The Boy on the Bus

by

Cole Parker

colepark@gmail.com

Part One

I was on the bus again. At least it wasn’t boring, even if I was used to it by now. My parents had done that split-up job so many did these days. I’d been a bargaining chip. My mom hadn’t wanted me but had used me to try to get things from my dad. Dad liked me a whole lot more than she did and would have welcomed having full custody; he enjoyed my company. But he wasn’t one to make a fuss about much of anything. He was a smoker—and not tobacco. Perhaps as a result, he was very complacent, very laid back, very nonconfrontational. Luckily, if luck played a role, he’d somehow found a good lawyer, one who was everything Dad wasn’t. Mom would have taken him to the cleaners, taken everything and had him pay the cleaning bill for it, too, except for Marylyn, Dad’s lawyer.

Not that Dad had been rich or anything like that when the two of them were still together. Things changed just before they split. What he had now was a large piece of land with his house and some other buildings on it in California that he’d inherited from his dad. His dad had died just a few weeks before my folks split, and so that property was listed in the assets of the marriage. No way my mom wanted it. She was a city girl, had a decent job she liked in Denver, and she was not about to move west to a new life in a new state and go searching for a new job. What she did want was every asset the two had—not to split them but instead to take them over entirely—and that property came into the discussions. She didn’t want to keep the land; she wanted it sold, turned into cash, and if she couldn’t have all of the proceeds, then, reluctantly, at least half of them.

There was no question of alimony. She made more money than he did. She tried to tell the court that he’d be making more money now that he had a large property that his dad had been running as a ranch, but the court correctly ignored that. Marylyn successfully argued that the property had never been an asset of the marriage. She said if my mom wanted to discuss alimony, the court should decide how much she should pay my dad. Mom had dropped the request.

Marylyn had the personality and tenacity to fight that wasn’t in Dad’s makeup. The result of her work was that Dad kept the property, along with half of everything else. I was the principal part of the everything else. The divorce judge hadn’t been as smart as Solomon. He didn’t suggest cutting me in half, which probably would have suited Mom fine, but instead did that himself. She got joint custody, which I hated. Half of me belonged to each of them. Mom had abhorred giving in during the asset division proceedings, and probably, if emotions and avarice hadn’t been involved, she would have relented when it came to me. But she hadn’t relented. The result? Now I had a long, tedious bus ride twice a year. I lived in Boulder, Colorado, half the year and on a ranch outside Temecula, California, the other half. That’s where Dad had moved a couple of years ago after their Colorado house had been sold and the monies from that asset were split.

This gave me a problem I had to contend with. With a six-month, two-state split, it meant my schooling was interrupted each year and I had to change schools in the middle of terms, which was a tedious bother socially and didn’t do my grades any good, either.

When does the kid ever get what he wants? Well, I’d just recently celebrated my 16th birthday, and I asked Dad’s lawyer that very question. When did I get a say in the custody matter? Marylyn said she was going to petition the court. At 16, I was old enough for my sentiments to be heard. What I wanted was to live with my dad and screw the bus ride. And in the process, my mom as well.

)    (

The bus drove through the Rockies on I-70, a scenic, beautiful journey. My bus left Denver at seven in the evening, so I only got to see the splendor surrounding me for an hour or two before darkness took over. I shut my eyes then. It was a five-hour ride to the bus’s first stop, Green River, Utah, where we’d have an hour and a half’s food break for those who were hungry at midnight. I’d had dinner before getting on the bus, and I was asleep soon after it was dark.

I hoped I could still sleep through our three stops in Utah; Green River came first. Then it was Richfield, followed by Parowan. If I woke before Parowan, I hoped I could at least doze the rest of the way there. We’d get there at five in the morning. Parowan was a one-hour food stop. I’d probably be able to choke down some breakfast then. The trip would have reached its halfway point when we left Parowan.

Next would come Mesquite, Nevada, then Las Vegas, where we’d have our longest stop—three hours to eat and/or gamble—before heading off to Los Angeles, still four hours away.

I was lucky. Maybe it had been the stress and excitement of the past few days, knowing I was leaving soon and looking forward to it, but whatever it was, I slept like the proverbial log and only woke when we stopped in Parowan, Utah. Parowan isn’t much of a town—only 3,000 people—but it had a Greyhound bus stop, it had a diner that probably survived on bus passengers, and we stopped for those who wanted a bite to eat this early in the morning and couldn’t wait till we hit Las Vegas. The stop also allowed the bus to unload old passengers and board new ones.

No one got off the bus—the diner wouldn’t be getting rich off Greyhound business this morning. I wasn’t awake or hungry enough to venture out myself, but a couple of people got on. One of them was a kid. He was younger than I was, but beggars can’t be choosers, and I’d had no one to talk to since leaving Denver. Having a companion to converse with, to kill some boringly lonely time with, was something to beg for; I was hoping he’d come sit with me. I was an old hand at this trip and by the time we reached Parowan, knowing the trip from there to Las Vegas was through empty desert and would be boringly dull, I was ready for some company. Without it, I might go stir crazy.

The kid looked like he was 13, but it was hard to tell with boys in that age range. He could be 12, 13 or 14, and until I spoke with him, or at least had a more intimate view of him, I couldn’t be sure. But any of those ages were fine by me; he’d be someone to pass the time with, and that would be more interesting than staring out the window at the bleak countryside.

He looked short and maybe cute; I couldn’t see his face well. He wasn’t smiling and wasn’t looking around the bus at all as he made his way down the aisle. I always took a seat a little past the halfway point to the rear; most people selected one in the front half of the bus, and sitting next to an adult and listening to him or her telling me how best to live my life, which they all seemed to want to do, was something to avoid if I could. They were riding a Greyhound to get to where they were going; how clued in on how best to live one’s life could they be? I usually could avoid them by sitting in the back half of the bus.

This kid wasn’t going to make it all the way back to where I was sitting; I could see that. His eyes were down, and it looked like he was going for the first empty seat he came to. There were quite a few of those ahead of mine. I was right; he found a pair of empty seats across the aisle several rows in front of me and slid into one of them, moving to get next to the window.

He wasn’t alone long. A man also boarding in Parowan followed him down the aisle and, rather than take one of the many empty seats, took the seat next to him. The guy looked to be in his forties to me. He was dressed in a tee shirt and jeans and old sneakers, hadn’t shaved recently, and looked like he was used to riding a bus—like taking a train or driving his car would be beyond his financial means.

He ignored the boy, just sat looking forward until the bus drove off, headed for Mesquite, Las Vegas and then L.A. That was when the man turned and started talking to the boy. The boy had to turn his head when that happened, and I could see his face. The man spoke, and the boy didn’t look happy. He answered a question or two with very short answers, and the longer this went on, the unhappier the boy looked.

The man placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder, and the boy quickly shrugged it off, now not looking as much unhappy as scared. The man’s hand fell from the boy’s shoulder, and I couldn’t see where it landed, but the boy seemed to jerk closer to the window, and his face looked troubled.

I got up. Took the few steps needed. Stopped next to the man’s seat.

“Excuse me,” I said. I didn’t add ‘sir’ as it seemed inappropriate and probably would have confused the man. “My brother needs to come sit next to me. Please step out into the aisle so he can get by.”

The man gave me a look that might have bothered me if I were the sort to be anxious when confronted by a menacing look from a stranger, but I wasn’t. We were among a group of people who were ignoring us but wouldn’t if his challenge became anything other than a stare. I knew that, and he did, too.

The man turned to look at the boy, who wasn’t looking quite so scared now. “You know this kid?” he asked belligerently.

“Yeah. He’s my brother, dickwad. Now move.”

Wow, I thought. Dickwad? The kid had balls, more than I thought. But then, he’d been alone and unsupported before; now he wasn’t, and he knew it. If that guy did anything now, he was in for a load of shit, and who knew? Maybe he’d had trouble with the law in the past that could bite him in the ass even harder this time.

He scowled balefully, hesitated, but then slid out of his seat.

The kid followed and moved past me so he was then screened from the man.

“Thanks,” I said to the guy and took the kid back to my seat with me.

I could see him fully now. I had guessed he was 13 or 14, and probably 14 as most 13-year-olds wouldn’t call an aggressive man who didn’t shave regularly a dickwad. Most wouldn’t even know that word.

He looked like boys that age do: an unfinished human male growing into what he’d become. But right then, yeah, he was sort of cute. Brown hair, almost light enough to be called another, more provocative color, something like wheat or mocha, cinnamon or caramel. I’d settle for light brown. Hazel eyes that were bright now and inquisitive rather than sad or scared. His nose was Roman, and his eyebrows were lighter than his hair and perhaps deserved one of the stimulating colors mentioned above. His complexion was clear and boyishly rosy. I saw that I’d been right when we were both standing in the aisle; he was shorter than I guessed the norm was for his age. He appeared to be skinny, but I wasn’t sure as he was wearing an oversized tee shirt that draped his shape. I’d always liked that look on boys. All put together, I decided he was a good-looking kid.

I wanted to explore this dickwad remark. But he beat me to the punch. I was to find that shyness wasn’t one of his personality traits. It wasn’t one of mine, either, but it perhaps had been when I was his age and the divorce hadn’t yet occurred. That had matured me quicker than I’d liked. Hadn’t taken away my confidence, though. If anything, it had enhanced it.

“Thanks for that. The guy was suggesting he could give me a hand job and I could then help him out. I guess he was thinking a blowjob.”

“I could see you were having a problem,” I said. “I needed to figure out a way to get you free from him and came up with one. Worked a charm.”

“Yeah, the brother hack. Good job! Thanks again.”

“You going to L.A.? Or Las Vegas?”

He grimaced. “Neither. Mesquite. Not my choice, but kids like me don’t have choices. If I can, I’m thinking of getting off in Las Vegas. Don’t know how I can manage to get that far, but if I can, living on the streets there might be better than trying to do so in Mesquite.”

“What do you mean, ‘kids like you’?”

He gave me a look I couldn’t quite interpret, then asked, “You want the long version or the short one?”

“We’re on a bus driving through no-man’s-land. I’d vote for the long version.”

“Okay. Why not?” He stopped and twitched into a better place in his seat. “I grew up in an orphanage. Never knew anything about my birth parents. Nada. That means if I have any health issues stemming from a family history, I’m unaware of them. I’m a ward of the state of Utah. I was in the orphanage till I was eight years old, and then a foster family took me in. What they wanted was a boy to do all the work around the place. I think my CPS agent was getting a kickback because any complaints I made to her were ignored.

“I put up with it as long as I could, but when I was nine, I ran away. That didn’t work out so well. Living on the streets at that age . . . well, my recommendation is, don’t do it. I did learn a lot. I hadn’t known anything about sex before that. On the streets, you learn all about it whether you want to or not. Nine’s a little young to be interested in sex, but being on the streets at nine . . . nine’s not too young to be forced into it.

“I was only out there for about six months. Then the police picked me up and I was returned to CPS. They wanted to return me to the same agent, but by then, I knew better how to kick up a fuss, and believe me, I did. This time someone higher up listened, and I got sent to a different agency with better people running it. Still CPS though. And they hadn’t changed that much. Still in small-town Utah. This time I was sent to a family that was better than the one I had before. Not great, but better. There were two other kids there, one adopted, one of them a foster like me. The parents kept the two of us for the money they were paid to foster kids. We all had chores, but they weren’t horrible or excessive. We went to school and had more or less normal lives, I guess. I didn’t have much to compare it to.

“I was with them till I was 11, almost 12. Two, almost three years. That was when puberty was hitting me hard. The other two kids were one and two year​s older than I was. The one who was 12 was a girl, Nan, and she was into puberty, too—more advanced than I was. She and I became pretty good friends. Nan knew what I’d had to do to survive on the streets. She was ready to find out what sex was all about, and there I was, someone who already knew. She was feeling the itches that the urges of her age provided, and she wanted me to scratch them for her.

“We were already living cheek by jowl with each other, sharing a bedroom and bathroom. Seeing each other naked happened every day. It was routine. The parents didn’t seem to recognize what kids our age were feeling, and in any case, ours was the only bedroom left. They were happy as long as no fusses were made to upset the applecart.

“Anyway, Nan wanted to learn about sex with me, and sure, I liked the idea of partnering up as well. By then, I was pretty sure I was gay, because all my dreams and sexual thoughts were about boys. I’d had sex with them on the streets and sometimes even liked it. That was when it was with a kid my age or someone even older if he wasn’t rough. It wouldn’t be that strange or awkward to do what Nan wanted. Hell, I wanted it, too, even if she was a girl.

“So, I was willing, but worried, too. I liked Nan and was afraid of what would happen to her if she got pregnant. She’d probably be kicked out, and then what would become of her? I figured it would be better if anyone was going to be kicked out, that it should be me; I’d been on the streets and ill-directed by CPS before, and I could handle myself better than she could.

“If I stayed, I knew we’d end up doing the deed. If we did, I wanted to be sure she didn’t get pregnant. So, knowing it was fifty-fifty that I’d get the boot, I did it anyway: I let the adults know I was thinking about sex. And I got the boot. But it was what I had to do.

“What happened was: I told my foster mother that I needed condoms and asked her to get me some. That did it; I was sent back to the CPS for a new placement.”

“You did that on purpose?” I asked.

“You never did things you knew would end up bad for you, yet did them anyway because they were the right thing to do?”

I had to think about that, then remembered. “Yeah, I did. Got tired of seeing a bully beat up softer kids at school, and I kicked his ass. Did a thorough job of it, too. Did it well enough that he never picked on the weak kids again. I got suspended. But I knew that would happen and felt it was the right thing to do. Still think so. So, yeah.”

“Okay, you know then. I didn’t regret it, even though it didn’t work out great for me. I got sent back to CPS, but with a new guy running the place again. I guess the guys who actually care burn out after a time.

“This new guy, I think he was getting kickbacks from people to supply him the kind of kids they wanted, just like the woman agent had done. The guy probably placed me on the same basis. It could have been worse. Some of the kids were sent to places where adults wanted them as sex toys. Eventually, that CPS guy was arrested and given a long sentence in a state prison. Where this guy sent me wasn’t all that bad, but it wasn’t a good, normal home, either.

“I got sent to a guy who made his living as a porn supplier. He fostered me and another boy my age, and he had us do things together, and he photographed them, made videos of them, then sold the product to web sites and magazines. The thing was, he was an okay guy in that he was nice to us, treated us well, and actually didn’t force us into doing the things he filmed. He left the choice up to us. Well, he did talk to us about it, told us he remembered being our age and the feelings he’d had, and told us we could make good money doing just what felt good to us and, in fact, was sure we would be doing the stuff he mentioned anyway. We were both into puberty.

“We did enjoy doing what he had us do. He kept telling us how beautiful we were, how fabulous we looked together, and we enjoyed ourselves and the compliments.

“I knew when I was living with Nan that I was gay. This was great for me. I knew it wasn’t how I was supposed to grow up. I knew not to tell kids at school what I was doing. I could have but didn’t want to. Life wasn’t nearly as hard now as it had been on the streets. Why rock the boat?”

“Are you still with him?”

“Nah. He told both Kenny and me that he had to move on. He never stayed in one place more than a year, and he’d already been with us for two in Parowan. He liked small, out-of-the-way towns. He said people were looking for him, the law but also ones who wanted to cut in on his operation, take a percentage of the money he made, but also control the product he created—meaning producing much rougher sex—and moving kept him safe. That was why he was living in Parowan, exactly the type of small city he liked in rural, southern Utah. He thanked us, told us to be safe, and he left.

“Back to CPS for me. Kenny, too, but they had papers on him, and he was lucky. He had run away a couple of years earlier and his parents had been looking for him, which was why CPS was able to move him back to where he belonged. He was happy to go back, too. CPS there was still being run by the guy who’d sent me to the pornmeister. He’d been seedy then and hadn’t changed. He knew what I’d been doing with Kenny for the past two years. He knew I was perfect for a client he had.

“He checked out his computer and said, ‘Yeah, he’s still looking. He’s a younger guy, in his thirties, and he’s looking for a friend to live with him. He has a preference for a boy, and he says he’ll give a good donation to the CPS if the boy is 13 or 14, and even a larger amount if the boy is already into sex.’

“I couldn’t believe he was telling me this, acting like it was just another placement. ‘Hey,’ I said, ‘that’s not right. I don’t want to be someone’s sex slave!’

“‘You’re a couple of times a loser. You don’t get a say in the matter.’ That was typical of the way he spoke to me. Like I wasn’t a real person to him.

“So, anyway, that was yesterday. Today, I’m on a bus, and I’m supposed to get off in Mesquite. How he managed to move a client out of state is, well, I’m pretty sure it isn’t legal. But it is what it is. I’m to live with a guy who wants me for sex. The man will meet me there. He’ll take me home with him. You saw when I got on: I don’t have any luggage. For all I know, I won’t have any clothes but what I’m wearing, and he might not even let me keep them. I do know he’ll want sex. I’m thinking of not getting off, of just staying on the bus. I don’t think he’ll come on board looking for me. I don’t think he’d try to drag me off. I’ll hide and hope the driver doesn’t look too hard.”

I couldn’t believe he was so calm! I looked at him in wonder. He appeared to be just a normal kid. Yet I had heard what he’d been through! And he’d retained a sassiness one might think would have been knocked out of him.

I wondered if I could have survived what he had. Everything had to be uncertain for him, he had no foundation, nothing to hold tight to, yet he seemed able to get by, accepting what he had to, surviving.

I liked him. I liked his resilience, his fortitude, but on a more down-to-earth level. I liked what I saw, a semi-cute boy with a feisty personality and a seemingly unquenchable spirit.

“Are you going to do that?” I asked. “Stay on the bus? You know, the guy will probably ask the bus driver if a kid got on when he’d stopped in Parowan, and the driver will say yes, and the guy will ask him to have the kid come on out. What’ll you do then?”

I realized I didn’t even know the kid’s name. We hadn’t got into social niceties yet. But I did know he was gay and sexually experienced. Much more than I was. I smiled, thinking that in some ways, I envied him.

He didn’t answer right away. He stood up and stretched, then sat back down. Then, putting the adage ‘great minds think alike’ to use, he asked me, “What’s your name?”

“Trent Givings,” I said. “Yours?”

“I was always called Lonnie. CPS had my birth certificate. Still do, I’d guess. But I saw it once and learned my birth name was Alonzo. What a crappy name! I prefer Lonnie. Whoever gave me that nickname, I’m sure glad they did.”

“Lonnie. I like that. Fits you, too. So maybe, when the driver comes back and asks if you’re Lonnie, and asks me that, too, we can both say no, I’ll tell him we’re brothers, and our names are Dennis and Daniel. If he wants to get into it a little, I’ll ask him if he’s sure this Lonnie kid got on, and you can say when you got on in Parowan, you were the only kid who boarded there, and you’re sure as hell not Lonnie.”

“What if he asks for IDs?”

“I’ll tell him we don’t need to show him anything, that we bought our tickets, our fares are paid, and that maybe he should be getting an ID from the guy asking for Lonnie. Why would he, a responsible bus driver, be a part of giving this Lonnie kid to some stranger anyway? How does he know this is all above board? Then I’ll say this whole thing sounds pretty suspicious to me, and maybe we should get the cops involved. He won’t want any part of that. He’s on a schedule, and he’s probably pushing the time already, talking to us. I think we’ll be fine.”

And after saying that, I started picturing the expected scenario, rehearsing it, thinking if there might be a better way to approach this. Then it hit me. This wasn’t going to happen anywhere near as I’d constructed it for Lonnie. It wouldn’t play out like that at all. Lonnie had gotten on the bus at Parowan, and he’d given the bus driver a ticket to Mesquite. The driver would be watching to see he got off there. And that’s where the man would be waiting for him. Damn.

Okay, I needed a new plan. If I didn’t come up with one, we were screwed.

I told Lonnie about the problem we had. We kicked it around. The one thing we didn’t want to do was have Lonnie get off the bus in Mesquite. Once he got off, we’d lose any control of the situation we had. So, how could we keep him in his seat, and at the same time, thwart any attempts by the man who’d be looking for him to either come aboard himself to look for Lonnie or have the bus driver do it for him?

We didn’t have that much time. The trip from Parowan to Mesquite was only about an hour and a half, and Lonnie had used a lot of that telling me his story.

Lonnie wasn’t much help coming up with a solution to the problem. He just looked worried, and he pulled into himself. Me, I loved working out conundrums like this. I thought about it, watching the scenery pass by out the window, and when I saw the sign welcoming us into Arizona, I knew we were getting pretty close to Mesquite.

I got an idea. It was risky, but it could work. Depended on things out of my control, but it was better than nothing. I got up and made my way to the front of the bus.

“Okay if I talk to you for a moment?” I asked the driver.

“Sure.” He was an older black guy, overweight with a paunch, maybe from sitting in a padded bus driver’s seat all day. His hair was grey and I could see a good, thick pair of biceps filling the short sleeves of his shirt. I had the idea he might be perfect.

“I can buy a ticket from you, can’t I? For my brother? He only bought one to Mesquite because he’d spent most of his money and knew I’d have enough to pay for him once he was on the bus. We’re both headed for L.A., and it would be easier to pay you the extra fare than for him to get off in Mesquite and hope there was anyone to buy the ticket from in Mesquite this early in the morning. What’s the cost from Mesquite to L.A.?”

“$62. But there will be an agent there in Mesquite.”

“Yeah, but . . . look, we really don’t want to get off the bus there. It’s kinda dicey. A guy is looking for him. My brother, well, he got with this girl who was some years older than him. Even though he’s young, he’s a randy little bugger, and they got to talking. Eventually, the girl told him she liked breaking in virgins, and, to make a long story short, break him in she did, right and proper, but her boyfriend found out and . . . look, I can pay you. No one would know. I’m not going to be telling anyone about any of this. I don’t want the guy looking for my brother to know where he is. So, what happens to that $62 is no one’s concern at all; it never happened. If Greyhound doesn’t know, well, no one will know who’s on this bus or isn’t. The fact is, I don’t have that exact amount to give you. All I have is a hundred-dollar bill, and if you don’t have change, well, that’s okay, too. What do you say? Can you help us out?”

The driver was quiet for a moment, then said, “Yeah, you can pay for him going from Mesquite to L.A. Happens all the time, someone wanting to extend their trip. All sorts of reasons, too. Yeah, give me the cash; no more needs to be said.”

“Thanks. Gosh, you’re saving his ass. And, look, if a guy at the Mesquite station happens to ask you about a kid who got on at Parowan, and if he wants to get on the bus and check if he’s here, can you dissuade him? You don’t want bloodshed on your bus. Maybe tell him the kid got off at the edge of town? The guy’s just looking to make trouble; he has no legit business with the kid, and you certainly don’t want the kind of trouble he could cause. If he gets on and tries to haul my brother off, or if he asks you to haul him off, that would just end up being very bad.”

The driver twisted to give me a look, and I saw him grin. “That extra thirty-eight bucks is to make sure I deliver, huh?”

“Hope you don’t have to earn it,” I answered, matching his grin. Two comrades sealing a pact.

“No problem.” He didn’t look like a guy who’d have trouble dealing with this sort of problem. “I’ve had go-rounds with irate boyfriends and parents on occasion myself.”

“Thanks again. We appreciate it.” I walked back to my seat and was just in time to see the sign telling us we were entering Mesquite, Nevada.

The bus stopped at the depot but only to load and unload passengers. The bus driver didn’t even leave his seat. When everyone was seated and he began to close the door, a man stepped onto the lowest step and held his arm out to keep the door from shutting. Lonnie and I sank low in our seats where we couldn’t see him and he couldn’t see us. I couldn’t hear what the man said—he was too far away and mostly still outside the bus—but could hear the driver who was speaking forcefully.

“Hey, mister, I don’t have time for a story, and sorry, but without a ticket, you can’t get on the bus. Now move. I’ve got a schedule to keep, and I’m already five minutes late.”

He pulled the handle and the door began closing. I peeked over the top of the seat in front of me and saw the man withdraw his arm just before the door would have caught it. He was a large man, heavyset and middle-aged, and I was glad Lonnie wouldn’t have to spend any time with him at all. I reached over and put my hand on Lonnie’s shoulder, keeping him squinched down so he couldn’t be seen by anyone outside the bus. I ducked down, too.

The bus started rolling and soon was out of the city and at highway speeds. I started breathing again. I looked at Lonnie, and he was grinning. “You saved me again,” he said. “That’s twice. And I saw you giving the driver some money. Did you bribe him?”

“Well, sorta. Your fare was only paid to get you to Mesquite. I was afraid the driver would kick you off, and the guy would be there to grab you. I just paid your fare so you could stay on the bus, with a little extra to the driver for unexpected contingencies, like if the man wanted to get on the bus to check for you.”

Lonnie shook his head and looked down.

“What?” I asked.

“I can’t pay you back. I don’t have any money. I didn’t even pay for this ride to Mesquite. CPS made the seat reservation and paid the fare. They made sure I didn’t have any money, probably so I’d be hungry and glad to get off in Mesquite.”

A realization suddenly hit me. I hadn’t given it a thought at the time, but what I’d done struck me then. I’d paid for Lonnie through to L.A. I could have just paid his fare to Las Vegas. But I’d sort of assumed he’d be going to L.A. with me. It was like my subconscious knew what I wanted more clearly than I did fully awake. But too, my excuse to the driver was that Lonnie was my brother; paying for him only to Vegas would have sounded off.

Lonnie alone, penniless in Las Vegas just didn’t equate, either. Lonnie with me, safe in California, made a whole lot more sense.

Now, thinking that through, I knew I couldn’t have just left him with no money or anything else to fend for himself in Las Vegas. He had no one. If he came with me to L.A., I could look after him. Figure something out for him. I wasn’t thinking long-term. Just short-term; at the moment, with me, he was safe.

I put my hand on his shoulder, and he raised his head to look at me. “I paid your way to L.A.,” I said. “You’re coming home with me. My dad will pick us up at the L.A. bus terminal and take us home. Home is a ranch just outside Temecula. That’s a city about halfway between L.A. and San Diego near the coast. You can stay with us until we figure something out . . . well, until you figure out what you want to do. No way am I abandoning you in Las Vegas.”

He looked at me, sat up straighter, then turned away. I saw his shoulders begin to shake. I grabbed him and pulled him into me, and he sobbed for a few minutes. Damn, the stress that poor kid must have been living with.

When he finally stopped, he pulled away. I handed him my handkerchief. I figured a boy of 14 wouldn’t have one; I didn’t start carrying one until recently. He took it, blew his nose, and tried to give it back. I laughed and told him to put it in his pocket.

The thought of him having no money and maybe being hungry made me ask him, “When did you last eat?”

“Dinner last night. I had a hot dog.”

“You must be starving; I am too; we missed the early feeding in Parowan. We’ll get something in Las Vegas.”

“I can’t pay!”

“I can. My folks have been divorced for a couple of years now, but they still seem to want to have the upper hand over each other when dealing with me. Well, not so much my dad. He takes what comes with as little fuss as possible, but my mom is the most competitive person in the world. I’ve figured out how to use that. Dad sends me $200 every time I’m taking the bus coming to come live with him and then hands me the same again when I’m going back to Colorado. He wants me to have money if I ever need it for anything, especially emergencies. So, I tell my mom he’s giving me that money, and she gives me $250 to show me—though really herself—that she’s one-upping him and that she cares more about me than he does, that I should love her the most. It’s all bullshit. But all that money is way more than I need.”

The trip from Mesquite to Las Vegas took about an hour and a half. The next Greyhound to L.A. left at noon. We had about three hours to kill in Vegas. I saw that many of the bus passengers were going to use the time to visit the casinos since they were making beelines toward the several that were close by. As we got off, I thanked the driver again. He told me there’d be a different driver going to L.A. and gave me a voucher for Lonnie’s fare.

Our first order of business was to find a coffee shop and eat. The bus had dropped us off on the Strip near several hotels. I chose the Wynn Las Vegas as I was sure there’d be a coffee shop there. There was, and we both got large breakfasts. Lonnie wasn’t very big and was skinny, but man, that boy could eat! Made me wonder how well he’d been fed recently. Or ever. Drink, too: he had three cups of cocoa.

We talked over breakfast about what to do after eating. He didn’t have much to suggest. I did.

“They have some rides at one of the hotels here. The Strat Hotel and Stratosphere Tower. I’ve heard about one called the Big Shot. You like amusement-park rides?”

“Never been on one. Never been to an amusement park.”

“Well, this might be too scary for you. It’s a huge, powered ascent and then a gravity drop. But it’s supposed to be great. I’d like to go on it. You can just watch if it looks like too much for you.”

We took a taxi to the hotel, which wasn’t far from the Wynn, and got in line for the ride. Lonnie had recovered some of his feistiness. The food had enlivened him. He got in line with me, saying if I could stand it, he could, too.

That ride was something! We shot up the tower, over 300 feet, and the sign that said we’d pull over 4Gs was probably right. Wow. And then free-falling back down. I looked at Lonnie as we left the ride area, thinking he might be pale and shaking and on wobbly legs. Instead, his face lit up like Christmas, he said, “Let’s go again!”

And so we did.

The ride from Las Vegas to L.A. was pretty dreary. Just flat desert most of the way till we got to the mountains surrounding the L.A. basin, and even then we rode through mountain passes that weren’t the least bit interesting. The stress Lonnie must have been feeling, and then his huge breakfast, combined with the monotonous countryside, did him in. His head started nodding, and eventually, he slid over next to me, and his head fell onto my shoulder. He was out for the count.

No one had ever slept on me before. It seemed to me, someone who tends to over-romanticize things, that there had to be a lot of trust in his doing that. It was undeserved, of course, but his head on my shoulder suddenly filled me with an unexpected emotional feeling, probably some of the protective urge a new mother feels, and a lot of pride.

When we hit L.A. freeways, there was heavy traffic all the way into downtown L.A. Luckily, most of the gridlock and jams occurred in the lanes going out of downtown. Our lanes moving toward the downtown area were busy but at least moving.

Dad was at the terminal to meet me. I introduced him to Lonnie, who actually looked a little shy, an attitude I’d not seen from him before. Dad was Dad when I introduced Lonnie to him.

“Lonnie, this is my dad, Henry Givings. Dad, Lonnie.”

Nothing much fazed Dad. He didn’t even ask why I was bringing someone to stay with me or how long he’d be staying. Probably figured he’d find out when the time came, and no reason to waste his breath asking before then.

We got my luggage and headed out, made our way toward the I-15 and drove to Temecula. This time we were in the mass exodus from L.A. to the burbs, and it was slow, slow going till we were well past Irvine, headed south.

Part Two

Driving through L.A. to get to Temecula, one passes through many of the towns that comprise L.A. Ask most anyone how many there are, and you’ll get many different answers, but almost no one knows the true number, and when they’re told, they generally don’t believe it. But there are a large number of incorporated towns in L.A. County which get lumped together as Los Angeles. How many? Eighty-eight. And it’s likely that people unfamiliar with the city haven’t heard of many of these. Places like Maywood, Artesia, Hacienda Heights, San Marino, Signal Hill, Monrovia, Santa Fe Springs.

Driving the freeways, the 110, the 710, then the 15, we saw very little of the cities, but trying to take city streets with a traffic light on just about every corner, our journey would have taken us twice as long.

Lonnie was awake now, and since Dad wasn’t going to talk any more than he needed to and so wasn’t talking at all, I figured this was a good time to tell him about the house guest who’d be living with us for the unforeseeable future.

My dad is great. It’s easy for me to give people the wrong impression of him. Actually, he’s about the best father a boy could have. Well, a teenage boy who, like most of the breed, tends not to communicate that well with his parents. I love him to bits. Somehow, I never manage to tell him that. I think he knows. That’s the best I’ve been able to do in that regard.

“Dad,” I said, “as I told you, this is Lonnie. He’s 14 and homeless. Well, that’s gilding the lily. He’s actually an escapee from a bad situation. I’m going to call Marylyn and discuss the fine points of his living with us. But so you know and are aware that there could be some trouble down the road, he’s from Utah, a ward of the state there, and has had a horrible time due to corrupt CPS officials. I met him on the bus after he was, well, as outrageous as it may sound, sold by one of those corrupt CPS guys to an out-of-state man who was going to use him for sex.

“Right now, no one knows where he is, so there shouldn’t be any fallout on us, but if there is, if they discover his location and want repatriation with him, I want to know where we stand legally regarding keeping him. That’s why I’ll contact Marylyn. Any questions?”

Dad smiled. “Uh, well, yeah, I can manage a few. Oh, and welcome, Lonnie. Glad to have you with us, and sorry life’s been hard for you. It won’t be here unless you have a problem with working 11-hour days in the summer heat shoveling manure and doing all the household chores for us after that.”

“Dad! He doesn’t know you’re kidding! He’s probably scared shitless that you’ll turn him away!”

“Oh. Well, in that case, I can cut his work back to 10 hours a day. Plus chores.”

“Yeah, Dad. That’s much better.” I was about to get mad because I could feel how Lonnie might be reacting to Dad’s kidding. I took a quick look at him.

Lonnie was Lonnie. He was smiling. I guessed he did know. Maybe his circumstances in life had taught him how to interpret voices and what they sounded like when they were serious and when they weren’t. In that smile, I saw a return of the feistiness I’d seen briefly on the bus. That was reassuring!

Dad continued talking, trying to placate me, I supposed. He himself wasn’t uncomfortable with the teasing he’d been doing. But what followed was said for Lonnie’s sake.

“I probably should fill you in on where we’re going and the lay of the land not only physically but culturally, too. We live in, or just outside, Temecula. It’s a town of something over 100,000 people on the edge of Riverside and San Diego counties, about 20 miles east of the Pacific Ocean. Trent and I used to live in Colorado, but my father died a couple of years ago, and I inherited his property here. It’s around thirty acres. He established a horse ranch, stabling and training facility on his land. When my wife in Colorado filed for divorce, having that property made it easy for me to pull up stakes and come here to live.

“I’ve continued to run the ranch without making any changes as it was a going, profitable enterprise. Dad also left me a pile of money, so had I wished, I could just lay back and enjoy myself, but I was a little concerned with what Trent would think of me if I did that.”

He gave me a glance, and I didn’t see any sarcasm in it. Maybe he had felt that way! He’d never said anything like that to me before.

“I do have a fondness for weed,” he continued, “and with nothing else to occupy my time, it could have grown into an obsession, and I didn’t want that. Besides, there are families that live on my land and tend to the horse business, and I didn’t want to interrupt the life they have here. They’d been part of the ranch for a long time; their whole lives were here.

“So that’s what I have here, and my house—Trent’s and my house—is where you’ll be staying. I don’t do much overseeing; I let the families who live on the ranch run the horse business; they know what they’re doing a whole lot better than I do. I get a cut of the profits, so it’s best if I don’t mess it up any. I pretend I’m the boss but, in fact, let them make most of the decisions, and because of my inspired leadership, we’re doing fine.”

He waited for a chuckle, didn’t get one, and so kept going. “Tough crowd. Okay. Well, I live in my dad’s house. I have a housekeeper, the wife of one of the hands on the ranch, and she cooks and cleans and makes the place a home. Her name is Martha. She’s of Mexican heritage as are most of the hands; so is her husband. Temecula itself is about half Anglo and the other half a mixture of Hispanics and Asians. We all get along. We don’t have the hostilities that some places in the state have. I love my hands and their families. Wonderful people.”

He paused, almost as if paying homage, then changed the subject. “Trent goes to Great Oak High School when he’s here and it’s in term. It’s one of the better high schools in the state. If you’re living with us—if you haven’t had your fill of us and want to strike out on your own—you’ll go there as well. Are you smart?”

Lonnie looked at me before answering. I gave him a blank stare. He held his look for a moment, then turned to my dad. “I do okay,” he said. Talk about your noncommittal answers!

“Trent might not have talked to you about this. He’s very smart. Gets it from my parents, I guess. But he is. Just so you know; I’m telling you this so you won’t be upset if he pays attention in school and doesn’t skimp on his homework.”

“Dad, enough! School’s more than a month off. Jeez!”

“Lonnie should know what he’s getting himself into.” Dad had a wry grin on his face. He didn’t get to one-up me very often, and he enjoyed hearing he’d embarrassed me. But I had a perfect right to object! No teen wants to give other teens the message that he might be smarter than they are, and Dad knew that. He knew I’d want to keep my smarts to myself.

“I could tell he was smart on the bus, Mr. Givings,” Lonnie said, showing no reaction to Dad’s teasing. “He came up with things on the fly that saved my ass. I don’t mind him being smart. In fact, I like it.”

“Good,” Dad said. “Yeah, he does that. Probably gets that from me, standing up for himself and others when he sees they may need help. Then he gets all flustered when they thank him. Jeez! Anyway, right now, we have to find a name you can call me, because this mister stuff doesn’t set well with me. The hands all call me by my first name, Henry. That’s just the way I like it. But their kids can’t do that because their moms won’t let them. Mexican moms can be quite strict when teaching their kids manners, both their daughters and sons. The kids had to come up with something to call me, and they decided on Boss. That might be wrong for you, though. You calling me Boss while living in the house with Trent and me might make some people edgy. We’ll have to think about it. I get a kick out of that name, though. See, I’m really not much of a boss, so the irony is funny.”

Lonnie smiled. “You’d probably not like ‘sir’ then, either,” he said, and then couldn’t keep a straight face; his grin turned into a giggle, and Dad told me, “I see why you like this guy!”

We were on the I-15 nearing the exit onto the road that ran us past the driveway leading to Dad’s house, Temecula Canyon Drive. Dad called Martha to tell her we’d be home shortly, twenty, thirty minutes tops, and then had a final question, this time for me. “What are your plans till school starts, Trent?”

I didn’t really have any. I was going into my junior year when high school commenced, and I wanted to use the time here before that simply to relax. I’d finished my sophomore year in Colorado a couple of months earlier. School there was easier than here. Here, I knew I’d have to work hard to maintain my GPA. I could coast when I returned to Boulder. Knowing what I’d be facing, I was just figuring to relax till school commenced. Now, of course, I had Lonnie to think about. I really hadn’t had the time to do that yet. I needed to talk to him, see what his thinking was concerning his future.

“Just goofing off. You know about that; you could give a graduate course in it!” Hah. Payback for embarrassing me. But goofing off was what I had in mind for the few weeks we had left till the next school term began. Well, I’d show Lonnie around the ranch, get him acclimated. That should excite him.

The ranch was an interesting place. If he liked horses, he’d find it more than just interesting.

I still needed to have a heart-to-heart with him, but I’d get him settled in first. Give him a day or two till he had his feet on the ground, then ask him what he felt about things.

I knew I was avoiding the ticklish subject. That was: would he like to stay here permanently, at least till he’d finished high school? And did I want him to do that, or have any objections to him staying? And what would Dad say about a permanent guest?

The big question was, what were the legalities of him staying? I needed to talk to Marylyn—and soon. But maybe not till I knew Lonnie’s thoughts. If he wanted to stay a week, then just strike out on his own, I didn’t need to concern myself with any legalities.

)    (

Martha had dinner ready to set on the table. She was an excellent cook, and I liked her a lot. She gave me one of her warm, cuddly hugs first thing after I’d walked through the door. Then I introduced her to Lonnie.

She didn’t eat with us; things always changed when I came home. She cooked and ate with Dad when he was alone. When I was home, she cooked enough for what we two were having and made extra for her own family and then ate with them. She had food ready when we walked in for both us and her family because of Dad’s phone call; he’d told her that we’d have an extra guest for dinner, and as it was a teen, to expect another eating machine besides me.

We three ate. Lonnie and I both were starving, as only teens can be. We’d been talked out in the car and didn’t feel the need to keep a conversation alive, so it was a quiet dinner.

It was late by the time we were through, and Lonnie looked exhausted. I told him we should go up, and he looked pleased with the suggestion.

My room had a queen-sized bed. I showed him the room I thought he’d like, also with a bed like mine. He looked at it, then gave me a glance, appearing puzzled.

“What?” I asked.

“Aren’t we going to be sleeping together?”

“Uh, I didn’t expect we would. Why would we?”

“You don’t want us to have sex?”

That woke me up. “Sex? Us? I . . . I never gave that a thought. You . . . you want to have sex with me?”

“Well, duh. I thought you were gay! I thought that was one of the reasons you’ve been so good to me.”

“Lonnie, I’m not gay. Well, I’ve never had sex with anyone, so it’s really not something I’ve thought a lot about. But I don’t think I am. Gay.”

“Really?”

‘’If I haven’t had sex, how would I know?”

“Oh, come on, Trent. You’d know because you know who you’re interested in, who turns you on. Who you watch at school. The ones you think about when you beat off. You have to know if you’re gay at your age.”

I didn’t know what to say. This was something I just never had thought much about. I was me. Just me. Sure, I jacked off, but not while thinking of any of the people I knew or had seen. I’d had crushes, but not many, and they hadn’t been terribly strong or compelling, and none of them had lasted long.

Some of those had been on boys. Some on girls. Just like I’d been told in Sex Ed. At school, I’d always been more into academics than social activities. Huh. I’d always put that down to the fact I’d not be here long. I had friends of both genders but didn’t think of any of them sexually. Now I had to wonder, why not? I didn’t know, only that sex hadn’t ever come into it.

I remembered in Sex Ed being told our hormones control our urges, and some kids feel their effects as early as 11 and some not till we’re almost 18. Most of us will be feeling sexual by 14, but we were still normal if it was later or earlier than that. We were individuals, and there was no set time how puberty would work.

I’d heard that and so hadn’t worried. Now, I was starting to wonder if I was okay. But also, for the first time I could remember, when Lonnie said he was planning to have sex with me, I could feel the urge. I realized how excited I was feeling and how I’d not felt that before.

Did this mean I was gay? Or just that my hormones were finally kicking in? We’d been told that when that happens, it was very normal for boys to experiment with boys, and to a lesser extent, girls with girls. Maybe that’s what I was feeling, those initial urges.

Whatever the reason, I liked the feeling.

But was it because it was Lonnie? Did I have any interest in Lonnie that way? Lonnie was certainly cute enough. And I liked his personality. Having sex with him, though? But . . . well, why not?

I couldn’t think of any reason not to do this, although I’ll admit that my mind was more engaged in thinking why I should rather than why not?

What should I say to Lonnie? He was watching me. I had to say something.

“Well . . .”

Lonnie laughed. “You’re really something, Trent. You’re not sure about being gay or straight, are you?”

“No.”

“Okay. I’ll take charge here because if there’s one thing I know about, it’s sex. You don’t seem to know anything about it. Well, there’s Sex Ed, but that’s a kind of an academic view of it, and sex isn’t academic; it’s passion and excitement and a thumping heart and feeling like you’re going to explode and are out of control and how wonderful it is being out of control. Take what you feel while you’re jerking and multiply it by some power, and it still can’t be described.”

He stopped and reached down and pressed on himself, and his eyes were very bright. “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’re going to sleep in your bed, and we’re going to have sex. Nothing extreme. Not going all the way. You’re not ready for that and you might get to thinking about if that’s coming next, and that might turn you off and you’ll forget to feel what you should be feeling. Sex is about feeling things, and that’s what you should be doing. Not thinking.

“And look. This won’t tell you if you’re gay or not. It’ll show you what you should know already: how great sex with a partner is. It’ll give you a benchmark. Then you should have sex with a girl, and you’ll be well on the way to knowing if you’re gay or not.”

I think my body knew more about what was going on than my mind did. Lonnie took my hand in his and led me to my bedroom. By the time we got there, I was fully aroused. My body seemed involved in what was happening while my mind was still trying to catch up. Lonnie started undressing, and it didn’t take him long. I simply watched. This was all new to me, and I was feeling very uncertain. Well, very randy, too. No doubt about that at all.

Lonnie was in the same state I was, and when naked he was even more attractive. That may have been because his face was so alive and eager. I hadn’t even started undressing, and he came to me and began removing my clothes for me. While unbuttoning my shirt with one hand—my mom thought tee shirts too low class and ordinary, so I only had button-up shirts at my house—he used the other to grope my groin, and, well, yeah.

When I was naked, he led me to the bed. He hadn’t been kidding: he did know about sex. I’d say he was a wizard at it. In bed, he was the older of us two, and I was the neophyte beginner.

A lot later, when he was sleeping, his body against mine, I realized what all the furor concerning sex was all about. He’d been right: there was nothing pedantic or intellectual about it. In my ignorance, I’d thought that life was mostly about things that could be reasoned through, thought out, given their place in the order of life through logical contemplation.

Sex has nothing to do with logical contemplation.

)    (

I showed Lonnie around the ranch the next day. Dad’s house was just a short distance east of Temescal Canyon Road, which was the main thoroughfare in that area. The house was set a medium-short walk from the horse facilities. Martha had a golf cart so she didn’t have to walk back and forth every day.

The horse facilities were fairly elaborate. We had twelve families who lived close to the stables, all of Mexican descent. Mexico was fewer than 80 miles south of us, which was one of the reasons Temecula was so heavily Hispanic. These families were all involved with the horses. The ranch’s various businesses included breeding and raising horses for sale and boarding horses for families in town that had a horse or two but not the land or zoning to house them. We also had our own racetrack where racehorses could train. With three major racetracks in the area—Del Mar, Santa Anita and Los Alamitos—along with several other, less-prestigious tracks, our training and boarding facilities were in high demand.

All twelve families had kids, so there were tons of kids around whom I’d gotten to know in the couple of years I’d spent half my time with Dad in California. The kids ranged in ages from three up to 18. After 18, they weren’t kids any longer. But many of them stayed on. It was a good life, living and working with horses on the ranch, and that’s where their families were.

The kids went to area schools, and the older ones went to Great Oak High with me. We were all good friends. They all had jobs on the ranch with the horses or maintaining the facilities, but they all had time for things other than their chores.

I introduced Lonnie to the ones I knew best, the young teens who were between 14 and 17. There were several of these, both boys and girls, and the ones who could break away from their duties accompanied Lonnie and me as we showed Lonnie the sights.

My best friend there was a boy my age named Rodrigo. His siblings all called him Rod, so I did as well. A lot of those kids had Anglicized nicknames. He came up to me, grinning, and gave me a hug. He was very good-looking, with dark shiny hair and bright, intelligent dark eyes. I’d never had any sexual interest in him before. I really hadn’t thought of boys that way. Now, after my dalliance with Lonnie the night before, I realized I was seeing boys differently. Still, with Rod, my feelings were overwhelmingly just friendship. I was happy seeing him again.

He had a brother, Antonio, who was Lonnie’s age. Those two seemed to hit it off very quickly. It’s so easy for kids their age to become friends. Again, with a heightened consciousness now, I had to wonder: was Tony gay? He sure was eying Lonnie in a way that seemed almost salacious.

Lonnie told them he’d never ridden a horse, and Tony took charge of him. The two walked off to visit the stables and find a horse for Lonnie to learn on.

Rod asked me, “You hear anything about moving here permanently?”

“I asked Marylyn to look into getting my custody changed just before I left last time. She’d said she’d start working on it, seeing as how I was almost 16. I just realized, I never heard back from her.”

I frowned. Why hadn’t she called? “I haven’t heard a word, and I want to. I’ll go call her now, see what’s what. I’ll catch you later.”

Back at the house, I called Marylyn’s office, and her secretary put me through to her.

“Hi, Marylyn. I’m back at the ranch. Thought we should touch base. First, anything about getting my custody being changed from joint to just my dad?”

“Yes, I petitioned the court. A judge has to speak to you, your dad and mom. It would be best for your mom to come here, but the judge said she could join us on a video conference if attending in person was too inconvenient.”

“That’s great. When will we do this? Did you get the feeling the judge would be on my side?”

She chuckled. “I like your enthusiasm. But Trent, it’s hard to read judges. Very often in custody challenges they go by the applicant’s wishes at your age if he can give good reasons why the change should be made.”

“I can do that. So, when can the hearing be set up?”

“I wanted to wait till you got back to do that. Now that you’re here and are 16, I’ll call the court, get a date set and let you know.”

“Great. Now, there’s something else. I brought a kid back with me. He’s presently a ward of the state of Utah, but he escaped its jurisdiction.”

I went ahead and told her Lonnie’s circumstances. She had comments. “He’s going to stay with you for a while, then. That means he has to enroll at school. State law here says all kids must go to school. Also, to enroll at Great Oak, school policy says kids have to be vaccinated. If you don’t want Utah to know where he is, you can’t be asking them to send you records for school performance and vaccinations. How do you plan to get around all that?”

“You’re supposed to tell me that, Marylyn! That’s why you get the big bucks!”

She laughed. “Well, the vaccination problem is easy. Most of those were given, if they were, back when he was four or five. He can get the ones the school would want again, or just not worry about it. I’ll contact the school and see what they say. They certainly get students applying where their vaccination history is problematical. As for grades, we can have him tested and that’ll show what grade he should be in. It’s very likely at 14 that he’ll be going into 9th grade. I’ll set up a meeting with the high school and get all this worked out.

“But that doesn’t address the question of his legal status. In this state, he needs a custodial guardian until he’s 18. It’s required by law. Does your dad want to take that responsibility?”

“I’m sure he doesn’t. He’s fine with having full custody of me, but he’s not big on legal folderol, and, well, no. I don’t even want to ask him, because he’d be embarrassed saying no. Can’t we just skip that?”

“No, because if there’s anything in the future where Lonnie is involved with the law, he and maybe even you guys would be in trouble. Even getting a driver’s license would be difficult.”

“So, what do we do?”

“Well, one way to resolve this would be for him to be emancipated. It would stop all claims from Utah if they discovered where he was, too. From all you’ve told me, he should qualify, except for one thing. He has to show he’s financially independent. Can he do that?”

“I don’t think so. He has no money at all. But let me think about it. Other than that, you can get him emancipated?”

“I’m pretty sure. Maybe using the same judge who’ll get your custody changed. In this state, which incidentally is the only one where emancipation can be sought and given at only 14 years of age, you must be willing to live apart from your parents with the consent of your custodial parent—the only one he has is the state of Utah and that’s been shown to be fraudulent and he’s no longer in their custody anyway—you must be managing your own financial and personal affairs, and your income must be from a legal source. And, you must have a compelling reason for your emancipation.”

“Okay, great. None of that is a problem, except maybe the financial one. But I’ll try to figure that out. So, it’s great. Uh, I’m saying that a lot, aren’t I?”

She laughed. “Always fun talking to you, Trent. Or should I say it was great?”

)    (

I was enjoying life like never before, having a younger brother living with me. After a few weeks, Lonnie was riding like he’d been born in the saddle; he was spending as much of his time as possible with Tony, much of it on horseback investigating the far reaches of the ranch’s territory. But even those two, like all the kids on the ranch, were thinking about school. I was looking forward to it. I liked school, and I liked the majority of my classmates at Great Oak, a school with high values and where scholarship wasn’t disparaged by the student body.

Lonnie and Tony were together and in love. Tony had several siblings, one of whom, an older brother, was gay. His family had come to terms with that, and that acceptance made it easier for Tony. That was helped by the fact that the boy, Tony, was enamored of Lonnie. Lonnie had become a favorite on the ranch. He had a sunny disposition, jumped in to help wherever there was a need, and was always smiling. He and Tony were so cute together, and their eyes as they looked at each other . . . it was very easy to feel good about them as a couple.

With Lonnie so infatuated with Tony, he was no longer sleeping with me. He had for the first week we’d been home, but then he’d simply transferred his affections to Tony, and I hadn’t minded at all. I was happy for Lonnie. Seemed to me he deserved such pleasure. Sure, I did miss the sex, but I realized that it was just the sex I missed and not the affections of the boy who was providing it. I’d come to feel that perhaps sex and love were different. I did very much like, even loved, Lonnie, but more as a younger brother than as the true love of my life.

I also remembered Lonnie telling me that I needed to learn who I was, and that I should have sex with a girl to help me understand that. Now, with an empty bed and seeing how happy Lonnie was, I was looking at what girl I might like to lose my innocence with.

I’d been spending some time not only with Rod but with friends from high school, too. Rod and I would walk into town and find other kids we knew. Lonnie didn’t go along with us. He and Tony spent all their time together.

A group of 16-year-olds were talking about having a big back-to-school party the weekend before school started. Rod and I had joined the discussion. We were at a teen hangout in town, a separate room in the town hall purposed for teens. We’d copped a large table, and the group of us were kicking around individual ideas.

“I think we should make it a big deal, not just a small party, but with lots of kids and a bonfire and staying out there overnight. Tents, sleeping bags, bonfire, hot dogs, hamburgers. Down by the lake.” Eddie was doing the talking. Eddie did most of the talking when he could. He was a live wire. Not a shy bone in his body. He liked being front and center on the stage. No one had a problem with that. They’d known how he was since kindergarten.

Rod ooffered a conflicting point of view. “If we tell people about that, we’ll have most of the kids in school joining us. It’ll be too crowded, and we’d be unable to control it.”

I hadn’t said a word in the half hour we’d been there. Nothing unusual about that. I was more of a listener when in a group. I was also doing more than listening; I was looking at the kids that were there. We were about half and half boys and girls. My eyes were mostly on a tall, willowy girl whom I’d noticed last year in school. Julie Beyers. I’d never spoken to her, just noticed I liked the way she looked and carried herself. She dressed well and was pretty. She didn’t seem to talk much at group get-togethers, either. But she didn’t seem shy. Just quiet.

“Having the campout would be fun,” Eddie said, “but I agree, it should only include, well, us. I mean, only kids in our class, the junior class. Seniors would take over if they came, and we don’t want that. Maybe we could select the kids we want, not our entire class. How many should there be, you think? I’d say, keep it at around twenty or so, maybe fewer? Could we do that? Restrict it?”

Santiago, shortened to Ty by his friends, spoke up. “Yeah, we can do that. We just invite the kids we want and tell them to keep it to themselves, tell them if more kids know, we’ll have a riot on our hands. Tell them we want it to be a private party of friends. If we select the right kids, it’ll work.”

“Should it be couples only? I think that would be too restrictive.” One of the girls, Donna, asked that. I knew Donna wasn’t going with anyone at the moment, and it was apparent she didn’t want to be left out. But I thought she had a point.

“I’ll make a list,” Rod said, speaking up again. “There are 12 of us here. All of us want to do this, don’t we? One question: should we have an equal number of guys and girls?”

No one seemed to want to answer that, so I did. “Why don’t you make the list of those we want, somewhere between 16 and 20 kids, and see how that comes out? If it’s fairly even, guys and girls, then we might just as well go with that.”

Everyone seemed to like that suggestion, and Rod said he’d make the list. “Okay then. If any of you want someone included, give me the name. I’ll make a final list, and we can meet here tomorrow and decide on everyone. Okay?”

Everyone agreed. Rod made the list at home with me kibitzing. Not terribly surprising, he came up with 18 names, and it was easy to break it down into nine couples, or at least nine putative couples. Not that that was up to him to do. There were ten boys and eight girls on the list. If indeed they’d all couple up, then one of the couples had to be two boys. It also meant that girls like Donna might hook up with a boy. But there wasn’t any reason to assume if two boys tented together, or if a girl and boy who hadn’t been dating shared a tent, sex would be involved. Whomever Donna ended up tenting with, it would be up to her and her partner how sexy they’d get.

I was sure, however, that there would be sex involved. I was sure others were thinking that, too. Since Lonnie had turned me on to sex, it was on my mind a lot. As was Julie.

The group approved Rod’s list of 18. Also, that the kids themselves at the party would decide whom to tent with. Perhaps someone would have a tent that would hold two or three couples. Of the 18 kids, there were five couples that were already boy-girl couples. That left eight uncoupled kids, five of them boys, three of them girls. It would be interesting seeing how that played itself out.

Julie was one of the single girls. I waited till the meeting broke up, then approached her.

“Hey, Julie, I’ve been watching you. I saw you look at me a couple of times. I like you but haven’t had the guts to actually talk to you. But with this party, it’ll be more fun to go as a couple rather than as free agents and hope for the best. Would you be interested in being my date?”

I’d never done this before, and I felt like I was standing before a firing squad. My knees weren’t shaking, but I felt like they could be at any moment. I felt entirely naked and standing in front of a group of grandmothers. Critical grandmothers, not the kindly kind. Defenseless and open to ridicule.

Julie smiled. “I was just about to ask you the same thing. You beat me to it. So, do you have a tent? We do, but it’s just a two-person tent.”

My voice sounded funny to me, too high and squeaky when I said, “A two-person one sounds just the right size to me.” Then I blushed; I hate myself when I do that!

She didn’t blush. She laughed and said, “Me, too."

)    (

Somehow, we managed to pull it off. We almost kept it to just 18 of us, ‘almost’ because another couple, a boy and girl, got added. That made 20 of us, and that ended up being all that partied.

We did have a bonfire but kept it small. We were all together around the fire, cooking and talking. Lots of laughter as we recounted humorous times in our past. I was included in some of the occasions mentioned. I was still a relative newcomer, however. The others had enjoyed a much longer history together.

Julie sat with me. Rod had his own girlfriend and would tent with her. Julie had brought her two-person tent, and we’d use that.

The lake wasn’t a large one, only about an acre in all, bordered by a large grassy area where we had set up the tents. The grass led down to the lake. Some of the kids who’d come early had swum and said the water was warm. This was southern California in the late summer. The days were usually well over 90 degrees and swimming was a relief from the heat.

By the time we’d all eaten and the talk was getting softer and more personal, the night was on us. Being out in the sticks, the night was very dark, and only a sliver of moon and the stars gave any illumination. I couldn’t see the others well as the fire was more embers than anything else at this point. So I never did know exactly who it was who called it out.

“Skinny dipping!” a male voice yelled, and it was met with probably a unanimous response of yeahs.

Julie looked at me and saw my grin. “Let’s get ready in the tent,” she said as I pulled her to her feet. We made our way quickly to the tent.

I’d always been fairly modest, and maybe she was too, but it didn’t make any difference as it was black as sin in that tent. I stripped, and so did she. I could just barely make out where she was. When we were both bare, she asked, “Ready?” and I answered, “Just about,” then pulled her to me and kissed her.

She responded—I’d never kissed Lonnie, so this was a first for me—and while we were kissing, she reached down and felt my erection. I’d been erect since I was halfway through undressing.

“Ah,” she said, “I always wondered what one of these felt like.”

“Never been with a guy before?” I whispered. Somehow, whispering seemed appropriate.

“Nope.”

“This is all new to me, too,” I murmured. I wasn’t lying. This was my absolute first time—with a girl.

She took her hand off and said, “Later,” before rushing to join the others scampering across the grass and jumping into the water. I was right behind her.

As dark as it was, we couldn’t see much of anything, but just knowing everyone else was as naked as we were—knowing that sex would be rampant after we left the water, knowing we were all 16 and how excited we all felt doing this—added the spice of expectation to the swim. There was a lot of splashing and squeals happening, and certainly there was touching going on under the water. Emotions were running high, and it wasn’t long before couples were leaving the water and running to their tents.

Nor was it long before Julie whispered in my ear, “I’m ready.”

In the tent, it was all by feel. Which was wonderful. She was new to this, I was too, and we were both respectful of each other. We made out, and naked making out is a pretty great thing at 16. I’d never made out with a girl or a boy before. What I’d done with Lonnie didn’t seem anything like the making out I was doing with Julie. With him there was always the feel of us being headed toward the main goal, which was ejaculation. Simply reaching climax wasn’t the object with Julie. Here, I was more into what I was feeling, into abandoning any holdbacks, and also into making sure she was experiencing the same electricity I was feeling.

We’d been going at it for a few minutes when she stopped to breathe, then asked, “How far do you want to go?”

A good question, I thought. Deserved some thought, but not too much as thinking wasn’t what I was into just then.

“I don’t think I want intercourse. We need to know each other better before that. But I’d sure like to get you off—you know, to climax—and if you’d like to do that with me, too, well, that would be nice.”

“Nice?” she said and then laughed. I did too; it was such a bland, pallid and unemotional way of expressing myself, and in fact that wasn’t me at all. It was the uncertainty of the situation that evoked that, and the word certainly was cause for laughter.

But she agreed with the targets I’d proposed, and she showed me how to help her reach that goal, and I guided her so I was successful, too, and we were both very happy with the results.

The night was warm enough that we both opened our sleeping bags and then lay on top of them. She cuddled up to me, and we both slept very well.

When we woke in the morning, I was erect as I always was at my awakening. She was awake, too, and her eyes were on my dick. Embarrassing? Strangely, it didn’t feel that way. Maybe I was maturing before I expected to. I actually felt a little proud.

We got dressed. People were outside their tents and were headed for their rides. I’d been driven to the lake with Rod by my father. Julie had come with a friend, and a parent had driven them. Teens can’t drive other teens in California. You must be at least 20 to do that. So, everyone was phoning their ride to come get them. I helped Julie take down the tent. Then we looked at each other, both smiling. She stepped forward and kissed me, then said goodbye and went to find her friend.

I now had the benchmark Lonnie had said I needed. Sex with both genders. No penetration sex with either. So now I should know my sexuality.

Yet I didn’t have a clue. I did know I liked sex. It didn’t seem to matter what the gender of my partner was; the sex was good with either. Did that mean I was bi? I thought about that on the ride home. Rod was talking to my dad. I was just thinking.

The fact was, I’d had sex with a boy and a girl, and in neither case did I feel romantic love for them. Maybe that was the key to my sexuality. Maybe I needed to fall in love.

)    (

I tried to spend time with Lonnie, which wasn’t easy because he was overwhelmed with the love affair he was having with Tony. If I wanted to hang with Lonnie at all, it meant I had to walk down to the stable area and look for him.

I was doing just that when I heard a commotion. I saw several of the kids running into the stables, and I followed to see what was going on.

I found out quickly enough. A rather large, beefy, ruddy-faced and angry man was glaring at a boy of about eight who was lying on the stable floor, looking scared at the man standing over him and trying to hold back tears. The man was chewing him out, using profanity, and the gist of what he was railing about seemed to be that the boy had given a carrot to the horse whose stall they were next to.

“What’s going on?” I asked one of the older kids.

“This jerk pushed Freddy down and now’s yelling at him. All Freddy did was give the horse a carrot. We all give all the horses carrots all the time.”

The man evidently overheard the kid talking to me and turned away from Freddy. His eyes fell on me and maybe because I was the oldest one there, thought I was a good target for his anger.

“This fucking kid was feeding my horse. No one is to feed my horse anything. He’s worth more than this whole ranch. I won’t stand for him getting poisoned by some little brat.”

I took a step closer to the man, which seemed to startle him. “Freddy’s not a brat. He’s a great kid, he lives here, he’s part of the ranch, and in no way will this ranch put up with your behavior. I suggest you apologize to Freddy right now.”

“Fuck you. I don’t apologize to anyone. Who the hell are you, anyway?”

“I’m the owner’s son and, in fact, part owner of the ranch. You’re no longer welcome here.”

“I pay you guys a fortune to be here!”

“And we don’t need your money or your attitude. And since you won’t apologize, admit you were wrong, then so be it. You’re gone. I’ll have the eviction notice today. My dad has connections. You’ll have a week to find another boarding facility and move your animal, and then if you come on this property again, you’ll be trespassing. You’ll get the paperwork from the court emailed to you within an hour. Now, I want you gone. If you don’t go, I’ll tell Freddy’s father to move you. He’s a large man, bigger than you are, and he might not be gentle in moving you. Freddy’s his favorite. A favorite with most people here. So, get. Now. And, if your horse isn’t gone in a week, we’ll assume he’s forfeit property and auction him off. That’ll all be covered in the eviction notice.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I keep my horse here, pay good money to have him trained, and you think some snot-nosed kid is going to tell me what to do?”

I turned to the boy I’d been talking to. “Go find Freddy’s dad and have him come here. Have John bring Gus with him.”

Back at the man, I said, “I doubt either of them will be gentle with you. The smart thing would be for you to go now while you can still walk.”

The man looked uncertain for the first time. One of the kids helped Freddy up. Everyone was looking at the man. I guessed it was a matter of saving face with him that he stayed put.

It was only two minutes before John, Freddy’s dad, and Gus came in. Both were over six feet tall; both were well over 200 pounds.

Freddy ran to his dad when he came in. John put his arm around him, then asked me, “This the guy who shoved Freddy?”

“Yeah. He won’t leave. Maybe you and Gus can persuade him. Try not to encourage any legal troubles, will you?” Then I grinned. There was no humor in it.

Gus picked up one of the hay forks we used to clean wet straw from the stables and started moving toward the man. “Yell profanities at my godson? Huh? Huh?”

The man got the idea. Without another word, he walked out, exiting through the back door so he didn’t need to pass his two antagonists.

Snot-nosed kid indeed!

Freddy was the one to break the silence. “Thanks, Trent,” he said. I ruffled his hair. He was one of my favorites, too.

I asked John if they’d had to put up with nonsense from this guy before.

“Yeah, some. He seemed to be pretty sure he’s better than we are.”

“He was wrong about that. Arrogant, prejudiced bastards have no place here. Why didn’t you tell Dad? He wouldn’t put up with the shit that guy was handing out.”

“That guy pays a lot in stabling and training fees. We didn’t want to cost your dad that income.”

I shook my head. “John,” I said with all the sincerity I could muster, “you guys and your families are much more important to us than the money people pay for having their horses here. You have a problem with any outsiders, tell me or Dad. Please. I can’t stand the idea that you’ve had to take crap that guy was throwing out.”

John put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed it. “You’re good people, Trent.”

I nodded and left. Never did know how to react to praise, especially when all I was doing was the right thing. Never did find Lonnie that day, either. Those two knew how to ride off together, often hand in hand, and find secret places where they could be unobserved.

)    (

School was about to start, and I hadn’t heard anything from Marylyn. I called her. She could hear the worry in my voice, and, for once, didn’t tease me.

“I guess you still want Lonnie to stay with you? And that’s what he wants?”

“He’s my younger brother. I feel like that, and he does, too. And I think it would ruin him to be sent back to Utah at this point. He has a home here like he’s never had before. Yeah, we want to keep him.”

“Okay then. I can only suggest the emancipation route. And that looks like it’d be no problem other than the financial-independence requirement.”

“I told you I’d figure that out, and I have. How about his enrollment at school?”

“I spoke to the people at Great Oak. They have room for him, and by state law, if they have room, they have to accommodate him. As for his records, they say the easiest way is to let him start in the ninth grade with the other 14-year-olds, and if he can’t handle it, or if it’s too easy, they’ll just move him after a couple of weeks.”

“Good. What about the vaccinations?”

“After he’s emancipated, I’ll call for his records from the CPS agency that had him. They can’t touch him once he has a residence established here and is emancipated, and I’d guess with the history he has with them, they’ll bend over backwards not to stir anything up. They’ll send his records immediately. Great Oak is willing to go that route”

“All right then. Sounds like he’s taken care of. What about me?”

“The judge wants to meet you, and he wants your dad and mom to be involved. He gave me three dates. I sent your mom an email, asking which of those dates she could come here for the hearing. I also mentioned the video-conference option. She never responded. I have proof she opened the email. The judge told me she has a right to be present in person or by video, but her lack of response shows she is willing to forego her rights to argue the change of custody. So, the hearing can be held with only you and your dad present. He’ll also hear Lonnie’s petition for emancipation at that time as well.”

She told me the dates, and I told her we’d take the earliest one.

)    (

I was wearing a sports jacket, dress shirt and tie along with leather shoes instead of the sneakers I wore every day. We’d outfitted Lonnie and he was dressed the same way.

We met the judge in his chambers, which turned out to be a small office in the courthouse. The judge sat behind his desk. Lonnie, Dad, Marylyn and I sat in the four chairs provided for us. There was a court stenographer there, too, making a record of the proceedings.

“Let’s take you first, Trent,” the judge said. He had a very basso voice. With his white hair and the black robe he was wearing, he cut an impressive figure. “Why do you want your joint custody changed?”

“Your honor, I’m having to go to two schools every year, and the one here is much better than the one in Colorado. I have to work hard to maintain a high GPA here, and I don’t have to work at all there to get good grades. I think my transcript from Great Oak will be much more impressive when I’m finding a college than the one that shows my grades in Colorado.

“Also, my dad has time for me. My mom has little time for me—or interest in me, for that matter. That’s evident in her not being here today, even on video-conferencing; she was notified. She wants me mostly so as to thwart my father. The two go to war whenever they talk, and I’m their battleground. Changing my custody will take me out from between them. That’s in my best interests, it’ll save me from changing my life twice a year, and it’ll eliminate the stress that causes.”

“And you, Mr. Givings? Do you want sole custody of your son?”

“Very much, your honor.”

The judge turned back to me. “Those are very sound, non-frivolous reasons for the change you’ve requested. I’ve seen the paperwork showing your mother was notified of this hearing. As there are no rebuttals being brought before this court, your petition is hereby granted. Your father is now your sole custodian.”

I smiled so hard my lips hurt. Then I was in my dad’s arms. He was grinning like a madman, too.

“Now for Lonnie.” The judge turned to him. “Everything in your petition meets the requirements of the state of California except for the financial-independence provision. That is an important part of gaining emancipation. Unless you have a way to provide for yourself financially till you’re 18, I can’t grant your petition.

“As things stand now, I know you’re living with the Givings. But what if that changed? It could for a number of reasons, not all of them in your or their control. But, whatever the reason, if their support for you changed and you were on your own, then being emancipated could cause you problems you wouldn’t have if you were adopted or fostered. Yet you’re not asking for that status. Accordingly, unless you can show me financial independence, I can’t emancipate you.”

Dad, Marylyn and I had spoken about this. Marylyn was sure the judge would say what in fact he just had.

We did have a rebuttal. Our discussion had been about who would present it. As it had been my idea, they’d convinced me I should be the one to tell the judge. Scary, but not all that bad.

“Your honor, we had to figure that out. Lonnie needed to be emancipated so Utah would have no hold over him. As part of that, we knew he had to be financially independent. So, my father had an irrevocable trust created. Marylyn has a copy for you. The trust is in Lonnie’s favor. It will provide him with a monthly allowance of $4,500 till he is 18. It is fully funded so there is nothing to prevent Lonnie from receiving the money. A $54,000- a-year income makes him fully independent. Many families earn less than that, and in fact, Lonnie doesn’t even need the money as he’s still living with us and all his expenses are paid for by my dad. That money will pay for his college tuition four years from now.”

Marylyn stood and with permission, handed a copy of the trust to the judge.

“Why wasn’t I made aware of this earlier?” the judge asked.

I answered. “If you check the date on it, it was only established yesterday.”

The judge smiled. “Well, I’ll check it out, and if it is as you say it is, yes, I’ll grant Lonnie his emancipation. You’ll hear from me within a couple of days.”

 

So now I have a brother who’ll be with us forever. Well, a sorta brother. We both accept it’s real, and that’s what counts. He is so happy he’s now part of our family, and he loved the scam we were pulling. He’d get that money every month from the trust. The bank would give him a cashier’s check for it. Then he’d sign that over to me, and I’d cash it and give the money back to my dad. There was nothing at all wrong with this nor was it even unethical. For a few moments every month, Lonnie was even independently financially sound.

The only unsettled thing now is, I still don’t know what I am. Gay, straight, bi? I am pretty sure I’m not the latter. I think I’ll learn who I am, what I am, when I fall in love. That’d tell me what I am for sure. Guy, girl, I don’t care at all. I do want to find love, however. It hasn’t happened for me yet. But I am still awfully young.

THE END

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