Orange You Going to Kiss Him

By David Connor

If absence makes the heart grow fonder, what does togetherness do?

When Casey found himself falling in love with Eli and Johnny as they fell in love with each other, he fled the country. Upon his return four months later, he finds Eli off in Morocco for humanitarian work and Johnny all alone.

Forced together over the holidays, Casey and Johnny find the situation tense. But what kind of tension is building? When Eli comes home with a big reveal and a plan, where will that leave the three of them this Christmas and in the future?

• Language: English
• Publisher: JMS Books LLC
• Release date: Dec 3, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685503307

Book preview

Chapter 1

Kiss.

Esmerelda, Max, and Eddie often lined up side by side according to height, three-feet-two, three-feet-four, and three-feet-five and a half. Fleckman, Ushinger, Cooper, and Underhill Laboratories’ recently completed EME Primate Study and Jungle Sanctuary was named in their honor. The female, male, and male chimpanzee, bonobo, chimpanzee trio watched my hands intently with their affectionate deep, rich copper eyes, eyes that reminded me of my Eli. Most things did in one way or another. Deaf since birth, I needed my hands to communicate. All three little ones recognized American Sign Language. Eddie, who’d signed kiss upon seeing me that morning, was most proficient.

Kiss.

A huge smile showed every one of his thirty-two teeth when I signed the word back, then doled out one each to him and his equally cheerful mates.

Why FUCU Labs wrote paychecks for teaching primates to say Kiss in ASL remained a mystery. My Eli did the teaching. Though he never needed those checks, he loved his students, he loved his job, and I loved him.

The expanded habitat was Eli’s idea. With faux and real sunshine entering through large and abundant windows and myriad species of trees, it looked just like photos of the African rainforest I’d recently longingly studied online, save for several tissue paper turkeys perched in the foliage.

"Honey, I’m house. Casey, whose Malibu Ken looks would have him more at home on a California beach than the jungle he suddenly entered, wore a grin even bigger than Eddie’s. Anyone who’d ever seen a chimp grin knew that was saying something. Did I sign that right, J-Yo?"

J-YO, technically J O, stood for Johnny Orange, a nod to my fondness for the fruit and my ginger hair. I’d earned the moniker at deaf camp as a teen right before my first kiss. Eli gave me both, and I literally ran from him right after. We came together again twenty-some years later thanks to fate.

Fate, Eddie, and Casey.

Once we were securely reunited, Eli set out to make a chimpanzee love match for Eddie. Eddie and Esmerelda were lukewarm, at best, leading us to wonder if Eddie might be gay. After a rather exhaustive search, we came across Max, a bonobo, whose caretaker thought he might be as well. Now, the primate throuple was inseparable. At one point, so were Eli and I. So were Eli and Casey.

Home. I showed him the correct sign.

I’d been in love with Eli since the day we’d met. Come to find out, Casey had, too, since they’d shared a dorm at Princeton. Casey dropped that bombshell then fled to Switzerland to spearhead pharmacological research, to give Eli and I time to grow as a couple, and to get over his feelings. Now, he was back, and despite northern New York’s typical chill four days before Thanksgiving, we were almost immediately sweating.

He’d texted from JFK to ask if I was at work. A FUCU security guard, I’d recently switched to day shifts, so I was. After telling him that, I received a rebus via e-mail, the kind Casey became infamous for in college and sent on postcards from Europe. A cropped image of a map highlighting the Mediterranean Sea, a cartoon sheep with long eyelashes, Jane Lynch in her red Glee sweatsuit, a plus sign, and an N translated to Sea ewe Sue-n.

Eli? Eddie was hoping to see someone else.

Eli’s still not here, Ed.

Eddie’s frown was as intense as his smile.

Such long faces. Casey touched Eddie’s, and then, quite gently, mine, where I had to show him home. So…orange you going to kiss me? The grin returned.

Someone else wants one first.

Only one thing came between Esmerelda and her black-furred animal boyfriends—the flaxen-furred human one. She adored Casey, and her lip pucker wasn’t subtle.

Kiss, kiss, kiss. Casey crouched to plant three right on them, then his lips told me turkeys don’t sit in trees.

Bonobos and chimps don’t routinely form exclusive threesomes or communicate in ASL, either; yet here we are.

Here…we…are, Casey slowly signed back.

* * * *

Casey stayed all day. At the end of my shift, I took pity and invited him for dinner at the house Eli and I had shared since late summer. The place had never felt more empty, even with Rufus and Mortimer, our cats, and Ludwig, the spunky, sweet tri-colored mutt that made yet another trio. Before I could even peel a carrot, Casey had an idea.

Be careful! My puffy winter gloves made American Sign Language difficult, especially while also trying to steady a wobbly twenty-foot extension ladder for a daredevil goofball on a gusty November evening. Casey. I spoke his name, and simultaneously banged on the metal slats running snow dusted ground to roof edge. One or the other got Casey’s attention just as he was about to step from the highest rung to likely slippery shingles. Be careful. I signed it again with my gloves between my teeth. It’s dark out here!

"Not with three flood lights, Red Beard. Casey had several nicknames for me. Hand up the X-m-a-s lights."

Eli would have scolded him for his erroneous homonyms. The light Casey had chosen twice, ten spread fingers turned upward, had no plural, because it meant not heavy. The dominant hand eight sign under the chin was what he’d meant. His signing had come a long way, though. He’d studied hard via Skype, often right along with Eddie, Max, and Esmerelda. Still, like his rebus puzzles, Casey’s ASL sometimes needed deciphering.

I flashed back to an early lesson, Casey in Zurich, Eli and I at the lab.

"How do you say, Where can I find decent sushi?"

Why would Eddie, Max, or Essie need to know that? Eli’s delectable mouth twisted into a smirk.

I need to know it. More in German than ASL. Casey had told us within the first week the two things he missed most was his favorite Japanese restaurant and the two of us. Hey. I just thought of something.

"Should we throw