Page 13 of Country Road Romance

“Isaidhow y'all doin’ tonight?” she said louder, holding the mic out. This time the shouting was more exuberant. Charlie felt himself buoyed up by the sounds of so much queer joy.

“Boy do we have a show for you tonight,” the drag queen continued. “And we hope you have as much fun as we do!”

And with that the show began. The queens at the Stonewall might not be as elaborate in their costuming as the ones in LA, but Charlie still admired their acrobatics and their commitment. He smiled and walked up to the stage several times with tips, and once or twice he thought that one of them recognized him (though fortunately they didn’t say anything).

Jared cheered right along with the rest of them each time a new song came on, but he was clearly too shy to actually go up and tip the queens, no matter how excited he was to seethem. He even let out a little squeal of glee when the last of the performers did a rendition of Shania Twain’s “Man, I Feel Like a Woman!” It was clear that, for him at least, it was just like being back in college all over again.

After one of the final performances, Charlie turned around and saw that Jared had disappeared. He had an irrational thought that he’d gone home, but a quick perusal of the room revealed Jared sitting in a booth by himself, a guarded look on his face. Charlie looked around to see if Paul was lurking nearby, but there was no one. With a shrug, he walked over and slid into the booth next to him. “It wouldn’t hurt you to get out there and dance, you know,” he said. “Though you don’t strike me as the dancing type.”

Jared gave him a level look. “You’re right about that. I’ve never liked dancing, even when I was a young gay.”

Charlie let the music wash over him again, savoring the feeling of being just another gay at the bar, not “Charlie Garrett: Star.”

“Is there anything I can do to convince you to get out there and cut a rug?” he asked. He wasn’t sure why he wanted to get Jared out on the dance floor, other than that he genuinely wanted to see how he would look, out there being a little vulnerable for once. He’d managed to get him to soften up a little, but he knew that there was still a lot the other man was holding back.

“Well, you could start by not saying ‘cut a rug.’ That’s a bit much, even for a geriatric millennial.”

Charlie nudged him gently. “Come on. Do it for me? Please?” He flashed his smile and was satisfied when he saw Jared’s resistance beginning to crumble.

“Ugh, fine,” Jared said. “Just don’t blame me if I end up making both of us look foolish.”

They both made their way to the dance floor, swaying along to Dua Lipa’s “Dance the Night.” Soon they were dancing next to one another, their bodies growing hotter and hotter by the moment. Whatever Jared might say, he had a natural sort of rhythm that, strangely enough, seemed to perfectly complement Charlie’s own.

Charlie knew that he shouldn’t be thinking like this, knew that this weekend was going to go by far too quickly, knew that Jared was probably not even thinking about anything remotely romantic, but he couldn’t help himself. He wore his heart on his sleeve and he fell hard and fast. It didn’t hurt that Jared was very attractive and, at this exact moment, grinding up against him, the friction of their two bodies producing the expected results.

He wrapped his hands around Jared’s waist, and felt that familiar thrum of pleasure and desire race up his arms and settle into his chest.

For a second he just lost himself to the rhythm of the music and their bodies, but then he looked up and his heart froze.

For a moment, he couldn’t quite believe what, or rather who, he was seeing: it was the guy with the protest sign from earlier in the day. He was dressed in the same clothes as earlier, though fortunately he didn’t have his sign. He was trouble, though, of that there was no doubt.

Charlie tried taking a few deep breaths to calm himself and get the anger to go back down, and to an extent he succeeded. However, he couldn’t help but be aware of the protester moving through the crowd. He couldn’t tell whether the guy had come here deliberately to resume their quarrel or if it was just an accident, but he knew which onehewas interested in. He wanted to teach the guy a lesson.

Don’t do it, Charlie,he said to himself over and over.Sheri told you to stay out of trouble.

However, the guy came over to him, and all caution went right out the window.

“So, it’s you again,” Charlie said, pushing Jared gently behind him. “What are you doing here?’

The man cocked his head to the side, almost as if he was really considering what Charlie was asking.

“You know, I wasn’t sure that I’d find you here, but I know that you people always tend to gather at the same place, so I figured it was a good bet.”

“Do you want to take this outside?” Charlie snarled, acting like a total dude-bro and not even caring.

The other guy just shrugged. “Why bother going outside?”

It was at that moment that Jared decided to be a hero.

“Look, I don’t want to get in the middle of anything,” he said, pulling away from Charlie and striding up to the other guy. “But you’ve been making a nuisance of yourself this whole day, and I think it’s time that you get out of here and find something better to do.”

Charlie almost admired Jared for this, until he saw the ugly light that flickered in the man’s eyes.

Before he could say anything, he gave Jared a shove that was just this side of rough.

In that moment all of Charlie’s training at keeping his emotions in check, all of the admonitions from Sheri and the powers-that-be at the Romance Network to be on his best behavior and not to let his anger and frustration run away with him, went right out the window. Suddenly this guy was every homophobe that had disrupted his efforts to do something good for West Virginia, every hater who’d left a nasty message on social media, every executive that had said something vaguely (or not so vaguely) homophobic.

He didn’t think about what he was going to do; all he could do was feel irrational anger that this asshole would lay a hand onJared. Before he knew it, his fist was connecting with the guy’s face, sending him crashing to the floor.

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