I sat in my sad hotel room in Norfolk, Virginia, staring out the window at the harbor and wondering how this small, grey port city had managed to attract any breathing participants for "Amazonian Shamanism and Ayahuasca: A Multi-Disciplinary Conference on Shamanism, Ethnobotany, and Ecstatic States." I was here though, wasn't I.

After checking to make sure I still breathed, I got up and went outside onto the balcony. It was two feet wide and five feet long, which begged the question: why even bother? The railing was black and gritty with pollutants under my hands and chilled from the cool air, which carried a touch of salt that reminded me of home. I gave a squint out over the water, trying to see if things got interesting further out. But it was just a mess of big ships and hulking metal things that I couldn't figure out the purpose of. On the fringe of developed shoreline was a civically dull and sanitized park, abutting a touristy shopping mall. Only a few people were visible, some meandering through the green, others sitting on a set of steps from which they could admire the unmoving sailboats or maybe wait for the ferry.

Boring.

I went back inside and felt a renewal of nervousness, as if passing the threshold and being enclosed again by the small room was a commitment to...something. Something vague and stuffy and confined that I no longer fully believed in. And there were other niggling anxieties. Sure, I was only attending the conference as a member of the audience, but I'd be sitting in that audience among people who used to be my professional peers. No one would be likely to recognize me, or care much if they did, but it was impossible to completely shake the self-conscious anticipation I was feeling. This was as close as I'd come to revisiting my academic past. Keeping up with the reading didn't count.

The day was bleakly sunny, or seemed that way because I was tired, and I closed the curtains on the tiny morsel of balcony and the postage-stamp view and went to lie down. The bed was designed in the manner of all hotel beds; comfortable, with laundered sheets and a polyester coverlet that may not have been recently washed. I put on the TV, buttoning through the familiar string of cable stations until I reached Animal Planet, then lay back against the pillow with unfocused attention. Mild unease coiled in my belly, and my thoughts tugged me toward the evening's mixer. Nametags. Cocktails. The exchange of introductions and anecdotes, and perfunctory arguments about the nomenclature of their subjects. Medicine man, shaman, curaca, ayahuasquero.

"Hi, I'm Blair Sandburg, academic fraud and practicing shaman," I said. My voice sounded awkward and creepy in the quiet room. I made a dry mental note not to use this line, but then worried for a full minute about the odds that I might actually do so--from nervous, off-the-cuff perversity--now that I had vocalized it. The safe bet was not to introduce myself at all, because that would inevitably lead to questions about my status, my affiliation, my work. Trying to describe my interests would only lead to misunderstandings; in appearance I had become what professional anthropologists despised, a plastic shaman, a white-skinned wannabe who appropriated the traditions of indigenous and tribal peoples. I wondered if I could hang on the fringes of conversation for the evening, soaking up the atmosphere without getting sucked in.

Meerkats cavorted happily on the television screen.

As I was about to roll into a ball and nap, the phone rang. Chirped, actually. It was a matte black handheld unit shaped like a stylized bird; it was meant to be cordless, but attached to the wall by a security line. Expecting no one in particular (front desk? stray acquaintance?) I picked it up with a wary hello.

"Hey," Jim said, his warm voice carrying across three thousand miles to me.

I melted a little against the crisp white pillows. "Jim." I punched a big goofy grin into his name.

"How was your flight?"

"You...are a sneaky son of a bitch. When did you make that upgrade?"

"About a day after you booked the ticket. So, how was first class?" Jim asked with a tone of real, if mild, curiosity.

"Nice, but it was a rocky flight, so it was kind of like being strapped into the comfy chair for the Spanish Inquisition."

"Ah," Jim said in what I recognized as blank acknowledgment.

"Free drinks, though. And this babe in a power suit riding next to me with one of those new MPC Portfolios, with GPS situational tracking and VR glasses--and one of those little black ManuScript gloves. Man, she was decked out."

Jim uttered a thoughtful hum. I pictured his eyes narrowing. "Sounds pretty exciting. She have nice legs?"

"Huh? Um, I didn't really notice." I smiled against the hard curve of the phone and shifted on the bed. Almost by accident, my free hand came to rest between my crotch and my thigh. "You missing me?"

"You've only been gone six hours and thirty seven minutes," he said gruffly.

"Thirty seven minutes, huh."

"More or less."

"You have a burger for lunch?"

There was a bemused and guilty silence from the other end of the phone, then: "I ordered it without cheese."

I figured he'd ordered it without cheese, then changed his order, but I hated to call him on it when he was so sneakily proud of this technicality. "Where are you now?"

"Home. Had to grab a shower."

"Homicide?"

"Yeah."

Swallowing, wishing I was there with him, I asked simply, "Bad?"

He grunted, sort of. "Bad enough."

Oh, tough guy. I could have shaken him, thumped him in the head...held him. If I'd been there. Six hours and thirty seven minutes without me, and he was having a shitty day. And he'd called. Hearing his voice was giving me that sense of dislocation you sometimes get from traveling a long distance in a short period, knowing that the context of your life is a continent away; that your people, your tribe, are carrying out their business on a different time frame.

"What, um, what are you doing now?" I asked, watching the meerkats on the screen but visualizing him, how he might be sitting on the edge of our bed with the phone to his ear, a white towel around his waist, his handsome body gleaming. He could hear my heartbeat, if he chose; my respiration; the dry stroke of my hand on denim.

"Hold on," he said, followed by a pause. Then his voice came, thinned: "Get away from there! Go!" He came back on a moment later, irritation in his voice. "Bowman's goddamn dog is digging in the garden again. I'm ready to pop that mutt."

"Maybe we do need a fence."

"Maybe."

"Just don't shoot the dog, Jim."

"I've been thinking we could get a BB gun. Give him a goose on the rump now and then."

"Man, you've got to watch it, Jim. You're getting crotchety in your advanced years. Goose on the rump." I snickered.

"Keep it up. I'll be goosing your rump when you get home."

"Now you're talking." I spread my legs about four inches and stroked my hand once up the line of my crotch, where my cock had been stiffening slowly during our conversation.

"You messing around there, Tricky Dick?" He sounded detached, maybe interested; it was harder to read his tone without the accompaniment of facial expression.

"Mmm. One of the best ways to relieve stress is--"

"Get out of there! Scram, you damn mutt!"

"--yelling at defenseless animals, smashing pumpkins, shooting off guns--"

The nearness of his voice returned, welling up almost warmly against my ear. "What are you babbling about?"

"What are you wearing?"

"Oh, no. Don't start any of that."

I sighed. "Jim, man. Just walk away from the window and listen up. I'm lying here, fondling myself, thinking of your rampant manhood--"

"Manhood?"

"--and I expect a little attention. More than the dog."

"I've got to get back to work." When I didn't acknowledge this, he hesitated. "I'm not wearing anything."

I grinned at the grudging note to his admission and kneaded myself further. "Were you giving the neighbors a show?"

"Just the pine trees. Maybe a few starlings."

"And Jasper."

Jim's smile was almost audible. "He didn't appreciate it. He was going for your carrots."

"I'm going for my carrot right now."

A tiny, ambiguous whoosh of breath answered me. "Blair...shit...I..."

"We've never had phone sex," I pointed out. "Hey, listen." I tugged down my zipper, trying to make it noisy. "Hear that?" He didn't reply, and I lifted myself out of my briefs and cupped my shaft. It felt nice and naked and warm against my palm. Familiar. "I'm stroking myself," I said conversationally to Jim. It didn't feel too awkward, telling him that from a distance. It could have been because I had no way of knowing his reaction, unless he said something; and even then there was room for doubt. But the doubt worked for me, not against me. I was an optimist.

"Tell me," he said, and I heard the tightness in his voice, the difficulty with which he forced out those two words. My ear, the one pressed against the phone, flamed as if struck by a match.

"I'm, um...I'm cupping my balls and sort of rolling them around." I worked my hips a bit until this was true. "I'm getting harder, thinking about you." My voice husked out, and I cleared my throat. Now I was more embarrassed; I could sense that I had his full attention and momentarily feared that I'd trip up--descend into corniness, fail to enthrall him. But the potential for embarrassment also added a sharp edge to my arousal.

"It feels good," I went on. "I'm thinking about your hand, you touching me. How your fingers are a little rough, and you have that callus on your thumb and you're rubbing it against the head of, of my cock, and pushing at the notch where it kind of hurts and feels real good--" Breathless, I gasped, and heard him make a sound of quiet desperation in response. "You're coming up behind me on the bed--I mean, you're behind me on the bed--and you're, um, working your hips against me good and hard and  playing with me. And you--and I'm on all fours--and you--and I can feel your cock slicking up and shoving against my asshole--" God, I'd said asshole. I fumbled at the thread of speech and tried to regain it. "And you're pushing in and working it against me, your cock, and then you shove inside--" I broke off, groaning, my body spasming as I fought the need to come.

On the other end of the line, Jim gasped repeatedly, the way he did when he was jerking off. I could hardly stand to listen to him, it was that hot. I hadn't expected it to boil up so quickly, not like this. I breathed raggedly, my body an aching circuit of pleasure.

"And I want--I want you to fuck me just like that, real fast and hard, oh man, really fast--oh, man, Jim--I just want, just want--" I buckled and gave a small cry and jacked my dick faster and then shot up across my belly, three or four sticky laces flung across the sweater I'd traveled in.

I could hear Jim chuffing and groaning to match me, and then he cried out my name and there was an abrupt, electric silence that held and held, as if a breaker had been flipped. I was actually terrified for a moment, when I realized I could not hear his breathing, but then he took a long shuddering breath and the tight clutch of my stomach relaxed again.

"Oh, man," I mumbled into the phone, as I cradled my genitals carefully. Aftershocks rippled through my dick.

"How you doin' there, sweetheart?" Jim said in a lazy, sated voice.

"Um. Good. Yeah."

We lay connected by silence for a minute, then he gave a sigh. "I should get cleaned up. Head on back. H's going to be wondering where I am. This case--" He hesitated, not quite apologetically, but perhaps to let me remember why he needed to cut the call short.

"Nah, I understand. S'okay. While you're doing paperwork, you can just think about me lazing here in bed, ordering room service." I'd meant it teasingly, but he replied in earnest.

"You do that. You treat yourself, Chief."

My warm face grew warmer, and I felt the currents of ambivalent contentment which are unique to eating on another man's Visa card. It was imprinted with my name, but I was imprinted with his. I'd come to enjoy being a house husband, but when I published my first book, I planned to buy him lots of big and unnecessary presents. And maybe a new truck.

"Have a good time this weekend," Jim was saying. "And don't bring back any free samples of the funny vine." We had an ongoing debate--and occasionally argument--about shamanistic drug use. I think he really feared, in some small corner of his brain, that I might decide to trip out in the Norfolk Hilton. As if. The bedspread was hallucination enough.

"Yeah, I hear you." I retaliated. "Don't work too hard there. Make yourself go home before midnight. And don't forget to eat dinner."

"Can I watch TV if I eat my vegetables?" Jim asked dryly.

"I guess I'll allow that." I drew my briefs back up and half-zipped my jeans. "Since it's not a school night."

Jim semi-chuckled, then said kind of gently, "Okay then. Take care, Chief." We entertained another pregnant pause in which I could feel him gathering strength, courage, before he added, "Love you."

"Love you too," I murmured, heart beating for him. And then we both hung up, and the weekend stretched ahead. I'd get through it, might even enjoy it, but I could already tell that the best part would be going home.

It always was.
 

End.
  

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