Chapter 2-2
876 Words
As Barry signed the forms at the car rental desk, he could hear Jake and Jimmy teasing each other about the other’s passport photograph.
“Were you constipated when you had that taken?” Jimmy asked.
“At least mine doesn’t look like a wanted poster,” Jake fired back.
Barry turned around and said, “Boys! Remember, you’re ambassadors for your…our country, so behave.” He turned back to the cute clerk and rolled his eyes. “They’re just like children sometimes.”
The man, Peter according to his name tag, giggled. “You look like you have your work cut out for you.”
Barry nodded, smiled, and added, “But they’re worth the effort.”
Peter’s expression showed confusion before he brightened and asked, “You, and…both of them?”
Barry nodded again, his chest puffing up with pride.
Peter sighed. “Do you have any idea how lucky you are?”
Barry glanced briefly over his shoulder at Jimmy and Jake, who were making stupid faces at each other. “Yes I do.” More loudly he added, “But if they don’t quit acting like first graders, they’ll be put to bed without any supper…or anything else.”
Immediately Jimmy and Jake plastered on their best penitent expressions.
Peter sighed again. “Yep, so lucky.”
The paperwork was soon completed—thank goodness Barry had kept up his UK driver’s license—and he was handed the keys to a Ford Mondeo, along with instructions to where it was parked.
“To prevent any arguments I chose a silver colored car,” Barry said, striding out of the terminal building, pulling his suitcase behind him. The two tired cowboys with their own suitcases followed in his wake.
“Yeah, but it’s a Ford,” Jimmy said. “Couldn’t you have got, like, a British car or something?”
Barry didn’t think Britain still made their own cars, save maybe for Rolls Royces. Okay, the game was selling well, but not enough to afford to rent Rolls Royces.
“Shut up,” Jake groused. “Just be grateful you ain’t walking.”
“Who pissed in your corn flakes?” Jimmy wanted to know.
“Boys!” Barry halted and whirled to face his men. “I know you’re both tired. So am I. Let’s just find the car, something to eat, the hotel, and…” The rest of his statement was cut off by a jaw-splitting yawn. What time did his body clock say it should be? Surely only mid-evening. So why was he so exhausted?
The car was, thankfully, easy to find.
“Shotgun!” Jimmy shouted once the cases had been stowed in the trunk. He opened the driver’s door and stared.
Jake laughed. “It’s a right hand drive car, dumbass.”
“Whose stupid idea was that?” Jimmy mumbled and walked around the hood to the passenger side. But Jake was already climbing into the front seat.
As they belted themselves in, and Barry refamiliarized himself with the layout of a British car, he mused on how this would be the first time he’d be at the wheel with both his cowboys as passengers. They were way too alpha to let him drive. But Barry had insisted he should be behind the wheel in England, at least initially.
“So, we’re going for something to eat before finding the hotel?”
There were murmurs of ascent from his men, so Barry started up the engine and eased himself out of the parking lot. Or maybe he should think of such places as car parks whilst in England.
“f**k, I thought it was cold here, but not that cold! Jake said, pointing up at the thermometer.
“Huh?” Barry asked, glancing briefly up at the display.
“It says six point five degrees.”
“Degrees Celsius, not Fahrenheit,” Barry told him.
“Another fuckin’ stupid idea,” Jimmy mumbled from the backseat.
* * * *
Fed and in somewhat better moods, the trio walked down the narrow corridor of the Holiday Inn Express in search of their room.
“Here we are,” Barry said, stopping at the door and fiddling momentarily with the key card lock. The green light came on and the lock disengaged. Jimmy was first into the room, followed by Jake, who set down his suitcase and made a beeline for the bathroom.
Barry turned the corner out of the short hallway and saw Jimmy stretched out on the bed. “Boots!”
Jimmy raised one booted foot, no doubt inviting Barry to take it off for him. Barry’s gaze moved up Jimmy’s jean-clad legs, the bulge at his crotch, his still-jacketed chest and locked onto the man’s grinning face. Barry’s hands went to his hips and he tapped his foot waiting.
Jimmy huffed out a breath, swung to sit on the side of the bed and began taking off his cowboy boots. “Love it when you get all dominant and demanding.” And to prove his point, he rubbed at the growing bulge between his legs.
Barry, now in the privacy of their room, leaned down and cupped his cowboy’s face in his hands and began a long, tender, and tongue-filled kiss. Finally breaking away, he gasped for air. “You don’t know how long I’ve been wanting to do that.”
“Do, ‘cause I’ve been wanting to do the same to you.” And to prove his point, Jimmy claimed Barry’s mouth in an aggressive kiss.
Stripped out of their jackets, both men lay on the bed, hands and lips exploring. Jimmy said, “I like what I’ve seen of England so far.”
Barry chuckled. “All you’ve seen is an airport, some dark and wet streets, the insides of a KFC, and a short-stay hotel.”
“Yeah, just like home. Except for the odd temperatures and the driving on the wrong side of the road thing.”
The toilet was flushed and Jake soon emerged from the bathroom. “Steering wheels and cars driving on the road aren’t the only things on the wrong side in this country.”
“Huh?” Jimmy sat up.
“The lever on the john is on the right as you look at it.” Jake walked around the bed and flopped on top of it.
“Boots!” Jimmy and Barry said in unison.
- Writer
