The story below is a work of fiction, set in the format of reality. Any resemblances to real people, alive or in the hereafter, is entirely coincidental in nature. It is not meant to accurately reflect upon persons, in towns, cities, countries, nor governmental areas, which the story is staged. If a sexual scene involving male-to-male relationships offends you, then you should not read this story. Additionally, if you are under 18 years of age, in most state and countries, you are not allowed to read this story, by law. Check with your local laws regarding such. % Sexual safety matters. Remember guys, this is fiction. In real life, use protection.
%
"For Sale By Owner" 26 wriTten by T. Chase McPhee
%
Driving back to the Radisson, Kyle followed Dominic. They parked a car apart. Not just any car, a certain one. Parked way out in the lot, a figure bent, hunched over, ass sticking way up, over one of the tires.
"Yep. It's flat," Dominic said of Lance's plight", pulling in between two lines. .
Kyle exited, looking broadside at Lance's car, commenting, "Sure looks rusted out on this side." When Kyle went to pull on the door handle, it opened. "I guess out in the country here, you can leave it unlocked?"
"I think it goes beyond that," Dominic summed up, his foot grinding the red rust into the pavement.
"Yup. Just as I figured. Too rusty to lock." Slamming the car door shut a few times, Kyle finally got it to line up with the frame of the Chevy 4x4 pickup.
Running his hand along the side, Dominic wondered which was the original color, figuring it wouldn't hurt to ask, "So, what shade of brown is this, Lance?"
"Sort of a medium brown. When my dad saw it for eight hundred bucks, he thought it a fair price for an `89 Chevy Cheyenne. I would not turn eighteen for three more years, but dad figured, with inflation, he could save a few bucks. And, by the time I reached eighteen, he pretty much had it all fixed up for me. Dad was always a bargain-hunter, being as we didn't have much money most of the time."
As the two scanned the rest of the truck, looking as if it went through hell and back, they let Lance ramble on, picking out bits and pieces of his past life. "Yeah, we didn't have what a lot of folks have." Reminiscing about times past, the blond eighteen year old, standing there, elbows resting on the back of the 4x4, shirt slightly open, alluring, to say the least, to Kyle and Dominic, surveying the decrepid condition, smiled at each other, as they rounded the vehicle, spotting the openess of Lance's attire.
Finally, Lance came back to reality, snapping out his reverie of days gone by, saying, "Well, no sense procrastinating here." He sprung forth, from the body of the pickup. "Breaks over," he called out.
"Good thing you didn't find out at quitting time," Kyle told him.
"You said it. When it gets dark around here, the animals come out," Lance said, in a fearful manner.
"Animals?" Kyle replied, gulping down his spit. "You mean, like bears?"
"Some bears have been sighted," Lance told him. "Sometimes somebody will report they ran into one in the middle of the night, rummaging through a garbage can."
"What happened?"
"Bear was just as scared and ran away!" In the lull period, Lance says, "I better get back before `the dictator' knows I'm gone!"
Doing a `good Samaritan' deed, Dominic offers to get the tire fixed. Lance, after separating his car key from the others, giving it to Dominic, hightails it across the parking lot, running his hand along his beltline, stuffing his white shirt in.
Dominic finishes his tour of the outside of the 4x4. Kicking the flat tire, he says, "Tire's are almost bald as... this one... I don't think it has a chance of being revived. What do you think, Kyle?"
"Not, except two things," Kyle reports back.
Turning around, standing against the truck, as Lance had, the buttons up and down Dominic's shirt show skin inbetween. "And that would be?"
"First of all, did you hear Lance talking about going to school in the city?"
To the two, they knew it meant `New York City'.
"Sure I remember. Mannes College? Gee, I didn't think to ask him his major," Dominic said.
"Something like that. Well, anyway," Kyle went on about the business of the truck, "if you ask me, this baby ain't gonna make it to the New Jersey border."
Giggling, Dominic agreed wholeheartedly with Kyle's opinionated response.
"And what would be your second opinion?"
"Um, your theory about keeping the car door unlocked is because it's rusty?"
"Yeah. So?" Dominic replies.
"When you slammed it shut, like me, we have a habit of locking the doors? Um, how do you expect Lance to open it now?"
"Oh shit!" Dominic called out, jumping away from the pickup, looking at the opposite door to see if it was locked.
"I checked. It's locked," Kyle assured him.
"Poor kid," Dominic replies, adding, "We can't let him come out after work and find it locked."
Both peered in, on the driver's seat, seeing the shiny set of two keys.
Dominic asks, "Any brilliant ideas about getting at the keys?"
"Ah, breaking and entering?"
Cocking his head, Dominic rationalizes, "Not a bad idea. Then the cracked window would match the rest of the exterior!"
Backing up a little, squatting down at the flat, Kyle agrees, "Yep. This tire looks like it's ready for the junkyard."
Laughing, Dominic says, "Like the rest of the truck?"
"What's Lance going to do? You heard him. For his family, money doesn't grow..." Kyle starts thinking about the opposite position he's in, "on trees?"
Out of the blue, Dominic comes up with, "Well, I have an idea, which could be a lot of fun, if you want to get in on it?"
"And that would be?" Kyle inquires, standing, brushing both hands off.
"How about we leave an `upgrade' in it's place," he suggests.
"A `new' car?" Kyle toys with the idea.
"I think a new `used' would be more acceptable to Lance, than a brand new car."
"Would be fun, seeing Lance's reaction," Kyle as much as agrees with Dominic.
Into the town of Lake Quinn, Kyle, provided the wheels, driving his jeep.
The whole time, Dominic talked about the car, saying, "It's gotta be practical."
"But sporty. Remember, Dom-- I can call you that?"
"I've gotten that variety before." Driving, paying attention to the road, Dominic viewed half of the eighteen year old's smile. "As you were saying?"
"What I was going to emphasize is, we, Devon, Alex, Lance, Raj... me, we're still teenagers and.."
"Ah, to be young!" Dominic said, in an uplifted tone.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to slight you, Dom."
"Um, your emphasis?"
"All I was getting at, is I think Lance should have something of the `sporty' type."
Dominic, putting `his' brake on, as traffic stopped dead, looked ahead to see what the problem was. "That did cross my... my... oh my my, will you look at that?"
As they neared the `road under construction' sign, Kyle actually thanked his lucky stars there was a standstill, laughing, as Dominic said of the barechested worker, "Hold me back!"
Standing halfway in a ditch, the top half of the brawny worker could be seen. Dominic summed up his features as maybe 36 or 37yo, about 6'2, light brown hair. Then, from top to bottom his eyes made up the picture, stache, full chest of hair, then the lip of the ditch cut off his view.
"Ooooh are we moving already?" Dominic pouted.
"Better we are. You're getting sweatier than he is, Dom. He's in a ditch digging away and here you are with the windows down, sweating like a hog. Oooooh, wait til I tell Devon!"
Then, for the next ten minutes, the two had this mock argument about one telling on the other.
"There's a place."
"Honest John's?" Dominic read off the sign. "Isn't there a dealer?"
"Maybe," Kyle said, pulling off the shoulder in front of Honest John's and heading up the hill. Down the other side they came to a Chyrsler dealership.
"Hmm, this Lake Quinn is loaded with hotties!"
"Dom, do you think you can control yourself or do I have to head back to Honest John's?"
"I `can' control myself."
When they got out of the jeep, Kyle noticed Dom rearranging his package!
"Good afternoon, gentlemen," Came the excited greeting from the forty-ish looking man.
"Hello," Dominic said, extending his hand.
"I'm Jake Higgins. Welcome to `Chryslerland'! So, what're you kids looking for today?"
Dominic liked that!
"Something used, but looking new," Kyle put it.
"Funny, isn't that a 2007 Compass?" Jake inquired, eyeing up the spit-polished jeep, marine blue finish, sun making the pearl finish shimmery.
"Oh, we're not looking for me," Kyle set him straight. Already Kyle had some sneaky feelings about Jake.
"I have something you might like over on the other side of the building."
As they walked, following Jake, Kyle wrote the word on Dom's back, G-A-Y', Dom responding, his head nodding, yes', in agreement.
"Here we go. How do you like this?"
"What year is it?"
"1999."
"What do you have in the 2000's, say a 2004 or 5?" Dominic asked, since he had been the proponent of the whole deal.
"Nothing in that year, that's of a sporty nature," Higgins reported.
"So, what do you have of a `sporty nature'?"
"I have this 2006 Crossfire. I can let you have this used demo for $11,000."
"Hmm," Dominic said.
In Kyle's eyes, it looked as if Dom was ready to deal business.
"And how much would it be if I was paying in cash?"
"Cash?"
Kyle had to laugh, watching Jake's eyes almost pop out of their sockets.
"You youngsters can't be from around these parts!"
"I guess you didn't see the New York plates?" Kyle asked.
"No, but... let's see... hmm..."
Dominic then went out on a thin limb.
Placing his hand on Jake's shoulder, he asks, "What can you do for a gay brother?"
"Gay? Brother?"
Kyle's mouth immediately went into the shape of an `o', at Dom's audacity.
"$10,000 and that'd be my last offer."
Wondering, Kyle thought either Dominic was right, or took it as a bribe. It didn't matter, as long as Jake remained cheerful throughout the deal.
"Sold!" said Dominic.
By the time they got back to Higgins' desk, he had knocked another grand off the tally.
"Will you take a check?"
"You've got to be kidding?" Jake said.
"Brother to brother," Dominic reminded him.
"I dunno."
"Never mind then. I'll put it on my American Express Card."
"The whole 9 thou?"
"Yup."
Dominic smiled, as Jake took the card off, to `run it through'. After a short chat, the manager came over to talk.
"I'm Herb Watkins," the fifty-ish gentleman stated.
"Nice to make your aquaintance. I'm Dominic Tiertza and my friend Kyle... well Kyle is around here someplace."
"I know that name Tiertza. Your family into architecture?" Watkins asked, cordially.
"My dad."
"I thought so. He designed the library at Lake Quinn Community College, wasn't it?"
"I don't know all of his works. Did he?"
"I believe so. If you have a minute we can verify it with the dean."
`Nice stall tactic', Dominic thought. But he didn't mind, as he looked around.
"I have the dean on the phone. He wants to talk with you, Mr. Tiertza."
"Me?"
Watkins didn't say further, but pulled the receiver over, handing it to Dominic. The conversation went by sweet and simple. Dominic explained being a friend of two of the swim team members and he would be back later to pick them up. Dean Hardy extended an invitation to drop by his office. Dom relayed back there wouldn't be much time. So, then the dean mentions he'll meet him later at the pool. The phone clicked.
"No problem," came Jake Higgins, handing the Amex gold card back to Dominic. Along with him, a woman, pushing a cart of coffee, a silver set, laden with donuts, pastries, cotton napkins and the sort, smiled as she offered words of hospitality, along with the contents of the tray.
"Don't spoil your appetite," Kyle mentions to Dominic.
In an hour's time, the 2006 silver Crossfire was being driven off the lot, Dominic behind the wheel. Back at the Radisson, they parked next to Lance's worn out vehicle and transferred everything over, Dominic warning Kyle to stand back, while he threw the stone at the side window. Soon, a tow truck appeared, Dominic handing the driver a fifty, to haul the piece of junk over to `Honest John's'!
"What do you think Lance is going to say, Dom?"
"First he'll say, `where the hell are my wheels?', then after you explain..."
"Me? It was your idea. You paid for it, even though I thought I should go in halves."
"You save you money, Kyle. You'll need it when you go to MSM. They're not cheap."
"If they accept me."
"I have this feeling they will."
"But then what do I do about Knapp. Damn it! It's going to be bad enough we'll be living with him."
"Don't get upset, Kyle. My father used to say, `where there's a will, there's a way'."
"I guess."
"Worse comes to worst, you and Alex can stay at my Manhattan townhome, with Devon, Lance...." he counted up the invited residents.
"Did your daddy design it?" Kyle asks.
"Nope. He let me shop for my own place. He was good in that way. He didn't `own me', if you know what I mean?"
"I know. That's the way Knapp can be. I'm glad, in a way, Devon met you. Knapp isn't good enough for him."
"The feeling is likewise. You'll never know how happy Devon's affected my life."
"You're right. I won't know. Just like Alex and I."
"I'm thinking we're two lucky guys."
"So is Lance."
"Oh? What is it you know that I don't know?"
"Alex told me the family's had it rough since last year when Lance's father and brother were killed in an auto crash."
"Why didn't he mention it?"
Shifting his shoulders up and down, signified he hadn't a clue.
"Poor kid," Dominic replied.
Kyle could see the tenderness portrayed by Dominic. Touching, to say the least.
Holding the keys, Dominic asks, "So, what do think we should do? Blindfold Lance and lead him out here?"
In the mood for some more humor, Kyle states, "A bear leading the blind?"
Looking down, Dominic's eyes connected first, to his two shirt buttons open, displaying a curly mat on his chest. Then, placing both hands on his stomach, he made light, "I guess my sixpack ain't what it used to be!"
"Just wait til Devon gets you to the gym!"
"Gym? What's that?" After a few laughs, Dominic suggests, "Well, we better get moving. Our guys will be wondering what happened to us."
Staring at his wrist, the Alessi watch, goldtone face with a combo, white gold and gold band, Kyle says, "6...5...4...3...2...quittin' time!"
As they planned, they entered the swanky hotel, reporting to the bar. Spotting Lance, behind it, they approached.
"Almost ready to punch out?" Dominic questioned Lance.
Like a chip on his shoulder, in a sarcastic manner, Lance reports back, "Yeah, I'd like to punch out Terry Miller's lights!"
"Problem?" Dominic asks, his hand over Lance's.
"I dunno," the eighteen year old reports back, mixed with frustration. "Miller `told' me I have to stay... do overtime, which I wouldn't get overtime for, in my paycheck, just because Robbie Bentley called out. Hell, that's besides the point. I can't win. If I don't show up for swim practice, coach will take me out of the competition. Yet, if I don't stay and work, Miller threatens he'll can me."
"He can't do that!" Kyle frowns on the action, speaking a little louder than the crowded restaurant. Noticing, he says, meekly, "Miller can't fire you for not staying beyond the time you're scheduled to leave."
"So goes the law," Lance pouts, "but with Miller, he makes up his own rules. I don't know. I can't afford to lose my job here. I've got a scholarship to Mannes, but I still need materials."
Neither Dominic, nor Kyle had any suggestions. At least those that were sane.
Across the restaurant, outside the wide portal, taking customers from the eatery, to the lobby, Dominic stood there, staring at the thin, dark-haired desk jockey, parked behind the white, elegantly carved counter. "I've got a good mind to hog-tie that little bitch, throw him in the trunk and drop him off at Knapp's doorstep. He'd show the fuckin' bastard a thing or two about being homophobic!"
With something else on his mind, Kyle stare in the opposite direction, saying softly, "If you say so, Dom."
Breaking his stare, Dominic looks at Kyle, realising he probably missed his whole speech. Slowly he swung his bod around, trying to hone in on whatever it was, keeping Kyle's attention affixed, in the staring mode. Then, like two gay men would converse, standing at a bar, attention focused on the two,Dominic asking, "Um, the suit facing us?"
"Yeah," Kyle says back, eyes still feeding on the eye candy.
"Oh shit!" Dominic suddenly says, reporting, "He's headed over here."
Both hurriedly shift their attention from spying on one of two businessmen, sitting across from each other, scooting his chair out, standing, then walking like he's headed for the lobby. Instead, he stops at the bar, leaning on the wooden ledge, his elbow inches from Dominic's elbow.
"I'll be with you guys in a minute," Lance says to Dominic and Kyle, addressing the `suit', "May I help you sir?"
Stealing a quick glance to his right, in Dominic's direction, he returns his eyes to Lance, replying, "I'll have a Fuzzy Navel and my friend, a Martini."
All three, facing the bar, didn't have a clue to who stood behind them, until he was upon them, questioning, "Kyle Dryfiss?"
Swinging around, Kyle first lay eyes on the businessman's face, followed by Dominic, lastly, the other `suit', who sat across from him.
"Stephen?" Kyle replied.
Picking up on it, Dominic inquires, "Stephen Braddock, of Braddock's?"
"Do I know you?" Braddock asks, his arm lingering around Kyle, after greeting each other with a hug.
"No. I don't think we ever had the pleasure of introductions, but I think you knew my father, Alessandro Tiertza?"
"Oh my God!" Stephen Braddock, composure of shock on his face. Breaking from Kyle, he took Dominic by the shoulders, offering him an `European' greeting, a slight hug, kissing Dominic on each cheek. Finished with the formal greeting, he says, "Last time I saw you, you were up to here," he raised his flat hand to about each of their waists. "Your father designed our Rodeo Drive store."
"I remember!" Dominic stated, with a grin.
Good naturedly, Kyle put his hand on Stephen's shoulder, parting the two. Stephen and Kyle knew about each other, Kyle dropping the clue, "Um, you're getting too close to an `almost-married' man!"
"Oh, I'm sorry Dominic. Do I know the lucky woman?" Stephen asks, figuring, his highly successful father, once among the elite society of artists, musicians, designers, he might recognize a name.
"I doubt you would know the name," Dominic replies.
"Try me," the thirty-four year old high end department store magnate pried.
Smiling, knew it would be a bit of a shock, yet, his gaydar on the prowl, sensed something about Braddock, replied, "Devon Shears ring a bell?"
"Devon Shears," Braddock thought to himself. "No, can't say her name is familiar."
Looking over Stephen's shoulder, Kyle and Dominic exchanges glances, then crackup, laughing their asses off.
With question on his face, Stephen asks, "What?"
Leaning into Stephen's right ear, his chin on Braddock's shoulder, Kyle responds, "You've just insulted Dom's boyfriend!"
"Boyfriend? Oh I'm so, so sorry, Dom," he picked up on the nickname, as he apologized.
To save Stephen from any more embarrassment, or maybe it was to find out who was giving him a hardon, the other suit butts in with, "Well, are you ever going to introduce us, sweetheart?"
Again, Dominic and Kyle exchange glances, smiling.
"Why of course," Stephen introduced, "I'd like you to meet my soon-to-be husband, "Marat Favreau," then he pointed out, to Marat, "Kyle Dryfiss, who's father is a dear friend and business associate and..."
As Braddock introduced his fiancee, Kyle was already trying to figure out some statistics. He knew Stephen was a few years younger than his father, mid-40's, wondering why he toted around a boytoy on his arm, seemingly half his age. He also picked up on the quick handshake he got from Marat, however the French designer hung on to Domenic's hand as if put together with Krazy glue.
"So, what's your father up to. Is he at home or traveling, Kyle?"
He had wanted to keep his attention on Dominic and Marat, however both Stephen's football shouldered physique and conversation voided out the one-on-one scene.
"I'm not sure. Last month he was in Ireland. I only know that because... well, that's not really important."
"Oh now, you can tell your `Uncle Stephen'," Braddock tried getting the facts out of the eighteen year old.
Thinking it really nothing risky, to be turned into gossip, Kyle tells, "I was in the city with a friend... well I thought he was a friend..."
"A trick?" Stephen suggested.
"Well, um..." Kyle starts out, but too quickly becomes embarrassed, feeling flushed, as Stephen happens upon his secret.
"What are you drinking?" Stephen then inquires, to save Kyle from divulging something, Braddock reads as being too personal, feeling guilty he pressured the teen into talking.
"Oh, well we really can't stay. We only..." Using it as an excuse to slip by Stephen, Kyle says, "Ah, Dominic," he points to his Alessi on his wrist, "shouldn't we be going?"
"Um, sure. Marat just wants me to have his email and phone number," Dominic smiles, a thumb pointing in the direction of Marat writing down some info on a bar napkin.
A man with an inquiring mind, always in need of knowing everybody else's business, Stephen interrogates Kyle, "Off in a hurry to an engagement?"
Kyle learned Stephen's game long ago. He felt there wasn't any harm in telling him, "We've just come for Lance."
"Lance," Stephen more states than questioned.
"The bartender," Kyle pointed out.
Kyle said it loud enough, so that it would penetrate the light noise of the crowd of diners, but it didn't seem to phase Marat, as he still gave Dominic his attention, instead of, like Stephen, keyed his attention towards the bartender, the trim eighteen year old, with looks and build any gay man would follow. Like himself, it seemed Marat showed no interest. Nope, he definitely came to the conclusion this guy, mid-20's, maybe twenty-six or seven, showed an interest in older, gay men.
Breaking off his conversation with Marat, Dominic took command, stood upright from leaning on the bar, walked right around it, behind it, took the shaker out of Lance's hand, set it down on the wooden bar, with a loud `clunk' and escorted Lance out from behind the bar.
Protesting, Lance states, "What are you doing? If Terry finds out I'm not behind the bar.... that's it for me. I told you, I need..."
"Believe me, Lance. You can do a lot better for yourself. There's plenty of opportunities for you in the city..."
As Dominic readied to exit the private area of the bar, a body stood in their way, blocking the exit.
"Excuse me, sir, but this is a private area," Terry Miller cordially reprimanded Dominic. However, to the high school senior, he growls, "Get back to your job, Hawk or else you're history!"
Stephen and Kyle were shocked out of their gourds, at Miller's attitude, standing there with their mouths gaping. Dominic, frankly didn't know how to respond, but to force himself past Miller, Lance in tow.
Again, Miller terrorized Lance, threatening him with dismissal, placing his hand against Lance's left shoulder, same time pressing against Domenic's right shoulder, purposefully trying to pry the two apart, connected, Dominic's hand on Lance's forearm. Immediately, it focused Dominic's attention, as quick as lightning, on the division being created.
His attention on the two midway between the inner and outer sanctum of the hotel bar, Terry didn't see Marat, as he made his way towards the altercation, excusing himself to Kyle, now resting his left arm on the bar, the right one getting ready to handle Terry.
First, Marat in his deep baritone voice, relays, "I suggest you take your hand off the boy."
Whipping his head around, Terry's face almost `in' Marat's, he responds, "I'm sorry sir, but this is hotel business," adding a quaint smile.
Terry's head almost snapped off at the neck, when he turned back to face Marat, as the French designer balled up his shirt, in his fisted hand, pulling the hotel desk clerk within inches of his own face.
"I'm only going to tell you one more time, bud. Take your fuckin' hand off my friend," he flashed a quick glance at Dominic, then back to Terry Miller, continuing, "before I decide to get upset. I'd like to warn you, I'm not too pleasant when I get upset!"
Scared or whatever, it didn't register with the twenty-six year old hotel clerk, standing there, frozen in place. At the same time, it seemed like every patron in the crowded restaurant had stopped, to view `the show', silence prevailing, waiting for Terry's decision.
"Don't say I didn't warn you, pencil-neck!"
Immediately, Terry slid his hand from between the two, sensing a `danger Will Robinson' response.
Marat, unfurling Terry's shirt from his hand, just slightly grinned, placing both hands on the clerk's shoulders. "That's much better." Then, looking towards the other two, Marat inquires, "You okay kid?"
Lance signifies he's fine.
"You alright Dominic?"
"Sure," Dominic replies.
Turning his attention back to Terry, as he stand tall, hands still parked on Miller's shoulders, he say, "Well, just so we don't have this problem again, I'm going to leave you with a word of advice...."
Simultaneously, pressing on Terry's shoulder, lifting his right knee, Marat plows into the region between Terry's legs.
"Ugh! Ohhh...Akkkkkkkkkkkkk!" Terry moans and groans, loud sounds of pain emanating from his vocal cords, as he lays on the floor, holding his balls with both hands.
%
Copyright 2007 T. Chase McPhee This story may not be sold, nor made part of any collection, without prior consent from the author.