The Last Unrecognized Bond
As a Generation X gay guy, I’ve observed there’s a strong bond that goes relatively unnoticed in this world – the friendship between a gay man and a married woman. The Martini Chronicles (sort of like Sex and the City, only with a gay guy and his best friend, a straight woman, as main characters) tells this untold story. If you enjoy what you read below, I invite you to pass this on to those you think might enjoy it too. If this is ‘not your thing,’ I invite you to click ‘delete’ and go back to your day.
Thank you for taking the time to read this far – and encouraging this author to keep on writing.
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THE MARTINI CHRONICLES
FREE: The Sweet & Dark martini recipe and Chapter One (below).
If you like it, pass it on! (with a heart-felt ‘thanks’ from the author)
If you’re hooked, there’s more! Just visit Amazon and download to your Kindle, tablet, or smartphone:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Martini-Chronicles-Collection-ebook/dp/B00E18QOSE
THURSDAY NIGHT SPECIAL:
THE SWEET & DARK MARTINI*
(recipes for those of legal drinking age only)
Ingredients:
Vodka (Kettle One)
Crème de cacao (clear) (Hiram Walker)
Butterscotch schnapps (DeKuyper)
Dark chocolate salted caramel (Hedonist Artisan Chocolates, available online)
Powdered chocolate (Ghirardelli Sweet Ground Chocolate)
Fresh blueberries (organic)
Combine in a shaker:
2 shots vodka
½ shot crème de cacao (clear)
¼ shot butterscotch schnapps
2 crushed blueberries (fresh)
Instructions for serving:
Chill martini glass in freezer for three minutes.
Pour a small pile of powdered chocolate onto a plate.
Remove glass from freezer and wet the rim with vodka (you can use your (clean!) finger for this).
Dip wet rim into the chocolate powder and rotate until covered.
Turn the glass upright and place a salted caramel in the bottom.
Fill with martini mixture.
This one is very sweet – you’ll want to enjoy it after appetizers or dinner.
Serve and converse:
In your primary relationship, what ‘sweet’ things do you enjoy talking about?
What ‘dark’ topics do you avoid discussing because they are uncomfortable?
If you were given a ‘one healthy discussion for free’ card that allowed you to bring up a topic you’ve never discussed with your partner—and there’s no fear of reprisal (no angry or defensive comments, no hurt feelings, just healthy discussion)—what would you talk about?
*Note: Brand name products in italics are author’s preferences. Make substitutions as desired. As with all alcohol consumption, please drink responsibly.
THE MARTINI CHRONICLES
By Gregory Gerard
CHAPTER ONE: THE SPECIALTY CONVERSATION
“So I was reading today about how middle-aged gay men can fall prey to lottery-obsessive severe-emotional regression syndrome,” Patty Singer said to her companion at The Martini Chronicles, their weekly hangout.
She lifted her glass, as if to underline her statement, and caught a glimpse of him through her martini. Through the murky mixture, Chuck McGuinness’ average appearance skewed. Brown hair lost its coiffed perfection. His hooked nose suddenly loomed over nostril caves. Baby blue eyes—usually his best feature—stared too large. She set the glass down quickly.
Chuck raised his right eyebrow as he glanced between her face, the five lottery tickets in his hand, and the flat-screen TV over the bar, which currently displayed numbered ping-pong balls. “Lottery regression what?”
“Lottery-obsessive severe-emotional regression syndrome. Maybe you’ve heard of it under its acronym, L.O.S.E.R.S.?”
He rolled his eyes. “How long did it take you to think that one up?”
She smiled. “It came to me during Pilates last week. I’ve been waiting for the right moment.”
“Keep waiting. Besides, what are you complaining about? When I win the big one, Mrs. Singer, right after I build the Charles McGuinness Animal Rescue Shelter and hire a twenty-something, live-in, personal masseur, I plan to buy The Chronicles so we can enjoy our Thursday night specials ad infinitum.”
Patty laughed. “Why not just hire Skip as your masseur?” she asked, nodding toward the broad-shouldered bartender. “Then he can make us martinis at your place anytime we want.”
Chuck’s eyes lit up. “I’m already visualizing the Saturday morning special!”
They both laughed. When his attention returned to the TV screen, she tipped back her second martini of the night and glanced at her own reflection in the wall mirror.
Wavy black hair framed her fair complexion. She skimmed over those complementary features and chose to focus on her slightly plump cheeks and neck. The way her left breast seemed larger than the right. A queasy wave of disapproval washed through her gut. She looked to the bar.
Skip mixed drinks under the newly installed lighting: upside-down martini-glass fixtures suspended from the ceiling, which showered the curved oak-top bar pleasantly. The rest of the room was artfully peppered with bistro tables, stools, and, in one corner, a church pew. Patty wondered if its original owners would approve of its current location. She suspected the priest at her own church would not. She mentally brushed away a tinge of sadness and took a mouthful of peanuts from the bowl on the table between them.
“So I’m up there with the personal masseur?” she said, after her munching was complete. “Wow! Now I know how you really feel about me.”
“Maybe someday you can explain it to me.” he said, his tone lowering a notch. “But I appreciate your confidence in my emotional awareness. Besides, nothing’s too good for me and my—damn!” he swore as the final lottery numbers flashed across the display. He threw the tickets onto the table and grabbed his martini, taking a healthy swig.
Patty squashed the pity she instinctively felt, deferring to a healthy dose of annoyance. “And just what was the original end of that sentence? Were you going to use that repulsive phrase?” Her lips drew inward as though her last sip had been sour lemonade, not one of Skip’s Thursday night specialty martinis.
Chuck laughed. “I would never insult you with that; I was going for best lady, hello!” Her jaw relaxed. “Although,” he added, his eyes twinkling, “just for the record, some people do think of ‘fag hag’ as a term of endearment. I hear they even have a Miss Fag Hag Pageant in the spring. It started in New Zealand, I think. And you love New Zealand.”
Patty managed a grin. “Well, when you put it that way. Maybe I can still get an application…”
They laughed.
“By the way, where did your people ever come up with that term?” she asked.
He tipped back in his chair. “Oh, probably in the beauty salon next to some caveman bar, where all the Neanderthal wives and gays gathered in solidarity.”
“You’re quite clever tonight,” she said, staring into her nearly empty glass. “Skip must have made these extra strong.” He laughed as she looked at him for a long moment. “You know, I think I need a pet name for you. Something to capture the uniqueness of the relationship between a married, intelligent woman and her middle-aged gay male companion.”
His eyebrows twisted inward. “What is all this middle-aged stuff tonight? I’m 33, for God’s sake!”
“Almost 34. And you’re making my point. Remember that old movie, Postcards from the Edge?”
“What self-respecting gay guy doesn’t?”
“Good. So—my favorite scene. Meryl Streep is sitting at the bottom of the stairs exhausted with her entire life and Shirley MacLaine starts an argument with her, insisting that she’s middle-aged—the mom, I mean, not the daughter—and—”
“Okay, so now I’m Shirley MacLaine? Clever me wants to say something like ‘your stock is plummeting here…’”
Patty waved him off and continued. “So Meryl explains that it’s all about the math. If the average American man lives to, say, 72, then, yes, Chuck, you should consider that 34 is certainly closing in on middle age.”
She chuckled as he choked on his martini. “But I digress. We were coming up with a name for you. I mean for you-with-respect-to-me. Let’s see…it’s gotta rhyme, like the fag hag thing. What are you? My fey gay? My day gay?”
He scowled. “I’m about as ‘fey’ as I am middle-ag—”
“Shhhh. Don’t change the subject. Bay, say, dismay—”
His scowl shifted to laughter. “Dismay gay?”
She pushed his martini glass closer to him. “Work with me here. How about ‘way gay?’”
“Way gay’s not so bad.” Chuck took a final sip from his glass, exposing the caramel square to air.
“Pray, tray, lay—”
“‘Lay gay?’ I think that one’s a little off topic.”
She laughed and snapped her fingers. “I’ve got it! ‘Play gay.’ You’re my play gay. I have a husband for the married stuff and I have you to come out and play with.”
He cocked his head to one side and raised an eyebrow. He looks like Lee Majors when he does that, she thought. “It’s not bad,” he said. “But I’m not sure it captures the true nature of our relationship.”
She laughed again. “Okay, okay, I give. I guess the names aren’t working for either of us. Let’s go with this. You vow to never refer to me as your fag hag and I will never refer to you as my play, lay, fey, or any other type of gay.”
He tipped back his glass and the caramel slid into his mouth. “Deal,” he said through his chewing. She watched as his face took on its second-martini-serious look. “But what the hell are we? Seriously.”
He pulled at the napkin under his drink. She leaned forward and opened her mouth. He spoke first. “No, this isn’t just drunk talk.”
She laughed as he continued. “Our relationship is something really special to me. Family is a nice word, but my family drives me crazy. Lovers isn’t right, ‘cause we don’t have sex and all the baggage that comes with that. Honestly,” he said, leaning in and dropping his voice even lower, “if I could name the feeling…” his eyes searched her face, “…then I guess I’d call this something like chosen love.”
She looked back at him, her eyes unexpectedly filling with tears.
“What would you call it?” he asked quietly.
She glanced toward the bar, gathering herself to keep her voice from cracking. “I don’t know if I can come up with anything nicer than that,” she said finally. “And you say you don’t feel things.”
Silence fell across the table as they stared at each other for a long moment. Both of their faces curved into slow smiles.
Chuck pushed his fingers through his hair and rubbed the back of his neck. “So,” he said. “do you think I’ll ever have something like this thing we have,” he gestured back and forth between them, “with a guy? I mean,” he said, leaning in, “how does this compare to what you feel with Roger? I just wanna know if this is what a significant relationship is supposed to feel like.”
Patty quickly brought her martini to her lips and drained the contents. Finishing off the remaining peanuts, she glanced around The Martini Chronicles. A few male-female couples occupied the nearby tables. Without looking back at him, she spoke quietly. “So, Chuckles, ya think we’re in the presence of any past Fag Hag Pageant winners?”
He roared with laughter. “That’s what I love about you, Patty-cakes,” he said. “You do your best deflection and still bring us back to something on topic.”
She pulled the caramel square from the bottom of her glass and, grinning, popped it into her mouth.
“It’s my specialty,” she said.
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Why I wrote this story (on YouTube): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lh013eTrkbk
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Every gay man needs a married woman to talk to. And visa versa.
THE MARTINI CHRONICLES – available exclusively on Amazon Kindle.
