Divisions (Dev and Lee) (45 page)

“It’s not quite thirty pieces of silver,” I say, “but I hope you get good and drunk on it. Or get someone else good and drunk. Might do you some good.”

He looks sad for a moment, and it makes me a little sad too. But then he raises the bottle and says, “Have fun getting fucked by your football player.” And he says it really loudly, enough that the fifteen people closest to us prick up their ears. Some turn and stare at me. The hostess starts over, but stops when Brian grins and walks out. She just stares in my direction, and of course, I can’t leave until the waitress comes back with the credit card slip.

Driving back, I do wonder if Dev will ever really understand how important this is, not just to me, but to the world. I think he knows with his head, but I don’t think he feels it with his heart, and I don’t know how to get that through to him. Maybe if I confirm my suspicions about Kodi, maybe if Dev knows there’s another gay guy on his team who’s afraid to come out…maybe. Of course, then I think of Brian saying that Dev will eventually hook up with another gay football player, and I worry that he’d feel protective of shy, scared Kodi, that one night on the road, while Vonni’s getting a blow job that doesn’t count and Gerrard is doing whatever he’s doing and that male fox groupie is sucking off some guy who doesn’t want to admit he likes guys…

I grit my teeth and shake my head. That’s what Brian would want, to get into my head like that. But at the same time, I can’t quite shake it. And I can’t talk to Dev about it, I don’t want to expose stress in our relationship to Hal, and I can’t talk to Father. I want to drive to a liquor store like he did, buy a good bottle of scotch, and just get quietly, miserably drunk.

Sacrifice is most worthwhile and hardest when nobody knows you’re doing it. If I went to Dev and told him how much this meant to me, that I was giving it up for him, well, he’d feel terrible about it. It would pretty much screw up the whole thing. So I have to keep it tucked inside myself, and what worries me is that I have never been very good at that.

***

New Year’s Eve, Dev is in Hellentown, two hours ahead of me and Chevali. He calls me right around ten o’clock—his midnight—and says he’s out with the guys but wanted to wish me Happy New Year. I toast him with a glass of the scotch I bought and curl up alone on the sofa.

An hour later, I call my father for his midnight. He’s doing the same thing I am: drinking at home. At least he’s doing sparkling wine rather than scotch. We talk about maybe getting together for one of the playoff games if I can get an extra ticket. Otherwise it probably won’t be until the off-season. I tell him Dev and I will come up and visit, and he says if it gets too cold, he might fly down to Chevali again. I say I’d like that, and that I hope his ’09 is better than his ’08.

And then it’s ten to midnight and my phone rings with Dev’s number. I’m a little drunk from the scotch already, so I just listen to him talk about practice and the excitement around the playoff game. A couple times I break in with tips for him, but otherwise I stay quiet.

He notices, and asks if I’m okay, and then what I’ve been up to. I tell him I’ve been watching college bowl games, looking for my players, but it’s frustrating not having control over the film. When the TV cuts away from the player I want to see, that’s it. I don’t get another angle, don’t get to see more.

There’s a short silence, and then he says. “January first is tomorrow.”

“That’s what usually happens after New Year’s Eve, stud.”

“Did you talk to the Equality guy?”

“Brian. Yes.”

Another pause. “And?”

“I told him you’re not going to do it.”

He exhales. “Thanks, fox.”

I lean back on the couch. “Well, you weren’t. It wasn’t like I could lie to him.”

“No, but…” He might be a little drunk himself. “You could’ve kept bugging me about it.”

“I know better than that. You were right. I told you to focus on football and that’s what you should do. No matter whether there’s people out there who need to be recognized. That’s their problem.”

“Doc.”

“Sorry.” I sigh. “I might have had a little to drink.”

“You can make it up to me Friday.”

“I will.”

“With sex.”

I don’t say anything. He goes on. “That’s a joke. I mean, not that I don’t want sex. It’s…”

“It’s okay,” I say. “I get it.”

“Did you figure out what to do with the forty grand?”

I pause. “You said you’d be okay if I donated it to Equality Now, right?”

“I…yeah. If that’s what you want to do with it.”

“Okay.”

He knows me too well to let it go. “Is that what you did with it?”

I curl my tail around my legs and look up at the ceiling. “I’ll tell you Friday. Maybe.”

“Am I going to have to work it out of you?”

“You can work something out of me.”

“That’s my fox.”

“Yes,” I say.

The clock on the TV starts counting down. I count into the phone, and Dev counts with me, from twenty down to zero. Then he makes a kissing noise, and I make one back, and it’s 2009, a new year, and he and I are facing it together. I imagine my arms around him, and he imagines his arms around me, and we imagine together some of the things we’ll do on Friday.

When he hangs up to go get some sleep, I walk to the end table, pick up the check, and look at it. Then I set it down and go into the bedroom.

You can’t break up with a principle, Brian said. Shows how much he knows. I don’t want to send the check to Equality Now, because I don’t want Brian helping spend the money, but I don’t just want to spend it on us either. Right now I think I’m going to save half of it and give half to some gay rights cause. But I don’t know what cause that’ll be.

Lying in bed in the first hours of 2009, I think about searching for a cause, and that leads me to thinking about another member of my family who must have lain in bed many a night wondering what cause she could give her time to, who made a decision that—no matter what my father says—led to the dissolution of her marriage and the estrangement of her family, at least for now.

It frightens me that I feel that kinship with her. Is this the path that led her to Families United, this feeling of powerlessness and boredom and betrayal? Did that overwhelm her family instincts, lead her to throw her son out and break her marriage of twenty-five years? I want so badly to understand it, to take it apart so I can put it together in reverse, for her and then for everyone else in the country.

Mother can say she loves me and still lock my door and burn my clothes and refuse to acknowledge the person I am now. Brian is the guy who was my best friend in college, and the guy who tried to have an awkward tryst with me, and the guy who outed my boyfriend and the guy who really wants to change the world. He can be all those things at once. So I can be the activist and the boyfriend and the football scout too, find a way to balance them without letting them tear me or Dev apart. I have to. Because Brian, damn him, is right about me.

I can still work on my anger, with my father and maybe Hal. The gay activism I will have to pursue opportunistically, see if I can sacrifice a little and still remain myself. I’m just going to have to work harder at it, and remember that Dev and the love we have is the compass point to guide me through life. I wish I had more confidence in myself to follow that star.

Dev’s voice still echoes in my ears, his scent is in our bed, and his imaginary paws rest on my sides. I close my eyes. It’s a new year, for me and Dev, for my family and his family and his team, and if anyone can inspire me to carry on despite losing my motivation, it’s the Firebirds. After all, they may have lost the division, but they’re still going to the playoffs.

Kyell Gold took up furry erotica writing after high school, making the team at his small liberal arts college as a walk-on. He was drafted late by Sofawolf and blossomed in the professional league, earning four Ursa Major awards in his first three years as a pro for his novels and short stories. He has since won eight more Ursa Major awards, including one for "In Between," the first Dev and Lee story, one for Out of Position, which also won two Rainbow Awards for gay fiction, and one for Isolation Play, the second Dev and Lee book. At least two more Dev and Lee books are planned following Divisions.

His various online presences are linked from www.kyellgold.com, and you can follow him on Twitter at @KyellGold. In the off-season, he lives in California with his husband.

Blotch was one of the top-rated high school furry artist prospects of 2006 and starred in college before being made the #1 pick of Sofawolf. He’s excelled in his first two years, garnering several convention GOH appearances. He has won the last three Ursa Major awards for Best Published Illustration (including a 2009 win for the cover of
Out of Position
), and in 2008, his full-color graphic novel
Dog’s Days of Summer
won an Ursa Major for Best Other Literary Work. His next project is the Nordguard Adventure, a painted graphic novel to be released in three parts.
Across Thin Ice
, the first volume, has earned wide acclaim, and part two,
Under Dark Skies
, is forthcoming.

His all-ages gallery can be found at
www.blotchinc.com
. For more information on the Nordguard Adventure, please visit the official website at
www.nordguard.com.