Hero by Clyde-B

[Clyde-B]

Hi, I was asked to repost this story.  It's only ten parts and originally appeared in the Drabble thread.

It didn't have a title there, but I named it Hero for a couple of reasons.

As a gay kid, I grew up on borrowed heroes.  Most people thought that the idea of a gay man being heroic was laughable.  I didn't.  I was too young and too naive to realize that gay heroes were simply suffering the same fate as other minority heroes - pretending they don't exist.

Since there are so many gays in literature and the movie industry, I had hoped the situation would be rectified by now, but it isn't  So I decided to write my own.  Like everybody else, gay kids need their heroes too.

It's also the title of an Enrique Iglesias song.  He became one of my heroes when he picked a cute young gay kid out of the audience to sing this song to at London's G.A.Y. club.  Not many straight male singers would have the guts or the compassion to do that.

Comments, suggestions, etc. at the end of this thread or by PM are welcome.

Thanks

CB

[Clyde-B]

     A long hot drive home.  Jack, happy he’d decided.  Paper clipped to his invoices a card to Ennis.
     The towtruck from the last gas station barrelled past him and pulled across the road perpendicular to the ditch.  Why the roadblock?  Jack slowed to a stop.  The grizzled old mechanic walked toward him; he had a tire iron in his right fist nervously beating it against his left palm.
    Jack rolled down his window.  “There a problem?”
    “Get out the vehicle.”
     Jack froze, paralyzed.  Something wasn’t right.  “I said, there a problem here?”
     “And I said, get out a your vehicle.”   


      100 words

[Clyde-B]

     The wind slammed the metal side of the trailer, seeped in around aluminum frames and rattled windows and door.  Ennis, soaked in sweat, tossed and turned on greasy sheets.  “Jack... Jack...”

    “Twist residence, Lureen speakin.”
    “You should a kept that bullrider a yours in his own bed.”   Lureen shivered, the voice from the receiver didn’t even sound human.
    “Who is this?  Hello? Hello?”
     The line clicked, went dead.

     A stranger in a rusted pickup pulled behind Jack.  Now there was no escape.  No safe haven.  Maybe the abandoned grain silo on the rocky knoll.  The mechanic reached for Jack’s door.

     
     100 words

[Clyde-B]

    Out of the truck, Jack stood tall, a good half foot taller than the mechanic. “This here’s a fine kettle a fish.  Just what the hell’s your problem?”
    They were three against one.
    The mechanic moved in close palming the tire iron.  “Don’t suffer your kind around here.”
     Jack smiled, turned on the charm.  “I sell tractors.  You got somethin against tractor salesmen?”
     nobody laughed.
     The stocky one yelled, “We gone a fish or cut bait?”
    Jack glanced at the silo trying to gauge the distance.
    The mechanic sneered a gap-toothed grin.  “Planin on bein the one that got away?”


    100 words

[Clyde-B]

     Supper ended, Jack wasn’t home.  That phone call had unnerved Lureen.  She fidgeted, raised the receiver, dialed.
    “LaShawn?  This’s Lureen.  What?  No, honey I’ve not tried that pumpkin pie recipe yet.   What?  Yes, Bobby’s piano recital’s next week.”
     Dammit LaShawn, you chatter like a squirrel.
    “Listen honey, this’s important.  Is Randall there?  He is?  Jack’s not home yet, I’m half frantic.  Would you ask him if he knows where Jack is?”

     Over Jack’s shoulder, in the bed of his own truck, a new voice, “Better cancel them retirement plans.”  Jack spun around.  Behind him, the mechanic raised the tire iron.


     100 words

[Clyde-B]

    In a blood red sunset, like an evil talisman, the tire iron cut a cruel arc.

    “NOOOOOOO!!!!!!”

     A shot echoed, ricocheted off the descending metal, the mechanic’s blow deflected, smashed the knee of the ugly one in Jack’s pickup.  A scream, a loud snap, Ugly pitched face-first into the truck bed.
      Jack wrenched the tire iron free.
      The mechanic pulled a gun.  His eyes darted along the horizon searching for the shooter.
      In the silo’s shadow pawed a chestnut stallion with a silver blaze, its rider cocked his .30-.30.  “Believe I’d drop that pistol.  Your horseshoe ain’t that lucky.”


       100 words

[Clyde-B]

    The rider and his mount ambled closer, .30-.30 aimed squarely at the mechanic and his stocky cohort.  “I got two bullets.  You got two minutes.  Don’t forget your ugly friend.”

    In the emergency room she sat twisting her handkerchief.  The young intern wearing the Kokopelli t-shirt under his lab coat stooped down.
    “Will he be okay?”
    “He’s stable and resting.”
    “But will he be okay?”
    “We also found a bleeding ulcer.  It’s a treatable H. pylori infection, but the blood loss isn’t helping.”  Her eyes searched his.  “If the planets in alignment and we catch a little luck... maybe.”



     100 words

[Clyde-B]

     Waiting for the night nurse, she went through his things.
      His shopping list:
      a gallon of milk
      a gallon of paint
      a gallon of gas
     She smiled.  It was just like him.
     His mail: An old advertising postcard?

      Only Jack and the rider remained.
      The rider dismounted.  “They was gone a kill you.  If you’d a been alone.”  He looked haunted.  A long ago transgression he couldn’t forgive himself.  His eyes filled with tears.  “but I saved you...”   
     Jack’s arms enfolded him.  “Was never no doubt, Ennis.  Didn’t we always know you would have?”   He stroked Ennis’s hair.  “S’alright...  S’alright.”



      100 words

[Clyde-B]

     Jack gave the rider a lingering kiss worthy of a hero succeeding an impossible quest.
     “Remember July 20, 1969?”
     “Ennis, you don’t remember dates.”
     “Don’t never forget a good kiss.”  They laughed.
      With the back of his hand Jack caressed Ennis’s cheek.  “I have to go now.”
     “I’ll go with you.”
     “You can’t... not yet.  It’s not your time.”
      The wind ruffled Ennis’s hair.  The rushing in his ears grew deafening.  The horizon blazed unnatural bright, Jack’s outline wavered, shimmered, glowed until all Ennis could see was blinding white.

        “Jack!  Wait!”

       “Daddy?  Daddy?  Jenny, get the doctor Daddy’s wakin up.”



      100 words

[Clyde-B]

       “Where am I?  Am I dead?”
          A brilliant white hospital room, the doctor bending close, Junior standing, looking harried.
         “Mr. del Mar, we thought we’d lost you.”
         “Wouldn’t take me.  Tit for tat, I guess... maybe when hell freezes over.”
         “Daddy We was so worried.”
         “Had the damndest dream.”  Ennis smiled.  “M’friend Jack, alive again.”  He grew wistful.  “Thought he forgave me, maybe we could start from scratch, but... wasn’t real.”  He sighed.
          Something brightly colored on the nightstand caught his eye.
         “What’s that?”
         “Just a advertisement.  Came in your mail.”
          Ennis knew Jack Twist’s handwriting when he saw it.
       

           100 words