Extreme Bull

out.
    Just hope it’s on him and not the poor bull.”
    “Or the clowns,” Jeff said, wondering why Clay was so fucking annoyed.
    BJ started talking about other riders, and he and Caleb analyzed their strengths and weaknesses with accuracy and wicked ridicule.
    Jeff shoveled his food in, wanting nothing more than to be away from the table and Clay, sitting there all touchy and stone-faced. He didn’t think he could go on this way; trying to outguess Clay’s moods was worse than dealing with a woman.
    “Let me out,” BJ said.
    Seeing that he was ready to pay and leave, Jeff swallowed a last gulp of coffee and stood up. “I’m done.
    Coming, Clay?”
    “You go on ahead,” Clay mumbled. He stood to let Caleb by and sat down to wrap his hands around his cup of coffee.
    “Fine.”
    The three cowboys paid at the cashier and went outside.
    “I gotta fill up,” Jeff mentioned.
    “Me too,” BJ said.

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    “See you there,” Caleb said, pulling up his collar.
    Jeff pulled under the overhang at the pump and started to fuel up. He squinted at the grey clouds; the sky was bright, but it smelled like rain to him. BJ was over at a different island, gassing up his truck.
    Clay pulled up on the other side of the pumps in his rig, and Jeff faced away from him. He planned to ignore Clay from this time forward, and apparently Clay had the same idea. Jeff could hear him taking off the gas cap, putting the fuel pump in, and starting it up, but he didn’t say a word.
    “Uh, excuse me?”
    Jeff whipped his head around. The middle-aged man speaking to him looked like any other city man on the road, dressed in a suit with a raincoat over it, but he spoke with a slight lisp.
    “Yes?” Clay looked over as Jeff spoke.
    The man continued in a low voice. “Are you two cowboys?”
    Jeff met Clay’s gaze and stifled a laugh, drawn together somehow in the face of this citified dude accosting them.
    “Uh, yeah.”
    “ Real cowboys?”

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    “Yeah,” Clay answered this time, stepping closer.
    “What’s it to you?”
    “I always told myself if I ever met a real cowboy, I had to offer to suck his cock,” the stranger said. He smiled nervously and licked his lips. “How would you two like a blow job? There’s the restroom—or one of your campers—”
    “Get away from us, you cocksucker!” Clay exploded. The growing uneasiness that had kept him on edge all morning suddenly erupted, and he realized it was the memory of having Jeff’s cock in his mouth that was bugging him. Only once, but he’d done it, and now this stranger put a face on his fears, jamming his nose into it like he was a dog being housetrained.
    Jeff was as shocked as the stranger, but he moved between him and Clay, putting his hand up in the universal stop sign. “No, but thanks. Get lost.”
    “Are you sure?” The stranger took a few steps back.
    Clay’s reaction appeared to scare him, but it also seemed to titillate him.
    “Who the fuck do you—”
    Jeff put himself between Clay and the stranger again. “I think you better take a hike, now , if you want to live.”
    “Damn.” The stranger scurried off.
    “Goddamn faggot!” Clay growled.

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    “Listen, we’re not any—”
    Clenching his fists, Clay turned on Jeff. “You want to get your face smashed, you just keep on saying what you’re about to. You may be the same, but I’m not!”
    “What makes you so different then? And what does that make me?” The face of the stranger seemed to clear things up for Jeff in a way. He was just an ordinary guy, kind of like how Jeff saw himself, not some flamer who dressed like Terrence. Maybe this liking being with Clay was just some harmless variation.
    Clay struggled to answer Jeff, watching the emotions flit over his face. Jeff looked so impossibly beautiful to him right now, and the thought that he couldn’t have that…. “We’re not like them. You aren’t, and I’m sure as hell not.”
    “If I’m going to do this, I’m at least going to own it,” Jeff said, doggedly not backing down despite Clay’s enraged expression.
    “You do what you have to. I’m done,” Clay snarled. He turned and yanked the dripping hose from his trailer, jammed on the gas cap, and slammed the door. He revved the sluggish engine, which made Jeff snicker even though he was feeling as if the Earth had stopped turning. Clay stomped on the gas and peeled out, as much as anyone