A MOUNTIE ALWAYS GETS HIS MAN!

Chapter 4

The Woes of Emmy Lou

   It was a few minutes later.

   Justin and Brian graciously invited Emmy Lou inside and now they all sat awkwardly in the living room. Emmy Lou sat primly in a chair and Brian and Justin sat dumbfounded on the sofa.

   Brian had put the coffee on. He had a feeling he was going to need a lot of it when it was done.

   "Well, you're probably wondering what's happening," said Emmy Lou awkwardly. Now that she actually had to cross this bridge, she wasn't quite sure where to start.

   Brian and Justin just nodded dumbly.

   "Well, as you can see...I'm not exactly....normal," said Emmy Lou in her deep man voice.

   Brian nodded. "Boy, you can say that again!"

   Justin grimaced in embarrassment and smacked him.

   "Ow! What? I was agreeing with her...him...with...Emmy! Ow! You know, I'll just shut up now!"

   "An excellent idea!" snarled Justin. To Emmy Lou he said, "Were you in an accident, Emmy?"

   "Alas no. This is the real me, I'm afraid. Brian, I don't really blame you. I know I look like a freak. Perhaps I am one. As for gender, I'm confused myself. I suppose in a way, I'm both. Or neither. Depending on how you look at it."

   "How can you be neither?" asked Brian.

   "It's just my overwhelming strangeness cancels everything out. Some days...some days...I don't even feel human....much less like a woman."

   "Are you a woman?" asked Justin. "I mean...I just...I'm very confused. You've always just been...Emmy Lou...you know?"

   "Let me explain. Inside, I feel very much like a woman. I mean....I'm attracted to men. I love Ethan very much. And I enjoy womanly things and enjoy...no that's not the right word for it...I feel more comfortable...more right...wearing woman's clothes. But outside...I'm like this...and down...down there....well I'll spare you a visual...but...I have both...I have both...a penis...and a vagina."

   Brian and Justin were hornswoggled. Brian took a deep swallow of bitter, black coffee.

   "I'm told it has a certain name. I keep forgetting. Hermee....Hermphrody...oh dear!"

   "A hermaphrodite!" breathed Justin wonderingly.

   "Why yes! That's it! My goodness, Justin! You really are very clever!" said Emmy Lou.

   "But why? Why do you look like that!?" Brian said in consternation. To placate Justin, he added quickly, "I mean, I swear it was just a few days ago that you looked normal...like a woman I mean."

   "Ah yes! Well, here's the answer to that. You see..."

   KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!

   They all jumped.

   "Now who could that be?" wondered Emmy Lou.

   "I'm not sure. But we have acquired a few enemies recently. It's best to be cautious," said Brian.

   "Oh my! How strange! Well, at any rate, no one must know that I'm here. I sneaked out and left a note that I was going to my mother's for a while."

   "Go ahead and hide in the bedroom," Justin instructed. In moments, they took up this plan. Emmy Lou hid in the bedroom along with her bag and once she was behind the door, Brian once more took up vigil with the poker and Justin carefully opened the door. But once more, it was a complete surprise. It was the last person that they wanted or expected.

   "Justin! I have great news! I'll be alone for the next few weeks! Emmy Lou went to her mother's! We can be together! I've missed you so much!"

   Justin was flummoxed. "Ethan!!? What the hell are you talking about!!?"

   "Oh Justin! Don't play hard to get! Not now! Not now when we can be together! I've seen all the signs. You coming in to my place all the time! Accepting my gifts! The way you held my hand! You've driven me wild!"

   Justin's jaw dropped down to his chin. Unfortunately, Ethan took this to mean entirely the wrong thing and grabbed Justin in an embrace and kissed him, shoving his slimy tongue into his open mouth before Justin could stop him.

   Brian was paralyzed with stupefaction and rage. He simply could not move for a few moments. The poker dropped out of his hand. The DONGGG!!!...as it hit the ground seemed to wake everybody up and several things happened at once.

   Ethan pulled back a bit in confusion. Justin placed both hands on Ethan's shoulders and shoved hard in disgust. And Brian stepped out from behind the door to stand behind Justin with his hands on his shoulders in towering rage and hate.

   "But... but....Justin, who is this person!?" asked Ethan, as if he were the injured party.

   "Ethan, what the fuck!!?" Justin sputtered, "You know who this is! This is Constable Kinney and he's...well, he's what you seem to be deluded into thinking that you are! HE is my boyfriend Ethan, not you! Are you completely loco?"

/   "But...but...I though...You held my hand..." Ethan continued to mewl.

   "Oh...wow! OK, Ethan, you were the one holding my hand! And we weren't. You would grab my hand and shake it and not let go. It was awkward and embarrassing. Second, you gave me bits of candy and jerky. I would give that stuff to the schoolkids and a dog! It's not like we were exchanging jewellery or anything! And as for coming in all the time, well you run the only mercantile in town! Of course I come in! To buy stuff!"

   "But...but...Justin...don't do this....we belong together...we just have to be careful...."

   Justin frowned and then looked closer. He poked Brian and gestured. They were both alarmed to see one of Ethan's eyes rolling back and forth and around while the other one remained fixed and dilated. It was clear the man had completely snapped.

   "Oh yes!!? And what exactly do you have to be careful about?" piped up a deep voice. "Could it be because...you're married!"

   Everyone swung around to look. Emmy Lou had come out of the bedroom. What was left of her hair was hid underneath one of Justin's hats and she had inexpertly dressed herself in one of his suits. What with her hair hidden and her five o'clock shadow, she looked like a small, and rather ugly, androgynous man.

   "What business is that of yours?" Ethan shot back, "How do you know I'm married? And who the hell are you anyway?"

   "Ethan! It's...Don't you know....Oh the hell with it! You can call me Lou! Justin was kind enough to offer me a place to stay for a while. I had a fight...with my wife," he said meaningfully.

   "Sucks for you," said Ethan rudely, "Mind your own business!"

   Lou's lip wobbled and his eyes grew moist. Abruptly, she turned her back.

   "You know what! It's MY business!" said Brian, "The fact is...you ARE married! And for all intents and purposes...I am married...to Justin! Not you! Look, I don't care if you are homosexual or bi or....whatever the hell you are!! The fact is, you are married, you made your choice now deal with it. You made your bed! Now lie in it! Don't ever touch Justin again! Don't come around here again! Oh! And we've been apprised of your nocturnal activities involving binoculars!" He grabbed Ethan around the shoulders in a tight ‘buddy hug' and steered him toward the road. At the same time, he put his mouth close to his ear but the words spoken next were far from friendly.

   "I'll be making periodic checks over there. If I ever catch you watching us or stalking Justin in any way....you won't make it back to town alive. Now beat it!" Brian let him go, gave Ethan a swift kick to the behind that landed Ethan face first in the street, and then strode back inside Justin's little house.

   The door slammed and locked. The drapes were pulled shut.

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   Ethan picked himself up from where Brian had kicked him full length and face first, smack dab in the mud of the muddy road. He began to trudge away from his lover's house and back to town.

   How could Justin have done that? After all he'd done for him...for them to be together. Why was he saying all those hurtful things? After all they'd meant to each other! Ethan thought back to all the times they'd held each other's hand and looked soulfully into each other's eyes. It hadn't been embarrassing! It was the most moving experience of Ethan's life. He always wanted more but Justin seemed to be in a hurry a lot.

   It was all that damn Mountie's fault! He'd turned Justin's head somehow! He'd...he'd brainwashed him! Ethan knew he had to rescue Justin at all costs. He double his surveillance and...

   "Oh damn. He couldn't do that either. Somehow that damn pig had gotten wind of his binocular activities. Ethan thought carefully. Ah ha! The only one he'd told about that was Emmett Honeycutt. Oh, he was next on his list! He was going to make him pay! And that mind twisting Mountie too! He'd get revenge! And then he'd get Justin back! He knew he could make Justin love him again!

   The first thing he needed to do was to go and tell Mr. X all about the brainwashing bouncer wannabe Mountie and get his advice. Mr. X would know exactly what to do. Mr. X was so very, very wise. And maybe after that, Mr. X would see what an asset, what a clever thinker he was and give him a better job that just paying off the local slave cops.

   Ethan reached the main street, town area. One eye was still lazily looking around and back and forth and around again. But he really wasn't seeing anything, just consumed by his dark thoughts.

   In short, Ethan was nuttier than a bowl full of bridge mix.

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   "Emmy Lou, I'm so sorry! I mean...my God! I can't...I had no idea...You have to believe me ...nothing has ever happened between me and Ethan like that! We have absolutely no history of....of anything!"

   "Justin, don't worry! I know. I've known something was wrong for a long time. He spends so much time at Kip's. He...ohhhh, dang!  A lot of that time he was probably watching you. I know that now. I'm so sorry Justin.  And there have been other signs too. Over attentiveness. Attempts to hold eye contact. An almost manic desire to wait on certain male customers. And the lack...of intimacy between us. We don't...well we don't very often and we have separate bedrooms. And he enjoys it that way. And now...Now it seems he's completely snapped."

   "Then why? Why have you stayed with him this long?" asked Justin.

   "Because...I want to be married. And because...until this display...whatever his flaws...whatever shenanigans he did get into....he always came home to me. And for a long time that was good enough. But not anymore. He...he didn't recognize me. He didn't even look. I know I don't look like his Emmy Lou but there had to be something...somewhere...on any level...that he could have recognized. But there was nothing. Just nothing." Emmy Lou wilted back into the chair and sobbed with a broken heart.

   Justin patted her shoulder soothingly and Brian did his own brand of comforting. He poured some more coffee and secretly Irished it up it up with a little Jim Beam before giving it to her.

   They waited a little for Emmy Lou to compose herself, for Justin to brush his teeth and tongue vigorously and for all of them to process the unpleasant scene.

   At last though, Justin asked, "Emmy, I'm sorry if I'm being insensitive but I'm dying of curiosity. You were about to tell us when we were so rudely interrupted. How do you go from woman to...well...this?"

   "Oh. Well, you see, a long time ago when it became evident I was not going to develop....properly...the doctors who I was seeing in Toronto asked me which gender I felt like. Which gender I wanted to be. I told them woman. And so they prescribed me these..." Emmy Lou produced her mint tin from a pocket and opened it. Inside, were the white pills Brian had seen earlier. There were only a few left, maybe ten at the most.

   "Ahhhh....your mints!" said Brian, "So what are they really?"

   "It's estrogen. The female hormone. I suppose if I told them I wanted to be male, they would have given me testosterone. As it is, my body produces both...either not enough...or too much of one and makes me...like this. But with regular doses, my body normalizes.... enough...to get by."

   "But surely that doesn't fix your hair....enough," asked Brian.

   "No. This happened a good while ago, in my twenties. My hair.... just a wig, I'm afraid. But I don't really consider that as fake. It's what it would have looked like...if this didn't happen. The estrogen slows the facial hair but I still have to shave quite a bit. My curves come back and my breasts fill out. And I wear special panties that hide my penis from Ethan. I've never told him."

   "As you can see, I'm nearly out. I've had to cut back and back. I pretended I had a cold ever since I received this in the mail." Emmy Lou produced a letter. Brian and Justin perused it.

   "It's from the pharmacy that I deal with in Toronto. They send me a six month supply at a time. But occasionally they don't have enough to send me. When that happens they have to order extra from Thunder Bay. That has to travel to Toronto and then they send it to me here. The whole delay process means I run out like this and I won't get my prescription for another two weeks. And then there's another week for me to....change back. Usually, I get the letter in time for me to...prepare. I tell Ethan I'm going to my mother's or even my sister's back east if I really need time. Then I go to one of my girlfriends ho only know that I'm "sick". Perhaps they even think I'm faking just to get away from Ethan for a while. So they take me in. But I've always looked well, halfway normal. As the time runs on and I run out more and more I just pretend to get "sicker". I stay in my room a lot or keep the lighting low. No one really is the wiser. But this time, I was waiting and waiting...and then finally the letter. And I already looked like this. So I can't go to anyone else now. That's why I came to you two. I knew you'd...understand. I knew you'd help me."

   "And how did you know...exactly why would we....understand?" purred Justin in a dark and dangerous voice that even Brian found rather scary.

   Emmy Lou gulped but she'd come this far and she knew she had to go all the way here. So she took a deep breath and said as if it were no big deal but everyone knew it was: "Oh well, you know, yesterday I was just watching the street out my window....bored really...was pretending to be contagious for days...and I...well I saw you guys come into town and I saw you guys....kissing...and I knew you would...um...might be....sympathetic."

   About halfway through this speech Justin‘s face grew darker and darker and it smoothly but sllloooooowwwly swivelled around sideways to glare at Brian. If looks were a bondage death trap, Brian would have been dead. Brian just looked straight ahead.

   "So I figured what the hell....you says? So yeah...welcome to life outside the closet, isn't that what you said?" mimicked Justin in a furious whisper. "Welcome indeed! I wonder who else saw us!? Who else is going to come begging favors? Hmmmm!!! Stockwell maybe!!? Since he's the one you actually told!"

   "Oh Justin, of course not," Brian said consolingly, "At least...not for a little while. He thinks we're dead, remember?"

   "WHAT!??" screeched Emmy Lou...Or would have screeched if her voice wasn't so deep.

   "Yeah. It's quite the story but here's the short version! Stockwell's an evil sonofabitch!" yelled Justin. Then he took a deep breath.

   "Look, Emmy Lou, I'm totally not mad at you. But you can't stay here. Not while I'm in this state! It wouldn't be fair to any of us. But don't worry. We'll take care of you. Brian will take care of you and take you to a safe place. Now!"

   "What?? And just what am I supposed..."

   "Figure it out!!" Justin snarled, "I'm going back to bed!"

   SLAM! And darn it, if that isn't just what he did!

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   Now Brian may have been a total studmuffin and a hunk to boot but that doesn't mean he was a slouch in the brains department either.  He had gone through high school and then the police academy with top marks on all his written exams. When he wasn't studying, he was working out on his awesome hunky bod. Besides this he had achieved an extra credit of top marks in Chemistry 12th grade. He got this by coasting through the class, reading ahead and learning everything in the book by the middle of the year. For his midterm project, he went home and concocted a powerful superglue and its antidote. The next day, he went to school extra early and placed the glue on key toilet seats around the school. Then he went to the library and just waited.

   Shortly after the school opened for everybody else, there was a dreadful outcry. The principal, the chemistry teacher, and a young, pretty substitute teaching what-the-fuck had all sat on the baited toilets in the various teacher's restrooms. And they were all stuck like roaches in a roach motel.

   Humming a cheerful tune, Brian had gone to the chemistry teacher and the principal and told them, this was his project and he wanted an A or they were never getting off there again. He made them sign papers and also one that said he would be exempt from the Chemistry Final and receive an automatic A. Furious but trapped and facing life on the john, the teachers had no choice to but to agree to whatever Brian said. He then gave them the antidote and told them good day. He used most of his extra free time working out.

   You may be wondering what all this has to do with the current situation. Nothing at all. I'm just rambling.

   So anyway, even though Brian liked to adopt a "what the fuck" attitude, he was in fact extremely smart. And therefore, after Justin had flounced out of the room in the mother of all queen outs, Brian mobilized his mental machinery into motion and in a minute or two (give or take) he had easily figured it out.

   "Come on Emmy Lou. I'm taking you to a guy who's about as much of a woman on the inside than you want to be on the outside."

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   Brian knocked.

   Emmett answered the door. He had a more reserved face on this time and his voice was cold. "Yes, Constable? Is there a problem, Officer?" Clearly, in spite of Justin's efforts to smooth things over, there was still some hard feelings there.

   "Hey Honeycutt, look, I need a..."

   "Oh my God! Is it Justin? Is Sunshine all right? Mr. X didn't strike again did he? Where is he? Where's Justin!!!" Emmett began craning his neck and stretching trying to see past Brian's enormous girth.

   "Calm down will'ya!? Justin's fine! He's at home queening out because he's out of the closet now! But he's fine and safe. I came over for another reason. I need another favor."

   "Ohhhh! Thank heavens! Well, if it's not about Justin then I'm afraid Candy Boy's indisposed...where you're concerned!" Emmett's coolness was back with the intensity of an icehouse.

   "It's not about Candy...him either! Will you just look for a minute?" Brian brought out Emmy Lou out from where she was partially hiding behind and to one side of him.

   "Oh hey, Emmy Lou! How's it going?" Emmett said.

   "Emmy Lou's jaw dropped. "But...but...how did you know...it was me?" she asked in her deep man voice.

   "Oh pleeeeeeze!! You might be having a bad hair day and wardrobe issues but those sparkling baby blues give you away in a second! So, what's going on, girlfriend!!?"

   "Well, it's a long story!" Emmy Lou said. "But the short version is I need a place to stay for about three weeks until I get my medicine that will...will change me back!"

   "Back to what?" Emmett pretended confusion.

   Emmy Lou burst into tears and wrapped her arms around Emmett's long, taut waist. She sobbed into his shirt softly.

   "Hey now guuurl! There's no need for that! Dry those tears! No seriously....stop that! This is a silk shirt!"

   Emmy Lou hiccupped and started to laugh and cry at the same time." Sorry! It's just...I never thought anyone would treat me with this much understanding while I was like...this! Much less recognize me right off the bat."

   Emmett wrapped his arm around her shoulders and guided Emmy Lou into the house.

   "Well hey now! Why don't I make some special bubble berry tea and we'll have a real chin wag all about it! Now you just consider mi casa, sous casa, OK? In the mean time we'll..."

   At this point, the door slammed heavily in Brian's face and he heard no more.

   Brian smirked. The queen was still pissed. Great! That made two drama queens pissed at him. But Brian didn't mind. He just needed a little time. And Emmy Lou would be taken care of. That's what really mattered for now.

   He mounted Midnight, flicked the reins and with a flourish, rode away and headed back to Justin's.

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   "JUSTIN!! I'm home!" Brian slammed the door and locked it.

   There was no reply.

   "Justin! JUSTIN!! Shit! Are you here!!? Are YOU HERE!!!? JUSTIN!!!....  JUUUUUSSSSSTTIIINNNNNNN!!!!!!!"

   The bedroom door slammed open.

   "For the love of God...WHAT!!? Stop screaming! You could wake the dead! As it was, I was trying to sleep like them. So what... do... you...want??"

   Brian rushed over and enfolded the smaller man into his huge chest. "Oh thank God! I thought you were...I thought something had happened to you. I hate leaving you alone like this!

   Justin allowed a few beats against that studly chest. Then he pressed away. "Stop that! I'm still mad at you, you know."

   "I know. Justin, it really was an accident. Really...I'm....I'm...Well, I really didn't mean to. It just slipped out. To Stockwell, that is."

   "Uh huh..." said Justin, not really believing this bull.

   KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK!!!

   "Oh for God's sake, what the hell!!!?" Brian ejaculated. "Who is it now? I swear if that's Ethan come back, I'll..."

   He threw open the door.

   His face went slack with horror. It wasn't Ethan. It was Stockwell, in full Mr. X getup.

   "Well! Well! Well! If it isn't my two favorite gayboys! And alive and kicking so I see! You were right Ethan! Although how you managed to escape, I'll never know! Get em boys!"

   "Thank you Master!" sniveled Ethan from where he was trailing behind like a duckling after its mother. Along with him were two muscled thugs who strong armed their way into the house.

   "NO! No, not again!" Brian yelled from where he was pinioned by the two thugs, one on each arm. "Justin! Justin, RUN!"

   Justin tried, made for the back door but Mr. X only laughed...BWA HAHAHAHA!!!!!...and threw out a gas pellet. It exploded as it hit the floor. Instantly, the house was filled with knock out gas! Mr. X and Co. held rags over their faces but Brian and Justin were not so prepared or equipped.

   They quickly grew disoriented, stumbled, and then succumbed to the gas. In no time, our heroes were laid out flat on the floor, two knocked out and helpless hunks, ready to be tied up and gagged, ready for transport to...

TBC