(no subject)

[wildcolumbine]

A SWEETER LIFE

Jack Twist first glimpsed the man a long way up ahead when his truck and the far-distant figure crested hills at the same time, but it took another few minutes before he swooped down into a shallow valley and got a really good look. A pale as dust cowboy in need of a horse, shoulders slumped, Stetson jammed down against the buffetting wind, sack full of nothing much slung over his shoulder. Jack was nearly on top of him before the engine growl made headway against the gale, and the man held out one finger, barely shifting it from the taut, skinny line of his body.

"Want a fuckin ride or not?" Jack muttered but he pulled in and waited a few yards further on. In the wing mirror he watched his would-be passenger approaching, no quickening of pace, just the merest nod in Jack's direction.

"Where you headed, friend?" Jack turned down his radio just in time to catch the soft reply.

"Moorcroft."

"Lucky day. Headin that way myself." But even as he said the words, an exquisite sliver, icy and sharp, sliced its way down through his chest. Moorcroft? Sure, he could go through Moorcroft but the back way through Weston was quicker up to Lightning Flat. Still, he could do with the company. He ran a finger and thumb over his mustache - a habit developed of late - and hauled the truck one-handed back onto the hardtop as the other man slumped down in the passenger seat.

"You workin there?"

"Mmm."

"Been walkin long?"

"Mmm."

Well, don't talk then, Jack thought, as the silence settled loud and heavy over the cab. But then suddenly his companion cleared his throat and struggled to a more upright position.

"Heard there was maybe a wrangler's job goin up at the Mannerim ranch, somethin...." He subsided into stillness again, as if the effort of stringing together a whole sentence had exhausted his store of words, but out of the corner of his eye Jack caught the pale man taking a quick look in his direction.

"Mannerim? You don't want a be workin for them. Heard nothin but bad." The sliver caught Jack's chest again and he found himself saying something long before his brain had thought of it. "You want work? Tell you what....uh...?"

"Ennis."

"Ennis." He held out his hand. "Jack."

"Jack." It wasn't an echo; it was too quick to be an echo. It was almost like this Ennis had spoken his name before Jack had even said it, as though he knew it already. Ennis twisted in his seat and grasped Jack's hand. The wind suddenly dropped and lurched the truck over the centre line.

"I...uh...I could offer you work. North a Moorcroft, on my daddy's spread?"

Ennis shrugged. "Okay. Job's a job."

"Can't offer you but minimum wage and board."

"Uh huh."

For the first time their eyes met, azure and sable, sky and earth, and Jack, always open-hearted, ready with the quick smile and easy laugh, couldn't hold the gaze, had to look away and fight down the rising panic. What have I done? What have I done?  He gripped the wheel and concentrated hard on the road ahead. Within a few minutes, Ennis was asleep, snoring gently as his head bumped against the side window.

It had been a simple choice for Ennis - run or die. He hadn't bothered to pick up his wages or hang around long enough to fix his truck, figuring that money and a truck weren't much good to a corpse. That night, when he wasn't walking, he'd slept as best he could, curled around himself like a working dog, in the lee of a locked shed.

When he hit the road again in the pre-dawn chill his stomach was growling. In his pocket was enough money for a meal up ahead at the next little town but there was a heap of walking to do first. Not much traffic on this backroad, everything using the highway further north, but that suited Ennis. Fewer vehicles, fewer eyes. His legs were burning with all the unfamiliar activity when, in a lull in the wind's drone, he heard an engine noise. Do I? Don't I? His left index finger made its own decision and inched out cautiously from his side, but he half-hoped the driver would just sail on through like the others had.

He didn't, pulling up a fancy orange truck onto the soft edge ahead of Ennis. Get it over with, prob'ly ain't plannin on killin you, not today anyway. As he clambered into the cabin and glanced at the dark-haired, smiling driver, an odd peace crept around Ennis, like a bath-tub of warm water. Should stay awake, should keep a lookout, he kept telling himself, but the warmth settled heavy on his eyelids, and the driver's tuneless whistling swirled into the engine’s thrum, and a pleasant oblivion snuck up behind him and carried him off.

The letterbox near the gate carried the freshly painted legend "J & J Twist" but the small stucco house at the end of an interminable drive was in desperate need of a new coat. Inside, in the cool, austere kitchen a woman sat spooning a mushy mess of unidentifiable food into a crumpled death-grey man in wheelchair.

"Daddy, Mama, found us a new hand, Ennis..."

"del Mar."

"del Mar," repeated Jack, too quick to be an echo; the name had been there, in his head, even before it had been spoken. He shivered, caught his breath, interposed as Ennis went to stretch out his hand.

"Daddy don't shake hands since the stroke. He don't do anythin much. But he's still got it up here." And Jack touched his head with his finger.

"I'm right sorry, sir," Ennis mumbled.

"Where do you want a sleep? There's a spare bedroom out in my cabin," said Jack.

"...or there's Jack's old bedroom upstairs," said his mother quickly. "It's just a small bed but..."

Jack let out a sharp laugh. "Freeze your ass off up there come winter."

"Upstairs'll do fine, thank you ma'am."

"Well," said Jack, "stash your..." He glanced at the pitifully small bag Ennis held. "When you're ready I'll show you round."

"Like a cup a coffee?" said Jack's mother. Ennis murmured a thank you and his eyes slid round to where a cake sat on the kitchen bench. He sure could eat some cake right now.

They saddled up the only two horses and rode around the small ranch, Jack talking in a nervous, rapid manner most of the time, telling Ennis how his daddy ran black baldies, good little cattle but Jack had bigger plans. It was more like a social visit than a job introduction, and Ennis, not used to such familiarity, mostly held his peace and took in as much as he could. The Twist place was right out the back of nowhere and that at least gave him the beginnings of a sense of calm.

"See, the ranch'll come to me when Daddy dies so I figured it was time to come back and make sure there was somethin worth havin when it does. I done the best I could before, come up from Texas once or twice a year but...hard to get help out here. Daddy, he never could get much help. Tell the truth," Jack's voice dropped, "he's an old bastard to work for. Can't never get things right with my old man. Still, things is better since he had the stroke. Wait long enough..." He laughed but there was a bitter little undertone to his voice. "There was one ranch hand came up a while ago..."

Ennis made a deep grumbling sound in his throat but said nothing. Didn't seem right to him to bad-mouth your own father like that.

Later, they hitched the horses outside Jack's log cabin, a neat affair that had obviously come prefabricated on the back of a truck and which sat slightly incongruously amidst its sad surroundings. While Jack busied himself in the small kitchenette, Ennis surreptitiously checked out the place. There wasn't much furniture but it was all new, and on one wall was the only piece of decoration, a framed photo of a young boy, handsome but sulky, and carrying some of Jack's dark looks. When Jack returned he seemed eager to talk about his past and Ennis let the words wash over him as they sipped coffee.

"Yeah, Texas. Use ta rodeo, met a girl down there, married, a kid - you know how it happens sometimes, kinda unexpected-like." Ennis nodded politely. "Went okay for a while. Her daddy's in the farm machinery business. Big bucks, you know? But then things turned bad." Jack looked closely at Ennis as he continued. "There was another feller come between us, if you get my drift."

"Sorry t'hear that, Jack. She marry him?"

Jack's brows pinched together for a second. He felt a flicker of disappointment; Ennis's question had no apparent guile to it. "No, it all fell apart. Anyway, suited her family to have a quiet divorce, decent financial settlement, and here I am, back at home with a bit a money to spend."

"Uh huh. You see your kid?"

"Ever once in a while. Neutral territory."

"I see my...uh, I see." And Ennis drained the rest of his coffee and signalled the end of the conversation by standing up and heading for the door. "Let's get started."

Jack lay in his big bed, hands behind his head, and stared up through the layered darkness. Ennis del Mar - strange name for such a beaten-down, taciturn man. Ennis del Mar - why did it resonate in his mind like it did? Surely he'd have remembered a name like that? Maybe someone said it once, in a bar someplace, and it had lodged in a lost corner of Jack's memory.  Ennis del Mar.  He tried saying it out loud and found he liked the way his voice wrapped around it, liked the shape of it in his mouth, comfortable-like. More than comfortable.

His right hand took it upon itself to abandon the chill air of the bedroom and seek out the warmth under the covers. It wandered lazily down his body, stopping here and there to twirl a little hair, stroke a bit of flesh, until it came at last to its ultimate destination and set to work. A few minutes later, when Jack came, shuddering and gasping, the sound of the low moan which he breathed into the night was..."Ennis!"

In Jack's old bedroom at the top of the stairs, Ennis's hand made no similar journey. He ran his mind over the miles between Lightning Flat and Ten Sleep, measured the distance to the next desolate ranch, pictured the wide, empty spaces which now surrounded him, spaces where a group of men could be spotted coming a long way off, and figured it was safe enough to drop his guard for a few hours and sleep. He barely gave Jack Twist a thought.

With lunch at the main house over for yet another day, the two men headed back to work, passing the clothesline where Ennis's only spare shirt and jeans flapped near-horizontally alongside the Twist laundry.

"Not much to show for...how old you, Ennis?"

"Thirty-one."

"Same as me! But thirty-one and you only got a change a clothes? You some kinda eastern monk or somethin?"

Ennis sighed loud and long and pointedly yet a little tickle of warmth was playing around his heart, had been growing these past couple of weeks. Dammit but this Jack Twist was beginning to get under his skin, whether he liked it or not. And in an odd way, Ennis was finding that he did like it. He'd spent most of his thirty-one years keeping people at bay, never really comfortable in company, preferring the open range and a good horse, but Jack was something else. Around Jack, the air was just a little warmer, the sun brighter, and the weight on Ennis's shoulders that much lighter. There couldn't be any harm in telling him.

"Ain't no monk. Left my other things with my truck."

"Your truck!" Jack squawked with delight. "Better and better! And where'd you leave that?"

Just outside of Ten Sleep, Ennis dropped Jack as far up the ranch drive as he could bear to travel then disappeared a few hundred yards back along the road, to sit slumped and wary in the deepening twilight. Jack had strict instructions - get in, get the gear and get out. If the truck turns over, good; if it doesn't, leave it. Don't talk if you can help it, don't say where you come from, don't ask about what happened. Jack had rolled his eyes a little but agreed to everything. He soon found the manager, and Ennis's previous boss didn't seem to bear a grudge for his employee's sudden departure. He gathered up Ennis's belongings and helped Jack stow them in the battered old pickup parked round the back of the bunkhouse, chatting amiably as he did so about the brawl that had prompted Ennis's departure. Casually Jack asked what the fight had been about.

"Oh you know what it's like, men get a little too much liquor inside them, bit of pushing and shoving and horseplay and next thing Jerry's calling Ennis a dirty faggot and threatening him with death or worse. Ennis punched his lights out, took off into the dark and next morning he was gone. Didn't even bother to take his truck. Anyway, one of the men fixed it, busted hose or something, work of five minutes. Figured he'd be back when he cooled down some."

"You don't reckon he is....?"

"Queer? Ennis? No. He's been married, got kids, though I suppose that don't count for much. Keeps to himself, though he does have a way of looking at other men sometimes. Don't think he knows he's doing it, but hell, ain't nothing else to look at stuck out on these old ranches." The manager chuckled. "He might be one of them -- what's the term? -- 'latent homosexuals' you hear about but I never lay awake at night worrying about it. Still, you got an odd one there, Mr Johnson. But he's a damn good worker. If you ever have no more use for him..."

"Unlikely. Well, thanks for your time."

"Your things, your truck and this." Jack tossed an envelope containing Ennis's pay onto the seat. "Sure were in some sort of a hurry, weren't you."

Ennis took his wages, mumbled something that might have been "thank you" and climbed out of Jack's truck and into his own, then the two headed in convoy up the long road back to Lightning Flat.

"Never told me you was married." Jack settled his feet up on the heavy coffee table in front of the fireplace.

"Weren't none a yours," said Ennis, following suit. They drank deep from the first beers of the evening and watched the flames pushing against the smoky glass of the fire door. Jack said nothing else but when Ennis ventured a sideways peep he found himself being watched intently. "Okay, coupla daughters, Alma's remarried, nothin else."

"What was it?"

Ennis shrugged. "Just widenin water." He wasn't about to admit to Jack - could barely even admit to himself - that the waters had been greatly increased by his bedroom performance. That wasn't something you talked about, even to a man who was rapidly becoming the nearest thing to a friend you could ever remember having. It hadn't been that he couldn't get it up - no problems there - but when it came to putting it in he'd found it more and more difficult to muster the enthusiasm. The process gave him little physical pleasure and no emotional release. And in his private moments, alone with his hand for company, the images that drifted up and caused his innards to grab and cramp were dark and unwanted and disturbing. He'd told himself the trouble with Alma had just been boredom but after they'd separated, of the handful of girls who'd been drawn by his quiet, moody ways, only a couple had stayed around for seconds.

On Sundays Jack drove his mother to church while Ennis kept a safe, watchful distance from the malevolent-eyed old man and his wheelchair. John Twist had a way of looking that made Ennis squirm, as though every bad thought, every sinful urge he'd ever had was written in letters of flame across his forehead. Still, he couldn't help but feel pity. Didn't look like much of a life, helpless in a chair all day, reduced to talking in frustrated, dribbly grunts. Probably not even that old when he thought about it. Ennis had put a rifle to many a sick or injured animal's head and he hoped and prayed that someone would do the decent thing for him if he ever got like Mr Twist.

His pity was increased by Jack's simmering hatred of his father, a hatred that boiled up while Mrs Twist was away for a few days, leaving the men as reluctant carers.

"Jesus Christ! Fuckin want a puke!" Jack was holding the plastic jug of foul-smelling old man piss at arm's length as he emptied it down the toilet. Out in the hall, Ennis thought it didn't stink any worse than plenty of ranch smells but he bit his tongue. Every time he'd said anything positive about Mr Twist Jack had jumped down his throat and told him to mind his own business.

"Filthy old bastard. Wish I could push him and his damn chair down the steps, break his fuckin neck."

"I'll empty it next time, you want."

"You're welcome. You can do the fuckin lot. Wash him, feed him, throw him in bed, clean out his fuckin bastard mouth, wipe his shitty ass, put that damn thing back on his shrivelled pickle of a stinkin dick! Fuckin Uncle Harold and his fuckin lungs. When's Mama gettin back? I gotta ranch to run."

"You go run your ranch, Jack, more important than your father."

"He don't deserve none a my time!" But that evening, after Ennis had gently attended to most of Mr Twist's needs, Jack sheepishly stepped in and helped lift him into the little bed made up in the corner of the living room. Beneath his frail body their hands met and slid one over the other and although neither man showed a sign both felt a sudden grabbing in their guts. When Jack's mother returned later that week, announcing that Harold was once again safely away from death's door, Ennis said perhaps he might take up Jack's offer of the bedroom out in the cabin, save waking the parents up when he got up in the mornings. Mrs Twist looked sadly at him then at Jack, and she sighed but said nothing. That night, Jack shaved off his mustache.

Jack stripped, sat on the edge of his bed, contemplated another night of beating off while Ennis slept in the room next door, and decided he had nothing to lose.

"Ennis!" he shouted, voice not reflecting the quaking he felt inside, "could you get here a minute?" Mixed in with the wind's moan he heard Ennis grumble his way to the door and cautiously knock. Jack smiled. "Yeah."

As Ennis stepped inside, feet bare but still dressed, Jack was ready with his story. "Forgot to say, those calves in the small corral are goin a need drenchin tomorrow." He stood up and knew that what Ennis was seeing in the lamp glow was good enough to tempt men and women alike, watched as Ennis froze, chest heaving, eyes flicking away in embarrassed uncertainty but always coming back to rest on Jack's body. "Yeah, the calves...", stepping forward, "...you want...?", fingers feathering Ennis's cheek, "...you want..."

In a flash, Ennis grabbed Jack's arm, twisted him round and swept his feet from under him, throwing him half across the foot of the bed. The air was squashed out of Jack's lungs in a great cry of exaltation, and he knew by the sounds behind him that his instincts had been right. But Ennis came at him hard and fast, slammed into him again and again until Jack was whimpering, stuffing the bed-quilt into his mouth, too shocked to do anything but hang on. Then Ennis shuddered, groaned, pulled away and fled from the room, leaving Jack distraught and frustrated.

"Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ!" he muttered, as he knelt, shivering and shaking, trying to breathe away the burning pain. There'd be blood, he was sure of it, didn't want to find out. The expected sound of a door slamming didn't come. Instead there was a muffled thump in the living room then nothing more could be heard over the wind and rain. Jack pulled on a t-shirt and drawers, collapsed onto his bed and let the minutes tick by until he could bear it no longer.

He found Ennis lying on the couch, quivering waves passing over his rigid body, firelight gleaming in his wide-open eyes. A deer caught in a shooter's spotlight. Quietly, Jack settled on the floor beside the fire, hugging his knees to his chest. Ennis seemed barely aware of his presence. He murmured over and over again, "I ain't queer, I ain't queer, I ain't queer...", sometimes low and moaning, sometimes rising to the edge of hysteria, as though the winds of hell were howling through his soul. After a while Jack crawled across to him and cautiously touched his shoulder. Ennis flinched and shuddered, swatted the hand away, but stopped his moaning and sank down into a numb silence that was nearly as unsettling.

"Ennis?" Jack whispered at last, and Ennis's eyes focussed on him as if seeing him for the first time.

"I ain't queer, Jack." It was almost a plea.

"Ain't about bein queer, just about me and you, yeah? Ain't nobody's business but ours." He waited, knew he'd wait for as long as it took; this one was worth waiting for. Finally, a small tear escaped and slid down Ennis's face.

"Just me and you?"

“Uh-huh.”

And Ennis allowed Jack to stroke his hair a while, then gently sit him up and raise him to his feet. Like a child he took Jack's hand and followed him back into the bedroom, where Jack carefully undressed him and laid him down, all the while cooing softly as he would to a terrified colt. He covered Ennis's mouth with sweet lapping kisses, and covered his body with his own, caressing, gentling, willing, until Ennis sighed and reached up for Jack's mouth and let his own hands timidly touch the body he so craved. And Jack began a slow dance, drawing Ennis in until they settled into a rhythm that was as natural as breathing and curiously familiar.

Driven by an instinct he couldn't name, Ennis wrapped his strong rider's legs around Jack's buttocks and pulled him closer, but Jack breathed into his ear, "Too soon, sweet, too soon", although he trembled as he said it. Then Jack lifted a little, made room for his hand, brought Ennis quivering to the brink, held him there a few desperate, teasing seconds, then tipped him over the edge. Ennis buried his moans in Jack's neck, squeezed his eyes shut and at last stroked Jack to his own longed-for climax.

When Jack finally cranked an eyelid open against a day already well advanced, the first things he beheld were Ennis's eyes, tempting as chocolate, just two nose-lengths away.

"So, this goin a continue?"

"If you want..."

Ennis nodded and Jack felt the pillow they shared move under his cheek. Then the velvet brown eyes misted and closed.

"M'sorry, Jack...bout...y'know."

"It's all right."

"Did I hurt you bad?"

"No," Jack lied. He broke away from gazing at Ennis long enough to reach into his bedside drawer and pull out a jar. "But next time you might find some a this helps a little."

Which it did, along with Ennis's newly solicitous manner, but Jack still winced and bit his lips and had to pretend his little yelps were cries of ecstasy until finally, as he guided Ennis's free hand to where it would do most good, that's what they became. Later that day he was more than happy to let Ennis work the distant pastures alone; horse-riding could wait for another time.

So Lightning Flat time took a sideways waltzing step, wrapping the little ranch in a bubble of bright promise, and leaving the dreary outside world to go its own way. As fall slid into winter, and winter drifted into spring the ranch gradually bloomed and improved under the pair's stewardship. During the day each undertook the tasks he was good at, Ennis a natural with animals, displaying a skill and care Jack could only marvel at. The old house got a new coat of paint, although neither Jack nor Ennis were expert with a paintbrush. They were co-workers, never boss and employee, and all the hard work was made easy because it was done with a friend. And as he watched his mate work, a long-treasured dream began to take clearer shape in Jack's mind. This is the one, sure of it.

It wasn't perfect, far from it; Ennis now refused to accompany Jack into town, and if any game of footsie broke out beneath the dinner table Jack's ankles soon bore the brunt of Ennis's disapproval. Ten Sleep, Jack reminded himself often; this man still had a long way to travel, but he'd get there one day and Jack would be beside him when he did. Still, he longed to touch Ennis in broad daylight, not just a friendly push and shake but the touch of a lover, to sit close at supper and smile and wink and feel his Mama's approving eyes on them both.

But more than that, to lay my lover's long pale body on that table, with the old man looking on! To fuck him slow and deep and good, so his eyes roll back and he moans, and shakes like a reed in the wind. And watch Daddy slack-mouthed and squirming and say, See, you old bastard? I can get things right after all, and I can ride better'n you ever dreamed of...

In his arms at night Ennis proved to be a willing - if shy - partner, and Jack had the wisdom to let them discover tenderness and sex together, subtly guiding him into the ways of giving and taking pleasure. Ennis, who had been ready to throw his body onto the sexual scrapheap, who had thought real ecstasy was for people other than him, blushed like a schoolgirl at some of the things he found himself doing but did them anyway because he was doing them with Jack. But away from the bedroom he never said a word about their activities, and if Jack ever tried he would find himself talking to thin air. Even within the sanctuary of their cabin Ennis displayed an odd reticence, so Jack quickly found the best course of action was to retire to his room and wait in hopes, wait until that skinny body stretched out beside him, for it seemed that it took the first touch of skin on skin, mouth on mouth, to pull the trigger. It was always up to Ennis whether he chose to come to Jack's bed and some nights he simply chose not to.

But when he came - oh, Jesus, Mary and all the saints! - when he came.....!