Brokeback Mountain: Ennis' Story from 1963-2006

WEBNOVEL/FAN FICTION

THIS NOVEL/ARTICLE CONTAINS ENHANCED AND DETAILED DESCRIPTIONS OF A LONG-TERM CONSENSUAL, SEXUAL AND EMOTIONAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TWO ADULT MEN. IF THIS TYPE OF LITERATURE OFFENDS YOU, PLEASE EXIT NOW

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Portions of this novel were published in February-March at Blogcritic's Magazine. This entire novel in this format was originally published on April 1, 2006-then moved to its own page here on July 20, 2008. This novel is based on the short story by Annie Proulx combined with the screenplay Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry. Portions of the following were added to enhance the original story or to set up the ending that I invented for this novel. Where they appear, I have formatted them in this font in italics.

Prologue for a couple of Deuces
And so it began on a hazy early summer morning near the end of June 1963. The two young men were raised on small, poor ranches in opposite corners of Wyoming, Jack Twist in Lightning Flat, up north on the Montana border, Ennis del Mar from around Sage, near the Utah line, both high-school drop-out country boys with no hopes of a meaningful job. Both brought up with hard work and hardship, rough mannered, rough spoken, and hardened to the stoic western cowboy way of life.

Both too, though they couldn't find it on a world globe if their lives depended on it, were more than a little worried about being drafted into the escalating Vietnam War and vague rumors of atomic bombs and missiles in Cuba.

Hungry for a job-any job, Ennis signed up from a newspaper ad with Farm and Ranch Employment Services. He and his girl Alma most likely would get hitched next year and he’d need money to start a family.

It would be Jack Twist’s second time working for foreman Aguirre. By sheer fate, Twist and del Mar had come together on paper long before actually meeting. Twist had a summer’s worth of experience on the mountain as a herder, but his previous partner wasn’t returning this year. Del Mar was assigned at random as his camp tender for this year’s sheep operation north of Signal. The summer grazing range lay above the tree line on U.S. Forest Service campsite land in the National Park encompassing Brokeback Mountain and its surrounding peaks.

Ennis del Mar had been traumatized at fifteen by the death of both his parents in a road accident. He was devastated, but had been taught early by his strict father that real men don’t cry. Whenever he did, it’d result in a beating until he stopped, so he spent the rest of his childhood keeping his feelings to himself. His sister Jean had just turned nineteen when it’d happened and gave up the next 3 years of her life raising her two younger brothers while traveling between aunts and uncles.

Everyone who knew him said Ennis was just plain shy and sported sandy blond self-trimmed hair and a rugged horseman’s build. Sometimes he lamented having never graduated high school with the class of ‘61. Many in his one and only sophomore year of high school said that with a lot of cleaning up and some training, he could’ve been a movie star like James Dean. It never came about though, because no one could coax him onto a stage.

Many a girl was turned on by his silent brooding, then after a while they were turned off by it too. Not many knew what color his blue eyes were, because they were always hidden beneath the brim of his ever-present cowboy hat…


Jack Twist had just turned nineteen. He’d always seen the rodeo as a way of getting in good with his loveless father, who was a famous and award-winning bull rider in his day. Jack hoped for the same level of fame, though he never succeeded or for that matter even came close to it. The good son, Jack wanted to follow in his hero-father’s footsteps, but never got any help or encouragement from the elder Twist, so he decided to set out on his own, prove himself, outdo his father, then go home someday and rub it in the old man’s face. He’d tell anyone who’d listen, “My goal is to marry a woman prettier than my mother and to raise a family bigger than my father’s.”

That was his dream, anyway.

Jack’s mother Martha married John Twist straight out of high school without knowing what she was getting herself into. The first few years of her marriage were spent living with her in-laws on their home ranch while John went off to be a well-known rodeo hero. In that time she found religion to fill the time waiting for her new husband to come back home.

Then the war came.

After a serious back injury in World War II that’d take years to heal, he came home to stay, and their marriage produced a single child in 1944.

After that, the loss of his fame made John Twist lose interest in his wife and son, and he became indifferent and bitter.

All through high school, Jack kept his dark hair short and trimmed neat, always wore denim and favored a “bad guy’s” black cowboy hat. He wasn’t exactly conceited, just careful to look his best, hoping that the right girl would come along and think him a good catch or the right guys would come along and accept him into their group and he’d acquire their popularity as his own. He spent many hours memorizing funny stories and one-line jokes and tried never to be without his smile.



Chapter 1: Forty-Three Miles of Dead Horse Road
A couple of hours before dawn, Ennis set out to thumb a ride north into town carrying only a battered paper grocery sack containing a razor, extra blades, a spare shirt, socks and a carton of cigarettes. He didn’t know about cancer; no one did back then, so he got hooked on smoking early, like most boys who wanted to look cool and feel grown up.

After half an hour or so of walking with his thumb out hitchhiking, a brand new big-rig truck hauling cattle picked him up. He was left off soon after at a dusty intersection just outside of Signal as the first pale blue light began to halo the distant mountaintops. The driver, hungry for conversation on his lonely journey to Idaho, probably would’ve taken him all the way into town, but Ennis only answered the man’s friendly questions in grunts and one-word answers so he was dumped half a mile from his destination.

As the truck pulled away in a cloud of diesel smoke, del Mar set off again, half asleep and on foot for the address that he’d scrawled on the back of an old envelope...

...Meanwhile a few hours earlier, and from another direction, Jack Twist had been pleading half the night with his old and battered GMC pickup to just give him one more half a mile and then another and another. He didn’t want to be late and have to suffer the wrath of the foreman he’d worked for last year and considered a jerk. Thankfully he’d had the presence of mind to head south from home at midnight, thinking he’d most likely have to hitchhike the rest of the way in to Signal after the damned thing broke down.

The drive consisted of mostly begging and praising his dashboard, singing cowboy songs to his broken radio and debating whether to kiss or kick the damned thing when or if he arrived on time. When he finally made it to town, the first light was coming up over the mountain. With a cough and a backfire his truck died and he spent half an hour under it tightening old electrical tape around a leaky fuel line suspended from a bent clothes hanger.

Ennis arrived first and found the office trailer locked and unoccupied, the parking lot empty, except for a couple of broken down ancient pickup trucks and tumbleweeds scurrying around with the windblown dust.

A wooden sign on the office trailer door held a friendly greeting that read, “TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT-SOLICITORS WILL BE SHOT FIRST” . He leaned his back against the metal corrugated wall to the left of the wooden stairs that led up to the door, while lowering his hat’s brim against the bright morning sun as it cleared the crest of the mountain.

His thoughts strayed to his fiancée Alma and the family he hoped to raise as he lit a cigarette and absently watched a train rumble by, clattering past an old broken down pickup truck in the field across the road. As he pondered how his life was a lot like that truck, rusting, useless and going nowhere, the sound of something backfiring in loud irregular bangs came from somewhere in the distance.

He looked up and a moment later an old dark GMC pickup came rumbling in a cloud of dust and oil smoke around the corner and into the parking lot. Gears gnashing and clutch protesting, it came to an abrupt halt after first spitting gravel as if the driver had resorted to throwing it into reverse to get it stopped.

His new boss?

A young cowboy decked out in worn but fancy denim scrambled angrily out of it and high kicked the back quarter panel, rattling it and cussing under his breath.

They were like different sides of the same coin. One hated the truck; the other would’ve given anything to have one to get around in, no matter what its ailments. Like their lives up to that point, the paint was dull and uncared for, everything was rusted and not a single corner of it wasn’t dented or scratched.

They’d soon find out that in many ways and for a lot of other reasons, they had a lot in common, though they themselves didn’t know it.

Jack glanced over at the door of the trailer, spotted Ennis watching him from beneath the brim of his tan cowboy hat and quickly looked away relieved that the foreman’s car wasn’t there. They were both brought up to avoid other men’s eyes, so when their gazes met for brief seconds, they’d quickly dart away. For the next five minutes they played an undeclared game of “eye tag”. Naturally they were curious about the stranger they were about to spend the whole summer alone with.

Twist appeared to be a year or so younger than del Mar. Ennis sized him up as a “show” cowboy who’d never rode or done a day’s decent work in his life, with his matching jeans and shirt, plus a kerchief tied loosely around his neck. He changed his mind at the sight of well-worn cowboy boots, shined to hide their age. Averting his gaze as much as possible, Ennis noticed the muscular thighs and hardened calves beneath the close-fitting denims and correctly guessed a rodeo cowboy after noticing the developed biceps too.

His dark hair was closely trimmed beneath a new black cowboy hat as if he’d left the barbershop only an hour ago. His broad shoulders formed a well cut “V” down to a trim waist. As he turned sideways, Ennis noticed a pair of worn black leather work gloves sticking out of his back pocket. This kid worked hard with ropes and horses, and del Mar was glad to see he was here to do his fair share of chores.

At first the young ranch hand told himself that he was only sizing up a co-worker, but strangely Ennis was having a hard time keeping his gaze off the guy; the swaggering way his hips moved, the gleam in his eyes and his ready smile.

To his dismay, he found himself fantasizing about running his hand up this young man's inner thigh, as though sizing up a muscular new horse he'd wanted to buy. Shocked that the thought would even occur to him, he quickly distracted himself again by thinking of Alma, the girl he loved and planned to marry.

Turning his back to him, Jack took a different tack and used his driver’s side mirror to check the lanky ranch hand out while shaving the same spot on his cheek over and over. The quiet stranger had moved and was now sitting on the edge of the steps to the left of the office door. From what he could tell under the loose, worn jeans and old tan coat, the young man looked to be about his age, strong and solid with the stance of someone raised on a horse. He nodded to himself because that was good. His partner from last summer was a lazy-assed young kid with company connections, who barely lasted till September.

There was a look of shy confidence on his face, and now that Jack had his back to him, he noticed in the mirror that Ennis seemed to be openly staring at him too. Something else about Ennis kept drawing Jack’s eyes back to his mirror, but he couldn’t name it and kept shaving to distract himself.

Neither knew why they’d gone their whole young lives checking out other men. Both chocked it up to defensively sizing up a possible opponent in a rough fistfight and left it at that.

A brand-new shiny ’63 Rambler roared smoothly into the parking lot, coming to a dusty stop left of the trailer’s wooden steps nearly hitting Ennis, who jumped out of the way at the last moment. The young ranch hand had a quick temper but held it, not wanting to get off on the wrong foot with his new boss.

The look of smirky disdain on the foreman’s face didn’t help matters. Through the glare of the windshield, the man’s eyes held a sour expression. He grabbed his hat, a stainless-steel lunch pale and a thermos, kicked the door to hold it open and then slammed it after putting on his hat.

He’d pulled in too close to the trailer to walk around the front of his new car, so he detoured around the back, ignoring them both as he headed between them and up the stairs. In the brief moment he had to size them up, the foreman declared them about as useless as a pair of deuces in a high-stakes poker game and probably just as dependable.

Ennis carefully, but quickly stubbed out his smoke and saved what was left in his pocket. The foreman slipped his key in the lock and entered. Jack was prepared for it, but Ennis wasn’t, so when the old man abruptly pulled the door closed in del Mar’s face, Ennis jumped back surprised, shrugged and then looked questioningly back at Jack, who only snickered in explanation.

Jack posed against his truck, trying to project exaggerated unconcerned relaxation and confidence.

Ennis frowned at him and their eyes met and locked. An electrical magnetism struck them and the world suddenly disappeared, but for the sight of each other’s gaze. Neither young man understood what they were feeling and neither were left time to name or ponder it.

“If you two deuces are lookin’ for work, I suggest you get your scrawny asses in here pronto!” the foreman’s brusk voice said from the suddenly opened door.

Barely acknowledging each other’s presence, they scurried inside while quickly removing their hats. Jack stood defiantly in the middle of the floor, feet confidently planted, thumbs in his belt. Ennis settled to his left, leaning his shoulder nervously against the wall next to a grimy window.

Foreman Joe Aguirre was a man with little use for, nor any respect for ranch hands. They were just tools of the trade, a dime-a-dozen, deserving little or no notice and only slightly better then the bastard sheep wranglers from Chile or somewhere in South America that he’d just hired.

As he rounded the desk toward the back of the trailer facing them, he scooped off his hat and plopped it down as he landed in a squeaky reclining office chair. If he recognized Jack from last summer he didn’t show it and probably didn’t care. A sign outside on the door with his name on it was all the introducing he figured they deserved.

The old wooden desk was littered with scribbled papers, clipboards, a Bakelite ashtray brimming with cigar stubs and a phone. Joe Aguirre, wavy hair the color of cigarette ash and parted down the middle, began reciting instructions with no preliminaries.

“Forest Service’s got designated camp-sites on the allotments. Them camps can be a couple a miles from where we pasture the woolies. Got bad predator loss ‘cause nobody’s up there looking after ‘em at night.”

Pointing at Ennis, he continued, “What I want is you-the camp tender in the main camp where the Forest Service says, but the herder,” pointing at Jack with a chop of his hand, “is to pitch a pup tent on the Q.T. with the sheep. Stay outta sight and you’re gonna sleep there. Eat supper’n breakfast in camp, but sleep with the sheep a hundred percent, no fire, don’t leave no sign. Roll up that tent every morning in case the Forest Service snoops around. You got your dogs’n your .30-.30, so sleep there. Last summer had goddamn near twenty-five-per-cent loss. I don’t want that again.”

“You,” he continued turning his attention back to Ennis, smirking as the young man jumped upright nervously. Aguirre took in his blond ragged hair, the big nicked hands, the jeans torn and button-gaping shirt, “Fridays twelve noon be down at the bridge with your next-week list of groceries and pack mules. Somebody with supplies’ll be there in a pickup.”

He didn’t ask or care for that matter, if Ennis had a watch. He reached up and took a cheap dime-store wrist watch from a box on a high shelf, wound and set it and then tossed it at him as if he weren’t worth the reach. Ennis confidently caught it with a precision that surprised the foreman, checked his own watch and reset Aguirre’s to it in a youthful act of defiance dumping Aguirre's in his pants pocket.

The foreman’s eyes narrowed at him.

As he prepared to say something, the phone rang, and Aguirre answered, “Yeah?” impatiently, cussed out whoever it was on the other end of the line and then hung up.

“In a couple a hours, we’ll truck you up to the jump-off,” startling them as they suddenly realized he was talking to them again. Their eyes met his, his met theirs only briefly, then he picked up the phone in silent dismissal, pausing to look pissed that they weren't already gone.

They shrugged, put their hats back on and swiftly walked out the door and down the steps. Lost as to what to do next, they paused in front of the Rambler. The more friendly of the two, the young rodeo cowboy carefully lit a smoke then suddenly extended his hand to the ranch hand’s back and declared, “Jack Twist”

“Ennis,” he mumbled in reply, turning to briefly shake the offered hand with a quick strong grip, then his eyes hid under the hat as he turned half away.

Jack’s friendly smile turned to an expression of laughing question. “That’s it; your folks stopped at Ennis?”

Ennis met his gaze this time and replied flatly, “del Mar.”

Jack raised his eyebrows with another friendly smile and responded, “Nice to meet you Ennis del Mar,” then added, “Well, if we’re gonna be workin’ together, we might as well start drinkin’ together.”

To Ennis’ lack of response, Jack headed off past him out of the parking lot on foot muttering, “Come on.”

A pair of deuces going nowhere.

Walking with Ennis trailing two paces behind, as if pretending not to be with him, Jack Twist was satisfied this guy would work hard and do his share. Maybe a couple of brews would loosen him up a bit. Since they actually wouldn’t be working together it didn’t matter much, but he was hoping they’d at least be on speaking terms.

Ennis on the other hand was glad they’d be separated. This rodeo cowboy seemed to be way too talkative and conversation was never one of del Mar’s strong suits.


He trailed along behind him to a bar that Jack knew of a couple blocks away and they drank beer through the afternoon. Making conversation, Jack told Ennis about a lightning storm on the mountain the year before that had killed forty-two sheep, the peculiar stink of them and the way they bloated, “The smell damned near asphyxiated me, and ‘Ageery’ yelled me out good about it, like I could control the fuckin’ weather or something.”

He told Ennis of the need for plenty of whiskey up there to alleviate the boredom. He was proud to be connected with the rodeo circuit and fastened his belt with a minor bull-riding buckle, and he was crazy to be somewhere, anywhere else than Lightning Flat up north.

Twist was starting to get frustrated with the grunts and single-word answers he was getting and was beginning to conclude his new companion had taken an instant dislike to him.

As Jack had already deduced on closer inspection, Ennis was scruffy but had a sturdy build that balanced a developed torso on long bowed legs and possessed a muscular and supple body made for the horse and for bar fighting. Feeling like he was getting nowhere with this guy, Jack tried to draw him out again as they sat alone at the bar.

Twist asked, "You rodeo much?”

Ennis shook his head silently, “Only once in a while… when I’ve got the entry fee in my pocket.”

Jack smiled knowingly and nodded. Determined to learn something, anything about the man he was about to spend the next few months alone with, Jack thought a moment and then asked, “You from ranch people?”

Ennis only shrugged without looking up. As he fondled the neck of his beer bottle he replied softly, “I was.”

Twist was getting the impression that del Mar lived alone, “Your folks run you off?”

Ennis shook his head, “They run themselves off. There was only one curve in forty-three miles of Dead Horse road and they missed it one night,” gesturing his hand straight ahead and then down as if it were a car jumping a cliff.

Jack blinked and replied softly, “Shit,” drinking the last of his beer. “That’s hard.”

As they began warming to each other, the two young men seemed to be physically drawn as if by magnets and shifted ever closer till they were nearly shoulder-to-shoulder.

Jack was having the same trouble and rattled on about the girls on the Rodeo Circuit he’d seen after Ennis told him of his fiancée Alma Beers. Jack leaned over him for a pretzel at the bar and their shoulders touched. A shudder ran through Ennis’ body like the first time he’d touched Alma’s breast and he quickly inched away.

Jack began rocking forward and back to the music on the jukebox and without knowing why, Ennis ever-so-slightly moved his thigh a little sideways until the rodeo cowboy’s calf rubbed against his.

Without breaking the intimate contact, Ennis pulled out the stub of his cigarette, nodded at Jack’s lighter in his hand and asked, “Can I?”

Jack’s eyebrows went up and he handed it to him. Their hands touched and Ennis drew in a breath, quickly lit up and handed it back, muttering, “Thanks,” withdrawing his leg.

A middle-aged man with a South American accent suddenly entered the bar, called out their names impatiently and drove them out to the drop off point a few miles away in the shadow of the mountain.



Chapter 2: No more Beans!
Jack eyed a long narrow wooden bridge above them spanning the shallow stream. It was suspended by ropes and looked sturdy enough for horses, but it’d take forever to get a thousand sheep across it single file.

Ennis had been eyeing the river but Jack knew that sheep avoided moving water and he had a hell of a time last summer getting them across, but this year he knew how and it’d go a lot faster.

He turned around to see the Chilean herders babbling in Spanish or something at each other as they painted green “brands” on each animal’s back counting them off of the trailer ramps. The sheep trucks continuously unloaded at the trailhead and a bandy-legged Basque showed Ennis how to pack the mules; two packs and a riding load on each animal, ring-lashed with double diamonds and secured with half hitches-telling him, “Don’t never order soup. Them boxes of soup are real hard to pack.”

Ennis muttered, “I don’t eat soup anyways,” and went back to tying knots.

Twist eyed the horses and chose a bay mare that looked like the calmest of the bunch, leading it on foot behind himself to a pack of dogs. Three puppies went in a basket attached to Jack’s saddle. Their mother began persistently yapping at him as he climbed up on his saddle and his horse reared up kicking at the air.

He thought Ennis had just yelled something at him, but couldn’t hear over the bitch barking.

Ennis had already picked out a big chestnut horse called Cigar Butt to ride. Being a better judge of stock, he’d passed up the mare and when he saw Jack try to mount it while a dog was barking at him he interrupted the Basque’s instructions to yell out, “Careful; that horse has a low startle point!”

After finally getting his steed under semi-control and riding up to a skittish stop barely astride the mildly bronking mare, Jack smirked down at him and bragged, “Ain’t no mare that can throw me!” Nodding at the South American, he added, “That’s his job; you want to stand there tying knots or get the hell up the mountain?”

Ennis shrugged, mounted his horse and followed.

Half an hour later, Ennis and Jack, the dogs, the horses and mules, a thousand ewes and their lambs flowed up the trail like dirty water running uphill through the timber and out along the tree line into the flowered meadows and the coursing, endless wind. Jack picked a trail he knew along a gurgling steam, eventually picking up a lamb that’d fallen and hurt its hoof, straddling it across his saddle.

His mare became skittish at a stream half a mile later, so he dismounted, slung the injured lamb over his shoulders and led his horse behind him through the water, muttering to himself while kicking a reluctant sheep’s ass in front of him as he went.

He glanced back to find Ennis with an “I told you so” look on his face. It was the first time he’d seen him smile.

Jack resorted to parking the mare on the other side and crossing back and forth to forcefully coax or carry the cowardly ones through or over the water while Ennis stayed mounted, instructing the dogs with high pitched and piercing whistles through his teeth.

Jack had learned last year of a strange talent he possessed of simply raising his arms straight out like a scarecrow and the sheep would automatically run the opposite direction. Trouble was, he had to keep re-crossing the damned stream repeatedly to get behind another group. He looked back to find that del Mar had a little one hanging from a bag at his right thigh.

Jack hated sheep because he was raised in the cowboy way and real cowboys hated sheep.

Ennis on the other hand considered any farm animal “stock” and was indifferent to labels or breeds. Any job was a good thing, be it herding cattle, horses or sheep; they were simply things you sold and made money on, nothing more.

After another hour’s travel they settled the herd far up on a hillside allotment. Ennis scanned his surroundings in satisfaction, while Jack tended to a sheep's hoof. Though it was distant, they could see from the herd down to the campsite. When they were satisfied the flock would stay put, the dogs were left to baby-sit and the two cowboys rode together back down about half a mile and got the big camp tent up on the Forest Service’s platform, secured the kitchen and the grub boxes.

Then they worked together cutting down small trees for firewood, barely speaking a word between them, always glancing back up the mountain to make sure the flock was grazing and still. Jack got busy splitting logs with a mighty swing of a new axe, while Ennis set up the iron fire grate for cooking.

Later as they finished up, Twist hoped the rancher was a better cook than he was a talker as he hauled two buckets of water up from the stream.

That evening, Jack wanted to stay in camp, but rode off up the mountain to join the flock for the night anyway. Alone with the mountain by himself, he fell deep in thought about the stirring in his loins when Ennis’ thigh touched his.

Jack wasn’t no faggot, that he was sure of because of an incident that happened with the kid from last year. He distracted himself by thinking about a female barrel rider he’d had his eyes on in Texas last spring. Whenever he came to a clearing though, he looked down the valley to see Ennis’ cook fire and wondered why the ranch hand’s rare smiles seemed to warm him.


...In the dark the young man tried to find the right key as he stood outside the office trailer. After two more tries he got it. Entering quickly he pulled the door closed behind him and switched on the lights. The clock over the clipboards read 2:20 AM.

At the desk he shuffled through the papers and found only inventory sheets, updates from the U.S. Forest Service and an empty pack of smokes.

On the wall behind him, he scanned the clipboards and found it. He switched on the desk lamp and read the top application with a W2 attached and shook his head. He knew everything he needed to know about Jack Twist.

Flipping the page he found what he was looking for and pulled a notepad out. As he wrote he said out loud slowly "Ennis del Mar" and frowned. His mind wandered back about three years ago to being introduced to an Ennis in high school but the guy disappeared for some reason.

He wondered if anything would happen between this Ennis and Jack.

As he switched the light back off again and locked up, he mumbled again, "Ennis del Mar?". Maybe his photo'd be in an old yearbook. Deep in thought he climbed back into his father's Rambler and drove off...


...Ennis got a fire going against the night’s cold and bunked down in his camp tent. Neither got much sleep, both wondering separately what had happened back in the bar, trying to figure out the compulsion to flirt with each other.

The next morning, Jack headed down for breakfast. His grin at seeing the ranch hand faded when he noticed two open cans of beans bubbling over the campfire’s grate, but the smell of coffee brightened his mood. Ennis lifted the lid of another pan by the fire that had been left there to keep warm and revealed eggs and fried potatoes.

It came out of his mouth before he realized what he was saying. “I’m in love!” he gasped and took a filled plate from Ennis.
Jack said he couldn’t wait to get a spread of his own so he wouldn’t have to “put up with Aguirre’s bullshit no more”.

Ennis claimed to be saving money for a small spread of his own; which meant a tobacco can with two five-dollar bills inside. He told him how he’d planned to marry Alma when he came back down from the mountain.

After only a few days, they fell into a pattern, each feeling he could trust the other’s abilities. Ennis had never done this before, but he was used to hunting, fishing, camping out and fending for himself. Ennis’ sister had taught him basic cooking, so he could fry up eggs and simple things out of cans, sticking mostly to what he knew.

Not knowing Jack’s distain for them, he heated beans over the fire with whatever else he cooked and had a stream cooled bottle of whiskey or a couple of beers waiting for Jack at breakfast and supper. He eventually experimented with some redi-mix dough and fried some biscuits to go with eggs and some potatoes he’d peeled. They’d usually turn out as hard as rock, but he kept trying and eventually he got it right, warmed by the fact that Jack seemed to appreciate the effort.

By the end of the week, Jack was already bitching about Joe Aguirre’s sleep-with-the-sheep-and-no-fire order. He also showed how stubborn he could be by refusing to pick out one of the other spare horses, which would be admitting he made a mistake selecting the bay mare. “Ain’t no mare that can throw me!”

In the morning he’d saddle her and she’d always buck, nearly throwing him as she wheeled around and it was the first time Jack saw Ennis laugh, “I warned you!” he declared, as the rodeo cowboy just barely stayed in the saddle, his steed abruptly galloping off as if it were determined to leave him behind.

Throughout the day Ennis kept feeling that odd yearning he couldn’t name. He was always alone with his thoughts, basically because he’d always been taught not to share them. He’d roll up his jeans to his calves, wade into the stream, and while cleaning the breakfast pans, would look up across a great valley to the distant hillside and sometimes spotted Jack, a small dot moving across the high meadow like an insect moving across a tablecloth.

Later, Jack too would pause often in his dark camp to see Ennis’ night fire, a red spark on the huge black mass of mountain and wonder why he yearned for his new friend’s company. He’d shrug if off as making sure he knew what direction camp was in.

They settled deeper into the routine reluctantly, but surely.

Several times over the next few days, Jack would spot a coyote stalking the herd and shoot at it, missing every time, cussing under his breath and glad Ennis wasn’t there to witness it. More often than not he’d lay on his back using a log for a pillow and doze, guarded by one of the now almost grown puppies. The false alarms were becoming more frequent as the sheep seemed to bleat at anything and he began relying on the dogs to alert him when a wolf or coyote showed up, which had become increasingly more often as they learned where the herd was bedded down.

About all he could do was shoot at the predators and hope the sound scared them off, which luckily it did. Unfortunately it also sometimes scared the skittish sheep into running too. Jack blamed the rifle’s bent sites for all his misses, though he knew better.

Down below it’d rain often and Ennis usually passed the time in the camp tent waiting out a storm whittling this or that, and after a while settled on a little wooden horse for his future son that’d be later joined by a toy cowboy astride it that looked a lot like Jack.

Sometimes he’d hear Jack’s gun blasts and wonder what he’d gotten, but quickly deduced he’d mostly missed because the rodeo cowboy would’ve been braggin’ his head off when he came down for supper, but never did.

Friday morning, Jack squatted at the fire to eat breakfast. Another can of beans; some eggs and more of Ennis’ strange campfire biscuits. His hungry eyes strayed to Ennis without knowing why, watching him prepare the pack mules to go down for supplies.

He spotted Ennis scrawling on a piece of paper and said, “Don’t forget whiskey and beer. Don’t forget ammo for the rifle neither; lots of coyotes up there."

Ennis nodded and jotted down something.

Jack walked over, mounted his skittish horse, and farted loudly, glancing back red-faced to see if Ennis had heard. The ranch hand looked away just before their eyes met.

As he spurred the mare on, Twist yelled out in frustration, “No more beans!”

Del Mar nodded, but Twist was gone in the time it took for him to look up.



Chapter 3: Sick 'n tired of your dumb ass missin'!
The weekly trips down the mountain were something Ennis would come to enjoy and savor. He liked being alone on a good horse with the fresh pine air, birds singing and a tune to hum, punctuated by the calls of an elk or a bear off in the distance or a hawk high above.

As he neared the bottom of the trail and spotted the bridge, he checked his watch and smiled; he’d made good time.

He considered buying the horse from Aguirre because he’d come to like the mare a lot, though he didn’t have much cash to offer. What little he had would have to go towards supporting Alma and probably a kid soon, but he figured that with the pay he’d earn up here, maybe he could manage it.

Half an hour later he stood frowning while checking off his list with the Chilean herder after packing the mules.

“Something wrong?” the man asked with a heavy South American accent.

Ennis responded, “Yeah, uh, what happened to the powdered milk, and we only got one bag of spuds, where’re the other two?”

“Sorry, dat’s all we got.”

Del Mar shrugged and handed him the list from his pocket muttering, “There’s next week’s.”

Looking it over the Chilean frowned, “I thought you didn’t eat soup?”

“Well I’m sick of beans.”

He smiled back knowingly, “Too early in the summer to be sick of beans.”

Ignoring him, Ennis gathered the reins and began pulling the loaded down mules behind him over to his horse. After making sure everything was secured, he headed back up the mountain.

Jack’d be pissed.

Ennis’ mind seemed to be filled lately with how much he’d taken to Jack, and reminding himself not to let his feelings go too far because they’d have to part company in only a couple of months and go their separate ways, probably never to see each other again. That happened a lot in his young life, so he’d guarded himself against letting anyone get too close to him.

Del Mar had let his guard slip only once… with Alma, and that’s what puzzled him, because he seemed to be having the same feelings about Jack.

He remembered waking up yesterday with a hard-on, as all young men his age did and began pulling and rubbing thinking about her. He didn’t want to get her pregnant, so had always fucked her from behind. Without realizing it, Jack had somehow entered his fantasy. Ennis' hand once again caressed up the taunt inner thigh of Twist's leg. Just as he came in loud gasps, he realized he was thinking of Jack bucking wildly under him and sat bolt upright in a cold sweat.

His daddy taught him well what happened to men who had “faggot” thoughts.

Bringing himself back to reality on the upward trail through the forest, Ennis realized he’d been so deep in thought that he’d made it about halfway up the mountain. Distracted when one of the mules in tow began resisting as they came up on a narrow mountain stream, but still moving forward, he turned around in his saddle to bitch at it.

Ahead of them a bear that’d stopped to drink roared a warning and stood up on its hind legs.

Cigarette Butt reared up in fear and kicked at the air in panic. Ennis got only the barest glimpse of the huge black beast before finding himself in mid-air falling first on his shoulder, then his face slammed painfully into the scattered pebbles at the edge of the stream.

Scared as hell, dizzy and near panic, he had only seconds to determine if he were about to be mauled and was relieved to see the bear running away, spooked by the horse probably.

In the moment’s distraction the mules ran off hawwing into the woods scattering the packs of supplies everywhere followed close behind by his horse. Cussing his head off, Ennis took off after them, concentrating on Cigarette Butt because he needed the rifle in case the damned bear had company…

...Near dusk, Jack had come down from the herd for supper only to find an empty camp and Ennis nowhere to be found. Then he remembered it was Friday so he must be late coming back up from getting supplies. He cussed under his breath.

As hungry as he was, even if Ennis showed up at that moment it’d take half an hour or more just to make something to eat and he was in no mood to settle for cold beans.

After an hour and almost half a bottle of whiskey, he didn’t know if he was more worried or pissed at his stomach growling. By the light of the campfire he’d just lit, he scavenged together a couple of potatoes to boil and one can of beans from what little they had left. He’d come to know Ennis well enough to figure he could take care of himself and knew better than to go looking for him. Best to stay put in case Ennis come back and then set off searching for Twist. Two people won’t find each other unless one waited where he could be found, so he sat and waited… reluctantly.

A little after darkness settled he finished the can of damned beans. At least his stomach had stopped growling.

Now more worried about Ennis than pissed, he decided not to go back up to the herd and after making a third circuit of the immediate area and checking the tent for a note, he settled back in front of the fire.

A twig cracked somewhere behind him and he reached for his rifle and looked.

Just barely in the moonlight, he spotted Ennis’ silhouette on horseback leading the mules. Letting the whiskey speak for him, he got up angrily as del Mar got painfully down from his steed.

“Where the hell have you been?” he spat out impatiently, as Ennis approached. “I come down hungry as hell and find nothing here but beans…”

His friend came into the glow of the fire and that’s when Twist saw that the left side of his face was scabbed over with dried blood. His anger swiftly changed to concern, “Jesus, Ennis; what happened?”

As del Mar groaned to a seated position on a log, Jack pulled his neckerchief off, dipped it in a kettle of warming coffee water and approached his friend with the canteen.

“I come up on a bear is what happened.” Waving away the canteen, he asked, “You got any whiskey?”

Jack reached it over as Ennis added, “God damned horse spooked, threw me, and the fuckin’ mules took off running, spilling supplies all over the place.”

Jack moved intimately close and began dabbing gently at Ennis’ head with the rag. Del Mar took it from him and rubbed away most of the dirt, wincing from the pain and added, “About all we got left is beans.”

Ennis wrung out the rag and poured whiskey on it and then dabbed at his sideburn some more, using it as an antiseptic, wincing as the alcohol stung.

Jack looked pissed. “Well we gotta do something about this food situation,” he said and then after a moment of thought added, “Maybe I’ll shoot one of the sheep.”

Ennis stopped dabbing at his cuts long enough to huff, “And what if Aguirre finds out, huh? We’re supposed to guard the sheep Jack, not eat ‘em.”

Jack shook his head and sat down beside him. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked with a smirk, “There’s a thousand of em up there, Aguirre would never know.”

Ennis looked away, “I’ll stick with beans.”

As if to close the argument before it damaged their friendship, Jack declared, “Well I won’t.”

That night Jack rode out of camp without a word...


...The next morning, Ennis had nothing to offer for breakfast but beans, so he waited for Jack to come down. When he did, they set off together. Within an hour they’d spotted a couple of deer and a wild turkey, but Jack kept missing and scaring them off with his gun blasts and everything else within earshot too. Then they’d have to move somewhere else and wait again and again and again through the morning into the afternoon.

Twist was getting more and more pissed off and embarrassed in front of del Mar and turned to leave for camp to get some fishing rods.

In frustration, Ennis grabbed the rifle away from him and within another hour had spotted himself a praiseworthy Elk. Beside him, Jack hadn’t seen it yet through the thick undergrowth of the forest and was still bitching about the sites on the rifle.

“Shhhhhhhut up!” warned Ennis in a harsh whisper.

Closing one eye del Mar took careful aim as Jack’s eyes widened at the intended prize. Choosing his moment carefully, Ennis waited. The elk moved into his sites and the young accomplished hunter gently squeezed the trigger with a deafening blast.

…Nothing happened.

The great beast seemed to just stand there unphased by the loud sound and just as Jack was about to say “See, I told…” the elk seemed to suddenly go drunk, stumbled and fell straight down.

Jack’s jaw dropped, as Ennis sprouted a rare proud smile.

“Whooooooweeeeeee!” exclaimed Jack in glee, grinning from ear to ear.

Ennis shoved Jack sideways and said impatiently, “I was gettin’ tired of your dumbass missin’!”

Jack gave him a congratulatory hug, cheering, "We're gonna have steak tonight!"

The intimate contact sent chills through both of them. Ennis experienced an uncontrolled shudder through his whole body as Twist’s fingers ran up the valley of his spine. Jack pulled del Mar closer as they both whooped and grinned like kids.

Neither wanted to let go, but separated quickly with embarrassed glances away.

Jack turned red and grinned, “Let’s get a move on, we don’t need no Fish and Game catching us with no elk out of season!”

They spent the rest of the afternoon separately.

Ennis backtracked his path down the mountain and spotted the single bag of potatoes and a case of fresh eggs that miraculously hadn’t broken and eventually found enough food to last them a while.

He shook his head at a cardboard box of shattered glass whiskey bottles by the stream. Alone, he allowed himself to smile, thinking if anyone downstream had caught some mountain browns it’d probably be because they were too drunk to know better than to avoid his hook.

When he got back to camp he found a note saying Twist had gone off to finish butchering the elk.

He rode out and joined him in the bloody chore. Fortunately the carcass was far enough away from camp to insure unwanted visitors.

After a late good meal of fresh steaks at the campfire, Jack rode back up to bed the sheep down, leaving Ennis to dry out the meat in strips, curing it with some salt.

That night Ennis’ thoughts were filled with Alma and their future together. If he was careful, the money he’d make over the next few months would just barely cover a wedding and the start of a new life for them, but cash would be very tight.

He fell asleep thinking of her.



Chapter 4: I Think My Dad Was Right!
Ennis woke naked in his bedroll. He’d done more than just think about Alma last night and the next morning woke up hard, as usual.

His thoughts turned to Jack and the strange thrill he’d gotten from that hug that he’d given him yesterday. He closed his eyes and remembered the pleasure of Twist’s fingertips traveling his spine, lingering here and there. Somehow the memory of it reversed and Jacks fingers were now traveling downward instead to between his hips.

Within minutes he was breathing harder and harder and when his breathless gasps came in an orgasm, he felt guilty and puzzled afterward.

Laying there exhausted and spent he sat up to spot the object of his fantasy riding through the brush halfway down the mountain trail and quickly dressed.

He had about half an hour or so.


…Jack came lagging in 45 minutes later groaning and tired.

As he dismounted he complained, “I’m commutin’ four hours a day,” as he took a skillet of fresh cooked eggs, elk meat, fried potatoes and a cup of coffee from Ennis. He added, “Come in for breakfast, go back to the sheep, evening’ get em bedded down, come in for supper, go back to the sheep, spend half the night jumpin’ up and checkin’ for coyotes. By rights I should be spendin’ the night here. Aguirre’s got no right to make me do this against the rules.”

Ennis was now afraid of being alone in camp with Jack. He was afraid of what “this thing” that’d taken hold of his thoughts and fantasies might make him do before he got it under control. If Jack wanted to be down here so bad, he’d have to be up there with the sheep.

“You wanna switch?” offered Ennis. “I wouldn’t mind bein’ up there.”

“That ain’t the point. Point is we both should be in this camp. Besides, that goddamn pup tent smells like cat piss or worse.”

Damn! Try again.

“Wouldn’t mind bein' out there,” he repeated the offer.

Jack met his friend’s eyes, “Well, I’m happy to switch with you but I’ll give you fair warning I can’t cook worth shit. I’m pretty good with a can opener though.”

Ennis responded, “Can’t be no worse than me, then, huh.”

They spent the afternoon and evening planning where to set up the camp next week, after they decided to move the herd to another grazing spot. Around ten, after checking his rifle, Ennis mounted Cigar Butt, who he’d judged to be a good night horse.

Jack joined him and warned, “You won’t get much sleep, I promise you that.”

Ennis only grunted a response, clicked his cheek at the horse and silently rode off up to the sheep carrying leftover biscuits, a jar of jam and a thermos of coffee with him for the next day, saying he’d save a trip and stay out until supper.

He needed time to think this through.

That night an odd sadness came over Jack as he tried to sleep. He couldn’t name it, but suspected it had to do with how good it felt to be around Ennis’ shy friendship. Them holding each other after Ennis bagged the elk was more thrilling than he’d expected and it seemed as if they didn’t want to let go of each other.

His mind wandered back to last summer when he woke to find fingers trying to undo his jeans buttons. His whole body shuddered as he wondered what would’ve happened if he’d pretended sleep and had let the kid go through with what he wanted instead of kicking his ass and throwing him out of the tent.

This whole thing with Ennis started as a game with Jack, like a child that wasn’t allowed to have something, so he was determined to get it by hook or by crook. In this case it was coaxing a grin of out del Mar. All through the weeks they’d been up here, Jack would tell funny stories or just laugh hoping for del Mar’s smile but never got one.

Then they killed that elk.

Jack found himself craving just being around the ranch hand and was disappointed when instead of staying in camp, Ennis offered that switch derailing his hoped plan to keep them together more often.

If he closed his eyes he could feel Ennis’ strong hard-as-a-tree-trunk chest, and his lithe back again enclosed in his arms, their chins on each other’s shoulders, thrilling as his sinewy muscles writhed beneath Jack’s touch.

That night Twist did some gasping of his own and it wasn’t from thinking about that pretty barrel rider in Childress.

Just as he reached climax a gun blast sounded far in the distance in the direction of the sheep…

...Later the next afternoon, del Mar came back down the mountain, stripped off his shirt and began shaving. “Got me a coyote last night,” he told Jack casually with a hint of pride, sloshing his face with hot water, lathering up soap and scraping his beard off while Jack peeled potatoes. “Big son of a bitch; he had balls on him the size of apples. Looked like he could eat a camel. You want some of this hot water? There’s plenty.”

It irked Jack that Ennis bagged the damned coyote that he’d missed so many times. He gingerly picked up a can of beans that’d been heating on the grate and took the opener to it. The red sauce spat out of it as the opener pierced the tin and sprayed all over him.

“It’s all yours,” said Jack disgusted, indicating the kettle, clumsily dropping the hot can back down on the grate. He found himself fighting the sudden urge to explore the ranch hand’s naked torso with his eyes.

“Well, I’m gonna warsh everything I can reach,” he said, pulling off his boots, jeans and everything else till he was crouched naked at the fire slopping the green washcloth lathered with soap.

Jack began to panic, not understanding the strange desire he still felt to watch Ennis as he rubbed and probed every part of his naked muscular body. It was a fight but his eyes dared not move, though he could see him out of the corner of his eye. He nicked his thumb with the knife not paying attention to what he was doing, cussed under his breath and turned away to suck at it, drying it with his shirtsleeve.

While his back was turned, Ennis moved away and Jack finally spotted him a few moments later on a log bridge still naked and about to dive into the stream to rinse off.

What he didn’t know was that Ennis had felt Jack’s attention and began to harden. While the rodeo rider’s attention was diverted by the cut, the ranch hand fled to the stream.

For a brief terrifying moment his mind wandered to a scene he’d witnessed as a boy of an old man who’d been beaten to death in a dried out irrigation ditch.

The sound of the stream beneath him brought him back to reality and he dove off the bridge into the cold mountain water.

Later that afternoon they got another campfire going to fight off the coming evening chill. Ennis would have to leave soon to go tend the sheep overnight but Jack didn’t want him to go.

Ennis had just settled down to warm his hands around a galvanized coffee cup in front the flickering flames.

Jack returned from taking a piss.

When Ennis looked up at his friend standing above him, Twist jutted his hips forward, proudly clinking the chromed prize bull-riding belt buckle with his fingernail. “You rodeo much?”

Ennis shook his head no. “Not more’n once or twice. Couldn’t see the point in riding a piece of stock for only eight seconds.”

As Jack settled down in front of the fire, his eyebrows rose considering, “The prize money’s a good reason,” he responded, pushing his worn boots closer to the flames to warm his feet.

“Yeah, if you don’t get stomped to death in the process.”

Jack shrugged unable to argue because if he’d really been any good at it, he wouldn’t be here babysitting sheep. “My dad was a pretty well known bull rider in his day,” he said. “But he kept the secrets of his success to himself, he never taught me a thing, and never once come to see me ride.” Not wanting to see their conversation end, he thought a moment and then asked, “Your brother and sister do right by you?"

Raising the metal cup of coffee to his lips to take a sip, Ennis paused in thought and then replied, “Well, after my parents died the bank took the ranch and we was left with a coffee can with twenty-four dollars in it… I was fourteen then. I got me one of them hardship licenses so I could drive back and forth to high school but the transmission went on the pickup, so there went any hope of graduating. After that, we sorta moved around for a couple of years and my sister, she married her a roughneck and they picked up stakes and moved to Casper. My brother and me, we got a job on a ranch near Worland but then he got married when I turned nineteen and… no more room for me,” he paused to take another sip of coffee and added, “And that’s how I wound up here.”

Ennis looked up and saw Jack giving him an odd sideways smile, like the kind of look you give to a little boy who’s just said something cute. They locked eyes for a couple of moments. Ennis couldn’t figure out the look Jack was still giving him, and asked, “What?”

Jack’s face broke out in a grin. “Friend; I believe that’s the most you’ve said at one time in two weeks.”

Del Mar only shrugged, met his eyes and said, “Hell that’s the most I’ve said in a year,” and then added, “My dad, he was a fine roper… He didn’t rodeo much though; he thought all rodeo cowboys were fuck-ups.”

Jack frowned, straightened and considered whether he’d just been intentionally insulted. He decided he hadn’t, so he responded smoothly with a sideways glance, “Like hell we are.”

An uncomfortable silence ensued that Jack felt needed broken, so he suddenly jumped to his feet, stuck his face down close to Ennis’ and abruptly yelled, “Yeeeeee Hawwwwww!” nearly startling the coffee out of del Mar’s cup.

Moving around behind him, Twist started bucking his legs, jolting up and down like there was a bull under him, and called out in an announcer's voice, “There he is folks; world champion bull rider Jack Twist!”

Ennis grinned back over his right shoulder at Jack and shook his head disapprovingly, “There he goes!”

Twist had his reward; Ennis’ laughing smile broad and happy and the sight of it shot pure joy through Jack’s body like good whiskey.

Jack continued undaunted, jumping around backwards, waving his hat at an imaginary stadium full of fans, “He’s on a world record ride folks, wavin’ at all the pretty girls in the stands and…”

Suddenly he fell backwards tripping over some camp supplies landing flat on his ass to the clattering of pots and pans with a loud and embarrassed laugh.

Struggling to lift his head, he found Ennis shaking his in mock disapproval and calling out over his shoulder, “I think my dad was right!”

After another half an hour, Ennis got up and headed toward his horse, mounted it, and rode off up the mountain.

Jack sat pondering the fire wondering once again why he was so sad to see the ranch hand leave and trying not to admit to himself that he knew. The craving friendship that Jack felt for Ennis was love; it was the only word he knew that would fit. Jack had spent so much time wanting to please him, craving his approval and desiring his touch. Jack wasn’t queer; he knew that, but maybe he was a little, but only for Ennis.

The ride up the to the herd was spent humming a happy tune on the ranch hand’s part. They were respectful of each other’s opinions, each glad to have a companion where none had been expected. Ennis, riding against the wind back up to the herd in the hazy bright moonlight, thought he’d never had such a good time and felt he could paw the white right out of the moon.



Chapter 5: Damned Tent Don’t Look Right
The next week, it grew warmer and they moved the herd farther up the mountain to new pasture. Their camp was now closer to the sheep. While getting settled in, Jack argued that they were far enough up the mountain that if Aguirre wanted to check up on them the distance would discourage him, and that they could safely stay in camp together instead of one here and one there.

Ennis disagreed.

Afterward, del Mar busied himself setting up the camp tent, while Jack lay on his back against a log, lazily playing a harmonica.

Between Jack’s sour notes, Ennis stood back, studied his work and complained, “Damned tent don’t look right.”

Jack paused playing. Without looking over his shoulder he replied as if he were bored with listening to him bitch, “Leave it be, it ain’t goin’ nowhere,” and went back to playing some barely recognizable tune.

As he adjusted a pole further out, del Mar glanced over at the back of Twist’s hat and added, “That harmonica don’t sound right neither.”

Jack stopped long enough to reply, “Well… it got kinda bent when the horse threw me.”

Ennis chuckled and sarcastically objected, “I thought you said that mare couldn’t throw you, huh.”

Jack cocked his head back and declared, “Welllllll, she got lucky.”

Ennis shook his head and countered, “If I’d got lucky, that harmonica woulda got squarshed too.”
Jack thought a second and laughed, then went back to playing.

Their friendship had gotten to the point where they could joke around and fling half-hearted insults at each other and it felt good, damned good.

They worked together through the afternoon putting away the new load of supplies and then settled down in a meadow that looked up into the mountains, sharing a bottle of whiskey.

Jack half succeeded in pulling a squalling tune out of the harmonica, but finally gave up and put it away.

After a good meal, Jack suddenly remembered it was Sunday and almost startled Ennis sitting next to him off of his log by abruptly yelling out an old hymn with dirge slowness. Ennis reached over and grabbed a twig and with a grin began half-heartedly keeping time banging it against the coffee pot. After another encouraged minute Jack ended it with, “…I know I'll meet you on that judgment day, water-walking Jesus, take me awaaaaaaaaaaay”, hoping it was loud enough to echo off a nearby cliff.

Ennis pounded the pot enthusiastically out of rhythm almost as if he were applauding and remarked dryly, “Very good.” and then rewarded Jack with another warm smile.

Twist took a swig from the second whiskey bottle they’d been sharing and nodded, “My mama taught me that… She believes in the Pentecost.”

Ennis shrugged, took a swig of the bottle Jack just offered and asked in a puzzled tone, “What exactly is the Pentecost? My folks were Methodists.”

Jack seemed to be lost for an answer and frowned, saying in an embarrassed tone, “I… I’m not sure. I don’t know what the Pentecost is; she never explained it to me. I, I… guess it’s when the world comes to an end and sinners like us go marching off to Hell.”

Ennis scoffed, “Well, I don’t know. You may be a sinner, but I ain’t yet had the opportunity.”

Jack raised his eyebrows skeptically and tossed the empty bottle towards the tent. He’d clean them up later.

As the shadows grew longer, their friendship grew stronger.

As the alcohol flowed, Jack wanted more and more to tell Ennis about the feelings that he’d started having for him, but didn’t dare for fear of rejection or possibly the same over-reaction he gave the kid last year.

Night fell some time later and after a few hours more of laughing and drinking Jack began yawning loudly.

Del Mar felt lightheaded and was shocked when a giggle escaped his mouth. He gestured wildly toward the distant mountaintop as if he were trying to pull it down to within walking distance. He clumsily tried to get up, but finally settled for crawling off balance toward his horse on hands and knees.

Shaking his head in resignation, he paused worried he was about to fall over. “Too… it’s uh… too late to go up to them damn sheep,” declared Ennis in a slurred voice, pointing vaguely towards the trail, dizzy drunk on all fours. In a low moan he struggled to stay upright and fell over on his side.

The mountain cold had set in and they could see their own breath now. By then the full moon had notched past two in the morning. The meadow stones glowed blue-white and a sharp stiff wind worked over the wild grasses, scraped the fire low and then ruffled it into yellow silk streamers.

Somewhere in the distance a wolf howled out as if calling to its pack and after a moment several more joined in.

Laying there, Ennis was nearly helpless to get up, but he managed to struggle to one elbow and asked, “Got, I, You, Um you got a extra blanket? I’ll just roll up out here and grab four, uh forty winks and uh ride out at first light.”

Jack shrugged and staggered toward the tent commenting, “You’ll freeze your ass off when that fire dies down. Better off sleepin in the tent.”

“Oh, uh, I doubt I’ll feel nothin.”

Jack shrugged and went in, grabbed a blanket and tossed it to a crawling Ennis as he groaned, lost his balance again and toppled over on his side next to the fire. As a rack of wispy clouds threatened to obscure the full moon, an owl hooted. The campfire soon became only dull red embers...


...An hour later, Jack got up and went out to lay tenderly outside beside Ennis by the campfire, pulling the blanket around them trying to warm his friend. Ennis rolled over in the cold, facing him and kissed Twist tenderly. As they both shivered together Jack felt Ennis’ hand travel down his chest and begin to unbuckle his jeans. Transfixed, Jack began to harden. Suddenly Ennis begin gasping for air, moaning in pain and shivering in passion…

Jack sat bolt upright in the tent, covered in a cold sweat and realized he was dreaming… another one of “those” dreams and he cocked his head listening for what woke him up but heard nothing but the wind. Just as he was about to lay back down and try to recapture the dream where he’d left off, Ennis groaned again and gave out a shivering breath through clattering teeth.

Jack’d never get any sleep like this.

Parting the tent flaps, he yelled out in an annoyed tone, “Ennis!!!”

The ranch hand jerked awake and in a weak shivering voice replied, “What?”

“Jesus Christ, Ennis quit yammering and get your ass in here. Bedroll’s big enough,” he yelled in an irritable sleep-clogged voice.

In no position to argue, Ennis got up dizzily, grabbed his blanket and wove to the tent, knocking over and spilling the coffee pot in the process, killing what was left of the fire.

Inside the tent, Jack unzipped the bedroll and after pulling off his boots, Ennis wiggled in. It was just big enough and warm enough for two grown men to tightly fit in it but they’d have to sleep intimately close.

In a little while they fell back asleep as the full moon crawled farther across the sky outside.

With their combined body heat, in no time it got progressively warmer in there. First the extra blankets came out and were rolled up to make better pillows and then their coats and eventually their shirts came off too.

With the front of Ennis’ chest now pasted to Jack’s back by hot sweat, it was only natural in the name of comfort that sooner or later del mar’s arm came up and over Twist’s side and his palm rested across Jack’s pecs.

Ennis felt his breath quickening as the friction of his hand began to harden Jack’s right nipple. Alma’s did that too and for some reason he never knew that men got nipple erections, so he left his hand there.

In the silence they both pretended sleep, but that wasn’t all that was hardening.

Ennis’ gentle breath felt good on the back of Jack’s neck and he snuggled closer in their embrace.

Finally Jack could no longer take it. He couldn’t understand the want welling deep inside of himself but he wasn’t going to fight it either. He groaned and moved his body up. Ennis’ hand absently strayed down his bare stomach to Jack’s denim covered crotch.

This time it wasn’t a dream.

Jack took hold of the hand and pressed Ennis’ fingers down firmly against his rock-hard erection.
Both stayed that way for what seemed like an hour but was only a few minutes. In his sleep, Ennis’s hand absently rubbed there for a moment and then traveled ticklishly up Jack’s abs to grip his developed pecs one at a time, marveling again at how hard the nipples were. In his drunken slumber they were Alma’s tits.

As Jack’s breathing became labored, Ennis’s palm slowly roved back down and his fingertips probed inside Twist’s jeans just beneath his belt buckle. Ennis’s arms tightened around the desirable body he was blindly embracing and as they did his hand slipped deeper until it rested over the pulsing, oozing head of Jack’s raging hard-on.

Jack breathed a soft pleasured sigh and reached back to pull Ennis’ head forward and felt the young ranch hand’s lips brush the nape of his neck.

Half consciously, Ennis nuzzled him, moving his hand deeper and left it there until he realized where it was and what he was doing. Ennis jerked his hand away as though he’d touched fire.

Within moments, unspoken, unplanned, and unhesitating, the zipper of the sleeping bag was torn open along with Jack’s buckle and jeans buttons. The hell with all this denying what they’d been fantasizing about for weeks now with no release. Ennis got to his knees, unbuckled his belt and shoved his pants down. Then he hauled Jack onto all fours, shucked down his jeans and with the help of the clear slick of pre-cum and a little spit entered him with a pleasured groan from behind.

It was something he’d done with Alma before so she wouldn’t get pregnant prior to their getting married, so no instruction manual was needed. Ennis closed his eyes, still half asleep and it was Alma he was fucking not Jack.

They went at it at first in silence, except for a few sharp intakes of breath and Ennis withdrew completely and then reentered, both of them thrilling at the sensation.

As the alcohol haze began lifting, Ennis realized it was Jack he was fucking but it was too late to stop now, he was getting closer and closer; too close to stop as that roaring tingling sensation began building behind his pubic hair. The base of his cock felt white hot and as it felt better and better, he became bolder and bolder, thrusting ever harder and faster determined to keep his manhood by completely dominating Jack.

This wasn’t love, nor was it passion, just animal lust drowned in mutual youthful loneliness and pure male horniness.

Without knowing why, when Ennis felt close to shooting his load, he reached around under Twist’s bucking hips to begin working Jack’s swelling cock because he needed and craved the thrill of holding it again. He couldn’t be sure over his loud breathing, but Twist seemed to be whispering, “Harder! Harder!”

Ennis wasn’t clear if he wanted to be masturbated harder or fucked harder, so he did both.

Their breathing got more urgent and then their gasps came in unison as if they’d joined somehow and became one. Each time Ennis withdrew for another stroke, Jack pushed his hips backward to keep him in there to not allow the contact to break, to make it last forever if he could.

Jack thrilled that it didn’t hurt; not one bit. Ennis was rubbing Jack’s prostate from within, driving them both into a frenzy of ecstasy.

Ennis’ hips rhythmically slapped against Jack’s ass cheeks loudly and got faster and faster as did his fist around Jack’s throbbing erection. He worked on holding back shooting his load until Jack was ready. It became important to him that they come together, to experience each other’s joy as one.

Jack finally choked out “Gun’s goin off,” and Ennis screamed at the top of his lungs as he lunged forward in a final thrust and choked out more babbled gasps as his loins emptied, feeling as if he’d never stop cumming, fighting desperately to get his breath back.

Jack collapsed forward in a pool of his own sperm and at first faked sleep, and then dozed off completely spent, happier than he could ever remember being. He felt as if Ennis was trying to crush him under his weight and it felt thrilling, as if it was where he’d always belonged.

Eventually, Ennis was so exhausted; he fell on his side away from Jack and silently suffered the feelings he couldn’t name that most young men have after an orgasm. Confusion rocked his conscience until he eventually fell asleep himself…



Chapter 6: I ain't queer
Ennis woke on his side with the deep blue dawn. With a groan he found that his pants were down around his thighs, and he had a massive and painful hangover. It was then that he realized that he’d rolled over in his sleep and was cradling a warm and naked body in his arms from behind. His morning erection was nestled in a tight warm place and he moaned in sleepy pleasure remembering how he’d wake up like this with Alma while still in her, still hard, then would give her a few strokes till he came and...

With a start, he realized who he was inside of and carefully moved backward withdrawing, hoping not to wake him.

Then he remembered what he’d done last night.

Parting the tent flaps to look out, he squinted at the bright light, realized it was the next morning and silently pulled his pants back up, fumbled with the loud belt buckle, then slipped out of the tent feeling like an escaping rapist who’d fallen asleep with his victim and was fleeing before he was discovered.

Jack crawled out a few minutes later, dressed to his hat and without even exchanging glances; he stood silently at the tent flaps tucking his shirt in.

The loud clack of the rifle as Ennis checked his ammo brought Jack out of his thoughts. Twist started striding towards del Mar’s back as he shoved the rifle into its saddle sheathe and mounted.

As much of a question as a comment, Jack said softly, “See ya for supper.”

Ennis spurred his horse and took off toward the herd without a word and barely a glance back.

They both suffered through the morning, each in his own way.

In Ennis’ case, he rode quietly, deep in tormented thought. Jack would never-could never forgive being raped last night. How would Ennis ever be able to face him again? Del Mar fought a stinging, welling up in his eyes because he’d done something horrific to a man he’d considered his friend and now he’d have an enemy for the next couple of months.

What if Jack rode down the mountain and reported him to the sheriff while he was up here tending the sheep? He’d be arrested, ruined, maybe even lynched. His marriage plans to Alma would be destroyed.

What had he done?
Why had he done it?

Had he started it, dreaming of Alma and in his slumber blindly used Jack to replace her; then when he woke up he’d gone too far to stop?

It was something he never even considered before… something he’d been thoroughly taught was evil and that he’d surely go to hell for. If anyone found out they’d kill him, just like his father killed them two queers that were ranched up together when he was a boy. His father taught him that kind of “thing” was like a cancer that had to be cut out before it spread.

Ennis suffered an uncontrollable shudder just thinking about it.

No, he couldn’t be one of those, he just couldn’t be!

For the whole ride up the rocky trail, he could think of nothing else and tried to figure out a way to apologize to Jack but the words wouldn’t come. His mind kept wandering back to how good it felt; so natural, so… right to hold Jack in his arms. Something wasn’t right about the whole thing though; it was almost as if Twist had enjoyed being fucked.

As he cleared the crest of a hill overlooking the herd, he heard a dog crying…


…Jack watched him ride away.

Did he really get Ennis drunk on purpose and then seduce him?

Why?

All Jack knew was that it felt right but it wasn’t, was not anything he’d ever even considered doing. Clearly Ennis blamed him for it. Jack had worked so hard to get Ennis’ friendship, and now it was all in ashes. Del Mar wouldn’t even speak to him when he rode off.

Jack tried to distract himself by setting out some ingredients for that night’s meal, which he’d long before planned special. He opened a few cans, added some water and spices, and lowered the lid over the cast iron kettle, moving it slightly off the fire to cook slowly through the afternoon like he’d seen his mother do many times.

One thing was for sure, this would have to be resolved or the next couple of months would be unbearable.

This couldn’t wait until supper.

His ass was burning and itching something awful, and he lowered his jeans to the acrid smell of shit. He undressed completely and took a couple bars of Ivory soap to the stream, dragging the bedroll with him.

Naked, he first washed himself, then used a stick to rub and beat the shit out of the seat of his pants, rubbed the soap all over them and the sleeping bag.

Later he hung them over a makeshift tripod above the cook fire to dry.

His mind kept straying back to how good it felt to have Ennis’ arms around him and how little the fucking had hurt; amazed that after a few seconds it actually began to feel damned good, as if his life centered around a spot just behind his pubic hair.

Despite the number of girls he’d fucked, and there were many, he’d never felt that sensation before and like a potent drug, he wanted, no-needed, no-craved it again.

Standing there naked, his eyes wandered to the flock up above and to the right, but he couldn’t see Ennis up there.

He didn’t know how he felt, much less how Ennis felt, because he’d never been taught words that described what he was going through, but this was a bull that had to be ridden now or never.

Lifting the kettle, he stirred his concoction again and was amazed at how good it smelled.

He pulled on his clothes, now smelling fresh of soap and came up with an excuse to ride up to see him. Jack packed up a couple of bacon and egg sandwiches and a thermos of hot coffee in his saddle bag to replace Ennis’ missed breakfast, mounted the mare and took off toward the high pasture.

He’d figure out what to say on the way up there…


…Glancing around quickly, Ennis spotted the young dog whining next to a nearly hollowed out and bloody corpse of one of the lambs. Spurring Cigar Butt, he rode as fast as he could down to the herd in case the wolf was still there.

He spent most of the afternoon tracking down the son of a bitch by the blood trail, killed it and strung it up by it’s feet on a tall pole to warn off anything else that came near.

For the next hour he sat with the herd, not understanding why the death of that poor lamb hit him so hard until he realized it wasn’t that; it was how he felt about Jack that was tearing him apart.

One of the dogs came over and appeared to try to comfort him, whining and licking his face. Ennis stroked its head and fell into a deep dark brooding.

Sometime later while Ennis was still deep in thought, the dog jerked his head and Ennis glanced up on the hillside to see what had caught its attention. In the cloudy sky stood the silhouette of Jack Twist, carrying his rifle.

It was a very rare occasion when Ennis felt scared and this was one of them. At this range, considering what he’d seen of Jack’s rifle skills, he knew that even if he tried, Twist would never hit him.

If the roles were reversed and Jack had raped him, would he go gunning for him? He nodded to himself that he probably would’ve, and then walked over to his horse and pulled his rifle out.

He decided instead of riding up the hill, he’d walk to his friend and maybe take what was coming to him, what he thought he deserved.

Better by Jack’s hand than end up in some drainage ditch after torture and a lynching. In the space of fifteen minutes, del Mar strode straight up the steep grassy hill, never letting Twist out of his sight.

Halfway there Jack put his rifle down, making sure del Mar saw him do it and lay on his side propped up on his right elbow facing away from Ennis’ advancing figure, surrounded by sheep on all sides, bleating, grazing and sleeping.

Jack heard the grass rustle under foot and looked up at him as Ennis came up close. Ennis passed his feet by three paces to stand in front of him facing away, presenting his back as a sacrificially offered target.

Just for one fearful moment Jack thought that Ennis had brought the rifle to shoot him. Mysteriously, the ranch hand only stood there holding the gun, but not in a way that he was about to fire it.

From behind, Ennis thought he heard Jack let out an anxious breath as if he’d been holding it for a long time and wondered what that meant.

Without knowing it, both thought the other were out for revenge, neither knowing how wrong they were.

Just for one brutal moment Ennis closed his eyes, waiting for Jack to reach for the rifle just out of his reach and put the bullet that del Mar thought he deserved into his back. He never looked back or down at Jack, but seemed to exhale a sigh of relief for some reason when all he heard was silence and the bleating of sheep.

Somewhere in the distance a hawk cried out.

They remained there in limbo, silent for a long time, not knowing what to say to each other, both watching the brown ocean of wool flow down below and around them.

Without taking his eyes off the sheep, finally Ennis crouched down on his haunches. He meant to promise that it’d never happen again and to beg his friend’s forgiveness and silence. He’d rehearsed it all the way up the mountain, but the words wouldn’t come out right so he settled for saying, “This is a one-shot thing we got going here,” meaning it as a promise that he'd never do it again, but somehow it didn't come out that way. He struggled without looking back to see Jack’s reaction.

Jack looked up at Ennis’ back from where he lay and sadly answered, “Nobody’s business but ours.”

Both were still tense but relieved that the other seemed to have forgiven the one to blame.

“You know I ain't queer,” mumbled Ennis carefully, knowing it needed to be said lest Jack think differently.

“Me neither.”

They sat like that, not speaking for about half an hour.

Finally unable to stand it anymore, Jack got up and began striding toward his horse and asked, “You hungry?”

Del Mar only nodded.

Twist reached for the sandwiches he’d transferred to his pocket, and then changed his mind. “Come on, then.”



Chapter 7: The Forever Joining of Souls
The ride down to camp was made in complete silence. They rode side by side, each adjusting their speed to keep exact pace with each other, only pausing to detour around a tree or a boulder.

Jack rebuilt a larger campfire than usual and surprised Ennis with some hunter’s stew he’d made with meat scraps, a can of tomatoes and one of peas, potatoes he’d peeled earlier and some carrots chopped into big chunks, along with some supplies and spices they’d never asked for earlier and hadn’t used.

Though Ennis wordlessly made sure Jack knew that he enjoyed the meal and appreciated the effort by eating a couple servings and mmmmmming a lot, he uttered not one single word, which worried Twist.

Needlessly though, for the ranch hand was still convinced that Jack hated him for raping him last night but was too embarrassed to report it to the sheriff or Aguirre; probably for fear of what people would say.

On the other hand, poor Jack still thought Ennis hated him for trying to turn him into a faggot or something.

Unable to find the right words, neither spoke, and as wolves and owls called out into the night, Twist finally gave up and crawled into the camp tent muttering, “G’night”, sort of hoping Ennis would follow.

When nothing happened, he peeked outside as Ennis walked slowly over to his horse, mounted it and rode away into the darkness. Jack bowed his head alone and a tear dropped from his eye. He pulled his shirt off and was just preparing to bed down for the night when from outside twigs snapped.

A bear or a wolf attracted by the smell of food?

He sat up and saw Ennis dismount, walk towards the tent but then stop in his tracks at the fire as though changing his mind.

Jack lay back down, shivering from the evening cold or from anticipation; he wasn’t sure which but waiting to see what would happen. When nothing did, he sat up and peered out through the flaps.

Ennis had sat back down on the log staring like a lost puppy into the flickering embers for what seemed like forever, sometimes looking over at the tent flap causing Jack to duck out of sight, sometimes just shaking his head as if he were really sad. He looked off toward the hillsides where he had a responsibility to be with the sheep and then at the tent, then back toward the herd.

Suddenly the loneliness and the night’s cold got the better of him and he felt himself drawn to Jack and the feelings within himself that he couldn’t understand. He closed his eyes and bowed his head in surrender, cursing under his breath.

Jack almost jumped up to comfort him when Ennis suddenly stood, as if making a decision and then slowly advanced on the tent. With his hat meekly in his hand in respect, he parted the flaps and was startled to meet Jack’s eyes right in front of him.

Both felt it, but either young man knew yet that in that precise moment their souls had been joined together by fate for the rest of their lives.

Jack drew closer, but hesitated with a lost look and without a word their eyes locked and they both knew the “one shot deal” had been canceled.

Ennis didn’t know what to do as Jack reached out and took his hat, tossing it aside. Jack only knew that he wanted to do it again, only this time with feeling. Ennis’ pent-up emotions began to spill out and his fear caused him to draw away and try to back out of the tent. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry that I… I’m so sorry, Jack.”

Jack grabbed his forearm and held it, keeping him from chickening out and tenderly whispered, “It’s alright, come and lay with me, it’s alright” as Ennis’ eyes seemed to glaze over with want. The comforting palm of Jack's hand found Ennis' cheek as they became lost in each other's eyes.

With each softly repeated “It’s alright,” that followed, something inside both of them began to heal and without voicing it they gave each other permission to explore forbidden thoughts.

With shuddering hands they embraced, knowing that the unfeeling animal sex they’d had last night was the only thing that was “a one shot deal.” As their lips met for the first time, hesitant at first, they became locked in breathless passion.

Ennis, now in tears, couldn’t stop whispering that he was sorry and suddenly drew back again, scared of the feeling he couldn’t understand and feared. As it came welling up inside of himself, Jack pulled away unsure that he’d mistaken this man’s intentions, but Ennis drew him back and Jack’s trembling hands finished pulling his new lover’s clothes off as their lips relocked in a fiery kiss.

Jack pushed him onto his back beside him and Ennis’ head fell onto his left shoulder. Letting his fears go completely, del Mar began caressing Jack’s bare chest, then his fingers strayed to his neck and then his chin.

Jack rolled over on top of Ennis, who was still shaking from pent up emotions and as their lips met again, Jack kissed him as no one had ever been kissed before.

Ennis began exploring Jack’s body again and soon they were making love, not just sex, it was love, as undeclared as it was deep, leaving them convinced that they’d never before felt this way about anyone else.

It was like falling for your first love all over again.

Jack pulled the sleeping bag’s zipper up, locking them in together and then turned his naked back to Ennis’ steel erection whispering, “do it.”

Without saying anything about it, both knew how it would go for the rest of the summer, sheep be damned.



Chapter 8: Invisible
Within the next few love-hazed days after they’d joined their souls and bodies together even further, they admitted to themselves that that’s what had happened… but not to each other.

There were many tender moments, like the morning Ennis found Jack asleep on his feet by the fire and came up tenderly behind him, wrapped him in his arms, and sweetly sang a lullaby that his mother had taught him as a boy, then pointed him toward their tent with a small push and jumped on Cigarette Butt, riding off to tend the sheep.

As Jack watched him go, he thought of him, realizing it really was “love” though he’d never dare speak it.

Neither of them would.

They never talked about the sex either but just sort of let it happen, at first only in the tent at night, then in the full daylight with the hot noon sun striking down and in the evening within the fire's glow, masculine, quick, rough, laughing and snorting, no lack of noises, but without saying the one word they felt, but that neither could say out loud. Not that it really needed to be said.

Oddly the one forbidden thing that seemed to thrill them the most was kissing, which they did often.

Ennis never did admit that most of the time he was thinking of Alma while they made love.

Twist suspected it anyway and came up with a plan. Jack tried new and progressively more daring things, like making Ennis lay completely still on his back, while he squatted over him, raising and lowering himself as if jacking Ennis off with his tight throbbing ass. Another night Jack tried oral sex but didn’t like it, but Ennis expressed how much he enjoyed it, saying it was like giving Jack his life to swallow, so Jack kept using it as foreplay, and eventually got really good at it, even acquiring a taste for it (excuse the pun).

Ennis had never volunteered to allow Jack to fuck him, so Jack never asked, though one night he tried to urge him over on his stomach to enter him but Ennis resisted, so he gave up quickly.

Del Mar even tried giving head to Twist once and they wound up in an aggressive “69” that lasted half an hour, each competing with the other to bring his partner to orgasm first but hold off on their own climax. Both stopping just before the other came, making it last, but after that night Ennis never offered again.

As men, all men straight or otherwise, they had one overriding fear of not pleasing their sexual partner, so though they’d start something they didn’t particularly like to do, once started they gave it their all for fear of failure.

They’d blissfully created their own Eden, and they were both happier than they could ever remember being their whole lives. It was as if there were only the two of them on the mountain, indeed in the whole world, their souls soaring joyously high in the brisk mountain air, looking down on the hawk’s back spreading it’s wings far beneath, and the crawling lights of cars and trucks on the plain far below, suspended above ordinary affairs and distant from tame ranch dogs barking in the dark hours.

They believed themselves invisible...

...but they were wrong.

They moved the camp again, even closer to the sheep this time, fire and all, not caring about the Forest Service rules or what Aguirre would think. The little pup tent stayed permanently rolled up behind Ennis’ saddle. They hadn’t seen a single soul since coming up here anyway, and for some reason even the wolves stayed away.

It had gotten to the point where they couldn’t stand to be apart for more than a few hours, and one or the other would come up behind him and give an affectionate hug or a peck on the back of the neck. Usually both began tending the sheep together, always keeping the flock within sight of camp.

Late one morning, Ennis came up from the stream naked from a swim to find Jack making breakfast.

It’d bothered Ennis that maybe Jack resented their unequal sexual partnership and long had tried to think of a way he could give of himself to show his appreciation. He’d been pondering the gift a long time and though hesitant, decided today was the day to find out what Jack found so enjoyable. As Twist eyed del Mar’s still wet naked lithe body hungrily, Ennis spread out a blanket on the ground near the fire and then gave him a seductive backward look as he lay spread eagle face down and waited.

Jack began breathing so hard he nearly fainted.

Before he knew it, he too was naked.

He knelt behind del Mar and was about to spit on his hand and then had a better idea-he’d apply it directly, after all Ennis had just come from washing in the stream. As Ennis began to rise up on all fours, Jack gently laid his hand on his warm firm ass and pushed him back down to lay flat again.

Ennis gasped as Jack’s face made contact with his ass cheeks as if he were using them as a pillow, gently kissing one then the other, back and forth. Ennis inhaled suddenly as Jack's finger touched his pucker and began running it up and down his ass crack briefly touching the hole.

Then he realized it wasn’t Jack’s finger, it was his tongue!

As he squirmed and moaned in forbidden pleasure, he didn’t want the sensation to end, and Jack continued for a few moments enjoying the pleasure it gave the blond ranch hand.

Then impatiently Jack straddled him before both could change their minds, and pushed forward entering him, taking his time, whispering and moaning tenderly in his ear. It was like a warm tight ring of pleasure was rolling from his cock head eventually, gradually meeting his pubic hair, as Jack's hips met his lover's soft warm ass cheeks.

Ennis only exhaled once in the beginning through a tightly clenched throat, as Jack moved forward to lower his full weight onto his back. Del Mar was determined to hide the pain of entry as Jack’s rock-hard cock slid in to the hilt again, but he seemed to relax as Twist slowed his strokes and they both found joy as he rubbed del Mar’s prostate from within with his impossibly long steel shaft.

Ennis’ grunts and pleasure-filled moans thrilled Jack into an immediate early gasping ejaculation.

Ennis grew proud with accomplishment at the sensation of every warm squirt of cum, nearly orgasming himself as Jack's throbbing cock pulsed against his prostate.

As Jack was about to withdraw, Ennis pleaded him to keep going and was temporarily mystified as his lover withdrew anyway.

Suddenly Twist grabbed del Mar’s legs and playfully flipped him roughly onto his back. Ennis’ ankles went up onto Twist’s shoulders and he was quickly but painlessly entered again. Pushing forward, Jack began slow thrusts in and out nearly crying from ecstasy and folded Ennis in half, pinning his knees back against his own shoulders, craning his neck to hold their lips together in a fiery kiss.

Jack continued his slow strokes for a long time and then tried something he’d only imagined yesterday, but never dared think he’d ever get the chance to try. If there’s one thing a rodeo bull rider has to be it’s limber, so without withdrawing he arched his back and strained down to kiss Ennis’ right nipple, then began working his way down further and tongued del Mar’s glorious abs and with a groan of determination, kissed the head of Ennis’ cock.

“Ohhhhhhhhhh” Ennis moaned in disbelief.

As Jack’s back relaxed even more, he only partially withdrew his cock from where it was buried and his determined encircling lips swallowed Ennis’ pulsating seven-inch rod down to its root, then held it until he began gagging, and as he pulled back, his still imbedded cock penetrated his lover again to the hilt.

He quickly picked up a seesawing rhythm swallowing then fucking, swallowing then fucking, never letting Ennis' warm hard shaft leave his lips as he kept stroking in and out.

Ennis began thrashing around, moaning and screaming for all he was worth, and somehow after what felt like an hour, but was actually around three minutes, Jack filled his ass yet again, as Ennis flooded his mouth with repeated gushes of cum.

They fell atop each other for a long time, gasping for air, tenderly kissing and stroking, Ennis tasting his own sperm on Jack’s lips.

Around them the pines hissed as the wind fragrantly swept through them and somewhere a crow cawed out.

About fifty yards away, within the edge of the forest, Joe Aguirre sat astride his horse, watching them through disgusted eyes glued to his 10x42 binoculars...


...To the smell of burning eggs and sausage, Jack jumped up and tended to the skillet, as Ennis took another bath at the stream, and then ran up to Jack and they frolicked naked, playfully fighting over Ennis’ white plaid shirt. Aguirre watched for another ten minutes, waiting until they’d buttoned up their jeans and shirts.

Only after Ennis went back to tend the sheep, did the foreman go riding up slowly to the camp while Jack was busy splitting firewood.

Jack had just put another piece up to split and heard a noise behind him. The sight of Aguirre on horseback instantly washed the warm smile he flashed intended for Ennis away. He swung around startled and knocked the wood that he was about to swing at off of the stump with his axe handle as the foreman just sat and stared judgmentally from above.

He’d come up to tell Jack that his mother had sent word that his uncle Harold was in the hospital with pneumonia and was expected not to make it.

“Bad news,” answered Jack, nervously looking up at him still astride his horse.

Aguirre pulled out a potent pair of binoculars and watched Ennis up on the hillside tending the herd instead of Twist, only a few hundred yards away.

“I guess there’s nothing I can do from up here," said Jack trying to recapture the foreman’s attention.

Aguirre lowered his glasses and downwardly gave Jack a sickened look that nearly froze his blood. “Nothin’ you can do down there neither, unless you can cure pneumonia.”

Jack nervously nodded, and Aguirre turned tail to ride slowly away without another word.

Had he seen them?
How long had he been there?

Maybe he hadn’t, after all they hadn’t been fired on the spot. He didn’t even mention them switching jobs against orders or breaking Forest Service rules by having a fire going this far up...


…Late that evening, the twelfth of August, they were getting ready to ride up to the herd together when an intense lightning and hail storm hit without warning. Jack had to forcefully hold Ennis back from rushing out to the sheep. Within moments they were cowering under the camp tent being pelted with golf ball sized ice stones and feeling thunder strikes seemingly only yards from them, mindful that the steel tent supports would act as lightning rods.

Later, when it was over, they rode up in the dark to find not a single sign of a thousand sheep, or where they’d gone. Ennis wanted to go look some more but Jack finally convinced him that it was useless until first light, so they bedded down together, both barely sleeping after Jack told him about Aguirre’s visit, and the binoculars.

Their relationship changed after that. Jack gave of himself because that was what he came to enjoy not because he was the weaker. Ennis was still struggling with the sexual side of their relationship and eased off till he only fucked, but never allowed himself to be entered, nor did he ever blow Jack again.

Ennis craved Jack stronger in a physical way, but Jack was more attached emotionally. As long as they stayed on the mountain, they fit together perfectly.

The only thing that saved Jack from deep resentment at the lopsidedness of it was the craving that Ennis always held in his eyes for him. Nothing else was really needed but the unexpressed and obvious want that they both felt deep in their souls.

After an hour of tracking the next morning, they finally found the herd… sort of.

The sheep had taken off west and gotten mixed in amongst a herd on another allotment. What followed was a damn miserable time over three days, involving Ennis and a Chilean herder with no English, trying to sort them out, the task almost impossible as the paint brands were worn and faint after so long.

With Jack’s continued bitching about not being able to tell them apart, Ennis turned to see him dragging a protesting ewe by her hind legs toward a makeshift pen they’d set up.

“This is impossible!” Twist loudly declared in frustration.

Over the bleating, del Mar, yelled from his horse, “We gotta keep trying Jack. The least we can do is get the count right for Aguirre.”

Jack went off running after another one, screaming, “FUCK Aguirre!”

In the midst of lassoing one, Ennis answered out of breath, “Oh yeah right, fuck Aguirre huh, that makes sense Jack. What if we have to work for him again next summer, huh, you ever think of that?”

In a disquieting way everything seemed as mixed as those two herds.

The next day they guided 990 sheep back to their own allotment. Midway there, Jack began playing his harmonica on horseback to keep from falling asleep in the saddle.

Beside him, Ennis warned sternly with a smile, “You’re gonna run them sheep off again, if you don’t quiet down!” to which Jack only chuckled and kept on playing, sour notes and all.

After a while, even the dogs began objecting in loud howls, and fearful of attracting attention from wolves, Jack finally put it away in his pocket.

When they got back, Ennis decided to sleep with the sheep from then on, despite Jack’s objections.



Chapter 9: The stairway from Heaven
Two days later Ennis woke in his little pup tent with a start to find his feet freezing cold. He stumbled shivering out in confusion to discover everything was covered in white after the first snow came early, piling up a foot in places, but was followed by a quick melt.

He rode down the mountain to camp, only to find Jack undoing the straps on the tent frame, as he spotted the food and their supplies all packed in boxes ready to be piled onto the mules.

“What the hell? Why are we movin’ camp?”

Jack looked over and said, “Aguirre came back up, told me my uncle didn’t die after all and said to bring them down.”

“What? ...Why?”

“He said an even bigger storm is coming in off the Pacific and he wants them down fast.”

“What, but, uh, that snow only lasted an hour!” he objected. “Besides, he’s cheatin’ us out of a whole month’s pay, huh!”

Still busy folding the big tent, Jack considered a moment and said, “Well, if you’re short, I can lend you some as soon as we get paid in Signal, be glad to do it. You can take your time payin’ it back.”

Ennis’ pride took hold and he answered angrily, “I ain’t in the poor house, huh; I don’t need your money.”

Jack watched him kick at some unmelted snow in a spray of white and then stride to a nearby tree stump. Sitting down upset, he grabbed an unused fire log, dug around in the dirt a moment and then absently tossed it aside.

Ennis looked around and saw that everything had already been packed and except for loading it all, they were ready to leave.

But he wasn’t. His chest tightened and his eyes began to burn painfully as he realized why he was so upset; in a day, he’d probably never see Jack again. He couldn't cry in front of Jack.

He thought he’d prepared himself for their coming separation, but not for a month or so, not in a few days-hours!

Jack watched his lover turn and walk slowly out about a hundred yards into the meadow, and then sit down in a crouch within the wet high grass on the top of a knoll, tucking his head to his knees as his arms surrounded them, the tan cowboy hat hiding his face as he began bawling his eyes out... alone. He was always alone, and now he realized that his private hidden dream of never leaving this mountain, to spend the rest of his days with Jack, was just that... a dream.

Ennis had always pretended this was all a dream, because he knew that in real life it would have to end sooner instead of later. But like a really good dream, he woke up from it before he wanted to, and longed to go back to sleep to be back in it. He knew that when he “woke” he’d have to be normal again, marry Alma and forget all about Jack.

As long as he was up here, he was free... of himself. He hadn’t prepared yet to face the fact he’d given his heart away on Brokeback Mountain... and so he wept.

Half an hour later, having finished packing the camp up by himself, Jack felt it too.

With one last tug on the ropes, and a look to see that the pack animals weren’t going anywhere, he scanned the clearing to find Ennis still sitting there. He'd steal glances of Ennis' shoulders heaving and fight to keep from running to comfort him. He had to give his friend time to let it all out. Jack would cry later ...possibly for the rest of his life.

When he couldn't stand it any longer, he reached up to his saddle and grabbed his lasso, heading toward his friend.

About ten yards from him, Jack began twirling the rope over his head neatly landing it around Ennis’ back and knees where he sat. The wind was picking up and smelled of snow, pine and wet wild grasses.

With a gentle tug on the rope, he softly said reluctantly the words he'd dreaded since falling in love so deeply, “Time to go, Cowboy.”

Del Mar stood up, pulled the lasso off over his head, brushed himself off and gave Jack a silent nod, walking ahead of him down the hill.

Jack smiled and playfully swung the rope again, this time catching Ennis’ feet, causing him to fall. Twist giggled and pounced him, meaning to give him a kiss goodbye, but Ennis struggled away and laughingly protested, “This ain’t no rodeo, you,” and began mock fighting him like a calf that didn’t want to be roped and tied.

With joyous peals of laughter and grunts, they both rolled down the hill side by side in each other’s arms struggling mischievously.

Then something happened and Ennis flipped a switch in his head, maybe because he was thinking of Alma, and he started fighting for real, circling Jack’s neck with his strong hands. Something inside of him thought that if he killed Jack, he’d kill the hurt of the coming separation and painlessly destroy the feelings he had for him.

Surprised, Jack fought back and accidentally butted Ennis’ face with his knee.

Del Mar stopped abruptly and stood up, wiping gushing blood from his nose onto his white plaid shirtsleeve and cuff. The blow had cleared his head, and he stood dazed wondering what he was thinking.

Aghast at what he’d done, Jack jumped up, pulled him close and started wiping Ennis' nose with the sleeve of his denim shirt.

Suddenly rage and confusion welled up in Ennis at acting queer for the last few weeks. Without warning, he flattened Jack with a left hook to his jaw, laying him out all curled up and moaning on the ground painfully clutching his head. Fearful of another blow, Jack finally looked up to see Ennis staggering to their horses, peeling off his shirt, wiping his nose with it and searching for his spare, jamming the bloody one into his saddlebag.

Jack came carefully over and just as he reached out for his friend, Ennis backed away from him and muttered, “Gotta piss,” and took off toward the woods while Twist waited by the horses.

When he returned, Ennis stood transfixed looking for a long time at his nose blood all over Jack’s denim shirtsleeve.

A moment later, they rode off silently. They didn’t utter a word the whole ride down. The mountain boiled with demonic energy from the sudden snowmelt, glazed with flickering broken gray cloud light; the wind combed the grass and swayed the tall pines, moaning through slit rock in a bestial drone.

As they descended the slope Ennis felt that he was in a slow motion, but headlong, irreversible fall, like an angel who’d been banished from heaven, or a child who’d been punished for a crime he didn’t commit.

Jack kept rubbing the deep bruise on his left cheek next to his eye that hurt like hell.

Ennis withdrew further into himself, becoming the stoic and nearly wordless man he was before. Jack watched it happen close to tears and helpless to do anything about it. Both men hid the heartbreak they felt.

At the trailhead, it began raining as Jack and Ennis waited at a split-rail fence. Jack bowed his head and sniffed, knowing the rain disguised the tears still running down his cheeks. The distant foreman kept giving them pissed-off looks as he supervised the herders loading the sheep, mules and horses into trucks.

Eventually he walked over with a sheaf of paper in his hand and a sour expression. “Some of these sheep never went up there with you. The count ain’t what I expected neither. You damned quee... damned ranch stiffs ain’t never no good.”

Both young men bowed their heads and looked away.

Joe Aguirre handed them both envelopes with cash in them and walked off toward his Rambler muttering something under his breath that sounded like “fuckin’ queers”.

Twist and del Mar turned to move toward him, expecting a ride back to the office trailer and Jack’s truck but he started it up and drove away before they reached it.

They hitched a ride back into Signal with the Chilean herder, and once there, Ennis silently turned to head toward the highway to thumb a ride home. He’d thought of asking Jack for one, but needed to cut the ties fast.

A sharp knife cuts the cleanest and hurts the least.

They parted without a word, but Ennis had gotten only fifteen feet on foot, when he heard the grinding of Jack’s starter.

Then he heard it again, and again.

Reversing course, he silently strode up to the truck, reached into the front of it and opened the hood. “Pump the pedal.”

After fiddling a moment he shouted, “Okay, try again, and give it just a little gas!”

The starter grinded and then caught immediately, the truck roaring in a cloud of smoke.

Ennis slammed the hood closed and when Jack jumped out to thank him, he found del Mar searching absently through his paper bag. “I can’t believe I left that damned shirt up there. Oh well, I’d never have gotten the blood out of it anyways.”

Ennis looked up to find Jack nodding, “Yeah,” and then looked away. “You gonna do this again next summer?” asked Twist with a hopeful tone, interrupting Ennis’ continued search. Jack was prepared for a fast exit and already had one leg already up in his old pickup, his arm propped over the top of the open door between them.

The wind was gusting hard and cold.

He looked away from Jack’s jaw; bruised blue from the hard punch Ennis had landed this morning, unable to settle his eyes on it for more than a second. He kept looking down, absently rummaging through his bag some more.

“Oh, Maybe not,” he answered finally. A dust plume rose and hazed the air with fine grit and Ennis squinted against it. “Like I said, Alma and me’s gettin’ married in November, so uh, I’ll try to get somethin’ on a ranch I guess... You?”

“I’m going up to my daddy’s place, and give him a hand through the winter… I might be back, if the army don’t git me.”

Ennis nodded nervously a lot and after an uncomfortable silence between them finally said, “Well, I guess I’ll see you around, huh?”

The wind tumbled an empty feedbag down the street until it swept up under the truck.

Ennis felt his heart welling up in his throat, and he decided to cut and run. Quickly, there was forty feet of distance between them. Nothing for Jack to do but drive away and as he passed Ennis on foot he looked back through the truck’s side mirror till he turned the corner.

Within no more than fifty paces Ennis felt like someone was pulling his guts out hand over hand a yard at a time. He stumbled to his knees between two utility shacks and tried to puke, but nothing came up. He didn’t want it to end with Jack, but couldn’t admit it to himself or face it either, so he did what any man would do; he began punching the wall of the building until the pain took away his unwanted thoughts.

He felt about as bad as he ever had. The throbbing in his knuckles was so intense he began sobbing. Deep inside himself he knew why he cried, but the man in him blamed it on his sore knuckles.

A cowboy on foot came up on him and silently paused to see if he could help.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” Ennis yelled ferociously, and the man retreated, figuring he was drunk.

As he ached for the comfort of Jack's strong arms and the tender caress of his lips, Ennis collapsed against the wall and bawled in despair for almost half an hour.



Chapter 10: Junior and Jenny
September was miserable for Ennis. He'd squandered the money he made up on the mountain on a cheap apartment that he never came out of, except to buy basic groceries and go to local bars. In his depressed condition he didn’t care how soon his cash reserve would run out, so he never sought a job. Alma Beers was lost to figure out what had happened to change him; it was almost like he was in mourning for someone.

She had no idea how right she’d guessed.

Ennis had been secretly trying to find Jack, but had no luck. After a month of trying, he gave up hope, as he'd given up on everything that he loved, because he knew it'd only just eventually hurt him.

He had a terrible argument with Alma one night when he came home from a fight in a local bar. She was furious at how battered and bloody he was and he couldn’t understand her problem, mainly because he was so proud of himself for winning an old 55 Chevy truck in a poker game. The brawl was because the owner said del Mar had cheated, but he hadn’t. He’d bluffed his way through a high-stakes hand and won out with three deuces!

The owner folded with three tens.

October came and she pulled him out of his shell by visiting every day. Bitching at him for not getting a job would be counterproductive, so she started living with him full time, cooking his meals and sleeping with him.

She finally figured out a way to get at the problem and in mid-October she took a part-time job at a local Monroe’s Grocery Store to keep food in the apartment.

It worked

Ennis wasn’t about to let no woman support him and made her quit after he found a job on a ranch. He also suspected she was flirting with the store owner to make him jealous and true or not it worked, and he began paying more attention to her and also allowed her to take up where she left off last summer making wedding plans.

He'd changed sexually too.

He began to prefer fucking her from behind doggie style instead of the traditional missionary position, and more often than not it was anally. He’d flip her over and lay her flat on her stomach too, and seemed to have a "thing" for kissing her shoulder blades tenderly.

As he’d pretended with Jack to be fucking Alma, now he was pretending with her to be fucking Jack, pretending her shoulder blades were his pecs. At one point he'd even talked her into cutting her hair short for no apparent reason.

As planned, in November of 1963 they were married and with the ceremony brought a new change in Ennis. Suddenly he became fun to be around and most of their days were spent together laughing, seeing movies and dancing in the local bars.

In the middle of their improvised honeymoon in Casper the whole world came to a halt. President Kennedy had been assassinated down in Texas somewhere and everyone held their breath waiting for Russia to react. As rumors swirled about the new President getting deeper involved in Vietnam, Ennis took his new wife home and started planning for a family, wondering if at any moment he’d be drafted into the army to fight World War III.

In January of the next year, Alma was pregnant.

Ennis kept busy on ranches and farms during spring planting and roundups, and then with occasional part-time summer jobs working on road crews in the miserable heat. All through July they moved from place to cheaper place and finally Alma had her fill of it and demanded Ennis take an apartment in town so they could have their own permanent home base.

He surprised her on a hot August day by announcing they were moving.

Ennis had gotten an important job on the Hi-Top Ranch up in Washakie County working with the horses and agreed to take lower pay in exchange for a house on the southern tip of the spread.

Alma was overjoyed, until she saw the place.

In September she had a baby girl. Alma’s mother’s name was Alma and she seemed determined to name the baby Alma too, so Ennis dubbed her Alma Junior on the baby's birth certificate.

After that, Jack faded slowly from his mind, reluctantly replaced with midnight feedings, the responsibilities of being a husband and a father, and the pride of feeling like a real man.

He had Alma pregnant again in less than a month, hoping for a boy this time, so he’d have a namesake.

By the end of October the Hi-Top folded without warning.

The del Mars began worrying about where to move. Alma’s mother lived near Riverton and she was sure she could get her old job back at the market. Ennis knew of a ranch near Signal that’d take him.

The problem was money now, with no paycheck coming in.

Circumstances made up their minds for them.

In late November, Ennis came home after working all day on a snowplow crew to discover their electric had been turned off. After going to town hall the next day, he had it turned back on under their name and while there discovered that no offers had been made on the ranch. They chanced it and stayed put where they were, figuring that sooner or later the new owners would come along and either evict them for squatting rent-free, or offer Ennis a job.

The next January Ennis got himself hired on at the Rafter-B and like their present arrangement it came with low pay, but an old rundown house and a place to keep his horses. Ennis had taken on three horses in exchange for back pay that he wouldn’t get, infuriating Alma.

The new house was even more rundown than the old one and through the winter Alma became more and more miserable fighting drafty rooms and a leaky roof.

In May came the birth of a baby girl three weeks premature, which they named Jenny after his mother.

The house became smaller and smaller with constantly crying babies, dirty diapers and feedings at all hours of the day and night. Baby Jenny developed a cough that wouldn’t go away and as the doctor bills mounted Ennis took on more part-time jobs, and became more miserable.

Finally in 1967 Alma seemed on the verge of a nervous breakdown, the kids, especially little Jenny were getting more and more sickly and a trip to the hospital or doctor could take 45 minutes not counting how long it took to find Ennis to drive them there.

On top of that, Ennis seemed to have grown an impatient and mean streak, getting into fights in bars and coming home drunk, or arriving the next morning after spending the night in jail. He’d become more distant to his wife too, mostly rolling over and facing the wall away from her, claiming to be too tired for sex.

Finally it came to a head on July 4th, when Ennis was arrested for assault and battery involving two bikers he’d beaten up in front of his family at the fireworks display that night.

After three weeks in jail, Alma threatened to leave him unless they moved back to Riverton where her mother and sister could help her take care of the kids, and he relented.

What she didn’t know was that Jack had been invading her husband’s dreams. Trying hard to push them “faggot” feelings away, he became more aggressive and masculine to suppress it, but it was hopeless. The only reason he agreed to move back downstate was to try to get a new start.

Once in Riverton he got another job on the road crew, worked at a couple of ranches, one without pay just so he could board and feed his horses.

He finally settled with himself that even if he wanted to, he’d never find Jack again, and so he allowed life to go on and once again became a good husband and father.

As 1967 progressed, husband and wife became even more distant. They moved out of her sister's place and into an apartment over Monroe’s Laundromat. He came home more and more reluctantly, and he suspected she was having an affair with Monroe again; this time for real.

If he hadn't fallen madly in love with his daughters he would've left her...



Chapter 11: Send In The Clowns
Jack spent the rest of ’63 at his father’s ranch, mending fences, harvesting crops, plowing fields and tending to the stock.

Northern Wyoming had a rough winter that year.

1964 rolled around, and Ennis was still never far from his mind, and after spring planting, summer couldn’t come fast enough. He was sure that Ennis missed him as much as he missed del Mar. He’d even sent in an application to work up on Brokeback again, but heard nothing back, so he figured it’d gotten lost in the mail.

Over the holidays that winter, his father found religion and Jack knew the next few months would be hell unless he could find a way out. At one point his father had even proposed, now that his son was an adult, charging Jack rent on his room in order to tithe more to their church.

By June he still hadn't heard back on his application and in desperation, Jack was drawn to the office trailer in Signal. He made the long drive, hoping that maybe del Mar’s plans to get married had fallen through and Ennis had already signed up for more shepherding. Either way he’d damned sure rather spend another summer on Brokeback than with his parents; even if it meant four months with Aguirre’s teenaged kid again instead.

By then he’d come to accept the jack-off fantasies he kept experiencing in the nearly year since he parted ways with del Mar. They’d start out with him fucking some really sexy girl and end up with him being the one being fucked under Ennis, resulting with Twist having an exploding orgasm just as they both shot their loads together. More often than not though, it was the one where Jack fucked and sucked Ennis at the same time up on the mountain….


...Signal hadn't changed-it never changed. As Jack pulled into the wind blown dirt and gravel parking lot, he spotted Aguirre’s car.

Pounding loudly on the door, he still hoped Ennis had been there.

The foreman’s voice held an aggravated tone as it yelled out, “Yeah?”

Jack entered, removed his hat and Aguirre looked up to blink at him, almost not believing his eyes. He shook his head, and then returned his gaze to his paperwork, contemptuously remarking, “Well, look what the wind blew in.”

Twist nodded and replied, “Howdy, Mr. Aguirre. Uh... will you be needin’ any help this year?”

Chewing on a toothpick, the foreman just looked off in the distance, not bothering to meet Jack’s eye. A remembrance of when he watched Twist having sex with del Mar in the clearing that day filled his mind with disgust. With a tone of pure contempt, he replied, “You’re waistin’ your time here Twist.”

Jack frowned, almost turned to leave, but wasn’t ready to give up yet. “You ain’t got nothin’?” then after a pause he added, “Nothing up on Brokeback?”

Aguirre turned to face him in his squeaky desk chair and as his narrowed hateful eyes were lit by the desk lamp he said, “I ain’t got nothing for you, Twist.”

Jack felt the man’s hatred, but stood his ground till he saw the foreman’s eyes and finally got the message. The son of a bitch had seen them last summer with those binoculars. He turned to leave but figured he had nothing to lose, so he turned back and asked, “Has Ennis del Mar been by here?”

In a flash the foreman recalled recently finding a magazine with naked men in it hidden in his son's room last spring and wondered if Twist had corrupted his own boy too. In a building rage, he seriously considered murdering this faggot standing before him with his bare hands, but decided it wasn't worth a long stretch in jail.

Aguirre’s expression looked just barely controlled, “Twist, I wasn’t payin’ to let the dogs baby-sit the sheep while you two stemmed the rose.” Aguirre looked away and then spat out a warning by glancing toward a tire iron sitting on the counter by a pair of work gloves, “Now get out of my trailer.”

Jack swallowed hard, nodded and put his hat back on. He wasted no time and slammed the door behind himself, and wondered if Aguirre knew about his son. It'd serve him right to turn tail and go back in and tell him to his face that his damned kid had made the first move.

As he backed his truck out, he wasn’t paying attention and came up tailgate to bumper against Aguirre’s Rambler. The contact was gentle enough not to be heard in the trailer and his surprise turned to bravado. With a touch of the gas, both of the Rambler's taillights crunched and with a grin he shifted into first and intentionally popped the clutch, spraying driveway gravel at the car and the office trailer. As the shrapnel hit the metal walls and windows, he roared off.

A few blocks away, he pulled over and rested his forehead on the steering wheel and felt like sobbing, though the tears wouldn’t come. He wasn’t sure if he was more afraid of the threat Aguirre had made, or disappointed at not finding Ennis. As del Mar had done a year before, he punched the metal dashboard as an excuse for the pain he felt.

Putting it in gear, he drove off again and eventually came to an intersection and stopped. Should he try to find Ennis somewhere near here or head south? North was out of the question; he’d had his fill of his father all winter and spring.

At the corner to his left was a payphone booth. He pulled into the dark lot of a closed gas station and slid a dime into the slot dialing the operator.

No listing was found in Signal for Ennis del Mar or in any of the surrounding counties.

He got back into his truck, slammed the door and closed his eyes, feeling them start to burn beneath their lids.

He’d heard some things about finding male prostitutes in Mexico, shrugged that he had nothing better to do and figured maybe he’d become one after he ran out of money, servicing women and/or the occasional man.
Gunning the motor, he turned left...


...Six months later, he wondered what would’ve happened if he’d actually made it there, but as fate would have it, the truck broke down near Childress Texas. He’d had second thoughts all the way there anyway and instead decided to look up the barrel riding cowgirl he’d eyed last spring, and in the process entered himself in the bull riding competition in a rodeo at a local stadium.

He did fairly well, but only managed to come in second or worse in most places on the circuit, which wasn’t enough to make much of a living.

The constant strenuous exercise turned his once-boyish body into a defined man’s well-toned but bruised build. Bull riding was taking its toll on his back and legs too.

His nighttime thoughts became divided between Ennis, and the female groupies that tagged along with him from rodeo to rodeo. He may not have been winning much, but he only needed to pull his shirt off in the parking lot to bed any girl he liked-sometimes two at a time.

Still it didn’t satisfy him, and one day after a particularly grueling couple of hours of bull riding, a rodeo clown caught his eye in the corral. The man under all that comic makeup made him look like a 90-pound weakling that’d just had sand kicked in his face. Later that afternoon, Jack nearly got stomped to death, paying attention to him instead of the bull that’d just thrown him.

It took him a while, but he finally figured out why; he reminded him of Ennis.

Later on that evening, he sat in a dark bar eyeing the girls, listening to the music, and incidentally watching the young guys playing pool within a haze of cigarette smoke.

A tall good-looking shorthaired blond man of about thirty, with a woven stark white cowboy hat entered. The overhead light at the door, bounced off his white Stetson and the shoulders of his shirt, causing a flash that made heads turn in the dim room.

Jack frowned to himself a moment and then realized it was the clown he’d been eyeing earlier. He wore a pair of “tight enough to be painted on” Levis, black boots and a fancy white cowboy shirt that highlighted his V-shaped muscular torso and arms. The man was spectacular and knew it, possessing the pecs, the swagger, the biceps, the slim waist and the impossible crotch bulge of a Greek god.

He also possessed a heart-melting grin, which never left his face. One of the barmaids yelled out "Hey, Jim!" and he tipped his hat towards her.

A few days earlier, Jack had found some badly printed flyers in the trash for some homosexual prostitution house down in Mexico. The jack-off fantasy that resulted later that night looked just like this guy, making Twist wonder.

All eyes couldn’t help but follow him cross the room, both male and female. The cowgirls wanted his body-the cowboys wanted his leftovers.

His face didn’t look as much like Ennis’ as he’d thought, but that body kept drawing his gaze and quickened his breath. Scenarios of Twist getting him drunk and using the prize money to spend the night with this Adonis in some cheap motel began filling his head.

The popular rodeo clown went straight over to a group of his friends shooting pool. He dropped a couple of quarters on the table and then glanced over towards the bartender. Moving forward again, with a friendly smile and a few nods, he met many eyes in the crowd with a grin... including Jack's.

For a moment their gaze locked across the noisy bar, then just as quickly flicked away. Jack began breathing hard, as the hunk seemed to be coming directly toward him, but at the last moment detoured to the rail twenty feet away to sit down and order a beer.

Was it an invitation or a casual glance?

Before he could wonder why or chicken out, Jack found himself walking the length of the bar rail to sit next to him.

To the bartender, Jack said, “I’d like to buy ol’ Jimbo here a beer,” giving the clown a bright smile.

The bartender nodded and the handsome stud next to him gave him a quizzical glance and shook his head no as Jack laid a dollar on the bar. Just then a pretty bar girl went by, the clown's eyes following her hips.

Jack’d made a bad mistake and knew it with everyone watching. Now all he had to do was get out of the situation. Thinking fast, he added quickly, “The best damned rodeo clown I ever worked with!” was a good excuse to buy another man a beer.

Without realizing it until after he'd done it, Jack had blinked both eyes at him in a sort of flirtatious double wink.

The brawny object of his hopes only straightened to his full six-foot-five and answered, “No thanks,” looking away. Speaking to the bartender he said, “If I took liquor from every cowboy I ever pulled a bull off of, I’d be an alcoholic by now.”

The bartender chuckled as the clown shoved his own dollar forward, pushing Jack’s away in the process and said to Twist, “You keep your money,” as he turned away with his bottle. Over his shoulder he added, “Save it for your next entry fee.”

Jack watched the man stroll over to the guys at the pool table as they all gathered around him, then looked his way.

“You ever think of changing to ropin’?” the bartender asked his back.

Jack turned around and tersely replied, “Do I look like I can afford a ropin' horse?” slapped his dollar across to pay for his own drink and made his way quickly out of the bar.

Outside, a good-looking girl sidled up to him and asked if he had any plans. He took that as a sign, escorted her back up to his cheap room over the bar and fucked her silly repeatedly over the next few weeks, deciding to give up on men unless it was Ennis...


...Near the end of the Rodeo season, Jack finally found the girl Lorene that he’d been looking for in Childress. During a small town rodeo, he made a point of watching her ride, and had even caught her eye a time or two. After retrieving her hat when it blew off, she returned his flirting grin. Five minutes later one of the bull riders gave him the very same seductive look, and for a moment his breath left his lungs.

Later that evening in the very same bar that he'd tried to seduce the handsome clown, he was eyeing the muscular bull rider who showed promise that afternoon. While distracted and trying to catch his eye, she startled him and half the people in the tavern by loudly yelling over the jukebox, "Hey cowboy, what are you waitin' for-a matin' call 'r somethin'?"

After asking the bartender about her, all thoughts of him left Jack's head. She had an expensive horse, an expensive car and cheap tastes in men, fortunately for him.

Only after he’d gotten her pregnant in the back of her father’s new Thunderbird, did he find out he’d hit the “mother load”. Lorene Newsome’s daddy owned a company that sold very expensive farm equipment, and after the baby was born and it turned out to be a boy, the old man fell madly in love, bragging that the baby looked just like his grandpa. They of course named it after him-Robert Lucas Deke Newsome II.

L.D. Sr. rewarded Jack with a job selling combines and tractors to rich farmers, which kept him on the road a lot. Lorene’s nickname for Jack was “Rodeo” and he became comfortable with it until Deke started using it in an insulting tone as if it was the ultimate put-down.

In January of 1965 Jack got notice that he’d been drafted just after his 21st birthday. Newsome said he had political contacts that’d help his son-in-law avoid winding up in Vietnam. He promised his daughter he’d try.

Senior never lifted a finger; the best thing that could happen would be for his little girl to be widowed by that loser. He’d be real pleased to have a dead war hero in the family and she'd collect the war casualty and life insurance he already had on him and then start her life over again.

Jack reported to the draft board for his physical and failed because of the rodeo injuries to his back. Of course, Deke took credit for keeping him out of the war, but a more resentful tone crept into his voice whenever he called him “Rodeo” exclusively from then on.

Within the space of only three years of marriage, Jack was miserable living under his wife’s and his father-in-law’s thumbs, despite the fine new modern house, a new truck and the big salary.

He started spending even more and more time away from home, selling.

Little Bobby as he grew seemed to have been born retarded, and Deke Newsome started calling him Rodeo Jr. instead of Bobby Junior and didn’t seem to visit as frequently as he used to after that.

Lorene began keeping the books for her father and became good at running the day-to-day operations of Newsome Farm Equipment Company…



Chapter 12: The Kiss
August of 1967 Ennis settled happily into fatherhood and ranching, and seemed to get along with Alma because he was spending more and more time away from home and from her constant whining about wanting a better life. He’d even considered applying to work up on Brokeback again that summer, but decided against it because the pay was better ranching. He’d even cut down on his drinking and fighting since moving to Riverton and had a full time ranch job and two steady part time jobs caring for horses.

The old Chevy truck had become a real challenge to keep running and he had to use the emergency brake to stop it, but it got him back and forth to his jobs.

Things settled deeper into a pattern of church picnics, drive-in movies, eating cheap food and barely making the bills.

As things got more strained between them, Ennis asked her to start working for that guy Monroe again at his food market down the street, figuring that it’d give him an excuse to be out working while she watched the girls and vise versa. He loved teaching the girls to talk and had even discussed sending Junior to kindergarten next year.

Alma was always checking the want ads trying to get him a better job here or there, her latest with the local power company, but Ennis only remarked, “Hell, honey, as clumsy as I am, I’d probably get electrocuted.”

Alma had done her best to fix up their new place, though it was obvious that Ennis hated it. The sound of the washers and dryers going at all hours in the dry cleaners below was tough to handle for a man who was used to living out in the peaceful prairie. Mostly he’d come home for meals, catch up with “his girls” and then head out to a bar unless he had to watch his daughters that night. Though he'd cut down on his drinking considerably, she didn’t have to know that and mostly he shot pool, played poker and shot the breeze.

He had few friends because of his standoffish attitude and sparseness of words.

He’d run into foreman Joe Aguirre and his grown son Jack last fall at a church social, and introduced them to Alma and his family.

Aguirre's son Jack looked shocked when he was introduced to Ennis, Alma and their two kids, and seemed to always appear near them, asking a lot of questions... especially after his father mentioned that Ennis had worked for him up on Brokeback a few years back. For the rest of the picnic, every time Ennis looked up, Jack Aguirre seemed to be looking at him.

After that incident, Jack Twist began playing on Ennis’ mind and sometimes the erotic dreams came back.

He hadn’t given Twist much thought in years, being too busy keeping his family fed and settling on the excuse he’d never find him again anyway even if he did want to look him up-which he didn’t. He had too many problems in his life now, without trying to sort out feelings he didn’t understand.

The war in Vietnam was escalating and Ennis became ever more worried about being drafted. The anti-war movement and the hippies with their strange music hadn’t invaded del Mar’s corner of the world yet, but the TV and bar conversations made it impossible to ignore.

Near the end of a hot August afternoon, he climbed the stairs to their apartment to find Alma cooking as usual and the kids playing loudly and crossed the kitchen to wash his hands for supper muttering a hello to his wife, who didn’t answer.

After a few mumbled sentences at each other, she asked, “You know someone name of Jack from down in Texas?”

He froze a moment, as his face grew a puzzled frown. How the hell did she know about Jack? In Texas? Noncommittally he replied, “Uh, maybe… Why?”

“You got a general delivery postcard from him today,“ she replied, nodding to the counter beside him.

He picked it up and his heart sang, though he wouldn’t admit it to anyone, much less himself.

"Friend this letter is a long time over due. Hope you get it. Heard you was in Riverton. I’m coming thru on the 31st. thought I’d stop and buy you a beer. Drop me a line if you can, say if you're there, Jack"

The return address was Childress, Texas.

“Someone you cowboyed with?”

Ennis blinked and brought himself out of a fond memory. In reply he mumbled, “No, Jack’s mostly rodeos.” As he turned to walk toward the front door, he added over his shoulder, “We was fishin’ buddies.”

He grabbed his hat and nearly ran down the stairs to his truck, leaving Alma wondering where he was going. His mind wandered back to the day he'd let Jack fuck him. His head swam in the love they'd once shared... and the kiss Jack'd given him afterward as if the cowboy was sacrificing his very soul at the alter of Ennis' reluctant love.

He was so distracted by the memory of that kiss and his deep longing for another one that Alma had never been able to match, that he drove right past the post office.

After turning around and going two blocks south, Ennis bought a plain pre-stamped postcard at the post office, jotted a quick “You Bet!” then copied the address over from Jack's card and dropped it in the outgoing mail slot.

Within a week, cards were exchanged along with directions and a date was set, though Jack didn’t know what time he’d get there.


...That Friday Ennis, wearing his best shirt and clean jeans, had taken the day off to anxiously wait for the man he still wouldn’t admit to himself that he loved… and craved. He spent the morning pacing with a beer back and forth, looking down into the dusty rear parking lot from his second floor window.

Alma was done up in one of her best dresses as if she had intended to go out with Ennis and his old friend Jack, and was saying something as he paced back and forth but he wasn’t really paying attention. He’d have to find a way to ditch his wife and if his mind weren’t so preoccupied with anticipation he’d be pissed that she was so determined to go with them.

On his second trip to the kitchen for another beer after forgetting the first time, Alma repeated, “I said; you know Ennis, it’s so hot today maybe we could find a sitter for the girls and take your friend to the Knife and Fork for dinner?”

Coming back out of the kitchen on his way to the chair he’d been sitting on at the window sill, he replied, “Nah, Jack’s not really the restaurant type; we’ll probably just go out to a bar and get drunk.”

There… that aught to discourage her.

Nervous with anticipation, Ennis sat at the window playing with his lighter and chain smoking, knowing, but not knowing why he wished Jack would hurry and arrive. He scanned the sky watching clouds roll by and worried that the heat and humidity could bring a storm with them later in the day.

Alma busied herself feeding the kids, trying to figure out what Ennis was so anxious about. She’d never seen her normally stoic husband act like this about anybody.

Sometime around five o’clock, after Ennis gave up watching and moved to his easy chair, he heard the sound of a car pulling up out back. He jumped up anxiously to watch a new red and white Ford pickup come to a stop just below his window.

He could feel his heart pounding beneath his shirt and he inhaled sharply as he saw Jack get out of it. A hot jolt scalded Ennis and he was instantly on the second floor porch landing pulling the door closed behind him.

Jack looked up at him, grinning from ear to ear afraid his face would split.

Ennis just glowed with joy and began gasping for breath. From the top of the landing he happily slapped both palms on the railing and gushed out in a shaky voice, “Jack Fucking Twist!” and bounded down the steps two at a time as Jack met him halfway across the lot in front of the girl’s new swing set.

They seized each other by the shoulders, hugged mightily, squeezing the breath out of each other, saying "son of a bitch, son of a bitch". Ennis nervously looked around, weary of who might see and then roughly grabbed him, pushing him backwards twenty feet like fancy dancers in a ballroom. He threw him against the back wall of the laundromat at the bottom of the neighbor’s little hidden staircase, across from the foot of their own leading up in the opposite direction.

As easily as the right key turns the lock tumblers, their mouths came together and hard, Jack’s teeth bringing blood, his hat falling to the ground, stubble rasping, wet saliva welling between them. So urgent was their need for each other, it seemed like more of a bar fight than a greeting, both competing to see who could hold the other tighter.

Jack’s trembling fingers gathered up in Ennis’ shirt’s shoulders and grabbed them, pushing him roughly away only to pin Ennis forcefully against the opposite privacy wall, crushing him against it and returned the fevered kiss.

In the flash of a moment, the years vanished and their pent-up emotions spilled out as their lips locked and relocked repeatedly, each running their fingers through the other’s hair, while both tried to climb into the other’s clothes craving any bare skin they could reach. Neither man could see, hear or think of anything but the one he held in his arms, as the world seemed to disappear for both of them.

It was the goodbye kiss they’d wished they’d shared back then, but couldn’t. It was the kiss that filled both men's private fantasies, dreams, and hopes for the last couple of so very long, long years.

Like two stallions in rut, their bodies and breath trembled as they clutched each other more and more tightly. It was as if they each feared that if either let go the other would disappear and they’d wake up from the dream.

Upstairs, Alma came back out to the living room to see if she could find their usual sitter’s phone number and wondered what was taking Ennis so long outside. Checking the window, she saw nothing but a strange truck so she went to the front door, opened it and looked out.

From above, she peered down at the foot of the neighbor’s stairs for a few seconds in disbelief. Her husband was in a clinch with another man and for a moment of panic, she thought they were fighting, possibly trying to strangle each other.

When her mind finally processed what she was actually seeing, her jaw dropped. She watched Ennis’ straining shoulders pulling the other man closer in a clinch. She couldn’t help but see the passion in Jack’s urgently searching arms as they explored her husband’s body holding him so close. As their hips began grinding at each other's, she went into a sort of shock at the sight of them holding such a fiery kiss, not believing what she was seeing. It was something she never even had imagined or heard of.

Hurt shattered her, as she watched Ennis show such an intense passionate wanting for someone that he’d never even come close to showing for her. As both of the stranger's hands invaded down the back of her husband’s jeans to cup his buns, Ennis began caressing Jack's crotch to an obvious erection through his jeans, their lips still locked together as if glued.

Shutting the door, she began crying, choking down blurred questions, unable to answer any of them.

Without knowing what had just happened above them, the two men clung desperately to each other, pressing chest and groin and thigh and leg together, treading on each other’s toes until they pulled apart to breathe and Ennis, not big on endearments, said what he said to his horses and daughters, “Little darlin’,” with a satisfied smile.

He peered carefully around the little privacy wall hiding the stairwell where they hoped they were safe from view and breathed a sigh of relief that no one had seen or heard.

They exchanged a look that ended the passion and they immediately began straightening their clothes and combing their hair with their fingers to straighten it. Ennis bent over, picked up Jack’s hat, and as he handed it to him, gestured with his head to follow up his own set of stairs to their apartment.

A few anxious moments later they both appeared in the upper front hallway.

Alma gave Ennis a knowing look but said nothing, but he knew that she knew or maybe had seen.

What could he say? “Alma, this here is Jack Twist. Jack, my wife, Alma.” His chest was heaving. He could smell Jack’s intensely familiar odor of cigarettes, musky testosterone-filled male sweat and a faint sweetness like new mown grass. “Alma,” he said, “Jack and me ain’t seen each other in four years.” As if it were a reason they were so glad to see each other. He was glad the light was dim on the landing because he’d grown rock hard between his legs greeting Jack, and it refused to subside, but he didn’t turn away from her.

She’d noticed.

“Sure enough,” said Alma in a low voice for want of a better response. She had seen what she had seen. Behind her the wind pushed a curtain and from another direction came the sounds of the girls playing in their room.

“You got a kid?” asked Jack grinning. His shaking hand grazed Ennis’ and electrical current snapped between them.

“Two little girls,” Ennis said proudly. “Alma, Jr., and Jenny. Love them to pieces.”

Alma’s mouth twitched.

“I got a boy,” said Jack. “Eight months old; he smiles a lot. I married the cutest girl in Texas down in Childress—Lorene.” From the vibration of the floorboard on which they both stood Ennis could feel how hard Jack was shaking.

“Alma,” he said. “Jack and me is goin' out and get a drink. Might not get back tonight, when we get to drinkin and talking and all...”

“Sure enough,” Alma said again, taking a dollar bill from her purse. After what she’d just seen, she didn’t want her husband and the father of her children running off with this man until she could figure out a way to compete with him.

Ennis guessed she was going to ask him to get her a pack of cigarettes to bring him back sooner than the next day.

“Pleased to meet you,” said Jack, trembling like a run-out horse, as he tipped his hat.

“Ennis,” said Alma in her misery, but that didn’t slow him down on the stairs and he called back, “Alma, you want smokes there’s some in the pocket a my blue shirt in the bedroom.”

They went off in Jack’s truck, bought a bottle of whiskey, and within twenty minutes were in the Motel Siesta...



Chapter 13: Not just yet, Cowboy
Outside the cheap motel window a light misty rain fell. Just inside the newly closed door the two men stood transfixed in each other’s eyes.

Jack was trembling with passion so hard his teeth were chattering. Ennis was having trouble breathing as he reached over and shut the lights back off.

Dim light filtered through the curtains giving them just barely enough glow to make out the other’s silhouette. Yet they still stood there not touching, only inches apart as though afraid of the other vanishing in a dream come true.

Finally Jack raised a severely shivering hand to tenderly touch Ennis’ face, feeling his stubble rasp as the ranch hand pressed his cheek against it. Ennis swallowed hard and rested his palms on Jack’s hips and slowly pulled their bodies together.

Both closed tear filled eyes as slowly their heads found the other’s shoulder and their arms tightened.

Jack began quietly sobbing in joy as they pressed the sides of their heads together tightly, breathing slower now, taking their time, their arms exploring each other’s back while their cowboy hats joined each other on the floor.

In the dark Ennis moaned, running his fingers through Jack’s hair, comforting him.

Tears were flowing uncontrollably down both men's cheeks.

Jack backed up, pulled him to the side of the bed and fell backwards onto it, bringing Ennis down on top of himself. He then rolled them over and straddled Ennis' lap as the ranch hand laid back and sighed, his eyes still closed tightly.

Twist leaned down to kiss his lips tenderly and then moved to his neck as del Mar’s hands fondled the short bristled hair on the back of his lover’s head. Jack ran his tongue down to Ennis's muscled chest and quickly undid the man's shirt buttons. As anxiously as a child on Christmas morning, he began pulling it apart as he yanked del Mar’s t-shirt up and kissed his abs.

Ennis sat up and pulled both his shirts off over his head, then laid back down, as Jack undid his lover's belt buckle greedily, undid the buttons and kissed his pubic hair while del Mar kicked off his boots. Twist moved to the foot of the bed, grabbed the jeans and urged Ennis to raise his hips while he shucked the denim down and off taking his socks with it.

Still dressed, Jack lay down on the now naked and rock-hard Ennis and kissed him silently on the mouth.

Ennis’ fingertips dug into Jack’s pant waist and pulled his shirttails out, running his palms up the warm skin of his long-lost love's back. His hands came out and reached for Jack’s shirt buttons, but Twist backed away out of his reach.

Sliding down kissing trembling skin as he went, Jack ducked his head and swallowed Ennis whole to the root. The huge, hot and quivering shaft completely filled Twist's mouth and touched his tonsils, causing the ranch hand to make the first sound they’d uttered since entering the room together.

“Ohhhhhh my God”

Ennis’ cock head swelled within Jacks esophagus trying to gag him, but he fought it for a moment and then eased back to breath without releasing his eight inch steel hard shaft. Jack began swirling his tongue around it working his lips up and down, causing Ennis to moan and buck his hips. As Jack's lips kept working, his palms explored Ennis’ abs reaching higher to thumb both of his hard nipples.

Not wanting to cum yet, Ennis suddenly grasped Jack’s shoulders and shoved hard, knocking Jack to the floor. Instantly the naked man was atop Twist, yanking at buttons tearing at boots and within impatient moments had him naked. With a rough shove Jack was flung back onto the bed and Ennis was instantly on top of him.

They repeated their earlier kiss of this afternoon over and over again with just as much impatient urgency and passion.

Wordlessly they maneuvered onto their sides and began urgently sucking each other’s pulsing cocks, clutching the other’s body tightly, while working passionately to bring the other to orgasm but desperately trying to hold back his own.

Unable to hold back, Ennis spat out Jack and screamed, flooding Jack’s mouth to overflow. With each spurt he gasped harder and harder barely able to breath or speak until finally he collapsed exhausted.

Taking advantage of his helpless condition, Twist quickly flipped del Mar onto his stomach. Twist had dreamed of this for years, but never dared think it'd ever really happen ever again except in masturbation fantasies. Jack spat on his hand, rubbed it on his own shaft and entered Ennis' sphincter slowly and tenderly, releasing a sigh of pleasure as he sank deep within until he was satisfied he could go no further. Beneath him, Ennis, now face down, folded his forearms under his pillow and moaned while Jack’s throbbing member massaged his prostate.

Jack began slow strokes in and out wanting to savor the chance he might not get again, and was surprised when Ennis began bucking his hips up hungrily to meet each thrust. Twist began pulling out completely and re-entering giving them both pleasure as the smell of passionate sweat filled the room.

Jack moaned in lust and love as he molded his chest and hips to Ennis’s back and muscled ass, resting his head against the tossled blond hair of del Mar’s. Then he dug his arms within and beneath Ennis’s armpits and squeezed as he continued to fuck him slowly, his mind in a stoned high he’d never experienced before.

As he felt his orgasm build he couldn’t hold back for much longer and from under him, Ennis gathered Jack's forearms beneath them tightly and continued pushing his hips back till they were a couple of inches above the bed as Jack pounded harder and faster, sobbing tears of joy. Del Mar began chanting rhythmically, “Yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah,” with each thrust's impact and suddenly Jack groaned and collapsed dead weight onto Ennis’ back as his buried cock unloaded into his lover in mighty gushes that drained his strength.

Ennis lay there in a cloud of joy, unable to remember when he’d been this happy and at peace. Jack went to withdraw, but Ennis reached behind and held his hips down. Twist kissed the back of his neck and began stroking in and out again.

Something began happening within Ennis’ cock. With each of Jack’s thrusts, it was as if his penis were invading Ennis’ own internally and it became thrilling and to his shock del Mar instantly orgasmed in body-jolting spurts flooding the bedspread beneath them with warm slick fluid. Unable to hold back Jack unloaded too and collapsed again.

Their breathing came slower and together as they silently lay there savoring the sensation of Jack's hips joined to Ennis' warm ass cheeks. Both still cried in choked sobs.

After a few minutes, Jack withdrew and fled to the shower, and moments later Ennis joined him in the tiny tiled cubicle. After a few minutes of playfully soaping each other and exploring each other's yearned-for bodies, Ennis stepped out and grabbed a towel.

Jack entered the room a moment later to find Ennis sitting naked on the far corner of the foot of the bed, bent over with his face on his palms and his elbows on his knees facing away.

Del Mar didn’t even look up, as though he were ashamed. His head was filled with thoughts of Alma and the girls, and how much he loved them… and how much more he loved Jack.

Twist lay down face up on the right side of the bed and after a moment, Ennis scooted diagonally up on his back across the sheets to rest the back of his head on Jack’s chest with his big feet hanging off the opposite corner.

After a moment, Jack wrapped his arm around Ennis’ head as the nape of his neck rested against Twist's shoulder and chin.

As with all men, it was sex first, conversation and cigarettes later. With Alma it was doing his husbandly duties and get it over with; with Jack it was as if he couldn’t get enough, like once they started he couldn’t reach the reins to slow the horse down, out of control, passion and lust.

It was something only men understood.

“Four years, Damn!,” exclaimed Jack in a whisper distracting Ennis from his thoughts.

Ennis nodded, “Yep, four years.”

Jack whispered, “I thought I’d never see you again.”

Ennis chuckled as he flicked his cigarette against the ashtray perched on his chest. “I just figured you were sore at me about that punch.”

Twist didn't realize it, but del Mar was sinking back to his emotionless mode by way of indifference. Ennis' ego was trying to recover his masculinity by attempting to pretend that what had happened and what was happening hadn't really.

Unaware, Jack exhaled forceful cigarette clouds and said, “Christ, it’s got to be all that time of yours on horseback that makes sex so goddamn good. We’ve got to talk about this. Swear to God I didn’t know we were going to get into this again.” He paused to stroke Ennis’ hair and admitted, “Yeah, I did. It’s why I’m here. I fuckin’ knew it. Red-lined the tach all the way, couldn’t get here fast enough; doubt if I did less than 90 the whole way up.”

Ennis silently flicked another ash as if distracted. His responsibility to his family weighed heavily on his mind, and he barely heard Jack through his thoughts. He was busy weighing Alma and the girls on one side of the scales and what really made him happy on the other.

Jack was speaking again. “I was in Texas rodeoin’. That’s how I met Lorene. Look over on that chair.”

On the back of a soiled orange chair Ennis saw the shine of a buckle. “Bull ridin?”

“Yeah. I made three fuckin thousand dollars that year. Goddamned starved. Had to borrow everything but a toothbrush from other guys. Drove grooves across Texas. Spent half the time under that cunt truck, fixin’ it.

Now Lorene: there’s some serious money there. Her old man’s got it. Got this farm-machinery business. Course he don’t let her have none of it and naturally he hates my fuckin guts…”

Still in a mental haze, Ennis asked, “Army didn’t get you?” A bright flash of light lit the window and after a few moments thunder sounded far to the east..

“Nah, I was too busted up. Got some crushed vertebrates and a stress fracture, the arm bone here, you know how bull riding you’re always levering it off your thigh, she gives a little ever time you do it. Even if you tape it good you break it a little bit at a time. Tell you what, hurts like a bitch afterward. Had a busted leg in three places. I got out of rodeo just in time while I could still walk; it ain’t like it was in my old man’s day. Now, Lorene’s old man… I know enough about the game to know he’d do just about anything to get rid of me, ‘cause now that he’s got his grandson, I’m useless to him.”

Not really listening, Ennis just nodded and said. “You sure as hell seem in one piece to me. You know, I was sitting up here all that time trying to figure out if I was… if I was, I mean I know I ain’t. I mean, here we both got wives and kids, right? I like doing it with women, yeah, but Jesus H., ain’t nothin’ like this was tonight, even better than back on Brokeback. I never had no thoughts of doing it with another guy except I sure wrang it out a hunderd times thinking about you.”

Ennis closed his eyes tightly; he’d damn-near almost used the word “love”… something men weren’t supposed to say to each other.

Jack smiled, pulled the back of Ennis’ head to his lips and whispered, “Old Brokeback got us good.” Love weighed heavily on his mind too. He’d all but come right out and said he’d leave his wife and son for Ennis, now it was all up to him. Twist thought a moment and then asked with a prayer for the answer he was silently hoping for, “Well, what do we do now?”

Ennis’ inhaled a slow thoughtful breath and exhaled smoke. “There ain’t much we can do. I got my hands full here just trying to feed my family and make a living. We’re both committed to our families Jack, there’s not much more we can do.”

Jack’s heart sank, along with his hopes. He changed the subject and they spent the next hour or so talking about their separate lives, how Aguirre threatened Jack the summer of ’64, and how Jack peppered his car with gravel.

Ennis laughed and told Jack about meeting the foreman and his son at a church social, and Aguirre not remembering him, even offering him a job up on Brokeback last year. Jack seemed to tense at the mention of Jack Aguirre's name.

Ennis inhaled a long thoughtful breath, “I gotta get home, Alma’ll be worried. I gotta be at work early tomorrow too.”

As he tried to get up, Jack pulled Ennis back to him and kissed him full on the mouth as the ashtray fell to the floor.

“Not just yet, cowboy.”

They turned off the lights and cuddled in each other’s arms. Ennis kissed his way down Jack's stomach and swallowed him. Sexually Ennis had loosened up a little, servicing Jack orally, which he almost never did when they were on the mountain and they passionately went at it again until they fell sound asleep contented.



Chapter 14: You seen that?
The next morning after waking up in each other’s arms, it was obvious that Ennis was having second thoughts about the whole situation. His male cowboy ego began suffering something terrible as he realized that he was the one that was so completely dominated sexually last night. But more than that, he had to accept the fact that he not only craved it from Jack, but that he needed it from him too, and had thought about it for the long years they’d been apart.

It was beginning to hit them both hard that unless they did something about it together, they’d never see each other for another long stretch, maybe never and both were saddened by it.

Jack wanted to head for their mountain, but Ennis had responsibilities. Twist argued, “What harm can a weekend do?”

It took some fast-talking on the trip back to his apartment, but Jack finally talked Ennis into seeing things his way, at least for the time being. They agreed to head for Brokeback right away.

Unfortunately Jack read more into it than was there, because while Ennis was finally facing just how much he craved Jack, that secret fear; the one that his father had bred into him, had reared its ugly head. Ennis still loved Alma, but he only agreed to go because he needed time away from her...


...Alma had been sitting at the dinette table for what seemed like all morning; sobbing and convinced her husband had left her and the girls. When she heard them pull up out back, she wiped her tears and rushed to the window, relieved that she’d been wrong. Had he come back or was he here for his things and to say goodbye?

Her heart sank as she saw them both jump out of Jack’s pickup and Twist waited down there while Ennis rushed up the stairs… not a good sign.

Rushing through the door he gave Alma a quick, “Hey,” in passing and quickly gathered his coat and fishing equipment.

Alma opened her mouth to ask something, but he interrupted with, “Jack and me is going up to the mountains for a couple of days to get in some fishing before he has to go back home.”

The concept of Jack as the “other woman” was something she still couldn’t understand, or figure out. Her head was spinning trying to conceive a way to keep him here, to make him realize he had a family to support. “Can’t your friend even come up for a cup of coffee?”

“Well, he’s from Texas,” replied Ennis without even thinking as he went to the bathroom and grabbed a toothbrush and a shaving kit.

“What; Texans don’t drink coffee?” she asked, moving to the window to look down on Twist still leaning against his truck.

Little Alma Junior came rushing in and wrapped her arms around her father’s knees, “Bring me home a fish Daddy! A big, big one!”

Ennis smiled down at her, picked her up, kissed her and then silently handed her to her mother. He looked out the window and his breath quickened.

Alma’s world was shattering for reasons she still couldn’t understand, nor could she hide the confusion in her face. All she could think to say was, “You sure that foreman won’t fire you for just taking off?”

Ennis looked back at her and replied, “He owes me... Huh? Didn’t I work all last Christmas Eve through a blizzard for him last year? ‘Sides I can always find another job.”

Ennis saw her face crestfallen and muttered a quick, “Come here,” to her, kissed her over Junior’s shoulder and was gone out the door.

Moving to the window, she watched her husband hit the bottom of their stairs running. Across his face was the biggest brightest smile and it was a total shock because she’d never seen him wearing that expression before.

She broke down and began sobbing.

Junior hugged her closer and she sniffed as she heard them down below.

“You hungry?” asked Twist

“Starved!” exclaimed Ennis enthusiastically in a happy voice. The doors slammed, the motor started up and they were quickly gone.

She stood transfixed in that window for a long time until Alma Junior began squirming…


...That first trip back up to “their” mountain was glorious. Ennis couldn’t remember being so at peace and realized that Jack was the reason why he was so happy. On the way they stopped off to eat, and buy whiskey and supplies for their hastily planned trip.

After Ennis stowed the supplies in the bed of the truck, Jack decided to try coaxing a laugh out of Ennis like the old days. As del Mar climbed into the cab of the pickup with a sack of food, Twist suddenly cut the engine, asking his love, “You sure we got everything?”

With a puzzled frown del Mar shuffled through the grocery bag as Jack leaned over to look in it. Suddenly his door was open and Twist yelled, “Be right back!” over his shoulder as he ran towards the store. A few moments later he emerged with another little sack, got in and handed it across to Ennis and then started the truck. Ennis peered into the bag as Jack shifted into gear and began laughing until tears streamed down his face, making Jack Twist the happiest man on the face of the earth.

The bag contained a can opener and two cans of beans…

They spent the trip talking endlessly about what the last four years had held for each other. The rodeo, ranching, the learning impaired son, the sickly daughter and the hateful father-in-law. Ennis talked about how much he loved his girls and how he and Alma might not be getting along as well as they could be, but they were working as a team to build a future for themselves.

Before they knew it they were at a twenty-foot cliff overlooking the stream where they camped the night they made love the first time. Laughing as they scurried out of the truck, Ennis challenged, “The last one in…” as they joyfully raced to the edge, shedding clothes as they ran and leapt off into the surprisingly frigid mountain water below.

Their heads surfaced, both screaming about how cold it was.

They felt they were in their own private heaven, laughing their heads off and splashing each other. Here they didn't have to hide. Here they could be themselves. The laughter ended suddenly when they both realized at the same time that their clothes were back at the top of that cliff; a good 20-minute walk naked around the rocky prominence back up to the truck at what was now a public campground.

After a day of setting up camp and regretting in their haste at not bringing a couple of Ennis’ horses from the ranch, they settled down that night at the rushing stream’s edge, bundled in coats.

Surrounded in peace and without a care for the first time in a long time, Jack got a roaring fire going against the cold.

Ennis fell silent for a long while looking into the flickering smoking flames and eventually eased back to lay with his feet near the fire, one knee up with his hat propped on it. He seemed to be in a state of rapture, just staring up at the stars in wonder with a half smile.

Jack had never seen Ennis smile so much and so continuously, and it gave him hope. He sat on the log beside him, listening to the roaring water, deep in thought and looked over at him. He’d come a long way north hoping their reunion would be permanent, but every time he brought it up, Ennis would sidestep the subject, wanting to just enjoy being up here again.

For a long time they sat, becoming uncomfortable with their silence, Jack settled to just watch the man he was now convinced that he loved looking dreamily up at nothing.

To break the silence he asked, “See anything interesting up there in heaven?”

Ennis' contented smile grew a rare mischievous grin in response, and he commented lazily, “Ohhhhhh, I was just sendin’ up some thanks.”

Jack’s heart suddenly swelled with hope. “For what?”

Ennis snorted a laugh, “I’m thankful that you forgot that damned harmonica… Huh. I was just enjoyin’ the peace and quiet.”

Hiding his disappointment, Jack chuckled and shook his head.

The cowboy closed his eyes and moaned enjoyment.

Jack straightened and looked out at the mountain, topped with glowing light blue snow in the dark, lit only by the full moon. Gathering his courage he hesitated and then said softly, “You know it could be like this, just like this, for always,” knowing that it was as close to a proposal of love and commitment as he dared make.

Ennis opened his eyes and looked at him quizzically. “How do you figure that?”

In one fleeting and horrible moment, Jack knew his hopes had been dashed, but bravely collected his thoughts.

They both stared into the campfire, realizing the consequences of what had just been said, but more importantly of what hadn’t been answered.

Fighting tears from his eyes, Jack said softly and hesitantly trying to renew his fleeting hopes, “You know, if we had a little cow and calf operation together; you know along with your horses, it could be a sweet life... Lorene’s old man; you bet he’d give me enough for a down payment if I’d get lost. Already more or less said it…”

Halfway through the sentence, he knew it was doomed when Ennis began shaking his head no, and Jack felt frustration welling up in his throat.

Ennis sat up, still shaking his head, put on his hat to hide his eyes and corrected as he settled over beside Jack, “Now I, I told you it ain’t gonna be like that.” Resting his back against the log, he continued, “You’ve got your wife and baby in Texas and I’ve got my life here in Riverton.”

Unable to hold his resentment in any more, Jack asked skeptically, “You and Alma, that’s a life?”

Ennis’ heterosexual ego set in suddenly and answered for him, “You shut up about Alma, this ain’t her fault… The bottom line is Jack; if we’re around each other, and this… ‘this thing’ catches a hold of us at the wrong time, or the wrong place and someone sees us, we’re dead Jack. Dead… both of us.”

Thinking of Alma and the girls he added, “Can’t get out of it. Jack, I don’t wanna be like them guys you see around sometimes. And I don’t wanna be dead neither.”

Jack frowned an unphrased question at his hidden eyes.

After a moment deep in thought, Ennis explained, “There was these two guys ranched up together down home; Earl and Rich - Dad would pass a remark when he seen them. They was a fag joke for everybody, even though they was pretty tough old birds. I was what, only nine years old I guess when they found Earl dead one day in an irrigation ditch.

”I found out later that a couple of local ranchers got together and took a tire iron to Earl and beat him to death, then drug his dead body around off the back of a pickup by his dick until it pulled off, just a bloody pulp. What the tire iron done looked like pieces of burned tomatoes all over him, nose and face tore down from skiddin’ on gravel.

“The bastards tied old Rich up in the back of the truck and made him watch them drag Earl around… and then they killed him too… but not right off. They tied him by his neck to the top of a tall fence with only just enough rope for him to stand up without it chokin’ off his air, then they beat the shit out of him, but they didn’t kill him on purpose, they just left him standin’ out there all alone and finally he was so weak from the pain that night that he slumped down and hung himself ‘cause he was too weak to stand up no more… they laughed that you could hear Rich crying for help a mile away.

My daddy took my brother and me to see the bodies like some sideshow at a circus.”

Jack looked appalled that a child would be exposed to such a sight and asked, “You seen that?”

Ennis nodded, “I couldn’t have been more’n nine or ten. My dad made sure I seen it and that I knew why it happened. We knew the story by heart because he told it over and over to everybody that came to the house. He took me and my brother K.E. and we stopped at the fence where Rich was rotting with flies all over him and ole Dad laughed about it. Then he took us to see Earl. Hell, for all I know he done the job. I tell you what; If he was alive and saw us last night or together right now like this, you bet he’d go get his tire iron.” A visible shudder ran through del Mar as he shook his head no, “Two guys livin together, Jack… No way… Now, we can get together once in a while way the hell out in the middle a nowhere…”

Jack’s jaw dropped, “Every so often? Every four-fuckin’-years?”

“Jack, if you can’t fix it, you gotta stand it,” Ennis replied.

Ennis bowed his head lower as his face became a mask of sadness.

Twist felt tears welling up again, as he realized that this man couldn’t love him like he needed to be loved.

“For how long?” he asked hesitantly.

Unable to meet his eyes, Ennis gazed down into the fire with a heartbroken look and mumbled, “This horse don’t got reins on it Jack, we just got to ride it as long as we can.”

They fell into an uncomfortable silence. Leaning over to him, Jack brushed the top of the fingers of his left hand against Ennis’s right sideburn and gently rubbed.

As the fire crackled, Ennis’ hand quietly found Jack’s.

That night in the tent there was no sex between them, they just lay naked together in the sleeping bag; Ennis pressed against Jack’s back cradling him in his strong and loving arms.

Ennis decided being there was just too sad for him and asked Jack to drive him home the next morning.

The long trip home was done in almost complete silence.

A block from the parking lot, Jack pulled over and gave Ennis a big bear hug and a peck on the cheek.

They promised they’d keep in touch.

Ennis walked home alone, not looking up as Jack passed.

Down in the parking lot, Ennis got in his truck, started it, but didn’t want to go anywhere, so he just sat there eventually resting his head against the steering wheel. Emotionally exhausted, he started to doze off and a nightmare began of his father beating him.

Alma Jr. rushed down the stairs to come up on his door. “Daddy, did you bring me a big fish?”



Chapter 15: The Year Dreams Died
After that Ennis began feeling trapped in his increasingly loveless marriage. He and Alma fought almost constantly and over the next five years, Jack and Ennis did keep in touch, exchanging post cards and meeting twice a year or so when they could both get time off from family and work. Their fishing/camping/hunting trips usually lasted between a week to ten days and both spent most of the year looking forward to them.

Alma was left to imagine what horrid things happened on those trips, but was relieved when her man returned to her... but the resentment grew more and more as each year passed. The look of glee on Ennis' face whenever he'd get a card from Jack haunted her for weeks afterward.

L.D. Newsome semi-retired in 1974, after failing to get elected to a seat in the Texas State Republican primary races. He turned the day-to-day operations of his farm equipment business over to Lorene, but kept a close eye on things, never letting Jack advance higher than head salesman.

As little Bobby grew, his learning disability became more of a problem, but Grandpa doted over him anyway.

Jack had regular bouts of depression and began developing a drinking problem, though he kept pulling himself back from the brink before it became serious. He’d always come home from one of his fishing trips tenser than when he left. He knew he loved Ennis, but was never brave enough to utter the word. Jack was the one who worked to keep the relationship going and sometimes resented Ennis for seemingly not wanting it as much as he did.

Ennis was the more secretly loving emotionally, but couldn’t show it.

Jack was the more passionate sexually.

Both rationalized it by calling it a very close friendship that just happened to include sex.

Del Mar’s length was apparently a perfect fit to internally rub and stimulate Twist’s prostate in such a way that crashing shattering orgasms came without Jack so much as touching himself and his craving to be fucked became more intense. He felt terrible that to satisfy his ever-increasing need, he’d make periodic trips just across the border to Mexico, always telling Lorene he was on a “business trip.”

But it was only sex, and what he needed was the love that only Ennis could give, but only seldomly.

On the home fronts, Ennis loved his daughters, but slowly began to resent Alma.

Monroe became a business chain opening up more grocery stores and laundromats, and recently had even started a catering business that he’d put Alma in charge of.

But that didn’t keep them ahead of the bills by a long shot, what with school clothes and supplies, doctor bills for Jenny’s asthma and Alma Junior having to have her appendix out.

Huge fights broke out between them over anything no matter how trivial. Ennis’s old ’55 truck finally gave out and he bought a used light blue Ford pick-up that was nearly falling apart and needed parts they didn’t have the money for.

She didn’t like that.

He also bought and sold horses on speculation instead of putting money away for the girl’s further education.

Alma started going to the Methodist Church with the girls, always leaving him behind when he mumbled something about Sunday being his only day off, not liking that “fire and brimstone” crowd; that and he wanted to sleep in one day a week.

Several bibles appeared in the living room and the nightstand of the bedroom. He came home one day to find a crucifix nailed above the inside of their front door.

Then Monroe began regularly driving Alma and the kids to church every week and for socials and picnics.

After a particularly nasty and loud fight over his refusal to take a second job with the electric company, Ennis went out to the bar to cool off. He’d never laid a hand on Alma in their years of marriage, but that night he’d come close. When he came back home, the sounds of the kids laughing up there, the TV playing loudly, and Alma singing, was too much for him and he sat out in the night air on the tailgate of his truck for an hour smoking and wondering if his life would ever turn around for the better.

Above and behind him, he heard their storm door open and didn’t bother to turn around because he figured it was just Alma. He didn’t want to hear her bitch at him for staying out so late. The girls started calling out “Goodbye!” and he frowned to see Monroe come out on the landing under the porch light and come down the stairs.

He must’ve not seen Ennis in the dark until he was right beside him, because he practically jumped out of his skin.

Her resentment opened out a little every year: the embrace she had glimpsed of her husband and that Twist guy, Ennis’ fishing trips once or twice a year with him, but never a vacation with her and the girls, his disinclination to step out and have any fun unless it was alone, his yearning for low-paid, long-houred ranch work, his propensity to roll to the wall and sleep as soon as he hit the bed, his failure again to look for a decent permanent job with the county or the power company put her in a long, slow dive

Finally the summer of ’77 it all came to a head when Ennis was feeling particularly horny one night and just as he was about to enter her, Alma asked him to use a rubber. “As far behind in the bills as we are; I don’t think it’d be a good idea not to use precautions.”

That killed the mood immediately.

Before rolling off of her panting with passion, he said in frustration, “If you don’t want any more of my kids, I’ll be happy to leave you alone.”

She replied a little too quickly, “I’d have them, if you’d support them.”

She remained silent as he climbed off her and took his usual position facing the wall.

She turned off the light.

In 1977 when Alma Jr., was nine and Jenny seven, Alma filed for divorce and custody of the girls.

When the court day came, Ennis felt like the world had crashed down on his shoulders. His self-image as a man who was a good husband and loving father was now shattered and he felt like a complete failure. He loved and cherished his little girls more than his own life and standing there his face held a mixture of equal parts resentment, hate and shame.

As the Judge ruled in Alma’s favor and ordered Ennis to pay child support, his chest tightened to the point of hardly being able to breathe and tears fell from his crestfallen eyes. He looked to be in such agony that both Alma Jr. and Jenny broke free of their mother and bawled open tears as they gathered around him hugging him and looking frightened of the judge.

He wrote a heartbroken letter to Jack giving him the news, hoping he’d write back, but heard nothing for a month.

He wanted to be in love, but knew he was just lonely.

He was shocked when after another month Junior called to tell him that Alma had married Monroe and was a month or so pregnant. ..


…Twist started making slow deliberate preparations to leave Lorene the moment he got Ennis’ card with news of the divorce. He didn’t care about Newsome’s money or his kid that his wife and father-in-law had taught to hate him. He went as far with his plans to just up and disappear on his family as he could without carefully leaving a way back “just in case”.

Ennis’ phone had been disconnected and none of his postcards were answered, so Jack just assumed that Ennis would be waiting for him and leave hints in town where to find him.

When finally he could wait no longer, Twist nearly flew north in his truck; in fact at some railroad crossings, he actually left the ground. He was rushing to his man-his lover and had been rehearsing how he was going to make “Deke” real happy by leaving Lorene, but it’d cost him dearly. Jack’d leave her for free, but Newsome didn’t have to know that. Ennis finally had come to his senses and left his wife; they’d finally after long last be together like it should be, like it was meant to be.

He was smiling so much his cheeks ached and he couldn’t help singing all the way north to Riverton.

After the divorce, Ennis had moved into an old run-down house at his boss’ ranch’s far western edge. It wasn’t much, but as he was fond of saying, “If you don’t have nothing, you don’t need nothing.” It took a lot of hard work on the place before the court would let the girls stay there over weekends, and he was overjoyed at their being there with him at last. That afternoon he’d fixed up some trout he’d caught and had frozen on his last “fishing trip” with Jack, and the girls as usual loved it. He only got to see them one weekend a month and the time was precious to him.

After a nice day together teaching them how to ride horseback, he bundled them up in the truck with the promise of a drive-in movie. He was walking around to his door of the pickup when he heard a truck horn blaring away behind the house coming toward him and was astonished to see Jack pull up and jump out with his arms outspread.

Knowing the girls were watching, Ennis approached cautiously, darting his eyes at Jack towards the girls, but Twist didn’t get the hint and rushed up and gave him an affectionate hug.

Ennis pulled away cautiously and asked, “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Hell, I drove 18 hours from Texas, asked a dozen people in Riverton where you’d moved to and that’s all you got to say?”

“Jack, I uh, you don’t understand, I…”

Jack pulled away and replied with a frown, “I got your note about the divorce and all, and I figured that meant we…”

The look Ennis gave him, froze Twist’s throat and del Mar’s eyes darted toward the truck again.

Shifting his arms so only one was around his shoulder, he guided Jack to the driver side of his old truck and gestured inward, saying, “Girls this is my old friend Jack; he’s a good fishing and camping buddy of mine.”

Taken aback at his first sight of Ennis’ daughters, Jack simply said, “Hi.”

They both stared, sort of stunned. As they’d grown up they’d heard fights through the bedroom wall between their parents about someone named Jack.

When the silence went a little too long, their father tersely said, “Say ‘hi’ girls,”

“Hi” they replied in unison, as Ennis led him out of earshot.

Looking back at the girls, Jack continued, “I just figured that your note meant that you wanted to, that you wanted me to… you know.”

Ennis bowed his head, “Jack; I’m sorry… you know I am.”

To Jack’s puzzled frown, he added, “I only get the girls once a month and I missed last month because of the roundup, so I…”

Something caught Ennis' eye out beyond the golden fields. A white pickup drove slowly by with two men in it, pointedly looking their way. One was his boss Carl Scrope, the owner of the ranch and the house he was staying in here.

Ennis took a step backward and Jack followed his eyes and saw the men watching them too.

Twist nodded disappointment and said reluctantly, “Yeah, okay.”

“Jack, if there was any way I could… You know I would,”

Jack realized that he wasn’t as important in Ennis’ life as he’d hoped he’d be, so he nodded again and turned to pace back to his truck. As he opened the door, Ennis’ voice came from behind him at a distance, “I’ll see ya next month, right?”

Jack nodded and slammed his door, started the engine and gunned it backward, spitting gravel and dust, and was gone in moments.

The ache in Ennis’ heart was almost unbearable, because he missed Jack as much as Jack missed him. He put on a happy smile and got in his truck, “So what do my girls wanna see tonight?”

Jack sobbed heartbroken almost all the way back south. He was thankful he hadn’t gone too far with his plans and was so deep in thought that he missed the turn off home.

So full was his heart with resentment and disillusionment, he couldn’t stand to see his wife and the life he didn’t want, but would be stuck with probably the rest of his life, so he made a decision and headed toward Mexico.

It took him an hour or so to find a hustler who looked a lot like Ennis, and since Lorene thought he’d be gone the whole week, he spent the whole week with him…

...That winter Ennis and Jack hooked up with a gay friend (one of the few they could be themselves with) who owned a cabin at the base of Brokeback, and he'd occasionally let them use it for free, so they spent Christmas together for the first time, bagging an elk whose head they had mounted on the wall. It was a good memory that they shared, but it wouldn’t last.

Ennis got poorer and Jack got richer and it strained their relationship when Jack’d offer to help financially.

The years piled onto years for both of them, Ennis stuck to ranch work with Scrope, but hired on here and there part time, not getting much ahead but glad enough to be around stock again, free to drop things, quit if he had to, and go into the mountains with Jack at short notice.

With each passing year, Jack lost a tiny bit more hope. His trips to Mexico became more frequent, but he needed love-Ennis' love-not just sex. With each passing year, Twist's mind began seeking out someone to give him what del Mar wouldn't.

The years saw Ennis watching his girls gradually grow through their teens and he realized that the passage of time was moving too swiftly for him to keep up. He’d date a woman now and again, but it never seemed to work out. As much as he hated to admit it, he’d always be comparing how he felt about Jack to how he felt about her, and not many measured up... but he was tortured as to how to tell Jack he loved him.

He just assumed Jack would always be there. Twist started to sense that, and a resentment began to build within him that del Mar took him for granted.

Paying the child support was rough on Ennis, but he never missed one damned payment. He was offered a permanent full-time job on Carl Scrope’s ranch on the condition he quit all the other side work, and he began taking charge of the horses and managing roundups. It meant more money and was work he enjoyed, but it meant cutting down seeing Jack to only once in maybe seven or eight months.

Jack began to change, always talking about the stock market or investments, or the changing economy. The only times he and Ennis were happy together were on their silent rides in the forests of Brokeback Mountain.

His parents had raised Ennis well before they died and he was taught that a man never uses the word love unless forced to, and never to another man. Ennis started wondering if people could tell he was "different" just by looking at him, but Jack told him he was just being paranoid, and once even offered to help him move to Texas, but Ennis didn't want to leave his girls.

His ego was too much part of his personality to admit he needed help from anyone; another gift from his father.

As his paranoia grew, he began seeing a girl named Cassie Cartwright out of loneliness, that he met in a bar one night and they became a regular couple in town. As they became good friends it even grew to a kind of love on his part, to the point of him wanting to introduce her to his daughters.



Chapter 16: Almost knocked into next week!
Toward the end of July Ennis ran into Monroe at one of his stores while picking up supplies. Monroe (who’s last name was also Monroe) told him that he’d been fighting with Alma lately because he thought that Ennis deserved more time with the girls and she didn't agree, but wouldn't say why.

Always the good-natured one, Monroe put it down to the resentment and scorn of an ex-wife.

They became instant friends and because of Ennis' irregular schedule Monroe agreed to allow him to take his “weekends” with the girls any time he wanted and even extend them when time permitted.

Something must’ve happened between him and Alma. Ennis didn’t know what, but he was glad of it. He smiled remembering what a bitch she was when she was pregnant both times and figured that’s probably what it was.

The beginning of November, Ennis sent word to Jack that he’d be able to get the week of Thanksgiving off and they immediately made plans to spend it on the mountain.

Jack joyfully started researching ways of surprising Ennis by cooking a wild turkey over a campfire or if it was even safe to roast it over an open flame. He settled for trying to do it in a Dutch oven and started calling department stores and camping supply houses. The project started looking too complicated, so he settled for pre-cooking one at home, hiding it packed in dry-ice in the big pan and then just suddenly having it appear out of nowhere roasting on a spit over the campfire.

He smiled for a week just thinking about the look on Ennis' face when he saw it.

Jack and he were back on good terms again after their fight about Twist not being able to see del Mar as much as he wanted to, so they went into it with their hopes high. Speaking of "highs," it was the first time Jack brought a little something to smoke with him that he discovered on one of his little trips to Mexico that summer. Even when they were arguing it was fun on the stuff, though a thoroughly buzzed Ennis did almost lose all their campsite cookware in a stream one day last year.

L.D. Newsome had other ideas about the holiday festivities.

Just as Jack had packed up his new truck, his father in law called and announced that he and his wife were inviting themselves to his house for Thanksgiving. Lorene wasn’t all that concerned about her husband missing the holiday, but seizing the opportunity to meet the “mystery man” in Jack’s life, she suggested Ennis come down to Texas to have the holiday meal with them.

She was beginning to have her suspicions that maybe this "Ennis" was actually another woman.

Jack said Ennis' pickup truck probably couldn’t make the trip and that was that.

On the way up to the mountains Jack stopped off at a department store and bought a set of new carving knives and a fancy bone china serving set with a big and expensive sterling silver serving tray that he figured Lorene would like.

His wife loved expensive things she could show off to her friends.

Lately Jack had been getting along well with his wife after all the years of indifference. Twist began wondering if maybe the business disagreement she’d had with her father may have caused a little animosity between them. Jack backed her up on her decision not to carry a line of expensive farm equipment that only a handful of ranchers would buy and they’d make very little profit on.

When Deke went ahead and ordered 5 units costing nearly a million dollars, Lorene called the manufacturer behind his back and canceled the order.

She and her father eventually made up, but Jack could tell that they were still pissed at each other.

Lorene’s mother began noticing Bobby’s slow behavior and how he’d stare into space for long periods of time and backed Jack up about getting him a special tutor over the summer.

Deke must’ve noticed his wife and daughter had seemed to side with Jack and the resentment was building up over the previous two weeks. Jack figured he was itching for a showdown with his son-in-law and was in no mood to go back under his thumb, especially in front of his wife and son.

Ennis was disappointed their holiday had to be cut short, but there was nothing to be done about it, so they made the best of it and had a good time despite themselves.

They had Jack's special meal Tuesday and spent practically all of Wednesday sleeping. To show his appreciation, Ennis was especially good in their sleeping bag on their last night on the mountain... or maybe it was just the week's supply of weed they tried to smoke all in those last two days?

Jack arrived back home around 11AM Thanksgiving morning, having driven all night and been delayed by snow and heavy traffic near Childress. He noticed his wife had changed hair color yet again, but rather than get into it with her, he barely mentioned it except to compliment how she looked, wanting to keep her on his side against her father.

Her face lit up when she saw the serving set and while her mother gushed over it, Newsome took the attitude he always had; anything Jack gave his daughter came out of the old man’s pocket whether Jack earned it or not.

While Jack pulled the bird out of the oven and got things ready, Lorene quickly reset the table with the new dinnerware and called everyone in.

Twist almost said something as he saw from the kitchen that Newsome had parked himself at the head of the table, but Lorene whispered in her father's ear while filling bowls with cream of turkey soup. Even then, he only grudgingly moved when his usually stone-faced wife quietly prompted him too.

Par for the course.

Jack settled for listening to the football game, paying attention just long enough to get the score before Lorene came in from serving and kissed him, thanking him again for the new table setting.

Twist smiled, at least he had her for an ally for a while, especially today.

Jack ladled some more drip juice from the bottom of the pan over the bird, and then picked up the fancy turkey and with a prompt from his wife screwed a half-hearted smile on his face and as he entered the dining room called out “Heeeeeeeere we are!” trying to sound like Ed McMahon announcing Johnny Carson.

As Lorene took her place at the table, Newsome swiftly stood up and grabbed the carving knives before Jack had even finished setting it down.

In a correcting tone and a smirk Newsome announced, “Hold on Rodeo, the stud duck’ll do the carving around here.”

Jack had expected him to pull something like that and rather than cause more friction than there was in the house already, had planned in advance to allow him the privilege. Lorene at the other side of the table pursed her lips but said nothing as if she’d expected him too after her father tried to take over the head of the table.

While her husband muttered something about saving his father in law the trouble, Lorene calmed down and redirected the attitude she was about to give her father to her son instead, whose eyes and attention were focused out of the dining room watching the TV in the living room with a blank stare on his face.

“Bobby,” she correctively warned, “if you don’t eat your dinner, I’m gonna have to turn that TV off.”

Jack feeling the need to reassert control in his own house stood up as his son began protesting in a spoiled voice, saying to him as he passed, “Ah, now you heard your mama,” walking across the living room. As he turned off the set, he said, “You finish your meal and then you can watch the game.”

Newsome watched resentfully as Jack returned to the table, after first making a point of resting a reassuring hand on his wife’s shoulder, who gave him an impish smile for standing his own ground. When L.D. Newsome was in a room, he was in charge-damn it! Before Jack even reseated himself, Newsome put down the carving set and headed for the TV, flashing narrowed and determined eyes at his daughter as he passed.

Wanting to avert a holiday showdown, she asked “Daddy?”.

Newsome ignored her.

This time in a warning tone, clearly indicating she’d side with her husband if he didn’t stop now, she repeated louder, “Daddy.”

As the set came back on, Newsome smirked directly at Jack and announced, “Hell, you don’t eat with your eyes do ya?” then with a dig directly at Jack he added, “You want your son to grow up to be a man don’t ya daughter?” and having gone that far cleared his throat at his son-in-law and added, “Boys should watch football.”

The insult was clear and Jack avoided his wife’s eyes, played with his wedding ring and quickly stood up. He’d be damned if he’d let that bastard insult him in his own house, in front of his own wife and son.

Getting up from the table, Jack quickly advanced back to the TV announcing in a barely controlled voice, “That boy is gonna finish eatin’ a meal that his mama spent over three hours cooking first!” then hit the button shutting it off, slamming the little door shut hiding the controls and then stalked back toward his seat.

It was now obviously a face-off and Newsome was determined to assert his authority. Before Jack even took his seat, Deke had put the knifes back down again and took a couple of steps with a smug look on his face back to the living room.

Suddenly from behind him Jack’s enraged voice yelled, “Now you sit down, you old son of a BITCH!”

Lorene’s mother’s eyes widened and her jaw dropped, not knowing whether to cheer or cower in fear at her husband's coming reaction.

Newsome froze in his tracks, his back to Jack hiding his reaction, as Lorene held her breath in shock.

To his surprisingly stunned father-in-law, trying desperately to calm down, Jack announced, “This is my house, that is my child, and you are my guest. Now you sit your ignorant ass down before I knock you into next week!”

Jack held his breath and surveyed the room for allies.

Mrs. Newsome swallowed hard

Lorene had a “WHOA!!!!!!!!” look of alliance with her husband and had to bow her head to keep from cracking up at the expense of her father's pride.

Encouraged, Jack looked over and found that Bobby was still staring at the dark TV in a trance as if he hadn’t noticed any of it.

Daring to glance up at his father-in-law, Jack was as stunned as the look on L.D’s face.

Almost meekly, Newsome smoothly turned tail and sat back down beside his stone-faced wife.

Fighting from fainting, Jack stood and grabbed the carving knives as Lorene gave Bobby a proud “See?” expression to her son indicating his father.

Obediently, Bobby picked up his spoon and started eating his soup.

The rest of the meal went in near silence, though half an hour into it the phone rang. Lorene answered it out in the kitchen and after coming back to the table was noticeably friendlier with her husband.

The private detective reported that he indeed did go camping, and with a man who owned a truck registered to Ennis del Mar. Well, at least it wasn't another woman; now if she could only figure out what was keeping him so preoccupied on those trips of his.


Jack knew he hadn’t heard the end of it from Deke Newsome…



Chapter 17: Tied to the line
Ennis held no serious hard feelings towards Monroe after Alma married him, just a vague sense of getting short-changed and showed it was all right by accepting the grocer’s last-minute invitation to Thanksgiving dinner with them, sitting between his girls and talking horses to them, telling jokes and trying not to be a sad daddy.

It was obvious that Alma didn’t like the idea at all, but went along with it for the sake of the girls, who missed their doting father. She never smiled once through the whole meal.

Ennis saw she really was pregnant by about four or five months.

Over the loud clatter of the electric carving knife that Junior had bought her stepfather for his birthday last week, they had a nice dinner and though Monroe was polite, he mostly stayed quiet.

After the pie, while the girls and Monroe watched a skating competition on TV, Alma got Ennis off in the kitchen and while she scraped plates into a bowl, said she worried about him living all alone and that he ought to get married again.

“Once burned,” he said, leaning against the counter, feeling too big for the room.

He dug at her, so she decided to return the favor.

“You still go fishin with that Jack Twist?”

“Not often… some,” he replied reluctantly.

He thought she’d take the pattern off the plate she was scraping.

“You know,” she said, and from her tone he knew something was coming, “I used to wonder how come you never brought any trouts home. You always said you caught plenty and you know how me and the girls like fish. So one time I got your creel case open the night before you went on one of your little trips… price tag still on it after five years, and I tied a note on the end of the line. It said, ‘Hello, Ennis bring some fish home-love Alma.’ And then you come back looking all perky and said you’d caught a bunch a browns and ate them up. Do you remember? I looked in that case when I got a chance and there was my note still tied there and that line hadn’t touched water in its life.”

“That don’t mean nothing Alma,” he warned in a low tone

Alma realized suddenly she’d gotten in over her head and began breathing heavily in fear, tears dropping from her eyes, “Don’t lie, don’t try to fool me no more Ennis. I know what it means. Jack Twist? Jack Nasty. You didn’t go up there to fish you went up…”

She’d overstepped his line.

He seized her wrist and twisted; tears sprang and rolled, a dish clattered. “Shut up,” he warned, “You don’t know nothin about it.”

“I’m gonna yell for Monroe!”

“You fuckin go right ahead. Go on and fuckin yell. I’ll make him eat the fuckin floor and you too!”
He gave another wrench that left her with a burning bracelet.

Working his way loose of her, he fled the kitchen as she screamed, “Get out, Get out of this house!” repeatedly.

On his way through the living room he shoved his hat on backward, gave Monroe a stern warning look that kept him seated and slammed out the front door to the sound of Jenny and Alma Junior calling out from the porch, “Daddy? Bye Daddy! Daddy?”

In a rage, he drove through the snow towards town and found a bar, but was too pissed to pay attention and crossed the road right in front of a pick up truck that slid to a stop to avoid him. Past caring, he tried to punch out the cussing driver and got flattened on the street in a fight he couldn’t win.

Rubbing his wounds, he picked himself up and went into the Black and Blue Eagle bar that night, got drunk, had a another short dirty fight and left.

He didn’t try to see his girls for a couple of months, figuring they would look him up when they got the sense and years to move out from Alma…


…Twist and del Mar were no longer young men with all of it before them. Jack grew a "salt & pepper" mustache and had filled out through the shoulders and hams; Ennis stayed as lean as a clothes pole, stepped around in worn boots, jeans and shirts summer and winter, only adding a canvas coat in cold weather. A benign growth appeared on his eyelid and gave it a drooping appearance; a broken nose healed crooked.

Years on years passed and always they made the pilgrimage to Brokeback together, Always made love, but never spoke the word and always there was never enough time.

Jack always willing to drop everything at a moment’s notice…
Ennis never willing to take a chance.

Down in Texas Jack’s father-in-law retired and gave Lorene control of the farm-equipment business. She showed a skill for management and hard deals.

Jack found himself with a vague managerial title, traveling to stock and agricultural-machinery shows. He had some money now and found ways to spend it on his buying trips.

A little Texas accent flavored his sentences, “cow” twisted into “kyow” and “wife” coming out as “waf.”



Chapter 18: A new lover by chance
In June of 1982, Jack and Lorene were on their way to a charity dinner one evening and came across a broken down truck. A good-looking man in fine Texas duds was peering into the engine compartment of a five year old Dodge pick-up with a camper on the back. A buxom woman in her early thirties with hair bleached blonder than Lorene’s (if that was possible), was on the road’s edge trying to look sexy enough to stop someone to help.

After about five minutes, Jack declared it too far gone for him to fix and discovered the couple were on their way to the same dinner as they, so he gave them a lift in his brand new club-cab truck.

Randal and LaShawn Tanny had just moved here from Idaho and were in the process of moving onto a ranch down the road where Randall had gotten a job as foreman.

At the dinner they invited themselves to sit with Jack and Lorene and from that moment on LaShawn never stopped talking.

Jack was in a rare period of being comfortable with his wife. She needled him all through dinner about never wanting to dance with her, so just to get back at her Twist asked LaShawn to dance.

Jack was also eager to escape the table to get away from Randall's unexpected hungry looks towards him.

Outside afterwards, while the two men sat waiting for their wives to "powder their noses", Randall and Jack got to talking and struck up a friendship that included invitations to go camping and fishing at a friend’s cabin.

A month later after a trip to Brokeback with Ennis, where they almost came to blows after Jack offered to help him out financially again,

Jack came home to find Randall’s invitation to go on a road trip with him to New Mexico. He mistook the invitation out to a secluded lake to go fishing and drinking whiskey and nearly got beaten up in the process.

One night Randall came up from the lake after skinny-dipping and sat naked on a secluded dock with his feet in the water. Jack had spent enough time camping with Randall that he thought it was safe to make a move on him... and did. Stripping off his clothes, Jack came up behind him, brushed his lips against Randall's back and dove into the water

When he surfaced and looked back, he saw that Randall had left and went back up to the cabin alone.

They’d already taken to each other as close friends, but like everything good in his life, Jack was prone to finding a way to destroy any happiness he had, especially if it didn’t involve Ennis.

Randall didn't take Jack's kiss on his shoulder too well.

They didn’t speak to each other the whole rest of the night, but strangely Randall didn’t leave. Then the very next night after a bottle of fine whiskey, Jack bedded Randall.

He kept telling himself it was just sex, because he loved to be fucked, but only by Ennis, so it wasn’t the same.

Suddenly Randall Tanny was in love with Twist and wanted to leave his jaw-flapping wife, maybe move up to Jack’s parent’s ranch where no one could find him and start a new life together.

A few months later though, just to complicate things; Jack began screwing Randy’s pretty wife on the side too!

L.D. Newsome began a campaign for Lieutenant Governor and Lorene became involved with it, giving Randall more time alone with him to convince Jack that they were meant for each other.

Randall offered the sex and the commitment that Jack wanted so badly in his life, but Ennis was the one he loved. As months went by and del Mar couldn’t get away from his work, Tanny began filling more and more of Twist’s time.

Finally in May of 1983, he showed up at Jack’s house and announced he’d left his wife and asked for shelter.

As usual, just when things started getting serious with someone else, Jack’d hear from Ennis like always, about getting some free time to spend up on the mountain and everything would fall back into its old pattern.

He told Tanny he had to take care of some farm business up in Wyoming that would last about ten days, for which he had to tend to first, and after packing up Randall they headed north.

Twist traveled as far as Riverton with Tanny, where the ranch foreman waited in the motel where he and Ennis had reunited. Randy played heavily on his mind during the rest of the trip to Brokeback Mountain State Park as Jack actually contemplated a showdown with Ennis.

It was the right dream-but with the wrong man.

Jack had called ahead and told his father he’d be up to talk to him about setting up a place to live, possibly building a small cabin on the ranch on an unused outlying acre away from his parents, and how he planned to separate from his wife again. He said he was bringing up some help from Texas with him so he could manage the farm full time. Old man Twist said he and his mother were going to a religious retreat up in Montana and they’d only be home until Thursday so Jack told him he’d be up around noon on Wednesday for sure. His father made a point of repeating Jack’d be there at noon.


Chapter 19: You got a better idea?
As planned, Jack and Ennis spent a few cold days at a series of little icebound, no-name high lakes, then worked across into the Hail Strew River drainage, looking for someplace warmer to spend their last vacation days.

Both knew where they were headed.

This had been “their place” by the lake for years, with Brokeback rising high above, majestically covered with snow.

The tea-colored river ran fast with snowmelt, a swirl of bubbles at every high rock, pool and setback. The tall pines swayed stiffly as hawks argued overhead somewhere. The horses drank and Jack dismounted, scooped icy water up in his hand, crystalline drops falling from his fingers, his mouth and chin glistening wet.

"Get beaver fever doin’ that,” warned Ennis with a smile, then, “Good enough place,” looking at a flat piece of ground by the river, with two or three stone fire rings from old hunting camps. A sloping meadow rose behind the bench, protected by a stand of lodge poles. There was plenty of dry wood.

They set up camp without saying much, settling the horses in the meadow. Jack broke the seal on a bottle of whiskey, took a long, hot swallow, exhaled forcefully and declared, “That’s one of the two things I need right now,” eyeing his friend lovingly as he capped and tossed it to Ennis.

Tuesday morning the clouds came that Ennis had expected, a gray racer out of the West, a bar of darkness driving wind before it and small flakes. It faded after an hour into tender spring snow that heaped wet and heavy. By nightfall it had turned colder. Jack and Ennis set up lawn chairs facing the water and passed a joint back and forth, the fire burning late, Jack restless and bitching about the cold, poking the flames with a stick, twisting the dial of the transistor radio until the batteries died.

Scanning the darkening sky, Jack commented, “Gonna snow for sure tonight.” Ennis silently nodded, handing their third joint back to Jack.

Twist took a good deep toke and asked, handing it back and letting the smoke out slowly, “All this time and you ain’t never found no one to marry?”

Ennis said he’d been “putting the blocks” to a woman who worked part-time at the Wolf Ears bar in Signal where he was working now for Carl Scrope’s cow-and-calf outfit, but it wasn’t going anywhere and she had some problems he didn’t want. “She’s studying to be a nurse too, or something… I don’t know”

Jack admitted he’d had a thing going with the wife of a rancher down the road in Childress and for the last few months he’d sneak around expecting to get shot by Lorene or her husband Randy, catching his breath at the mention of the name, wishing he could inhale it back.

Not noticing, Ennis laughed a little and said he probably deserved it if one of them bagged him.

Jack bowed his head.

They’d have to leave early tomorrow for him to get to his parent’s by noon. If his father agreed, Randy was waiting in Riverton for his call to head north to Lightning flat in a rental car where they’d meet up. With his parents away on their retreat in Montana, they’d have the place to themselves.

His ache that Ennis would come with him instead, got more intense, making him sad. Unless he could talk Ennis into finally committing to their mutual and long-standing love, this would be the last time he’d ever see del Mar again. Jack had told himself that so many times before, but this time he knew he’d do it. It hurt too much to think he’d wasted his whole life hoping for this man he loved so much. The heartache of the situation was just too much to bear any more.

After a long, long thoughtful pause, Jack admitted in pain, “I tell you what…”

Ennis looked over into his eyes.

“…sometimes I miss you so much, I can hardly stand it.”

The horses nickered in the darkness beyond the fire’s circle of light. If Ennis had said anything to that, which was doubtful, it wasn’t heard, he just looked into the glow at the end of the joint and then silently across to the mountains.

That night, Ennis was especially tender with Jack as they made love in the tent, both satisfied afterward to just hold each other in their arms till they fell asleep.

The next morning they talked about nothing and made love again, knowing it’d have to last a while before they could come back up here.

Jack pondered if it’d be their last time and at that moment would’ve sold his soul if Ennis would admit he loved him. Twist suspected that a loveless life with Randall would be more misery than he was feeling now.

Afterward, Ennis put his arm around Jack, pulled him close, fretting over how much he missed his daughters and how he only saw his girls about once a month, Alma, Jr. had grown to be a shy nineteen-year-old with his beanpole length, Jenny a little live wire. “I used to want a boy for a kid,” said Ennis, “but just got little girls.”

“I didn’t want none of either kind,” said Jack. “But fuck-all nothin’ has worked the way I wanted. Nothin never come to my hand the right way.”

Ennis pulled Jack into his strong arms. One thing never changed: the brilliant charge of their infrequent couplings was darkened by the sense of time flying, never enough time, never enough. Jack was weighing whether it was worth it to keep the relationship with Ennis going; after all he’d cheated on his wife with him, why not on Randall too?

An hour later at the trailhead parking lot, horses loaded into the trailer, Ennis was ready to head back to Signal, Jack up to Lightning Flat to see his folks for a few days. As Jack loaded the camping equipment into his truck, Ennis walked over to him and said what he’d been putting off the whole week. "There's somethin' I've been meaning to tell you Bud," he said as casually as he could, digging his thumb nervously into one of Jack's new chrome door handles. "It's more'n likely that I won't be able to get away again until November, after they shipped stock and before winter-feeding starts.".

“November? What in hell happened to August? Tell you what, we said August, nine, ten days. Christ, Ennis! Whyn’t you tell me this before? You had a fuckin' week to say some little word about it. And why’s it we’re always in the friggin cold weather? We ought a do somethin’. We ought a go south. We ought a go to Mexico one day.”

Jack slammed the door of his truck and began walking away from him toward the edge of the lake 10 yards away.

To his back Ennis replied, “Mexico? Jack, you know me. All the travellin I ever done is goin around the coffeepot lookin for the handle. The trade off for this week was August, that’s what’s the matter with August. Lighten up on me, Jack. We can hunt in November, kill us a nice elk. Try if I can get Don Wroe’s cabin again. We had a good time that year; remember?”

Jack turned around to face away from the sight of his beloved Mountain and said with barely controlled anger, “You know friend, this is a goddam bitch of a unsatisfactory situation. You used a come away easy; now it’s like seein’ the damned Pope.”

“Jack, I gotta work...Huh? Them earlier days I used to just quit the jobs. You got a wife with money, a good job. You forget how it is bein’ broke all the time. You ever hear of child support? I been payin' out for years and got more to go. Let me tell you, I can’t quit this one... and I can’t get the time off. It was tough gettin this time... some of them late heifers is still calving. You don’t leave them. You don’t. Scrope raised hell about me takin the week. I don’t blame him. He probably ain’t got a night’s sleep since I left. I told you the trade-off was August... You got a better idea?”

“I did once.” The tone was bitter and accusatory.

Ennis said nothing, straightened up slowly and rubbed at his forehead as a horse stamped inside the trailer. He walked with slow deliberation toward Jack and his eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“You been a cheatin’ on me in Mexico, Jack Fuckin’ Twist? Huh?”

Mexico was the place. He’d heard. He was cutting fence now, trespassing on verbal forbidden ground when he added between gritted teeth, “I heard what they got down there for boys like you, Jack.”

Jack felt the resentment coming, the wasted years of loving a man incapable of showing love back. His thoughts flashed on Randy waiting for the call that’d start their life together. Jack didn't know that Randall had already foolishly called the elder Mr. and Mrs. Twist to thank them for opening their home up to Jack and himself, and for their generous tolerance.

Twist gathered his courage; it was either split up forever or stay together. “Hell yes, I been to Mexico. Where’s the fuckin problem?” Braced for it all these years and here it came, late and unexpected.

A jealous rage began building in Ennis, a rage that he didn’t know was there because he wouldn’t let himself feel it all of these years, but now it was surfacing and almost out of control. He paced up to Jack and stood, his face only inches from the man he just admitted to himself that he could lose.

“I’m gonna say this to you one time, Jack Twist,” said Ennis between gritted teeth. “What I don’t know, all them THINGS," he spat out shoving Jack sharply, " I don’t know bout what you do in Mexico could get you killed if I should come to know them… and I ain’t foolin.”

Ennis turned away and began pacing down the bank toward his truck.

“Try this one,” yelled Jack at the top of his lungs, letting the years of resentment out, “and I’ll say it just one time.

Ennis suddenly turned around and angrily answered, “Go ahead!”

Jack spun back around to take in the sky, the lake and the vista of Brokeback Mountain and suddenly couldn’t stand the sight of it. Turning his back to it again, he replied in a frustrated scream, throwing both arms out and gesturing wildly, “Tell you what, we could a had a good life together, a fuckin real good life. But you wouldn’t do it, Ennis, so what we got now is Brokeback Mountain.” His voice raised almost an octave as he wheeled around to gesture at the beautiful mountaintop. His eyes began burning and his chest tightened to the point that he almost couldn't gather the breath to say, “Everything built on that. It’s all we got, boy, FUCKIN' all, so I hope you know that, if you don’t never know the rest.”

Ennis turned his back to Jack.

In anger, Twist began stomping toward del Mar. A rush of adrenaline filled him as he felt the freedom to finally let out his unsaid feelings. In a frustrated rage he shouted, “Count the damn few times we been together in twenty years. Measure the fuckin short leash you keep me on, then ask me about Mexico and then tell me you’ll kill me for needin what we have together and not hardly never gettin it. You got no fuckin idea how bad it gets! God damn it all to Hell, Ennis, I’m not you. I can’t make it on a couple of high-altitude fucks once or twice a year!”

He turned and walked back up the bank to stand at the edge of the water. He felt the words coming, afraid they’d end it between them, but he knew what had to be said. He gave up fighting back his tears as he said it to the mountain, “You’re too much for me, Ennis, you son of a whore-son bitch. I wish I knew how to quit you.”

Like vast clouds of steam from thermal springs in winter the years of things unsaid and now unsayable admissions, declarations, shames, guilts, fears all rose around them. Ennis stood as if heart-shot, his face gray and deep-lined, grimacing, eyes screwed shut, fists clenched.

He was always the one in control, he was always the one who was strong and through the hell he’d lived all these years there was always Jack, always Jack. In his mind he hated that he needed anybody and the crashing blow that hit him was he’d lied to himself, he didn’t think he could live without his… his lover.

Abruptly Ennis cried out like a bear that had been shot. His voice so deep in sorrow that it shocked Jack into looking back at him. Ennis stood glaring at Jack, pawing at a tear falling from his eye, trying to hide it with the brow of his hat.

Sniffing to clear his sinuses, he barely blubbered out, “Then why don’t you Jack? Why don’t you just leave me be? You’re the reason I’m like this; got nothin’ and no one, all alone. I, I can’t stand this no more Jack, I just can’t.”

Then their eyes met and Ennis' knees began to cave as he sank towards the ground. His strength and manhood seemed to have left him and he burst into uncontrolled sobs at the thought of Jack leaving him too.

“Jesus,” said Jack. “Ennis?” bounding toward him, trying to guess if it was a heart attack or the overflow of an incendiary rage, Ennis was struggling back onto his feet and as Jack tried to extend his loving arms around him, Ennis shoved him away sharply. “Get the fuck off of me,” he shouted, “Just leave me be!”

Ignoring him, Twist fought him up to his feet, both of them clutching each other tightly.

Jack had rarely seen Ennis cry before and was nearly in shock as the man he thought was made of stone and steel sobbed in his arms as they both sank to their knees.

“I can’t hardly stand this no more, Jack” he blubbered again.

Then, just as fast as it started, it was over.

In an instant they were facing each other, though only a foot apart, it seemed like a hundred yards, as Ennis fell silent.

Twist could see that the emotions Ennis had held in for twenty years had torn him completely apart in trying to get them out, so he just stood there silently as del Mar turned his back to him, stood silently for a moment collecting himself and then headed to his truck without a look back.

While he silently watched Ennis finish packing the saddles, Jack remembered and craved in a way he could neither help nor understand, the time that distant summer on Brokeback when Ennis had come up behind him and pulled him close, the silent embrace satisfying some shared and sexless hunger.

They had stood that way for a long time in front of the fire, its burning, tossing ruddy chunks of popping sparks, as the morning sun cast shadows of their bodies a single column against the rock.

Gently the young Ennis put his arms around young Jack’s shoulders tenderly.

The minutes ticked by from the watch on Ennis’s wrist, and from the sticks in the fire settling into coals. Ennis’s breath came slow and quiet, he hummed, rocked a little in the morning silence, punctuated by a horse snorting. Jack leaned back against his man’s steady heartbeat, wanting to drown in his arm, as the vibrations of the humming like faint electricity and, while standing he fell into sleep that was not sleep but something else drowsy and tranced until Ennis, dredging up a rusty but still usable phrase from his childhood time before his mother died said, “Time to hit the hay, my cowboy… I got a go. Come on, you’re sleepin on your feet like a horse,” and gave Jack a shake, a push and went off without another word.

Jack heard his spurs tremble as he mounted and the words “See you tomorrow,” and the horse’s shuddering snort and the grinding of hooves on stone.

Later, that dozy embrace solidified in his memory as the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives. Nothing marred it, even the knowledge that Ennis would not then embrace him face to face because he did not want to see or feel that it was Jack he held. And maybe, he thought, they’d never got much farther than that.

Let be, let be.

Coming out of that wonder filled memory, Jack realized that Ennis had wordlessly driven away and as his eyes focused, he watched the battered Ford with their horses aboard round a curve and disappear between the tall pines in a cloud of blowing dust.

No goodbyes, no nothing.
Was it over between them?



Chapter 20: Newsome's revenge
It took Jack two hours, sometimes with tear-blurred eyes to drive the long miles to his boyhood home. Randall Tanny’s offer to leave his wife and take up with Jack up in Lightning Flat and start a new life together would be impossible unless he could free himself of a lifetime of loving Ennis.

Trying to balance the scales between the hopelessness of ever having something permanent with the manhe loved, and with never being able to love Randall as much, weighed heavy on his mind.

By the time he crossed the town limits of Lightning Flat and spotted his family’s battered, faded and rusted mailbox, he decided he’d talk to his father about building that cabin, but had also decided to give Ennis just one more hopeless chance to give in and show him the love he’d been hiding all these years.

After traveling about a hundred yards down the long private dirt lane that led to the ranch house… his boyhood home, through the blowing dust, he saw old lumber, or a post from the barbed wire fence that’d somehow fallen over and he smiled that his new truck could run over it without even noticing.

As he bumped over it, the front right tire blew out and he cussed his head off as he struggled to stay in control.

Jumping out to inspect it, he exclaimed, “Shit!”

He pulled off his jacket, slapped it across the hood overhanded and reached in to shut off the truck.

After scanning the surrounding weathered out-buildings of his youth and hearing only crows cawing and cows, he rolled up his sleeves, got under the back of his truck and pulled down the spare, jack and tire iron, then set to work getting the front tire off.

A sound distracted him, as an old battered Chevy pickup pulled up behind him that he recognized as his father’s. His smile to his old man changed to surprise as the door of the passenger side opened too and his hated father-in-law, climbed out. Two husky young farmhands wearing worn overalls that he’d never met before, leaped athletically out of the old bed, bouncing the back of the truck on creaking shocks and started looking for something beside the old dirt road together.

His dad smiled as they approached, “Trouble son?”

Jack puzzled that his parents were supposed to be up north, and that somehow Newsome and his father even knew each other, much less that they were friends. While Jack was still mystified, distracted and off guard, his father-in-law appeared at his side, reached for the tire iron in Jack’s hand and said, “Here ‘Rodeo’, let me help you with that.”

“Well thank you,” responded Jack with a surprised grin. “Rodeo” had become a nickname over the years that Lorene’s old man used to deride his son-in-law with disrespect. Jack's brows furrowed in puzzlement because it clashed with the warm smile his father-in-law now wore.

“What happened?” his father asked.

“That post was layin’ across the road,” replied Jack gazing over into his dad’s eyes. He turned to look for it and found that one of the young men that’d come with them was now carrying it toward him. The other farmhand was nowhere to be found. As the stranger approached with a threatening grin, Jack noticed that the big wooden post had a bunch of new shiny long nails driven through it, so that the ends were all pointing outward. As he came closer, the ranch hand gripped it like a slugger about to belt a home run out of the stadium.

The long grass rustled behind the truck, as the other man came up behind him, tire iron in hand.

Mystified, Jack turned to ask his father what was going on, but he wasn’t there. After a moment of glancing around, he spotted him out in the wheat field about twenty feet, facing away, his head bowed and hands clasped in front of himself as if praying.

The last things Jack Twist saw were those shiny nails rushing towards him, only inches from his face.

Still facing away, old man Twist closed his eyes and choked out a very rare sob, remembering Randall’s voice thanking him for his generous tolerance of the love he had for his only son. The deviant on the other end of the line was confessing his disgusting and immoral sexual relationship with his boy-his pride and joy that he’d worked so hard to make a man out of and now was nothing more than a faggot. Jack was now nothing more than a beloved pet dog that had gone rabid, or a diseased prized steer possessed by Satin.

John Twist and Ennis del Mar had one intimate thing in common that they'd both regret the rest of their lives... being unable to tell Jack how much he was loved.

All that the elder Twist knew for his whole life was that homosexuality was like cancer and it had to be cut out of society before it spread wherever it was found. He comforted himself knowing that his god would forgive him for saving his son from a horrid life of sin and a later damnation to hell. He closed his eyes tighter and began reciting the Lord’s Prayer loudly hoping he wouldn’t hear what came next.

When the sound of loud thumps stopped, someone came stumbling toward him, ending with a soft painful groan. Then something heavy was dragged through the tall field crop the rest of the way and dropped without pity at his feet behind him.

The air filled with the putrid smell of blood. His son’s blood.

The elder Twist didn’t look as Newsome eventually came up beside him and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder and then joined him reciting softly. Newsome nodded behind himself, as Jack’s lifeless body was then dragged away.

“Amen,” they said together.

Newsome ordered one of his men to get kerosene to burn the blood-soaked wheat, and reminded them he wanted no traces left.

In the distance, just barely over the sound of a crow cawing, a woman's voice wailing in agony and grief was heard.

Newsome quickly looked back across the fields towards the farmhouse to spot Martha Twist standing in the open doorway in shock.

She witnessed her son's murder and Newsome wondered how much trouble she'd make later, and what he would have to do to keep her fool mouth shut. His men would set it up to look like some kind of farm or road accident. The elder Twists would attend that meeting up in Montana to establish an alibi... not that they'd probably need one.

He then grinned and nodded to himself in satisfaction. Lorene would now live very comfortably on the large life insurance policy he'd bought on Jack back when he tried to get him sent to Viet Nam...


Chapter 21: Ashes to ashes
For a couple of months afterward Ennis made a serious effort to date Cassie, but there were too many things that were against it. Jenny hated her and Junior just barely tolerated her. Also the difference in their ages, and that Ennis had lost interest in having sex with her or anyone for that matter.

In the end, she’d visited the ranch so much trying to see him, that she actually started dating his boss Carl Scrope. Of course Ennis was so wrapped up in his own problems that he didn’t even find out until he encountered her in the bus station on her way to visit her parents up north… accompanied by Carl.

He felt the need to get away and talked Scrope into letting him have some extra time off in November above what they'd already agreed on. Ennis was figuring he could patch things up with Jack, and maybe even summon the courage to tell him he loved him. He didn’t know about Jack's death until his postcard to Twist saying that November still looked like the first chance came back stamped “DECEASED" in red ink.

For a moment he stood dazed in the middle of the street. He looked at it again, rereading the word DECEASED rubber-stamped diagonally across his handwritten card. Repeatedly he kept asking himself if there were another meaning for the word, not able to face what it was telling him.

He went to a payphone by the post office and dialed Twist’s number in Childress, something he had done only once before when he tried to apologize to Jack, who had misunderstood about the divorce and had driven twelve hundred miles north, only to be sent back home because he had the girls that weekend and couldn’t get out of it.

His legs barely supported him as he trembled, not wanting to face the loss, and he leaned against the glass of the booth.

This would be all right; Jack would answer, had to answer. But he didn’t. It was Lorene and she said “”Who? Who is this? and when he told her again she said in a level voice yes, Jack was pumping up a flat on the truck out on a back road when the tire blew up. The bead was damaged somehow and the force of the explosion slammed the rim into his face, broke his nose and jaw and knocked him unconscious on his back. By the time someone came along he had drowned in his own blood.

“Jack used to mention you,” she said. “You’re the fishing buddy or the hunting buddy, I know that. Would have let you know,” she said, “but I wasn’t sure about your name and address. Jack kept most of his friends’ addresses in his head. It was a terrible thing. He was only thirty-nine years old.”

Years of conditioning in the ways of men took hold and not a tear fell from his eyes, though he wanted desperately to be able to feel that release. His chest tightened just the same to the point of almost not being able to breathe.

Tire rims don't just explode off of cars, that much he knew. Jack must've let his secret slip to the wrong person.

They'd used the tire irons on him for sure' just like Earl and Rich.

If they knew about Jack, did they know about him?

“He's buried down there?” He asked and wanted to curse her for believing that lie.

The little Texas voice came slip-sliding down the wire, “We put a stone up. He used to say he wanted to be cremated and have his ashes scattered on Brokeback Mountain. I didn’t know where that was. So he was cremated, like he wanted and like I say, half his ashes was interred here and the rest I sent up with his folks. I thought Brokeback Mountain was around where he grew up. But knowing Jack, it might be some pretend place where the bluebirds sing and there’s a whiskey spring.”

“No ma’am. We herded sheep up on Brokeback the summer of ‘63,” said Ennis. He could hardly speak as his chest tightened and his eyes burned.

“Well, he said it was his special favorite place. I thought he meant to get drunk. He drank a lot.”

“His folks still up in Lightnin Flat?”

“They’ll be there until they die. You get in touch with them. I suppose they’d appreciate it if his wishes was carried out, about his ashes and all.”

No doubt about it, she was polite but the little voice was as cold as snow.

“Well I thank you for your time ma’am, and I sure am sorry.”

The only reply was a click as she hung up.

Ennis hung up and slumped against the glass enclosed booth, unable to move, unable to feel and unable to grieve. Then as he reached to push the glass door open, scalding tears finally fell down his cheeks. He’d cried like that only once before-the day he lost his girls in the divorce hearing.

…He headed for a pawn shop in town to buy a pistol. He needed one that couldn't be traced back to him.

Lorene reached over to the end table and picked up a little address book, looked up Old Man Twist’s phone number. Sighing resignment, she picked up the phone, paused and then changed her mind and replaced the receiver. After lighting a cigarette, she picked up the remote and clicked on the TV.



Chapter 22; Bound by blood
Ennis drove the road to Lightning Flat through desolate country past a dozen abandoned ranches distributed over the plain at eight and ten-mile intervals, houses sitting blank-eyed in the weeds, corral fences down. The mailbox read “John C. Twist.” Though the spread was over a thousand acres, the ranch itself was a meager little place, leafy spurge taking over. The stock was too far distant for him to see their condition, only that they were black baldies.

Part way up the lane, he brought his truck to a stop as he came to a place where the brown wheat had been burned. It was a narrow strip maybe five feet wide, but about twenty yards long.

Leaving the motor idle, he got out to look at it.

His first thought was that someone poured gasoline on it to burn out an underground hornet’s nest, but it didn’t look right.

A lightning strike?

No, as far away from the house as it was, the whole field would’ve burned before someone could come along and put it out.

Around him crows cawed and horses whinnied. He looked around and then got back behind the wheel. Sitting there, he pondered what else might’ve caused it, and a scene flashed before his eyes of men chasing Jack into the field, beating him as he tried to get away, then later dragging him back to his truck. Later they’d burn only that part of their valuable crop, to destroy the bloodstains.

It was the tire iron, it had to be and Jack’s father probably did it, later having his own son cremated to hide the evidence.

An angry rumble began in his ears.

He leaned over to push a chromed button in the dash and the glove box popped down, revealing an always-loaded revolver that he’d bought last week. He’d never in his life before thought of murdering someone, but to avenge Jack’s death he considered it.

He’d called ahead, so they knew he was coming out here, but not when, so he doubted an ambush was waiting, but he was ready for it.

He shifted back into gear and pressed on.

At the end of the lane, he came up on an old farmhouse and a couple of out buildings. The years of rain and wind had nearly scoured the white paint off the old wood, except up near the eaves.

A roofless platform porch stretched across the side of the dreary place, a broom leaning next to the door.

He hadn’t made it out of his truck, when the door opened and an older thin woman in a plain housedress opened the door and gestured a welcome to him.

They wouldn’t do it in front of a woman.

The gun stayed where it was.

Moments later, Ennis sat at the old and worn kitchen table with Jack’s father opposite him. Ennis fought his emotions at being so close to a man capable of murdering his own son, probably with no more regret than it'd take to kill a favorite horse that’d gone lame. Martha Twist avoided his eyes. She was stout and careful in her movements as though recovering from an operation. Ennis wondered if her worried look was because she suspected he was here to kill her husband for killing Jack.

She stumped him into confusion by asking unexpectedly, “Want some coffee, don’t you? Piece a cherry cake?”

In shock Ennis replied sadly, “Thank you, Ma’am, I’ll take a cup a coffee but I can’t eat no cake just now.”

The old man sat silent, his hands folded before him, staring at Ennis with an angry, knowing expression. Ennis couldn’t see much of Jack in either one of them and took a breath.

Feeling tears well up behind his eyes, Ennis said softly, “I feel awful bad about Jack. Can’t begin to say how bad I feel. I knew him a long time. I come by to tell you that if you want me to take his ashes up there on Brokeback like his wife says he wanted, I’d be proud to.”

Jack’s mother placed a cup in front of him and he muttered and nodded his thanks to her.

A smothering silence filled the room like smoke.

Twist seemed to be eyeing a sideboard where maybe a gun was hidden. Fighting down fear of the pure hatred in Jack’s father’s eyes, Ennis cleared his throat.

The old man's eyes narrowed as he said from a clenched jaw, “Tell you what, I know where Brokeback Mountain is. He thought he was too goddamn special to be buried in the family plot.”

Mrs. Twist showed tender concern for her guest, despite her husband and despite the presence of the man who may have perverted her boy that was sitting in her very kitchen. She may have believed in the Pentecost, but she knew too that her son had loved this man. Since witnessing her son’s death at a distance, secretly her husband had become her enemy and the enemy of your enemy was your friend. For a moment she was lost as to what she’d do if this man killed her husband as much to avenge Jack as to calm her grief.

Ennis seemed transfixed in Twist’s eyes, wishing now he’d brought that pistol in with him.

Looking across the room from where she stood near the kitchen sink, she recognized the hatred in her husband’s eyes. Jack’s mother ignored this and almost to defy him, she moved to tenderly lay a comforting hand on Ennis’ shoulder and said gently, "He used a come home every year, even after he was married and help his daddy on the ranch for a week, fix the gates and mow and all. I kept his room like it was when he was a boy and I think he appreciated that. You are welcome to go up to his room if you want.”

Ennis was almost dizzy in lost thoughts. Grabbing comfort where he could, he looked up at Martha and nodded, “Thank you ma’am, I’d like that.”

The old The old man’s eyes flickered toward his wife with pure resentment and then returned to glare at Ennis, eyeing him with a lethal mixture of bitterness and hatred. Twist spoke, “Jack used ta say, ‘Ennis del Mar,’ he used ta say, ‘I’m gonna bring him up here one a these days and we’ll lick this damn ranch into shape.’ He had some half-baked idea the two a you was goin a move up here, build a cabin and help me run this ranch and bring it up. Then this spring he’s got another one’s goin a come up here with him and build a place and help run the ranch, some ranch neighbor of his from down in Texas name of Randall. They were both goin a split up with their wives and come back here. So he says. But like most a Jack’s half-baked ideas, it never come to pass.”

Ennis’ heart froze and his throat tightened: Jack had found someone else. He wanted to cry because he knew he was the one who drove the man that only now he could admit to himself that he’d loved away, and this was his punishment.

Avoiding his eyes, Ennis glanced at her, glanced up the stairs, then back at her for permission.

She sadly nodded and he stood, walking across the creaking floor, forcing himself not to look back, again hoping he hadn’t made a bad decision leaving the gun in the truck. Wondering again if he could summon the guts to kill the man he was now convinced killed Jack... his own son.

The bedroom, at the top of a steep stair that had its own climbing rhythm, was tiny and hot, afternoon sun pounding through the west window, hitting the narrow boy’s bed against the left wall and reflecting onto a wooden chair, a B.B. gun in a hand-whittled rack over the bed.

Ennis caught his breath and fondled the little wooden horse and cowboy that he’d whittled so many years ago while waiting out a rainstorm on the mountain. Jack had lovingly kept it as a souvenir on an ink-stained desk.

He sat wearily on a boy sized wooden bench by a steam radiator next to the window, which looked down on the gravel and dirt lane, stretching south and it occurred to him that for Jack’s growing-up years that was the only road he knew.

It was too stuffy in there, so he slid the window up, using an old wooden paint stir to prop it open. Outside was only the sound of livestock and crows. No other cars were in sight, so he relaxed a little.

An ancient magazine photograph of some dark-haired movie star was taped to the wall beside the bed, the skin tone gone magenta. He could hear Jack’s mother downstairs running water, filling the kettle and setting it back on the stove, asking the old man a muffled question.

The closet was opposite of him and he got up to distract himself to look inside. He found two pairs of jeans crease-ironed and folded neatly over wire hangers and on the floor a pair of worn packer boots he thought he remembered.

Amongst the shirts hanging neatly there, was the jacket that Jack had worn the last time Ennis had seen him on the mountain.

It was true, he’d been here but never left, otherwise the coat would have left with him.

A roar filled his ears, as he knew now that it was true… they’d killed him.

Ennis’ throat tightened again against a sob that was fighting to escape.

He knelt to look at the boots again and noticed a tiny recess in the apple green back wall of the closet. Just barely in sight was a denim long-sleeve shirt with a dark reddish-brown stain on the cuff, stiff from hanging there for so long. He stood to lift it off the nail as his jaw tightened painfully and his eyes burned. Suddenly his throat was so dry he couldn’t swallow.

It was Jack’s old denim shirt from their Brokeback days. Ennis’ breath began to shudder as he knew that the dried blood on the sleeve was his own; a gushing nosebleed on the last afternoon on the mountain when Jack, in their horseplay, grappling and wrestling, had slammed Ennis’s nose hard with his knee.

Jack had tried to stop the blood with his sleeve, which was everywhere, all over both of them, but Ennis had hit him with a roundhouse right, laying him out in the wild columbine and mountain clover.

The shirt seemed oddly heavy until he saw there was another shirt inside it, the sleeves carefully worked down inside Jack’s sleeves. Ennis moaned a tear-filled “Ohhhhhh Jack.” It was his own white plaid shirt, lost, he’d thought, long ago up on that mountain, his dirty shirt, nose blood still all over it where he’d wiped it, the pocket ripped, buttons missing, stolen by Jack and hidden here inside Jack’s own shirt, the pair like two skins, one inside the other, two in one.

As tears fell from his eyes and his nose clogged, he pressed his face into the fabric and breathed in slowly through his mouth, hoping for the faintest smoke and mountain sage, or salty sweet stink of Jack, but there was no real scent, only the memory of it and the imagined power of Brokeback Mountain of which nothing was left but what he held in his hands. He tried to remember and then imagine Jack’s loving body within it and choked on the memory, clutching it tightly to his chest as he finally sobbed out his sorrow and grief.

He wiped his acid tears on the soft denim, and swore not to leave this house without it.

Barely containing his grief and anger, he found himself at the bottom of the stairs, trying to find the words to ask permission to take the item he had in his trembling hands.

To his relief, Jack’s mother seemed to read his mind, nodded silently and went to the kitchen to fetch an empty paper grocery bag. He was reluctant to let it leave his hands, as she gently took it from him with a reassuring smile.

Her gaze fell on the blood stained white plaid shirt and she realized Jack’s denim shirt was hidden within it. Something else was in there-Jack’s toy horse and rider?

Her eyes showed brief pain, then swiftly flickered toward her husband, satisfied he wasn’t watching and then locked again on Ennis.

A bond in Jack's blood was silently exchanged between them, with a promise of a secret kept.

If she noticed the shirt inside the shirt, she didn’t show him she had and silently handed the bag to him after carefully folding everything inside of it.

Jack’s damned father refused to let his ashes go. “Tell you what… we got a family plot and he’s goin in it.”

Jack’s mother stood beside del Mar, caressed his shoulder gently and said, “You come again,” as she opened the door.

Ennis nodded to them both, silently thanked her for the precious package he held and made it to the truck before he burst out in tears, beating the steering wheel with balled up fists.

Bumping down the washboard road Ennis passed the country cemetery fenced with sagging sheep wire, a tiny fenced square on the welling prairie, a few graves bright with plastic flowers and didn’t want to know Jack was going in there.

A few weeks later, on a Saturday, he threw all his dirty horse blankets into the back of his pickup and took them down to the Quik Stop Car Wash to turn the high-pressure spray on them. When the wet clean blankets were stowed in the truck bed he stepped into Higgins’ gift shop and busied himself with the postcard rack.

“Ennis, what are you lookin’ for, rootin’ through them postcards?” said Linda Higgins, throwing a sopping brown coffee filter into the garbage can.

“Scene of Brokeback Mountain.”

“Over in Fremont County?”

“No, north a here.”

“I didn’t order none a them. Let me get the order list. They got it I can get you a hunderd. I gotta order some more cards anyway.”

“One’s enough,” said Ennis.



Chapter 23: MURDERER!!!
Three weeks after Ennis’ visit to Jack’s parents, Twist began coming to him in his dreams. It was always the handsome Jack, the lithe muscular Jack and the young happy Jack. Sometimes the dreams were of them making love on the mountain. Other times they were often of cans of beans resting on the log next to a camp fire and suddenly the spoons would turn into tire irons flying through the air at them.

He’d be walking down a country dirt road and Jack would be tied to a fence dead, and further down he’d find himself beaten to death in a drainage ditch.

He’d always wake up from them in a cold sweat; sometimes his sheets would be soaked. More often than not his pillow would be wet with tears too.

After three nights in a row, Ennis couldn’t stand it any more and set out for Lightning Flat to dig up and steal Jack’s ashes from that plot and take them back to the mountain where they belonged.

Only then would he have peace…


…Jack hadn’t been back to the trailer in years and hung around the front steps smiling at the old cracked wooden sign held onto the front door with four rusting wood screws. He remembered as a kid taking a week with his brand new wood burning set to make it for the door as a Father’s Day present. It read, “TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT-SOLICITORS WILL BE SHOT FIRST!” He smiled at that, remembering the first attempt at it he’d spelled trespassers wrong.

Over the years the portable office trailer had become rundown and moved a couple of times and now sat empty in the back parking lot of a new hardware store.

His watch said 10:00AM and he hoped Laura would hurry up. He had to be up on the mountain in a couple of hours.

He looked up at the sound of a police car pulling around the back of the store and stood up as it stopped beside him.

“Hey gorgeous!” she grinned jumping out of the squad car with her walkie-talkie squawking. Her blond hair was tied up in a neat bun and out of force of habit she reached back in for her nightstick, rolled her eyes and tossed it back on the seat.

Laura looked about 28 even though she’d just turned 35 and while she knew it was hopeless, she always flirted with Jack, touching hips or giving him a sexy come-on look.

Jack smiled at her pouting lips as she blew him a kiss and he asked, “D’ya bring it?”

She showed lots of teeth and sarcastically remarked, “No, dumb ass, I just come to flirt with you!”

Jack mouthed a silent “Oh” and shook his head as she headed to the trunk and pulled out a big pair of bolt cutters.

Reaching them to him, she squeezed the trigger on her shoulder mike and called the desk to say she’d be busy for about 10 minutes.

Looking expectantly at him, she watched Jack turn and pull the long wide handles together piercing the master lock holding the door closed in its hasp.

Handing them back, he said, “Thanks”

She nodded, tossed them in the trunk, closed the lid and then joined him on the stairs as a loud overhead siren on a tall pole began blaring a few blocks west of them. Someone needed the volunteer fire department.

She glanced at him and said, “That’s probably going to need me, so hurry up!”

Jack picked up an old cardboard box and pulled on the office door. It creaked on long unoiled hinges and they climbed the three steps to enter.

The old office was musty and dark, the windows papered over some time ago, so they set out pulling yellowed newsprint down.

Looking around she noticed the wood paneling had been warped from a roof leak and it smelled moldy in here. “Anything we’re looking for in particular?” she asked her long time friend.

Jack just shook his head; “We haven’t used this thing in years. We’re selling it for scrap, so I figured I’d check for old family photos and stuff.”

All but one of the drawers of the desk had been pulled out and were empty except for useless pieces paper. The old dial phone still sat on the desk with its cord wrapped around it, as did the ancient lamp and a half-full old bakelite ashtray of cigar butts.

Outside the siren wound down as the sound of a fire truck went screaming down the road heading south.

The walls were bare of photos and the file cabinets stood empty.

Jack walked around the old desk and pulled out the middle drawer.

With a grin, he grabbed a handful of old bic pens, “Hey Laura, you’re always complaining about losing pens right?”

She chuckled and took them from him, leaving the trailer to put them in her glove compartment.

Outside she listened to see how far away the sirens had gone; they seemed like they were headed a few miles out of town at quite a distance.

Climbing back into the trailer, she noted that Jack now had some Business Association plaques and awards in the box, and seemed to be staring at a tiny newspaper clipping that had been raggedly torn out.

“What’s that?” she asked.

Jack looked incredibly sad, and with a frown said, “It’s an obituary.”

“Your dad’s?”

“No… it’s for a guy I spent a summer with up on Brokeback… uh the summer of 1962…”

Laura’s car radio squawked.

She turned and glanced out the door, “Gotta go… You okay?”

Jack nodded and said, “Sure. Get out of here.”

She grinned and jumped in her squad car.

He rushed to the door and yelled, “Thanks for the cutters!”

She beeped her horn and waved as she turned the corner.

Jack noticed a copy of the Lightning Flat Flash, the newspaper the clipping probably came from. Twist said that was his hometown. He looked down on the little piece of newsprint and as he pulled the door closed with the box under his arm, he looked again at the obituary, all of three lines long. His father had only died last week, and according to the death notice the younger Aguirre held in his hand, Jack Twist had died last month. He didn’t think his father still came here, but how else could this clipping be in his desk… and why?

A far way look crossed his face as he locked up and he said softly, “Jack Twist,” shaking his head.

Hardly a week went by when he didn’t remember that summer, or his first love…


...Laura was within a mile of her radio call at an outlying ranch when a brand new Ford sedan literally flew past her in the opposite direction doing at least 100 MPH or more. It’d gone airborne after hitting a raised railroad crossing. Like an expert, she pumped the brakes twisted the wheel in a perfect “bootlegger’s turn” and went after it in hot pursuit siren blazing…


Ennis drove home through the night empty-handed, suffering from a bad decision. He’d driven north determined, but he’d changed his mind at the Twist mailbox.

As the sun cleared Brokeback Mountain on the horizon, he crossed Signal’s city limits. He paused at Higgin’s gift shop for a cup of coffee and another tank of gas and was on his way by 10:30 AM after using the payphone to call Carl Scrope to tell him he couldn’t make it in to work today, but got no answer up at the main ranch house.

About half a mile from home, he began smelling smoke, and rolled the window down to sniff.

He floored the gas, as up ahead through the building haze, a couple of fire trucks were in the wheat field surrounding his house putting out what was left of a very large grass fire.

He bounced down his dirt road and slammed on the brakes.

His home of ten years was a pile of smoking embers, flames still flickering from the charred mound.

Up ahead a police car blocked the lane, so he pulled over into the grass and got out to walk the distance. From what he could see, there was nothing left to hurry about.

A handsome cop in his late twenties in a county uniform came hiking up to him as he surveyed the damage.

It looked like a total loss.

“Mr. Del Mar?” the officer asked carrying a clipboard with a sheaf of papers on it.

Ennis absently nodded, still staring at his destroyed home. Behind him in the field fire fighters sprayed down the grass yelling instructions to each other. About 500 yards in all directions was flat, black, scorched and smoking.

Suddenly his eyes widened in panic and he yelled, “The horses!”

The officer grabbed Ennis’ arm as he turned to run, “Whoa! They’re okay, they’re okay; they’re safe Mr. Del Mar!”

Ennis let a relieved sigh escape him and seemed to deflate.

As the fire squad got control of the last of the grass fires, the trucks moved over and started working on what was left of his house, the cop got del Mar’s attention again. “Where have you been Mr. Del Mar?”

Ennis blinked a puzzled look at him, “Uh, up in Lightning Flat; I had some business up there; why?”

The officer jotted down something on his clipboard, as his boss Carl Scrope came driving up in his new white Chevy pickup.

Slamming the door closed he surveyed the damage at a run towards them. They’d made up as friends again, after Scrope had split up with Cassie. It was impossible to tell if he was being sarcastic, pissed, or concerned as he asked midway to them, “You been smoking in bed, Ennis?” scratching his handlebar mustache.

Ennis turned to the cop, “When did this happen?” he asked, as Carl joined him.

Scrope looked over at the house and nearby barn in ruins. “Looks like you lost everything.”

The cop looked up from his writing, “About 45 minutes ago,” and returned to scrawling something on the page.

Ennis squinted suspiciously at the officer, “What’s with all the questions?”

The young cop looked up, set eyes on Ennis and said, “Arson.”

Both men backed up half a step in surprise.

Before either could respond, the cop added, “According to the Lieutenant over there, someone doused the house, the barn and the surrounding grass with kerosene and lit it.”

As that sank in, he added, “Whoever it was, let the horses out before torching the place, so he was gunning for just you; Mr. Del Mar.”

Carl looked over at Ennis, “Who’d want to burn you out, or kill you?”

The cop’s walkie-talkie squawked and he turned his back to speak into it.

Mystified Ennis only shook his head at his friend in answer.

Carl looked over to watch the firemen rolling up their hoses and storing them on the trucks. “What’d you lose?”

Thinking back to the two shirts and a toy wooden horse and rider in a grocery bag that never left his truck, he replied, “Wasn’t anything worth stealing; just changes of clothes, a spare saddle, and a cheap stereo and even cheaper TV, and some old record albums.”

…and Jack’s old post cards.

A sound of a car approaching caught everyone’s attention and they turned to see a Signal city squad car approach. Coming to a stop at their knees, a pretty blond in uniform got out.

A dark figure sat quietly in the caged back seat.

The county cop replied, “I think we’re about to find out,” nodding his head toward her prisoner.

She ushered the men out of earshot of her car, “Hey Bob,” she smiled at the officer.

Glancing over she asked, “Either of you Ennis del Mar?”

Ennis nodded, “I am.”

She handed the cop a sheet of paper. He read it quickly and his eyebrows jumped. With a questioning look he nodded to her squad car and the man sitting in the back.

She nodded, “In his pocket. I brought him up here because I stopped him in a rental car for speeding about five minutes ago and he had 6 five-gallon gas cans in the back seat, all of them empty.”

The cop handed the paper to Ennis, as she showed the officer the prisoner’s driver’s license.

Ennis’ couldn’t believe his eyes and his jaw dropped; it was a photocopy of county court records showing the encircled address from where he was mailing child support payments from.

In a rage, Ennis yelled, “Monroe you son of a bitch!” and they all grabbed him before he could stalk over to the squad car.

Breathing hard, he shook loose and stood still, red faced, shaking with rage and muttering, “Son of a bitch-Son of a bitch” over and over.

Laura frowned, “Monroe?”

Both officers looked at each other.

Both grabbed one of Ennis’ elbows, looking back at Carl to join them in case they needed help. As they paced back to the patrol car, del Mar was instructed to look only down and away from the car, which he did.

Reaching it, she said softly, “Okay, Mr. Del Mar, I want you to turn slowly and tell me if you recognize this man.”

Ennis looked up and laid eyes on a complete stranger, about his age with a dark well-trimmed beard.

The man frowned out the closed back window through the cage between the seats. He asked in an unsure tone, “You’re Ennis?”

Perplexed, Del Mar frowned and nodded.

Flashing into a rage, the man in the car began struggling in his cuffs trying to kick out the window with the heels of his cowboy boots. “Son of a bitch-you killed Jack! He killed Jack that son of a bitch!”

As the car rocked back and forth on its springs they all jumped back.

Laura swiftly and smoothly pulled a little bottle from her belt and jumped into action, squirting pepper spray through the open front window and into the back.

As he continued screaming and coughing out his accusations, everyone turned to Ennis.

“Murderer!” the man whimpered.

The county cop asked Ennis, “Want to tell me who he is now?”

Carl looked over at Ennis quizzically because the implication from the cop’s tone was that Ennis was lying about knowing him.

Totally aghast Ennis only shook his head unable to take his eyes off the stranger still struggling in the back of the rocking car, “Ain’t never seen him a day in my life.”

“MURDERER!”

They turned to Carl, “You?”

“KILLER!”

Scrope only shook his head not taking his eyes off of del Mar.

Laura handed Ennis a Texas driver’s license. The name on it was Randall K. Tanny… Ennis caught his breath-hadn’t Old Man Twist called Jack’s new lover Randall?

“YOU KILLED JACK YOU SON OF A BITCH!”



Chapter 24: If you can’t fix it, you’ve gotta stand it.
For the next few months as the court case waited to be heard, the story was hushed up in the papers, but people still whispered about del Mar being a secret homosexual and about the circumstances of his house being torched.

Ennis remembered back to a camping trip with Jack where he asked, “You ever get the feeling when you’re in a bar or someplace in public… that people know your secret? And when you get out on the pavement, they’re all looking at you like they know too?” With all the rumors and everyone in town just assuming that Ennis might be "one of those" anyway, del Mar refused to confirm or deny it when he was asked. Let 'em figure it out for themselves.

Jack had offered to help Ennis move to Texas, but del Mar turned him down.

As with all people who lose a loved one, he started asking “what if”. What if he’d taken Jack up on the offer, what if he’d shown Jack how much he loved him, what if he hadn’t walked away from him without a word the last time they spoke?

What if…

Tanny’s fit was to try to distract the cops from looking too closely into his past, but it didn’t work.

Officer Laura Olsen discovered that Randal Tanny’s name was actually Malloy. He and his wife were con artists who hustled rich couples into having affairs and then blackmailed them out of anything they could get. Tanny-aka-Malloy had been on the run for five years after being convicted of murder in Idaho and escaping en route to prison with the help of his “wife” who it turned out was actually his sister. He pled guilty to arson and attempted murder and was sentenced to 25 years, only to follow his life sentence for the Idaho murder.

His babbling sister Lashawn was never heard from again and is still wanted to this day.

The police investigated Malloy's accusations and found them groundless. Del Mar had dozens of witnesses willing to testify that he’d been on Scrope’s farm non-stop helping to birth calves for five solid days without leaving once, covering the time of Jack’s death.

Up in Lightning Flat, they re-opened the coroner’s investigation into Jack’s death, which had originally been ruled an accident. A week later it was mysteriously closed again. Rumor had it that some rich relative of theirs in Texas had used his political influence to see that it ended quickly, “For the sake of the still-grieving Twist family.”

Without a body to exhume, there wasn’t much point.

In a bit of fitting poetic justice, Larene Twist and L.D. Newsome died the following week when his private jet crashed into Brokeback Mountain during an early heavy snowstorm on the way back from a Republican fundraiser in Montana.

A month later, Ennis rented an old trailer way out in the middle of nowhere. It was basically one long room with a tiny bathroom at one end, a cubby hole for a bookshelf and some knickknacks over the back window, a kitchenette in the middle and a little living room up front. The couch was the kind that folded out into a little bed.

For gays, the 80s were a good time to come out of the closet everywhere except the Rocky Mountains. For gays, the 80s were a bad time to come out of the closet in the age of "The Gay Cancer" later known as AIDS. Still, those who knew Ennis well treated him fair and Carl even gave him a raise and promoted him to ranch foreman. Del Mar’s advantage was that everyone already knew and respected him before he was revealed as gay.

Ennis had struck up a close friendship with Laura to the point of becoming hunting buddies and they’d often be seen out dancing at the bar or just sitting and talking in town somewhere.

When it came time to move into the trailer, she offered to help him, but he didn’t have anything so it wasn’t necessary.

In the week that followed, he didn’t spend much time at home, though he wanted to. Except for some mismatched glasses, plates and coffee mugs the 30-year-old trailer had everything he thought he needed.

Ennis carefully enclosed Jack’s shirt down inside of his, reversing them so that now symbolically Jack was within his skin. They were the only things hanging on his living room wall.

When Laura visited, she asked him about them, eyeing the bloodstains suspiciously, and he said they were souvenirs from a hunting accident a long time ago when he’d been nearly gored by an elk, which was only partially true.

Daughter Jenny, now seventeen, came by and took him shopping for some clothes and stuff that he’d lost in the fire. Monroe sent along an old portable TV and a clock radio with her and she spent the evening puttering around, threatening to make new curtains to replace the drab miss-matched ones he had and the ugly Venetian blinds.

Ennis laughed at her when she seemed a little intimidated by the large assortment of butcher knives on his counter for carving up the prime beef he’d infrequently bring home with him.

She too pointedly eyed the shirts, so he moved them to the inside of a wooden wardrobe cabinet in a far corner of the trailer.

When the postcards of Brokeback Mountain finally came in, he bought one for 30 cents and neatly tacked it up next to the shirts on the inside of the door, wishing he had one of Jack’s old ones that he’d carefully saved, but that’d been lost in the fire.

The shirts and the spirits encased within them kept the dreams away when he was home. When he was out on a roundup or on the ranch, they came back, so it was hard for Ennis when he was away from the trailer.

Word came that Alma had lost Monroe’s second baby at birth and had nearly died herself. Ennis sent her an 8-week-old kitten from one of the barn cats on the ranch and Monroe half-heartedly bitched him out because she spent the rest of that day bawling over it.

Ennis lived his whole life by a phrase his mother once taught him, “If you can’t fix it, you’ve got to stand it.”

Life went on.

Early one morning Ennis had just come from the ranch after spending a rough night with some newly bought horses. After making a detour to pick up some supplies and finally getting around to buying some numbers for his mailbox, he came home tired and hungry. He parked a couple of bottles of whiskey in the fridge with some eggs, sausage and bread.

He sat down on his couch and instantly dozed off. As usual the dream was of holding Jack in his arms while they peacefully slept in the tent by the stream the last day they spent together on Brokeback Mountain.

Sometime around noon, he woke with a start.

He yawned and stretched and was about to get up when a car door closed outside. Frowning he got up and looked out the window, stretching his mouth wide with a tear filled yawn. He frowned at an unfamiliar middle-aged man in a black suit and tie who was walking toward his front door, but at the last moment he detoured around to the other side of the truck.

Ominously, he checked something in his inside breast pocket.

Someone was sitting on the passenger side, but he couldn’t make out who.

He’d seen that truck before.

Suddenly his breath caught and his lungs froze.

It was Jack’s truck!

As quietly as he could he stooped low and grabbed the revolver out of the kitchen counter drawer, making sure it was loaded.

Crawling back to the window he peered out and his jaw dropped at what he saw…



Chapter 25: Come hell or high water!
…Alma Junior rushed around the apartment in her bra and panties looking for Kurt’s shoes.

When she’d turned 18, she rented the apartment above Monroe’s laundromat, the one she grew up in. She’d fought long and hard with her stepfather about moving out on her own and he finally compromised with her by offering her the place almost rent-free in exchange for managing the laundromat. Having long-since become friends, Ennis backed Monroe up on the decision.

Kurt Kirkwood, a handsome tall and lean 22-year-old blond, came out of the bathroom. He wore only a pink towel barely clutching around his trim waist, a worn green John Deere baseball cap and had a toothbrush sticking out of his mouth. Alma had been dating "Kirk" for about a year now and had secretly lived with him since April.

He mangled a question around the toothbrush, “You seen my blue plaid shirt?”

She sauntered up to him with a grin and ran her hand over his dense furry chest and down ticklishly over his washboard stomach. “You don’t need one with all this.”

“Ha, ha.”

His towel dropped to the floor as he reached into his jeans hanging over the back of a dinette chair. Pulling out his wallet, he handed her a ten, then turned around and dug his keys out handing them to her.

For some reason her eyes weren’t meeting his at that moment and he laughed while pulling her chin up with his index finger and kissing her full on the mouth.

As his hand caressed up her side and fondled a Playtex covered breast, he said with a growl, “I like how you make me feel like a man.”

Intentionally not answering him, she frowned at the objects he’d handed her and asked, “What’re these for?” already knowing the answer.

“Bob’s coming to ride me out to the rig,” he responded picking the towel back up and slinging it over his shoulder. “Get gas while you’re over there; you got the car all day today.”

This had been an ongoing fight between them over her repeatedly putting off telling her father they were engaged.

As he went back into the bedroom naked carrying his jeans he called over his shoulder, “And wear that ugly blue ‘Little House on the Prairie’ blouse I hate so much; the thing with all the little girl ruffles and no neckline.”

Alma rolled her eyes at the ceiling.

There was no use arguing with him…


…Jack’s mother Martha Twist stepped down from the truck, the stranger reaching back to carefully close her door. At the front bumper, she said something softly to him and after a glance at the window that Ennis was peering from; he nodded and got back into the truck.

She wore an old but well kept cloth coat over a black dress and black flat-heeled shoes. Stunned, Ennis put the gun quickly back in the drawer, opened his door and offered a hand down to her.

Before moving, she looked up at him and asked politely in a meek voice, “May I come in?”

Ennis nodded and carefully escorted her up. Nervously watching her seat herself on his unmade bed, he asked, “Uh, can I get you something; some coffee maybe?”

Martha answered, “No, my nephew and I ate on the way down here.”

Ennis glanced out the window at the truck and sat down opposite her. At a loss they both waited for the other to speak as her nervous eyes darted around the trailer. Silently del Mar thanked God he’d put the shirts in the wardrobe out of sight.

“I come to tell you that my husband John; Jack’s father’s dead. We came directly down here from the burial.”

Stunned Ennis paused and muttered, “I’m awful sorry ma’am to hear that. Jack always said he was a good man and a good father.”

She shook her head no, “No… no he wasn’t Mr. Del Mar.”

“Ennis, please Mrs. Twist.”

The soft sadness with which she expressed them didn’t near match the words she said, “He was a cold self-serving son of a bitch, who lived and died without a heart.”

She nodded, becoming more uncomfortable. She seemed to be trying to say something else even more painful and fought to keep her calm.

Ennis waited patiently. Eventually she asked, “You still have them shirts?”

Ennis’ eyes widened and he responded softly “Yes ma’am.” Getting up silently, he crossed the trailer and brought them to her without being asked. She gently took them and silently wept, while Ennis told her where he’d found them and after asking him, he explained that the blood was his and how exactly it got there.

He thought he owed her complete honesty.

Composing herself, she told him that Jack had turned his room into a shrine to Ennis. She’d even found a piece of notebook paper in his wastebasket on which he’d repeatedly signed Jack Twist-del Mar over and over on both sides of the page. When her husband found his mementos of their love, he burned them, leaving Jack’s room stark and empty, except for his clothes.

Then she told him of the awful day when she’d come to the kitchen door after hearing something strange outside and of witnessing her son being brutally beaten to death by Newsome and some boys she’d never seen before or since while her husband stood idly by, not participating, but not lifting a finger to stop them either. She concluded her story by saying that it was by God’s providence that that evil man and Jack’s horrible wife died on the mountain that Jack seemed to love so much.

A long uncomfortable silence followed. Outside her nephew started up Jack’s truck to get the heater going against the chill.

She fixed him with a lost look and said, “My upbringing won’t let me understand… but I have to know Mr… uh Ennis.”

Ennis’ lower lip tightened.

“Did you love him?”

Ennis bowed his head and swallowed hard, “Yes ma’am, I did.”

It was the first time he admitted that to anyone, even Jack.

“Then don’t be ashamed of it.”

Del Mar looked up in surprise to be captured in a mother’s eyes.

“His awful wife Lorene, she waited till the day of the memorial service to tell me that she was keeping his ashes. I begged her to allow me to divide them up and the mortician gave me a nice can to put them in. I went out back behind the funeral home and scooped up some sand and put it in her half.”

Before Ennis could digest that, she added, “My husband buried sand in the family plot too.”

Ennis' jaw dropped in shock as it hit him and it took another moment for what she’d said to fully sink in. “You mean you have all, uh all of, you’ve got?”

She nodded, “I’m his mother. I didn’t want him cremated, but John and that awful L.D. didn’t want no evidence.”

Ennis got up and put the shirts back where they belonged, nearly knocking the postcard off its tack in the process.

As he passed back through the kitchen, he nearly paused at the fridge for a whiskey, but thought better of it. Out of consideration for her he didn’t reach for a smoke either, but wanted one badly. Martha stood, sniffed and stared directly into his eyes with a determination that surprised him.

“Jack wanted to be scattered on Brokeback Mountain; didn’t he?”

Ennis nodded, “Yes ma’am, he did.”

She nodded with a determined look, “Write me down your complete mailing address and the address where you work.” She glanced around and didn’t see a phone. “Give me your work number and your social security number so I can send you them registered mail.”

Ennis nodded and wondered why she wanted his social security number, and then frowned, “Them?”

“I’m sending you Jack’s ashes.”

The room began spinning and Ennis was fighting back tears, so far successfully, but barely. Scribbling everything down that she’d asked for, he handed her the paper. She reached out slowly to take it from him, and suddenly seemed at peace.

Meeting his eyes again she stunned him with a look of sheer determination. “Swear to me you’ll take him up there like he wanted, come Hell or high water Ennis del Mar, come Hell or high water!” she spat out as though the anger she felt toward her husband was releasing itself at him.

With a clenched jaw he nodded in a reassuring soft and polite voice, “I swear.”

Startling the hell out of him, she repeated loudly in his face, “Promise it like you mean it damn it, this is my son, my only baby we’re talkin’ about!”

Ennis straightened, met her searching eyes and repeated, “I swear, Martha, with all my heart and soul.”

She lurched forward and clutched him with surprising strength, sobbing into his chest. After about five minutes, she nodded and let go. Ennis opened the door and escorted her to the truck.

Just before she closed it, she said, “Get some numbers on that mailbox; I don’t want him in no dead-letter office for eternity.”

Ennis nodded and they drove away without another word. As he watched Jack's truck disappear, the sun came out and brightly warmed the wind.

Ennis took that as a sign.

Back inside, he put some coffee on to heat and searched around in the junk drawer



Chapter 26: “If you don’t got nothing, you don’t need nothing.”
Back outside another bank of clouds seemed to be trying to organize without much success. It’d gotten cold again as he stuck the metal lot numbers for the trailer on the mailbox he’d bought earlier.

Deep in thought, he wasn’t actually smoking the burning cigarette he had in his mouth.

Unsure if the numbers were now big enough, because they’d suddenly become very important, he walked away around ten feet and looked at them again, ignoring an unfamiliar car on the dusty road that ran through the trailer park.

He squinted at the silver stick-on numbers and decided to get bigger ones; he heard the car pulling up behind him.

Turning he spied a new brown Camero Z28. He ducked down and squinted into the open front window as he recognized the driver. “Well hey there Junior!” he said, giving his daughter a surprised if not distracted smile.

She got out of the car giving her beloved dad a big hug. Though she was a young woman now, she had her mother’s height and the top of her head barely reached his chin.

Releasing him she gestured at the chariot she’d arrived in and asked, “Like the car?”

He gave her a half-hearted “Yeah,” indicating it was okay for her, but he’d never own one; preferring trucks. “Is it yours?”

This was a good enough time as any to introduce the name, so she replied instantly, “Kurt’s”

Playing the typical father who never knows what’s going on, he protested in an unsure puzzled voice, “Well I thought you were seeing uh, uh Troy?”

“Troy?” she replied in a miffed tone and then protested, “Daddy that was two years ago!”

Having fun with her was a familiar pastime between them, so he made a point of half-heartedly ignoring her face, pretending to be fascinated with the car instead.

Pointedly not paying attention to her, he nodded absently. As he fought to keep from cracking up and began seriously sizing up the suped up little Chevy, he wondered if it might have too much power for his little girl to handle.

Absentmindedly he asked, “Troy still playin’ baseball?” as he continued to enjoy the sarcastic ignoring game he was playing with his first-born

A little annoyed that he seemed to still be paying more attention to the car than her, she replied tersely, “I don’t know what he’s doing, I’m seeing Kirk now.”

He gave a hint of a sly smile and asked, “Well what does Kurt do?”

“He works out in the oil fields.”

That got his attention. Putting a gentle hand on her shoulders, he remarked skeptically, “He’s a ‘roughneck huh?”

Seeing straight through his attitude, she chuckled, “Yeah,” and began heading to the trailer’s door with him accompanying her.

Voicing a respect for her he asked “Well I guess you’re nineteen, you can do whatever you like; is that right?”

Taken back a second at the fatherly deference, she replied, “Sure!”

At the door he asked with a frown “Kurt or Kirk?”

“His name is Kurt Kirkwood, Daddy,” she replied, “his friends call him Kirk.

As she sat down on his couch/bed he remarked jokingly, “Alma Kirkwood… Nah, don’t sound right.”

That made her squirm uncomfortably where she sat next to an unused box fan on a portable stand. She pulled off her sweater, placing it on the bed next to her, revealing Kurt’s hated blouse.

For this she needed to be as prim and proper as possible. While Ennis busied himself pouring a couple of cups of coffee for them, she anxiously scanned the room.

In an attempt to distract herself from the nervous announcement she’d come to make, she remarked, “Daddy; you need more furniture.”

Carrying a pair of mismatched mugs, he handed one to her. A scant hour ago Mrs. Twist sat in that same place and as much as changed his world as he knew it. He was unprepared for his daughter to do the same thing, but that was what she was here for.

Handing her a steaming mug. What did she just say? Oh yeah; furniture.

To distract himself he replied, “Yeah well… if you don’t got nothing, you don’t need nothing,” in a resigned tone and sat down opposite her.

Alma Junior always brought out the young man in him and for a brief glimpse the worries and heartaches of the past few months left his face and he looked the part.

Junior briefly got distracted by a full rack of butcher knives behind him and nervously played with her cup.

Her father could read her like a book, instantly knew she had something important to tell him and maybe difficult on her mind, so he inquired, “So what’s the occasion?” with a half-hearted stern look.

No turning back now.

She looked into her mug then at her father. Fearful of dropping it out of anxiousness, she clutched the cup with both hands and tried to be casual, “Me and Kirk… we’re getting married.”

She felt lost as her father’s face turned to stone.

For him, all the years flashed by in the blink of an eye. Her birth and his dreading this moment from that day forward and as if written in his eyes, the objections painted his face. He remembered using her mother to cover his affair with Jack, of John and Martha Twist’s loveless marriage and of Jack using Lorene for her money in an unfeeling partnership.

This was his little girl; the one he cherished above all else in his life and now another man threatened to tear her away from him. Before he’d let that happen, he had to know she was safe from the fate he now lived.

Struggling for the words, he leaned forward, still looking like he was no younger than Kirk and probably knew all of her fiancé’s secrets too. “Well, how long have you known this guy for?”

“About a year,” she answered. In his pain-filled eyes as she spoke, she watched him suffer and knew why, having witnessed her parent’s turbulent marriage. She bravely continued, “The wedding will be June 5th at the Methodist Church. Jenny’ll be singin’ and Monroe will be catering the reception.”

She’d hurt him and knew it in his hesitation. She’d unintentionally just let it slip that he was the last to know, the last to be invited-not the first, as it should be.

He showed her how much he loved her by voicing his only true concern, “This Kurt fella, he loves you?’ he asked meeting her eyes.

Her face lit with hope and she knew she still had her father’s love as she replied with a half smile, “Yeah daddy,” she assured nodding, “He loves me.”

He knew he’d never make it through that wedding. He studied out the window as if seeing all of his pain on a billboard outside. His whole life he’d never let anyone see inside him, not even Jack.

His silence was cutting into her heart like the knives she kept staring at behind him.

Bowing, and then deciding to face him head on, she looked at him again. He was still staring out the window. “I was hoping you’d be there,” she said nervously.

A lame excuse came to him off the top of his head and he mumbled and stammered out softly, “Uh, I uh, think I’m supposed to be in a roundup down near the Tetons.”

They looked everywhere but at each other. He’d given his blessing… sort of, but wouldn’t participate. Suddenly their eyes met. She looked away and then bowed her head in disappointment.

Ennis wouldn’t let her suffer with her love as he had his. Painful as it was, he came to a decision and silently put his cup down. After all, the fact was his daughter was a woman now, a full-grown woman. Silently and without explanation, he stood up and turned his back to her.

Her eyes silently began to flood at his apparent rejection.

Midway to the kitchen Ennis looked back at her and as casually as he could, he gestured with his hand and asked, “You know what?” then reaching the ancient refrigerator he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and gestured it at her with a neutral expression. “I reckon they can find themselves a new cowboy.”

He’d so carefully phrased what he’d just said, she found herself not knowing how to react.

Then it hit her.

He was pouring a toast and it meant he not only approved, but he’d attend despite how difficult it’d be. Suddenly her heart filled with relief as she reaffirmed the treasured love of her father.

He continued, “My little girl getting married… Huh?” as he poured out the liquor into a couple of mismatched glasses.

Carrying them over he handed her the bigger, more full of the two and sat down, still trying to hide his approval, unable to defy her loving smile.

He raised his glass to her and toasted, “To Alma… and Kurt.”

They clinked glasses and her eyes widened comically after she swallowed hard and gasped as the drink burned down her throat.

For the next half hour she told him everything she knew and loved about her boyfriend, even spilling that she’d been living with him.

Ennis took it in stride, admitting he’d lived with her mother months before they wed too.

Watching her drive away in a throaty roar of the powerful engine and a cloud of dust, he turned to walk past the mailbox, making a point not to notice it. Everything that had happened this morning weighed heavily on his mind as he headed back to the trailer, closing the door securely behind himself. Images of his unexpressed love for Jack filled his mind as he shuffled through his home and hung up his hat on a nail.

On the couch was Junior’s forgotten sweater.

He needlessly rushed to the door to call after her, but she was gone. Gone just like Jack was, he thought as he pulled the door closed again.

He neatly folded it under his chin, sniffing at the smell of her face powder and perfume and then walked over to the wardrobe, opening it to push his daughter’s sweater onto the top shelf.

He came face to face with his love’s shrine and he remembered his promise to Martha Twist. As if to make sure his lost love’s spirit remained locked in that denim, he clicked the snaps on its chest closed.

Reaching to straighten the postcard his eyes filled with tears.

Just as he had earlier promised his mother, he would now repeat it to Jack. With an aching and broken heart he declared in a whisper, “Jack… I swear,” as his sinuses completely clogged.

Closing the door revealed a vista of flat expressionless land, completely opposing the mountains he saw in his mind’s eye.

He spent the rest of the day thinking of Jack and listening to the record player, selecting country guitar instrumentals, later switching to a Willie Nelson album.

…he was feeling old


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From this point forward, I take Ennis and the story beyond the end of the movie, with all due respect to Annie's great work... what follows is of my own invention… I hope you like it.
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Chapter 27: The unfinished task
Two weeks passed by filled with wedding plans and Jenny fussing with him over getting off his ass and buying a suit for the wedding. Monroe and Alma finally motivated him by threatening to bar him from the church if he showed up wearing jeans.

Jack’s ashes never arrived; though Ennis rushed home twice a day in case UPS or FED EX had left a note while he was away, but nothing came. At work he even made it a point to call the post office with no luck.

Laura Olsen accepted an invitation to be Ennis’ partner at the upcoming wedding and pledged to give their limo a police escort, siren and all, from the church to the reception hall.

Life went on... reluctantly.

Ennis and Monroe each took an arm and walked Junior down the aisle.

A week later on a hot afternoon, Ennis stood trying to reach an itch in the small of his shirtless back and wasn’t succeeding. Standing at the corral fence on the Scrope ranch, an unseen hand suddenly eased his agony and he groaned in pleasure.

He turned to find a young shorthaired brunette ranch hand smiling at him. The 20-year-old was a shirtless stunner in painted-on jeans, his thin tanned skin vacuum-sealed to deeply creased and well-developed muscles.

Billy was completely straight, but loved cock-teasing Ennis and it was something everyone on the spread good-naturedly grinned about, even Ennis.

“Thanks,” declared del Mar gratefully as he flexed his shoulders.

“Carl wants you up at the house, Mr. del Mar,” the kid said flashing a sexy grin.

Reluctantly tearing his eyes away from the lithe young man, Ennis muttered, “Thanks.”

Indicating a couple of mares being exercised in the middle of the fenced off area, he added with a nod toward them, “Keep an eye on them for me.”

Billy nodded and climbed to sit on the top rail. Ennis headed away from the barn toward the house shaking his head. Since recently turning forty, it still irked him to be called “Mister” del Mar because it made him feel old.

Rounding the corner on foot, he spotted Jack Twist’s truck parked in front of the main house and a shiny new black Cadillac sedan beside it. Entering through the screen door, Carl on the couch looked up at him from his newspaper and silently indicated the den with a nod of his head.

Inside the wood paneled room, he found Martha Twist’s nephew behind the desk. The man stood and offered his fist as del Mar entered. “Mr. Del Mar,” he said politely shaking Ennis’ hand. “I don’t believe I introduced myself the last time we met. I’m Silas Caine; Mrs. Twist’s nephew.”

He indicated the chair and Ennis sat down facing the desk. He was a little self-conscious at still being shirtless.

“I’m also Martha Twist’s lawyer and executor.”

He nodded and suddenly frowned. “Executor?”

Silas glanced up in surprise; del Mar didn’t know.

A cat unexpectedly rubbed up against Ennis’ left ankle and he absently reached down and stroked the purring animal. Recovering from the distraction, Ennis met the man’s eyes expectantly.

He swallowed hard. “My Aunt Martha put a gun in her mouth last week Mr. del Mar and pulled the trigger.”

Ennis’ jaw dropped in astonishment.

“She left two envelopes on her kitchen table,” he continued, “One addressed to me and one to you.”

He reached into the breast pocket of his brown suit and pulled a white envelope out; Ennis’ name hand-scrawled across the front in a woman’s scrip. He fondled it absently and set it down on the desk unopened.

“She had no living relatives except for me and so the week before she took her life she set out reassigning ownership of all the properties she inherited from my Uncle John.” He paused as a sad expression crossed his face. Shaking his head, he met Ennis’ eyes, “I had no idea she was going to do that, none at all… May I call you Ennis?”

Ennis nodded absently.

Caine continued, while opening an envelope containing a sheaf of paper stapled together with a shiny red seal affixed to the top page. Indicating it, he said, “She didn’t want to leave a will that’d take forever to clear the legal system, so she transferred ownership and power of attorney over to me in advance of her death.

Del Mar’s head was swimming trying to understand.

Caine continued, “Also in my envelope was a confession that she’d poisoned her husband over a long period of time since Jack’s death with tiny amounts of cyanide, letting it build up in his system gradually until he died of it. As far as the coroner knows, he died of natural causes after a long illness. The reason she gave was that my Uncle John had participated in cousin Jack’s death with the help of L.D. Newsome.”

Indicating himself, he said, “I’ve been assigned the task of gutting her house of all of her possessions and distributing them to her close friends from church and a couple of neighbors. Afterward, I’m to oversee the burning down of that house, being sure it’s completely destroyed.”

Ennis’ eyes widened in surprise as he struggled to digest the news. Still lost, he framed the nagging question in his mind, “Well uh, why are you telling me all this?”

Silas smiled understanding and as he handed him the documents he explained, “I’ll get to that in a minute.”

To del Mar’s questioning look, he nodded and then as if reciting from memory, “She has assigned you a task, of which she indicated to me that you swore to complete.”

Ennis interrupted, “Uh I can’t Mr. Caine; I never got the… a package she was supposed to send.”

Her nephew bowed his head and a puzzled frown crossed his face. Daylight dawned on him and he understood, “If you’re referring to a burial urn, it’s out in his truck, Ennis,” he shrugged and then added, “Uh excuse me, your truck.”

She’d left Ennis a thoughtful and practical gift-Jack’s truck!

“I, uh I don’t know what to say Mr. Caine,” he replied in a stammer. “I’ll cherish it forever, I promise you that.”

Silas stood up, “You didn’t let me finish, Ennis.”

Del Mar looked up in puzzlement.

Caine reached across the desk and laid his index finger on del Mar’s envelope.

Ennis opened it and tried to read it, but it was all in “legal-speak” and he couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

Understanding, and being the one that had drawn it up, Silas told him, “On the completion of the task that you swore to do for her, and on the condition that it forever remains under the same name…”

Ennis squinted at him, “The same name?”

From just outside the office door, Carl yelled out in frustration, “Will you shut up and let the man finish a sentence! DAMN!, Ennis!”

Appropriately chastised, Ennis looked expectantly back at Silas.

Caine declared flatly, “From here you’re directed to drive Jack’s truck to Brokeback Mountain to scatter my cousin’s ashes. The moment they touch ground up there… you Ennis del Mar, become the sole owner outright of the Twist Ranch...



Chapter 28: Jack Edward Twist II
…it was a good truck, and since Jack’s death someone had carefully maintained it in top condition.

Ennis was impressed.

He couldn't stop looking over at the carefully packed container made of blue porcelain with Jack in it. Someone had taken some gold paint and in fancy scrip had lettered Jack Edward Twist 1944-1983 across it. Ennis spent the whole trip feeling its presence in the cab of the truck. It’d become such a distraction that he had to get out and place it carefully in the foot well of the back seat, encased in foam peanuts in a little cardboard box.

He hadn’t been up this road in a year, and at nearing the end of it, he was surprised to find a Park Service fire watchtower on tall stilts on the horizon with an enclosed lookout nest on the very top of it rising high over the pines. It looked to be located in the very place where he and Jack pitched their tent every year at the edge of the water.

The dirt road leading to it had been paved in asphalt and the stretch to the water’s edge overlooking their beloved mountain was now a public parking lot, with a few coin-activated binoculars on elevated stands for people to look out over the vista to Brokeback's peak.

Within minutes he was standing at the base of the tall wooden structure, there was a patch of ground about 40-feet square of grass where the support logs had been driven securely into the ground.

Ennis considered climbing the narrow zigzagged stairs to the top and scattering the ashes to the wind from its encircled balcony, but was too weary to attempt it.

He settled down on a bench facing away from the plot of grass and decided that this was indeed exactly where their tent used to be.

It had to be done here.

Maybe he’d save some and scatter it up where they used to pasture the sheep. The forest service no longer allowed grazing since the area had become a state park, so it’d probably stay relatively undisturbed.

The wind picked up, sifting through the pines spreading their scent and memories of Jack.

Up near the timberline where the snow began to touch the impossibly tall lodge poll firs, a bare treeless patch was evident even from this distance. Though the previous spring had brought new growth, it was obvious, even at this distance that it must’ve been where Newsome’s plane hit and burned before snowmelt snuffed out the flames.

Grudgingly he had to admit that this was an ideal place to put the lookout tower if they wanted a good vantage point to spot fires on the mountain.

Surveying the surroundings, he knew he had to hurry before someone came along. He didn’t know the legalities of spreading human ashes on public land, but he didn’t want to risk it.

Walking slowly and thoughtfully to Jack’s beloved truck, he opened the back door, carefully pulled the urn out of the box and paced back to the spot in the exact middle of the grass directly beneath the lofty platform.

He closed his eyes and said the Lord’s Prayer.

It took him a second to figure out how to open it, but once he did, he stared fascinated at the sight of Jack’s remains. This amount of grit was all that remained of a full-grown man and his life.

Something was stealing his breath away, as if Jack had come back from the dead and was sitting on his chest.

Nodding after deciding to save half for the spot where they made love the first time in the high pasture, he hesitated and pushed his hand into the gritty ashes.

A roar filled his ears as his fingers touched something solid inside, and he jerked his hand out, fascinated by the tan dusty grit that came out with it.

A tooth, a piece of bone, or his wedding ring?

Again he pushed his hand in and pulled out an inch-square flat piece of lead with a number stamped on it; A crematory serial number to keep track of the remains insuring against a mix up.

Carefully he began scattering, crying burning tears and sniffing to clear his sinuses. In his mind’s eye Jack appeared as he last saw him at the water’s edge.

He kept scattering until he got halfway down and then he carefully screwed the top back on, cautiously putting it down on the first step of the stairs leading upward to the lookout platform high above..

He thought of tasting the residue on his hand, to have Jack within him, but didn’t know if it’d be poisonous and he had something to live for now, his own ranch.

It was coming…
He could feel it, like vomit rising from his heart instead of his stomach.
He couldn’t stop it.

He couldn’t stop it!

Running in panic, he got to the water’s edge and thrust his hand in to rinse it away but that didn’t help. Weakly he collapsed to his knees and bowed his head as incredibly intense sorrow washed over him.
It’s coming

It’s coming!

Suddenly and uncontrolled, a horrendous and primal scream escaped his throat as he yelled “Jaaaaaaaaaaaaack” barely pronouncing the J and the K. Without warning another came as he bellowed out an uncontrolled cry for his lost love, as if he’d finally found a release of all the pent up grief and sorrow flowing from him like acid verbal vomit.

His sorrow in not finding the courage to tell Jack he loved him out loud, though he knew Jack needed to hear it. His shame at believing that he loved Alma. The hurt, the regrets and the things unsaid flowed out of him in those two screams, cleansing his soul.

As he collapsed back against one of the binocular platforms, feet pounded down the stairs from above and across the parking lot toward him.

Ennis kept his eyes tightly closed not caring who it was and even as strong arms silently pulled him to his feet, cradling him to keep him from falling, he didn’t open them. Blindly he was carefully helped to the foot of the tower’s stairs by a gentle male voice who softly guided him, made him sit down and then rocked him to and fro in his arms carefully, as more gushed from Ennis’ eyes as if the hot acid flow would never stop.

Bowing his head, he looked and saw a neatly pressed forest ranger’s uniform.

As he focused with his liquid encased eyes, a man maybe only a year or two younger than he appeared in a tear-soaked blur.

With incredible comforting arms, the stranger continued rocking him back and forth, till del Mar quieted down.

Somewhere in the distance a horse sputtered. Ennis thought that he was alone because no other vehicles were in the parking lot, he forgot about horses.

He tried to speak, to thank the comforting ranger, but his throat was too sore and hoarse to utter a sound.

The ranger was his height, maybe ten pounds lighter and solidly built.

The brief glimpse of his badge said Jack something, but he still couldn’t focus enough to read it.

The man wore a comforting expression and held Ennis’ head to his solid chest.

They sat there quietly for a minute or two and Ennis began feeling uncomfortable in a stranger’s arms.

Suddenly the man stood up with a shocked gasp.

Ennis looked up to find him clutching the fallen urn, gawking in near fascinated horror at the name printed on it. He must’ve knocked it over rushing down the steps and now held it as if terrified of dropping it.

Getting his first good look at him, Ennis suddenly realized what the ranger was holding and grabbed it viscously away, backing up a few steps.

Incredibly the ranger was now the one hyperventilating.

They hadn’t seen each other in long years, so it was natural that they didn’t recognize each other right away. As he gasped for breath, he asked in awe, “You can’t be… You just can’t be Ennis del Mar?”

Surprised out of reaction, Ennis only managed a nod.

The ranger reached in his back pocket and pulled a tiny piece of carefully folded newsprint.

Ennis frowned as he read the ranger’s name badge again.

Del Mar’s addled brain finally put the pieces together. Jack Aguirre was that first kid that Twist had spent the summer with up here tending sheep in 1962!

They sat down on the bench and for the next hour the story came out of Aguirre as a 16 year old, who'd fastened his first young crush on Jack Twist, but the rodeo hero wouldn’t respond.

One night the teen snuck into Twist’s tent and tried to suck him off in his sleep, but Jack woke with a start and nearly beat the hell out of Aguirre.

From then on they slept separately, one in camp below and one with the sheep.

His father Joe found out about the arrangement but if he knew why, he never let on and through the years kept it up to cut down on predator loss.

The resulting daily sorrow and depression of seeing his first love, which always is an intense one, was too much for him. To not be able to touch him and know he didn't feel the same way towards him was more than he could bear. The young Jack almost succeeded at committing suicide that September by jumping off a cliff, but only hurt himself badly and for the rest of the summer was too weak to do much work while he mended painfully.

Ennis told him about their long-term love affair and its aftermath and as the afternoon wore on, without warning the two men’s souls gradually molded together.

Mutual love; was there a better way to start a relationship?

That night they traveled up the mountain together and spread the rest of Jack’s ashes.
Ennis fell apart and began weeping uncontrollably, and while Jack comforted him tenderly they made love their first time on Brokeback Mountain. Both believed that Twist was nodding approval from somewhere above.

From that moment forward Ennis stopped living by that phrase his mama taught him. Instead when he faced a problem with Jack, they worked on solving it together with love...



Chapter 29: We are Family
Through the rest of the 1980s and 90s, they rebuilt the Twist Ranch together, Jack Aguirre giving up his career as a forest ranger after a joining ceremony in San Francisco. Both went before a judge and legally had a hyphen and Twist added to their last names.

They built a house together where Jack Twist’s boyhood home had stood. In 1984 Laura Olsen moved in with them and the two men mixed their semen and then had her artificially impregnated at a clinic. She became an official live-in part of their family when Jack Edward Twist II was born in January of 1985.

Ennis sold 700 acres of nearly useless land on one far distant corner of the ranch to a real estate developer and houses sprang up in an allotment called Mountain Twist Estates. Ennis and Jack used the proceeds to build up a horse breading business that became famous around the world when one of their mares produced a Triple Crown winner and others began winning horse show blue ribbons.

In 1990 Laura met and married University of Texas political science Prof. David Nails and moved to Austin, safely leaving young Jack to be raised by his two loving and doting fathers.

The Nails eventually had four children of their own and they, Monroe & Alma and their two children, Jack & Ennis and young Jack, Kirk & Alma and their six kids, and Jenny & her lover Sarah, all became a huge extended and close family traveling to, and celebrating every holiday and anniversary together on the ranch.

Eventually, around the Main house/office, a cluster of nice homes sprang up and ultimately the families all lived on the ranch.

Monroe bought 60 acres on another unused part of the spread on the main road and opened an office complex, from which he ran his chain of stores.

When the professor retired in 2000 Laura and Dave moved to the Twist Ranch and while she helped run the day-to-day operations, Nails opened a successful Lighning Flat Dodge dealership from 50 acres of ranch land adjoining Monroe's, given to the couple as a Christmas present from the Twists.

Their kids that didn't work on the ranch all worked for one of the family businesses, and Ennis and Jack achieved their dream of being completely surrounded by love, family and happiness.

They all knew they'd hit the big time when an extra panel was added to the local expressway exit that read "TWIST RANCH COMPLEX-Next Exit"

As they grew into their sixties, it was decided that Ennis became “Dad” to everyone who knew him and Jack became “Pop”.


Chapter 30: Together
January of 2006, they had gotten into a verbal fight over something so trivial, that neither could remember what it was really about. Ennis had started it, not wanting to buy a horse that Jack thought would make a good investment sire. That graduated to an argument over post-Christmas bills and some project Ennis was working on with the Lightning Flat Chamber of Commerce that Jack thought was a waste of time.

They’d always leaned on each other, one’s interests always dovetailed the other’s and over the years they fought a lot. Not out of spite, but out of passion. They both stubbornly cared deeply enough to refuse to back down on things they were committed to. As with any relationship, if their love weren’t as deep as it was they’d never argue about anything because they didn't care enough to.

Jack was the money man, always fretting over finances, where Ennis was more interested in the heart of an animal than its worth. That was the secret of their success as businessmen, because one was tailored to whatever interest best suited a particular customer.

To a stranger these verbal battles might have seemed like hatred, but the family knew it was passion-pure and simple.

Most envied them their marital bond.

Inevitably when things got too strained between them, they’d take off by themselves for Brokeback for a week or so, and leave the business to Laura…

…They’d bought Don Rhoe’s log hunting cabin a few years back, expanded it to include a small horse shed on the side, and fixed it up nice and comfortable. It was one big room thirty feet square with a primitive propane kitchen on one side and a huge fireplace on the other that they’d laid together fieldstone by fieldstone. It was a far cry from the camp tents of an earlier day, but as they got up in years it was better to sleep inside and dry, especially now that winter was here.

In the middle of the bare log and very masculine interior was a cheap fold-out couch with two end tables, battery operated lamps and an old braided rug that Laura had handmade years ago. The walls were decorated with pictures of little Jack growing up and their favorite horses, peppered here and there with stuffed trophy heads of an elk or a deer that they’d bagged on hunting trips.

A few days after they’d arrived, Ennis suddenly jolted awake in the dark interior of the cabin. He looked curiously around the room lit only by the flickering fireplace bouncing off the dark walls.

What had woke him?

Through the windows a midnight blue hue shown barely past the curtains. He yawned and stretched his old bones, then rolled over to face Jack, still sound asleep and snoring softly.

As he reached to caress his lover’s hair tenderly a distant gun blast jolted him upright. That startled Jack awake too. A huge antique hunter’s grandfather clock chimed 6AM in deep bass gongs.

Jack reached for his cell phone and hit speed dial. “Billy?” he asked, after a couple of rings. “We just heard your poachers. They’re,” he paused and looked curiously at Ennis, who pointed toward the front door. “They’re about half a mile or so north of us.”

After a few brief exchanges, he clicked the phone closed and pulled his naked lover to him. In a loving embrace Ennis frowned and whispered in his ear, “You know, I can’t remember the last time I told you I loved you?”

Jack smiled in the flickering dark and planted a tender kiss on Ennis’ lips and replied, “We say it every day.”

Ennis nodded against his shoulder.

Jack began kissing down Ennis’ chest and just as he reached his abdomen they were startled upright by an even louder twin blast of gunfire.

Ennis bared his teeth and spat out between them, “Fuck!”

Jack shot a concerned look towards the door and shook his head. “Those idiots’ll bring the whole damn mountain down on us if we don’t do something!”

They both jumped out of bed and quickly dressed.

Jack grabbed a shotgun and tossed its twin to his lover, then grabbed a pair of binoculars as they shrugged into their coats and headed outside.

They paused on foot, a hundred feet north of the cabin. All was blanketed with two feet of new snow and an ear-ringing silence. As Jack scanned completely around them, the only movement was gray steamy smoke wafting gently into the morning air from their chimney.

Ennis beside him spotted their buried truck and wondered if it’d start.

A brisk wind whipped up and swayed the tall pines, spraying the two men with falling clumps of accumulated snow from the branches.

“There!” exclaimed Jack softly, pointing west along the flanks of a cliff. He handed the binoculars to Ennis who took a look and nodded.

Three teenaged boys were laughing and having a snowball fight in a clearing. One tried to play baseball and began batting at pitches with his rifle.

Ennis shook his head in disapproval, looked back towards the shed and thought of mounting the horses, but Jack grabbed his shoulder and said, “Come on old man; we could use the exercise.”

After about half an hour of trudging through the snow, they found them, gave them a stern lecture about risking an avalanche with their gun blasts and sent them on their way.

When they got back to the cabin, Jack went inside to start breakfast. Ennis detoured to check the horses and made sure they had enough to eat. As the smell of bacon, sausage and eggs wafted from the cabin, Ennis headed toward their old truck. They weren’t planning to leave for a few more days, but it was a good idea to get the thing running for a while every few days to keep the battery charged.

As the snow began turning light blue to match the brightening sky, he found the pickup. It took him a couple of minutes to dig around the door so he could get it open, and once he was in, fluffy and cold snow invaded the interior with him. The dome light was bright, which was a good sign.

He fished out his key and turned it expectantly. The starter grinded reluctantly and the motor coughed and almost caught, but not quite.

He tried it again, and this time it turned over. He had to play his foot on the pedal to keep it running, but after a minute or two it purred like a kitten.

Ennis reached over and hit the windshield wiper switch, and laughed as the blades slogged uselessly under two feet of snow. He’d wait till they left before he cleaned it off; right now he just wanted to make sure the battery was charged. While he waited and watched for the temperature gauge to rise, he fiddled with the radio and got a good station, stomping his feet to get the snow off of them to the beat.

About five minutes later when the temp gauge was still unenthusiastic, he gunned the motor to encourage the thermostat to open. As it backfired loudly, he grinned as the needle finally woke up. He hit the heater and warm air wafted from the vents as he pulled his gloves off to warm his hands. Soon he’d have to crack the door open or start breathing carbon monoxide.

Over the radio and the heater fan he thought he barely heard, “Ennis!”

Jack was probably calling him to breakfast.

He opened the door to see Jack urgently pointed upward and back behind the cabin. He frowned and turned off the truck.

“Be right there babe!” he called out in a hungry tone.

As he struggled out of the truck, he heard Jack scream for him; this time frantically, “ENNIS!”

Above them came a low rumble like a jet flying over; only it was constant and getting louder.

He didn’t have to look; he knew. The whole mountain was coming down.

There was no time to decide if they were safer outside than in. Jack was in the cabin, so that’s where Ennis needed to be. He took off running, crying in terror, as the rumbling got louder. Ennis could feel the ground begin to throb beneath his hurried feet.

He had seconds.

It hit just as the door slammed behind them. It was so loud they actually couldn’t hear it. The pines took the brunt of it, but the huge tall trees collapsed against the cabin. Everything went dark, as the beams began loudly creaking above them, Jack grabbed at his phone on the end table and dialed.

Instantly the roof pancaked in on them. Ennis lost consciousness to the sound of a 911 operator asking what the emergency was. All around them became a smothering silence…


…Ennis woke up sometime later in a coughing fit. Something was pressing hard against his chest and it ached to try to breathe. He was still in the dark and found himself in a space that stretched beyond his reach in all directions but seemed to be only about eight inches tall. Smoke was burning his lungs; probably the fireplace collapsed but the embers were still producing smoke.

He tried to pull himself along the floor but something had his left ankle trapped and he couldn’t move. Above him wood was creaking loudly in the dark and ice cold water was dripping in.

He stretched as much as he could and suddenly panicked, “Jack?” he called out weakly and had a coughing fit from the soot he’d inhaled.

Everything remained silent.

He wondered how long he’d been out and tried to rub at his aching head.

From somewhere behind him a horse began crying out in pain. In his tiny space he began stretching his hand out, painfully at first from bruised muscles. He encountered one of the legs from the couch and a cold cast iron frying pan. For it to be that cold, he had to have been out for a while; maybe more than an hour. In the choking smoke darkness he kept exploring and saw the hint of pale blue.

At first he thought it was the morning light leaking in, but realized it was the screen of Jack’s cell phone. He painfully reached in its direction and froze as he encountered a hand with a wedding ring on it.

His sinuses clogged and he moaned, "Nooooo, no Jack, please no," painfully in anguish as burning tears ran down his face.

Jack’s hand was stone cold... His lover was dead,

As the smoke got thicker, Ennis called out, repeatedly croaking out his lover's name, and choked out his grief, bawling and begging God to show him he was wrong, until he passed out himself…


…Young Jack was in his dorm shower trying to wake up. It was his birthday and he was trying to prepare for what pranks his frat brothers inevitably would be pulling on him all day.

Through the steam, his roommate Bob Lohert called out “Jack!”

Turning off the water he frowned and saw Bob was thrusting Jack’s cell phone at him.

Preparing himself, he rolled his eyes and asked, “Yes?”

A weak voice said barely grunted out, “Jack?”

He laughed out, "Nice try asshole," and tossed the phone back at his roommate, then turned the water on again…

…In the smothering dark, Ennis gritted his teeth in pain and redialed, barely able to read the blood-smeared display.

It rang several times.

Young Jack finally answered, probably only after he saw who was calling on the I.D.

“Son?”

“Where are you?”

………….”We’re, we’re on the mountain… ah… a… aval…lanche.”

“Pop?”

“Never forget how mu…. much we love you son.” The line went dead as the cell’s batteries died.

A week later the Forest Service found them in the rubble, still clutching hands. The coroner said that Jack had died instantly as a beam crushed his head. Ennis died sometime later of smoke inhalation.

They died as they’d lived for over 22 years, happy, in love and together. They were buried in a plot out by the horse barn just off the lane leading to the main house. Above their names in curved scrip on a single headstone read their family’s proud motto: “If you can’t stand it-You gotta fix it.”

Tucked within Ennis del Mar-Twist's coffin was Jack Twist's denim shirt; in its breast pocket a tiny bit of gritty ash. Tucked within Jack Aguirre-Twist's coffin was Ennis del Mar's bloody white plaid shirt also with a tiny bit of gritty ash within its breast pocket.



Epilogue: One last song
E-mail June 1, 2006,
----Friend, I know it’s an imposition but I could really use a big favor from you. Jack’ll be home from UCLA next month during summer break and he’s going to be really torn up on the six-month anniversary of both his father’s deaths. I see you’re on tour through the northwest and I was hoping you could stop by and help us cheer him up—I’d owe you big time buddy. Steve----

Steve Essex had moved into the main house of the Twist Ranch to assume full time control over the operations after the owners had died. In 2002 Jack and Ennis had recruited the highly qualified veterinarian after he’d fled his job up in Montana because the local county child welfare threatened to take his young daughter because he lived with another man who was rumored to be gay. Aguirre and del Mar moved Essex’s family to Lightning Flat to take over the day-to-day operation of their horse-breeding program a month later.

It was the best decision they’d ever made, because within months Steve had brought in all kinds of celebrities as customers, and Ennis and Jack specified in their updated will, that until the younger Jack graduated college, Essex would assume control of the ranch in the event of their deaths.

June 23, 2006
As the sun rose across the pasture, Laura’s shadow traced her steps to the main office. Jack had been home for two days and she figured she’d take him out to see a movie or something to take his mind off his fathers’ deaths six months ago today.

As she entered the book-lined air-conditioned room through the back door, Steve looked up from his desk computer and smiled, a phone cradled on his shoulder. She used to tell him he reminded her of a 40-year-old Steve McQueen, especially the blue eyes. He was busy ordering something from a supply house so she plopped herself down in Ennis’s old office chair and snapped on the computer.

While she waited, her eyes wandered to a photo of Dad, Jack, Pop and herself. Young Jack had Ennis’ hair, eyes and mouth, but he had the Aguirre nose and chin. She’d often thought of having DNA testing done on her son to see who the real father turned out to be, but the three of them wouldn’t hear of it, preferring not to know and by coincidence Ennis and Jack were both the same blood type.

Steve got off the phone and looked over at Laura.

She looked up towards the ceiling and asked him, “Is he?”

Essex nodded.

Laura moved to get up and Steve stopped her with a look. “Let him grieve,” he said gently. “He’s got to work it out for himself.”

Since coming home day-before-yesterday, young Jack had spent both nights sleeping upstairs in his fathers’ room, barely making a sound, only coming out for a snack or two, but keeping mostly to himself.
Laura tried to coax him once, but he wouldn’t’ go out to their grave…


........Bobby Twist had turned 42 a week ago. He’d inherited his grandfather’s “Newsome Farm Equipment Company”, but others ran it for him. He turned out to be a damned good salesman and represented his company well, but he didn’t have it inside for hard business deals like his mother did.

He’d inherited his late father’s good looks and was a spitting image of him minus the mustache.

He had one quirk though that no one could figure out, the result of a cruel joke that no one knew about that’d follow him the rest of his life. On his eighteenth birthday, his late grandfather's lawyers presented him with a trust fund of almost two million dollars and a package containing a single item that he would treasure that’d been kept in a bank safety deposit box for him away from any snooping detectives.

When the old tire iron wasn’t mounted up on his office wall, he carried it with him whenever he traveled as a memento and a sick "good luck charm"; a souvenir of his barely remembered father. It’d give people pause when they’d find it going though airport baggage checks or some hotel maid would see it sitting on a dresser and call security on him.

L.D. enclosed a note in the box telling him it was the last thing that his father Jack was holding when he was killed by that exploding tire and that the coroner had to pry it out of his hands.

Little did he know that it actually was one of three murder weapons, along with a post bristling with nails and a wooden baseball bat, both of which had been burned when the wheat was torched to hide Jack's blood. That old son-of-a-bitch was the only one that knew that this very tire iron was what L.D. used to deliver the fatal blow when they killed his father.

The two "good 'ol boys" that'd helped with the killing disappeared a few weeks later on a hunting trip... their bodies were never found.

One day a few months into 2004, a bunch of Lightning Flat and Wyoming State Police detectives showed up at the Twist ranch with a search warrant regarding the 21-year-old murder,and left with some of Jack Senior's clothes and possessions, saved by Ennis before the house was burned. As the years had gone by, DNA technology improved. Two months before they showed up, an airport security guard noticed blood on the carefully and unfortunately lovingly preserved tire iron, which turned out after testing to be Jack's. The only fingerprints on it were Bobby's, so he was convicted of killing his father and sentenced to 50 years to life.

After the trial the two shirts that Ennis treasured were returned. It was proven that the blood was over forty years old and was Ennis'.

Documents were presented that L. D. Newsome had contacted Child Protective Services, and told them that his son-in-law had repeatedly, savagely and sexually abused and tortured his young grandson. The report was found to be completely false of course, but the publicity forever stained Jack's reputation, and the paperwork remained on file to give a strong motive for young Bobby to kill his father years later when the kid was 21.

The absence of a body has been the basis of several appeals, but to this day Jack's son sits in a prison under a life sentence for a murder he didn't commit hoping for another appeal that'll never come... Newsome's method of getting rid of a bastard son of that faggot son-in-law of his, and a way of cutting all ties so his daughter could start over again.

Deke Newsome has looked up from Hell every day since, and laughed his head off…....


...The clock radio said 9:14 AM when young Jack woke up.

He’d fallen asleep in his clothes again in his fathers’ giant bed that barely fit in the 18x20 room. By the morning light streaming through the windows, he found himself surrounded by his own images on every wall. It was a testament to the strong love of both his doting dads that their room would be decorated like this.

Everywhere were baby pictures, school photos, images of him in uniform on his high school football team, photos of he and his girlfriend just before they left for the senior prom. Between the two dresser mirrors were the framed letter from UCLA accepting his application and a Joining Certificate from the Metropolitan Community Church of San Francisco from Jack and Ennis’ marriage.

He bowed his head sadly, stripped, took a shower and shaved.

Returning to their bedroom, he put on fresh jeans from his still unpacked suitcase and a fresh gray sweatshirt. On the twin side-by-side dressers were photos of his fathers kissing, holding hands, posing in front of this or that prize-winning horse with all kinds of celebrities and politicians. There was also a faded black and white snapshot of the elder Jack Twist from when he was a bull rider.

It was unfortunate that neither Jack Twist Sr. nor Ennis ever posed for photos way back when, mostly because neither could think of a safe place to store them where their families wouldn’t find them.

He sat down sadly on the edge of the mattress and remembered crawling often into this bed in the middle of the night between them during a scary lightning storm, or because he was lonely. On the left dresser was a light cream-colored cowboy hat, old and battered. Dad had worn it since he could remember.

He smiled at the portable CD player next to the window. He’d fought long and hard to drag both of his fathers into the 21st century and when they finally bought the thing Dad would only play Patsy Cline or Willie Neltson, and Pop favored Bob Dylan and the Doors.

He bent forward double and wept bitterly again at their loss. Unlike his fathers before him, he grew up allowed to express his emotions freely.

Outside, the sound of a loud diesel pulled up under the window. Jack got up and peered down to find an oversized white horse trailer pulled by a big crew cab truck. A grizzled old man in a cowboy hat got out along with three other men. Steve came out to greet them and shook hands.

Jack leafed through the CDs and popped in one at random and Patsy Cline began singing “Crazy”.

A minute later there was a knock at the door and Jack opened it to discover Willie Neltson himself standing there, his hat in his hand.

Jack’s jaw dropped as Willie said in his famous Texas accent, “I come up to pick up some horses I have here for a check-up. We bought 'em from your daddies and I figured I’d come up while I was here and pay my respects, if I'm not intrudin'. ...May I come in?”

Young Twist just stood there surprised. In his childhood he’d met a lot of celebrities who bought and sold to his fathers, so he wasn’t all that awed... but still, this was Willie Neltson!

Jack went over to switch the CD player off and Neltson protested, “No leave it on, just turn it down a little bit,” tossing his hat down onto the bed.

Young Twist nodded and as he walked over to it, Willie added, “I wrote that song for her.”
Jack looked back puzzled as Patsy sang the final “And I’m crazy for lovvvvvvvvin’… Youuuuuuuuuuuuu.”

As the final chords sounded, Willie smiled and said; “Now you can turn it off.”

They both chuckled together.

In the silence the singer looked around the room and spied an old beaten and battered folk guitar on the wall. He walked over to the right side of the bed next to the window and asked, “May I?”

Jack nodded and Willie pulled it down from its nail hanging by the shoulder strap.

It was one of Neltson’s favorites. In hushed reverence he sighed, “My god the memories this thing brings back.”

Ennis had bid $10,000 for it at a charity auction to benefit Farm Aid in 1995, and gave it to Pop for his birthday. The elder Jack would play it on special family occasions. In black marker, Willie had written across the honey colored wood, “Ennis, please let your babies grow up to be cowboys!” and scrawled his signature.

He sat on the bed and strummed it a couple of times and his eyebrows jumped. “It’s still in tune!”

Jack sat next to him and smiled, “Pop Jack taught me how to tune his guitar before I knew more than a couple of sentences.”
Burning tears welled up in his eyes. Willie’s comforting arm went around his shoulders as Jack choked and sniffed to clear his sinuses. When it subsided the singer stood up and frowned at something up on a little shelf next to where the guitar hung. Pulling it down, he asked, “What happened to this poor thing?”

Jack looked up and grinned. “That was my father Jack Twist Sr.’s harmonica,” he replied. “According to Dad it got stomped on by a horse a long time ago. Dad gave it to me for my 10th birthday.”

Neltson looked at him skeptically and remarked, “You know, I think I'll need a score card to keep track of how many daddies you got! ...In a way, I'm kinda jealous.”

A truck horn blew outside and Willie grabbed his hat, slung the familiar guitar backward over his shoulder and onto his back and nodded his head out the door, “Come on son; I wanna show you somethin’."

As Jack tossed the harmonica back on the bed, he corrected, “No, bring that with you.”

Outside next to the trailer two completely different horses stood side-by-side waiting to be loaded.

Willie led Jack up to a sleek black mare, her healthy coat shining in the sun like a polished jewel. Willie pulled an apple out of his jacket pocket and fed it to her. To Jack he said, “This here’s Chantal.”

The mare nodded her head up and down recognizing her name and Willie have her an affectionate pat on the neck. “I was on business in Columbus Ohio one day and this stunningly beautiful woman walked up to a bank teller, so I sent my assistant over to see if he could find out her name. She’ll never know I saw her, and I’m damned sure ain't gonna forget her name. The moment I saw this horse, I had a name for her.”

Dwarfing her to the left was a massive Clydesdale right out of a Budweiser commercial. Pointing up to him, Willie smiled, “This ol’ boy is named “Stoned”, because every time I look at him, I think I’ve been smokin’ too much.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a photo of a powerful horse running race sprints in a blur past the camera. Willie and a couple of men are looking at a stopwatch with impressed looks on their faces. “I bought him from your daddies last year and we’re hopin’ he takes the Triple Crown next year.”

Jack studied it and asked, “What’s his name?”

Willie grinned and replied, “Well I bought him on a whim, and my accountant got really pissed and asked me why, so we named him "Just Because”.

From behind a curtain in the living room Steve and Laura watched her son wearing his father’s cowboy hat and laughing, and knew things would be better now.

An hour of leisurely walking and casual conversation down the lane brought Neltson and young Twist up to the big granite head stone of Jack’s fathers’ graves. It stood three feet tall was a foot thick front to back and was five feet wide. It was sort of midway between the lane and the wall of the horse barn about 20 yards from the asphalt ribbon.

Pulling the guitar off his back, Willie set it gently down on the monument and asked, “Kinda an odd place to put a grave ain’t it?”

When he didn’t get an answer, Neltson turned to find Jack’s face in pain.

Twist sniffed a few times and led him to the back of it. In the middle read “JACK TWIST 1944-1983.

Resting his hand on the warm stone he explained, “According to dad, this was the exact spot where my “father” was murdered.”

Willie swallowed hard, “Wow.”

Jack sat down with his back to the left edge of the head stone facing the lane, crossed his legs and began pulling out little strands of grass, playing with them, occasionally smelling one and then pulling out others. With a groan Willie sat down opposite him cross-legged and waited.

Jack explained, “Jack Twist was Dad’s first lover, and Pop’s first crush. It was their last wish to be buried on this very spot.”

Neltson Frowned, “Where’s papa Twist buried?”

Jack wiped a tear and replied, “He was cremated before I was born and they scattered his ashes together up on Brokeback Mountain south of here.”

Willie frowned and then understood. "You know... I know a lady writer that don't live too far from here and I bet if you told her all this, it'd make a good story."

Jack probably hadn't heard him, as he seemed to be lost deep in a fond memory. “My fathers and I used to go camping up on the mountain a lot and we’d sit around singing songs and laughing.

Dad liked all your stuff, but Pop was partial to Bob Dylan.”

The singer smiled as Jack pulled out his “father’s” harmonica and began playing a Dylan tune that Willie had once performed in a movie not too long ago.

Willie reached up for his guitar and silently started strumming the tune along with Jack.

When the chorus ended, they began singing the first verse together.

“Heeeeeeee was a friend of mine,
Heeeee was a friend of mine,
Ever’ time I think of him,
I just can’t keep from crying,
'cause heeeeeeee was a friend of mine……


The end

Thanks Annie...

After seeing this great movie, we all have our own strong ideas as to what became of Ennis del Mar after he sadly closed that wardrobe door at the end of the movie. This is my own interpretation of Annie Proulx’s love story from the point when Jack and Ennis first met and then all the way to Ennis’ death in 2006. It includes the combined short story by Annie Proulx and the screenplay by Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry. I have to add story elements to the original in order to set up my "version" of what happened to Ennis next. This is NOT meant as any disrespect to the original author and screenwriters’ great work. My purpose in creating this was to help a blind friend understand this incredible movie. I discovered that he’d tape recorded my narration to him while the movie was playing. He asked me to type it all out and he converted it to Braille. As with any un-narrated movie it’s difficult to tell what’s going through each character’s mind, so this is only my own personal interpretation. Certain scenes have been drastically shortened in the name of saving space; others have been lengthened to understand them better...

Brokeback Mountain-The Classic Movie and the 2006 DVD

MOVIE/DVD REVIEW

I have converted the movie/short story into a novel-the link is above in the table of contents...

Obviously, Brokeback Mountain is not for everyone as evidenced by how many people were too nervous to go see it in packed theaters during it’s extended run. It’s not what you expect either, since it has no mincing fairies, no comic-relief limp-wristed lisping queens, and absolutely no preaching, hidden messages or agendas. In fact the main character-Ennis (Heath Ledger) is probably one of the most "manly" men ever seen in a movie.

So let's start with the DVD basics. If you've never seen the movie, watch it first. If you have seen the movie, watch all the extra features BEFORE you see it again. They are all a joy, though I should warn you they take a while to root through, but it's time well spent and definitely worth it.

I found only one fault with the DVD; and that was that it needed a deleted scenes section, that I know exists because they’re there taunting you in the trailer I saw on line. Heath and Jake are said to have had to shoot the kissing scenes at the bottom of the stairs 13 times, and they also had to shoot and reshoot the love making in the tent, and darn it all, I wanted to see those outtakes! Oh well maybe in the “collector’s” addition.


About the Movie
First of all, visually it's in crystal clear focus. The many times I saw it in a theater, not once was it completely focused, but on DVD it's an absolute joy. Since this is a very quiet film, you don't have to deal with muffled explosions coming from the theater next to you either.
About the story
Two young men, a ranch hand, and a up-and-coming rodeo bull rider (Jake Gyllenhaal), the very definitions of the word "cowboy" are so down on their luck, that they're forced to do something no cowboy wants to do-herd sheep over the summer on Brokeback Mountain. (Some have criticized this, asking how it could be a cowboy movie if they're herding sheep... read on)

Simply put, straight men that see this movie identify with the main characters, before they realize that they have... and by then it’s too late. There lies the problem. The movie hits a little too close to home. Jack and Ennis regularly go camping in the wilderness, were brought up to own and use guns. They hunt elk and wild game; they fish, carry hunting knives and know how to survive in the forest on their own. They own dogs, love life on horseback, tend cattle, are tough enough to ride bulls in rodeos, live on ranches, date women, drink whiskey and beer, get into bar fights, and own and repair old pick-up trucks.

The two young men never planned or expected to fall into the situation they found themselves in, and have no idea how to react to it themselves, once they’ve realized what’s happened. The concept of a man falling in love with another man is so alien to them, that they don't even know the words to describe their feelings-Ennis can only call it "This thing".

When the summer ends, they go back to typical Western ranching, herding cattle and horses, competing in the rodeo, selling farm equipment and existing in the standard cowboy life, fathering children, attending church, Fourth of July celebrations, and arguing with their wives.

Some women will get bogged down with the two men cheating on their marriage vows, and that’s very valid, but the point of this tragic tale is that the intolerances of the time, that still exist now, have forced these men to make commitments they never wanted. Jack and Ennis were committed to each other before their marriages, and that bond lasted long after the ashes settled on their straight facades.

As for the objectionable “explicit” sex scenes so many bible pounders are up in arms about-Huh???? It must be the scenes between the husbands and their wives, because in the intimate scenes between the men-hell they're never shown with their jeans off together, and only one is shirtless! Jake and Heath are shown completely nude (separately) only once each in the whole film, with no frontal nudity at all. Heath’s scene is out of focus to boot!

If all you attend a movie for is sex scenes, you'd be better off straight, gawking at the women in their sexy attire and bare breasts in the bedroom or the back seat of a T-bird. With all the sex in today’s movies between men and women bordering on pornography, it’s actually disappointing in a way that you don’t see the men expressing their physical love for each other. In fact, the sex between the men is done in classic Alfred Hitchcock fashion and you'll swear you saw more than you actually did, because it's left to your imagination (and wonderment as to what all the fuss was about.)
After you’ve played it a second time you'll be astonished that no sexual contact is actually shown at all-except what you "thought" you saw!

And there lies the proof. This movie’s purpose was definitely NOT made to put the “Sex” in homosexual, and is just a damned good simple love story, and anyone too scared to see it, is probably just too unsure of their own sexuality to admit it to themselves.

If ever a movie made you walk in someone else's shoes, this is it.

So go grab your masculine pride, your wife/girlfriend to put on your arm to prove you're straight, and head to the nearest video store, or department store, and rent or buy it. You'll be shocked when you laugh, and then cry while seeing a damned good movie...

As you hit STOP on your remote, you'll know undoubtedly, why the two shirts worn by Jack and Ennis brought in $101,100.51 (!) recently at auction to benefit a children's charity, and the beat up and rusted GMC truck that Jack drove at the opening, fetched $70,000 dollars.

By the way, if you haven’t seen it yet, pay close attention to what happens to the shirts they wear up on the mountain, and to the horse and rider that Ennis whittles in the tent during the rain storm, you’ll see them again.
Remember that this movie was made on a shoe-string budget, so ignore Heath's empty pierced ear lobes, and the disappearing log that Jack almost splits, but then vanishes.

On a scale of five stars, I give this DVD ****** …Yes I can count, that’s six !

My Disappointment at Brokeback's "Collector's" Edition

I want to make something really clear up front. My very first article for Blogcritics was an enthusiastic and loving tribute to Brokeback Mountain. I’ve written a few more on the subject that were just as positive afterward, so it’s a fair assessment that I’m a fan. I make this statement because I found this new edition a disappointment, not because of the storyline or the production values, but because I was expecting—no I was hoping for what I and other fans didn’t get.

With the addition of the unused amount of space afforded on a second disc, I expected DVD extras such as outtakes and flubbed lines. After reading reports of how the original film had to be edited from nearly three hours down to two hours and fourteen minutes, I wanted to see what was edited out. Any true fan of the film would welcome—no downright relish the chance to enjoy a two and a half hour or even longer version, just to see what was missed and to satisfy a hunger for more of the story.

Perhaps more than all the other unanswered questions, I’d hoped to discover the solution to the mysterious missing scenes from the movie that have been taunting me for over a year now.

Missing scenes?

I’ll get to that in a moment and present evidence of them.

When it all comes down to it, if you don’t own a DVD of Brokeback Mountain yet or have a brand-new HD/DVD player, then you should definitely buy this edition now. This is a glorious and beautiful presentation of an incredible film that’s not to be missed. The HD in HD/DVD is obvious and magnificent

However, if you already own the original DVD released in 2006 don’t bother with this one. Instead try holding out for a director’s cut version further down the road and hope it’s not until a tenth anniversary edition is released.

Here’s why.
Having seen the movie repeatedly. Having for all intents and purposes memorized this DVD. Having written an entire tribute web page to it, I can say without doubt that this is the exact same transfer to disc of the original DVD. Complete with soundtrack foibles and all. In chapter five there's a scene where Ennis is setting up the camp tent and Jack is laying on his back playing his harmonica. Over the dialogue there's an annoying reverb that I expected would have been repaired or replaced on this version, but disappointingly wasn't.

Of the seven DVD extras, four of them already came with the previously presented original 2006 release.

They are:
· Directing from the Heart: Ang Lee. A great tribute to an equally great director.

· From Script to Screen: Interviews with Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana. The screenwriters explain how they discovered the short story and subsequently brought it to life.

· Sharing the Story: The Making of Brokeback Mountain. The best produced extra on the disc and well worth watching.

· On Being a Cowboy. On how the cast learned to convincingly portray life in the saddle and the culture that goes with it.

Of the above, the most work seems to have gone into Sharing the Story, which was actually a TV special produced by the LOGO cable network. It appears to have been tacked onto the original disc in place of Focus Features/Universal Studios going to the expense of producing a better one of their own and is resubmitted here.

In my opinion the three new featurettes for this collection are not worth rationalizing the use of an additional disc. In fact one of the new extras is included on the main movie disc. Had it been conveniently grouped with all the others on the second disc, it would have allowed room for an extended version of the movie. This is what people hope for when a movie expands to two discs—but not here.

Make sure you check the packaging before you whip out your charge card and make sure you're getting the more expensive HD/DVD - DVD combo. If not, basically your second DVD purchase would essentially buy the same original 2006 release that you already own with only the following features tacked on:

· A Groundbreaking Success: How do you combat a beautiful heart-touching love story being instantly labeled “The Gay Cowboy Movie?” This subject deserved at least half an hour or more; it absolutely deserved more than a mere seventeen minutes. It consists of mostly interviews with gay film critics who cannot stop referring to “queer filmmakers”, political and social analysts, and is sprinkled with very few old and new brief snippets of interviews with the cast and director. A fleeting glimpse is given of how the movie trailer for the film gained a life of its own with spoofs of other film’s trailers, such as “Brokeback to the Future” and “Top Gun.” The producers noted that these parodies were good natured and accepting, which they were.

What isn’t included but should have been, was an examination of the real world controversy and opposition that this movie generated, if for no other reason than to add contrast to an otherwise self-praising featurette. I wanted to see and hear about the theaters that had agreed to show the film and then pulled out at the last moment because of the religious right’s opposition. Missing also was how most of us felt cheated that the early advertising concerned itself with the heterosexual relationships involved in the storyline instead of the one between Jack and Ennis. I’m sure many early straight theatergoers thought they’d been “bait and switched” an hour into the film. Also blatantly missing was Heath and Jake winning the MTV best kiss award. I also would have liked to have seen and laughed at Lance Armstrong again while kidding his good friend Jake at the ESPY awards "preferring it in the rear........ of the theater!"

What is infuriatingly, inexplicably and inexcusably missing is an interview with Annie Proulx the creator of the story.

· Impressions From The Film, is a very scant two and a half minute slide show set to music from the film. This is similar to a feature that could be found on Brokeback Mountain’s website. The difference being that the images here literally blink by at breakneck speed, are grouped together by scene but then are presented inexplicably out of order, so skip this one.


· Music From The Mountain, is the one saving grace and is more or less a tribute to Academy Award® winning composer Gustavo Santaolalla’s wonderful work on the film. It astonishingly reveals that the magnificent musical score was written before the movie was even shot. Ang Lee had the score playing on CD or running through his head during the filming and scenes were shot to fit Gustavo's beautiful music! It also covers the quest to find just the right vocal performers like Willie Nelson and others to showcase this movie’s score. To actually watch Willie sing, “He was a friend of mine” in the studio brought me to tears.
This featurette is very enjoyable to watch, however it is over just as you are getting into and enjoying it. At only a little over eleven minutes long, it seems disappointingly short.

· The package also comes with eight postcards. These are beautifully printed and big. Any collector would cherish them, particularly the facsimile of Jack’s note to Ennis. The problem is that that note was on a general delivery card and was only half as big as the one that’s presented. No matter. Just don’t tack them up on the wall if you're thinking of keeping them as collectibles.

· The film has more enhanced soundtrack options, and is also now dubbed in Spanish.

Having said that…

I’ll repeat from another review I’ve done that if you’ve already seen the film or DVD, watch the extras first. They’ll give you a clearer understanding of the story and the work that went into presenting it. If you’ve never seen the film or DVD, watch the movie first then check out the DVD extras.

As for the movie itself, watching it again only confirms my original assessment of what a great work it is, which has already been covered in another article of mine. It also reinforces my firm conviction that both Brokeback Mountain and Heath Ledger were blatantly robbed out of political correctness, or just plain homophobic internal politics at the Academy Awards®.

I hadn’t seen any of Heath Ledger’s films before Brokeback Mountain so I had nothing to compare his performance to. Now that I have, I can appreciate what a master performance he gave in this film. To observe a previously mere serviceable actor so completely become his character was a joy to watch. Nor is his work here truly appreciated unless you take the time first to compare it to what came before.

I think Annie Proulx should be compelled to write a sequel detailing what happened to Ennis after that cabinet door closed. It was unfair to leave us wondering. I was so frustrated, I even wrote my own imagined ending to his story on my fan page. There aren’t many movies that leave a viewer feeling that way, but this is one of them. The only others worth trusting with such a project would be screenwriters Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry.

To sum things up:

My imagined and hoped for DVD release would have/should have contained the following:

· A two and a half hour or longer version with the missing footage edited back into the feature maintaining the film’s continuity.

· The early outtakes of Heath Ledger nearly breaking Jake Gyllenhaal’s nose while attempting that award winning and passionate kiss at the foot of the stairs. I wanted to laugh at their frustration at not being able to get the damned bear to roar on cue. I wanted to see both Jake and Ang Lee on the mechanical bull trying to learn how to ride a real one.

· I wanted to see what was missing from the second love scene in the tent that was obviously and drastically edited down and way too short. As in straight movies the heterosexual lovers get undressed and nearly nothing is left to the imagination. I’m not talking about showing porn here, I’m talking realism, which I’m sure was experimented with, but discarded because of threats of how the film might be rated.

· At least a minimum of thirty minutes of flubbed lined outtakes as a DVD extra showing how much the cast enjoyed the filming.

· Missing scene: In the movie trailer there’s a shot of Jack standing on the log bridge shirtless looking down into the stream that was cut from the film.

· Missing scene: At the campfire when Jack and Ennis get away to the mountain for the first time in four years, there’s a shot of them (see above) sitting next to each other laughing, which isn’t included in the film. At the opening of the "If you can't fix it Jack; you gotta stand it" scene Ennis is still joking about Jack forgetting his harmonica. When Ennis joins him on the log he doesn't smile. I believe this missing piece is a prelude to the gut wrenching dialogue that followed and deserves to be edited back in.

· I’d include an interview of Annie Proulx about how she wrote the story, her reaction to the movie and how she wasn’t included in the production of it.

· Missing scene: In the movie trailer there’s a mysterious man with a concerned look on his face and a teenaged boy standing behind him in front of a cluttered garage, neither of which are seen nor mentioned in the movie.

· Missing scene: In the movie trailer there’s the line, “Well, since we’re going to be working together, I reckon it’s time we started drinking together.” It must have been filmed and should be cut back into the movie.

If that’s what you—no, what we were all hoping for, you won’t find it here. I can only hope that the powers that be at Focus Features read this and create a “director’s cut” just for us based on the above wish list.

And that’s why I’m disappointed.
Not in the film, which is one of the greatest I’ve ever seen, but at the bean counters at Universal that figured we’d buy anything they offered disregarding our hopes.

But of course this is only my opinion.

Heath Ledger Wasn't Even In His Grave Before The Hatemongers Descended

MEMORIAL/EDITORIAL

I have turned the movie/short story into a novel, the shortcut to it is in the above table of contents...

At first I thought the whole Gibson/ Fox Radio thing was taken out of context, but then I listened to the audio clip for myself and was outraged into breaking my silence and grief at hearing of Heath Ledger’s death.

Less than an hour after the preliminary news broke of the Academy Award nominee’s death, Fox News personality John Gibson took it upon himself to open a segment of his radio broadcast with funeral music. As an organ dirge played over more audio clips from BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, Heath Ledger’s voice was heard talking about death, as Gibson began making tasteless jokes about Ledger’s state of mind, and speculating about drug abuse and suicide.

As Ledger’s saddened family and fans were just learning the grim details, Gibson referred to the actor as “a weirdo,” during his radio broadcast. While audio clips repeatedly played Ledger saying,”we’re dead,” the radio host laughingly echoed it, followed by insensitive remarks about how “we’d found a way to quit you!” referring to another famous clip from BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN.

The Fox News radio personality sarcastically quipped about Ledger’s alleged thoughts of death at the age of only 28, while the late actor’s fans listened in shock. Gibson then speculated that “maybe he was a weirdo?”

Tom Sullivan, also from Fox News, joined Gibson on the air and began an insensitive piece concerning Ledger’s name, referring to him as “Keith Bledger,” and continued to sarcastically speculate on the reasons of the actor took his own life. While early and sketchy details of his death were still coming in, Gibson laughingly speculated that Ledger was “depressed concerning yesterday’s downturn in the stock market,” and later quipped with a caller that he didn’t want a “Heath Ledger moment.”

Joyously continuing, he laughed that Ledger was upset while watching a Clinton/Obama debate because the actor was “an Edwards guy.”

While all of this was going on, to add even more pain to the grieving family, the 50-member Westboro Baptist Church led by Fred Phelps announced that they had already purchased airline tickets in order to protest Ledger’s death outside of the Academy Awards ceremony on February 24th. In addition, Phelp’s daughter announced that the group was determined to ferret out the details of Heath Ledger’s funeral so they could be there too adding, “They are going to try and hide the body like a bunch of ghouls so we can't protest. The only thing in this country people worship more than filthy sex acts is the dead.”

The hatemongering Phelps family, notorious for protesting outside of soldier funerals for Iraq war veterans, is already in the process of making signs reading “Heath in Hell” and “Mourn Your Sins!” in addition to their usual “GOD HATES FAGS” placards.

Heath Ledger’s brokenhearted family are intent on keeping the location and hour of his funeral a closely guarded secret, other than that it will probably be held in his native Australia.

When will the difference between hatemongering and free speech be defined?