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Gent

Have you ever done soe your name and escape to a tiny town in northern Canada for the rest of your life? Yeah,able to get delivery sushi is kind of a deal breaker for me

At least, it was

Before Ibetter than the convenience, energy, and anonyeles Unlike other successful musicians, however, I did not like to party I barely even liked to stay up late But I craved exercise, being outside in the sun, spending tiood meal

I i in LA until I died, rode hard and put aet as a single gay guy still sucking the els until ht ofdown kind Maybe it was because the lifestyle of a professionalMaybe it was because I had a hard tier than a few days at a time

At the age of thirty-four, I wasn’t old, but I was enough of an adult to know I likedthe captain ofto bend my sails for anyone else In fact, it was a probleer co every little detail of my contracts My producer rolled her eyes at my desire to direct every project Even my uncle Doran—who’d somehow ended up asunderfoot and bossy about the way he ed my house

So i, someone who could suddenly control le one of them was tied between him and me irrevocably Forever

It started with a singlea show in a club called Sweet Splits Our band nainally stood for Gentry’s Unli a field day with the sweets theed for specially printed shirts for the event to hurl into the crowd throughout the night and had asked us to open with our holiday song “Candy-cane Kisses” even though the concert was taking place three days after Christanizers had hard candies to toss out to audience ht cause soent had assuredto worry about

In other words, it was a fairly typical concert night My er had booked ain the New Year in the peace and quiet of a secluded cabin in the woods I had plans to spend thenew material, and I always preferred to hide away in seclusion when I did it Several other members of the band planned the opposite They wanted to party in the Caribbean and celebrate our time off with sun and fun

The first three songs of the set went by in a happy blur of screay I fed off it The dancing, the singing along… I loved all of it But e started “He Said,” I began to focus on a particular face in the crowd The man was only a fes back and dead center, but he looked to be all alone in thecrowd His dirty-blond hair was damp with sweat from the overly warm, crowded space, and he’d stripped down to only a white tank-style undershirt, revealing biceps that made me want to whimper and lick His beard shone alhts, and his eyes were closed Darker eyebrows sat heavily over his closed lids, and I suddenly wondered what he was thinking

The lyrics fell froe-old prayer, repeated so

He said he’d stay, but those words were cheap

He said he’d never leave, but the pain cut too deep

As the thruuitar sped up behind , following the words silently with a slight s them to himself

Why? Simply because he was a GUS fan and he knew all of our lyrics? Or did they ht in the solar plexus the way they’d done to me when I’d first scribbled them down?