Chester MacCardle used to be my aunt’s lawn boy two decades before. Chess, as he liked to be called, went from a short, pudgy, and timid lad to a chiseled adult with sweeping ginger hair, muscles galore, and the most tranquil green eyes that I have ever viewed on a man. Youth brought us together and we saw each other regularly. Life-long friends through the good and bad, the ugly and beautiful—everything to share.
Of course, we kissed once, back in the day when Child’s Play and Men in Black played on the big screen. Back when Justin Timberlake was the lead singer in a boy band. And back when Stephen King’s The Stand played as a mini-series on television. All of that history felt a million years ago. Lost.
Once, only once, not a single time more, I jacked Chess off behind my aunt’s cottag
