that godforsaken office he called a home.

"Your hotel room?"

"I didn't let a hotel room."

I start to make a crack about proper preparation and he reads my mind. He cuts me off.

"We'll get one as soon as I'm done here. I need to see Turnbull first."

"I know."

I think he's going to kiss me now. I think I'm going to let him. The voices of people walking down the hall interrupt us. It's Huey and Dewey again. He backs away from me and straightens his jacket.

"Benny?"

"Yes, Ray?"

"I'm really fucked up."

"I know, Ray."

"I'm sorry for everything, Benny. Even the things you don't know about."

"As am I."

"You go see Rennie. I'll be in the Riv, I promise."

"I have faith in you, Ray."

I don't know what to say to that, so I nod for the millionth time and walk out to try to meet my goal of keeping one promise a day.

***********

A table with two chairs, an entertainment center, wetbar with key, fiberboard dresser and mirror, a nailed-to-the-wall vanity counter, two nightstands, two lamps, one mass-produced oil painting, a bathroom door that comes complete with fire escape map, and a bed with a washed-out pastel scratchy thin comforter, the lingering threat of old cigarette smoke -- it could be any rack-rate room in any hotel in any decent-sized city in America, but it's not. It's the room I've plunked down too many greenbacks for. It's the room we should have been in almost a year ago. The room Benny is going to call home for the next eighteen hours or so. The room that he insisted would come with one bed -- one very big bed.

Being a hotel desk clerk isn't like being a cop, but it must be close enough because the "knit one, purl two" grandmother behind the counter didn't bat an eyelash at Benny's request -- just asked if we wanted our big-bed room to come with a view of the river.

I don't know if it's my porno-based solo sex life or Benny's letting the desk clerk and a good number of the lobbyrats think that we're here to do the nasty, but I've got the sense I'm looking at the bed through one of those fisheye camera lenses. It feels like it takes up sixty percent of the room and the longer I hang in the doorway, the bigger it's getting.

I can't let myself forget that we aren't here to take advantage of each other or that bed. We're here to play "This is Your Sick and Twisted Life." I'm the only contestant tonight. I know what he said back at the hospital about not caring about what I've done, but he doesn't have clue one about who I did some of those things to -- some of the worst things -- and I'm afraid she's going to be the straw that breaks the Mountie's heart.

I'm staring at the room -- at the bed that now takes up seventy-five percent of the room -- and Benny's staring at me. He's still standing in the hall, carrying his bedroll and knapsack. He's a finger's breadth away, closer than I've let anyone get since I evicted Armando Langostini from my brain and chose to become the inky shadow of my old self. Benny brushes the backs of his knuckles lightly against the back of what is left of my hair. I don't lean into his touch, but I don't pull away.

"Ray, my bags are rather heavy. If you wouldn't mind?"

Old die-hard habits and patterns. His bags are heavy, but he could carry them for hours without feeling the weight. Constable Benton Fraser, RCMP, would rather chew sandpaper than point out someone's shortcomings. So saying, "My bags are rather heavy," is much easier for him than, "You idiot, stop standing in the hallway like a virgin on prom night."

I put my right foot in the room. I take my right foot out. I Hokey Pokey my skinny ass into the hall and motion for Benny to lead the way. He acts like my dance number is the most normal thing in the world, like it's some Inuit ritual to welcome him to my fair garbage-strewn city. He thanks me kindly and steps through the mental barrier I had put over the door. He walks inside and places his bags on the dresser. He takes off his jacket and drapes it over the back of one of those chairs. He can't hang it up because the closet is hidden behind the door that I'm still standing in front of.

Benny takes too much time with making sure his jacket is resting just so. He lines up the shoulder seams with the edges of the back of the chair and then smoothes the yoke under his restless fingers. When he realizes what he's doing, his hands slow and then stop, but they don't move away from the water-resistant material. He turns his head to where I'm still standing under the door's frame.

The room is cool and quiet, and we are still. He stands in his chosen spot and looks at me. He's not staring into me or trying to work through the maze that is my twisted mind. He's just got his eyes on me. Maybe he doesn't know what to do with me now that he knows he can have me -- like a Christmas present that doesn't live up to the commercial hype. I half-expect him to turn away from me. At least I tell myself I won't be surprised if that's what he does. Expect the worst. Don't dare to hope for the best. That way, if the worst happens, I haven't stepped so far out of the dark that I can't find my way back.

Benny holds his hand out to me. I feel Armando Langostini standing at my shoulder and hear him whispering in my ear. Armando Langostini doesn't come when called. Armando Langostini is the one who snaps his freshly manicured you'd-better-come-running fingers.

Benny tilts his head in a silent invitation and I tell Armando Langostini that I'm going in and he isn't welcome.

I put my right foot in the room. I take a shaky breath. I put my left foot in. I walk past Benny's reaching out hand and step into what used to be my piece of his personal space. He wraps his arms around my bony self. A moment in Paradise. I think about all of the things I've done to earn this piece of peace.

Benny's body goes stiff and I jealously look around to see what's taken his attention away from me. It's a youngish couple standing in the hall, giving us the "Look, Marge, faggots" twice-over. I pull away from Benny and slam the door in their judgmental faces.

I'm angry. It's easier to be angry than scared -- or honest. So I'm angry.

"Goddammed, right-winged, sanctimonious bastards. Like we're any business of theirs. He probably dresses up like a prison matron and has her fist him one every Tuesday night."

I punctuate my tirade with a well-placed expletive aimed at the thick automatically-locking door.

"Motherfuckers!"

". . .Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray. . ."

"What, goddammit?"

"May I take your coat?"

"What?"

"May I take your coat?"

"May you take my coat?"

"Yes, Ray, we've been in here for several minutes and you have yet to remove your coat. I thought you might be more comfortable without it."

"They're staring at us like we're that porn star that got elected to an Italian Congressional seat, and you want to know if you can take my coat! Don't you give a shit about what just happened?"

"I care very much, Ray."

"Then act like it."

"I care. I care that I just held you. I care that you allowed me to hold you. I care that we have been exposed to the world and that you did not run away. I care."

"Shit, Benny, don't do that."

"Don't do what, Ray?"

"Don't go all romantic and faggy on me. I hate that."

"But I am faggy, Ray. We both are."

"I am not. . .you're laughing at me."

"Never, Ray."

"I know what you're trying to do, and I'm not going to let you do it."

He's not smiling. It's killing him, but he's not smiling.

"Whatever do you mean, Ray?"

I'm no Mountie, but I can do a pretty good imitation when the mood strikes.

"Whatever do you mean, Ray? I would never try to dissuade you from your display of righteous anger, Ray. I would never distract you with the fact that you will be labeled a faggot instead of permitting you to dwell on the notion that you have just been outed to some small degree, Ray. Have you ever considered a job as an interior decorator, Ray?

"That's whatever do I mean, Benny."

I've been pacing and hand-flailing like the Italian Kowalski could only be in his dreams. I end up standing next to the bed that now takes up ninety percent of the room.

"That's just silly, Ray."

He hasn't changed. He's still the man who first came to Chicago on the trail of the killers of his father.

My ass meets the mattress and my face meets my hands. I stall by rubbing my skinny fingers over my face. I finish with my elbows on my knees and my hands folded in front of my mouth like I'm praying. It's been so long since I've done that, I'm not sure if I remember how.

I'm so far from being who I was that it had never occurred to me that Benny wouldn't -- maybe couldn't -- have changed.

"You haven't changed, Benny. I'm a different person, but you haven't changed at all.

"I'm not who I was. Not even close. I still wear the same clothes and walk and talk the same, but I'm not any closer to being the real Ray Vecchio than Kowalski ever was."

He starts to say something.

"Let me finish."

He pulls his jacket's chair out from under the table and sits. And for once, he does as I ask.

"You're you, but I'm not me. I want you. You want me. You're right here in front of me. I could reach out and touch you. But the me you want, he's not in this room. I don't know if he's anywhere.

"This isn't going to work. It can't work. When you know the things that the thing I've become has done, you won't want me. It's pointless. It's over and it's always going to be over and I should just go."

He never did take my coat, so there isn't anything keeping me here. I stand up and make my way to the door. I have my hand on the knob and I'm five seconds from Scot-free.

"You left me."

He stands up, but he doesn't walk toward me. He just takes one small step onto his soapbox.

This is what he's wanted all along -- to play the blame game. If anyone's got it coming, it's me. I wait with my hand on the doorknob. I wait for him to get his anger and pain out into the open, because then he'll be done with me and he can move on and I can stop moving at all.

"Americans seem to have a fascination with forgiving others for sins which have not been committed against them. What could I possibly care about forgiving you for the actions you took while you were undercover? You didn't do those things to me. You did them to survive. I understand that. I may not like or condone some of the things that you did. I may find them abhorrent. But you didn't do them to me. It isn't my place to judge you, and it most certainly is not my place to absolve you.

"You left me and I forgave you -- without question, without reservation, without explanation.

"And then you came back, and I was so relieved. I wanted explanations and I wanted questions answered, but the only thing I needed was you with me.

"You did come back, but you didn't come back to me. You didn't even let me get close enough to allow you to push me away. You came back only to leave again, and I hated you for it. I hated you for leaving me. Your only sin against me was leaving me. That is what I meant when I said that I forgave you. That is all I have the right to do. I forgive you and God help me, but I don't give a damn about the rest.

"I am an unyielding man, Ray Vecchio. I have never been one to compromise. You have my forgiveness for what you have done in the past, and nothing you can say will change that. But if you walk out of that door, if you leave me a third time, it will be the last time. I forgave you twice -- freely. I don't have it in me to do it a third time.

"So leave. Or stay, as you will. But understand that this time your decision is forever. You are with me or not. We are together or not. We are partners and lovers and lifemates and faggots or not."

He's run himself out of steam and me out of excuses. Is it really possible to die of fear? Right now, I'd lay odds on it. Do I release the doorknob or do I turn it? The whole rest of my life rests on the answer to this small question. Release? Turn? Fear freezes my hand. I force it to move. I try once and again and then again and finally manage to force it to move.

"So are you going to offer to take my coat or do I have to die of heatstroke here?"

"May I take your coat, Ray?"

"Thanks, Benny."

"You are most welcome, Ray."

***********

He takes my overcoat and my suit coat and hangs them in the closet. He looks over at his jacket and I know what his anal-retentive soul is thinking about. I get the jacket and hand it to him. He smiles his thanks, grateful I understand that it's being out of place would distract him during the story I'm about to spill.

He hangs his jacket next to my suit coat, and I can't help but think how good they look sitting together like that.

I sit on the edge of the bed again. The bedsprings moan out a small complaint and I slide even closer to the edge.

Benny pulls a chair over and sits in front of me, his knees touching mine.

I lean into him. He closes his eyes and moves closer to me. Our foreheads touch. I take his hands in mine and close my eyes too -- that way, I can see what I'm going to say.

My thumb rubs the fine hairs on the back of his hands, trying to soothe the wound I know I'm about to reopen.

I don't start at the beginning. I don't want to sound like I'm making excuses or making a pity play. I get paid to manipulate people for a living, and I'm damned good at it. Benny deserves better than that. He deserves "just the facts, ma'am", and that's what I'm going to give him.

When the images behind my eyes fall into a chaotic version of order, I know that it's time.

"Victoria.

"It was Victoria. One of my -- Langostini's -- one of Langostini's men caught her cheating at poker. He pointed her out on the monitor. I told him to bring her to me. Different name, different clothes, but I knew it was her right away. I never knew if she knew if I was me. I never asked. I never cared.

"I bought her. She put herself up for sale, and I paid the price. I'm still paying her price.

"I. . .I made her a whore, Benny. I used her and I passed her around like a bottle of screw-top wine. 'Good job with collections this week, Bruno. Go tell Cate I said to suck you off.' She did everything I said and I liked it.

"I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to humiliate her. She made you do things you can't ever take back, things you'll be ashamed of forever. I wanted her to know how that felt. I wanted to turn her into that thing she had tried to make you. I wanted her to look in a mirror and see the monster I saw. I wanted her to hate her own beautiful face. I was going to make her hate her beautiful face.

"I told myself that I was just trying to keep my cover. That I was doing what Armando would do. He had a certain. . .reputation, and the things I did to Victoria fit in perfectly.

"I kept telling myself that and I kept on believing it, until she died.

"I know I told her that I would kill her if she hurt you, but I didn't want. . .

"I swear. I swear to the Virgin Mary that I never wanted what she got.

"It was a drive-by. Some little punk thought he could move up in his Family by wiping out The Bookman. We were getting out of my limo -- Langostini's limo.

"She never had a chance. She was dead before I could touch her."

"I gave her a funeral, Benny. I didn't know what she believed in, but I gave her a good funeral -- Catholic Mass and everything. I did that for you. I still didn't care about her. I wanted to, but I couldn't.

"I'm sorry."

I cry heavy silent tears. Benny doesn't move, doesn't speak. I force the tears to stop and wipe my eyes with our hands.

I lean back to see if he'll look at me, hope he will still look at me.

He's looking at me. I can't tell what he's thinking, he's got his interview face on.

He eyes move to my lap. His thumb is rubbing my hand now. He lowers his head and rests it on our hands.

He's thinking. He's making up his mind. He sighs and rubs his thumb over his eyebrow. He sits up, still wearing his interview face.

"Turnbull -- Renfield -- Renfield told me what they did to you, what the FBI did to you. How they convinced you to work for them. Not all of it, but enough."

"Benny, that's not an excuse for. . ."

He puts our hands over my mouth.

"I don't know the name of the agent they sent to you. For all of our sakes, I pray I never do.

"Ray, I know that it's not something that you can see, but I have changed. I have admitted to myself that I have a bitter darkness in my soul. I am arrogant and selfish and obsessive."

I try to interrupt again.

"Stop. Listen. It's my turn to confess.

"If I were ever put into your situation. If I were chosen to be an Armando Langostini. If it were I looking into that security monitor, and I knew I was looking at that FBI agent, I would have him brought to me. I could do what you did. I would do what you did.

"I would have done exactly what you did -- with a great deal less regret."

"You can't know that, Benny."

"I know, Ray. I look at you -- at what they tried to make you -- and I know.

"There's a black, gnawing thing inside of me, Ray. It's eating away everything in me that is good. Every day that I am away from you, it grows more voracious, more demanding.

"I need you, Ray. I ache for you. You are my light, my oxygen. You are my manna from Heaven, and I won't be without you any longer.

"Please."

He leans forward. He tries to kiss me. I let him.

He presses into me. He tries to devour me. I let him.

I shake his hands off of mine and grab desperately at his head, thread my fingers into his hair and hold on much too tightly.

***********

We are here. At long last, we are here. We have spoken and touched and come to an understanding. His elegant fingers are pulling desperately at my hair. I extricate myself from his grasp and encourage his hands to circle my waist instead.

We kiss. We're too desperate to do anything else. Too long imprisoned by pain to do anything else.

We kiss our lips raw. He presses against me, hard. I press harder and we end up falling back onto the bed. My shoulders hit the mattress, and the judgmental squeak of wise, experienced bedsprings shocks me into pulling back from him. We stare into each other's eyes, searching for answers to long-held questions. I assume he finds the same truths I do, because, without taking his eyes off of mine, he reaches over and undoes the buttons of my shirt.

He's trying to go slowly, to make this last. He's trying to make it perfect. I know there's no such thing. We are going to sweat and stink, and our bodies will betray us by making comical noises. We're going to stain the covers and the sheets and perhaps the pillows as well. No one can make it perfect. But I can make it right.

"Ray?"

"Yes?"

"I want very much to show you that I love you."

"I want that too, Benny."

I sit up and press him back into the protesting mattress.

"But first, I'm going to show you how much I need you."

In our recently-begun, unusually honest correspondence, Renfield has written of Ray's self-imposed solitary state, of his continued withdrawal from friends and family and life. I shamefully admit that found dark pleasure in hoping that Ray was unwilling, unable to find happiness outside of my presence in his life.

I see the bitter truth of Renfield's words shining through the dry brightness of Ray's eyes.

His eyes are enormous, the emerald of their irises is swallowed by their fathomless pupils as his long-neglected libido explains my words to his body.

I strip us both and fall upon him like a wolf in heat. I leave no part of him untouched and very few parts unmarked.

We thrash about and wrestle for long minutes. We rub against one another and grasp at beloved flesh. We roll and twist into ridiculous positions. We tumble onto the floor and we laugh. We laugh and I know then that we have won. We are together. We will heal.

Our eyes meet and our laughter fades away. I am on my back on the rough industrial-grade carpet and he is kneeling between my legs. He leans forward and kisses me messily. Our groins meet and he thrusts against me, slowly, deliberately. I grab the perfect globes of his ass, my hands covering more than one love bite.

I rock my hips, and my hands encourage his pelvis to do the same. We find our rhythm and rush headlong toward completion.

Ray tumbles first. A voiceless gasp and arch of spine are my only warnings. He releases his seed onto my stomach and my chest, and pants his relief against my neck.

He realizes that he finished our journey alone.

"Benny?"

"Soon, Ray."

"Soon?"

"Yes, Ray."

He slides his hand through the semen splattered across my torso. His hand works its way between our bodies and his fingers wrap around my penis. He matches the tempo of his hand to that of his hips.

"Now, Ray."

"Now?"

"Now."

"Now is good, Benny. Now works for me."

I try to answer, but my orgasm takes command of my throat and loudly shouts its arrival.

Ray lowers himself onto me and covers me with his full weight. We drift lazily in a post-orgasmic haze.

"I can't believe we just did the nasty on this hard floor."

I laugh. He smiles. We drag our spent, momentarily sated selves onto the thoroughly wrecked bed. We untwist the covers and the sheets. I have no idea how that pillow came to rest on the dresser, but Ray and I can share the one I retrieved from the floor.

We hold one another for long moments. Ray senses my restlessness.

"Go get a towel, Benny."

"I'm fine, Ray."

"You know you want to clean up."

"I can clean up in the morning, Ray."

I hold out for approximately five seconds.

"I'm going to get a towel, Ray."

"Sure thing, Benny. I'll be here when you get back."

"I know."

***********

Benny is talking and trying to show me that he isn't the pure in thought and deed officer who walked up to my desk almost five years ago. And I find myself wanting to believe him, maybe even really believing him, because he's admitting that he isn't as perfect on the inside as he looks on the outside. He's copping to nasty hurtful mean thoughts and how he thinks he could act out each one of those thoughts -- and all this without anyone running high-voltage electric currents through his body.

Then it's here, the moment I've been dreading like a diabetic faced with a three-layer Black Forest cake. I know it might kill me, but I think it will be worth it. I've been alone for so long that sometimes I think my skin has a layer of permafrost that not even he can melt away.

He leans forward. He tries to kiss me. I let him.

It's put-up or shut-up time -- put-out or shut-out. My heart is a jack-hammer in my chest, and damn it if it isn't taking all of the blood that I could really use somewhere else right now.

He presses into me. He tries to devour me. I let him.

Kissing is good. I can handle kissing.

I shake his hands off of mine and grab desperately at his head, thread my fingers into his hair and hold on much too tightly. If I kiss him good enough, maybe I can make him forget about the rest of it -- for a while.

We kiss a lot. We've got the kissing thing down pat, but everything else I've got is down too. No up anywhere, if you get my drift. My lips are getting raw, his are already there. I start to panic, until he starts to make those noises. He moans low in his throat and then he's humming while he's kissing me.

I know what comes next. I remember what comes next.

He's going to start sex-talking me.

He starts sex-talking me.

A couple more hums and moans and then I find out my skin is addicting, that I taste like honeyed musk behind my left ear, that he loves my nose, gets turned on just thinking about touching my bald head, thinks about my hands when he masturbates, that he wants to crawl inside of me and live there.

The best part about his sex-talk, he doesn't know he's doing it. I asked -- teased -- him about it last time, and he just said, "I most certainly do not." And he meant it.

He gets to that part about my hands, and my dick realizes that he just said "masturbate" -- that he does masturbate. I get the Technicolor wide-screen version of that film in my head. My dick is hard, really and truly a full-press boner. I don't know if it's going to turn into anything more than that. Right now, I'm just happy that it's willing to come out and play while there's someone else to play with.

Even if I can't come through -- so to speak -- I can come through for Benny. He thinks about my hands while he's working himself over? We can always find out if reality can live up to his fantasies.

Now that I'm a man with a plan, I feel kind of confident and maybe even relaxed.

I'm going to make this perfect.

I try to go slow, make him as comfortable as I feel. He's got his own ideas, tells me he's going to show me how much he needs me.

Need. That word sums up the last two years of my life. No matter what I was doing or not doing, everything -- every day -- had a quiet, desperate undercurrent of need running through it.

I can see that he can see the pain that has made a home for itself in the back of my eyes. I am sure that it will be too much, that it will ruin the mood.

But once he's decided on a course of action, Benton Fraser, RCMP, is not a man to be denied. He has decided that he is going to have this. He is going to have me -- now.

Then we're rubbing and doing a horizontal bump and grind. We have to look like a couple of Greco-Roman wrestlers -- complete with historically accurate uniforms, or lack of uniforms. We're sweating and straining and serious as Hell, and Benny's doing his play-by-play announcer bit.

Then he does some fancy move and my bony ass meets the rough nylon carpet. He's right with me and barely manages to keep from planting an elbow in my ribs.

I think about explaining how I got a crushed sternum to the emergency room docs, and I laugh. Benny must have read my mind, because he laughs too.

We're laughing together and it is perfect. I realize everything is going to be okay, maybe not right now or next week, but soon.

One minute we're laughing, the next we're going at it like hamsters.

I'm not even worried about whether I'm going to get off or not. I figure I can always do that hand thing for Benny today. Me we can keep working on until we get it right.

I guess not caring about about it is the secret to doing it right. Not only do I come, I come hard. I come first. Then I realize Benny is the one who's stuck in libido limbo.

I do the hand thing. It does the trick.

He screams so loud, even he hears it. We lay there on the floor, just too damned tired to care that we're laying on the floor. Another room and another floor and another orgasm pop into my head.

"I can't believe we just did the nasty on this hard floor."

He laughs at me. I smile at him. We both take it as a signal that it's time to crawl into what's left of the bed. Since Benny is Benny, we fix things up before we get under the covers.

I'm proud of Benny. A complete stranger might not be able to tell that His Anal-Retentiveness really, really wants to clean up.

His fidgeting is really starting to bug me. And when he bugs me, I tease him. It's the natural order of things.

***********

The off-key piano's last sacred notes have wafted Heavenward, wafers and wine have been transubstantiated and taken in by the faithful, collection plates recollected, and sinners sent back into the wide wicked world.

Ray and I have sat through it all, here in the barren back row, observing from a physical distance that mirrors the self-imposed isolation of his battered soul. He has made himself an island.

He does not feel worthy of the Body of Christ, has not partaken of the Eucharist since Victoria's murder. He still sees himself as tainted, unforgiven -- rather like lepers who would, in ages past, ring a bell and shout, "Unclean!" to warn all godly folk of their cursed state.

Ray must learn to let the past pass away. I fear that his Catholic soul will not allow this until he has relieved himself of his burden by placing it squarely on the shoulders of his Pater Noster.

That is what brings us here. That is why I have brought him here. If we are to start clean, as it were, he must believe his soul to be cleansed.

This is the Church of Infinite Compassion. It is not his family's church, or Father Behan's, for that matter. It is one of my own choosing, far from our usual haunts and beaten paths. The sanctity of the confessional is complete, but should Ray speak of his not-so-recent sins with a priest of his acquaintance, their continued presence in his life would forever be a reminder of those sins. He would never cease searching their eyes for signs of recrimination.

Unlike Ray's boyhood house of worship, this church lacks the lofty vaulted ceiling that inspires one's eyes to raise toward the Heavens. It is also without Father Behan's grand Stations of the Cross, cut from imported Venetian glass and worked in fine detail.

But it is rich in understanding.

We rise to our feet as the priest, Father Wellington, finishes bidding his flock of same-sex couples adieu.

Father Wellington has hung upon the cusp of censure from Rome for years. He has avoided it thus far by refraining from speaking too publicly about his views and by not performing actual marriage ceremonies for his parishioners. Rumors abound that even these attempts at self-control shall not long protect him from the wrath of his self-imposed masters. But he is a man of the Vatican's cloth and has the authority to absolve its sons and daughters of sin -- for now. And that is all that Ray need know.

The good Father approaches us and we respond to his muted greeting with subdued, respectful nods of our over-filled heads. Ray looks to me for strength. Our eyes lock and I nod again, encouragingly this time.

Ray turns back to our stranger priest.

"Father, I need to. . .I have something to confess."

"Of course, my son."

Those four words wash over Ray like a half-forgotten lullaby -- soothing in their familiarity. He turns to me. I seat myself upon another cold, hard pew. I sit with purpose, with authority - feet flat on the stone floor, hands firmly on knees -- a rock that shall not be moved until he chooses to move me.

"I will be here when you are done."

"I know."

The good Father motions toward a cheaply paneled confessional booth and leads Ray onward.

I remain in the same position for unknown minutes, with only the ticking of my father's watch and the sad eyes of my sometimes Savior for company.

I remember laying in bed as a small child and praying to Him, praying fervently for Him to return my mother to me. He was a presence in my grandparents' home, spoken of in hushed tones and feared as much as loved. Their love of Christ was, like all of their affections, expressed in a cool, distant manner.

My own singular devotion to Him was badly stretched and warped by the heat of puberty. My blood was boiling and had nowhere to release its passions. I was drawn in by the immediacy and willfully contained energies of Inuit rituals.

The Inuit are a closed people, as are all tribal societies, but my open interest in their religion was enough to garner me a place at almost all ceremonies. Somehow, knowledge of my interest would precede our arrival at new townships and cities. I would be taken aside and issued subtle invitations to join the local natives for "dinner" on this night or "lunch" that afternoon. I would always accept.

My soul opened like the petals of a flower turned to the sun. I soaked up many of the beliefs of my hosts, but never turned completely from the God of my youth. By the time I left for Depot, my religious beliefs were firmly set as an odd mix of Inuit legends and Presbyterian lessons -- as slapdash and unique as the rest of my alien freak self.

I, not unlike Mozart's Salieri, lack skill at forming a prayer that is commensurate with my emotions. I offer up gratitude that, in light of my blessings, is sorry indeed.

Thank you, God.

My father's watch ticks and tocks. Outside, a taxi horn sounds its displeasure at some citizen of Chicago or another. I resist urges to alternately slouch, fidget and scratch at various annoyances. I am three pages away from my second mental recitation of "Robert's Rules of Order" when the seal on Ray's confession is broken and he emerges from the booth.

Father Wellington opens his door as well. He reaches into the folds of his sacred robes and then silently offers Ray a small plastic Rosary.

Ray accepts it hesitantly and makes his way down the church's single aisle. He stops several rows from the altar, genuflects and then seats himself on the edge of a pew. He searches the face of his Lord and Savior for several minutes before sinking to his knees and allowing his head to be bowed by the weight of his heavy heart.

My father's watch counts off the seconds as Ray casts off his sins. After my twenty-fourth conscious effort to lose track of those seconds, Ray crosses himself again and rises lightly to his feet.

He walks up the aisle, and I rise to meet him. I look searchingly, half-fearfully into his eyes and find blessed peace. He tucks his new most prized possession into his coat pocket.

As we are leaving the church, we pass its small poorbox. I deposit two well-worn, carefully folded, Canadian bills. They are not much, but they are all I have.

We leave the quiet sanctity of the rightly named Church of Infinite Compassion and return to the relative bustling hustle of an early urban Sunday morning. As Ray reverently shuts the wooden front door and turns to me, a single sunbeam breaks through the grey cloud covering, bathing him in golden light. I choose to see it as a benediction and as a promise.

***********

Three days ago I was the recipient of an injury that is sure to add yet another pair of scars to my already dubiously large collection. A bullet pierced my flesh and penetrated muscle, tearing and burning as it went. The projectile passed cleanly through, missing bone. I was left with a minor wound, if any bullet wound can be considered minor.

The doctors' assure me that there should be no lasting ill-effects. It is absurd that I was not treated and released from the emergency room. And were I a private citizen, no doubt I would have been. But I was injured in the line of duty -- the unofficial nature of that duty not withstanding -- and I am a foreign officer of the law at that.

This hospital operates on a budget that leaves it envious of shoestrings. The chance of a sure payout and positive publicity - in two countries no less -- was enough to assure that my stay would be extended by a few days at least. That is how I come to find myself fully capable of taking care of my own needs, and yet idling away my time in a standard hospital bed in a private hospital room, with my Ray attempting to sleep on a hard hospital chair.

It is forty-two minutes past three on this Sunday morning. For the third night in a row I am contemplating my situation. Because for the third night in a row, I am awake.

I find myself becoming disconcertingly comfortable in this bed, in this room. There are no bars protecting the windows from my wrath and no straps protecting my wrists from the window's glass. The nurses and doctors who attend me are decidedly American. And my Ray, who is snoring in a most undignified manner, has his booted feet propped upon the mattress, where they are pressed comfortingly into my right calf.

It is quite different from my former hospital room, and yet entirely too similar.

The hospital room's ambient temperature is set to optimize the possibility of sleep. The yellowish fluorescent light leaking from beneath the door provides only the slightest of distractions. The hospital bed is firm enough, the hospital sheets not too terribly harsh, the hospital pillows not too far from cardboard.

Each time the air pressure in the room changes, signaling the opening of the door, I find myself looking to that side of the room and expecting to be greeted by J.T. or Bryan or even dear Helen.

I sneezed earlier in the evening and my Ray gave me the oddest look. It was a moment before I realized that my shackled mind was patiently waiting for someone else to wipe my nose.

I am afraid.

I am to be released some time tomorrow morning, and I am afraid that I will be unable to make the transition from hospital to not-hospital a second time. I am afraid that I will again beg to be allowed to stay in my safe, sterile room. I am afraid that if I do stay, I will find myself reverting to my old-hospital ways.

I feel my fear growing within me like the ever-strengthing waves of a rising tide. I need reassurance. I need a distraction - any distraction. It is better to be hurt than afraid, so I am hurt.

I purposefully fidget and stretch my legs. My hypersensitive Ray reacts to the movement and pulls himself from the closest thing to a decent sleep that he has been able to steal in three nights. He jerks into an upright position and looks worriedly in my direction.

"Wha. . .Rennie, you okay?"

I open my mouth to ask him why he didn't come to me in the emergency room, why he chose to hunt down the man who shot me. I open my mouth to ask questions whose answers I already know.

"I'm afraid, Ray. I'm so very afraid."

He is at my side instantly, his hand in mine.

"What is it?"

"It's stupid."

"That's okay, I'm stupid too."

He knows it irritates me beyond measure when he derides his intellectual abilities. I start to chide him for his inaccurate description of himself, when I realize my fears have receded to a bearable level.

I offer him a baleful stare.

"Don't give me that look. I'm just telling you that you can front your big self out and I won't laugh at you."

I am laying down and Ray is standing upright. I am loathe to expose another of my many failings from what I feel is an inferior position. I sit up and my Ray obligingly presses the button on the hospital bed's control box and brings the pillows into alignment with my spine. He asks if I would like some light. I shake my head. The fluorescence leaking from under the door allows me to make out the sharp lines and flat planes of his beloved face. I find the remaining shadows comforting -- not unlike those cast by the screened divider of a confessional booth.

"I'm afraid that I was a less than ideal patient the last time I was in hospital."

"The smacking the nurses around thing? Or that trying to do yourself in thing?"

His willingness to cut through the intricately set layers of my past and plainly state that which I cannot say without pain and embarrassment earns him a small smile and slight squeeze of his warm hand.

"Both, actually."

Anxiety and the need to plan for the worst war for dominance in his sleep-swollen eyes.

"So you thinking about doing those things again? It that it?"

"No."

I pause, expecting an interruption. This is where anyone else would interrupt. He waits with a patience he has often denied possessing.

"I'm doing everything they say. Each day, it's getting easier to do as they say.

"It's like before. . .like after. It's like after Helen brought me my grandfather's clock.

"I've told you about that."

He nods -- an acknowledgement, not an interruption.

"After everything. . .before. . .before I changed. Before I changed, everything was so difficult. Everything was dangerous. I never knew what would remind me of the things I had done -- the things that had been done to me. A doctor's footsteps would mimic Brock's, the snap of window shades being drawn would hold the echo of the crack of his riding crop. I would see Fraser or my professor in an orderly's eyes.

"And then I did change myself. At first that was difficult too. My learning to say 'please' and 'thank you' was akin to a lowland gorilla teaching itself sign language."

He rewards my weak attempt at humor with a small smile of his own.

"But then I learned the forms followed by polite society, pounded them into my warped mind, just as my instructors at Depot had drilled me in the 'right face, left face, about face' of marching until I could perform the moves instinctively, until they became second nature -- part of my true nature.

"When I first changed myself, I had to grasp desperately at those forms. But I had always been a quick study. Soon I could step easily into the role I had created. And not long after, all I had to do was let go of myself and slip into it.

"I'm slipping, Ray."

He seats himself in his former makeshift bed and stares at a spot on the floor. I try to offer a belated reassurance.

He interrupts me.

"I'm thinking."

I allow him to think. Long moments pass with only our measured breaths for company. I wait patiently for him to decide upon my best course of action.

His gaze rises form the floor to look into my insomnia-hollowed eyes.

"Is that what you want?"

"Ray?"

"Is slip sliding away what you want?"

"No."

"You sure?"

What I want is to blurt out that I am indeed sure, but I understand what it is that he is looking for. The unusually straight set of his shoulders tells me that he wants to know that I have considered my options carefully. I take a moment of my own to think.

"Yes, Ray, I am sure."

Relief seeps through his bones and eases his backbone into its accustomed come-hither slouch.

"Great. Greatness."

He seats himself gingerly upon the mattress, in the narrow space between my wide hips and the edge of the bed.

"Okay, no making like a straight man on a banana peel. What do you want to do?"

I have found, much to my delight, that it is rather difficult to think of anything -- other than one particular thing -- when he is favoring me with the smile that he is now employing with marked success.

"Home, Ray. I want to go home."

"Sure thing, Rennie, two red eye tickets to Ottawa it is."

"Ray. . ."

"Oh, home. You mean our home. I don't know. What's in it for me?"

"Ray. . ."

"I mean are you in it for me? Or would that be are you in me for it? I can never keep that straight. Get it? Straight?"

"Ray. . ."

"Kidding. I was kidding -- except that 'you in me' stuff. But we can talk about that later. You call the nurse. I'll get your clothes and pack your stuff."

"I can't leave now."

"Why not?"

"It's four in the morning."

"And?"

"And it would be. . ."

"And it would be what? Breaking the rules? Inconvenient for the nurses? Rude? Dare I say it -- Uncanadian? It would be Uncanadian to leave now, is that it?"

"Well, yes, Ray."

"And the Renfield Turnbull I know and love would care about that because. . ."

"Would you be kind enough to get my things, Ray? I need to call the nurse."

My Ray has the gall to give me a proper British salute.

"You will pay for that."

"Sweet talker."

***********

I'm typing my way through another day of civil servant Hell, slouching low in my chair every time Welsh looks my way, wishing Frase's one-hundred words a minute hands could somehow trade places with my "made for loving, not working" mitts. I'm just sitting here Rob Zombie-ing throut my day, working on law enforcement's version of "This is Your Life -- In Triplicate!" and counting the hours, minutes, seconds 'til I can bug out of here and check on Rennie. It's his first day back as a Canadian Chairborne Ranger/Doorstop and I'm more nervous about it than him. Which wouldn't be saying a whole lot, 'cause he's not nervous at all. Excepting it is a lot cause I'm feeling like Kid Rock at an Indigo Girls concert. Of course, one of the good things about being normally spastic is that nobody notices when you're abnormally spastic.

So I'm typing, and my foot is tapping and I'm singing something I don't remember the name of to myself, and I'm trying to decide if I should white-out my last typo or just smash my Smith-Corona with a well placed kick to its header bar when Frannie walks by me.

This gets my attention for two reasons. First, Frannie is a lot more interesting looking than my fourteenth supplement of the morning. And B, she never walks by me.

She stops to flirt with me or she rushes by me. Sometimes she bumps into me. She has been known to run past me. And of course there was that one time when Freddy Kelso went apeshit during book-in and Frannie slid over the top of my desk like Starsky and Hutch and slammed Kelso to the floor like she was tenderizing a veal steak. I still get hot remembering that.

Anyway, Frannie walks past me, which she never does, so I watch her. She's got that "keep moving, there's nothing to see here, if anybody looks me in the eye I'm going to cry" walk going on. So I don't look her in the eye. I just jump up, grab her by the arm and pull her to the the nearest room -- which turns out to be the guy's locker room. I do a quick about face and take her to the supply closet. It ain't like it's gotten any use since Fraser bugged out.

So I take her into the closet, shut the door and look my former pseudo-sis in the eye. She cries. She don't even try not to. I just hold her tight and let her cry right on my clean shirt. I don't ask what's wrong. I might not be her blood, but I know her good enough to know she don't hold stuff in like that brother of hers.

"It's not fair. It's just not fucking fair. How come everybody is always so worried about what every other body is doing and they never stop to think about how the things they themselves are doing are really the same things? I mean, not the SAME THINGS maybe, but the same things.

"And they can see how people used to do things to them and how those things were wrong, but now that they're the ones doing the same things, not the SAME THINGS but the same things, to people that were done to them they can't see how it's the same things."

"I don't know, sis."

"But it's wrong, isn't it? I mean to do those things to people that other people did to them. It's wrong, right?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah it's wrong?"

"Yeah."

"You're right. It is wrong. I said it was wrong and I was right. He doesn't see it that way, but that's because he's wrong."

"Right."

I haven't got clue one about what she just said or what I said back to her, but it must have been the right thing to say -- who knew all that time I spent in the Stellaverse would come in handy one day? Frannie cries a few more tears, wipes those gorgeous eyes and blows her nose into a paper towel I tear off of a roll that's sitting on the shelf behind her. She nods her head once and gives me a too bright smile. I hug her and her bulletproof shell again and she walks me back to my desk.

She hugs me and kisses my cheek and says, "Thanks, Bro," in front of Welsh and everybody. I play it cool and pretend like I ain't blushing when I sit down, but I got to admit it's nice to feel kind of Hero-y and Fraser-like for once, even if he wouldn't have ended up with snot marks on his shirt.

I watch her make her way to the break room, and for some reason I have to call Rennie at work and hear his voice before I can put my mind back to work.

Dewey comes slouching out of the break room a couple of seconds later, looking like the neighborhood bully just took his new laser pistol.

He stops at my desk, looking for sympathy.

"Frannie just kicked me out of the break room so she could talk to Huey, and he let her. That's not partners."

I open my mouth to agree as how it ain't but that he's do the same for any girl that looked as good as Frannie in her uniform and I spot Welsh eyeing us. I sink back behind my paperwork, but Dewey ain't that lucky.

Welsh comes on over, all smiling and friendly-like and claps one of those big bear paws of his on Dewey's shoulder. That just can't be good. I mumble something about coffee and bran cereal and make a run for the john.

"Detective Dewey! I was just wondering about who was going to be hosting our next office poker party, and since you seem to have so much time on your hands. . ."

*

Your mission, should you choose to accept it: Five cops, six cases of beer, fifty-two cards, assorted poker chips, potato chips, corn chips, dips, cigars, and a case of Diet Fresca -- don't ask.

Dewey's place is one of those new downtown high-rise one bedroom condos some real estate genius with more dollars than sense decided all of those over-crowded multi-kid families would just love to shell out for. Dewey gets it rent free in exchange for being on site security. It's a controlled access building with over half of the units empty so it's a pretty sweet gig.

It's on the eighteenth floor, has a killer view of the Lake Fraser calls Michigan and three stewardess sharing the condo next door. Like I said, it's pretty sweet.

So there we all are, three Divorced's and two Never-been's lounging in a state of the art living/dining room surrounded by beautiful hardwoods and stylish lighting fixtures, sitting on Sears kitchenette chairs around a fold-up card table covered with a round piece of plywood that's set up on the floor of a building that none of us can afford to sweep. And it's all good.

I'm good. I'm loose, like right before a match. Like when I used to step in the ring and I'd look at the other guy and I'd be crazy enough to think I could take him.

Vecchio's just dealt the latest hand and I'm sorting my cards. I got to have them in order -- highest to lowest, left to right -- or I can't see what I got. Vecchio says it has something to do with the way my brain works. Dewey makes some smartass comment about my brain working at all. I just keep sorting cards, with one specially placed finger to keep them in check. A finger that just happens to be aimed skyward, right where Dewey can see it.

Welsh is talking to himself. And Huey is looking everywhere but at me -- He hasn't looked at me in four days, not since he and Frannie had that talk in the break room.

But I'm good. I'm loose, so I let it slide -- for now.

Five hours and a few too many beers into our sorta-monthly, sorta-not poker game and it's starting to wind down. We're all telling tales about "back in the day" -- pretty much meaning back when Frase was here and threatening to make us all names on the Memorial Wall. Dewey is having his say, and for once he's actually using complete sentences. The guys all get smarty-er at Millertime.

". . .so I'm sitting there on the edge of the pier. I got lake water coming out of my nose, my hair is still smoking and, I swear to God, there's a trout flopping around in my pants, and The Mountie just looks at me and says, 'No need to thank me, Detective.'"

We all laugh in that "yeah we know, and we miss him too" way.

"I mean, don't get me wrong, I know that dying in the line is something that could happen to any guy, but I got to admit it's my second choice. You know what I mean?"

I must be drunker than I thought 'cause I hear myself asking, "What's your first?"

"Ah, my first was in the tenth grade. Her name was. . ."

"No, Einsteed, what's your first choice -- to -- you know?"

"Oh, that's easy. I want to get shot in the ass by some jealous husband while I'm jumping out of his bedroom window. When I'm ninety, of course."

"Jesus, Kowalski, you had to ask. Don't you know by now to just not ask?"

"Sorry, Lieu, must be more lubed up than I thought."

Huey stares at his cards and mumbles, "You can say that again."

Welsh stares over his cards at Huey. Vecchio puts his cards down and looks at Huey. Huey is looking everywhere but at me. I'm looking at Huey look everywhere but at me. Dewey is putting away his third bowl of cheese-sausage dip.

I snap. I jump up and walk around to where His Royal Blindness is sitting.

"That's it! That is it! I ain't dumb! I got ears. I heard that. And I got eyes too. I see what you've been doing, how you're not looking at me. You got something to say to me, Huey, do it!"

Vecchio gets between me and where Huey's still sitting. Welsh looks back to his cards and just starts talking in that "Oh yes, I will be obeyed voice".

"Gentlemen, I think that this is not the time or the place. Kowalski, sit down. Jack, ante up or fold."

I jerk away from Vecchio and sit. Jack folds. He drops his cards on the table and stands up real slow. He walks to the door and takes his keys out of his pocket. He stops and looks at me. He turns away and walks out the door.

Welsh and Dewey are looking at me like my two heads just switched places, and Vecchio is looking like he don't know whether to throw up or hit Huey or maybe throw up on Huey after he hits him.

Dewey asks what Welsh is thinking, "What the hell is he talking about, Kowalski? You're something and he's something?"

"I'm out of here, that's what I am."

My hands are shaking, itching to hit someone, but I get my coat on okay.

Dewey gets between me and the door. He's really worried. I actually start to respect the guy, which really sucks, 'cause he's going to feel anything but that for me in a second.

"Hey, Kowalski, we're just getting started here, right? Right guys? It's good. It's all good."

I hear my earlier thought coming out of his mouth, coming back to haunt me and I make one of those dark barking laughs Rennie used to make when our shrink would talk about "pain leading to progress".

"I mean, everything'll be good real soon. Huey didn't mean nothing. He just gets like that sometimes, all talking weird and shit. But he doesn't mean anything by it. I mean, we're all friends here and sometime friends. . ."

I can't take it anymore. I really can't take it anymore. Huey not looking at me was bad, but this, this Dewey trying to make it all okay is about eight billion times worse. It's worse because Huey did mean something and he isn't my friend, not anymore.

". . .sometimes friends just weird out and they say stuff, but that's all part of being the package and they're allowed, because they are friends. . ."

He has to stop, because I like him and I don't want to hit him. I have to stop him, because he isn't going to stop himself.

I walk past Dewey until I'm face to woodgrain with his door, ready to do my James Dean righteous anger exit scene. I press my fingers into his door for support and I push my forehead into it too, to keep from banging it 'til I see stars and chickadees.

"Dewey, shut it."

He does.

"Jack. . .Huey. Huey meant it. He knew what he was doing and he meant it. He walked out. He meant it, and I'm going."

"Kowalski, come on. I'm sure it's just that he's fighting with Frannie or something."

I laugh.

"No, Dewey, It's just that I'm gay or something."

Nobody's got anything to say to that. I didn't expect them to.

I open Dewey's door and walk out of that part of my life, probably forever. I walk past the two elevator doors. I got some thinking to do, and I never could do that too good while standing still. I take the eighteen flights of stairs to the floor, walk through the lobby out the controlled access door and into the rest of my out of my control life.

Vecchio was the designated driver so I don't even have to worry about the GTO. I just follow the sidewalk and figure I'll go wherever it leads me.

Course, I'm like a dog on a bone. Or is that a dog with a bone? Maybe both. The sidewalk leads me right back home. It takes me more than a couple of hours and a couple of blisters to get there, but there I get. It's late, almost too late for poker night, so I'm quiet letting myself in -- just this side of "Oh shit, I'm going to hear about it in the morning" quiet.

I got no ideas about what I'm going to tell Rennie, but I got no doubts that I'll end up telling him the whole mi vida loca story. When I look up from hanging my coat up, I'm not surprised to see Rennie sitting up watching Curling reruns on ESPN2, waiting for me. I really don't know what to think about him sitting there with Dewey though.

"Hey Kowalski, this curling is some great stuff."

I don't have nothing to say to that, so I don't say nothing. Dewey gets the hint. He stands up and walks over to me.

"I have to be getting on home. Uh, you forgot your dip bowl so I brought it to you."

I still don't have nothing to say.

"So I gave it to Turnbull. And I guess I'll just be leaving. . . doing that getting on home thing.

"I'll see you on your Monday."

"Detective Dewey, won't you stay for the end of the bonspiel at least?"

Rennie's talking to Dewey, but he's looking at me while he's doing it.

"Well, thanks for the offer, Turnbull, but I'd really better be heading out. Next time, maybe."

Rennie's still looking at me, they both are. I suck.

"No way, Dewey, if you're going to get him started watching this crap, you can at least finish it."

Dewey grins at me and plants his backside on the sofa next to my favorite backside.

"Cool. So, Turnbull, who're we rooting for again?"

"Team Canada, in the black and red."

"Those guys are pretty girly looking, if you ask me."

"That would most likely be a result of this being the women's team, Detective."

"Oh."

"Yes."

"Sorry about that."

"No offense taken, Detective, I have seen your taste in women."

"Hey! Hey Kowalski, tell your boyfriend to behave."

I head to the kitchen. I really want to stick my head in the oven, but it's electric. So I guess I'll settle for a brew.

I finish my 'ski and head off to bed. I tell Rennie and Dewey nitey nite. They answer with a couple of grunts, their eyes glued to the "action" on the screen. I drop off to sleep, serenaded by enthusiastic cries of, "Sweeeep!"

***********

I always knew there was something not right about Dewey, and now I got the proof. The proof is me sitting at my kitchen table shining up my favorite pair of boots so I can go watch Dewey and Rennie in the Midwestern Amatuer Curling League semi-finals.

When he came over that time after I outed myself to him and Welsh, I though he was just watching the game with Rennie to show he was cool with me, with Rennie and me. Then when he started hanging around with Rennie, I thought he was trying to do a little batting for the home team -- got to admit I let him know I wasn't real cool with that. When he figured out what I was talking about, he just about pissed himself on my floor from laughing so hard.

Turns out Dewey's more twisted than any of us thought. He doesn't have a thing for Rennie -- or any other guys -- he has a thing for Curling. Who'd have guessed?

And not only does he start watching it, he goes out and joins a team. Who the Hell even knew they played that stuff in America? It just seems so civilized and houseworky and, well, Unamerican. Come on, they don't even whack each other with their brooms when the ref's not looking.

So anyway, he goes out and joins this Curling team and then he starts coming around our place in his "uniform" all talking about "Oh I joined this Curling team and we go out and play Curling. And everybody's so nice, and there's two Canadians on the team, and did I show you my new broom, Rennie?"

And Rennie gets this look on his face like he's eleven and all the other kids got scooters and he don't even got a tricycle. And I should have just turned around and left but Dewey runs out to his car and comes back with his broom. To me it just looks like a broom, 'cause it IS a broom for Chrissakes, but Rennie's holding it like it's that Dead King's sword that he pulled out of a boulder. And well shit, I'd do just about anything to put that look on his face. So I hear my mouth saying, "Hey Dewey, they got any more room on that team of yours?"

And Dewey says as how they still got sign-ups going on and they're looking for a vice-ship, whatever the Moose Ass that is. And Rennie's eyes go all soft and dreamy and he starts talking about how he was the skipper on a team back when he was in school and I can't take it no more. I tell Rennie he'd better get his gorgeous bod down there and take that vice-ship job.

He says, "It's vice-skip not vice-ship," and I say, "Whatever it is there's probably about a thousand guys wanting that spot, so you'd better head out now while the skipping's good."

And I am soooo stuck, 'cause he smiles and kisses me in front of Dewey, which embarrases the shit out of me, but just makes Dewey grin. And he and Dewey almost run out the front door to get down to the League Headquarters, which turns out to be in the basement of some guy named John Franklin -- which Frase thinks is really funny for some reason.

And Rennie comes back home about five hours later with a uniform and three -- THREE! -- brooms and a rock with a handle on it -- all excited and happy and horny.

And that's why I'm sitting here seven months later shining up my best boots so I can go play cheerleader for my my favorite vice-skip.

Course, it ain't all bad. Dewey suckered Vecchio into coming along. I figure watching him watch Curling ought to be worth at least the cost of admission -- which is zero dollars US. Besides he and Fraser have been doing the Monday through Friday phone sex and monthly commute to fuck like ferrets relationship thing for months now and we ain't really had a chance to talk about how it's working out.

I'm still at the kitchen table, putting the finishing touches on my boots when I hear the knock. Rennie and Dewey are closer to the door, but they're too busy polishing their stones to get up.

Damn I love saying that.

So I get up and let Vecchio in. He takes one look at the uniforms and the brooms and the stones and follows me into the kitchen. I sit down and go to take a final swipe at my boots.

"Jesus Christ, Kowalski, what the hell are you doing?"

"What's it look like I'm doing, Detective Braintrust?"

"Well I'd have to say it looks like you're using a permanent marker to color in the rough spots on your boots."

"Got it in one."

"You are such a pig."

"Oink."

"Give me your boots."

"No."

"Give me the boots."

"Leave me alone or I'll tell my boyfriend to beat you up."

"Give me the boots or I'll tell Dewey I caught you looking at his ass."

"Ain't no way Dewey's going to believe I been staring at his ass."

Of course, Dewey picks that second to walk into the kitchen.

"Kowalski, you been staring at my ass?"

"No Dewey, I ain't been staring at your ass, Vecchio just has a bootshine brush up his."

"You never stared at my ass?"

"Never."

"Not even once?"

"No Dewey, I have not ever, even once, stared at your ass."

"Why not?"

Rennie chooses that second to walk in.

"Why not what, Dewey?"

"Your boyfriend says he ain't never stared at my ass, and I want to know why not? I mean is there something wrong with my ass? I work out, watch what I eat. Women worship this ass. Women have kissed this ass and I'm not talking symbolically."

"Well Dewey, if it's any consolation, I have always thought your ass to be a particularly fine specimen."

"Thank you, Renfield."

"You are most welcome."

"See, Kowalski, I got a great ass, your boyfriend said so."

And he walks out of the kitchen still muttering to himself.

"Never stared at my ass, yeah right, tell me another one."

And then, icing on the twinkie, I get a lecture from Rennie.

"Really Ray, do try to be more considerate of the feelings of others in the future."

He's laughing under that Mountie facade. I can tell. He is going to pay for this one, and there's not going to be any break on the exchange rate, that's for sure.

"Sure thing, Baby, no problemo. From now on I'll just stare at everybody's ass. Hey Vecchio, stand up, would you? My boyfriend wants me to ogle asses, and I figure I better start out small."

"Ray. . ."

"No, no, no, I insist. If it's ass watching you want, it's ass watching you got."

Rennie figures out I ain't going to let him win this one.

"Well I know where I'm not wanted. If you need me, I'll just be polishing my stones."

"I got your stones right here."

Vecchio follows my ogled ass of choice out to the living room.

"Turnbull, where do you keep your boot polish?"

"In the entryway closet, but it is strictly against the rules to use any kind of lubricant on the stones. . ."

All this talk about asses and lube and stones is really getting to me. I wonder if Rennie has time for a quick bone-spiel before his bonspiel.

I think I'm just going to stick an ice cube or three down my pants now.

*

Rennie and Dewey left about ten minutes ago. Rennie said something about warming up. Dewey was still muttering about his ass.

I'm lounging on the sofa, in my stocking feet, 'cause Vecchio just wouldn't give up on the whole "proper polishing" theme.

"I ain't tipping you, no matter how much spit you use."

"Vecchios don't spit."

I smirk.

"Yeah, I heard that about you guys."

Bastard winks at me, but then he goes back to polishing and doesn't say any more until he's done.

"Kowalski, you've been looking good these last couple of months. So are you? Good? I mean are you as good as you look? Shit. That didn't. . ."

"Vecchio, yeah. Yeah, I'm good."

"Good. That's good."

"Thanks."

"Sure."

He puts Rennie's polishing stuff in its old kit bag and tucks it back into the closet. He sits down on the coffee table, right in front of me. Table sitting ain't really his thing, it's more of a Frannie thing, so I know he's got something big to say. I just hope it ain't going to fuck with my Good.

"Benny got a letter last week."

My Good is now fucked with.

"Maggie?"

"No, nothing like that, knock wood."

"Shit, don't scare me like that."

"Sorry."

I take a mental minute to un-fuck my Good. Then I notice Vecchio ain't talking any more.

Getting stuff out of this Vecchio is like pulling short curlies. Now I got to get him rolling again or I'm going to be on the phone for the rest of the night trying to get Fraser to tell me about The Letter.

"You need a beer?"

"No."

I lean forward, smile and kind of half-flirt with him.

"You want a beer?"

I don't wait for an answer. I jump up and grab us a couple of twist-to-opens.

I twist and open and twist and open and hand one over. He holds it but doesn't make a move to drink it.

"So Frase got a letter. . ."

"Stan, do you remember when you were in the academy and they asked you to make a wish list of what station you wanted?"

He don't give me a chance to answer.

"I remember my list. The top six they said -- make a list of your top six choices. I got my third choice and felt pretty lucky."

He takes a sip of his beer.

"Benny got this letter last week. It told him he only had about six months left teaching at the academy, and it asked where he wanted to go next. No 'this is where you're going' or 'list your top six choices' or even 'please consider these posts' -- just 'where do you want to go?' As in, you really are forgiven and we're kissing your puffy-pantsed ass, pick a spot and it's yours."

He stops and looks at me, but I'm not interjecting again until he's done.

"He hasn't picked yet. He doesn't know where he's going to go, but he wants me to go with him. He asked me to go with him.

"I don't know what to do, Stan. I just don't. . .I just. . .How did you do it? How did you get Good? I just want to get Good."

Shit. How do you answer something like that? I know what he's asking, I know what I did, but how do you tell someone else all that stuff?

I take a sip of my beer -- a long slow sip.

I think and I think some more.

I take another long slow sip of beer. I remember to put my fist over my mouth when I burp.

"Vech -- Ray, I just decided. . .I mean it's like I made these lists -- in my head. I didn't write them down or nothing. But I made these lists in my head. You know, "The Shit I Can't Live Without" list and "The Shit I Really Want" list and "The Shit That Wouldn't Suck" list, "The Shit I Got To Do" list and "The Shit That Can't Nobody Make Me Think About Doing" list.

"So I made these lists in my head and they were just kind of there, hanging out, floating around in the old mental stew. And one day I was feeling really good and it started bugging me. See I wasn't doing anything great. I was folding laundry, and I started thinking what was so great about Rennie's springtime fresh underoos? Had my idea of Good fallen that far?

"It took me a while, all of the whites and half my jeans before I figured it out. It was those lists. I started going over those stupid lists and I realized I had so many of the good things present and accounted for.

"Everything on my "Can't Live Without" list -- there. You know, food, water, air, beer, Rennie -- all there. And "The Shit I Really Want" list -- a killer stereo system, love, affection, friends, family, the hair -- there. Most of "The Shit That Wouldn't Suck" -- right freaking there. Even "The Shit I Got To Do" list was looking pretty good.

"And that stuff that I don't even want to think about doing? I got that covered."

Vecchio's peeling the label off his bottle. I remember hearing in college how that was a sign of sexual frustration.

"So you're saying I should make a list?"

"And check it twice, Buddy."

He kind of laughs at that.

"I guess I'm saying that you got to be real honest about what you can't live without, and you got to do everything you can to get that stuff. The rest is just like a bonus."

"Can you live without the job? Can you live without the clothes? Can you live without the take out pizza and the movies and the classic cars and having your family ten minutes away?

"Can you live without Fraser right next to you in bed every night?"

"Good questions."

"Hey, I ain't just a pretty face."

He smiles and nods at that.

"So what are you going to do?"

"I guess I'm going to make some lists."

"That's good."

"Yeah."

"After Curling though, right?"

"Right."

"Right, and speaking of which, we'd better get going or we're going to miss the kick-off."

"Is there a kick-off in Curling?"

"How the Hell would I know?"

"How many of these games has Rennie taken you to?"

"I don't know, ten maybe."

"You've watched ten of these things and you don't even know if they have a kick-off?"

"You didn't ask me how many games I've watched. You asked how many I been to."

"Good point. Do they serve beer?"

"Tea."

"Really?"

"No."

"Then they serve beer?"

"No."

"Damn."

"Yep."

"Can we smuggle any in?"

"Why do you think I'm wearing the long coat?"

I do my Mountie imitation and usher him out the door. I lock up and we head out. Vecchio puts his hand on my shoulder while we're bickering our way to my car. Life is good.

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