Page 53 - Leather Blues

Leather Blues 41

pulled cold and beaded from a cooler. “Everybody’s some-
body’s student.”
“I pick my own teachers.”
“Have a beer.” Chuck thrust the tall can into Den’s gut.
“Depends. My mood. The guy I’m with. Sure,” Chuck
said, “I go either way.”
“Slave or master,” Den said. “It’s that easy to turn
around?”
“Man, with some guys you want to turn around.”
“I’m an S,” Den said.
“So’s God,” Chuck said. He took a hit off his beer. “So
are we all.” He looked deep into Den. “There’s honor in
being a good slave. I started out as an M.” Den flashed
uncomfortably. “Can the judgmental disgust. man. Now
I’m predominantly S, I’m a better S for it.”
“I’ll never lick anybody’s boots,” Den said.
“Until you meet a pair of boots you like.”
“I’m total S,” Den said. “I figured it out.”
“You can lead a guy to bullshit,” Chuck said, “but I ain’t
eating. Let me tell you. Out front. For every S there’s a bigger
S. Always somebody a little more S than you and when that S
points his finger at you some night in some crummy bar and
says you, you know he’s talking to an M and that M is you.”
Denny spit off the porch. “Always a faster gun after the
fastest gun in town, huh?”
“Any Top Man who tells you he’s never been bottom is
a fucking liar,” Chuck said. “And that’s a fact.”
“Any Top Man so far,” Den said. “You forgot so far. And
that, good buddy, is a fact.”
“Never say never,” Chuck said. “You always end up doing
that exact thing the next Saturday.”
Den poured out the rest of his beer into the dust along
the porch. “So long,” he said.
Chuck walked slow down after him. “Don’t be sore.”
“I didn’t come here for a sermon,” Denny said.

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