Excerpt From "His Tuscan Embrace" Soon to be Published
I'm working on a new book, HIS TUSCAN EMBRACE, and I'm having a little trouble getting chapter four right. So I decided to post an excerpt here before I submit the book to the publisher, hoping to gain a different perspective by seeing it in published form.
Chapter Four
When Joey King had first moved to New York, he'd arrived a virgin. He'd grown up in a small town in Southern New Jersey, a place called Cowtown that was actually part of the rodeo circuit. And when a gay person grows up in a place called Cowtown, surrounded by farms, tobacco chewing cowboys, and little white country churches, where the most impressive home in the entire town is the funeral parlor and the most scandalous topic of conversation is the occasional divorce, there aren't many opportunities to meet other young gay men.
Joey learned how to survive by keeping a low profile and following those unspoken small town rules. When he heard the guys in school laughing about fags, he either pretended to laugh along with them or he turned his head and pretended he wasn't paying attention. In high school, when he changed in the boys' locker room, he moved fast and kept his eyes focused on his own locker. He couldn't say he had a terrible experience growing up like other gay men he knew. In other words, he fit in so well he was never personally bullied nor was he ever abused by anyone. In fact, most of the guys liked him and the small town girls were constantly flirting with him. This was partly because of his easy going personality, and partly because he was terrified of what might happen if anyone discovered he liked dick more than he liked pussy. He never forgot what happened to that one effeminate young guy who went to the small Catholic Church in town. This guy was always running around with the priests, sashaying through town in his long black alter boy dress, smiling and waving at everyone he passed. And then one day he shot himself and no one ever knew why. Joey King had his own suspicions. And that's why he left that town and never looked back the day after he graduated from high school.
It wasn't easy getting started in New York, with nothing but a suitcase filled with clothes, a few small personal items and a wallet that contained three thousand dollars he'd managed to save by working as a sales clerk part time for a country western boot shop in Cowtown. He stayed at the Chelsea Hotel for a few nights, and then he answered a roommate ad in The Village Voice to share a small studio in The East Village near Chinatown, on Broome Street. Within the same week, he found a job working as a bar tender in a gay bar so he could pay his rent and meager living expenses. He got into female impersonating by sheer accident. Six months after he answered the ad for the studio apartment, his roommate moved out in the middle of the night and left him with nothing but a stack of dirty underwear and a trunk filled with drag costumes.
Chapter Four
When Joey King had first moved to New York, he'd arrived a virgin. He'd grown up in a small town in Southern New Jersey, a place called Cowtown that was actually part of the rodeo circuit. And when a gay person grows up in a place called Cowtown, surrounded by farms, tobacco chewing cowboys, and little white country churches, where the most impressive home in the entire town is the funeral parlor and the most scandalous topic of conversation is the occasional divorce, there aren't many opportunities to meet other young gay men.
Joey learned how to survive by keeping a low profile and following those unspoken small town rules. When he heard the guys in school laughing about fags, he either pretended to laugh along with them or he turned his head and pretended he wasn't paying attention. In high school, when he changed in the boys' locker room, he moved fast and kept his eyes focused on his own locker. He couldn't say he had a terrible experience growing up like other gay men he knew. In other words, he fit in so well he was never personally bullied nor was he ever abused by anyone. In fact, most of the guys liked him and the small town girls were constantly flirting with him. This was partly because of his easy going personality, and partly because he was terrified of what might happen if anyone discovered he liked dick more than he liked pussy. He never forgot what happened to that one effeminate young guy who went to the small Catholic Church in town. This guy was always running around with the priests, sashaying through town in his long black alter boy dress, smiling and waving at everyone he passed. And then one day he shot himself and no one ever knew why. Joey King had his own suspicions. And that's why he left that town and never looked back the day after he graduated from high school.
It wasn't easy getting started in New York, with nothing but a suitcase filled with clothes, a few small personal items and a wallet that contained three thousand dollars he'd managed to save by working as a sales clerk part time for a country western boot shop in Cowtown. He stayed at the Chelsea Hotel for a few nights, and then he answered a roommate ad in The Village Voice to share a small studio in The East Village near Chinatown, on Broome Street. Within the same week, he found a job working as a bar tender in a gay bar so he could pay his rent and meager living expenses. He got into female impersonating by sheer accident. Six months after he answered the ad for the studio apartment, his roommate moved out in the middle of the night and left him with nothing but a stack of dirty underwear and a trunk filled with drag costumes.
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