Tales of the City 04 - Babycakes

scenery, huh?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
“Would you mind telling that to a camera?”
He regarded her for a moment, then shook his head with a weary chuckle. “I should have known.”
“I mean, it’s really a fantastic …”
“What station do you work for?”
His tone somehow suggested betrayal. She resented that. They were just two people talking in a bar. “You don’t have to, if you don’t want to,” she said.
The lieutenant ran his forefinger around the rim of his glass. “Do you want a story or do you want a friend?”
She answered without hesitation. “A friend.”
He winked at her. “Excellent choice.”
She knew that already. A friend just might relent and agree-to a story after all. A friend who could trust her to present him in the best possible light. She explained her reasoning to Brian as they opened their Lean Cuisines that evening.
“He might be calling,” she added.
“Calling? You gave him our number?”
She nodded. “I doubt if he will, though.”
“But he might?”
“He might. He doesn’t know a soul, Brian. I told him to call if he needed help with anything.”
He nodded slowly. “Sort of a … Welcome Wagon gesture.”
She glanced across at him, then blew on the surface of her steaming dinner. “You’re not jealous. Don’t pretend to be jealous, Brian.”
“Who’s pretending?”
“He’ll be a nice new friend for both of us. He worked on the royal yacht, for God’s sake. He’s bound to be interesting, if nothing else.”
He plunged a fork into his dinner. “So what’s the name of our interesting new friend?”
“Simon,” she answered grumpily. “Simon Bardill.”
“What does he look like?”
“Gorgeous. Well, sort of gorgeous. He looks a lot like you, as a matter of fact.”
Brian stroked his chin. “Why do I find that disquieting?”
She rolled her eyes in retort. “What in God’s name would I do with a younger, English version of you?”
“The mind fairly boggles,” he replied.
    Campmates
A S DAWN CREPT OVER DEATH VALLEY, MICHAEL stirred in his sleeping bag and catalogued the sounds of the desert: the twitter of tiny birds, the frantic scampering of kangaroo rats, the soothing rustle of the wind in the mesquite tree …
“Oh, no! The vinaigrette leaked!”
… the voice of Scotty, their chef for this expedition, taking stock of his inventory in preparation for breakfast. His plight provoked a burst of laughter from Ned’s tent, followed by more of the same from the sandy bluff where Roger and Gary had slept under the stars.
“What’s so fucking funny?” yelled Scotty.
Ned answered: “That’s the nelliest thing that’s ever been said in Death Valley.”
“If you want butch,” the chef snapped, “try the third RV on the right—they’re eating Spam and powdered eggs. Us nellie numbers will be having eggs benedict, thank you.”
General cheers all around.
A tent was unzipped, probably Douglas and Paul’s. Boots crunched against gravel, then came Paul’s voice, froggy with sleep. “Does anybody know the way to the bathroom?”
More laughter from Ned. “You didn’t really believe that, did you?”
“Listen, dickhead, you told me there was running water.”
Roger came to the rescue. “All the way down the road, on the right-hand side.”
“Where’s my shaving kit?” asked Paul.
“Behind the ice chest,” said Douglas.
Turtle-like. Michael inched out of his sleeping bag, found the air decidedly nippy, and popped back in again. There was no point in being rash about this. His absence from the banter had not yet been observed. He could still grab some sleep.
Wrong. Scotty’s smiling face was now framed in the window of his tent. “Good morning, bright eyes.”
Michael emerged part of the way and gave him a sleepy salute.
“Are you heading for the bathroom?” the chef asked. “Eventually.”
“Good. Find me some garni , would you?”
“Uh … garni?”
“For the grapefruit,” explained Scotty. “There’s lots of nice stuff along the road.”
“Right.”
“Just something pretty. It doesn’t have to be edible, of course.’’
“Of course.’’
Garni in Death Valley. There was bound to be a message there somewhere—about life and irony and the gay sensibility—but it eluded him completely as he stood at a sink in the middle of nowhere and brushed his teeth next to a fat man in Bermuda shorts and flip-flops.
On the way back to the campsite, he left the path long enough to find something suitably decorative—a lacy,