Welcome to March!
Of course, it’s the month of our collective quarantine anniversary. We had unseasonably warm weather in Montana last week, and I’d just been cleared to exercise again after surgery, so I thought -- I’ll treat this anniversary as something positive and try and get back into running! (I say running; I really mean jogging while gasping for breath, filled with self-loathing; picture a just-born giraffe trying to gallop with one of its legs still asleep).
The first mile felt surprisingly okay. It was pretty euphoric actually, my body feeling correct, and I had my Goo Goo Dolls nostalgia playlist going, and I thought that maybe I haven’t hated running all these years, and maybe I’ll start training to get back up to the 5 and 10k’s I used to be able to run. And then — I was flat on my back, arms and legs in the air like a dying beetle. All because I’d slipped on the lone patch of ice in the entire neighborhood that was refusing to melt in the 50 degree weather.
I have no point to this other than the undeniable fact that running is terrible and should not be attempted.
Little else to update on as winter (hopefully) comes to a close. Later this month I have my long-awaited court date to legally change my name and ID -- the results of navigating a confusing and quite frankly archaic (and prohibitively expensive) process. Cross a couple fingers for me that whatever employee I get at the DMV is in the mood to comply and change my gender marker that day. I also have anticipatory grief over the fact that I won’t be able to channel my inner Legally Blonde and stand up and shout “I object!” in the courtroom. But needs must.
My partner and I also put in our order for three little chicks coming in two weeks, fulfilling a collective dream for a chicken coup! I am naming one hen Jeff, but suggestions are open for additional names. Maybe next year we’ll continue climbing the Montana social ladder and graduate to a goat or a sheep. In five years, maybe we’ll even be Horse People (although I’ve heard reliably from Cow People that Horse People are terrible, so maybe not).
And now for the newsletter!
Sneak Peek: NAMES FOR THE DAWN
As promised, below is a preview from my upcoming novel! Coming in 2021. Apologies in advance that I’m dropping you right in the middle of the angst in this snippet; I couldn’t resist the temptation to be a bit mysterious and—hopefully—tantalizing.
As a brief refresher, NAMES FOR THE DAWN follows Denali National Park Ranger Will Avery as he navigates love and loss in the early 90’s — and I promise it isn’t as trite as it sounds.
Enjoy!
Two days later, I led the caravan along the snow-covered road to Toklat, trudging along like sleepy bears lumbering over the passes. It was quiet in my rig aside from the purr of the engine, and I rolled down both windows to let the air sting my face. Sanctuary, Polychrome, and Geode all passed, standing at attention with pride, begging me to look, to be glad at our reunion. I kept my gaze straight ahead.
I didn’t stick around for the usual ‘we made it’ huddle in the parking lot, knowing my absence wouldn’t be surprising anyway. Terry started another speech, and I quietly slipped away into the shade, following the network of trails cut into the hillside from decades of Ranger boots, telling myself with each step that I had almost made it—that my Toklat cabin, alone in the mess of everything, would bring a hint of peace.
The door creaked open. It was just as I’d left it: pristine and empty like it’d never been touched by human hands. Five years of using it and I’d never so much as even pinned a postcard to the plain wooden walls. It struck me, not for the first time, that it looked like some model of a cabin from the 1800’s you’d see in a museum, stripped to the barest of necessities minus my one luxury: the Pendleton hanging over the arm of the couch, a parting gift from the crew at Death Valley. I stroked its wool edge once in hello, then opened the windows to let out the stale air. Unpacked my two measly bags in the closet before starting a pot of coffee with a bag of beans I’d left in one of the cupboards.
You’re relieved, I told myself. You’re back in Denali with everything you want; everything you need. Nothing out of place.
But I didn’t once look at the bed. If I did, I knew the outlines of two bodies would still be visible in the thin mattress, hidden under the cotton sheet like a secret carved in the earth—those skeletons archaeologists found of forgotten souls who died in each others’ arms, brittle, stripped bones stained by the sand, eternally reaching in vain for the other. I was like a shadow in socked feet, afraid to ruin the empty silence, drifting from the stove to the sink to the wooden table without leaving a trace. I wrote up a grocery list for my next trip into Cantwell as if every Chief in Head Office would read it, could rescind my titles if they found anything wanting in the items listed, the careful margins of the page, the way I formed each letter.
Far off, a whoop sounded, followed by echoing laughter. The rest of Toklat were having their traditional first-night campfire, an event that I hadn’t attended in five years, and hadn’t been invited to in four. I wondered idly which of the two possible options they’d all decided on: if I thought I was too above them or too below them to join. And I didn’t even feel a pang in my chest anymore at being so separated—no empty seat on a sawed-off log stump reserved for me, nobody reaching for my hand to pass the whiskey.
Well after midnight, I sat on the edge of the bed in only my boxers, bare toes gripping the floor. The rolled-up sock sat in the bedside drawer, hidden for the night so I wouldn’t have to look at the pathetic Nike swoop. A dead weight sat in my lap, a little black pouch. Even after decades, even sitting alone in the dark, I still glanced over my shoulder as I undid the zipper. The needle was cold when I finally mustered the courage to plunge it into my thigh, breathing in—one, two, three—breathing out. My hand shook.
He had held the shot, once. He’d held it in his gentle fingers, pressed the thick fluid into my muscle. He’d leaned forward to kiss me with a wet, open mouth as the pooling testosterone burned under my skin, holding my face in his palm.
“Are you sure?” he had asked me just before, kneeling at my feet.
I lay back on sheets that no longer smelled of him.
“No, I’m not,” I whispered.
#
The next morning, I rose early to thick darkness, the lazy winter sun still fast asleep, and I fell into my routine: boil water, put on coffee, drop the spoonful of peanut butter into my oatmeal, pull on my uniform, check my radio and gun, pack my bag. The little clock above the stove told me I still had a good thirty minutes before I needed to report for my shift patrolling out to Wonder Lake and back, completing a road conditions report and measuring the snow-levels near major forks of the river.
The darkness was just beginning to clear with the morning breeze, sheltering the cluster of cabins in a wash of rich, shimmering gray. I pulled on my boots on the rickety porch and set off, nothing on me but a can of bear spray and my green Stanley full of coffee. The cabins seemed abandoned as I crept through the bristly tamarack trees until I emerged onto a flat expanse of river rock that coated the small valley, surrounded by the mountains streaked with long, striped shadows. In the distance, a lone moose ambled across the rock. He paused to look my way before returning to a clump of wet grass, his breath rising in clouds of steam.
I thought of Lugnut; the homely smell of Gina’s cabin; anticipated with eagerness how the deep rutted canyons throughout the park would have been changed by that spring’s snowmelt, as if the moss-covered valleys were excited to present me with their new forms, welcoming me back with eager, open arms; the relief of my return. My lungs burned with each inhale of icy air and morning pine, clearing sleep like cobwebs, the kiss of the sun’s first, weak rays warming my cheeks.
“Good morning,” said a voice behind me.
The earth dropped from under my feet.
It was impossible. It was scanning the horizon and seeing a blank hole where the mountain should be. It was looking down at my own chest and seeing I hadn’t been flat for the last twenty years. And if I turned around, I would sink to my knees, rip my uniform on the rocks, crack open and lose even the dignity of my own grief—
I faced forward, hoping the lines of my shoulders looked steady from behind, gripping my mug so tightly I thought it might crack. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
Two steps rattled on the loose river rock, devastating landslides.
“There are still rogue wolves unaccounted for,” he said casually—too casually. “Collar data still points to the possibility of an undiscovered—”
“There is no lost pack,” I snapped, nearly laughing at the impossibility of discussing research again. With him. As if nothing unusual had happened. As if the mere sound of his voice was stripping me bare before the peaks, secrets revealed. “You proved that yourself.”
He sighed—or did I only imagine it? Then said slowly, as if in apology, “Certain evidence deserved following up on. The project wasn’t complete.”
I clenched my jaw, hot air swelling in my lungs. All winter I’d begged the stars to let me hear that voice again, pleading in the dead of night for one more breath, one more word—and now I couldn’t decide whether I wanted him to be real or a hallucination, a sign that my mind had become warped by so many winters spent alone. Distantly, I heard the other Rangers gathering at their trucks, signaling the time for shifts to start.
“I can’t do this right now,” I said to the mountains. My voice sounded far away, not my own. Fading into the mist.
The rocks rattled again—footsteps gradually backing away. “I didn’t mean to surprise you. I only thought that I should—”
“Please.”
There was a heavy pause, kept in time by the blood beating in my ears. Then, in a flat, disinterested tone he’d only used with me that first day in my truck, he said, “I’ll be out of your way.”
I let out a bitter laugh, then opened my mouth, but could only muster a grunt.
Turn, my soul screamed at me. I wanted to glimpse his face, the curve of his cheek, say his name, Nikhil . . . but neither of us moved, only the wind whipping over the rocks.
“Will,” he said. Finally.
I shut my eyes at the sound.
I truly can’t wait to share the rest of this book with the world (well, at least with the tiny slice of people who’ll read it). It’s been such a labor of love, such a learning process, and really an adventure. More details to come!
Check out April’s newsletter for another glimpse of my work in progress SLOW BURN -- when we’ll finally meet our heroic, bisexual love interest, smokejumper Brett Song.
Announcements
Not so much an announcement, but a huge *thank you* to everyone who subscribed to Just Kiss Already since launching in February! We’ve already broken my first goal of 50 subscribers. If you haven’t subscribed already, help us reach 75!
Additionally, THE SEA AIN’T MINE ALONE is now at 133 Amazon Reviews with an incredible rating of 4.8 stars! If you enjoyed the book and haven’t left a review, consider leaving one to help reach a goal of 150. Every little bit helps in boosting SEA’s eternal fight against the dreaded algorithm. And thank you so much to everyone who has supported this book so far.
This month, here’s what I’m . . .
Watching:
Something about dreary winter days makes a re-watch of Broadchurch inevitable, even though the show itself is almost hilariously devoid of any rain or atmospheric gloom. So color me astonished -- nay, aghast! -- when I checked and saw that not a SINGLE PERSON had written a fic shipping Alec Hardy and Mark Latimer together.
Alec and Ellie? Of course, makes obvious sense. Alec and the vicar Paul Coates? Understandable -- although the offerings were suspiciously devoid of delicious religious tension; most had Paul moving on from the church. But now I’m begging someone to write an emotional S1 Alec and Mark fic. Maybe Mark and Beth had already separated just prior to the events of the show. Maybe Mark’s missing / suspicious alibi was due to visiting a gay bar for the first time. Imagine the sexual tension during police questioning; Mark’s internal battle over coming out to himself later in life; the push and pull of desire and grief; Alec’s quest for vengeance; the imperative secrecy; the war between suspicion and want; the eventual release in coming together . . . I could go on and on.
Someone just write it. Please.
Reading:
More of a ‘to read’ than an official recommendation, but I’ve been anxiously waiting for a free weekend to sit down and binge KJ Charles’ second book in the Will Darling Adventures series, THE SUGARED GAME. Me recommending a KJ Charles book to a queer-romance-enjoying audience feels a bit like a gold fish asking the ocean if it’s ever heard of a blue whale. But nevertheless, I’ll shout from the rooftops that I adored the first book in the series, SLIPPERY CREATURES and can’t wait to read the sequel. If a 1920’s pulpy mystery, complete with thugs, government secret papers, a dusty bookshop, kidnappings, and hijinks sounds like a good time to you, this will be your jam.
Reviews online seem torn over whether they like the love interest, Kim Secretan. Personally, I thought he was gloriously posh and mysterious and selfish and even a bit rude. I’m a sucker for a good enemies to lovers narrative (although Book 1 is more of a . . . scoffing incredulously to hooking up against one’s better judgement, narrative), and I appreciated that it’s clear from the start that Kim has his own motivations, suspicions, and secrets outside of the budding romance. He doesn’t suddenly drop everything and surrender to Will’s charms, even at the end, and given that it’s an arc playing out over a trilogy, I loved the tantalizing not-quite-HEA ending of Book 1.
Listening to:
I’m not a regular listener of the podcast Oh No, Ross and Carrie, but I check in from time to time, and I recently listened to their two-part series on Girl Defined (episodes 256, 257). The podcast itself consists of the hosts investigating “spirituality, fringe science, and claims of the paranormal.” The twist is that instead of merely reporting, like most ‘true crime’ podcasts, Ross and Carrie become full-on participants in whatever it is -- taking classes, joining cults, going on retreats, etc. And always with a touch of humor.
Girl Defined, if you (luckily) don’t know, is a ‘ministry’ (I use that term loosely) run by two sisters aimed at teenage girls, all about purity culture, how to be a Godly woman, Christian dating, modesty, etc. I had the dubious honor of reading devotionals from near-identical ministries in church throughout middle and high school. In my ongoing inner work of undoing and challenging all that purity culture taught me, listening to Ross and Carrie attend Girl Defined’s hilariously bad virtual 2020 conference was healing for my soul. If you too are a survivor of purity culture, or you just want a glimpse into what the hell it’s about, give this a listen.
Props to Carrie for pointing out that, even after a two day long conference, Girl Defined still failed to actually DEFINE a GIRL. And props to Ross for asking Carrie if she did any “flax gathering” at the conference (if you know the ‘wife of noble character’ from Proverbs 31, then this is hilarious to you).
[Content warning for Girl Defined’s homophobia, transphobia, and misogyny, as well as poorly-handled discussions surrounding struggles with fertility on the part of the conference.]
Learning:
If you want to learn something completely useless but minorly humorous, perhaps you’d like to know about the Great Cross Stitch Scandal. I’m an avid cross stitcher -- my mom tried to teach me when I was a kid and I lacked the patience and immediately gave up. But I picked it back up a few years ago and have been hooked ever since. Above is a very poor photo of my most recent large-scale finish, Klimt’s Judith with the head of Holofernes.
The Scandal referenced above happened somewhat recently, and involved one of the most well-known cross stitch pattern makers, Heaven and Earth Designs. Here is a fantastic write-up of the situation on my favorite subreddit ‘Hobby Drama.’ Enjoy this extremely low-stakes account of floss and pattern-related drama and inevitable fallout.
Amusing Musings
This month’s amusing musing will be brought to you by the trip I took with my class in 5th grade to Washington DC (and surrounding areas). Now, there are many embarrassing things I could focus on here. I could talk about getting everyone lost for hours at Monticello because I proudly claimed I could follow a map better than anyone else and then failed to understand what a scale meant. I could talk about being a total Civil War buff weirdo / wannabe reenactor trapped in a 10 year old girl’s body, telling my friend that “when I grow up, I’m going to move here and live here forever and give tours” when we visited Gettysburg. I could talk about crying and praying to God on the way to to the Washington Monument that something would happen so we wouldn’t have to go up to the top (terrified of elevators) and then LIGHTNING STRUCK NEAR THE MONUMENT and it closed and that singular proof of God carried my faith forward for years.
But instead I’ll just briefly talk about Pennsylvania.
We spent about a day in Pennsylvania. It was the standard fare -- a bunch of kids in matching ugly t-shirts and haggard parent chaperones all crammed on a tour bus, following a minute-to-minute itinerary with a tour guide narrating into a crackly microphone, eating sack paper lunches on five minute breaks in between rushing to various monuments. And everywhere we stopped -- historical sites, Amish country, battlegrounds, etc -- I looked in the gift shop for a postcard to add to my collection, since I’d made it a goal to get a postcard from every single place we visited on the trip. Now, I got my first Pennsylvania postcard no problem: a horse and buggy, ‘Greetings from Intercourse, PA!’ (No, I didn’t buy it ironically. Remember I went to a Christian school? Yeah, I had no idea that that postcard was funny. I still thought in 7th grade that a condom was a special condominium you lived in in college where you all signed a pledge not to have sex).
But then, at the second gift shop, I was distraught -- none of the postcards were what I wanted! I searched and searched in vain, but they were all wrong, and then it was time to get back on the bus, and for the first time all trip, I had to leave somewhere without a postcard. We got to the third stop of the day an hour later, and the same thing happened -- no acceptable postcards! Sure, there were racks and racks of them, but they were all wrong! As an easy crier, I started to tear up by this point. One of the teachers asked what was wrong, but I bit my lip and refused to answer. The inner teacher’s pet (cough kissass cough) in me wouldn’t let myself throw a fit over a postcard on such a special trip.
Fourth stop of the day. I ran to the postcard rack -- and still they were wrong! Now this time I actually did start to cry. I clutched my lone Intercourse postcard in my hand, feeling like an utter failure. When the teacher asked me again what was wrong, I couldn’t help but pour out the truth -- the horrible, despairing truth that I couldn’t *believe* nobody else had complained about either all day.
I said, through my snot and tears, “I want to get a postcard, but I can’t get any of these! They’re all addressed to my dad, and I already got my dad a postcard!”
After a stunned silence, the teacher stared back and forth from me, to the postcard rack, and then back to me. Gently, she took one of the cards from the rack and knelt down to show me. “Is this what you’re upset about?” she asked, pointing to part of the card.
I nodded, my face burning and red, tears still flowing down.
“Oh honey,” she said. “The PA stands for Pennsylvania, not for your dad.”
And that’s how I, a straight-A student, proved myself the dumbest kid in the entire class, because I had passed up about 200 postcards at 3 different shops, thinking that the state abbreviation meant they were all specially addressed to be given to your father — your Pa.
Speaking of elementary school, my partner’s favorite story from my life is from when my Girl Scout troop got to stay overnight at SeaWorld (give us a break, Blackfish hadn’t come out yet . . .). The biggest draw of the trip was getting to swim with dolphins. Swimming with dolphins?!? Every young girl scout’s dream, right? Until we got to the pool and were randomly split up into different small groups. Each group was assigned their own dolphin to spend the hour with. I watched the other girls start to ride on the backs of their dolphins, doing tricks, laughing with glee as the dolphins leapt out of the water and chirped.
And my group?
We got the heavily pregnant dolphin, literally due to give birth any second, and who was on strict orders not to move. So we just stood there in our bathing suits on the steps and quietly gave our dolphin a two-finger touch one at a time -- careful, don’t splash her! Don’t make too much noise! Nice and gentle -- while the dolphin floated there and seemed to stare up at the sky in a mix of boredom and agony, gently rocked by the waves created by the other groups doing fucking acrobatics and dolphin races.
Nearly twenty years later, I would still love to have a discussion with whatever SeaWorld employee thought that was a good idea — for us and for the poor animal. Seriously if anyone has their number, please pass it on.
See you in April!
I am so thrilled to receive the newsletter and read about all of your musings! I can't wait for The Bluest of Blue to be published. I was just wondering if you've changed everything or just the names?
The world really deserves to read Will and Nikhil's story. Hopefully in your next newsletter, you'll share how you'd come up with the character's names—or about the writing process of The Sea Ain't Mine Alone. Cheers!