When Kit Walker’s leg is shattered at the Battle of Manassas, he finds himself on Doctor Wallace Sanger’s operating table. Wallace saves his life but removes his leg. As his wounds mend, the two men find more than comfort as they explore each other's hidden desires.
From the battlefields of Manassas, Virginia, to the Union prison in Elmira, New York, author Shane Michaels explores the hidden world of men loving men during the American Civil War. In this erotic tale of lust, love, and sacrifice, two men find solace in each other’s arms - and other's arms - as they are caught between the splintered world of the Union and the Confederacy.
Explicit dark romance for men who love men. This novel was previously released on Amazon in a serialized format. This version is the complete novel.
Original Review April 2021:
Cigars in the Parlor has been on my Kindle for a few years and just kept getting buried but I finally had a chance to read it. I've never read this author before, which can always be a bit of a scary thing for some but for me it just adds to the adrenaline rush of discovery and possibilities. I wasn't disappointed. Cigars is a lovely blend of reality and fiction with the perfect balance of drama and sexy times. It's easy to feel for Kit and his new found reality after losing his leg and the pull between him and Wallace, the doctor who saved his life, is believable and entertaining. As a historical lover it is always important when authors use little details to keep the era real, or as real as possible for dramatic fiction. I'm not looking for a history lesson but those realistic elements help to not only set a scene but also sucks the reader into the story. For those who don't think about LGBT in history terms, it's stories like Cigars in the Parlor that can open eyes and even though it's fiction it can pique a readers fascination and lead them to discover the truths of the era, I know that was one of the things that made me a history lover when I was in junior high. As I hit the last page I was entertained and that is what is important, making this a worthwhile read.RATING:
1. AFTER MANASSAS
The storefront was hot. Dr. Wallace Sanger had been working all day, the pile of limbs growing with every soldier that was brought into the room. It was a senseless war. He grew angrier with every stroke of the saw – so many men in their prime hobbled before they had even lived. Dr. Sanger didn’t understand why Lincoln was insistent on keeping Virginia in the Union. Every one of the poor souls on his table had been chasing some inane vision of the South that they did not really understand. Freedom. Slavery. States Rights. Self-determination. These words meant very little when there was a bone-saw your hand.
Two soldiers brought in one last patient on a stretcher, placing him on the operating table.
“Doc… I don’t want to lose my leg. Please.”
The man was clearly in great pain. His head was warm and he was covered in sweat. Fever coursed through him.
“It’s infected. You’ll die if I don’t.”
Wallace looked at his patient wearily. He noticed the man’s deep blue eyes. “What’s your name?”
“Kit… Kit Walker.”
“I’m Doctor Wallace Sanger.”
The man was shaking. Wallace spoke in a low voice. “I wish we could have met under different circumstances,” he said, “I’m sorry to have to do this but it’s for the best.”
“Doc, please.”
“You do want to live don’t you?”
Kit said nothing.
Wallace and Kit were about the same age. If he had not gone to the university, the doctor realized that it might have been him on that table. Wallace studied the soldier. Kit seemed familiar, like an old friend. Wallace guessed that he had once been quite handsome – but it was clear that his body had been ravaged by cold nights in tents and meager rations. Only his beard showed signs of life - bushy and red.
Wallace cut the hem of Kit’s trousers and then ripped the fabric up the length of his leg, revealing gangrene already above the knee. Kit had been shot, his bone shattered. Wallace removed the filthy bandage and examined the limb closely. He needed to cut above the knee instead of below. He picked up the bottle of chloroform. “Is this all we have left?”
Kit had fear in his eyes as he stared at the brown bottle.
His nurse answered him, “Yes. I asked them to bring more but they said that’s all we’ve got.”
Wallace nodded. “Kit, I’m going to put you under to do this. I don’t want you to worry. We’re going to take good care of you. You’re going to live. I promise. Hear me?”
“What happens to my leg?” Kit asked.
“We bury it with the rest of them. Now, just lean back and close your eyes.”
Kit sobbed gently. His life was about to change, but at least he could leave the war. Wallace took a clean piece of cotton and turned the bottle upside down over it until it was saturated. He took the rag and held it over Kit’s face until the man was unconscious.
Wallace had a routine now. He had learned to do the job quickly before the men awoke. He knew to leave a flap of extra skin. He would cut through the muscle until he found the bone and then use strong, firm strokes to saw it in two. He sweated as he did this, the nurse wiping his brow. It took less than a minute to separate the flesh from its owner, tossing the heavy limb onto a table next to him with a thud. One of the soldiers picked it up and took it outside as the nurse helped him to stop the bleeding. He sewed quickly until the flap of skin was neatly sealed over the wound. She helped him dress the stump with clean cotton and a compression bandage to control the bleeding.
“Take him into the church,” Wallace said, motioning to the soldiers.
They picked up the stretcher and carried Kit out the front door of the storefront, across the street, up the steps of the church, and into the nave of the church where he was laid on a cot among the dozens of other men.
Wallace took a deep breath. When he went to medical school, he thought he would be dealing with old men having cases of gout and young women having their first child. He never dreamed his first year after medical school would be spent in the fields of Virginia sawing the limbs off young men. He was happy to be away from the warfront, working in town where bullets did not fly. As difficult as it was, it seemed much kinder here.
The nurse had filled a pan with water for him to wash; the blood on his hands immediately stained it red. His apron was covered with many men’s blood; he carefully undid the knot at his back, folded his apron, and placed it on the table. He took the pan and threw the water outside into the street and then poured fresh more to wash his face. He hated to walk into the church covered in blood; his patients needed to forget what they had lost.
He went outside into the street. He could already hear men wailing in agony inside the church. He pulled his pocket watch out and looked at the time; he was starving but knew he had to make his rounds first. There was much to do.
Wallace walked up the steps into the church where row after row of men lay on cots. He proceeded to visit one and then the next, stopping to see if any infections had taken hold. The room was crowded and the air still. Women from town fretted to and fro, wiping one man’s brow, feeding another, emptying a bed pan. Each nodded as the doctor passed.
Wallace noticed Kit lying on a cot in the last row, under a stained glass window of Adam reaching out to God. Kit was beginning wake, looking about the room groggily. The light shone on his face, his hair glowing like a bonfire. Wallace was compelled to sit with him.
“Shhh… Kit. You’re okay. Just lie still,” he said.
Kit’s eyes opened.
A woman walked by. “Nurse, this man needs morphine.”
“We don’t have any,” she said, “We don’t have much of anything left.”
Wallace could tell Kit was overwhelmed by the pain. He took his hand. “I know it hurts. I’m here for you. Just like I promised.”
Kit looked up at the man. Dr. Sanger was tall and handsome. His face was silhouetted in the light; Kit thought he might have some Cherokee in him, his hair thick and black and his jaw strong. The light poured over the doctor, shining through the thin cotton shirt he wore, damp with sweat.
As the chloroform wore off, the pain grew worse. Wallace wiped Kit’s brow.
“There now, squeeze my hand when it gets bad.”
* * * * *
Wallace was exhausted but he sat with Kit for hours. He had so many patients that day, but Kit called to him. When Kit finally fell asleep, the room was dark, lit only by candles hung on the wall. A few nurses still shuffled about.
“Doctor, shouldn’t you go home?” a nurse asked, “You’ve been here for hours.”
Wallace nodded his head. His new friend was finally asleep. He got up from his stool and made the walk through town back to his room.
Betsy Marple was renting him a room in her home. She was two year’s a widow – and he suspected that she was trying to find a second husband. He was terrified that he had given her the wrong impression – that he was smitten with her. “Where have you been?” she said as he entered, “I was worried about you.”
“I had a very bad day. There were so many today.”
Betsy had saved dinner for him. It sat on the table, covered with a napkin. “Here. Eat something,” she said, “You need your strength.”
Wallace did as she asked. The beef was cold but filling.
“Just leave the plate. I’ll get it in the morning,” she said.
Betsy went up to her room. He quickly finished eating and pulled himself up the stairs to his bedroom, quietly closing the door behind him. He found a handkerchief and put it on the nightstand. His clothes stank and he threw them to the floor before blowing out the lamp. The room was too hot; the mattress, hard. He was tired but could not sleep.
He saw Kit as he closed his eyes. He imagined what the man had looked like before the war started – his muscles strong, his smile full of white teeth, and his red hair full and clean. He was certain that Kit had been quite popular with the ladies – and maybe the men. It had been so long since he held another man.
A year earlier the doctor might have exchanged glances with Kit on the street. They would have chatted about the weather and asked each other if they were courting a lady. One would have said no; the other, likewise. They would have laughed and looked at each other, stealing glances until their glances coincided and melted together into a single pool of acknowledgement.
Kit’s eyes flashed again. Wallace felt his cock grow hard. He imagined himself running his hands along Kit’s strong chest, feeling muscle beneath his fingers, silky smooth. Kit would pull him close, pushing his head onto his nipple.
Wallace wrapped his hand around his cock as he imagined finding Kit standing in an alley with him, the two pawing at each other like animals. The doctor would fall to his knees, his pants getting stained on the filthy cobblestone. Next, he would unbutton Kit’s fly, freeing the soldier’s cock and the tangle of his red bush. He would nibble at it gently, teasing him, until the man could take no more. Kit would grab his head and shove his cock deep into Wallace’s mouth. Wallace imagined the saltiness of it, his hands wrapped around Kit. He would pull the soldier’s pants down and feel the hard muscles of his calves and the soft fur of his ass.
Wallace imagined all this, jacking his cock with urgency. He needed release.
He pictured Kit standing there, continuing to pound away at his mouth. Kit would moan softly as he came. Wallace increased his pace, his eyes closed, picturing the fantasy in his head, until he felt the world wash over him. He felt his own warm cum pulse onto his chest and his mouth.
He sat there motionless, covered in sweat as his breathing slowed. He stared at the blank ceiling. Finally, Wallace reached for the handkerchief and wiped his skin clean. Only then did he realize how long it had been since he had climaxed.
Wallace cringed when he realized the source of his fantasy – the man whose leg he had dismembered hours earlier. As he fell asleep, he wondered what would happen to this beautiful man.
With a passion for untold history, Shane Michaels looks for details that hint at the hidden lives of gay men in days past. Though he now lives in a remote community in the northeast, his roots are in the South. His first erotic romance, 'Cigars in the Parlor', delves into life in Virginia during the American Civil War. The story tells of a doctor and soldier that fall in love under tragic circumstances. His second novella, 'TransAlaska' tells of a trans-woman who falls for a hunky gold-miner in rural Alaska in the 1990s. His 2023 release of 'The Milkman', tells the story of two men trying to find love in a small town during the lavender scare of the 1950s. ‘Kushtaka’ is the story of two desperate goldminers finding love during the Yukon Goldrush while enduring a jealous ghost. Shane has also published a number of short stories.
