Find my place in the sun
Then your path crossed mine
And from our first kiss
You were the part of me
I never knew I missed.”
He held out a ring. “Join me on the highway?”
Mike’s eyes widened and he stood open-mouthed, speechless for the longest moment in history. “You… you… You really want to do this?”
“That’s not a no, is it?” Please don’t let it be a no. Please, please, please.
Mike yanked Killy to his feet, crushing his bass between their bodies. “It’s a yes, definitely a yes.” He sealed their mouths together, and pulled back with a wince.
“You’re going to have to tune that again,” Killy said, slipping the strap over Mike’s head and placing the bass on a nearby stand.
“Don’t care.” This time, Mike kissed him even more fiercely, holding on and rocking back and forth, his grin mashed to Killy’s face. After a moment he pulled back and rammed a hand into his jeans pocket, wearing a bashful little half-smile, and pulled out a ring of his own. “If you didn’t ask me, I was gonna ask you.”
What? Killy’s face nearly hurt from his grin. His vision grew a little blurry.
In his beautiful tenor, Mike sang, “And on the highway I was born, it’s there I’ll meet my end.” To Killy he said, “And you’ll be with me when I do.”
Instruments forgotten, Killy held Mike in his arms. “Damned right, I’ll be.”
They danced, with only the music in their hearts, bodies sliding together in the rhythm only two lovers could know.
“How long before Merle comes back?” Mike murmured. “We got time to make use of a back room?”
“No, but if that’s what you got your heart set on, we can stay late.” He lowered Mike into a dip and pulled him upright again. “But I got a question for you.” All day long he’d replayed their first meeting, from the time spent in the trailer Mike lived in, to their conversation in the Bronco the night they’d left this place—together.
Killy’s heart slammed against his ribs. “You don’t want this.” He had to be the voice of reason, even though every fiber of his being was tired of traveling alone. “I never stay anywhere long. I’m always on the move.”
Tex reached into his pocket and extracted a crumpled pack of gum. He popped a strip into his mouth and gave a few good chews. “What does this taste like?”
Kill scratched his head. “How the hell am I supposed to know?”
“Exactly.”
“Huh?”
“If you ain’t the one doing the chewing, how can you know what it tastes like?” Tex paused. “If you ain’t the one doing the living, how can you know what I want?
“Yeah?”
“What did that gum taste like?”
Mike stepped back, meeting Killy’s gaze full-on. “Like forever.”
* * *
Mike sat at the bar sipping a beer and showing his ring to the bartender when the first unannounced arrival crept up behind him. Killy’d been watching the door, waiting for Mike’s surprise.
Mike glanced up and nearly fell off his stood in his excitement. “Val! Jake! What are you doing here?”
“We didn’t want you two to have all the fun. Neither one of us has been in a bar fight in ages.” Jake turned his attention to the bartender. “Just a soda, ma’am, I’m not too particular which kind.”
