A Look Back – A Look Forward, and What I Learned
In the churn and burn of a writer’s life, there are the all-to-frequent ‘Dark Night of The Soul’ moments–between books, in the middle of writing your current story, and frankly even during a particularly blah meal sitting w
ith someone else’s book propped up against the sugar canister.
While your mac and cheese is congealing on the tip of the fork, hovering in front of your gaping mouth, you think:
“Who writes like that…” and “why can’t I?”
For me, this moment is likely one of awe and frank admiration, and generally not debilitating, but occasionally the doubt creeps in. I’m not immune.
Comparing my writing to the shockingly fantastic scribblings of another author? Yeah. Been there, done that, it’s not fun. But worse, there is nothing like matching a work-in-progress to one of my own past glories. The failed comparison can drive a stake through my confidence and inspiration faster than a barista steams almond milk for my five-shot lattes.
Have I lost my touch? Am I losing my mind? Why won’t the words flow like they once did?
It’s writing-dysmorphia.
For me, I need at least 8 months before I can re-read my own body of work without gagging. So it was a bit of a shock when I was forced to cull through my short stories and novellas looking for candidates for Kiss, Kiss! and I realized how much I liked them–loved some of them, even.
This was revelatory and I had to work backwards to understand that the writing hadn’t changed, hadn’t bloomed like wine aged in an oak cask, but I had. Distance had granted me the grace to see my work clearly.
As writers we don’t often have the luxury of time. Deadlines beat at us and we grit our teeth, charging ahead desperately ignoring the looping chorus of panic & doubt.
Perspective is what others lend you when you don’t have enough for yourself.
The lesson is clear: Learn to trust your voice, and lean on those who already do.
Without the alphas and betas, the editors, the authors who inspire us to be better, and the readers who appreciate and challenge us, our work remains adrift in uncertainty.
You anchor us.
You bring our words home.
And we thank you.
-LE Franks
Kiss, Kiss! Stories of Love and Cake is a print only edition of my favorite short stories and novellas, together in one place. Continue on for a little taste of Birthday Cake – first time in print.
Birthday Cake
a short story by LE Franks
The apartment isn’t chilly. Not like it should be.
I notice this right away as the front door bangs shut behind me.
Jordan is half a world and an ocean away, and I’ve gotten lax about so many of the things he cares about: staying late at the office, grabbing lunches at my desk, living off to-go containers of grease and fire, or tonight’s sin… forgetting to set the thermostat. Why bother when I never planned to be here, to notice?
Tonight, I should be busy.
Tonight, there should be something beyond a silent phone and an empty inbox.
Birthdays aren’t supposed to be this way. Not alone and uncelebrated. The whole thing is depressing—turning thirty—and the heavens seem to agree. It’s been pouring rain all day.
I’d awoken to weak gray light filtering through my curtains, underscoring my mood after sliding a hand across four weeks of empty space in my bed. It’s been that long since Jordan left Manhattan on assignment.
I miss him more each day despite our best efforts to stay in touch. A clunky combination of text, Skype, and cell lead to conversations filled with exotic background noises on his end, and empty echoes on mine. They last long enough to paint his adventures in broad strokes, before evaporating like water droplets under his latest desert sun. When he disconnects, he leaves me with an aching loneliness that lingers as a reminder he’s gone.
Today was the worst.
Today, Jordan is in transit.
One brief text last night warned me he’d be out of cell range for forty-eight hours. A promise of a belated celebration upon his return doesn’t help, instead, my birthday has rolled out in a series of dull meetings with unpleasant bosses, uncooperative clients and a marked absence of greetings from anyone on staff. Even my friends have disappeared.
Instead of lunch with the gang, I get a drenching on the street, a broken elevator in the lobby, and a five-story hike to my apartment.
I drop my keys onto that stupid little table of Jordan’s—the one he spent a month repairing, sanding away a lifetime of wear and tear. He drove me crazy agonizing over shades of blue paint, until picking one that reminded him of the summer sky off Nice. The fact I was with him on that trip makes the blue seem… bluer.
And as I stand in the hallway, next to that awkward little sentinel, I flick through the sodden envelopes and wonder why I bother tipping the postman at all—my mail looks like it’s been dropped in a puddle. The only birthday card I’ve received is from my dentist, no doubt celebrating the prospect of more crowns and fillings now that my mouth has aged along with the rest of me.
The central heating kicks on, swirling warm air around my ankles and making it apparent everything from my knees down is wet. I look around.
No one is here to complain about me dumping a parka on the floor, but I hook it over the door handle to drip anyway—nostalgic for Jordan’s fussy house-husbandry—and begin a brisk strip tease in the front hall for absolutely no one at all.
It’s harder than I expect once I toe off my shoes.
My cheap-ass parka has left me soaked in patches, undershirt sticking to my back. I’m clammy and uncomfortable and out of patience, which is my only excuse for pulling the entire soggy mess over my head—my arms getting hung up in damp cotton, and buttons I’d forgotten to release.
I sway. Disoriented, suffocating in a dank cocoon and struggling to solve a puzzle of sleeves, necklines, and inconvenient ear and nose placement before tilting sideways.
Slumping forward, I find the front door with my forehead, metal pinging from the contact. I feel like an ass.
A warm hand slides slowly up the skin of my back, and I freeze. Soft, soft lips nuzzle under the cotton bunching around my shoulders, and one kiss on my trapezius has me relaxing. Jordon. It’s his favorite spot to kiss.
“Jordan…” that’s odd—my normal speaking voice has gone all quivery.
“Happy Birthday, baby.” Jordan’s salutation, murmured against my skin, sinks into my bones and blood, riding along on kisses that seem to go straight through me.
He pulls my entangled arms over my head and I feel his long slim artist’s fingers unbutton my cuffs in reverse, releasing my hands, though he makes no move to pull my shirt all the way off—in fact, he’s taken steps to pin me against the door with his body, my arms still held overhead. I can’t see anything from behind this white cotton veil.
“Baby…” Jordan husks through the fabric pressed against my ear. The shivers start and they have nothing to do with my chilled skin and everything to do with Jordan’s slow grind against my ass.
“J-Jordan… where did you come from?” It’s the only thought I can latch on to. Jordan is supposed to be on assignment somewhere on the Eurasian Steppes. His hands, his lips, continue to disorient me and I wonder for a moment if I’m delirious or if this is a dream. Maybe I’ve fallen on the train and I’m lying in some uptown hospital in a coma… Will I wake? Will I ever feel Jordan’s hands on me for real?
“Shhhh… I’m here. Just relax. Re-lax, baby.”
My tension has a stink of its own and Jordan can’t have missed it or my struggle to free my head and arms. I need proof that this is my Jordan, not a specter come to torment me as a topper to this very fucked up day. But this Jordan isn’t cooperating, just pressing his length harder against me, and keeping me trapped. I hear a moan escape and realize it’s mine.
“What are you doing to me?” I want to cry with frustration. It feels like hours since I entered this apartment, since I had a grip on reality. I am upside down and I don’t have any way to orient myself without Jordan’s guidance, and he’s… I just don’t know what he’s doing. He’s acting coy, and mysterious and I hate it. I want him to wrap me up and keep me safe, instead he’s dangling me over the ledge of a skyscraper, swinging me out into space, below—there are crocodiles and puddle splashing cabbies like the one who covered me in grimy water. They’re all just waiting to finish me off when Jordan lets go. “Don’t let go…” Is this my voice?
Jordan’s hands are back encircling my waist and I realize I don’t know when he let go of my wrists. I’ve been holding them over my head for so long they no longer feel part of my body. They flutter away from the door a moment before resting against it once more. I leave them there, while I melt into the warmth coming from behind.
“I won’t ever let you fall Marcus.” He licks a stripe across my shoulders as he speaks. Did I say all that about the ledge and crocodiles out loud or is Jordan really just in my head? Whichever it is, warm hands slide over my shoulders following my arms up into my sleeves, freeing them one at a time. He gently rubs the life back into each arm, sliding them down to hang at my side. They’ve become plastic. Docile. Deadened.
I notice that the Jordan-specter has left my Oxford shirt bunched around my face still obscuring my vision.
“You know how much I care about you—” his body presses into me from behind once more.
“Uh huh…” My shirt smells of starch and sweat and damp cotton with just a little ozone from the rain.
Jordan has been speaking and I’ve missed something important. I only get this because he’s just slid something black and silky across my eyes underneath my shirt, tying it behind my head, stealing what little light is allowed by my white cotton hood, which is next to go.
I feel, rather than hear the shirt drop to the floor and I shudder. Jordan has never blindfolded me before. I reach out with my remaining senses and realize how very ridiculous the act is. I’m not Spiderman. I have no extra “spidey-sense” that will guide or inform. Panic swells in my gut.
“Is this okay, Marcus?”
It’s serious. Jordan’s tone is no longer seductive or playful and I guess I’ve zoned out on more than just one of his cues.
He’s worried.
I can imagine. I’m the one who always likes to push the envelope when it comes to our sex life and Jordan is shy by nature. So, this is new territory for both of us. To be honest, I’m still a little freaked out by the idea that he’s even here.
Having him act out of character is prickling every hair on the back of my neck. I drag in a deep breath and turn in this man’s arms and realize for the first time that he’s as naked as I am from the waist up.
Reaching for him I make myself see the flesh as I touch it. Do the planes of these abs match the picture I have of Jordan standing naked under the shower, his tanned fingers rubbing soap into ropy muscles? Is this his six-pack I feel? I count back in my mind and there seems to be a match.
Certainly, the low husky moan I hear coming from this body is familiar. And if I lean forward just so, I should be able to tease a tight nub of a nipple with my teeth. I try it and it’s exactly as I expect, down to the hiss and shudder he makes.
If I lick straight across the smooth skin of these pecs, I should find a thin patch of silky hair, dark blond if I could see it. It roughens the tip of my tongue, temporarily numbing it but I keep going, past the confirmation, past even the other nipple already perky with anticipation. A quick kiss is as much as I can be bothered with at the moment.
I realize there is one final proof that will turn this specter of my lover into my absent boyfriend once and for all, and I skip the rest of the body mapping in my rush to nuzzle into the crease of his arm.
There is only a faint ghostly breath of lavender clinging to the warm skin and in my mind’s eye I can see a dark olive sheen. I lick into the fold of skin savoring a familiar tang.
Sweaty men have never been my thing—wet and sloppy will send me reeling. But Jordan after a hard day working outside has always tasted of sunshine and grass. The man under my tongue is the flavor of summer and my knees buckle. “Jordan.”
* * *
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LE Franks is an author of Gay Romance fiction, living in the SF Bay Area surrounded by inspiration; and after years of ignoring the voices in her head, she’s now giving them free reign in the form of her characters.
Email: le.franks.books@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/LEFranksAuthor