When photographer’s assistant Gary Holland meets three Australian underpants models—all called Bruce—on what should be a routine shoot in LA, it turns out to be anything but. He falls for the geekiest, yet sexiest, Bruce of them all, but soon learns Bruce has not only never been with another man but is an anxious virgin.
Bruce lives in the whimsically named town of Come By Chance in northern New South Wales, population 187. After a torrid fling starts in California, Bruce wants Gary to visit him in the land down under. Shocks, laughter, love, a shy kangaroo named Phillip, a goose called Zeus and a tractor that thinks it’s a horse, soon welcome Gary to a life he never thought he’d want to live. Can two men who are such opposites make a life together? Does love like this really…come by chance?
The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.
Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Come By Chance
Copyright © 2011 AJ Llewellyn
ISBN: 978-1-55487-965-6
Cover art by Martine Jardin
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
Published by eXtasy Books
Look for us online at:
www.eXtasybooks.com
Smashwords Edition
Come By Chance
By
AJ Llewellyn
To the memory of all the cowboys and convicts who shaped our sun-blessed country. Their passion, perseverance and pain is present with every step we take—even for those of us who have moved abroad.
But my languid
mood forsook me, when I found a name that took me,
Quite by chance
I came across it—`Come-by-Chance’
was what I read;
No
location was assigned it, not a thing to help one find it,
Just
an N which stood for northward, and the rest was all unsaid.
- from the ballad Come-by-Chance by Banjo Paterson
Chapter One
They told me Australia was the lucky country. The sunburned country. My friends told me lots of things. Mostly, they said I had to go visit the man I’d just started seeing. A crazy, Aussie cowboy kinda guy. Just thinking about Bruce made my stomach ache. Could I really miss a man so much after knowing him three short weeks?
And who the hell lived in a place called Come By Chance anyway?
Well, he did. And so did one hundred and eighty six other people.
I’d taken the plunge, not difficult when Bruce had used some of his modeling contest winnings to purchase me a ticket. How could I not give Come By Chance a, well, chance?
Yeah, my friends told me lots of things, but as my Qantas flight veered into the home stretch for our landing in Sydney, Australia, I stared in horror at the scene from The Coca Cola Kid, an Aussie movie I was watching on my laptop. In the movie, actor Eric Roberts has landed in Sydney to handle a promotional campaign but before he can get off the plane, two men in shorts and long socks board the craft and start spraying the passengers with what looked like bug spray.
Lovely!
“Relax,” the guy beside me said. He already knew all about my trip. He was Australian himself. Damned nice guy. If Bruce were here, he’d proclaim him as “as lovely as they come.”
Come.
Phew. I was starting to get excited now. Yeah. I’d come for the hot sex, the sweaty, manly kisses and the too-short nights we’d slept wrapped around each other. Bruce was a hot guy and the first in my experience who was a major cuddler.
The guy beside me was talking.
“Sorry. Bit distracted. What did you say?” I pulled an ear bud out of my ear.
“No worries, Gary.” Craig was his name and he smiled. “I was just saying that they don’t get on the plane anymore and spray.” He gestured toward the computer screen. “They pump it through the air ventilation system now.”
What? Eww! For how long had we been ingesting bug spray?
Craig gave me his business card. I gave him mine.
He smiled. “I really meant it about you and Bruce visiting us for a meal. You said you’re staying in Sydney for a couple of days. I have a wonderful house with a view of Mrs. Macquarie’s Chair. You’ll love it.”
Who the hell was Mrs. Macquarie and why would I want to see her chair? Did he think I’d want to spy on his neighbor? Wait…was it a landmark? Maybe so. I filed this tidbit of information away. Maybe Bruce would want to see this chair. Why did things have such weird names in the land down under?
“My daughter wants to be a model,” Craig went on.
“Isn’t she five years old?”
“Yeah.” He blushed. “Tantrums and Tiaras is her favorite show.”
“Don’t you mean Toddlers and Tiaras?”
Craig grinned. “I’m always doing that. Listen, I know by their standards she’s geriatric, but it would be really cool if you could convince her she could still have a career.”
Oh, boy. His hopeful look told me he was serious. Geriatric. At the age of five! Even in Los Angeles the use-by date was twelve.
“You work in movies. You know the business. She’ll be so impressed that I know somebody from the industry in Los Angeles. And if she’s happy, then my wife will be happy. I might even get some sex out of the deal!”
“I can…try.” I felt a huge amount of pressure all of a sudden. I was a photographer’s assistant, not bloody Cecil B. de Mille, for God’s sake. Bloody. My lover’s language had already seeped into my soul.
“She’s beautiful,” he insisted and whipped out his cell phone. “Look.”
He was right. Gorgeous. Or as Bruce would say, a stunner. Fuck, I missed him.
I more or less promised Craig we’d visit. He’d already told me Come By Chance was a one-horse town. Bruce had said it was a two-horse town. I liked the idea of hanging with some city folks.
“We’ll call you tonight.” I started packing up my things as the flight began its final descent. But first, Bruce and I had some catching up to do. I thought of his big, beautiful cock, or as he called it, dick. I’d been the first man he’d ever been with. I wanted to make sure things were so hot between us he’d never even think about being with another guy.
“G’day,” our captain said as the tires hit the tarmac. “Welcome to Australia!”
The final slowdown was a bit of a thrill, my adrenaline already careening. We all burst into applause. It seemed like forever until we taxied to our gate. After I’d gathered my things, I shuffled with the rest of the passengers into the tunnel that spat us into the terminal and the first thing I was aware of was light. Bright, blinding light. The sun shone differently here, even in the terminal.
I’d brought only a cabin-size bag even though I was staying for two weeks. Bruce had bought me an expensive, open-ended ticket which I could change, but to me, two weeks without work was a good start. I couldn’t vacation forever, even if I wanted to.
After going through customs and immigration which took a good half hour, I tried not to feel frustrated. I wanted to see my man!
Once the immigration guy stamped my passport after asking me a host of deeply personal questions except for what color underpants I was wearing, I ran into the terminal. I looked for him.
No sign of Bruce. I’d taught him how to text and we’d exchanged feverish messages right up until my flight had boarded fifteen hours ago. I tried not to feel dismayed. I tried not to worry. But sheesh, I hadn’t come by chance to Australia. No siree. So where the hell was he?
The last thing he’d told me was that he was driving to Sydney and he wanted to book a nice hotel for us for a couple of days. I’d wanted to check on the place he picked and wanted to Google it and verify it through Trip Advisor.
“What the hell is Trip Advisor?” he asked. “I want to surprise you.”
He was such an adorable Neanderthal. He wanted to surprise me and he sure had. I hadn’t expected this.
I sat in one of the terminal chairs near the large glass doors that kept swishing open and sliding shut, spitting in and spitting out everybody except Bruce. I checked my cell phone which I’d turned on as soon as we landed.
The last text he’d sent me said, I wish I could hug and kiss you like all the other blokes picking up their loved ones. Just know that as soon as we’re alone I’ll show you what’s what. Love you, Gaz.
Gaz. He even had a nickname for me. He told me everybody’s names got shortened in Australia. The lucky country. He said it was a term of endearment.
So where the hell was he? I called and left a message on his voicemail. I texted him. And waited.
What if he’d changed his mind? What if he’d decided he didn’t really want me to…come to Come By Chance? Oh, wow…we had so many plans, so many things we wanted to do. We’d even promised the other two Bruces, the men I’d met him with, that we’d catch up with them, too.
Was it over? Were we done? Was he a giant flake? Was my Crocodile Undie as I’d come to think of him just a guy who really couldn’t handle his sexual truth?
Was I about to have a tantrum without the benefit of a tiara?
I breathed in. Breathed out.
He’d been a straight man, or thought he was, until he came to California to shoot an underpants modeling campaign. We’d bonded and fooled around, even though he said he had a girlfriend. Our connection was intense.
I knew that she had fallen apart when he broke it off with her, but our intense skyping sessions had helped him deal with his feelings of guilt. He wanted me with him. He’d insisted. No. He hadn’t changed his mind. He was running late. Got lost. He was a country boy, after all. And it was just eight o’clock in the morning. Maybe he’d overslept? When we slept together he’d been known to get a little friendly with the snooze button.
It was a long drive from Come By Chance to Sydney. When had he left? Maybe he was still at home? I called his house number. He didn’t have a machine or voice mail. He’d promised me he’d get a machine. He and the other Bruces said people in the country didn’t bother with such things.
The number rang and rang. I tried his cell phone again and went straight to voice mail. In those moments of limbo, all I could do was remember how we’d met, how fast it had all happened, just a few short weeks ago…
* * * *
“G’day. You lookin’ for me, mate?”
Turning around, I held my iPhone to my ear, putting my meltdown on hold. I tried to count to ten before I said something rude to the tall, oddly complicated man before me. Could this be my missing model?
“Where’s my hero, Gary?” Duke Lancer continued bawling in my ear. “How could you fucking lose him? What if some freak abducts him and steals his kidneys? This guy is a find, Gary. A fucking find!”
If this tall, stripe-faced guy was our hero, we were all in trouble. His skin tone looked like swirled carnival ice cream. Even the two poker-faced airport police officers who’d helped me scour the international terminal at LAX for him, looked up and stared in horror.
“Relax, Duke. He’s here and it looks like his kidneys are intact,” I muttered into the phone. I wished I could have mentioned that Duke’s ‘find’ had weird orange and brown smears on his face, neck and hands, but I thought it would be rude.