(And no, Darren hadn’t fucked Tristan, much to Tristan’s dismay. In fact, now that I thought about it, I didn’t think Darren had done anything with any queen of mine. Or any other queen, for that matter, twink or not. Granted, I didn’t know (or care!) about his complete sexual history, but I assumed it probably resembled a graduating class from an all-boys Catholic school, but still. I didn’t know how to feel about that.)
(Not good. Definitely not good.)
Summer looked sufficiently cowed when I said, “Now. Where was I?”
“The men,” Georgia said. “How Summer wasn’t going to molest them and we were going to make them beautiful.”
“Right,” I said. “They are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, and the art of drag is a glorious thing. Combining the two should be nothing short of miraculous.”
“Unless they’re not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts and just want an excuse to put on makeup,” Sofonda said.
“There is that,” I said. “And we will cater to their secret makeup kink and not shame them because we, as drag queens, do not shame anyone unless we are performing. Then, everyone in the audience is fair game, but that’s
expected
.”
“One time,” Crystal said, “I made fun of a man in the audience so much so that I thought he was going to cry. I felt bad.”
“Bless your heart,” Georgia said. “Of course you did. What happened to him?”
“He turned out to have a humiliation kink and wasn’t about to cry. He was about to come. So I fucked him in the bathroom of the hotel I was performing at. You know that Holiday Inn by the airport? The one where that cult mass suicide happened when they were trying to get to Mars or Venus or something?”
“They have a really fantastic continental breakfast,” Sofonda said. “Eggs and butter and cereal and bagels.”
“Exactly,” Crystal said. “So I fucked him in the bathroom while calling him an asshole because he liked it.”
“What happened then?” Summer asked, voice low as if she thought she’d spook me into railing at her again. “Did you leave him there in a pile of his own come and never see him again?”
Crystal shrugged. “I took the little piss-pig home with me and now we’ve been together for fifteen years.”
Sofonda, Summer, and Georgia all sighed.
“That’s true love right there,” Georgia said. “Continental airport breakfasts and piss-pigs. They should make more movies like that.
That’s
realism. I swear to god if I have to see another romantic comedy with Kate Hudson, I’ll fucking choke her with my weave.”
“Speaking of love,” Sofonda said, a gleam I didn’t like in her eye, “I feel like we should be addressing the pink elephant in the room.”
Summer looked around the Lair. “What pink elephant? I don’t get it.”
Georgia and Crystal did, though, if their matching grins meant anything.
“Helena,” Sofonda said. “Should we address it?”
“There’s nothing to discuss,” I said, sure my tone of voice would end
that
line of conversation.
Alas, I was wrong.
“Oh, I don’t know about
that
,” Georgia said. “After all, the tension between you and the Homo Jock King was practically legendary. Everyone knew about it.”
That… I didn’t know that. “What? There was no tension.”
Sofonda tittered quietly. “Helena, surely you must be joking.”
“Why, pretty much every queer person in Tucson knew about it,” Georgia said.
“And Phoenix too,” Sofonda added. “And if it got all the way to the glorious mecca that is Phoenix, then you know it must be important.”
“Phoenix is a cesspool,” I said automatically.
“Be that as it may,” Georgia said before Sofonda could rise to the bait of Tucson versus Phoenix, “the fact remains is that the two of you are well-known for your UST.”
“I’ll admit,” Crystal said, “whenever I’ve been near the two of you, the tension is always so tangible, I’ve gone home to my vibrator and turned it up to eight. I
never
turn it up to eight for anything else.
Anything
. But after seeing you and Darren around each other, I felt my asshole deserved an eight.”
“Now that I’m sufficiently scarred,” I said, “can we please move on to more important matters? Ones specifically that don’t involve my personal life.”
“Aren’t you going to get jealous?” Summer asked.
I sighed heavily. “About?”
“Whoever bids on him.”
“Of course not,” I scoffed.
“But what if some brute of a man tries to take him away from you?” Summer asked, sounding scandalized. Then, “Also, as a side note, are we able to bid on homo jocks as well? Not that Darren and my wanting to bid have anything to do with each other.” She shifted her eyes back and forth. Shiftily.
“No, you can’t bid,” Georgia said. “But, since you’re apparently so kind-hearted, you could just give your money to the cause.” She paused, then looked at Sofonda. “What was the cause again?”
“Crack babies,” Sofonda said.
I rolled my eyes. “That’s not—”
“I can’t just
give
my money away,” Summer said. “Especially without getting something in return. That’s not how charity works.”
“I think that might be the actual definition of charity,” Crystal said.
“I think that’s enough,” I said. “We have more important things to discuss rather than my perceived relationship with the Homo Jock King. Like saving the crack babies and—”
“Does he have a big dick?” Summer asked.
I almost punched her in the mouth.
“Summer!” Crystal scolded. “What an inappropriate thing to ask of someone like that. But it’s a good thing I don’t care about propriety. Dish, Helena. Does the Homo Jock King have a monster cock? He seems like he should. Like he’s one of those unfair people who are beautiful and intelligent and so of
course
his cock would be big too.”
“I bet he’s not even circumcised,” Summer said dreamily. “All that foreskin just
begging
to be tugged on. With my teeth.”
“Jesus Christ,” I muttered. “Look, we don’t have time for—”
“Helena,” Sofonda said. “Just give us a little bit. A hint. Just the
tip
of a hint.
“We can take it,” Georgia said. “We’re ready. Give it to us. Just the tip.”
I sighed. “Fine. He has a gargantuan penis that’s uncut and right before he comes, I pull on his hairy balls and
twist
them until he wails like he’s singing an aria. And when he finally
does
come, it’s with the force of a cannon shot, a copious amount that I make sure gets on my face because I have a Krispy Kreme fetish and want to feel like a glazed donut. And when he’s finished, he rubs it into my skin and leaves it to dry and an hour later, I look like I’m suffering from a severe case of eczema. Any questions?”
They all stared at me.
“No questions,” I said. “Good. Moving on. Now, I’m so happy you’re all giving your precious time to help me, and I love each and every one of you. Summer, if you touch any one of the homo jocks in a way that makes him uncomfortable, I’ll fucking gut you. And you’ll never work in this town again. But that won’t matter, because you’ll be gutted. Now, let’s bring in the homo jocks and make them into the most beautiful homo jock drag queens the world has ever seen before we sell them for money like the concubines they are to help save the crack babies.”
I DEALT
with Brian first, because I figured it’d be easier. I thought briefly about assigning Darren out to one of the other queens, but decided I wasn’t that petty. It was better that I’d handle him myself, even if it meant I’d be getting right up into his face.
It probably didn’t help that the homo jocks arrived in the Lair wearing nothing but thin pairs of black briefs, as previously ordered. While we weren’t going to make them tuck, we still needed them as nude as possible while still preserving their modesty.
Granted, homo jocks weren’t necessarily known for their modesty, and this group in particular didn’t seem to give two shits about being practically naked. In fact, it was actually quite the opposite, especially with the other queens cooing at them. I thought it was possible that Summer was going to devour them whole with the way her eyes were raking over all of the exposed man flesh. It didn’t help that the majority of the homo jocks (including Biff, Chet, and Xerxes, what the hell) were posing, delighted by the attention they were receiving.
Darren didn’t look delighted.
In fact, Darren looked slightly pissed off.
And it was directed toward me.
It was about that time, however, that I realized that in addition to all the other homo jocks being in their underwear, that
Darren
was also wearing just his underwear, standing in what could arguably have been the smallest pair of briefs known to mankind. Either that, or the rumors about his monster cock were true and it was dwarfing all other cocks in the room. His body was all hard lines, cut muscle. His chest and stomach were hairy, something I hadn’t necessarily thought about before, but now realized I felt the desperate need to rub my face against. And his
nipples
, for fuck’s sake. How was it possible that a man already physically perfect also was graced with the most beautiful of
nipples
? Dusky and dark, they had perfect whorls of hair around them. It was like God had decided to up his game the day he made Darren Mayne’s nipples, glory be. Even Izaac, my wonderfully straight Izaac, could not compete with these nips. In fact, Izaac might as well have leprosy of the nipples, for all that it mattered.
Only then did I realize I’d probably been staring at his chest for a solid thirty seconds, which explained why his face had once again been infected by a smug smirk, even if it was still tinged with anger. I coughed rather harshly, and it must have sounded like I was hacking up my lung because Summer grimaced at me, but still attempted to smack me on the back.
“Are you choking on something? Maybe try and chew before you swallow.” She smacked me on the back again, her ridiculously long manicured nails scraping against my skin. “Or maybe just work on your swallowing technique.”
“I thought her swallowing technique was just fine,” Brian said.
The conversations in the room pretty much ceased.
“Oh my god,” I moaned.
“
What
?” Summer said, eyes wide.
“We had sex.” Brian shrugged.
“Now I know why she didn’t want us to touch them,” Sofonda said to Crystal and Georgia. “Because they’re all hers.”
“Like a harem?” Georgia sounded impressed.
Darren, for his part, had decided the best possible thing to do in the face of Brian’s statement was to crowd into me as much as possible. And since I was more Helena than Sandy at the moment, I thought it was probably one of his better ideas, especially since all that skin he was displaying was pressed up against my side, his chest hair brushing against my arm.
I allowed it to go on for a minute or so, before reality set back in. As much as him pressing against me was literally the stuff my fantasies were made of, Darren was a bastard and a two-timing whore who was cheating on his fake relationship with a hipster twink. That did not endear him to me, no matter how amazing it felt when his bulge brushed up against my hip inadvertently. And I told myself that the strangled noise that crawled out of my throat at that moment had nothing to do with my current state of arousal, but more with the fact that Darren’s audacity was overwhelming.
“I want to punch him,” he growled in my ear, glaring at Brian. “Just a little.”
“I need him,” I said, and he growled some more. “Shut up. Not like that, you idiot. I need him for the
auction
, for fuck’s sake. You can’t mark his face because I can’t sell a homo jock with a broken nose, no matter how pretty he might be.”
“I’m prettier,” Darren said, scowling.
“Oh my god.” Because
what
.
He winced. “I didn’t mean it like—”
“What the fuck.”
Darren sighed. “What am I going to have to do to make sure you never bring that up ever again?”
“Nothing,” I said through choked out laughter. “There is nothing you can do because I will
always
bring that up. You just tried to argue that you’re
prettier
. This is
amazing
.”
He looked grumpy at that. And that’s when I found out that his being nearly naked made his grumpy look all the more unbearable. There was a very real chance I was about to knock him off his feet and mount him in front of everyone.
This was bad.
Very, very bad.
Because there were
feelings
trying to break through.
“Brian!” I all but shouted. “I need to do you!”
And that was the second time conversation died all around us.
Brian blushed horribly.
“Not like that,” I snapped at all of them even as Darren’s nipples pressed against my arm. “I meant his makeup. God. Get your minds out of the gutter.”
“How many people
have
you slept with in this room?” Summer asked.
I was going to murder that little queen.
Sofonda must have seen Helena rage in my eyes, because she grabbed Summer by the arm and yanked her toward the other side of the room. “You seem like you got a death wish,” she hissed at Summer.
“What?” Summer said. “It was just a
question
. So she drops her panties for the homo jocks.
I
want to drop my panties for the homo jocks.”
“I’m going to drop your
face
with my
foot
,” I snarled after her. Once I was sure she was far enough away that I couldn’t reach for her to wring her fucking neck, I looked back at Georgia and Crystal. “I want her
dead
by sunrise.”
“We’ll get right on that,” Crystal said, patting my hand.
“They won’t ever find her remains,” Georgia said.
“Um,” Brian said as he came to stand next to us. “Are you being serious right now?”
“Mostly.” Crystal’s smile was all teeth.
Darren was still plastered against my side. He was eyeing Brian with barely disguised contempt. Brian, bless his heart, noticed this almost right away and was trying to maintain a safe amount of distance between us.