Best Gay Romance 2013

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As a new employee at Cleis Press in 2008, I could hardly believe that I would get to work directly with Richard Labonté. “Are you sure?” I had asked timidly at an editorial meeting. It just didn't seem right. After all, he was a revered literary lion and one of the founders of A Different Light Bookstore, which I trawled every weekend after matinees at the Castro Theater with my dear friend Duncan back in the day. Dunkie was fresh out of the closet and, subsequently, out of his house when his mother 86ed him after he came out to her. He ended up couchsurfing with me in the Lower Haight and we explored the beauty of San Francisco on foot together every weekend. Since we were both new to the city, it was simply electrifying to wake up in a place that enfolded us in her Golden Gate wings and accepted us, flaws and all.

Duncan gave me a crash course in cool culture, badly needed by this Appalachian transplant. I had met him at a séance on Steiner Street, and I thought he was possibly the most advanced
person on planet Earth with his “fauntleroons,” cut-off blue jeans trimmed in white lace. Duncan had an eidetic memory, and very long, very black hair that featured an under-layer of cobalt blue. Even better, he was a barback at The Stud.

On Saturday mornings, we would gather his tip money and head over to Castro Street, planting ourselves for hours at A Different Light and reading everything we could get our hands on. I still have a prized remainder copy of Gertrude Stein's collected plays, as well as several Oscar Wilde tomes, a handsome coffee table book of Aubrey Beardsley's art, and a battered copy of Louise Hay's
You Can Heal Your Life.
I remember Duncan patiently explaining that gay men had made cassette tapes of Louise's book and passed them around, sort of like bootlegged Grateful Dead tapes, and that those had launched Hay's career. I remember thinking I would also like to pen something bootleg-worthy one day.

As it turns out, gay men did make my career as well. When I returned to the Lower Haight as Associate Publisher at Cleis Press, I was agog at the very idea of contacting the legendary editor that is Richard Labonté. I worked up my nerve, picked up the phone, and introduced myself. He was unimaginably kind and seemed to know and understand everything

I did not know until my second year at Cleis that for a story to be classified as “romance,” it has to have a happy ending. While Richard is a writer and editor with an incredibly sophisticated sensibility who curates what he calls “literary porn” of the highest order, Richard is also a great romantic.

How do I know?

His own story reads like a fairy tale, complete with a handsome prince and a mystical bonny isle. From my seat in Berkeley, it looks like Richard and Asa live quite happily ever after on Bowen Island, the result of a chance meeting at A Different
Light. I have learned much about love from poring over Labont é's volumes, following his first crushes, first real heartbreak, and the lasting satisfaction of married love. Richard once said “Romance. It's the emotional component of the erotic… However romance happens, however long love lasts—a heartbeat to a lifetime—it's a wondrous thing.” And so it is with great pride that I present to you this latest labor of love from Cleis Press. Selected and collected by the inimitable Richard Labonté
, Best Gay Romance 2013
offers at least seventeen happy endings. Use these stories to inspire a few of your own.

And to Richard, thank you for the sanctuary within your bookstore and within the pages of your many marvelous anthologies.

 

Brenda Knight
Berkeley, California
2013

Neil Plakcy

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday morning, on my way to the unemployment office on Miami Beach to register, I decided to treat myself to a chocolate croissant from the little French bakery around the corner from my apartment. I was about to start tightening my belt, finances-wise, but I figured I could afford one last small indulgence.

I entered the bakery, my senses immediately assaulted by the smell of fresh bread, the rows of beautifully decorated pastries, and the French reggae music playing softly in the background. The bell over the door tinkled as I entered, but the heavyset Frenchwoman who normally waited on customers didn't appear.

I scanned the bakery case in front of me. What, no chocolate croissants? Oh, man. What a disappointment.

Then the baker himself appeared from the kitchen, carrying a tray of mixed breakfast pastries, including the
pain au chocolat
I was jonesing for. “Sorry,” he said. “My clerk, she has left me. I am all alone here.”

He was about my age, late twenties, and about my height as
well, just over six feet. But there the similarities stopped. He was broad-shouldered and beefy, with big hands and a broad smile. He wore a white chef's coat with the collar turned down, already spotted with what looked like raspberry jelly, and a white toque.

“Are you hiring?” I asked. “I haven't worked a register in a couple of years, but I spent four years while I was in college working at fast-food places.”

He quizzed me for a few minutes about my skills, and then said, “You are a gift from God. How soon can you start?”

“Now?”

I stepped behind the counter and he grabbed me in a big bear hug, kissing me on each cheek. My body tingled, and my cock stiffened almost immediately. Embarrassed, I backed away, as the bell over the door rang and a customer entered.

 

My shift was seven to three. The other clerk, who came in at one, spent her first two hours in the tiny office next to the kitchen, ordering supplies and paying bills. By the time she relieved me, my feet hurt, my shoulders ached, and I wanted to luxuriate in a hot bath for hours. But it all went away when the baker, whose name was Jean-Pierre, hugged me again and kissed both my cheeks.

“How can I thank you,” he said, his French accent making each word as sexy as a proposition. “I know! I will cook for you. Dinner, tomorrow night.”

“Okay,” I said, as he released me. My dick had popped back up and I tried to turn away as fast as possible so he wouldn't notice.

Back home, naked in a tub of hot, lavender-scented bubbles, I had only to remember the baker's embrace and I was instantly hard again. I closed my eyes and jerked myself to orgasm, remembering the scent of flour and lemon that surrounded him,
the touch of his lips against my cheek. In my head I heard him murmuring soft French words as my body shook and milky white cum spurted out of my dick.

The next morning I wore sneakers with thick white socks to cushion my feet. Jean-Pierre unlocked the door for me, greeting me once again with a big bear hug and a kiss on both cheeks. I felt my whole body glowing with his touch—and the memory of my bathtub adventure the afternoon before.

We chatted off and on as he baked. He was excited about the meal he was preparing for me that evening, and he kept popping out of the kitchen to ask if I liked oysters, spinach, chicken, mushrooms, garlic. With each new ingredient, with each time I saw his shining eyes and the sexy triangle of flesh where his collar folded over, I came closer to orgasm.

He lived in an apartment above the bakery, he said. Very convenient when it was time to start baking, at four in the morning. No commute.

I left at three, promising to return that evening at seven. I lounged in another hot, lavender-scented bath, but this time I wouldn't touch myself at all. I didn't think Jean-Pierre was gay, and didn't expect anything to happen—but I wanted to leave myself in a heightened state of expectation anyway.

After my bath, I stood in front of the mirror examining myself. I hadn't had a serious boyfriend for a year or more; I'd worked too hard at my last job, and all I had the energy for was the occasional bar pickup. But I'd kept going to the gym, and my body was toned and sexy: muscular calves and thighs, slim waist, seven-inch cock nestled in a patch of wiry, black pubic hair, six-pack abs, nicely defined pecs and biceps. If nothing happened with Jean-Pierre, I might head over to one of the gay bars on Lincoln Road and see if any of the available hunks floated my boat.

I pulled on a pair of Ginch Gonch briefs decorated with fruits and vegetables, a form-fitting black T-shirt, and a pair of khaki pants that accentuated my butt. Promptly at seven, I was ringing the bell at the back of the bakery.

Jean-Pierre was delighted to see me. He engulfed me in another of his big bear hugs. He took my face in both hands, kissing me on each cheek, and then, unexpectedly, on the mouth. Though the kiss was brief, his full, moist lips sent a jolt of electricity through me. Then he turned and bounded up the stairs to his second-floor apartment, leaving me to wonder if his ebullience was simply French, or something more.

I also got a great view of his ass as I followed him up the stairs. Without the white chef's coat to cover it, I saw two round globes gripped by a pair of form-fitting jeans. I liked what I saw.

“You must sit here,” Jean-Pierre said, when I entered his apartment. He stood by an oak table, pointing at an armchair covered in a colorful Provencal fabric. “You like white wine, yes?”

I said yes, and he filled a stemmed glass for me. “Appetizers in one minute, please,” he said, and disappeared into the kitchen.

I looked around. The impression was of a French country farmhouse: an oak armoire opposite a black metal baker's rack; curtains and cushions in the same blue, white, and green floral fabric as my chair. The air smelled wonderful: roast chicken, lemon, and a host of other fragrant aromas. Jean-Pierre reappeared, carrying a tray of oysters Rockefeller, which he placed before me with a small bow.

“Smells heavenly,” I said, as he sat down opposite me.

He wore a blue-and-white-striped shirt, the kind French sailors wear, short-sleeved and open at the neck. I eyed his muscular arms and large hands as he dished out the oysters. But when I tasted the first one, I forgot everything but their orgasmic taste. “Mmm,” I said, and sighed happily.

They were silky smooth, accentuated by the spinach and the seasonings. I'd never tasted anything so good. “You like?” Jean-Pierre said.

“I like,” I said.

We chatted as we ate, moving from the oysters to a roast chicken accompanied by a dish of creamy scalloped potatoes and a tray of warm asparagus dusted with olive oil and sea salt. I didn't think I'd ever eaten such a delicious meal, but Jean-Pierre dismissed my compliments. “Is a simple meal,” he said. “Because I must bake all day. When I have the day off, then you will see, I make something good.”