Page 1 of Hearing Hank

1

Hank

Iloveanimals.Seriously,all of them. All the birdies and beasties. I don’t even mind spiders. I’ve got to say, even though I love them, goats are minions of Satan. I don’t care how well you feed them or how much you love them, or how high and tight you build the pen you keep them in. They are always going to get loose, eat everything in sight, and generally cause havoc. It’s the way they’re programmed. They can’t even help themselves.

I’m bent over checking out a repair I need to do to the bottom hinge on the small barn door when Henry catches me in the butt with his head. He knocks me into the dirt, bouncing my skull off the door. Thank God my head is hard. Wyatt, my boss, happens to catch the action as he heads up to the house for the evening.

“We shouldn’t have given that old billy-goat the same name as you! He’s every bit as onery as you are,” he yells across the yard with a laugh as he stomps up the porch, knocking dirt off his boots. He knows I’m fine.

Henry never hits hard enough to really hurt. He just thinks it’s funny to catch me off guard. If that goat could, he would be laughing. I dust myself off and grab Henry. He’s not really named after me. The guy we got him from had already named him, and there was no point in changing it. Plus, I go by Hank anyway. Since he’s accomplished his mission of knocking me in the dirt, he heads happily back into his pen. I check around and see that this time he loosened some wire enough to squeeze out. At least he didn’t dismantle the gate latch again. He’s done that before. I twist the wire together and make a mental note to fix it right in the morning.

I really enjoy my job, even with the goats. I live for the horses and other animals, and I love being outside. I can’t imagine having to spend all day indoors. Sometimes the weather makes me wish for a nice office job, but by and large, even in the winter, I wouldn’t trade this for anything. The beauty, the fresh air, the space, and the quiet all combine to make this my personal paradise. Even with all of the questionable history I have in Shafter Falls, I don’t have any interest in living anywhere else.

I got my fill of moving when my parents dragged me all over the country as a kid, and now I’m perfectly content to stay right where I am for the rest of my life. I take the time to be grateful, yet again, for Wyatt and my position on the ranch.

Henry was the last straw for today. I was done with my chores before he bowled me over, and I’m ready for dinner. I eat with Wyatt and his husband Mark once in a while, but sometimes being around all the lovey-dovey energy they give off is a little depressing. It’s bad enough I have to start landscaping the side yard tomorrow for Wyatt’s son Sam’s wedding next month. Sam and Paul are just the cutest thing ever, and it kind of makes me want to gag. Ok, not really. Not if I’m being honest. What it really does is make me a little bit lonely, and a little bit sad. I’m so happy for both Wyatt and Sam, and I really like the men they’ve fallen in love with. I just wish I didn’t have to spend all my time alone.

I’m over thirty now, and in the back of my mind, I always thought I’d be normal by thirty. Like it was some sort of magic dividing line by which all of my problems would be figured out. Or at least replaced by more grown-up problems. When I was a teenager it seemed so old. Surely I’d have everything figured out and have made a place for myself in the world by then, right? But I guess I do have a place in the world. I run this ranch for Wyatt. It’s not a big ranch, almost a hobby farm at this point. We run a few head of cattle, rescue and board a few horses, and play servant to the goddamn goats. It’s enough to keep us busy, and I’m good at it. Also, I don’t have to talk.

I was sure that eventually, I’d figure out how to talk to people. I had mutism as a child, caused by anxiety, and although I’m not technically mute anymore, I do still have selective mutism. There are situations in which I cannot talk, no matter how hard I try. People in town call me retarded when they think I can’t hear them, hell, even sometimes when they know that I can. They think Wyatt employs me out of pity. I don’t bother to correct them. Even if I could get the words to come out, I can’t imagine what the point would be.

So I haven’t figured it out. I can talk to Wyatt and Mark just fine, and I can talk to Sam, too. I have a harder time talking to Paul because he’s newer, but I can usually handle it, so long as we’re not in public. In public, my throat closes up and I can’t get a word out for anything. My therapist says that I need to push myself to spend more time in public situations trying to talk to people, but I haven’t been very diligent about it. It’s embarrassing and uncomfortable.

One of the perks of this job is that I get to live in the foreman’s house, between the main house and the road. It’s far enough away that Wyatt and I can’t see each other, and it’s nice and quiet. It’s also, obviously, close enough to walk to work. I trudge up the steps and pry my boots off before I go inside. There’s no point in tracking ranch dirt in, I’ll just have to sweep it out again. It’s a great house and I love living here, but lately, I’ve spent more and more time thinking about leaving the ranch and going somewhere that I might meet people. Someplace that I hadn’t gone to high school with the entire town, someplace where everyone didn’t think there was something wrong with me. I’m tired of being alone, but I really don’t want to leave my job. Or maybe I just need to bite the bullet and drive down to Denver this weekend and get a backroom blowjob at that one club. It’s as close as I get to having an actual sex life, and I don’t have any shortage of offers when I go there. No one notices that I don’t actually say anything with the music so loud.

Sometimes the two-hour drive is more trouble than it’s worth though, and I’ve been getting less and less excited about the randomness of it all. Plus, just going into the club and being around that many people, even if I don’t have to talk to them, can sometimes make my anxiety flare up. I don’t just want an orgasm anyway, I want someone I can have a relationship with and talk to, and the irony of that is not lost on me.

2

Leroy

“Oh.My.God.Youcannot be serious!” I screech. Maybe that’s not the most professional response, but I’m pissed off and frustrated by what my manager is saying. “You’re trying to tell me that I can’t go to my best friend’s wedding, using leave that I requested, three months ago, in writing, because you‘can’t get somebody to cover for me?’” I do the air quotes and everything. If I’m going to sink my career, I’m going to blow it all the way out of the water. “You can either give me the paid leave I was approved for, or you can consider this my resignation.” I don’t even wait for his response, I know what it will be. I just turn and sashay out of his office.

The bravado lasts until I get far enough away that the bastard can’t see me, and then I kind of deflate. I’m not going to miss Paul’s wedding. He’s been one of my best friends for seven years. I practically adopted him when he first came to Denver, and we were pretty much inseparable until he moved back to that small town in Wyoming. I’mnotmissing his wedding. Not happening. But I know my manager, and that means that I’m also out of a job. I know that’s what he wants, and I know I’m playing right into his hands. He’s been trying to get rid of my gay ass since I was assigned to his department, but he hasn’t been able to do it with my work production. Unfortunately for me, I just handed him everything he needed to show me the door.

In the usual way of loud office drama, it takes about five seconds for the word to spread around our department. By the time I get back to my desk to start packing it up, people are starting to sidle over from their cubicles and ask questions. I genuinely like most of the people at work, but I don’t want to talk about it, and I don’t feel like I have the energy to hold the façade. We all know I’m going because I make my stupid homophobic manager uncomfortable with my genderfluid dress style and the “gay lisp” I’ve had ever since I can remember. I hug my favorite co-workers, and I’m done packing my shit by the time security comes to show me to the door. We’re not allowed to bring in many personal items, so everything I’m taking home fits in my bag.

The security guard is not an asshole, thank god, so I don’t give him any attitude. He searches me and my bag, follows me to the door, and says goodbye like he might actually miss me. I’m trying to straight-face it until I get home, but his kindness makes me tear up. I rush for my car and head to my apartment as fast as I can. I just want to be by myself when I lose my shit. I’m 38 years old and I’ve put the last 15 years of my life into the job I just lost. I don’t have any idea where I’m going from here, but I know I’m not going back. Not even if they beg.

Actually, I guess I do know where I’m going next. I’m going to pack up my cute little car and get my cute little butt up to the back of beyond where my best friend decided to find true love. Paul and Sam are living in a little town called Shafter Falls, and they’re getting married on an honest-to-god ranch. I’m thrilled for Paul. He had a hard time when he first came to Denver, and I’m so happy that he’s found his home and his person. I personally don’t understand why anyone would want to live there with the small-town thinking and small-town attitudes, but I’ve been a city boy my whole life. Give me sidewalks and skyscrapers over corn fields and cow shit any day.

I’m a little worried about whether it’s going to be safe to be me there. I’ve been tempted to leave most of my glitter and glam at home and tone it down for this trip. Paul says that I’ll be fine since he’s marrying the law, and I hope he’s right. Being Black and Queer has always put a double target on my back. I’ve been the target of bullying more times than I can even count.

You know what? People can just deal. After the day I’ve had, I’m not in the mood to cater to bullshit, and they can just take me as I am.

I pack my car and get everything ready to leave first thing in the morning. I like driving, and I’m looking forward to a couple of hours on the road. Prime sing-along time. I’ve met Paul’s Sam before, and I really like him, but I haven’t met his father. I’ll be staying out on the ranch with Sam’s dad, Wyatt, and his husband, Mark, since Sam and Paul are still working on their house remodel. Sam says it’s not a problem and they’re happy to have me, but I’m definitely going to stop in Shafter Falls on the way to the ranch and make Paul come with me to introduce me. I don’t want to get eaten by a cow or something.

I sleep in a little bit in the morning, just because I can, but I’m excited to see Paul, so I’m on the road by nine, oat milk latte in hand. My phone is synched to my stereo which is blasting my sing-along playlist. I’ve decided that I’m not going to think about work, or more accurately, not having work until the wedding is over. Then I will deal with real life. My job paid well, so I have some decent savings, and if I just take some time off before I go job hunting next, it won’t hurt a thing.

Almost two hours later, I’m pulling into the driveway at Paul’s house in Shafter Falls. I’ve never been here before, and I kind of love the way the house looks. It’s not big, but it’s cozy and cute, and it looks lived-in, in a good way. Paul has obviously heard my car, and he’s trotting down the steps with a big grin on his face. I hop out in time to meet him and sweep him into a big dramatic hug, twirling and all.

“Oh, thank God! I thought for sure that I would get here and you’d have grown a huge bushy beard and dyed your hair back to boring brown and taken to wearing plaid! I’m so glad I’m not too late to save you from the influence of small-town America!”

Paul laughs with me and holds tight for a minute. When he draws back and looks at my face though, I can see in his expression that my antics haven’t quite covered up what’s going on.

“What’s wrong, Lee?” he asks.

I decide to just rip the band-aid off and tell him. If I don’t, he’ll just worry, and I don’t want to cast any shadows on his big day.

---