Some time ago, one of my readers emailed me and told me that he loved my books and that he often fantasized he was one of the characters in my stories. I loved that!
He went on to email me often, commenting on my books and I appreciated his feedback, especially when he told me that my gay male characters gave him the courage to shoot for his dreams.
You see, he’s an older man living in the deep South and it isn’t easy being gay there, let alone meeting a potential romantic partner. He told me there was a man he admired online and wanted to meet.
“He’s my dream man,” he said. “Hopefully he likes silver foxes.”
I encouraged him to contact the man he was attracted to. I was surprised and more than a little nervous when the dream man turned out to be an athlete and cover model he’d been following on various social media sites for almost two years.
It was hard not to urge him to be cautious. I was afraid that any negativity would stop him in his tracks. To our mutual surprise, the model responded and a new friendship and budding romance blossomed.
I’d like to say things turned out well, but they did not.
I was stunned that after first seeming to be sweet, the model quickly realized his silver fox had some means and asked him to buy him things. In the beginning, it was small stuff, like health supplements, and ebooks.
That bothered me a lot, but my silver fox friend was overjoyed to give his new dream man gifts. Soon, the model had an Amazon wish list and my poor dear friend was snapping up every last outrageous item on it.
It gradually got ridiculous with the silver fox buying the model phones, iPads, you name it.
Their relationship was one-sided and yet, I don’t think my friend would trade the truly lovely moments they had together when they actually met.
My friend flew to LA within a few short weeks of their initial contact and set up what I consider a date from Heaven. They went to the Queen Mary for dinner. Let me tell you, I’ve eaten there and it is a very romantic, gorgeous restaurant. They both loved football and they watched it on TV at the model’s apartment the following day.
The model was charming and sweet and attentive. They exchanged a few kisses, but nothing more. My friend described the glorious tension of how their hands and thighs touched for the entire game. Ah, romantic tension.
He flew back home more in love than ever, but things grew distant. I could have predicted that. But my friend kept up the chase. He even plucked up the courage to buy an airline ticket for the model to make good on his promises and come to visit him, which the model never used.
I tried talking him out of it, but my friend felt that he had to do it.
Like I said, as hurt as he is, as foolish as he now feels, he ended things as soon as he realized (long after I did) that he was being used as a very attractive, talking ATM machine.
This story stuck with me though and with my friend’s encouragement, I have used his story as a springboard for my own tale of a silver fox, although mine has a happy ending! My character, Quiddity Flight, is an older, retired police detective who’s hired on a case to follow a soccer superstar. There’s only one small hitch. Quiddity keeps seeing posters all over town saying he’s missing.
But he isn’t. He’s very much in downtown LA and very much alive…
Quiddity Flight by A.J. Llewellyn is part of the Amber Pax™ Silver Foxes anthology. Buy one, or buy them all!
Purchase Link: http://www.amberquill.com/store/p/2037-Quiddity-Flight.aspx
Retired LAPD detective Quiddity Flight yearns for action, adventure, and good old-fashioned romance. He’s about to get it all...and it might just be the death of him.
Just as Quiddity accepts an insurance-fraud case, looking into the lifestyle and allegedly fake injury of multi-millionaire soccer player João del Sol, he finds that del Sol is deeply attracted to him.
But Quiddity has bigger problems on his hands. Del Sol is the best thing that’s come his way in a very long time, yet somebody apparently has it in for the sexy-but-slightly-grizzled, silver-fox cop. Missing posters start popping up around town offering a reward for information on his disappearance. Except he hasn’t disappeared. Then, new posters begin offering higher rewards for information about his murder. Except Quiddity Flight is still very much alive, and he’s not gonna sit around waiting to read his own obituary...
Genres: Gay / Contemporary / Action / Adventure / Mystery / Detective / Sports / Athletes / BDSM (Light)
Heat Level: 3
Length: Novella (22k words)
Aloha oe,
A.J.
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Thanks for sharing the story inspiration. I think it's sad that your friend went through that, but great that he was willing to let you use it to write a happier ending story.
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