The Perfect Man

By Ethan Williams

I'll admit that I sleep around with a bundle of different men – some my age, most younger. I'll admit that I like to get myself drunk, I love to party, and if I end up taking some guy home and waking up next to him without ever getting his name, well, it must have been a wonderful night. But that's not what I've been looking for lately.

I'm looking for the perfect man. Yes, that's right, Ethan Williams is looking for someone to commit to. I've been thinking of something to write for my column for a long while now and I've finally decided that it may as well be self-centered and uninteresting. So, what does a healthy young gay man like me want in the perfect man, you ask? We'll see:

Pros: Older than thirty, younger than fifty. Well read, intelligent conversation, dinner dates, long walks on the beach… the works. Handsome without being model gorgeous, not a father figure but someone that would be willing to keep me in my place.

My regular readers are probably thinking 'What the fuck? That's not like you at all, Ethan.' And I realize this, and sorry to disappoint… but I'm not kidding. I actually want a romantic relationship. Yeah, what the fuck? Anyways, back to my point:

Cons: No pets. No pint-sized doggies named 'Pookie'. No dresses – sorry ladies, I still love you! – not obviously gay, absolutely no pink, and I'm sick of dating fashion designers and architects. Please, please, no artsy man for me. I'm not interested in a man that wants to paint me in three colors and let his dog sleep with us.

I know what you're thinking. I want a closet case, is that it? No, not at all. I am looking to establish a relationship with a man that knew gay before gay let itself know gay.

--

Ethan Williams was a twenty-six year old man, not particularly short and not particularly tall. His eyes were a chocolate brown, and his hair was such a dark brown that people often mistook it for black. Men often told him he had a mysterious air of indifference and morbidity to him, but he was never really going for that. He wrote a column for one of his city's local independent gay magazines and at the moment he was rereading his latest rough draft of his article for the millionth time while walking to a café he frequented.

Words were scratched out in several different color pens, sentences were highlighted and notes filled the margins to their brims. Naturally rosy lips pursed around the end of an erasable pen, and he shook his head as he chewed on the little blue eraser. Nothing was really coming to him but his article still didn't have the right ring to it. Ethan guessed it was because it didn't sound at all like anything he'd written previously for the magazine, and that he feared his readers would find it too unlike him to even scan. Though considering it was the only thing coming to him Ethan promised himself that he would work it out to a T, and by the time it was published he would be at least partially satisfied.

Before the brown eyed young man had even noticed what had hit him, he'd run sideways into another person coming down the sidewalk from the other direction. Thankfully avoiding choking on his pen, Ethan was pushed back a bit with a startled cry as he dropped his rough draft and it was caught in the wind. He considered turning around and running to retrieve it, but on the pretense that it was his fault for the other's misfortune of smacking into him, he looked up at the other instead. "Oh, shit, sorry… you okay?"

The man, looking somewhat perturbed and red in the face only scoffed at Ethan's vulgar – though well-intentioned – attempt at making sure the guy was okay. "I'm fine." He replied flatly to Ethan's comment, before hurrying past him and refusing to make eye-contact.

Ethan spun around as the other went, calling out a: "Hey, dude, I really am sorry about that!" But it was too late, and the guy was already out of earshot. Watching his back for a little, Ethan bit down on his bottom lip with a frown, before going back to head in the direction he'd originally been going.

He'd just have to rewrite the entire thing when he got home again, he figured. Though it was early in the morning and he wasn't about to go rewriting something he didn't even like in the first place without some coffee in his system. He'd have to call his boss when he got back and tell him that he wasn't finished, tell him he ran into some guy and dropped it… Like Adam was going to buy that. With a long sigh, Ethan finally reached his café and passed a few people chatting at little green tables outside, before reaching the glass door and pressing it open with a bell's chime.

"How's that draft coming?" A friend of his, Matthew, asked as he stepped over to the opposite side of the counter and tied his apron behind his back. He looked Ethan over critically and added: "What's wrong with you?"

"Would you like to put seven shots of espresso into my mocha this morning? Please?"

With a wide eyed look of amusement, Matthew pulled out a thin notepad and started jotting Ethan's order down. He pushed the notepad aside as he started ringing his friend's order up on the cash register, and looked up at him when his total blinked up in yellow digital numbers. "$6.75, it comes to."

Ethan dug around in his pockets for a crumpled ten and handed it over to Matthew. "I was almost done with that stupid thing, too." He started, even though that was a lie. He was barely done. "I bumped into some guy coming here just a few minutes ago and it flew out of my hands. My luck, huh? Guy was a jerk, too. In a hurry for something I think."

"Everyone is. Are you going to rewrite it?" Matthew asked, though his head was now obscured by the espresso machine he was working with and his eyes were focused downward.

"I have to, or Adam's going to kill me." Ethan pinched the bridge of his nose. "I was going to his office but I guess I'm just going to get my coffee and go home now and start up a new one." He gathered up his change that Matthew had set on the counter for him moments ago.

"Whipped cream?"

A wink. "You know it."

Matthew blushed and frowned as he topped the mocha off quietly with some whipped cream, before sliding the cup across the counter to Ethan. "Daniel would kill you if he knew you were flirting with me like that."

Ethan grabbed his cup with one hand and leaned over the counter, looking up at the other from his position with a grin. "I'm not flirting, your mind is just constantly in the gutter." Ethan pulled back and stood straight, popping the plastic top off of his mocha and burying his lips in the frothy white cream, before licking it all off slowly. "Thank you, lovely."

Matthew could only glare and wave as he watched the other leave, settling against the counter. "Good luck with your rewrite!" He called, sticking out his tongue. Ethan made a motion with his free hand in the air, but didn't turn around as he left.

--

While taking one of his routine morning walks along the edge of the park, forty-four year old Marshall Carey was kicking away the leaves from his path when a worn and stapled couple pages of something landed at his feet. His brow knit in confusion, the graying, though particularly handsome man stooped to gather it up. Upon unfolding it and realizing it was an article, he found a nice little wall of rock to sit atop and began to read. So marred up by the indecision of its writer, Marshall found this task of deciphering it almost too difficult, but managed to catch the gist of the thing. He found that it seemed incomplete, and figured this 'Ethan Williams' must have dropped it by accident.

Marshall was a mild-mannered man, who worked at a local hospital as a registered nurse and was in the middle of a messy divorce from a woman he'd been married to for the past twelve years. The increase in graying hairs in his messy locks and the lines formed around the edges of his eyes that were definitely not from laughter reminded him of how stressful this whole thing was.

"It's just not there anymore, Marshall." His wife, Danielle, had been telling him as she was heading out the door late one afternoon. "We don't… have anything anymore. Marshall… I've been thinking about getting a divorce."

It had actually come as quite a shock to the man, though she continuously told him that he should have realized it was coming. 'All the signs!' She'd cry. 'Our relationship is terrible!' Poor Marshall still didn't quite understand what these signs were that he'd missed, and if their relationship really had been that terrible he figured she would have told him so they could do something about it. "You're just so damned apathetic about everything. That's your problem. You don't care!"

It wasn't that Marshall didn't care, it was that he had been quite happy with the way things had been going. He didn't realize that anything had even been wrong, though he assured her that if he had, he would have done something to fix it. Danielle only continued to become more and more frustrated with him, and he eventually just decided to let it happen. Only a couple days ago did Marshall wonder what in the hell he'd been holding onto in the first place.

He fingered the worn edges of this article in his hands for a moment, rereading the first couple words, then rereading all the pros about this perfect man Ethan had been talking about. A smile crept over Marshall's thin lips. Thinking back on it, he figured Ethan's perfect man sounded a lot like him. But Marshall wasn't homosexual. Marshall didn't even figure he was sexual at all anymore, he didn't really have much an interest in people after his wife berated him for being socially inept.

Still, he couldn't help being interested in meeting up with Ethan, even if only for the morbid fascination of seeing Ethan's reaction to how much like this perfect man of his Marshall was. Shifting about on the edge of the wall, Marshall folded the article back up and stuffed it into his coat pocket. Deciding that his reason for finding Ethan was only to return this draft to him and nothing more, Marshall headed to the corner of the sidewalk he'd been on and to a payphone. The rain-soaked phonebooks dangled from heavy duty cords near the bottom of the payphone's little booth and he grabbed one as it was swinging back and forth in the wind.

Cracking it open and peeling through the pages, Marshall found the W's with ease and began scanning over them for Williams, Ethan. His lips parted in concentration, Marshall eyed all of the names. "Williams, Bill.. Williams, Cathy… Williams, D… Williams, Ethan!" He hoisted the book onto his knee, propped open and one finger on the number. Marshall picked up the receiver and cradled it to his ear with his shoulder hunched up as he dug for fifty cents, sliding it into the pay phone's coin slot. He punched Ethan's number into the keypad and waited.

A shrill ring.

He wondered briefly what the hell he was doing, calling some kid he didn't even know. But only briefly.

--

Tossing his keys to his coffee table and setting his drink down on the little table next to the door, Ethan hurried to his ringing phone. He threw himself onto his futon that worked as a couch and bed in his tiny studio apartment, and dug around in the covers for his cordless phone as it cried out to him in pathetic rings.

"Hello?" He asked curiously after finally finding it and punching the talk button.

"Er… hello. Is this Ethan?" The voice on the other end was unusually soft for the men that usually called, and Ethan didn't always give his number out to his little one night fuck buddies so he figured it wasn't one of them. His mind tumbled over the thoughts quietly as he tried to put a face to a voice.

"Are you with the government?" He finally asked, after exhausting all of his potential options. The voice laughed, and Ethan's cheeks puffed up a bit with a huff.

"No, I'm not." He replied, still serene. It was curiously soothing. "I was just taking a walk when your… article, here, tumbled to my feet."

Ethan crossed his legs on his bed and chewed his bottom lip. "Oh! Sorry about that, I literally ran into some guy this morning and it flew out of my hands. I was just gonna rewrite it…"

"I could bring it to you, if you'd like. We should have dinner. I'm interested in meeting you." Marshall was surprised to find that these words weren't entirely a lie. He actually was interested in meeting him. No better way than dinner, right? It was Ethan's turn to giggle.

"Hey, you mean like a date?"

"Not entirely. Just a meeting, so I can return your article to you. It'll be fun. I'll pay for dinner." What the hell was he doing? Something damned stupid, that was for sure. Tempting young boys. Ethan didn't even sound over nineteen, and Marshall had no place to go trying to make new friends with people he didn't even know. Maybe it was the effects of the divorce. Trying to socialize. He wished he could show Danielle to prove to her that he wasn't really a recluse.

There was a pause on the other line as Ethan seemed to consider Marshall's offer. "I guess it wouldn't hurt. What's your name?"

"Marshall Carey." Marshall answered softly.

"Hmm… Marshall. All right. You wanna go tonight? Where should we go?"

"Tonight works fine for me. And, do you know that Japanese restaurant on the end of 34th street, downtown? I think it's around where… you usually hang out. People like you."

Ethan raised an eyebrow, but Marshall only got a silence. "People like me? You mean young gay boys? Yeah, we hang out there. But the Japanese restaurant's a little further out of gay town. You don't have like, a problem with gay people or anything, do you? You're not like some Neo Nazi trying to coerce me into going home with you so you can kill me?"

"I wouldn't do anything like that to anyone." Marshall's reply was almost too quiet to hear, and Ethan was surprised with how frank it sounded and how utterly believable his tone of voice managed to be. An automated voice on the other end informed Marshall that he only had one minute left for his conversation unless he fed it more money. "So, we'll meet outside there at.. what time? Eight thirty?"

"Works. I'll have stopped twitching from my coffee at that point." Ethan laughed lightly and wriggled a bit on his bed, his free hand picking at some of the strings dangling from the edge of a decorative pillow he had between his legs.

A small laugh. "Good. I'll see you then."

"You too. Bye."

Click.

Ethan shifted to place his phone back onto its cradle and leaned back on his bed. Nice voice, that man had. Straight. Marshall. Played well on Ethan's tongue. Maybe he wasn't straight. Maybe he was just a confused closet case. Wonder what he looks like….