Ben Soul

the garage, unlocked his car, retrieved the bamboo Buddha, locked the car, and went back to Dickon.

  “It’s a bamboo Buddha,” he said to Dickon. “Minnie, my friend who is dying, insisted I take it.”

  “Who’s Minnie?”

  “Minnie Vann. She was my boss when I started in the mailroom at Indigent Aborigine.” He smiled. “If she hadn’t ordered me around, I might never have hooked up with Len, or gone into computer work. She’s pushed me a lot of times when I was too slow to move.” Tears stood in Ben’s eyes. “She’s the one who came and helped me through things when Len died. I’m going to miss her, Dickon.”

  “Oh.” Dickon stared down at his feet as he walked the path up to the Village. He carried the clamshell Harry had put together for Butter. Ben carried the bamboo Buddha. They passed Emma’s cottage. Faintly they could hear two cats arguing, and the low laughter of women. Then Butter knew they were coming, and commenced barking. She’d had enough of time alone.

  “You will come in,” Ben said, “won’t you, Dickon?” Ben put his hand on Dickon’s shoulder to encourage him.

  Dickon looked at Ben’s hand and smiled a tight little smile. “Yes. I don’t want to go on much longer without sorting some things through.”

  Ben held the door for Dickon to enter. Butter greeted Dickon with a wagging tail and a great attention to the clamshell he carried. “Hello, Butter,” Ben said, grinning. Butter spared him a look and a brief whipping of her tail, and returned to her adoration of the clamshell.

  Dickon grinned a broad grin. “Shall I feed her?” he asked.

  “Go ahead,” Ben said. He put the bamboo Buddha on a shelf in front of some philosophy books. “She can’t wait. Never can.”

  “Dogs do people food,” Dickon said, still grinning. He went to the kitchen and put the contents of the clamshell in Butter’s bowl. She immediately began feasting on leftover hamburger and medallions of beef.

  Ben came into the kitchen. “Give me your jacket,” he said to Dickon. “Then I’ll put on some water for tea.” Dickon handed him his denim jacket.

  “I can start the tea water,” Dickon said. “I know where you keep your teabags and mugs, too.” Dickon’s eyes followed Ben as he left the kitchen.

  “Okay,” Ben said. He took hung Dickon’s jacket his own in the coat closet. When he returned to the kitchen, Dickon had set the mugs out with a teabag in each. He and Ben sat down at the kitchen table to wait on the kettle. The only sounds in the room came from Butter licking her bowl and the water growling in the kettle. When the water came to a boil, Ben got up and poured water in the mugs. He brought the full mugs to the table.

  “Would you like to sit in the living room?” Ben asked.

  “Yes,” Dickon said, and got up. He took a chair where his face was in shadow. Ben sat in the other chair, his face in the full light of the lamp beside it that he turned on.

  After a silence, Ben said, “Where do we start, Dickon?”

  “Where do you want to start?”

  Ben sipped at his hot tea and frowned at the cup. When he spoke, the words exploded out of him. “You left me out in the cold,” he said, “at Pueblo Rio.” Anger and hurt roughened Ben’s voice. The ultimate question blasted out of his throat. “Why?”

  Dickon let the fury of Ben’s emotions wash over him without flinching. “Stupidity,” he answered. “I shouldn’t drink so much. I don’t handle it very well.”

  “I shouldn’t either. Took me a couple of days to feel good again.” Ben was quieter, but the anger still rode his vocal chords.

  “I was a rude, silly, ass, Ben,” Dickon said contritely. “I apologize.”

  “Accepted,” Ben said after a long moment.

  “I don’t often drink, and almost never that much, not anymore,” Dickon said. “I had my wild time, after Vin Decatur died. I spent most of a year drinking with Harry Kerry, and others like him.” Dickon leaned forward into the light. Ben could see the earnest pleading in his green eyes.

  “It was a dark time for me. If it hadn’t been for La Señora, I might be dead of liver disease by now, or worse.” Ben wondered what to say to this revelation, but Dickon went on before Ben could think of anything. “I’m not proud of that time. There was a kind of wild freedom in it for me, a looseness I’d never had in my life. I almost got addicted to it.”

  Dickon smiled ruefully at Ben. “I’m sorry I lost it with you in Pueblo Rio. La Señora thinks I was getting too close to you, and got scared off.” Dickon sighed, and sank back into the shadows. “She’s probably right, as usual,” he added.

  Ben waited a moment. Perhaps Dickon had more to say. Dickon didn’t say anything more. Butter unexpectedly began chasing her tail, as if she wanted to break the tension in the room. Round and round she whirled, growling and biting at the air just inches from her caudal appendage.

  “Sit, Butter,” Ben said to her, finally. He had to repeat the command before she stopped, looked at him as if to be sure he really meant it, and then sat next to Dickon’s feet.

  “What do you want now, Dickon,” Ben asked. “Do you know?”

  “I’m not sure.” Dickon took a big swallow of his tea. “I’ve never had a long-term connection with anybody, except Vanna.” Dickon swallowed more tea, draining his mug. “I don’t know how to go about one, you see.”

  “The short answer is day by day.” Ben sipped tea from his mug, and set it beside him again. Dickon put down his empty mug. “At least, that’s how I did it with Len.” Ben wrinkled his forehead. “Len did a lot of the work,” he went on, “especially at the first. I’m not so sure how to start something off, myself.”

  Dickon waited for Ben to go on. The silence between them was less like strained.

  “Len sort of took me under his wing,” Ben said. “Come to think of it, so had Dill, my professor at college. And there was Minnie Vann, too.” Ben looked up at Dickon’s shadowed face. “I’ve usually had someone leading me into love. I’ve never tried being the leader before.”

  “I don’t lead easy, and I don’t think you do, either,” Dickon said. “Why does one or the other of us have to be the leader?” Dickon raised a puzzled eyebrow. He was rubbing his earlobe in an agitated way.

  “Maybe we don’t,” Ben said.

  “Then how do we get together, if we’re going to?” Dickon spread his hands as if he were holding a large bowl. Butter licked the hand nearest her. He used it to rub her head.

  After a long pause, Ben said, “Well, maybe we talk about it, first.”

  “Talk first, sex second? That doesn’t sound very gay,” Dickon said with a smile.

  “Or third, or fourth,” Ben said. “Gay or not isn’t important. The two of us are.” Ben shifted in his chair to get to his handkerchief. He took it out and blew his nose.

  “Do you want a long-term relationship with me,” Dickon asked.

  “I think so,” Ben said. “Do you want a long-term relationship with anybody?”

  “I don’t know.” Dickon studied his hands, rubbing them together. “I think sometimes yes, and sometimes no.”

  “What do you suggest we do?” Ben leaned forward in his chair.

  “Try it out, for a while.” Dickon looked away into the room’s corner. He was reluctant to see Ben’s face.

  “Perhaps,” Ben said. “Sort of ‘live together’ before we ‘marry’ kind of thing.”

  “At least find out if the sex is right between us,” Dickon said, turning back to Ben.

  “When?”

  “Now’s a good time to start,” Dickon said, grinning. “Except the blasted condoms are at my place.”

  “I’ve got a few around here, too,” Ben said.

  “Hoping?” Dickon leaned toward Ben.

  “Doesn’t every girl have a hope chest?”

  Neither of them moved. Finally Ben said, “Do you want more tea?”

  “No,” Dickon said. “Do I come to you or do you come to
me?”

  “We meet in the middle,” Ben said. “That’s best, I think.” He stood, and waited for Dickon to stand. Dickon took a deep breath and came together with Ben. They kissed, tentatively.

  “That’s a start,” Ben said, and kissed Dickon again, with more confidence. Dickon put his arms around Ben and kissed back. This time they held the kiss, exploring each other, for several seconds. Butter whined at their feet, unnoticed.

  On the hill, the unicorn with the unique horn stirred in her dreams. She reached out to Butter, to quiet her. “Now is their time,” she counseled the dog. “Let them be to fumble their way toward each other.”

  Ben and Dickon broke their embrace, and moved to put an arm each around the other’s waist. They headed for the bedroom. Butter whimpered once, and lay down beside Ben’s chair, though every fiber in her yearned to be part of the process.

  In the bedroom, Ben and Dickon explored each other, speaking in the languages of touch, not words, until they joined to fill each the other’s emptiness for that time.

  Respecting Morning

  Butter woke first. Her sleep on the hearthrug had been tumultuous with dreams she did not remember, except that they involved convoluted chases. She had not slept well, by herself. Dogs belonged with their people, not in another room. But, the unicorn with the unique horn had spoken, and she had obeyed. She stood, stretched forelegs and aft legs, and went to the kitchen to lap up some water. Her water dish was only partly full, but it sufficed for the moment. Her other pressing needs required she waken Ben to open a door for