Dirty Laundry by Gibslythe

Day 3 Ch. 14

Sunday, December 18th

9:57 A.M.

"So, are we gonna talk about this morning?"
Lance looked like he was close to throwing up, and Keith feared that with them driving on the twisting farm roads he just might.
"Um," Lance began, slowly making a left turn in his nasty car. "I would prefer we didn't?"
Keith scowled from the passenger seat. "Well, we need to. Because I don't want this to be awkward."
"I really don't want it to either, but I'd rather we just pretend it never happened?"
Keith was about to counter that, when instead he decided that maybe forgetting completely was a good idea. They could just forget. Act as if it never happened, like Keith hadn't been subjected to viewing his fake boyfriends dick. They could go on as friendly bros, wiping the awkward encounter from their minds entirely.
Keith swallowed. "Alright. Sure, it never happened." He turned his gaze out the corolla's side window and watched the dead trees spin past, an iron wire fence speeding across the window until it ended.
"Also-" Keith began, turning away from the farmland scenery. "I'm sorry about the video thing. It was lame and-"

Lance raised his hand to stop him. "Dude. It's chill. Drop it."
Despite his blunt words, it was obvious Lance wasn't angry in the slightest. There was even a small grin on his face, and it made Keith let out the breath he'd been holding. The two of them easily shifted into their regular, more comfortable communication.
The ride into town wasn't too long, though long enough that the car started to heat up under the Arizona sun. Fuck it being December, they were in a desert, and the sun warmed their car despite the neutral weather outside. Keith ended up rolling down his window to let the sharp wind whip his hair back, and Lance made several snide comments about his 'princess mullet'.

While driving down the main highway, Lance gave Keith a long introduction to the town he'd grown up in. Mesa del Caballo was small, with a population of 1,208 people. Of those people, around 50% were over the age of sixty. There were only a few places of interest, ones that consisted of the town's fire department, a tiny diner called 'The Gingerbread House', a gas station, and a small store known as The Sanchez Grocer. Lance informed Keith that the town was cute, if you were into the 'small town girl' lifestyle.

Apparently, Lance was not. He hated the damn place.

The Sanchez kids had attended school in the next town over, and Lance informed Keith that his high school was known as Grossling High School (Because, according to Lance, it was so goddamn gross.) Keith could only imagine how many times that stupid joke had been told.

Lance also told Keith that the town was full of hicks, and was an absolutely outstanding place to live if you were straight. Which, as Keith was fully aware by now, Lance was anything but. Keith chuckled when Lance told him about the older men that used to come into the store when Lance would work there over his summers. They'd ramble about politics and guns and tell Lance that he was a "Great young lad! You're so good to help your old man in the store!" .

Lance chuckled at that. "I only worked there for money dude. Summer job or whatever. And the old men had no idea the sinner I was."

As Lance described to Keith some old high school story, Keith observed the town pass by their car through the window. Several old houses ran past, followed by lampposts, cracked sidewalks, weeds, overgrown trees, road signs with chipped paint, and an ancient train that was no longer in use. It reminded Keith of something from a black and white western movie, despite the vibrant spray paint designs that decorated the rusting metal.

After a few minutes of cruising through the town's main road, Lance pulled the corolla into a tiny parking lot. The store in front of them was definitely one of the area's more prestigious buildings, the white paint not as chipped and the large sign on the front actually lighting up. Large price posters decorated the windows, advertising prices for cigarettes, fruit, firewood and other grocery store items.