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Hey folks. Episode 21, of the gay romance serial Free Association, is now available in the collection! :P Sorry I keep posting them so late! Shoud be back to the normal-ish time-ish in a few weeks.

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_ Tuesday. _

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"She wants 'em double-bagged," Eric said. Apparently, he knew this customer, because a moment after, the marten woman smiled and handed him her membership card.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Brad stuffed a bag of shredded cheese into the sack. He was a well-oiled machine, on automatic, inexorable. Unstoppable.

Yaaaaaaawn.

Aaaaaaaaaarghhh.

Eric was chatting with the woman about the weather. He had a cool, conversational demeanor, that he often wielded on customers in the small grocery store with an excellent reception. He'd be a good PR agent for some reclusive multimillionare dynasty with many scandals to dodge.

Instead, he was a grocery store clerk. With a Grade-B ass. Or so Brad had judged, after many long hours and months watching the red panda's flicking tail, as he stuffed shredded cheese into sacks.

Reminded him so much of Jonathon, nowadays, with the stripes... like his coon had been colored red and tan, instead of black and white. Technicolor. Though, Eric was taller, and not nearly as adorable. Still... he couldn't deny the ailurid had a certain charm, in his own way.

Like Daniel. He hoped he wouldn't have to talk to the dragon today. Monday had been plain awkward, with how much time he'd spent noticing the dragon's previously-overlooked 'charm'.

It wasn't as though either of the guys held a candle to Jonathon, he knew, and repeatedly verified - Jonathon won in the Fluff Competition, beating Eric by a nice margin and Daniel by a landslide. Jonathon won in the Ear Matchup, edging out Daniel and beating Eric handily. Jonathon also won in the Tail and Ass Exhibition (Eric following, Daniel at the rear of the rears), and blew everyone else out of the water in the Cute Nose Contest (though Daniel put up a valiant fight). To say nothing of the Personality Tournament, a much more important metric in the judges' consideration, and a clear victory for Jonathon over a competitive Daniel and a trailing Eric.

But in spite of Brad's mental pageant (now held several times, as much for amusement as reassurance), it seemed that after months of dormancy, his libido, and his inner romantic, were starting to venture out into the world again. And notice things. Like the fact that guys were cute.

About time, probably.

Brad scowled tiredly at the clock on the near wall, over the door. 1:58. Just about time for him to head out. "I'm gonna take off," he remarked to the red panda, as the marten made her way past him with her cheese. "Gotta get to class."

"Right, see ya," Eric said dismissively. In contrast with his customer voice, to coworkers, he was almost chilly. Brad hadn't gotten to know the guy more than superficially, after years of working with him. Guess some people only let you in so far...

The judges were not amused.

Brad headed back to the back room, undoing his apron and hanging it on the post, and yawning again. Well, he'd survived his shift, at least. He clocked out right at 2:00, and was out of there before Daniel had shown his face.

So much the better. Seeing the dragon again was not particularly high on the wolf's list of desirables... even if they had reconciled the awkward state of Brad's orientation.

Or perhaps because of that reconciliation.

Damn, soon as a guy says he doesn't mind, you start... doing this thing!

Yeah... maybe he did.

Oh well. Brad hopped in his diseased dinosaur of a car and vroomed away, making a concerted effort to keep his eyes open. Most days, he'd head right to campus, but today he had an errand to run at his local polling place.

Bah. Not like it was going to matter, with how certain individuals had been behaving in the capitol. Still, at least now he had the right to complain, for the next two years. Bradley would never give up a perfectly good chance to complain.

Or a perfectly good chance to get coffee! The sleep-deprived wuff had been running on two cups from this morning all day, and it was really a woeful state of affairs; he'd been an utter zombie at work. Fortunately, his polling place was near a coffee shop... the same one he'd met Jonathon in, in fact. He hoped he wouldn't trip over any cute guys this time. The cute guy count was quite sufficient, now, perhaps even a little overwhelming after the past months.

Forty-five minutes later, he'd done his share of standing in lines, and had his patriotic sticker and his cup of delicious smells/tastes/drugs, and it was time to get to class. A few blocks to campus, a swipe of his student card, and he was walking out of the parking garage and along the quadrangle, shivering a little in the frigid air. At least it kept him awake.

Another ten minutes found him slouched in a lecture hall desk, slurping coffee balefully and trying to keep his eyes open.

"...So I hope you all get out to the polls today, because it's really one of the most important things you can do now that you're adults."

Ugh. Good grief.

Brad yawned lazily, fangs clicking as his mouth snapped shut once more. If the darn droning sloth didn't stop blathering about voting, he was going to fall right asleep. The coffee in his paw was his only friend, it seemed.

"I'm voting for Heward!" a voice a few rows ahead of him said in a sibilant stage whisper. "It's about time our legislature had some diversity!"

Good for you, Ricardo, Brad almost replied, biting back the retort with great effort. He scowled at the sateen wave of bleach-blond between those two neat, small ears, a ray of sunshine in his squinting eyes. He wasn't sure he could take that much gaaaay this early in the morning.

All right, it was three in the afternoon, now. But it felt like morning dammit. The coffee was starting to wake Brad up a bit, but he was still way too tired.

Well, shouldn't've stayed up so late last night, he scolded himself. He'd known it was past his bedtime, felt the inexorable pull of his covers and the case of fussy whining that accompanied it...

...but it was too easy to ignore that when he had a Jonathon to talk to. Sitting at his computer in the dark, all ready to hop into bed... smiling and typing and hugging his arms around himself, feeling all kinds of things. Fuzzy feelings. Boyfriend feelings. Pretending it was Jonathon holding him, maybe. He might just admit to that.

He'd finally signed off, with many a groan (both for having to leave and for the remaining five hours before he had to be actually at work like walking in from the parking lot), and faceplanted into his pillow. And boy, had he paid for it. He was even more grouchy than usual, now that the coffee was starting to re-ignite his brain.

And he was gonna see the coon today, too! The thought brought a smile to his face, but also a twinge of regret and frustration. He wished he could be at his best, so he would enjoy himself to the fullest, with his sweet cute fluffy male companion.

Maybe they could take a nap together. That'd be a great way to spend boyfriend time, right? Ha ha.

He didn't really think Marty would want to join in, though... and his roomie did want to meet this coon he'd heard so much sappy blathering about. Brad had a remarkable ability to go on and on (and on and on) about the resident raccoon, he'd been told. You wouldn't think there was too much to say about him. Just an average college student, not too special.

Well, at least his roommate approved. 'Bout damn time you met a nice guy,' he said.

Brad supposed it had been almost exactly eight months since he broke up with Dillon.

Felt like yesterday.

Bah, thinking about that was not going to make him less of a Grumpster McGrumpypants.

The coffee might, though. Sllluuuurp.

The stuffy sloth instructor was now leading into his discussion of the latest in a series of bland and moralizing short stories inflicted upon his students. Fortunately, it was a large class, and the sloth had quite the penchant for lecturing. Brad huffed, and drew out his phone.

'One new message!' it announced textually.

Jonathon, maybe? Brad smiled, as he clicked into this and that, argh this terrible UI...

'Wallace Marshall: so i got promoted.'

Dammit, not Jonathon. Wait, huh?

'really thats great'

Hm, he should turn off the vreeper if he was going to have a textversation. Settings... Vreeper: Off.

'ya 2 head floor staff w/ raise!!!'

'you always were good at head managing ;]'

'lol well i think boss herd u makin a scene on saturday i aksed her y i deserved prmotion and she wouldnt say but she was rly nice 2 me all day.'

'hey, beats getting fired'

'ya no kiddin i mean i cant be fired 4 that bc of ADA but i was talkin 2 u bout it which is nuff 2 guess im gay which i CAN get fired 4.'

'bleh love this country. sorry about the shouting and all'

Brad threw a scowling glance out over the lecture hall, taking another gulp of coffee. Too early in the morning to think about workplace discrimination. Yeah, yeah, afternoon, okay. More coffee; it really was helping. The wolf gazed blankly at the board between texts, paying approximately 20% of the attention he could manage on a good day. He couldn't wait to see Jonathon...

'its ok my boss is apparntly a good person hell btr than just good speaking of gay did u vote yet?'

'uuugh. yes. my damn professor won't shut up about it and i'm like I JUST DID IT LIKE TWENTY MINUTES AGO HUSHHHHH'

'lol did u vote 4 hewerd?'

'no'

Bradley glanced up at the tasmanian devil in front of him, currently chatting to one of his girl friends in an undertone and paying even less attention to the instructor than his wolfy compatriot-in-cocklust. It would be like the guy to vote for someone entirely because they were openly gay. Brad, on the other hand, liked to consider things like, you know, the opponent, and past actions, and positions. And apparent IQ.

'neether did i lol that was such an awkwkard campane'

Brad cringed a little at his ex-boyfriend's spelling, even worse than the usual textspeak. 'i didn't really follow it'

'he scrued it up hardcore not rly the britest rainbow in the sky even if he is kinda cute'

Eeeeeewwww!

'eeeeewwww really?'

Seriously... eeeeeeewww!

'well he has his moments :p ok im off brake ttyl'

Brad snorted. Oh, Wallace, you did always have a thing for the sleazeball look.

Hopefully that didn't say anything about his erstwhile taste in a certain wolf!

Lapsing into a semicoma of boredom, the canine stared at the board, eyes unfocused, and amused himself by flicking his tail in patterns behind him. He wondered if the people in the next row would notice... or if they were in the same boredom stupor.

Maybe he could text Jonathon. See what he was doing. He hadn't actually set eyes on the coon since Friday, though they'd been talking quite a bit via text message and facebook. He hoped the coon hadn't spent the intervening time moping... he'd seemed a little bent-up about Friday.

It made Brad a bit hesitant, to be honest.

He didn't want to come off as too pushy... and after Friday, that seemed like a distinct possibility. The wolf wasn't sure, all of a sudden, at what pace he should move forward with his boyfriend... given that his previous attempts had been too fast.

He didn't want to scare Jonathon off, or something.

Maybe it would be better to wait for the coon to text him. The wolf grimaced and slid his phone shut, returning it to his pocket. Grumpy. A little mopey, too.

And the only thing to occupy his attention now, was... English!

Aaaaaaaargh. More coffee.

Sloths might not be quite as sluggish as their feral cousins, but one thing this professor was not, was animated. Or expressive. If he'd been teaching the wolf's math class, Brad would have been asleep after three minutes.

Bah, and he had math after this...

...And he hadn't finished his homework!

Shit!

The wolf came to his senses, shaking his head and knitting his brow. He'd been meaning to do it last night, and had been just about to start when he hopped on facebook, and a chat box had popped up... and he'd totally forgotten about it!

Ah, hell. He'd have to finish it between English and Math. Was it in his backpack? He hadn't stuck it there in the morning... had he even gotten it out last night? His backpack had been by his desk... But had he actually gotten it out before he started talking to Jonathon, hmmmm... No, he didn't think so.

The wolf gulped more coffee. It was going to be a tense two and a half hours, but if he really focused, he could probably get it done - the first chunk hadn't been too bad. It wouldn't all be right, but he never got more than a C on homework in that class anyway. Which was at least better than the last time he took it... not to mention the time before that. Ugh!

Brad came to, and realized people were getting up and leaving. Was class over already? Wow, that really flew by, much better than most days in here. The wolf grabbed his backpack and pulled it up onto the desk, intending to make sure he didn't have to frantically run home any time in the next few minutes.

"Hey, there, Bradley..." came a voice, just a touch playful, and a wee bit too... cheerful.

Brad raised his head just enough to regard the speaker. "Hello, Ricardo," he said, with precisely the intonation of the perennial address to Newman.

The tasmanian devil was clearly not a Seinfeld fan, however, because he'd never reacted to the wolf's inside joke. "How's my wolfy boy today?"

Brad opened his mouth, intending to inform the marsupial that if he was anyone's 'wolfy boy', he was Jonathon's... but he changed his mind at the last minute. He was in a grumpy mood today, no need to take it out on someone just trying to make conversation... even if he was a bit pushy.

And irritating.

"I've been better," the wolf replied coolly, tipping his coffee a bit in indication.

Ricardo eyed it. "That's a shame. You still look splendid, though..." He gave the canine one of his looks.

Unphased, Brad huffed, sorting through the contents of his backpack and ignoring Ricardo's blatant flirting. Aha! There was the paper he was looking for.

"This is pretty exciting, huh?" Ricardo let his arms slide down a little on the desk he was leaning on, so that he was leaning forward.

Brad gave the marsupial an evaluative look. The move would have looked better performed by a girl with a substantially more convex chest... which was probably where Ricardo had gotten it. But, it didn't fail to attract the other male's attention, regardless. "What's that?"

"After centuries of oppression and discrimination... we're finally going to get a voice in our society!" Starry-eyed, he flicked his little ears glamorously.

Brad blinked at him. "You're talking about Heward?" he offered, with a somewhat sardonic tone.

"Yes, yes, the celebrity, the man of our modern times! It shows just how far we've come as a culture, that someone like him stands on the brink of service to the people, as an authority!" He sashayed his tail in a very fantastic fashion.

Brad stared. "Truly."

Ricardo lurched forward like a catapult. "Have you done it, Brad? Have you voiced that pent-up challenge to our enervating status quo? Have you cast that beauteous ballot for our boldly blithesome buccaneer?"

Was he really using alliteration in dialogue? The wolf took a moment to brace himself before replying. "No."

"Ah, but surely you are moments away from your freedom of expression, my dear!" Ricardo fixed his eyes on the wolf, waving his tail excitedly.

"I already voted," Brad remarked conversationally.

The tasmanian devil processed that.

"You mean... you didn't vote for him?!" he sputtered, eloquence instantly discarded.

"Nope! He's a crazy loon!" Brad remarked cheerfully. "I voted for Chandler. Excuse me..." He nudged the tasmanian devil on purpose with his hip as he stepped out into the aisle, swinging his backpack up onto one shoulder.

"H-how..." he heard, behind him, as he strode off. He grinned a bit, thudding his way up to the exit. He hoped Jonathon hadn't been taken in by the politician's wild orientation proclamations. Sure, it was exciting... but it wasn't an excuse to blindfold yourself.

He hoped Jonathon had voted, or was going to soon. One of the most important things you could do, as an adult.

Brad snorted at that irony.

Hell, he had to get to that math homework... Grumbling, Brad set a course for the library. He'd get to see the coon soon enough... and that made the rest of his day, with all its sleepiness and superficial-marsupial frustrations... worth it.

For sure.

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I wrote a fair chunk of this while drunk. And it came out really well! Heheh. If you catch any typos, let me know. I'm surprisingly eloquent when drunk, though I tend to re-use words too often; I did revise this, of course, but who knows if I missed something.

Bit of a short, slicey one this time, but I had a bunch of things that I just wanted to happen. For instance, election day - which, if you're really paying attention, is a week later than it is in the US I live in, being the second Tuesday in November. Why? Because I screwed up! :P. I've been pretty good about not doing that in FA, considering most of the planning happened after I started it, but I did miss this one epically.

Also, Ricardo was mentioned in Episodes 1 and 3. I did not think it would be Episode 21 before he showed up again... but he finally did! Yaaa... aaay?

Oh, gawd, and I do apologize for Wallace's texts. They hurt me to write.