“Dre. You know I will always love you. We work better as friends, and you are the best friend I’ll ever have.”
“Then please stop banging folks that look like ...”
“Like?”
Dre shook their head, but Katie answered, “Like Dre. Your type is Dre, Petra.”
CHAPTER FIVE
“Okay, that place waspretty lit,” Duncan said as the door to Gertrude’s closed behind them. “That ... chick, I guess? I was talking to was alright.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Jay said. He didn’t offer any further insight because he didn’t have any. His mood was weird. It had tanked in the bar, and tanked hard. He wasn’t completely sure why, nor did he feel like trying to figure that out.
But Duncan pulled up short and gave him a look. “You okay?”
They were only about ten feet from their bikes, and Jay didn’t want to stand around outside a lesbian bar like a couple of weirdos, so he kept going. “Yeah.”
With a quick trot, Duncan caught back up. “That chick you were talking to was hot.” He shoved his elbow into Jay’s arm. “Is that why you’re sour now? Thirsty for a girl who likes girls?”
As usual, Duncan stomped right down on the sorest part. Yeah, that chick was extremely hot. Hot didn’t even cover it. She was, like,pretty. Really, really pretty without trying for it. On the short side but long-limbed, very slight but still with curves in all the right places, shiny dark hair that just brushed her shoulders, and vividly bright, pale eyes. He wasn’t sure of the color, though he’d tried to tell. Also a great smile. Just every part of her was perfect. Except for the part where she was gay.
Also, he’d felt so headass in there, surrounded by books he’d never read, having no idea who Gertrude Whoeverthefuck was. He knew the names Fitzgerald and Hemingway and Picasso, he wasn’t completely braindead, but, with the exception ofThe Great Gatsby—which he’d read SparkNotes for in ninth grade—he wouldn’t know their work if somebody hit him over the head with it. She must think him a complete waste of oxygen.
Fuck! He didn’t want to think about that shit.
“Fuck off,” he snapped at Duncan. “I’m not sour, and I’m not thirsty. I’m just tired. It was a shitty day and I’m tired. Okay? Fuck!” Jay yanked his kutte from his saddlebag, shoved his arms into it, threw his leg over the saddle and heaved his bike up straight.
Duncan, also wearing his kutte again, had mounted his bike as well. “You’re an asshole, you know? You drag me in there and then throw a bitch fit when I have a good time and you don’t. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He fired up his engine and peeled off without another word or look.
Jay sat for a while and stewed. Then the fat butch chick with the short purple hair came out of the bar. She saw Jay sitting astride his Street Bob and grinned in a way that pissed him off. Like she knew something secret about him.
He fired up his engine and rode away.
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~oOo~
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He rode for about tenminutes, until he was nearly at the ramp to get on the highway and head west. A question had hooked into the front of his brain, and he couldn’t shake it loose.
What if she wasn’t gay?
She was so fucking pretty. So feminine. Obviously, he knew there were beautiful, feminine lesbians. It was 2022 and he lived in the world. He got it. They didn’t all look like the purple-hair chick, or the one Duncan had been talking to, angular and tough-looking. But the girl tonight, something about her didn’t vibe gay.