Vanilla Ride by Joe R. Lansdale

I aren’t doing so good.”
    “Could it have anything to do with you crappin’ in the bed?”
    “I was mad.”
    “You? Oh, say thee not such foul lies about your own sweet self.”
    “I said some things.”
    “Another surprise.”
    “I’ve sort of been staying somewhere else.”
    “Where?”
    “Motels. I get off the security job, I been picking a different one each night. Quite the thrilling experience. One of them, it has one of those old-time beds where you put a quarter in a machine and the bed vibrates. … Course, it doesn’t work. But the mechanism is still there, and you can’t imagine how the nostalgia comforts me. Hey, and there’s this one cheap motel, the sheets, they got shit stains on them. I stayed there twice, two different rooms, shit stains on blue sheets. I guess it saves on laundry soap, leavin’ them like that.”
    I got up and poured us some coffee and got some sweetener and cream. We fixed our coffee. I stirred mine longer than was necessary. I said, “Have you tried to talk to John?”
    “I have.”
    “And what’s the sticking point?”
    “He doesn’t like me.”
    “Bullshit. What’s going on?”
    “The queer stuff.”
    “You’re both queer, Leonard.”
    “Really? Well, that puts some things in perspective.”
    “So, John feels guilty about being gay?”
    “John’s brother hates him because he’s gay. He tells him he doesn’t have to be gay. He’s telling him God doesn’t want him gay.”
    “Even if God made him that way?” I said. “Provided there was a God.”
    “If there was one, and he made someone gay wouldn’t God his own goddamn self be responsible?” Leonard said.
    “In my book, yes. But in the Christians’ book, that rascal can do no wrong. Someone survives a hurricane, it was God’s mercy. Someone drowns, it was God’s will. I don’t like him. He’s a bully.”
    We touched fists. It’s a manly bonding thing.
    “Or maybe,” Leonard said, “God is gay and it’s the rest of you people who are messed up and going to hell. You ever think about that? Maybe there’s another Bible out there that tells us to stone you guys and not to lie with women because it’s strange. It is, you know.”
    “Brett and I like it.”
    Leonard sipped some coffee. “You see, John is starting to feel he’s not supposed to be gay, and unlike us, on some level he believes that God stuff. He thinks he’s violated God’s law, so he’s going to church counseling to get straight.”
    “Oh, for heaven’s sake.”
    “That’s what he thinks. For heaven’s sake.”
    “It’s a figure of speech.”
    “I’ve tried to tell him that even if there is a God, the New Testament is the one to go by, and it’s not tough on us queers. It’s just the old mean version of God that gives us a hard time. Motherfucker in the Old Testament won’t even let us have a pork chop.”
    “God must have finally got laid between the Old and the New Testament,” I said. “’Cause between those two books, he sure mellowed out.”
    “Who’d he lay, male or female?”
    “Either … Look, Leonard, I’m sorry about John.”
    “Not half as sorry as I am. I’ve called him, I wrote him a letter. I even did an e-mail from one of the hotels on my laptop.”
    “You got a laptop?”
    “John bought it for me. At home I even got a printer and some paper to print out on.”
    “You are so cosmopolitan.”
    “Tell me about it. But the thing is, he’s going to take these classes sohe can tell his brain and his dick that he’s been confused and he likes women. I can’t think of anything yuckier than learning to like that old pink snapper.… No disrespect to you and Brett.”
    “I get your point. You want me to talk to him?”
    “I don’t know. I thought about that, thought about asking you. But it won’t matter. He thinks he’s on the road to hell and wang and butt hole are no longer on the smorgasbord.”
    “Leonard, thy middle name is romance. You and Tanedrue, you should get