April showers bring M/M ficlets

Good morning! I'd say that I hope everyone's having a lovely spring day, except I can't tell what season Mother Nature's decided on lately.

But who wants to talk about the weather? Here's a springtime flash fic I scribbled down a few months ago after watching a kiss-in clip on YouTube while I was holed up for winter. I think it would work as an opening to a book, but don't quote me on that since I have a few too many pots simmering on the stove at the moment. I thought I'd share here, typos and all. Enjoy!


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Perry followed his cousin and her girlfriend toward the fountain. “What gives?” he asked.

Cherise dropped Emma’s hand long enough to rummage in her pocket and toss a few pennies into the water. “Waiting on the bat signal.”

Perry squinted up at the blue April sky in jest. “Really? What for?” From the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of a cute guy with curly hair through the spray of water. They guy had been hovering in their vicinity for the past several minutes, and Perry was working up the nerve to approach him.

Cherise’s cell phone chimed. She whipped it out of her pocket and peered at the LCD screen. “Kiss-in’s about to start.”

Perry stared at his cousin. “What?”

“Follow us,” she said over her shoulder as she bolted off with a laughing Emma in tow.

A kiss-in? Perry managed to match the girls’ pace as they sprinted across the town square. A small crowd was congregating at the base of the courthouse steps. Perry immediately noted several same-sex pairings, while more than one wrist boasted an assortment of rainbow bracelets.

Cherise beamed at him as she gripped Emma’s hand. “Surprise!”

Perry lifted a brow. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“Because I thought you’d wuss out.”

I might have, he thought, but he wasn’t as much of an activist as his cousin. “I don’t have anyone to kiss.”

“There’s other people here without a partner,” Emma chimed in. “You’ll find someone.”

“I don’t want to share spit with some random person!”

“You just have to touch lips. It’s not like you have to tongue each other.”

A screech of feedback sounded, calling the crowd’s attention to the top of the steps. A girl stood with a microphone. “Good afternoon, friends and allies! Spring is in the air, and so is love! Last time I checked, love didn't discriminate. Are you ready to show your pride?”

The crowd cheered in response, fists raised in the air.

“All right, everyone, pucker up, and on the count of three, kiss your partner of choice for the next thirty seconds. One!”

Cherise and Emma turned to face each other. Bewildered, Perry stepped a few feet away and looked around. There was that guy again, the cute one who’d been following them. And he’s coming straight for me…

“Two!”

“Hi, I’m Seth,” the stranger said. Up close, his eyes were brown and shining with mischief. He grabbed Perry by the arms.

“Perry,” he managed to reply, noting cute had just turned to gorgeous. He’d always been a sucker for taller men. And brown eyes. And curly hair.

“Three!”

Their lips touched. Perry gasped, taken aback by the flood of sensation that rushed through his body. As his lips parted, ever so slightly, Seth’s tongue met his.

The spark of shock fired Perry’s senses. What the hell, he thought. Losing himself in the rush of the moment, he widened his mouth and kissed his random new acquaintance back. Fuck the haters. Fuck what anyone thought of the fact that he was gay and kissing a gorgeous and apparently very willing person of the same sex.

Seth let out a muffled groan. He wrapped his arms around Perry’s back and pressed their bodies tight.

“Time’s up!” the group leader announced.

Seth broke the kiss. He stared down, lips swollen and glistening, eyes sparkling with an impish gleam. “Thank you, Perry. You have a nice day.”

And then he was off, quite literally disappearing into the crowd. Perry watched mutely, lips tingling, pulse roaring in his ears. Any sense of the social statement he’d just made had admittedly been lost; all Perry knew was that his stomach was fluttering and his knees were about to buckle.

Emma came up beside him. “Wow! He was hot!”

“Yeah,” Perry muttered.

“Did you catch a name?”

Perry nodded. “Seth.”

“That’s it?” Emma said, her tone teasing. “No last name? Phone number? Blood type?”

Cherise appeared, phone in hand. “I snapped a pic of you two over Emma’s shoulder. Maybe we can post it online and track your mystery kisser down!”

“I think I need to sit down,” Perry said, still trembling, the taste of a gorgeous stranger named Seth on his mouth.

-- Copyright 2011 by Katrina Strauss

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