Campo Royale #3
Can two men move past their shattered dreams and create a new future together?
Corduroy Lopez is a hard-working man. He has to be. There really is no alternative. He’s a single father with a beautiful, special needs daughter to support. His mother and grandmother help when they can, but he’s a proud pan man who is determined to make it on his own. When his daughter is accepted into a prestigious developmental education preschool, Cord needs cash and he needs it yesterday. One night, offhandedly, the cute owner of the new bookstore in town mentions wanting to start a drag story hour, Cord leaps at the chance. He’s done drag before. Once. Performing on stage at the Campo hadn’t really been his thing but donning a wig and dress to sing children’s songs while strumming a ukulele should be a much more enjoyable experience. Also, the bookshop owner is adorable, newly single, and spending a great deal of time sitting at Cord’s bar sipping virgin piña coladas after the bookstore closes.
Jagger Collins never meant to end up here. He’d been a happily married man with a swanky job in a Philadelphia bank just two years ago. Then the bottom fell out of his life. His marriage combusted, his job quickly followed, and he found himself with only his dog Hamish, his brother, and half the cash from the home he thought he would be starting a family in. Taking the advice of his elder sibling to heart, he left the big city and bought a small brick building in downtown Wilmington. Trading in ties for tomes, Jagger is now embracing the simpler things in life. Reading, biking, knitting, and admiring the lithe bartender at the Campo Royale. Cord is ticking all the right boxes in a big way, but Jagger’s not sure if he’s ready to put his heart on the line again.
The Barkeep and the Bookseller is a single father guy next door gay romance that features a hard-working dad, a learning-to-love again bookdealer, a precocious preschooler, high heels, a loving family, flashy floral fashions, and a ukulele rich happy-ever-after.
ONE
Cord
I was on a desert island,surrounded by swaying palm trees and beautiful people with hard bodies in skimpy swimwear. Shiny happy vacationers frolicked on the white sands as I reclined on a chaise, icy cold bottle of Corona in hand, my bright pink toenails soaking up the Caribbean sun. Or maybe it was along the shores of Puerto Vallarta or even Samoa and not in the Caribbean at all. Hell. Could be I was lounging on the Riviera, which would be amazing. Wherever I was, it was fucking incredible. Zero stress. Like totally zero. Negative zero even.
Glorious tropical breezes, athletic men and women, cold beer, warm toes. It was paradise. Just as I was lifting my bottle of beer to remove the lime, a huge shape blocked out the sun, and I squinted as my eyes tried to adjust. The shape leaned down to poke me in the chest. Hard. With a massive finger the size of a bratwurst. The poking continued. I stupidly blinked at Maui—animated Maui with all that hair and tats and enormous pecs—as he hovered over my skinny ass. Okay, so we were for sure in the land of my maternal grandfather. Samoa. Cool. Never been but seriously wanted to visit someday soon. When I was rich, which would be roughly never.
“Daddy, wake up, please.” Maui—who sounded exactly like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, which was to be expected because, yeah, Moana was on the loop twenty-four-seven around here—continued jabbing at me with his big pointer finger. Why was this Polynesian demigod calling me dad? Was I a god in this glorious land of flirty dudes and chicks? That would be cool. “Daddy. The TV is yuck. Can we see Heihei?”
Wait. Maui wanted to watch TV? What did he know about television? The poking continued as someone who had bony knees and far fewer tattoos than Maui climbed into my lap. Maui then slap-patted my face with a sticky hand. A hand that smelled like peanut butter. The slap pulled me from dreamy Samoa and all the sexy people waved goodbye as I slammed back to reality with a grunt. Eyes flying open, I stared at the innocent round face of my daughter, Paloma. Her curly black hair was pulled up into two ponytails and glowing brown almond-shaped eyes studied me intently. In one chubby hand, she held the DVD of Moana that my grandmother had bought her, in the other a magic wand with rainbow streamers. Her face was smeared with peanut butter, as were her hands.
Shit.
“Can we watch Heihei later? Daddy’s watching the hockey game,” I replied, easing her knee away from my balls, then shifting her off my lap. The TV set had smears on it, peanut butter I was sure, as did the remote. Sitting up, I rubbed at my face, smudging the Skippy on my cheeks up into my eyes. Shit, that burned. Ouch. I’d just sat down for a minute to catch the rare Sunday afternoon Wilmington Warthogs game that was being televised. One damn minute. I’d not even felt my eyes dropping or anything.
“Hockey is yuck,” Paloma grumbled, falling to her back on the sofa, then kicked her feet into the air. She was wearing a pink sandal on one foot and a yellow rubber rain boot on the other. The dress she’d worn to church was gone and in its place, she’d pulled on zebra leggings that I think were my mother’s. How she’d come into possession of her grandmother’s leggings, I had no clue. Probably my grandmother mixed up the wash again. That happened weekly. The leggings were about three feet too long for my almost five-year-old child and so she had pushed the extra material up to her knees. With that she had dug out one of my work shirts, a black crop top, to wear with her borrowed leggings. Sure, the top was short but tips went up when the men in the club could see my abs. What there were of them, that is. They’d kind of softened up some since I’d hung up my cleats to become a father.
The bright red Campo Royale lip emblem on the black shirt sort of worked with the leggings though.
“Did you make a sandwich?” I asked my daughter. She hummed a little song, then started singing about her boot. I sighed deeply. “Paloma, did you make food without Daddy there to supervise?”
“Yes. Boot face. Sí. Boot nose. Ioe. Boot butt.” That last one cracked her up. She giggled madly, then poked her boot with her magic wand. Oh right, so the wand had been the father poking device. Got it. No wonder it felt like a godling jabbing me. Her giggling was infectious. I might have sniggered a bit as well. My baby may have been diagnosed with Mosaic Downs Syndrome as an infant, but she was as bright as the sun. And learning three languages. Hell, I could barely speak Spanish and forget Samoan. No matter how my grandmother tried to get me to learn her language, I just could not grasp it. If not for a Spanish 101 class in my first year at Goldey-Beacom, I’d not know the basics of my father’s native tongue. He’d died before I’d been able to learn a thing from him other than not to drink and drive.
But Paloma was absorbing all the languages spoken in our oddball little family. Her speech had been a little slow at first, but with patient family members, she’d not only caught up but was putting me—the guy with two years of higher education—to shame. Her motor skills still were an issue as well as her vision. Speaking of which…
“Where are your glasses?”
She scowled at her boots. “They’re yuck.” I sighed and squinted at the peanut butter coated TV screen. Hey someone had scored. The goal horn was blaring. Wonder who it had been? Tyr maybe? He’d been on a tear lately with this push to the playoffs.
“Paloma, you need your glasses.”
“No!” And just like that, the giggling little angel was gone. Anyone who tells you that people with Downs are always happy and laughing is full of it. My daughter has all the emotions every person has. She gets angry, fearful, sad, and happy. And she gets super anxious when things don’t go as she wishes. Buttons, zippers, cutting with scissors. We’d had a long, arduous time when she had been younger with using cutlery. And when we were having issues, Paloma got stressed and angry and acted out on occasion just like any other child. She was not always sunshine and puppy kisses.
Hoping to avoid a meltdown, I padded off into the tiny kitchen of our rental house. We lived on the left-hand side of a duplex row house. My mother and grandmother lived on the right-hand side. I paid rent for my side of the house and my utilities. If there was anything left over, I gave it to Mom to cover some of the cost of having childcare provided whenever I needed it. Taking in the counter beside the fridge, I ran a hand over my face, smearing the Skippy down to my neck. Paloma had indeed made herself a sandwich. Which was a good thing! Having the skills to spread peanut butter and jam on two slices of bread had taken us ages to master. So yay, my baby! Sadly, she had also coated the counter, the toaster, and herself. Then, being Paloma, she’d come out to find me with Moana on her mind. All three of the adults in her life knew that movie line for line. My grandmother was so thrilled to have a Polynesian Disney princess that she’d bought the DVD the moment it was available. And Paloma had to watch it at least twice a day.
Heaving a sigh, I made my way to the jar of peanut butter. Oh cool. There were her glasses. Stuffed into the jar of peanut butter along with a broken cracker. Excellent. Fuck. I had to do better on my time off. I needed to ensure I didn’t fall asleep. The back door creaked open and my mother entered the kitchen wearing jeans, a sweatshirt of pale pink, and a smile. Her short, black, wavy hair was still heavily sprayed from her Sunday morning church lacquer application, so when she whipped her head this way and that to take in the peanutty mess her bob didn’t move. Think football helmet only with hair. Hair helmet.
“Oh holy heck,” Mom said, her brown eyes wide.
“Paloma made herself a sandwich,” I explained as I eased my daughter’s itty-bitty glasses from the jar of peanut butter. Mom’s eyebrows flew to her hairline. “So that’s good.”
“So good,” she halfheartedly agreed. “How did she do all of this…” she waved a hand at the mess, “when you were in the next room watching the game?”
“I fell asleep,” I confessed. “Mom, how do you clean peanut butter off glasses?”
“Let me Google it,” she replied, moving closer to me. Paloma raced in, gave Mom a hug, and then ran back out, mumbling about God liking movies more than hockey. “You should have let us keep her, sweetie.”
“No, you and Titi have her all night. I should be able to keep my ass awake.”
“Cord, you work all night long, seven days a week. Of course you’re going to nod off. You’re exhausted. I wish Sitka would give you a night off.”
“Sitka has tried. I tell her I need every shift, so don’t come down on her. We need the money, Mom. That fancy school in Happy Valley that finally accepted Paloma costs fifteen thousand dollars a year in tuition. The state voucher is only for seven thousand. Yellow Bonnet Educational Center was kind enough to let me make payments because me and my baby are fucking charity cases.” I stomped over to the sink and cranked on the taps.
“You watch your language, young man,” Mom snapped as she came to stand beside me at the sink.
“Sorry.” I sighed. She patted my back, then gently took the pink eyeglasses from my wet hands. “I’m just so frustrated. The state should be willing to pay more for Paloma, but since her disabilities aren’t ‘severe enough to warrant extra assistance’ she barely gets any help at all. I mean shit, Mom, she still has trouble with zippers and writing simple letters and numbers, and I’m so damn tired. Like physically tired as well as emotionally tired of fighting with the state for every damn penny just so I can ensure my child can function well in society if something happens to me and—”
Mom pulled me in for a hug. It was easy for her to do. I wasn’t exactly a bruiser. She and I were the same height of five-seven and she probably had a few pounds on my one hundred sixty. I’d never say that to her face, though.
“I can ask for extra shifts at the plant,” she said as we hugged it out, Paloma’s greasy glasses resting between my shoulders and wetting my shirt.
“No, you work too much already.” I pulled back enough to stare into her pretty brown eyes. Eyes just like mine and Paloma’s. Eyes like Titi’s. “You work and babysit. That’s all you do. It’s not fair. She’s my baby. I’ll take care of her.”
I saw the condemnation on the tip of her tongue, but she held it back. Yes, if Paloma’s mother hadn’t bailed on us after my daughter had been born, things would have been better. Easier anyway, with two working parents. But Trisha hadn’t been able to cope. She’d barely wanted to be a mother, her religious upbringing being the only reason she had kept the pregnancy. Knowing that the child would require parenting for years longer than other kids had been it for her. She’d signed over full custody of Paloma to me and left the country.
The last we’d heard from Trisha, she had been in France living with a traveling theater group. That had been three years ago when a card for Paloma’s birthday arrived with a photo of Trisha dressed up as a faun for a Shakespearean play. Nothing from her since, not even a card or a text for Christmas. She had once mentioned asking her rather well-to-do parents for help with Paloma’s upkeep. So I did reach out. And got a card with some sort of flimsy apology and a check for two hundred dollars for Paloma’s first eyeglasses.
Her parents had been all on for her keeping the baby until they’d found out about the Downs. Then they kind of eased off the whole loving grandparents thing. They sent a card around the holidays with twenty dollars in it. Seemed they were all gung-ho about saving unborn babies, but when that child was born, they weren’t really into providing additional help, be it governmental or personal. Especially if the baby were “on the retarded scale”—their words, not mine. The R word is not allowed in my daughter’s or my space. Ever. I’ve gotten into fistfights at work for people using that word within earshot.
Bitter much, Corduroy?
Yep, bitter as a bitch pill to quote Gigi. And angry. And sad. For Paloma, not for me. Well, maybe for me too a little. Being a single parent was motherfucking tough.
“It’ll all work out. You’ll see.” She kissed my scruffy cheek. “Let’s get to work on these glasses. I think if we wipe them clean and use some Windex, it will cut the grease.”
“Yeah, sure, let’s get them back on her nose.” The clean-up began. I was scrubbing with a vengeance when my phone alarm went off in my back pocket. “It’s two o’clock,” I announced while Mom was putting the final tidy-up on Paloma’s glasses. She curiously looked my way. “I thought I’d get a couple of hours of fares in before I have to go to work. Can you take Paloma a little earlier? I know I said I’d have her until five, but…” I shrugged.
“You work too hard. I don’t like you driving people all over town. Last week, one of those drivers got held up at gunpoint.”
“That’s rare. And we don’t carry money, anyway. It’s all done online.”
“I know. The robbers took his car.” She handed the sparkling clean spectacles back to me.
“Then it was a carjacking. Which is why I drive my POS instead of your nicer Buick.”
She rolled her eyes. I gave her my most engaging smile. “Call it what you will. That man was nearly shot. Why don’t you let me grab an extra shift at work? You wouldn’t have to hustle all over town for meager tips and then rush to the club to mix drinks for more meager tips.”
“Mom, no. You already work sixty hours a week.” I shook my head, the pink tips from my hair falling into my eyes. I really needed a cut and a dye job, but all my extra pennies were now going into the Yellow Bonnet Fund. Paloma’s needs came first. Besides, if worse came to worse one of the queens would trim me up. Clarice had a way with scissors. “I just need a few more hours of babysitting, if you don’t mind.”
“Of course I don’t mind.” She gathered me into her arms for a much-needed hug. Anyone who says you outgrow a mom hug is full of bullshit. I sure never have and I was going on twenty-six.
“Thanks. I feel so shitty making you watch her all the time. You don’t have any kind of social life now. When did you date last? All you do is work and watch Paloma. I’m really failing at this parenting thing.”
Mom pulled back and rested her brow on mine. “Listen to me.” I sighed. “Are you listening?”
“Yes, Mom.” Her perfume filled my nose, a sweet floral scent that always eased any tension and anxiety that clawed its way to my overburdened shoulders.
“Good boy. You are not failing. Stop that noise,” she said at my snort of derision. “You are doing a wonderful job. Paloma is happy and healthy. She’s thriving and about to start at a new school that you had to beg, borrow, steal, and threaten to get her into.” Okay, yeah, the school thing and my baby girl’s happiness were on the mark. All the rest? Meh. “You’re an amazing father. Things will all work out. God always provides for his children.”
“Right, yes, of course.”
I knew that. I really did.
While I wasn’t much into the church, Mom and Titi were, and if they said God would provide then he would or they’d want to know why he didn’t. I just wish he would hurry up and start all this providing he was supposed to be doing. A little extra cash wouldn’t be a bad thing. A loving partner to help would be an even better thing.
Not only was being a single parent motherfucking tough it was motherfucking lonely too.
I hugged her tightly and went to round up my girl to slip her glasses on the flat bridge of her nose and get a super big kiss. Holding her close, I breathed in the aroma of strawberry shampoo and peanut butter. Her loud smacks on my cheeks made all the hours working and scraping and bowing to the public worthwhile. If she was happy, then I was too. Daydreaming about some prince or princess charming was not going to put food on the table or get my daughter the best education money could buy. That had to remain my focus. Everything else was just coconut in the fa’ausi, as Titi would say.
Monday Musical Melody
V.L. Locey loves worn jeans, yoga, belly laughs, walking, reading and writing lusty tales, Greek mythology, the New York Rangers, comic books, and coffee.
(Not necessarily in that order.)
She shares her life with her husband, her daughter, one dog, two cats, a flock of assorted domestic fowl, and two Jersey steers.
When not writing spicy romances, she enjoys spending her day with her menagerie in the rolling hills of Pennsylvania with a cup of fresh java in hand.
EMAIL: vicki@vllocey.com
The Barkeep and the Bookseller #3
Campo Royale Series
