I stop just short of admitting that I’d overheard someone at the gym joking that Everett was so hot, even Roly made an exception to his bears-only rule. The thought used to just annoy me. Now, it makes me want to mark Everett as mine and erase completely the memory of him ever getting naked with Roly.
“Fair point.”
Welp, that definitely took care of my boner. I’ll need to remember that for the gun range tomorrow.
9
Rafi
It’s Tuesday night, and we’ve ended up at Red’s Indoor Range. As usual, I’m the shortest, brownest person in the room, and we’re in WilCo surrounded by country-fed good old boys. Honestly, most of these guys would have my back without question or hesitation, but I always make sure to wear my Air Force T-shirt and cap, just to be on the safe side.
Everett puts a hand on my shoulder, and I try not to boner up in the gun shop. I’m only partially successful, so thank god for dad jeans. Virgil, the range manager, seems to know Everett annoyingly well. Frankly, he needs a haircut and probably some moisturizer. He gives me the shortest rifle they rent while eyeballing the hand on my shoulder, then brings us over to the range.
While it’s been several years since I’ve been in a gun range, the basics still feel familiar. I put on the protective eyewear and earmuffs, and immediately, my breathing is loud in my ears. I feel alone, even with Everett standing right there. He says something, and I verify that I can barely hear him, so he hands me the small rifle along with a thirty-round magazine.
The rifle is stripped-down, wildly disproportionate to the enormous magazine, but when I tuck the stock in against my shoulder, something clicks into place, a sensation of peace. I rest my cheek on the stock and look down the site, easily finding the target. I forgot how much I used to enjoy this.
“Let’s see if I’ve still got it,” I say, more or less to myself.
I take a deep breath, pause, and pull the trigger.
Fuck yeah.
I feel, more than see, Everett move to the lane next to mine, and a moment later hear muffled handgun fire. My breath begins to sound calmer in my ears, and I squeeze off several more rounds in tempo with my breathing. Seven, eight, nine, ten. I rest for a moment, squeeze off another ten, then rest and empty the magazine. Everett is retrieving his target, so I do the same.
His shots are neatly clustered around the center of the target. My target has less of a cluster and more of a large hole in the middle.
“When was the last time you held a gun?” he asks incredulously.
“Been at least two years.”
“That’s some damn good shooting for someone as rusty as you are. Think you can keep it up if we send the target all the way to the back?”
I switch out the target, remove the magazine, then grab the back up out of the bag. Sending the target downrange, I look up at him and smile. We’ve found my Zen. Everett goes back to his lane, and with a satisfyingly raspy click, I load the second magazine, tuck the rifle back in, and fire.
When we retrieve our targets, Everett rolls his eyes at me and mouths, “Show-off.”
His approval reminds me of Asadi’s smile, and for one precious moment, it doesn’t hurt.
10
Everett
Not gonna lie, watching the little guy own that target at the longer distance was one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen.
We don’t spend a lot of time at the range because Rafi had a long day, but I’m glad we’re back to some semblance of normal after whatever happened on Monday.
I still don’t have a full grasp of what happened with the shooting game at my house, so I’m trying to avoid reading too much into it. First of all, Rafi hit a shot in the game that…honestly, I didn’t think it was possible to hit.
When I gang-tackled him onto the couch, I was expecting a yelp of protest, maybe a bit of wrestling like we’ve done several times before. What I didnotexpect him to do was wrap himself around me and nestle his face into my neck. The real shocker, though, the thing that ruined an entire night of sleep for me, was the unmistakable hardness against my stomach.
Unmistakable because I swear, he might’ve actually thrust against me.
What does that mean? I already have a hard enough time keeping my hands off him, but if he’s gonna boner up around me, I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself. Worse, he fell face-first into my package. I’m pretty sure it was an accident, but fuck, I almost yanked him up for a kiss.
Or more.
The story I’m going with is that he’s had a resurgence of his sexuality which caused some momentary awkwardness, but today we found our equilibrium and can move on as though nothing happened.
